Having an online presence has never been more important in today’s ever changing digital world. There are more than 3 billion people using the Internet, equivalent to the combined population of Europe, Africa and the Americas. That’s a lot of people! One of the more frequently asked questions is “how can I drive more traffic to my website?” We take a look at ten top tips to help you improve your online presence and increase the overall traffic to your website.
1. Content Creation
One of the first steps of any successful online strategy is to engage with your audience by creating high quality content. The use of well-written text, beautiful images and informative videos can increase user retention, leading to a higher chance of your content being shared across other platforms. The more your content is being shared, the more people are viewing and engaging with your website.
2. Advertisements
Online advertisements are a sure way to increase traffic to your website. The downside is that they aren’t always free, however they can be very effective when used correctly. Here are some examples of where to use ads to increase traffic;
- Targeted Facebook Ads – This allows you to create ads that can be directed at your target market.
- AdWords – A popular Pay-Per-Click option that targets customers with product or services that they’re searching for.
- Twitter Advertising – Use promoted tweets and trends to increase overall exposure.
- LinkedIn Ads – A great Cost Per Click option if you’re looking to advertise B2B.
3. Social Media
When used correctly, social media can be an effective way to drive more traffic to your website. There are a ton of great platforms and most are free and provide a range of useful features. Sharing content on social media websites like Facebook, Twitter and Google Plus is highly beneficial and will enhance your overall reach and drive more people back to your website.
4. SEO
Search Engine Optimisation is essentially how well your website ranks on search engines. Following these three simple SEO strategies will increase performances on search engines like Google and Bing and ultimately raise the amount of clicks to your website.
- Content Strategy – Continually provide high quality content to your target audience across all platforms. This includes blogging on a regular basis.
- Keywords – Choosing the right keywords will improve overall searchability. Using the Keyword Planner tool will help you find appropriate keywords to use in your content strategy.
- Social Media – Posting your content on social media will increase your overall exposure. Backlinks on high authority websites are generally favoured by search engines and will improve your overall ranking.
5. Email Marketing
Email marketing is a great way to deliver high-quality content directly to your subscribers and increase the amount of traffic to your website. It’s worth sending exclusive content in all formats that isn’t necessarily available on your website. This will give your audience a good reason to subscribe and engage with your content. The more people you sign up, the more they will end up back onto your website.
6. Web Design
A well designed website can make a difference to your SEO and overall traffic. A strong landing page with a simple navigation could reduce the bounce rate and increase the click through rates to other pages, which means more people are viewing your content. As web design is subjective, we’ve put a small list together of some things you should try to avoid;
- Overcomplicated layouts – Keep the overall design simple and user friendly.
- Too many advertisements – Try not to clog up your webpages with too many adverts.
- Lack of colour – Incorporate some colour into your website to make it more appealing to the eye.
- Font and text – Make sure you use a clean looking font and ensure your text size is readable.
7. Web Development
Websites are effective when they are fully functioning, user friendly and responsive. It’s important to ensure your website runs smoothly as nobody likes a website that doesn’t work properly or has limited functionality. Taking advantage of web development features can be very beneficial in the long run as it will allow your website to provide more content and overall features to your audience which will increasing user retention and conversions in the long run.
8. Mobile and Tablet Optimisation
Over 4 billion people have a mobile phone and that figure is expected to rise every year. Another figure that is likely to increase is the amount of time spent on mobile devices every day, which is why it would be beneficial for your website to be optimised for mobile. This will inevitably increase your total reach as more users are likely to find and engage with your website, especially if your website has good searchability on mobile devices.
9. Competitions
Running the occasional competition can provide some additional traffic to your website. Most of the social media platforms have strict rules on running competitions, however when executed correctly, the results can be highly beneficial. The downside can be the quality of traffic, but you could also reach out to an audience will engage and share your content resulting in improved SEO and an increase in overall traffic.
10. Analyse Data
Finally, it’s important is to keep analysing all of your data as it’s worth paying more attention to strategies that yield positive results. For example, if a Facebook marketing campaign has experienced a large amount of engagement and has ultimately driven more people to your website, then it would be worth analysing that particular data and repeating a similar strategy further down the line. If something hasn’t worked as well as it should of then it’s important to learn why it didn’t work. Not all strategies will work for everyone, a large proportion of finding an effective strategy is by trial and error so you can figure out what works best for you and your website.
Conclusion
We hope you’ve enjoyed these 10 top tips on how to drive more traffic to your website. Most of these points are relatively straight forward, however some of them can be a little more difficult to master.
If you need any assistance with web design, web development or mobile and tablet optimisation then please feel free to contact us so we can help you get the most out of your website.
