There’s a common misnomer in the blogging arena:
“If you build it, they will come”
Many people think that if they purchase a domain, get hosting and put up a viable blog on the web, that the doors will careen open with thousands of people looking to absorb the content you’ve placed on your blog. Furthermore, these people will be looking to open their wallets in exchange for the products and services you’re offering that will help them change their lives.
Of course when you publish your blog live for the world to see, what is the reality of what you experience?
Crickets…
You keep refreshing your analytics page to see if you’ve received any new visitors.
Nothing.
You refresh your Stripe and PayPal accounts just to see if you have any new customers.
Again, nada.
What gives?
Just because you’ve put your site live on the internet, it doesn’t mean that people are going to find you and purchase your products or services. In fact, research indicates that in 2013 alone there were over 152 million blogs on the internet and that number has steadily grown over the past several years.
In order to increase the revenues through your blog, you’re going to need to get that content directly in front of the people who are looking for it. Once you get the content in front of people, you’re going to need to make sure you capture a point-of-contact from that person so you can sell your products and services directly to them.
But how can this be done? In this article you’ll find the best free methods of building traffic for your blog so you can increase the sales of your products and services thus giving you the freedom you originally set out to achieve.
Why a blog is still the best option for generating an income
There’s a lot of talk in the blogosphere that you don’t need to own your own domain and site anymore.
With the introduction in recent years of utilities like Clickfunnels and the like, many people have been saying that you are foolish to put a site up and get lost in the shuffle of the internet.
Furthermore, there are sites like Medium and Quora that allow you to get views of your content and subsequently be paid for it (Medium’s partnership program and Quora’s partnership program).
Okay, great.
But the problem in the long term with both of those solutions, is that you don’t own any of the content.
What happens if you breach a terms of use with any of those utilities and get locked out?
All the work you’ve put into building can vanish overnight.
I know for me, while it wasn’t my blogging content, I was accused of breaching a terms of use with Mailchimp and was locked out of my entire email list of thousands of people. Now, It wasn’t the content of my site and the resources that I have for my audience but when you play by a utilities rules, you run the risk of having them lock you out of everything you’ve built.
If you unsubscribe from clickfunnels, all of your products, list and funnels disappear.
If you breach a term of use policy with Quora or Medium, you lose out on all the valuable content you’ve created.
Instead, the need for a domain and host is critical for your long-term success.
That doesn’t mean you won’t be using any of the aforementioned utilities above to help bolster your traffic, however.
The best tools to increase blog traffic
When you get eyes in front of the valuable products and services you’re going to offer the world you do two things:
- Help a person solve a problem that has been paining them
- Earn a financial reward in doing so
These are the two most important facets of of blogging. On a very spiritual level, it’s the catalyst for positive change in our society. When done with integrity and good intention, you’re engaging in the act of expanding on human creativity and imagination all while increasing the well-being of your own life.
What could be better than that?
In order to make those changes, you must let the community know that you have the ability to catalyze those changes. You need to get eyes on your content. Here are the best ways to get free traffic, convert the traffic into an email list and use that email list for a financial income.
Medium:
Medium is a great way to increase free traffic to your blog. While many people think that Medium’s greatest purpose is to make money through the “Medium Partnership Program” this isn’t the case in the long term.
The partnership is always changing. The algorithm may have been in your favor yesterday and helped you make a few hundred bucks but tomorrow it might change.
Instead, with Medium, you have a testing ground for your blog. You are able to see what types of articles are working in your niche and what isn’t. You are able to write articles and with the use of “footers” navigate that traffic over to your site (more on that a little bit later though).
Here you are getting in front of the people who are looking for your content. It’s been said that Medium is “Youtube for bloggers” and this is true. Here you are in a community of people that are looking for an exchange of ideas — so give it to them.
A plus side of Medium is when you’re able to acquire Top Writerstatus. Top Writer status builds credibility of what you’re writing about. It’s almost like a badge that illustrates to your audience that Medium has recognized your expertise in a given interest. For more on how to achieve Top Writer status, check out the link below:
Quora:
Quora is short for “Question or Answer.”
If you’re a blogger and aren’t already on Quora answering questions, get on there now. Quora is a “hotbed” for people looking for answers to their problems. You’re going to be the person that can help them solve said problems.
- Are you an expert in weightloss? Quora is looking for you
- Are you an expert in Entrepreneurialism? Quora is looking for you
- Are you an expert programming? Quora is looking for you
- Are you an expert in self-improvement? You get the idea…
Fig 1.0 allowed me to be the top writer in Self-Improvement
Again, a lot of people think the “golden egg” with Quora is through their partnership program. Quora will pay users for excellent question material. While this might be great in the short-term, it doesn’t have the legs to carry you through to a viable business over the long haul.
Instead, just like with Medium, you’re using this as a branding measure — to get your content in front of the eyes of people that are looking for it and using the content to drive traffic back to your site (again, a little later on this). Figure 1.0 shows that I achieved number 1 in self-improvement. This is a major branding breakthrough that helped me generate more traffic for my blog.
With Quora, not only are you presenting yourself to the world by answering questions to problems that are plaguing scores of people, you can make sure you’re diving into the questions that are most important. It’s essentially identifying viable markets for your products or services.
For instance, if you jump into a question that only has 300 views and 3 answers, chances are it’s not a problem that’s plaguing a huge market. On the other hand, if you’ve identified a question that has over a million views and 100+ answers, you can better your bottom dollar that there are countless people that are dealing with this issue.
You shouldn’t be discouraged by the onslaught of answers either. Again, you have a unique story and viewpoint to help offer a solution that differs from the other answers.
Figure 1.1
On last bonus of Quora is their digest tool and how that can bring you added traffic. Let’s say you wrote a killer article and it got a lot of views. Quora’s algorithm picks up on that and shares it with the community that perhaps didn’t get a chance to see it. This can really accelerate traffic. Figure 1.1 shows how one of my answers was sent to 1,000,000 people and another was sent to 100,000.
Pinterest:
Pinterest is an excellent tool to drive traffic.
How?
Before I knew how valuable Pinterest could be for driving traffic, I just saw it as a place to share recipes and different styles. Boy was I wrong.
Pinterest is setup as the world’s biggest idea board. Think back to the days before graphic interface and if you needed to get an idea out into the world, you needed a tag board, pins and clippings so you could visualize a product or idea in front of you.
Now put that on the internet for the entire world to see.
People are constantly looking for problems to be solved in their life.
- People are looking to upgrade their wardrobe
- People are looking to invest $1,000 to make $2,000
- People are looking to lose weight and restructure their diet
- People are looking for ways to read 52 books in a year
Figure 2.0 I’m not a travel blogger but if I were…
You can use “pins” on Pinterest to drive traffic back to your site and thus capture an email (we’re getting closer to how this is going to radically change your income).
Figure 2.0 illustrates what you would see on Pinterest. Here, you are advertising your expertise in a specific area. In this example, we’ll use travel blogging. I’m making the claim (and it’s very important that you can live up to the claim) that I know how you can travel the world on someone else’s dime.
You’ll see I have the message, the headline (similar to an article), my logo (for this is a chance to brand) and in a real-life situation — the image would hyperlink.
Of course this is all hypothetical for this example, however if you did have content that could positively influence someone’s life and showcase it on Pinterest for them to see, you can hyperlink your thumbnail pin and have them sent over to your site or a landing page where you look to capture their email.
Once you start increasing traffic, leverage that traffic into sales
Traffic is great.
It’s the lifeblood of any successful blog. You need traffic in order to make potential sales.
But if you’re not leveraging that traffic, you’re not going to get any sales.
What do I mean by “leverage your traffic?” I mean taking the eyes that are visiting your site and capturing an email from the visitor so you can have direct contact over the course of your sales cycle.
Now the specifics of how to do this will take us too far off track for it is rich in its content. For further reading, check out this resource:
With all of these methods of generating traffic, you want to do your best in making sure you capture an email so you can keep a direct line of communication on any further products or services you develop and wish to sell.
From there, you have many different sales tactics at your disposal.
The one above all that will have the best return for you is through building trust.
How do you build trust?
The best way to build trust is to constantly be offering free and valuable content to your audience. Here, you’re illustrating that you have their best interest in mind.
No one likes a pushy salesman.
And for good reason.
You can’t be sure that when shit hits the fan they’ll be nowhere to be found. When you have an issue with the product or service, you want to let your audience and customer base know you are there to help them.
When someone emails you a question, you better email them back — especially when you have a small list.
When someone is disgruntled and requests a refund (when you have something like a 30 money-back guarantee) you better refund them. In fact, I’m pretty sure it’s fraud if you don’t though I’m not a legal expert…
There are so many different opportunities of what to sell:
- It could be a weight loss workout plan
- It could be a way to travel the world on someone else’s dime (cough, cough)
- It could be how to build an app from scratch that can sell on the iOS/Android Play store
And it all starts with getting the notion that you are that beacon of hope and value in front of the people that are looking for you.
From there the possibilities are endless
To read more on the first steps in making your dreams a reality, check out this resource:
Pin me!
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