8 March 2016

Generating Online Traffic: An Introduction

You've created a lovely new website, investing lots of time and/or money in getting it just right. So, where to from here?

Website traffic is the lifeblood of your business’s online presence. If your site isn’t receiving any visitors, then you have saddled yourself with little more than an overpriced online business card.

Generating online traffic to your site requires a strategy. It doesn’t need to be complicated, but you do need to be consistent.

There are some common traffic generation strategies you can use to bring visitors to your site. To start with, pick one or two, and focus on really understanding how to make them work for your business.

This blog post is a quick overview of the different strategies you can try, and over the next few weeks I’ll be expanding one each on in a little more detail.

1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search engine optimization, commonly known as SEO, refers to a number of different tasks you do both on and off your website to attract the attention of search engines.

SEO helps search engines like Google know that your website exists so they can send traffic to your site.

You can easily get a grasp on the basics and do enough so that you'll start generating online traffic. Once you learn the basics, there are many more advanced techniques you can learn if you'd like.

SEO includes such things as:

On Page SEO

On page SEO is everything you do on your website to attract the search engines. It’s a mix of your site design, layout and content.

Off Page SEO

Off-page SEO centers around backlinks – which are links back to your site from other websites. A link back to your site tells the search engines that your site is worth linking to, and hence worth sending traffic to.

Backlinking is a whole huge topic, but the main point you need to remember is that you need to keep those links natural and organic (don’t pay for them). And try to get links from sites relevant to your niche.

Keywords

A keyword is a word or phrase that's related to your website or your business. These are the terms people search when they type into Google. The main goal of SEO is to rank on Page 1 of Google (or other search engines) for your chosen keywords.

I've created a post going into more detail around SEO marketing, You can find it here.

2. Content Marketing

Content is anything you read, watch, or otherwise consume online. It includes articles, blog posts, videos, audios, presentations, images, and even social media updates.

Content marketing is a traffic building strategy where you produce content and post it in various places on the Internet.

In addition to traffic and SEO benefits, producing quality content also helps you to build an audience. You become branded as an authority in your niche. This helps to build trust with your audience, which makes them loyal fans and repeat visitors.

The best way to get the most out of your content marketing efforts is to keep a blog on your website, and update it regularly. You can then repurpose your posts across different media, driving traffic back to your website.

3. Email Marketing

Email marketing is an extremely powerful way to build a relationship with your audience. Email marketing is so effective is because it’s personal. Your messages go directly into your recipients' email inboxes.

You can get new subscribers by creating opt-ins on your website, and then regularly sending through updates and new content to your email list.

You can drive traffic back to your site by sending your subscribers links when you offer new content or valuable promotions.

4. Social Media

Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter can provide an excellent opportunity to generate traffic back to your website.

In addition to driving traffic, social media is great for relationship building. When using social media for your business, remember that the whole point here is to build relationships. Constantly bombarding your followers with your promotions and content is a quick-fire way to turn them off.

People do business with people, so remember to treat your social media community as the real people they are. Then when it's time to try and sell, you'll have a better chance of converting those relationships into sales for your business.

5. Promotions/Giveaways

Promotions and giveaways are great for traffic generation. A promotion or giveaway offers people a clear and compelling reason to visit your site - we all want to win stuff or get stuff for free!

Ideally, visitors come for the freebie but stay for the wonderful content you provide.This method brings you a quick jolt of online traffic. But if your content doesn't deliver or if there isn't another compelling reason to visit again, that traffic will stop.

Promotions and giveaways can also be used for your regular fans and customers. You can offer something as a way of saying thanks.

Conclusion

These are just a very quick outline of some traffic building techniques that you can start working on for your website. I'll go into more detail and specifics over the next few weeks.

For now though, do some research around the these different options, and have a think about what approach would be best for you and your business.

Cathy is the owner of Your Web Toolkit, where she empowers online entrepreneurs to turn their business dreams into reality.