Jenn VillaAs a blogger, you experience two big hurdles with every post you publish: getting blog traffic and landing new leads. Your job security, marketing strategy and overall business growth often depends on these daunting metrics, and you’re tasked with not only getting your business’s content to rank, but also doubling each post as a sales tool.
Even if you have a large audience who consistently sees your content, or you’re already getting organic hits, page views aren’t everything. What matters most is how well your blogs are generating qualified leads.
If the answer is, “not very well!,” it may be because you’re:
- Not engaging your readers
- Not fully answering searchers’ questions
- Not talking to the right audience
- Not sharing unique information to separate your brand from your competition
- Not optimizing for search engines (SEO)
- Not being present when your searchers need immediate assistance through means of instant-chat, etc.
- Not giving readers a “next step” to convert
- Not offering an enticing or relevant call-to-action (CTA)
Tips for Getting Found & Keeping Readers Engaged
Before you can get leads, readers must first find value in your content. Let’s explore how to get traffic to your business blog that keeps people reading.
Discover Each Post’s “Why”
Before you even start writing, understand why this topic is worth writing about. If “to get more traffic to my website” is the only thing that comes to mind, you better go back to the drawing board. You need to be attuned to the “why” of your readers.
Searchers typically read blogs for guidance, advice, entertainment or authoritative support. They’re problem-solving first and foremost— and looking to do it themselves. Ask yourself: what information does my audience need to grow or solve their problems?
To be a successful blogger, you must stop writing posts about the features of your products and services. People don’t want to be sold to. Only after you show them you can provide solutions to their problems, will they start looking into what it is you do. Find your buyer’s “why” and be hyper aware of their pain points and motivations in order to drive more traffic to your website.
Dominate Your Topic & Gather Your Own Evidence
In order for your blog to rank, it has to explain something better or differently than the posts already on page one of the search engine results (SERPs). Let that marinate; it’s important to understand. You have to provide more detailed or unique information that’s better than your competitors.
That might mean that you have to really research your topic and shake things up with more in-depth data. Let’s say your competitor’s ranking blog lists the top five things to do in your target city. You may need to talk about the top fifteen things to do, and elaborate further than they did about the original five.
Perhaps your blog post takes a new perspective on a topic. If all your competition thinks software A is the best, maybe you argue that while A is best for one thing, software B is actually better at X, Y and Z.
Another idea: make it original by running a long-term study or by conducting your own research. Stop reading the blogs already in the top positions on Google and rehashing their content. Dig deeper by creating it yourself and being original. Interview specialists, conduct case studies or shoot video to show what words can’t explain. Paint a new picture instead of trying to replicate a Picasso— that’s how to get traffic to your blog.
Do Keyword Research BEFOREHAND
You may have heard some marketers saying that keywords are dead. Well, they’re not. Although Google is getting smarter and topic clusters are becoming imperative, keywords are still the guiding light to your page rankings.
Each one of your blogs should have one target keyword, and at least two semantic (related) keywords. When talking about seafood, Google might expect to see the words lobster, crab, shrimp, etc. and will judge your relevance based on these common associations.
Strategize beforehand with data to support your direction. You have to weave keywords into your content in a way that’s authentic, not robotic, and that’s easier to do as you write, rather than awkwardly placing the terms in later. Here’s all you need to know to get started choosing the right keywords for your business and increasing your blog and website traffic, organically.
Really Spend Time on Your Title
Your title is the first thing a reader will see to entice them to click on your blog. If you’re an active blogger, you likely already know some of the best practices for creating irresistible titles, but here are some refresher tips.
Titles showcase your brand’s tone, so you should establish a consistent method of delivery that fits your company’s voice. Do you want to position yourself as an expert? Does your brand use humor? Are you capitalizing on fear-of-missing-out (FOMO)? Whether you are creating a sense of urgency, authority, keeping it simple, triggering controversy, aiming for a laugh, etc. — make it sexy and appealing.
Also, think like a searcher. Try to make a title that answers a specific question or soothes a pain point. And let’s not forget adding your keywords in that juicy SEO real estate. Here’s some ideas for crafting better article titles to get more traffic to your blog and tempt curious clickers.
Embed a Video or Sprinkle Visual Media Throughout the Post
Modern user’s threshold for attention is changing. With movies switching camera angles and shots every few seconds, mixed media in newsfeeds and a new distraction only a click away, 1,300 words of text can seem stagnant. You have to use a variety of intermediately changing stimulus to keep your readers engaged.
Do this by breaking up written content with other visual elements, like videos and graphics. In a how-to article, show pictures that demonstrate each step. For a very visual idea, use a brief video to add sound for auditory learners. Even animated gifs break the eye away from text and can trigger an emotional response before readers dive back into the written content.
Even with your written content, you can add colored headers, bullets and bold text to decorate your words. The reader wants variety in order to keep them reading, interacting and wanting more: AKA, converting.
How to Get More Blog Conversions
Once you’ve got website visitors reading your content, the journey shouldn’t end there. Whether it’s filling out a form, subscribing to your newsletter or chatting with your team online, after you get traffic to your blog, don’t let viewers leave your site without at least sharing their name and email.
Getting leads starts with a solid generation strategy! Let’s look at ways to foster a blog conversion with the right planning and optimization:
Know Your Target Audience (Personas)
If you don’t know what a buyer personas is, read our article. Basically, they’re fictitious representations of your ideal customers.
You have to understand who you’re helping, in order to craft blogs around your target customers’ specific challenges and interests. To ensure your blog matches your audience, each post should focus on at least one persona. For help developing your buyer personas, download this handy ebook.
Create Blogs for Every Stage of the Funnel
Once you have your personas, you’ll need to also remember to think in terms of their journey through the inbound marketing funnel. This means you have to tailor your content around different stages in the sales process to help people at every level: awareness, consideration and decision.
When planning your content marketing calendar, make sure you’re developing blogs around each persona in the different stages of their journey: learners, shoppers and buyers. Start thinking of your blog topics in terms of stages of the buyer’s journey.
Ask Readers to Do Something!
Your article should help the reader, but what’s the point of offering this information if you’re not aiming to get something in return? This doesn’t mean hard-pushing your products or services, but it does mean guiding your reader along a conversion funnel. You went through all this effort to get traffic to your blog! Don’t make the mistake of helping them and then letting them bounce back to the SERPs.
Not only will a CTA boost traffic to related pages, but keeping users on your site longer (while increasing views and pages per session) can also generate a new lead. At the end of each blog post— or even splashed throughout— give viewers that call-to-action. Whether it’s downloading a supporting content offer on a linked landing page or requesting a consultation, your blog should guide them to another spot to learn more.
Your CTA could even be a small, clickable graphic or short video. Again, think beyond the monotony of a text block and break up your content with new stimuli. Need help with conversion rate optimization? We can help.
Consider Using Chatbots
Buyers viewing your blog are on a knowledge quest. When you’re in the middle of researching a topic, when do you want your answers? Right then and there. But, unfortunately, questions sent via email can often take a few hours or days to be seen and answered. For someone on the prowl for a quick answer, they’ve likely moved onto the next resource to find their solution. Avoid these bottlenecks with conversational marketing.
Many chat services have bots that can send automatic responses for simple inquiries. For more complicated questions, the bot can toggle the conversation over to a real person, who can live chat with the interested reader and instantly offer assistance.
Improve Your Blogging Strategy!
These tips can help you drive traffic to your business blog and justify the need for consistent content creation. Although strategic blogging takes a great deal of time and commitment, it could be the key to increasing your website traffic and closing new customers.
Still pretty new to blogging? We can teach you how to find the right content to blog about, create landing pages, how to optimize and promote your blog posts, measure your blog’s performance and more. Simply download our Beginner’s Guide to Blogging for Business today.
Don’t have the resources to do all the blogging yourself? Check out our Blogging services page to learn more about our SEO-savvy content marketers.
