Want to drive traffic to your website? Learn how to get found on Google using some of these proven methods.
Google rewards those who create original content by showing them more traffic and engagement. This means your job isn’t over once you publish your blog post or create your e-commerce store.
If you want more traffic, you should also optimize and make sure that you promote your web pages to the proper channels.
The tips below (that are in no particular order) show you how to achieve maximum success in driving targeted traffic to your website.
Follow these steps, test them out, and see what they do for your SEO performance.
Create an Actual Blog
This may seem counter-intuitive, but creating a website or blog is actually a great way to drive traffic to your site. You can use this method for any type of business, whether you’re selling products online or providing services.
Any business needs a blog – especially true for industries that lend themselves well to regular, long form content. This part is essential.
The first step is to find a niche that interests you. It could be anything from dog training to home improvement. Once you’ve found something that you like, start writing about it on your own blog.
You don’t need to have a degree in journalism to build a successful blog. In fact, most people who do write blogs aren’t journalists at all. They just enjoy sharing their knowledge with others.
You can even set up a free WordPress account if you don’t already have one. Then, simply sign up for a blogging service such as Tumblr or Medium.com. These sites will allow you to easily add images and videos to your posts.
Once you’ve got your blog up and running, you can begin promoting it through social media. Start by posting links to your new blog on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Instagram, etc.
Then, as you gain traction, you can expand your efforts to influencers in the community which your blog is based.
The sky is the limit from there.
Create Original Long-form Content with Significant Value
Long-form content has become increasingly important in recent years. The reason? Because it works better than short-form content when it comes to search engine optimization. But, it’s not down to just word count here. That’s the wrong way to think about this. The right way to think about this is depth of content: how in-depth do you want to go to write about your topic?
When you share information on social media, you’re usually limited to 140 characters or less. That’s not enough space to provide significant value to readers, although it can and does happen.
However, on a blog post, long-form content gives you plenty of room to tell a story. And stories are what keep people reading.
If you’re looking to increase your organic traffic, then you need to focus on creating valuable content.
Here are some ways to get started:
- Write articles for other websites. There are many different types of websites out there. Some are focused on news, while others cater to specific niches.
- Some sites are very popular, so you might be able to pick up some extra work by offering to write for them.
- There are tons of freelance writers who would love to earn money by writing for other companies. All you need to do is look around and find someone who’s willing to pay you.
- Write posts on industry authority websites (this is different than guest blogging). Many bloggers are always looking for fresh content. By offering to write for them, you can help them grow their audience.
This is a win-win situation because they’ll benefit from having more traffic, and you’ll benefit from getting exposure.
Start a Podcast
Podcasts are another great way to create original content.
A podcast is basically an audio version of a webinar. People often listen to podcasts instead of watching video presentations.
So, if you want to drive traffic to your website, then you should consider starting a podcast. You can record yourself talking about whatever topic you choose.
And once you upload your podcast to iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, SoundCloud, etc., you’ll be able to promote it using all of those channels.
Create Video-based Online Courses
Video courses are also a great way to generate traffic to your site. They’re similar to eBooks in that they offer lots of value at a great price point (or more expensive price point, depending on your niche).
You can sell these courses on platforms like Udemy, Teachable, Skillshare, and CreativeLive. Once you upload your course to each platform, you can promote it using paid advertising campaigns.
You can even use YouTube ads to promote your videos. This will allow you to target potential customers who have already shown interest in your niche.
As you create an audience for these courses, and they continue to be satisfied with what you offer, you will naturally gain links, traffic, and influence as a result.
This can also ultimately result in an increase in search engine rankings.
Perform On-Page SEO Techniques
On-page SEO techniques include things such as optimizing the title tag, meta description, alt tags, image alt tags, page load speed, internal linking structure, and much more.
These factors play a huge role in determining whether or not users click through to your site.
When you optimize your pages, you’re essentially giving them the best possible chance of being found by search engines.
Once you’ve optimized your pages, you can begin promoting them via social media, email marketing, and other online channels.
The most important thing to remember when creating content is that you must provide value to your readers.
If you don’t give them something useful, they won’t read your article, let alone share it.
If you’re struggling to come up with ideas for blog post topics, try brainstorming ideas based on your niche.
For example, if you’re selling dog food, you could talk about different types of dogs, tips for training your dog, or anything else related to dogs.
Or, if you’re selling weight loss products, you could talk about healthy recipes, workout routines, or any other type of information that would help people lose weight.
Then, after you have created the content, you can massage it and add the proper on-page SEO. Using an application like Surfer SEO or Frase, it’s possible to identify what the top search results are talking about, and interweave those topics that are most interesting to your readers into your article.
Post to Social Media Regularly
Social media plays a significant role in driving online traffic. Use sites like Quora, Reddit, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube to promote blog posts, videos, and other useful content from your site.
In addition to posting regularly, make sure to interact with your followers. Respond to comments, answer questions, and engage with your fans.
This kind of traffic is known as referral traffic to your site, which can result in big gains.
If it’s not obvious by this point, it has to be said: you can’t just create great content and let it sit there, without people finding it.
Instead, regularly promoting your new content to social media is key.
Not only will this activity drive traffic, but it puts more eyes on your content. The more eyes you have on your content, and the more you interact with critical influencers, the more likely you are to get the backlinks that you need.
It may seem tedious at first, especially in the beginning, but don’t despair. This will pay off in the long run.
Demonstrating Your Topic Expertise
There are several ways to demonstrate your topic expertise when writing your content. One proven way is to use the hub and spoke model when creating your pages.
Let’s use this example: say that you write a page about a Ford Ranger Truck on your blog about cars. You would want to write around 15-20 supporting spoke pages about related topics such as Ford Ranger Truck Parts, Ford Ranker Truck Maintenance, and posts about each individual part that would be installed in a Ford Ranger Truck, if necessary.
The overall process looks like this: you write a hub page, which covers the topic broadly in a longer blog post. Then, your supporting “spoke pages” will all cover a topic exhaustively using the long-tail phrases and information about your topic.
It utilizes an internal linking structure that helps to organize and cluster your pages around each other, so that you distribute authority throughout your website properly.
Target Your Keyword Phrases
Don’t forget to research and target your most-searched-for keyword phrases. While you shouldn’t necessarily target high-volume keywords for every single post, you should target relevant keywords that will bring in some traffic.
It’s also true that Google doesn’t report on everything, and that you may miss some valuable keywords if you focus on higher search volume alone.
It’s important to find a balance between those keywords bringing traffic, and long-tail keywords that are likely to bring value to your site.
Don’t Forget to Include Supporting Long-tail keywords
Higher-traffic, short tail keywords may be searched more frequently, but it’s still more difficult to rank for them on Google.
Having a long-tail strategy as part of your mix allows you to achieve rankings more quickly, as well as more exposure as a result of these higher rankings.
Also, your services and products could be considered to be more long-tail searches, because they are more niche.
And, it would be a mistake to ignore these keywords while only focusing on the higher volume short-tails.
Add Your Keywords to Your Content Strategically
As important as including keywords as part of your content is, it’s also important to add your keywords to your content strategically.
Frase can help you alleviate the problem of figuring this out, by making sure that you hit the keyword targets in your post, as defined by this application’s analysis of the top search results.
As a result, you can make sure that you are optimizing and focusing on topics that people are actually searching for.
Just make sure that you augment your post with original content and valuable insight, so that it is more unique than another post.
Rank Your Videos on YouTube
Implementing a process where you rank your videos on YouTube while promoting your site is a great way to drive traffic from the world’s #2 search engine.
One of the key metrics that YouTube uses to evaluate your videos, however, is high engagement.
Things like views, likes/dislikes, how long someone watches your video, and CTR (click-through rate) are important factors that YouTube considers.
How long a user stays on YouTube is one of its high-priority factors.
As you rank videos on YouTube and gain more exposure, YouTube will reward you with visibility.
YouTube is important, because it continues to be a significant driver of quality traffic. Statista, for example, reports that 77 percent of internet users ages 15-35 are using YouTube as their primary source for consuming video content.
Repurpose Your Content
If you are struggling to come up with new ideas for creating content, then never fear. Did you know that you can repurpose your existing content?
You can take a blog post that’s performing well and turn it into a white paper and expand it with more data, statistics, and information supporting your topic.
You can take a blog post and transform it into a video, promoting it on YouTube and driving more traffic from there as a result of your video.
You can take a blog post and repurpose it into an infographic, using the infographic to answer common questions about that topic on social media.
You can even take several blog posts on your topic and repurpose them into an e-book, showcasing your expertise.
There is no limit where one can go when you can repurpose your content and expand your expertise and show your followers what you are really made of.
Update Old Posts and Optimize According to People Also Ask
You can also update your old blog posts and optimize them around additional questions that people may ask on Google, referencing the people also ask snippets.
When you update your old blog posts, you are adding fresh, more relevant information.
You are also adding further value for new prospects, because they will more than likely become returning visitors to your blog when they see that you’re updating your posts regularly.
This technique works well when you have a nice repository of older posts at your disposal, you have built up a significantly large amount of social media followers and blog subscribers, and your blog has been around for several years.
Media Coverage and PR Link Building
Gaining media coverage for your brand is a great way to make sure that you get eyeballs on your site and that you promote your site to the right people.
This is called “earned media coverage,” and you can use this type of coverage to really drive traffic and increase your site’s overall brand awareness. This will also help you generate great word of mouth for your site.
It’s also a wonderful way to increase third-party validation that your company is a great resource, and helps further increase your value as an expert and a knowledgeable and respected professional in your field.
Write Snappy and Interesting Headlines
If you want to really make sure that your blog receives returning traffic, write snappy and interesting headlines.
These are far better than boring headlines that don’t sound like much of anything. Dull headlines bore readers, are uninteresting to read, and fail to capture the point you’re trying to make.
You would be better off slapping your content into an AI generator, writing it overnight, and calling it a day.
This is why AI generators will likely not be replacing humans anytime soon: creating great headlines is a human talent.
Maybe someday a creative enterprising professional will create an AI program that can write snappy and interesting headlines.
But nowadays, AI content generators need extensive fact-checking and still need human involvement to make their content work.
The bottom line: Get creative with your titles so that you can catch the attention of users.
Generating Top Tier Traffic Isn’t Hard
It does require execution and consistency, however. And the results you achieve means that it is well worth it.
It’s not hard to create content at a consistent pace and scale that will help you achieve higher rankings and traffic.
What is hard, however, is dedication. And keeping that consistency.
If there’s anything that Google rewards, it’s the dedication and consistent publishing of that content.
Don’t think about how you can game Google. Instead, think about how you can provide value to your readers on a consistent basis, day in and day out. And how you can provide that value to Google.
As a result, Google will love you for it.
How do you plan on driving more great traffic to your own website?
