There is a huge difference between being alone and being lonely. But sometimes, even though you enjoy your own company you start feeling lonely, just because you are alone. But in a world so interconnected why should you stay all by yourself?
The feeling that your website is left outside (of the internet) alone can and should be fixed.
But how to get from “no visitors at all” to a substantial and targeted audience that loves what you do?
Targeted Еfforts
You can’t be everything for everyone. And not everyone is a client that you will want to have.
‘Oh, come on’ – you may say – ‘everybody that has money is my target group.’
And, I have to admit, there is a fair amount of logic in that sentence. You and almost everyone else started your business for the money. So, why not to sell to everyone, right?
The easiest explanation is that simply not everyone will buy from you.
We people are so much different from each other, as much we are the same.
While our core, biological, and psychological, is the same, we differentiate on a superficial level.
To put in other words, basically, we have the same values, goals, and desires, we just are trying to achieve them in a different way, because we have a diverse sense of self.
Pretty basic psychology.
When knowing this, why trying to be everything for everyone? If everyone else has a specific sense of self, why deprive your shop/site/brand of its own personality?
When your business has personality, you will easily find to whom you can sell, who will be, and who could be interested in what you do. This will significantly decrease your marketing efforts, and thus, the cost of these efforts. In a sense of money and time.
Now that you know who you are targeting, let’s define HOW and WHERE to target them.
Of course, I don’t know who will target, thus I don’t know exactly where you should do that, but I can show you the direction.
You will walk the road.
Social Media, duh!
People are there, and you should go where people are. Social media platforms, especially the big ones (we all know which they are), will allow you to target all of your efforts, especially the ones you pay for, to the right public.
Although it may seem worthless and boring, you already know that targeting is an effort you have to make.
When thinking of social media, don’t think of it as just another place to share your content. Put a face on your business. Talk with people. Help people. Give pieces of advice. Be valuable.
And do so not only on your business’ page. Create groups. Actively participate in other groups. Related to what you do, of course.
Facebook is not only a page of what you do, and social media is not only Facebook.
Forums
With the rise of social media, we somehow forgot about forums. With the rise of social media in a sense, the forums lost their value. Yet, with the rise of Reddit, forums evolved.
Now forums are once more a significant part of your marketing efforts.
Places like Quora and the Sub-Reddits, are getting a good amount of traffic that you really need to take advantage of.
Again, like in the social media groups, you will have to make effort not to ‘promote’ your business, but to give value. Expecting nothing in return. Building brand awareness and positioning yourself like an expert are more important in the long rung then just trying to sell, sell, sell.
Also, speaking of forums, think not only Reddit and Quora. There are thousands of forums. And the best part is that most of them are well-targeted. Forums for marketers, forums for webmasters, forums for cooks, forums for writers, a forum for athletes… You got the idea. Find your ‘tribe’ and be there for them.
On-Page SEO
As for now, SEO is kind of a big thing in the marketing world. And this is to be expected. The growth of technology and the Internet are the main factors for that to happen. We are constantly online. Chatting, surfing… searching.
Search is an ever-growing part of the Internet.
And the purpose of the SEO is to make it so when people are searching for something your website to be the one on the top. To be the most relevant for their search.
To optimize your content for search engines, you have to know what and how are people searching.
The main elements of On-Page SEO are:
- Short and relevant URL’s
- Title tags
- H1 Tags
- Keywords and LSI
- Optimized Media
- Outbound and Inbound Links
Guest Blogging
Guest blogging is serving two goals at once. You get traffic from an article which will be online as long as the website you posted it on is alive.
And you get a backlink which is kind of the essence of the Off-Page SEO.
To start guest blogging, just search for relevant websites that need content. And offer them to write an article.
Make sure the article is:
- Meeting their audience’s interests
- Engaging enough
- Long enough
- Valuable
- Relevant to what you do
Good Old Advertising
Except in the cases where you pay to someone to do all of the above, all the listed traffic gathering options are free and can ‘live together’. There is one more member of this family and it is the Good Old Advertising.
If you are able to target your efforts well enough, advertising doesn’t have to be expensive. And even when there are so many other ways to get people to know that your website exists, advertising still, and probably always will work.
Having a budget for advertising depends on way too many factors.
Yet, if you can, definitely advertise.
Of course, all the time bearing in mind the right audience, the right time, and the right advertising method.
