How to Increase Organic Traffic
Identify information that’s missing from online content., Create high-quality content to fill that information gap., Start a company blog and post it on your website., Write regular blog posts., Include images in your posts., Create a monthly...
Step-by-Step Guide
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Step 1: Identify information that’s missing from online content.
Put yourself in the shoes of your clients and perform searches on content that’s relevant to your business.
Think about both recurring trends and current fads you’ve noticed in your market and use those as a basis for your research.
Look for information that a customer would want to learn but that’s not coming up in your searches.Ask yourself, “if I was a customer looking for my product or service, what else might I want to know about it that’s missing from what’s been written?” For example, if you are in the pet grooming business and have had numerous customers ask about DIY dog shampoo recently, find out what information is and isn’t already available online about that.
If you’re in the restaurant business and always have customers asking about food safety laws, see what articles have and haven’t been written about the subject already. -
Step 2: Create high-quality content to fill that information gap.
Once you’ve located information that’s missing from the web, begin writing authoritative, well-researched, and relevant content that addresses the needs of your customers.
Use your experience and knowledge of your market to write articles, press releases (if applicable), and update pages on your own website.
Practice white-hat SEO techniques: this basically means writing legitimate and original content that’s designed for people, not search engines.
Focus only on educational, informative, funny, or interesting content.
For the pet grooming example, write an article about the best ingredients for DIY dog shampoos or a how-to guide about making your own.
For the restaurant example, research the food safety laws in your jurisdiction and have an easy-to-navigate FAQ page on your site that lays out the information customers might want to know.
Publish articles and other content on your own site, and also submit it to respected directories and information sites, and pitch to other high-quality sites in a similar niche to yours.
Include relevant links to your site in all the PR content you send out., You may need to ask your web programmer to install a blog platform, such as Tumblr or WordPress on your website.
Learn to use the platform yourself or assign someone else to manage it.
Write about relevant topics that you think would be interesting and engaging for your clients.
Use blog posts to write about specific aspects of your market.
Remember, customers will read a blog to learn something new, have a laugh, or because they find the topic truly interesting, not because they want to hear about how great your company is. , High-quality information, expert advice, and guest bloggers will drive more traffic to your site because it will make it easier for search engines to find.
Create links to your guest bloggers’ sites as well, but don’t rely solely on these for traffic generation.
Write at least one blog per week, and more if possible.
Think about hiring a freelance writer or content specialist who can take care of them for you if it’s in the budget.
Identify key events throughout the year that relate to your business or market and create a content schedule that coincides with those dates.For instance, a flower shop should have content ready for all the major holidays, especially Mother’s Day. , The images break up the text, make your site more attractive, and can increase the number of times your site appears in image search results.
Always include text links and tags with images for people who disable them. , The same blog rules apply to newsletters: use newsletters to share content that’s interesting, informative, or funny for your customers.
Include links back to your site and social media accounts, and encourage people to visit your website that way.
Always ask new customers for email addresses that you can add to your existing client list.
Have links or popups on your site where customers can sign up for news and information. , Find people in similar (though not identical) markets and respectfully ask if they’ll repost or forward your content on to more potential clients.
Be brief about your pitch. , Create a list of about 10 topics your clients are most likely to use when looking for your product or service.Once you’ve got those topics, brainstorm words and phrases that customers might use as search terms when researching those topics.
Keywords are important because if you identify what search terms your clients are using to find the products or services you offer, you can use those keywords to drive new clients to your site.
If customers can’t find your site because you haven’t used the right keywords, it doesn’t matter how great your content is. , When you’ve got a list of possible keywords, run them through a keyword search tool.
You want to identify terms that are relevant to your business, and have both a high search volume and low competition.
Some possible keyword tools include:
Google AdWords Keyword Planner Tool Google Trends Microsoft Bing Ads Intelligence Wordtracker’s Free Basic Keyword Demand HubSpot’s Keywords , These are very specific keyword phrases that consist of three or four words.Long-tail will also help you attract the right kind of visitors to your site, as most customers who use them are in the later phases of shopping.
This means long-tail keywords are used by people who aren’t just browsing anymore, but are ready to buy.The most popular one-word keywords will have a great deal of competition, and getting yourself to the top of search rankings will be nearly impossible if you focus on those, as you’ll be competing with the biggest and richest companies.
Good long-tail keywords are specific, and can even include location information.
For example, if you’re in the mom-and-pop furniture business, competing with large corporations will be difficult.
So instead of focusing on short, competitive keywords like “furniture,” try “kitchen tables Knoxville TN,” for instance. , Rewrite your existing content to include them as well.
But it’s important to avoid keyword stuffing.
Search engine algorithms prefer content and normal language over keywords, so use them intelligently and incorporate them naturally into your text to avoid content that looks like spam. , Everything you post from now on should use your keywords.
This includes image descriptions and tags, all titles and page titles, alternative descriptions (alt tags), and the URLs on your site if possibleThis keyword use will help increase your ranking.
Add a custom URL on each image that links back to your site.
When someone clicks one of your images on an image search, they’ll be redirected back to your site.
Separate keywords in a URL with hyphens if you have more than one., A meta-description is what shows up on a page of search results.
Although it doesn’t affect rankings, it will either encourage or discourage readers from clicking through to your site.Make titles 60 characters or fewer, with at least one targeted keyword or phrase.
Make your meta-description 160 characters or fewer.
Use action verbs to encourage users to click. , Ask affiliates and partners if they will link to your content, as this will improve organic traffic. , Facebook has pages especially for businesses that clients can like, follow, and check for information without having to “friend” you.
It allows you to instantly share videos, messages, news, and pictures with customers all over the world.
If people want to find out more about you and your company, they are likely to look for you on Facebook first, and then check out your website.
Use social media accounts to repost blogs, news, and newsletters from your site.
Share relevant content often and update the account frequently.
Facebook accounts are free, but the site also offers targeted ad campaigns for businesses. , This is especially important if you are part of a niche industry or you sell business-to-business.
Twitter is often used to trade industry information among people in the same markets.
Use Twitter to notify customers in your area about secret sales, pop-up stores, and other special events in real-time.
Involve yourself in trending conversations.
People love online communities, and you can use social media to create a community of your own and build brand loyalty. , This is especially important if any aspect of your business is visual.
You can drive interest and traffic to your site by posting images and links that will also be displayed in image searches.
For instance:
Restaurants can upload photos of prepared meals and specials of the day to entice customers to come in.
Retail stores can use pictures to suggest different ways to wear their latest styles. , With social media management sites like Hootsuite or SocialOomph, you can monitor all your accounts and schedule and automate posts.
This is a great resource for people who don’t have devoted social media specialists or don’t have the time to spend on each account individually. , #Hashtags are metadata tags that people use on social media and blogs to categorize content based on topic.
They will help more people find your site and allow you to engage with your customers in trending conversations. , Businesses in similar markets can help each other by trading links without paying any money.
Find natural ways to incorporate those links into the content on your site, otherwise your pages will look spammy.
Consider linking with suppliers, affiliates, or retailers who carry your product or sell your service. , Only link to relevant content on high-quality sites, because low-quality or spam sites can negatively affect your reputation.
To get an idea of what kind of sites you should be linking to, look at what links your competitors have on their sites.
Links are about quality, not quantity.
One good link to an authoritative site is better than 10 links to irrelevant sites. , You can also have bloggers write guest blogs on your site, and you can conversely write guest blogs that they’ll post on their sites.
Exchange links, and request that their inbound link to your site uses one of your keywords.
Bloggers will often accept free products in exchange for a review of that product and a blog post about it. , Internal links encourage users to spend more time on your site and make information easier to find, and users will be more likely to see related content.Include links to static, evergreen pages in your blog posts. , You want to know how people are finding your site and what they click on when they are there.
Software like Google Analytics, Bitly, or Bing Webmaster Tools can track different things, including inbound links that are bringing people to your site, broken links, how much time people spend on your site, and specific information about page traffic. , The backend of a website includes the server, database, and applications.
Backend developers deal with the information that is stored on the website for search engines to find.If you have an e-commerce company managing your site, you may have to contact them to make any changes.
You will need to determine the type of site you have and find someone with web coding or design experience in that platform.
Types of sites include WordPress, Drupal, or custom-built. , SEO tools like those offered by HubSpot ensure all posts are optimized with keywords and links before they are published. , Structured data is a way of formatting the information on your site so that search engines understand, index, and promote it better.It will also enhance how your content is presented in search results.
Products like Google’s Structured Data Markup Helper can walk you through this process. , Schema is a form of micro-data that can be encoded on your site to make it easier for search engines to find and comprehend the information on your site.
Although it won’t impact your ranking, it will make your site more visible.
Like structured data markup, Schema will also improve how your content is displayed on a search page, resulting in a higher click-through rate.The Schema project is a collaboration between all the major search engines, and their site can walk you through the process of encoding your own site. -
Step 3: Start a company blog and post it on your website.
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Step 4: Write regular blog posts.
-
Step 5: Include images in your posts.
-
Step 6: Create a monthly e-newsletter.
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Step 7: Promote your content.
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Step 8: Identify relevant keywords.
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Step 9: Perform a keyword search.
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Step 10: Focus on long-tail keywords.
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Step 11: Include keywords in your content.
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Step 12: Use keywords with images
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Step 13: and URLs.
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Step 14: Create unique titles and meta-descriptions that incorporate keywords.
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Step 15: Link your blog posts and website content to your social media channels and to other blogs.
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Step 16: Start a Facebook page.
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Step 17: Open a Twitter account.
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Step 18: Sign up for Pinterest and Instagram.
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Step 19: Link your social media accounts.
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Step 20: Use hashtags in social media posts.
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Step 21: Create link-sharing partnerships in local and web communities.
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Step 22: Incorporate external links on your site.
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Step 23: Work with respected bloggers.
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Step 24: Link your pages to each other.
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Step 25: Track your links.
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Step 26: Hire a backend developer to manage your site.
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Step 27: Install a search engine optimization tool on your site.
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Step 28: Include structured data markup on your pages.
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Step 29: Use Schema on your site.
Detailed Guide
Put yourself in the shoes of your clients and perform searches on content that’s relevant to your business.
Think about both recurring trends and current fads you’ve noticed in your market and use those as a basis for your research.
Look for information that a customer would want to learn but that’s not coming up in your searches.Ask yourself, “if I was a customer looking for my product or service, what else might I want to know about it that’s missing from what’s been written?” For example, if you are in the pet grooming business and have had numerous customers ask about DIY dog shampoo recently, find out what information is and isn’t already available online about that.
If you’re in the restaurant business and always have customers asking about food safety laws, see what articles have and haven’t been written about the subject already.
Once you’ve located information that’s missing from the web, begin writing authoritative, well-researched, and relevant content that addresses the needs of your customers.
Use your experience and knowledge of your market to write articles, press releases (if applicable), and update pages on your own website.
Practice white-hat SEO techniques: this basically means writing legitimate and original content that’s designed for people, not search engines.
Focus only on educational, informative, funny, or interesting content.
For the pet grooming example, write an article about the best ingredients for DIY dog shampoos or a how-to guide about making your own.
For the restaurant example, research the food safety laws in your jurisdiction and have an easy-to-navigate FAQ page on your site that lays out the information customers might want to know.
Publish articles and other content on your own site, and also submit it to respected directories and information sites, and pitch to other high-quality sites in a similar niche to yours.
Include relevant links to your site in all the PR content you send out., You may need to ask your web programmer to install a blog platform, such as Tumblr or WordPress on your website.
Learn to use the platform yourself or assign someone else to manage it.
Write about relevant topics that you think would be interesting and engaging for your clients.
Use blog posts to write about specific aspects of your market.
Remember, customers will read a blog to learn something new, have a laugh, or because they find the topic truly interesting, not because they want to hear about how great your company is. , High-quality information, expert advice, and guest bloggers will drive more traffic to your site because it will make it easier for search engines to find.
Create links to your guest bloggers’ sites as well, but don’t rely solely on these for traffic generation.
Write at least one blog per week, and more if possible.
Think about hiring a freelance writer or content specialist who can take care of them for you if it’s in the budget.
Identify key events throughout the year that relate to your business or market and create a content schedule that coincides with those dates.For instance, a flower shop should have content ready for all the major holidays, especially Mother’s Day. , The images break up the text, make your site more attractive, and can increase the number of times your site appears in image search results.
Always include text links and tags with images for people who disable them. , The same blog rules apply to newsletters: use newsletters to share content that’s interesting, informative, or funny for your customers.
Include links back to your site and social media accounts, and encourage people to visit your website that way.
Always ask new customers for email addresses that you can add to your existing client list.
Have links or popups on your site where customers can sign up for news and information. , Find people in similar (though not identical) markets and respectfully ask if they’ll repost or forward your content on to more potential clients.
Be brief about your pitch. , Create a list of about 10 topics your clients are most likely to use when looking for your product or service.Once you’ve got those topics, brainstorm words and phrases that customers might use as search terms when researching those topics.
Keywords are important because if you identify what search terms your clients are using to find the products or services you offer, you can use those keywords to drive new clients to your site.
If customers can’t find your site because you haven’t used the right keywords, it doesn’t matter how great your content is. , When you’ve got a list of possible keywords, run them through a keyword search tool.
You want to identify terms that are relevant to your business, and have both a high search volume and low competition.
Some possible keyword tools include:
Google AdWords Keyword Planner Tool Google Trends Microsoft Bing Ads Intelligence Wordtracker’s Free Basic Keyword Demand HubSpot’s Keywords , These are very specific keyword phrases that consist of three or four words.Long-tail will also help you attract the right kind of visitors to your site, as most customers who use them are in the later phases of shopping.
This means long-tail keywords are used by people who aren’t just browsing anymore, but are ready to buy.The most popular one-word keywords will have a great deal of competition, and getting yourself to the top of search rankings will be nearly impossible if you focus on those, as you’ll be competing with the biggest and richest companies.
Good long-tail keywords are specific, and can even include location information.
For example, if you’re in the mom-and-pop furniture business, competing with large corporations will be difficult.
So instead of focusing on short, competitive keywords like “furniture,” try “kitchen tables Knoxville TN,” for instance. , Rewrite your existing content to include them as well.
But it’s important to avoid keyword stuffing.
Search engine algorithms prefer content and normal language over keywords, so use them intelligently and incorporate them naturally into your text to avoid content that looks like spam. , Everything you post from now on should use your keywords.
This includes image descriptions and tags, all titles and page titles, alternative descriptions (alt tags), and the URLs on your site if possibleThis keyword use will help increase your ranking.
Add a custom URL on each image that links back to your site.
When someone clicks one of your images on an image search, they’ll be redirected back to your site.
Separate keywords in a URL with hyphens if you have more than one., A meta-description is what shows up on a page of search results.
Although it doesn’t affect rankings, it will either encourage or discourage readers from clicking through to your site.Make titles 60 characters or fewer, with at least one targeted keyword or phrase.
Make your meta-description 160 characters or fewer.
Use action verbs to encourage users to click. , Ask affiliates and partners if they will link to your content, as this will improve organic traffic. , Facebook has pages especially for businesses that clients can like, follow, and check for information without having to “friend” you.
It allows you to instantly share videos, messages, news, and pictures with customers all over the world.
If people want to find out more about you and your company, they are likely to look for you on Facebook first, and then check out your website.
Use social media accounts to repost blogs, news, and newsletters from your site.
Share relevant content often and update the account frequently.
Facebook accounts are free, but the site also offers targeted ad campaigns for businesses. , This is especially important if you are part of a niche industry or you sell business-to-business.
Twitter is often used to trade industry information among people in the same markets.
Use Twitter to notify customers in your area about secret sales, pop-up stores, and other special events in real-time.
Involve yourself in trending conversations.
People love online communities, and you can use social media to create a community of your own and build brand loyalty. , This is especially important if any aspect of your business is visual.
You can drive interest and traffic to your site by posting images and links that will also be displayed in image searches.
For instance:
Restaurants can upload photos of prepared meals and specials of the day to entice customers to come in.
Retail stores can use pictures to suggest different ways to wear their latest styles. , With social media management sites like Hootsuite or SocialOomph, you can monitor all your accounts and schedule and automate posts.
This is a great resource for people who don’t have devoted social media specialists or don’t have the time to spend on each account individually. , #Hashtags are metadata tags that people use on social media and blogs to categorize content based on topic.
They will help more people find your site and allow you to engage with your customers in trending conversations. , Businesses in similar markets can help each other by trading links without paying any money.
Find natural ways to incorporate those links into the content on your site, otherwise your pages will look spammy.
Consider linking with suppliers, affiliates, or retailers who carry your product or sell your service. , Only link to relevant content on high-quality sites, because low-quality or spam sites can negatively affect your reputation.
To get an idea of what kind of sites you should be linking to, look at what links your competitors have on their sites.
Links are about quality, not quantity.
One good link to an authoritative site is better than 10 links to irrelevant sites. , You can also have bloggers write guest blogs on your site, and you can conversely write guest blogs that they’ll post on their sites.
Exchange links, and request that their inbound link to your site uses one of your keywords.
Bloggers will often accept free products in exchange for a review of that product and a blog post about it. , Internal links encourage users to spend more time on your site and make information easier to find, and users will be more likely to see related content.Include links to static, evergreen pages in your blog posts. , You want to know how people are finding your site and what they click on when they are there.
Software like Google Analytics, Bitly, or Bing Webmaster Tools can track different things, including inbound links that are bringing people to your site, broken links, how much time people spend on your site, and specific information about page traffic. , The backend of a website includes the server, database, and applications.
Backend developers deal with the information that is stored on the website for search engines to find.If you have an e-commerce company managing your site, you may have to contact them to make any changes.
You will need to determine the type of site you have and find someone with web coding or design experience in that platform.
Types of sites include WordPress, Drupal, or custom-built. , SEO tools like those offered by HubSpot ensure all posts are optimized with keywords and links before they are published. , Structured data is a way of formatting the information on your site so that search engines understand, index, and promote it better.It will also enhance how your content is presented in search results.
Products like Google’s Structured Data Markup Helper can walk you through this process. , Schema is a form of micro-data that can be encoded on your site to make it easier for search engines to find and comprehend the information on your site.
Although it won’t impact your ranking, it will make your site more visible.
Like structured data markup, Schema will also improve how your content is displayed on a search page, resulting in a higher click-through rate.The Schema project is a collaboration between all the major search engines, and their site can walk you through the process of encoding your own site.
About the Author
Jerry Reynolds
Committed to making lifestyle accessible and understandable for everyone.
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