If I asked you if you’d like more traffic to your website, you’d say, “Yes, please!”, right?I mean, who doesn’t want more traffic to their website?More of the right kind of traffic means more people seeing what you have to offer, more people signing up for your newsletter, and more people buying your product or services.Who doesn’t want that?But how do you go about getting more traffic to your website?I feel like the only thing people talk about these days is doing guest posts.And guest posts are great, but since it seems like EVERYONE is doing them or talking about doing them, it starts to become a bit of a saturated and over-used tactic.So what can you do instead? Well, here are just three ideas for building traffic to your website that are a little more creative.
Three Website Traffic Boosters No One Talks About
1. Create a scholarship
Not just any scholarship. Create a scholarship that fits your ideal customer or that your ideal customer would support.If you’re a college admissions consultant, this one would of course be a good fit. But that’s not the only kind of small business that can benefit from creating a scholarship.Do you sell gourmet kitchen supplies? Create a scholarship for a local culinary school or camp.Do you teach graphic designers how to build a business? Create a scholarship for budding graphic designers to take a graphic design program from the college of their choosing or online from one of your own choosing.No, it doesn’t have to be a full scholarship.But it CAN be an easy way to get a link (and traffic) from university or college sites that do round-ups of scholarships. University websites tend to be seen as trusted & strong by The Google so it can be a great link to get to improve Google’s opinion of your own site.And if you can tie it in to your ideal client, the traffic bump will be all the better.Can’t seem to get the college idea to jive with your idea client’s needs?Do your ideal clients have a professional conference on their wishlists? Create a scholarship to fund their attendance.Oh – the secret here is then GO AND TELL everyone about your scholarship and encourage them to spread the word 🙂
2. Give away something amazing…for free
It’s hard to get people to write about or share something their audience has to pay for, right? You know what’s easy? Getting people to write about or share something AMAZING their audience can get FOR FREE.All you can have to do is create that something amazing :)What can you create?Well, again, you want to follow the rule of creating something amazing that fits your ideal client. We’re not trying to attract just ANY traffic – we’re trying to attract your IDEAL CLIENT traffic.If you’re a fitness instructor or have a studio, you might consider hosting one free fitness class a month.If you’re a local dessert shop, you might consider having a free scoop day.Are you a service provider or consultant? Maybe create a free tool, calculator or e-course your ideal clients would love like Shannon Whealy’s Visual Brand Planning Guide.I recently created a free Google Analytics e-course that my subscribers have loved. But I’m not the only one who’s created amazing free offers.Ramit Sethi who teaches wannabe freelancers how to get their first $1,000 on the side has the perfect amazing free tool for offer: a free idea generator tool which solves his would-be clients #1 problem – what to offer clients as a freelancer.Not only is it an awesome free tool, but it lines up perfectly with his product offering, Earn1K. And it just so happens, it’s where I point ANYONE who asks me how to get started as a freelancer.The key here is to create something awesome that ALSO aligns with your ideal client. This ensures any traffic bump you get from your awesome thing is 100% quality traffic who will also be interested in what you have to offer. Which is the point, right?
3. Get some really relevant press
I’m not talking about a link from The New York Times (though of course, who wouldn’t want one of those?) – I’m talking about a link from a top site that only your ideal audience follows.Are you a pillow designer? Maybe a link from Apartment Therapy would give you a lot of awesome traffic.Are you a virtual assistant? Maybe a link from Entrepreneur.com would give you tons of targeted traffic.Are you a weight loss coach? Maybe a link from CookingLight.com would be a great source of ideal client traffic.But how do you get this really relevant press? Sure you could hire a PR consultant if you have the budget.But what if you don’t have the budget? And need a DIY solution?One simple way to get more press is get yourself on the Source of Sources list.
Your turn
What creative traffic building ideas do you have? Like any of the ones on this list? Let me know in the comments!
Image courtesy of Eco Life- Sustainable Public Transport