Even the greatest rock bands start with a small, local following. If you’re looking for a way to promote your blog and gain some new groupies, keeping your efforts close to home may be the ticket.

Try submitting your blog to a site like outside.in. Outside.in keeps tabs on all the latest stories, conversations, and events happening by neighborhood. Imagine Craigslist for blog content. It’s a great (and free) tool to help you connect with a local scene. To get your content featured, submit your blog feed to outside.in, then use their tagging system to route individual posts to the exact location you mention (or are targeting).

You can link directly to an outside.in Place Page in your post and your story will appear on a Place Page (e.g. Atlanta), the individual neighborhood (e.g. Midtown), and a blog map. Or, include a specific address or Google map link in the body. The more technically savvy can encode GeoRSS data in their feed and outside.in will route your stories accordingly.

Outside.in lets you tap into a hyperlocal audience base. If your blog is barely a spec in cyberspace, here’s an opportunity to put it front and center . . . in your neighborhood.