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5 Ways to Grow Your Website Traffic from a Blog
You have a website, now what? Have you considered writing content in the form of a blog article?
A “blog” is a shortened version of a “web log.” This is a digital record of information that displays information that would be helpful to a reader. Typically, they are placed on a website in reverse chronological order. The latest entry will be at the top of the list of archived entries.
Why should I build a blog on my website? If you own a small business, the goal is to get google, your users, and other search engines to view you as an “authority” on a subject.
You may be thinking, “I am not interested in being an authority on a specific topic, but rather, I am just interested in growing my website traffic.”
The end goal is straight forward, building trust. For google, and other major search engines to see value in your business, you need to build trust by writing content specific to your trade, or products. Think of it as a “digital vetting” process. By building trust, your traffic will expand.
So, let us explore this concept of traffic growth by publishing content.
Below we put together a handy guide you can use with five main points you should use to expand your blog traffic and website user base.
- Aim small, miss small. Think of an extremely specific goal. Such as, I own a plumbing company, and I want to get more business installing water softeners in Boise, Idaho.
You could write a blog article on why your company is the best at installing water softeners. Be sure to include immensely helpful information in the article.
Like, get a water test first. The size of softener you need depends on how large of a home you occupy. Plan on regular maintenance. Should you use crushed or pellet salt in your softener system, and why. And so on.
But more importantly, you need to answer specific questions in the blog entry. Like, who, what, where, when, why, and how. These are the most used terms when someone is researching a topic.
Include a few high-resolution images in your article. Like the one above. In step #2 below, you can learn more about images and how to effectively use them in a blog entry.
Make sure to stay on topic. For instance, maybe your company starts with a water test first to build trust with the customer. It would be good to write another article on water testing and link it in your content. There is more information on contextual hyper linking in step #5 below. For example, here is a link we did as an example, on how to grow your business using google my business.
Be sure to use infographics in your article. Like this:
- Images in your blog articles are especially important. Images invoke emotions. Be sure that you use high quality, high resolution images.
To get the most exposure to your blog article entry, be sure to rename the images. Example: Your digital camera, or phone camera may have an image format something like 123456.jpg or 123456.img.
Following our example above, rename the image from 123456.jpg to water-softener-installation-in-Boise-Idaho.jpg.
To do this, save the image to a desktop or laptop computer. Navigate to the image, right click on the image, and select “rename.” See our example below where the image name is highlighted. Once the name is highlighted, you can simply rename it.
Add a clear and easy to understand image name will allow google bots to index the image to google images. This is a great technique for garnering additional traffic to your blog article.
- Be sure to use correct grammar when writing a blog article entry. Maybe you are not an English major, but you still want to write blog entries that provide value, in this case, simply use a program such as a word document. In word, you will see spelling mistakes, run on sentences, and grammar items with punctuation. Make sure to correct all grammar prior to publishing your blog entry on your website.
- Think of writing comprehension. The average user on a website in the United States has an 8th grade comprehension level. Be sure to use words with fewer syllables. The comprehension level of writing needs to be as easy to understand as possible. Another trick for this, is to use shorter sentences. Here is a great overview of content analysis Content Analysis Method and Examples
Here is a graphic on reading comprehension.
- Create contextual hyperlinks to additional resources on a specific topic. This may sound daunting, but it is relatively easy. Most website platforms, such as WordPress and Joomla allow simple linking of content.
When in your website editor, highlight the text you want to link, then click the insert/edit link button as illustrated below.
You simply paste in the link, and set a “target.” The target most used is, open the link in a new browser tab. That way the user still has your website article in a tab, and the additional resource can be reviewed in a new tab.
There is an old saying in the SEO realm. “Content is king.” This is a statement that has been around in digital marketing since the late 90’s. Content is a critical component of a digital marketing strategy. There is content that drives “calls to action, trust scores, authority scores, and user engagement.”
If you want to become an authority to your users, or google for that matter, be sure to take the time to write engaging, high quality content.