Want more traffic and engagement for your content? Get all the tools you need with Shareaholic for your blog.

According to our June 2012 Traffic Report, nearly three quarters of blog traffic comes from organic and referral sources. Boiled down, that means that 75% of your visitors are probably new to your site. It’s always awesome to get new visitors on your blog, but you need to make sure that they stay there. Here are four ways to engage new visitors and lower your bounce rate:

1. Related Content Widget

Once your new visitors read through one of your posts, you want to keep them hooked. A related content widget will share content similar to the post they are reading at the bottom of a blog post and encourage your visitors to keep reading.  To increase the probably of your readers clicking on the related content, make sure the related content is accompanied by images.

Get your own related content widget here.

2. Deep Linking

Sometimes people don’t read to the end of the page. When your visitors’ attention spans wander, you want to make sure they can still stay on your page by deep linking. Deep linking is when you put links within your content to link to specific landing pages on your blog. You would have a deep link if you linked the word “blogging tips” to a post about the top 10 tips for bloggers. Having deep links may not keep your reader on a specific blog post, but it will lower your bounce rate overall. If you want great examples of deep linking, check out How About We’s Date Report.

3. Customized Side Bar

Beyond the text of the post, your blog also has some prime real estate on the sidebar. With the right design and widgets, you can easily lower your bounce rate. Try repackaging old content into an e-book and featuring it on the side bar as a free download. Offer email subscription and RSS feeds (see below how) to make sure that these new readers keep coming back for more. Also make sure to include prominent social media buttons so readers can connect with you—they’ll see your publicized posts later in their news feeds. Overall, just make sure you use this space to your advantage since it is so prominent on your blog. Check out Hubspot’s side bar above as a great example.

4. Newsletter Sign-ups

As a last ditch effort, try to get people to sign up for a newsletter via RSS or email before they go. Your content will continue to reach them and they have a greater chance of coming back to your site than by randomly on it later. Some of our favorite WordPress plugins for newsletters include Newsletter Sign-Up (check out this awesome installation guide by WP Beginner) and ALO EasyMail Newsletter.

What are your favorite tips to lower your bounce rate? Comment below with your advice.