How To Drive Traffic To Your Blog In Little To No Time

How To Drive Traffic To Your Blog In Little To No Time Okay, if you’re game, I’m going to do a little mind read on you.  Ready? As a writer, you focus on these  traffic-building topics: Creating epic  content Writing better headlines Guest Blogging Sharing on social media Basic SEO (when you get time) How close was I?  If you’re anything like when I first started writing for Internet audiences, I’d imagine I’m right on. That’s because these are the traffic methods that come easily to you. You understand them. They’re always in the forefront of your mind. You always remember to do them. But, the truth is, by relying only  on these strategies, you’re letting your content down. You’re missing out on so many easy to use methods that will drive  traffic to your page in no time at all. And, here’s the real kicker: You already know most of them. You just forget to use them. Don’t worry though; that’s going to change with this article.  You’re going to learn how to drive traffic to your blog in little to no time. In return, youll get that sweet, sweet traffic your content deserves. How To Drive #Traffic To Your Blog With A Few Easy Optimizations #1: Use An Image Every 75–100 Words Using images in your blog posts will drive  traffic to your content. That’s no secret. It’s important to understand how many  images you need to use. Slapping on a featured image and the occasional screenshot  isn’t the best strategy. Luckily, Canva  and BuzzSumo  came together to do some deep research into how many images you really need. And, they found some interesting data: From looking at more than  1,000,000 articles, they found that using an image every 75–100 words increased the social shares of an article by at least  30%. Using an image every 75–100 words increases the social shares of an article by at least 30%.So, simply put, for every 1,000 words you write, you should aim for 10 images. But there is one caveat here you need to be aware of: These images need to be relevant. You can’t just stuff your post with images to fill the quota. Instead, these images need to be relevant to what you’re writing about. If you’re unsure, stick to: Relevant photographs (here are the best blog photography tips + 128 free images for your blog) Graphs Charts Screenshots of relevant steps/actions And, for bonus points, add captions to your images. They’re read  300% more  than your body copy,  which  makes them an excellent way to boost your on-page time. As you know, more social shares = more traffic. Recommended Reading: How To Design The Best Blog Graphics With Free Tools And Design Theory How To Make The Best Blog Graphics (For Non-Designers) #2:  Build Trust By Linking Out To Reputable Sites Okay, I’m not going to send you on a whole SEO link building campaign. Because that’s another topic for another day. So don’t worry about getting people to link back to your site right now. But right now, you can  link  to other reputable sites to drive traffic to your blog.  It's  as easy as  backing up your points with data or referencing scientific studies, including articles at the end of your article, or even simply linking back to an authority site when you quote them. This has two brilliant traffic-driving implications: Google will trust you more You can build relationships and trust with people in your niche Let’s look at each of them in a little more detail†¦ Capturing Google's Trust Google wants to rank sites based on facts. And, with good reason. Nobody likes searching and finding themselves on a spammy site that provides zero  value to them. In order to do this, Google uses  a metric called trust flow.  Without getting into too much detail, trust flow measures how accurate your  facts are and where you get your data from. If you’re linking to sites that are already authorities and are on Google’s good side like news sites, they’re more likely to trust the content you produce. While this isn’t a direct  way to drive  more instant traffic, it could improve your search rankings  in the long term. That  makes it invaluable. Outbound links build trust and relationships to help you drive #traffic to your blog.Building Relationships In the words of  Jeff Goins, â€Å"It’s not who you know, it’s who you’ve helped.† And by linking out to these authority sites, you’re helping them. You’ve given them something valuable that plays a big role in their success. If you reach out to them and let them know that you’ve linked to them, there’s a really good chance they’ll share your content with their audience. And that means  you get more exposure and traffic. But, that’s not the only benefits for you. Consumers see bloggers as one of the biggest influencers in how they choose a product. In fact, according to Technorati research, 31% of people say they’ll use a blog to choose a product. If you can get these bloggers to tweet, share, and interact with you (or feature them on your site) they’re more likely to buy into your brand,  which will drive traffic back to your content. #3: Do Influencer Interviews Interviews seem to have become the realm of Podcasters and YouTube stars. But, why? Getting influencers (people who have made a name for themselves in your niche) to appear on your blog is a direct brand endorsement. That's  powerful because 92% of people say they trust this earned media  more than any other form of advertising. So when they see a person they know sharing or tweeting about your blog, they take notice. Even if it’s just to promote their own interview. Take a look at this interview with Seth Godin from Contently. It’s been shared by over 11,000  people: That's  between 5,000–9,000 more  shares than their other top shared articles for the year: Now, your interview may not blow up this much. But if you choose the right  influencer and create a good interview, the exposure you get can be incredible. Recommended Reading from Neil Patel: The 6 Types Of Social Media Content That Will Give You The Greatest Value Boost Blog Traffic wrote an excellent article on how to get influencers to interview with you right here. Pro Tip: If you decide interviewing an influencer is something to check out, simply record the conversation as a podcast and embed it in the blog post you'll write. Pat Flynn just released an embeddable tool to help you put those podcasts right in your blog posts. Now there's no reason not to get started. #4: Focus On Long Tail Keywords You’re probably using a tool like Yoast SEO, right? So you can put keywords into your posts and get to a good  level of SEO for the piece of content. Now, there is nothing  wrong with optimizing it this way. After all, keywords are what people search for. But, you probably do a little Keyword Planner  research and come up with a two- or three-letter keyword like: Traffic methods Drive  traffic Good blogging Because they get a good amount of searches and they seem to fit the bill. But, if you’re not an SEO wizard by trade, you’re going to struggle to rank anywhere near the top results for keywords like this. Unless you’re already an established authority. That’s where long tail keywords come in. By switching to long tail keywords, Neil Patel managed to go from 89,000 visitors  per month to 174,000 people  per month  in a 14-month period. That’s a 91% increase in traffic from search engines. If you’re not sure what a long-tail keyword is, here’s a quick definition: Now, you can swap out the word ‘buy’ there for ‘learn’ and it’s exactly the same for your content. The longer it gets, the more specific it is. The more specific it is, the better you can optimize your blog for it because there will naturally be less competition. This is really specific to your niche and your site, so there’s no one-size-fits-all way to find these keywords. However, you can use tools like SERPed  or AdWords  to analyze your short keywords and build them into long-tail keywords. Recommended Reading:  How To Make An SEO Content Strategy That Will Improve Your #1–3 Results By 248% #5: Get Involved In QA Sites The reason your content (or blog or platform) exists is for one reason: To help people answer their questions. Each piece of content you create answers a question in your niche. No matter how big or small, that’s the purpose behind it. And you’ve probably got a lot of answers to a lot of questions by now, haven’t you? Instead of hoping  people stumble across your answers, it’s time to go straight to the source and put your well-researched and expertly written content in front of the people who are asking all the questions. Enter Quora. If you don’t know what Quora is, it’s a question and answer site. And, to you, it’s now a powerful traffic-driving tool. The smart marketers over at WishPond have used it to build up to  27,000 views a month  from their Quora answers. And it’s pretty simple to do. Let’s say you run a copywriting or content marketing blog. You’d search the broad topic that you blog about, and ‘follow’ it: Then read through a few pages of questions to find ones that: Have lots of engagement You have the content to answer You can provide a valuable  answer to That are either new  or get around 1,000 views a month Like this one right here (the comment from Sarah is the top answer right now)... Click on it, and take a look at what they’ve actually asked: Then answer the question in your way, giving plenty of value throughout. Think of it like a mini blog post where you can link back to yourself throughout, without them needing  to click the link to get the value. Like this one that starts with a link: Has a meaty, value-filled middle. And then finishes with a link back to their site: This particular answer has 26,000 views. That  means even if only 1% of people click that link, there’s still 2,600  people  who have clicked through to their site! If you answer questions regularly and with enough detail, the traffic you can drive really has no limits. How To Drive Traffic To Your Blog? Pick One, Run With It†¦ There you have it. Five easy-to-remember and implement traffic-driving strategies that you can use right now. Here they are again, in short: Use an image every 75–100 words: Add a relevant image every 100 words to break up your article, boost on-page times, and boost social share  that will drive traffic to your blog. Link out to reputable sites in your niche: This builds  trust, establishes relationships, and drives traffic. Do influencer interviews:  Tap into an established traffic stream, get brand endorsements, and create a strong image. Focus on long tail keywords:  Focus on  less competition, target specific users' search intent, get more search traffic. Get involved with QA sessions:  Use  sites like Quora to get the content you already have in front of people who need to answers you’ve given. Now, I have a challenge for you. Pick one  of these strategies and commit to doing it every month. Comment on this post with your choice. Then track the results. It could be the influx of traffic you’ve been waiting for.