Whether you’re a seasoned blogger or are just starting out with blogging, one of the biggest challenges facing content producers is finding ways to generate traffic to their site.
Recent research suggests we currently produce around 2.5 quintillion bytes of data per day over everything from blogs to social media channels, making it even harder to stand out.
Indeed, in a world where there are now more web pages than there are people, the competition to grab the attention of users online and build traffic is fierce. If you run a blog, below are some ideas you could try to increase footfall to your site and improve those oh-so-important Google Analytics figures.
Invest time (and possibly money) in Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Search Engine Optimization (or SEO for short), is the highly detailed and complex process of helping sites rank higher in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) under key phrases and terms likely to be used by browsers looking for that type of content.
Successful SEO covers everything from studying the way your pages are constructed to ensuring you write quality, authoritative, keyword-rich content. To be blunt, the huge range of techniques involved in SEO goes far beyond the knowledge of most casual web users or content producers so, if you want the best chance of success, you should enlist the help of a professional development agency like https://www.altagency.co.uk/services/design/web-design-rugby/.
A skilled web development and SEO company will first perform a full audit on your site to ensure it’s been built correctly to allow increased exposure before then turning its attention to other techniques that will see you scaling Google’s SERPs.
Use social channels to promote content
While effective SEO is beyond the skill set of most bloggers, you can still aid the process by engaging creatively and productively with the major social channels. While the bigger players are important (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, etc), don’t discount other smaller platforms that might bring you traffic (e.g. Pinterest, or even LinkedIn if you have a professional network).
Also, rather than just publishing content to your blog, try a bit of cross-promotion by also posting it to your channels. Another very useful idea is to repackage your most popular features – for example, by taking an article that was particularly well-received and reformatting the content so it can be used in a YouTube video.
Make sure you write compelling headlines, subheads and content
Rather than telling the full story in your headline, tease your visitors into clicking by writing interesting headlines that they can’t resist. For example, rather than giving the full game away in your headline (say, for example, “Call of Duty is the world’s biggest-selling mobile game”) try tempting your visitors to click by using an alternative like, “We researched the world’s biggest-selling games … and you won’t believe the results”.
Compelling headlines aren’t just useful for generating interest – they also get you noticed by Google too, which will, in turn, drive you further up the SERPs and encourage more traffic.
