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Driving traffic to your website can be a struggle, but with the right strategy and focus it can happen! Today we’re going to dive into SEO, Google My Business, social media, Pinterest and email marketing. These are the main ways my clients and I have seen success in increasing website traffic. If you’re a numbers person, you’ll love seeing this website traffic overview from one of my client’s websites. We haven’t even implemented a Pinterest strategy yet!
Recently, I started a collaboration with Grayson Robinson. He started as an intern with Create & Collab. to learn more about web design and fell in love with the SEO side of things! I’ve included him in this blog post to share a little bit about what SEO is and why it’s so important to have a strategy to drive traffic to your website.
What is SEO and Why Is It Important?
"SEO which stands for search engine optimization, is a practice that is often about making small modifications to parts of your website or as I like to say, “tricking Google into liking your website by playing by their unspoken/spoken rules”. Part of the set up process of SEO is presenting content in a way that will help search engines understand it. Making these small incremental improvements with time and regular updates to your SEO will fundamentally send more traffic to your website, because Google will see you are playing by their rules. Now, what do I mean when I say “ playing by Google’s rules”? To put it simply, being specific about how you are presenting content on your website will not only provide a much better user experience, but also can drive your website higher up in the search results." -Grayson
Bonus: Google Ads
"One of the many tools Google makes available to anyone who is looking to drive more traffic to their website, is Google Ads. Google Ads is a paid advertising service that allows anyone to run specific keyword ads on results of search engines, like Google Search and non-search websites, mobile apps, and videos for service offerings, product listings, or videos to web users. The nice thing about Google Ads is that it is very user-friendly. What you put into it is what you are going to get out of it. Let's say someone is on a tight advertising budget of only $50 a month for their website but they still want to run ads with Google. This is no problem at all and with the right keywords will still drive plenty of traffic to their website!! Now it may not get as much traffic as a Google ads campaign that uses a $500 a month budget but figuring out the best budget and keywords can allow for an incredible and affordable advertisement strategy!" -Grayson
Google My Business
"So while Google Ads is arguably one the best ways to get direct users to your website, it is by no means free. So are there any free tools Google provides for those of us on the free budget? It just so happens there is! It’s called Google My Business or GMB for short. Google My Business is a free-to-use tool that allows users to improve their business local and non-local SEO scores. Now while I say local and non-local SEO scores that's not entirely true some would argue. The reason being is that GMB uses information about your business such as your hours, website, street address, your business name, phone number, description of your business, and even photos/videos of your business. Most of what I listed here would only apply to local businesses but by just having things such as a physical address and listed hours you can turn an online business into a local one from Google's perspective! This will improve local traffic to your website by leaps and bounds and best of all, if you can master the beast that is Google then this can push both local and non-local traffic to your site, completely for free!" -Grayson
Social Media - Creating Content Like a Pro
Social Media is exactly what it sounds like, it’s social. It may not be the place to close the deal, but it is a space to generate new leads, drum up new conversations, and make new people curious about what you do. When someone new visits your social media, the posts should add value and spark curiosity. What do I mean by this? Sparking curiosity is the first buying phase everyone starts in. After they're curious, they browse through more of what you’ve posted. If you’re posting how to content or educational content that actually makes their life or business better, they'll share that with others and begin to trust you and your brand more and more. Once someone trusts you and your brand, the next buying phase is called 'the enlightenment phase'. This is when they’ve consumed enough marketing to realize what you offer has value and they can benefit from it in a positive way. Once they’re in this second to last phase, it’s just a matter of time before they book you for your services or buy your products.
I created a Content Planning Workbook to make brainstorming and planning your social media posts less overwhelming. This workbook is printable and reusable. If you’re wanting to create content like a pro, I would highly recommend utilizing this!
Pinterest 101: Set Up + Strategy
Pinterest actually isn’t social media. It’s a search engine. It’s very different than any other platform. People go on Pinterest to search for specific things or look for inspiration. It’s like a creative person’s Google search bar. There’s pins I’ve posted 1-2 years ago that are still being saved and driving traffic to my website. Social Media is great for one to one connections, but Pinterest is good for linking your posts to your website, blog posts, or product pages. I’ve written an entire blog post that explains how to get started, how to set up your account, and what to do for continued growth!
Email Marketing
This may not seem as relevant, but I promise it’s one of the most important pieces to the puzzle. Most business owners think they need to get to a certain place in their business before they can start building their email list, but it’s the exact opposite. Your email list should be established before you need it. I’ve heard so many stories about people getting their Facebook or Instagram accounts either taken down or hacked. If you've built a large following on those platforms, remember, you don’t own those followers – Facebook and Instagram own those contacts! When you build an email list, you own your contact list and secure a way to stay in contact with them whenever you want. Take the website traffic overview at the beginning of this blog post as an example, if you looked closely at the graphic, there’s a very large spike in traffic between Aug. 5th and Aug. 15th. What caused the spike? We sent out an email campaign to their email list. Not only did that help update their customers on what was currently being offered, it spiked their website traffic generating an increase in sales!
When you think about growing your company, it’s critical to think of your business as an airplane. An airplane requires strong engines to fly. Sales is one engine and marketing is the other. If the plane gets too heavy (too much overhead), it either needs to let go of some of that or increase the strength of its engines. The wings of your plane represent your products and services. Each being a crucial part of the business. When you have low overhead, strong sales and marketing that converts, a great leadership team in the cockpit, products and services that solve problems for people – this is the sign of a healthy and strong business.
This is all Marketing? What About Sales?
Marketing brings them into the store, your sales strategy is what closes the deal! This entire blog post is about the marketing engine, but don’t forget about your sales strategy too. If you bring in a lot of traffic to your website, include a clear call to action so visitors know what the next step is. This is the beginning stages of your buyer journey. How many steps does it take for someone to find you and give you their money? Do you have products they can easily find and purchase right away? Do you have services that you offer, but want them to book a call first? Adding a call to action button like "Schedule a Call", "Book Now", "Buy Now", "Call Now", "Get Started" – all of these make it very clear to your viewer, what the next step is they need to take to work with you! Analyzing this and making tweaks when and where they are needed will create a sales process that works every time!
The photo above is a snippet from the Business Made Simple book. If you’re looking for more resources to learn about how to grow your business and manage it, I would highly recommend this book. The same author, Donald Miller, recently released another book I've been recently obsessed with called How to Grow Your Small Business. Another book I would highly recommend any entrepreneur or business owner. You’ll notice, in this blog post there’s a whole section on capital and cash flow. Because this is a lengthy topic, I want to include a blog post titled: How do I Protect Cashflow for My Business? (The 5 Accounts Every Business Needs). In this blog post I explain briefly, the financial strategy taught by Business Made Simple. I shared this strategy with two accountants I trust and they said it was incredible advice. Obviously, I’m not a licensed CPA, so I wanted to do the work to make sure this was sound advice before I recommended it!
The biggest factor in your success will be prioritization your to do's, strategy, and protecting your time. All of these facets increase website traffic, but each will take some time, strategy, and good ol’ fashion brainstorming. I’ve been using all of these forms of marketing over the last 3 years and each year my business grows. Is it easy? Nope. Is it overwhelming at times? Yep. But I believe anything is possible with the right strategy and determination.
Cheers to new business growth and a successful business that stands the test of time!
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