I was thinking about this the other day, I could do with promoting my Art work.  Having read a few articles the rules seem simple:

Who do you write for?

• How big is your audience. You could always use gimmicks to get a larger audience like giving away free stuff, but is this what you really want? As a test I once or twice put celebrity pictures or images of beautiful women ( see the Excite fallen Angels blog) and that had many hits. However my blog is not about that.
• If you are say a specialist such as an IT expert then giving free bees may not be so bad. It all depends on what you want to achieve with your blog.

How committed are you?

• It is one thing to write blogs so that you capture a fleeting thought or experience, but another if your livelihood depends on it.
• Write well and write often.
• Tag correctly and a lot.
• Use lots of images but mainly to get the message across.
• Keep your audience interested so do not neglect comments.
• Aim for an exceptional blog every now and then. If you make it to say the WordPress most Pressed blog list then that would attract a new audience.

Know your thing.

• You need to come up with the goods so if your blog is supposed to be funny then it has to be funny. If you are giving expert advise then it has to be reliable. If it is a fan based blog then it needs that something which make it more interesting than similar fan blogs.
• Evaluate your blog as if it belongs to someone else and compare it to the blogs of similar nature.
• Be consistent as if your blog is a brand.

Spread the blog.

• Use social media.
• Join communities with similar interests and post comments.
• Promote others with a similar interest.
• register your blog with Search engines.
• register it with Blog search directories
• Setup your RSS feed.
• Use links and track back others so others would do the same for you.
• Use tools like Stumble. That brings in target audience.

Gimmicks

• Give free things
• Do or put something very silly or funny or cute