“How much blog traffic does your company’s blog receive?”
A blog is an easy way to provide information to current customers and potential customers. It can also:
- Increase your company’s page rank.
- Help your company gain media attention.
- Position your company as the ‘expert’ or ‘go-to’ business within your industry.
- Increase sales and profits.
- Assist you with keeping on top of customers concerns, needs, and wants.
Most customers expect businesses to have a blog on their website or a link to a blog. If your company doesn’t have one, it’s time to ask, “Why not?” Taking advantage of blogging is a cost effective marketing tool. Used properly, it can increase company sales and profits.
Boost Your Blog Traffic Today With Three Simple Steps
Photo by John Evans-Stock Exchange. Web: thetippingpoint.co.uk.
Provide Killer Content for Your Target Audience
Customers and potential customers want quick, valuable information that will help them solve whatever problem(s) they have. Give them what they want!
After you’ve polled or surveyed your customers, think about blog topics.
Example … If your company is a graphic and web design firm targeting small businesses, you could have blog posts on the following:
- How to get your small business noticed with a logo that stands out.
- How color psychology can boost web traffic.
- How a redesign of your blog can boost blog traffic.
The next step is to write headlines that stop readers’ in their tracks.
Using the above ‘graphic and web design company’ example above, possible headlines for the blog post topics are:
Company X’s Logo on Billboard Stops Rush Hour Traffic
Company X’s Website Makeover Attracts Celebrity Shoppers
Company X Big Fat Blog Traffic Results in 20 Million Hits
Use short and simple sentences.
Use Bold Headings and Bullet Points
Don’t use industry jargon if your audience won’t understand it.
Tip: Think of writing blog posts like writing screenplays. There’s a beginning (Act I, introduction; plot point or big event), middle (Act II, conflict; arc of the story; midpoint), and end (Act III, the resolution).
Remember, blogging isn’t about your company. It’s about helping your customers solve whatever problems they need solving. Blogging is also a good sales and marketing tool.
Optimize Content with SEO
Search engine optimization or SEO can be both time consuming and a pain in the neck. You want to optimize your blog posts. But on the other hand, you want to provide valuable content to readers. The good news is you can do both. However, I suggest putting more emphasis on content.
You can research keywords using Google AdWords Keyword Tool or another program to find the ‘best’ keywords/phrases for your blog. Select keywords/phrases and test them in blog posts. An “A/B” testing is a good way to analyze traffic to see which blog posts received the most blog traffic.
In addition to using Google Analytics, check out HitsLink. The company provides you with in-depth analysis of your blog/website. Reports are easy to download. In my opinion, HitsLink doesn’t seem as cumbersome to use as Google Analytics.
Find the Right Tone and Voice For Your Blog
Keep your target audience in mind when you think about tone and voice. Tone is the ‘author’s attitude (or mood) towards a subject. Voice is the personality, point of view, or style of writing. Examples of voice are:
- Funny
- Upbeat
- Serious
- Trendy
- Dark
- Snarky
- Matter-of-fact
It’s usually recommended that blog posts have a conversational, friendly voice. However, there’s a difference if your blog’s audience is for those in finance organizations vs. parents of toddlers.
Conduct research on what your target audience is reading. See what others are writing in your industry. Test blog posts to see which ones receive the most comments and traffic.
Extra Blog Traffic Tips
Before you leave, check out these bonus blog traffic tips.
1. Who is your target audience? Are they chefs or stay-at-home moms? If you don’t know ‘who’ your target audience is you can’t provide them with awesome content. This is where newer businesses stumble. They don’t know ‘who’ their target market is.
2. What problems are you solving? What problems do your customers need solving? How do you find out? Take a poll or survey using Survey Monkey, a provider of free online survey solutions. SurveyMonkey offers customers more features with one of their paid subscription plans.
3. Once you know ‘who’ your target audience is build a relationship with them. Or, continue to develop the relationship with a successful blog that provides killer content. Hook visitors with brilliant content, and they’ll come back for more.
If you use these three simple steps to increase blog traffic, your website may experience growth overnight. Make sure you’re prepared to handle the traffic increase. You have a webmaster in-house, right?
P.S. Check out these related articles.
- 7 Dust-Busting Ways to Clean and Refresh Your Blog (savvy-writer.com)
- 4 Ways to Tell if You’re Getting the Right Visitors to Your Business Blog (contentmarketinginstitute.com)
- 7 Lessons I learned from Increasing My Search Engine Traffic by 200% in 6 Months (dailyblogtips.com)
I think, although it may sound counter-intuitive, one of the most important things newer webmasters/bloggers/whatever-we-are-calling-ourselves-today can do is to not focus too heavily on traffic gauges like Google Analytics. Gasp – I said not to check your traffic. Sounds pretty weird, right? If you think about it, though, all too many people get caught up in this numbers game that leads us to nowhere but trouble.
We begin thinking that our readers aren’t people, but just a number. That’s not what a webmaster – a blogger especially – wants. My advice? Check your Google Analytics every week or two, not every day. The traffic will come with some clever marketing (and that doesn’t mean you have to pay), and quality content. All the internet wants is QUALITY, QUALITY, and some more QUALITY.
Great post, really enjoyed it.
Hi Joe,
Thanks for stopping by and commenting!
I agree that too many people get caught up in a numbers game, especially small business owners. Some don’t understand Google’s changes and how
a heavily SEOd (new term I made up) website can be penalized. Blogging is about providing valuable information to readers that keeps them
coming back for more. Of course, eye-catching headlines are a part of that as well.
Traffic is insanely important – I get that. Without the traffic, you’re just writing to yourself. But there’s this invisible line between caring about people, and caring about numbers. And once you are on the numbers side of the line, you’re pretty much screwed for good.
Two suggestions for your site:
1) Perhaps adding a reply button? Would make conversations such as these much easier.
2) Install a plugin to allow for comment subscriptions. It makes it much easier to track when new comments are added – if it weren’t for the email you sent me, I wouldn’t have known to come back.
Great blog, keep it up!
Good points!
Thanks for the tip. I just installed the Genesis theme about a week ago and still have to ‘tweak’ it.
Solid advice all around!
In our company blog, I like to do a monthly “Client Spotlight” series that showcases how some of our best clients are using our real estate listing software to get their websites to rank. So rather than talk about our product, we’re showing “how” people are using our product in creative ways. The posts in that series are some of our most trafficked posts.
Bottom line, a blog is a great way to drive and keep traffic!
Ricardo, thanks for the comment!
You make a great point about ‘showing’ versus telling. I think some companies miss the mark because they’re so focused on selling instead of solving problems. There has to be a balance, especially on social media. Constantly selling and promoting can deter people and won’t convert them into clients/customers.