How to Increase Web Site Traffic

So you have a nice website, great content, a fantastic layout and…no traffic?

Every new web master has been in this situation. The common misconception percolating around the web is that if you build a great looking site and fill it with interesting content, people will come.

Sorry folks…leave that phrase where it belongs: in the movies. Simple building a website and stuffing it with good content will NOT bring in the traffic. You need to take active steps to bring in that traffic. A more correct analogy is “build backlinks and they will come.”

There are two ways to increase website traffic. The first way is to use the whole social networks out there: digg, stumble upon, reddit, twitter, facebook, comment boards, forums. You basically write an article/post with a link back to your site. The more you participate in online communities (provided you have a visible link back to your website), the more you are throwing your link around, the more people will come to your website. This is especially true with big traffic getters like digg.com. Getting an article on the front page of digg may bring in 20-30k people.

You need to know the purpose of your website. If you are looking for readers and people to comment on your articles, then go after that social traffic. You can develop quite a community. You will have to work hard participating in online communities though. If you are tying to make money through your website or blog, be it through Google Adsense or some sort of affiliate program, you won’t make money through social traffic. Social traffic will not click on your ads and will not buy your products.

If you want to make money with your blog or website, you need organic search traffic (mostly from Google). Most bloggers get the wrong type of traffic (social traffic) and wonder why they make peanuts in Adsense clicks. It’s because the visitors are unfocused and not targeted to a specific keyword/niche, and the ads are not contextually relevant, thus paying pennies instead of dollars.

Typically, social traffic performs about 30 times worse than search traffic, in regards to sales and ad clicks. If you have 500 people from Google coming to your site through a keyword, you will need about 10k social traffic visitors to make the same amount of money. If you want to know how to make money, you can visit my Make Money Online hub for more information about this. I talk quite extensively about this on my Make Money Online hub.

So here are 3 ways to get more traffic to your website:

1. Get Search Engine Traffic with Backlinks

Now, how to get search engine traffic. This comes down two one thing: backlinks and SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Why are backlinks important? Because Google uses them to calculate your search engine ranking position for keywords. To get higher in the search engines, you need backlinks (unless your keyword has no competition).

A backlink is a link from another website to your website. Links have two components: the address of the link, and the anchor text. The address is where you end up when you click on a link; the anchor text is the visible text you see when you click on a link (often the color blue). For example Earn Money Online is a link to another one of my hubs.

Google basically uses the anchor text to “rank” that address linked to the anchor text for that specific keyword used in the anchor text. In my example, I just give my hub a Google “vote” for the keyword “Earn Money Online.” The more sites that “vote” my site using that specific keyword, the higher my site will rank for “Earn Money Online” when someone types it into Google. If my site has the most “votes” out of all the other websites (it doesn’t, sadly), it will place #1 in Google for the search “Earn Money Online.”

So, the more backlinks you have pointing to your site, the higher you rank. The higher you rank for keywords, the more visible your site will be and the more people your website will get. So to get search traffic, you want to rank as high as possible for as many different keywords (all relating to the content of your site of course) as possible.

2. Get Search Engine Traffic with SEO

Now besides backlinks, SEO plays a role in your ranking position on the search engines. If your site has proper SEO, then Google will more easy rank you for relevant keywords. Basically, SEO are like big arrows that connect Google to your content. The more precise those arrows are, the more keywords Google will begin to rank you for. I talk more about this on my How to Improve Search Engine Rankings hub.

Some quick SEO tips.

1. Make sure your website title is relevant to your website.

--If your website is about oil filters, don’t name it “Jack’s Filters.” Obvious, but you would be surprised at how many people don’t do this.

2. Make sure you use descriptive Webpage/Post titles.

--Don’t give a witty title to your blog posts or website pages. Use a title that captures the core of what your specific page is about. If your post gives information about how to change oil filters, then make the post title “how to change oil filters.” Don’t come up with some incredibly intelligent phrase to say this. As a rule of thumb, pick a title that someone would likely type into Google to find the information in your post.

3. Use keywords/keyword phrases in your post.

--If you are talking about changing oil filters in your post or webpage, make sure to use keywords and keyword phrases that relate to the content of the site. Also make sure they would be phrases someone will type into Google. For example, if we have a webpage about oil filters, and a post/web page about changing oil filters, I would include the following somewhere in my post: “oil filters”, “”how to change oil filters”, “changing your oil filter.” Try to use your “main” keyword 3-7 times per 500 words. Don’t go overboard and “stuff” your post with keywords. Make it natural.

3. Get Social Traffic with Social Networking

Now, if you actually do want social traffic (i.e. you want readership and not to make money), then you need to use social networks. With social traffic, you better make sure your writing is good and witty. Writing for social traffic (and converting them into regular readers) requires a whole different approach then trying to get search traffic and make money of them.

1. Submit your Article to Digg and Reddit.
2. Join Stumble Upon and Stumble Away. Use Twitter. Use Facebook.
3. Participate in online forum communities (especially ones that relate to your website). Have your website in the signature link of user name
4. Leave comments with your link on as many comment boards as possible (without spamming).

If you participate in enough communities, leave enough comments, stumble, twitter, and facebook away. You can draw a fair amount of social traffic.

So there you go, some simple tips for helping you increase your website traffic. If you have any ideas about making money, make sure you ignore the social traffic and go only after search engine traffic. If also possible to convert search engine traffic into social readers as well – but your content has to be useful, and the topic of your website has to have some real relevance.