Increase Your Blog’s Traffic

In our recent “5 Quick Keys to SEO” blog, we talked about the importance of blogging frequently. In that context, we meant that you should be blogging frequently to improve your on-site SEO. However, the reason that blogging is such a valued tactic in the marketing industry is because blogging comes with a whole host of benefits. When you run a company blog, you’re creating content for your social channels, adding content to be indexed by Google, creating opportunities for backlinks, establishing yourself as an expert in your industry and keeping your website fresh, exciting and updated. By my count, that’s at least 5 benefits from 1 tactic.

Once you’ve started blogging, it’s worthwhile to spend time deciding how you’ll increase your blog’s traffic. You won’t have massive amounts of site visitors when you get started blogging, after all. Over time, however, you’ll increase your blog’s traffic by using the tactics below. If you want as many eyes as possible on your blog posts, read on.

Increase Your Blog’s Traffic

Create Great Content

Sounds like a no-brainer, doesn’t it? We mention it here, though, because it’s oh-so easy to fall into the trap of pushing out content whether it’s high-quality or not. We get it – we’ve been there ourselves. You’re on a deadline, and the blog is supposed to be live at 10 am. But, wait. Stop a moment. It’s better to produce one less blog than to publish content for the sake of publishing.

Don’t forget about the auxiliary content within your blog, too. I’m referencing graphics, imagery, charts, etc. Make them pretty to look and interesting to read (if applicable). You’ll generate more backlinks that way (bonus!).

Write Targeted Content

Didn’t we just talk about this? No, actually. Not really. You could be writing very high-quality content, but for the wrong group of people. Think about your target demographic. Who are you trying to appeal to?

Refrain from pushing out content without any thought for what your viewers actually want to read. What will they connect with? What kinds content will they find interesting? If you remain user-focused, you’ll create great content. If you get sucked into the mindset of “this content must go out come hell or highwater,” you’ve forgotten who you’re writing for and why you’re writing.

Write Evergreen Content

That way, your blog post stays relevant no matter when someone stumbles upon it. Not sure what Evergreen content is? We wrote a whole blog post on it here. 

Spend Time Crafting the Perfect Headline

Capture interest with a well-written headline. The headline is the first item to pop up when shared on social. It’s the first thing people read when scrolling through your blog’s archive. It’s what shows up on search engines. To sum up: headlines matter.

Tip: test out a couple different headlines before deciding on one. Poll the office, publish to social media or run an A/B test in your email newsletter. Speaking of email newsletters…

Send Out via Emails and Social

We call this “integrated marketing.” We have a blog on this, too. Here’s the plan: publish your blog. Then, post to social. Next, include your blog post in your twice-monthly email newsletter. By following those three steps, you’ve multiplied the number of potential viewers to your blog.

Tip: Don’t forget about Pinterest. It’s not one of the “big 4” – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ – but it is a valuable platform for bringing in new traffic to your blog months after your original pin.

Write SEO-friendly Content

Make your blog posts searchable. Think about what your long-tail keyword should be before publishing your blog post, and perhaps even before drafting. Work to make your post search-friendly. Include your keyword in all the usual spots: in the meta description, the alt-text, the content and even the headline, if you can manage it. (A word of caution, though: always write for the reader first and foremost. Optimization comes second.) Optimize each and every blog this way, and you’ll notice an uptick in site traffic over time.

When you work to include these six tactics in every blog post on your company blog, you’ll notice more traffic to your blog within a couple of weeks. The beauty of these tactics is that they don’t just focus on immediate traffic. With these tactics, you’ll notice traffic to your blog posts months (even years!) after they’ve been written.