By John Turner, founder of SeedProd, a popular coming-soon page solution for WordPress used by over 800,000 websites.
getty
Are you struggling to get clicks on your company blog? If so, you’re definitely not alone.
Business leaders and marketer experts across every industry understand the value of content marketing.
Blogging can help new businesses establish their reputation in crowded industries. Veteran bloggers know that high-value content is the key to building rapport with their readers, growing their email list and boosting conversions.
Despite understanding the benefits, maintaining consistent blog traffic is still not easy. You have to work hard and pay close attention to the needs of your audience if you hope to thrive.
Here are a few actionable ways you can get started.
Write about your audience’s goals and pain points.
The first rule for blogging: Your content should resonate with your intended customers. If your topics don’t matter to shoppers, why would they bother spending time on your blog?
Imagine visiting the blog of your favorite clothing company. Instead of fashion advice, details on upcoming outfits and user-generated content, they just have a ton of articles reviewing electronics.
There’s a good chance you wouldn’t bother reading their content, even if you are interested in the secondary topic. You went to their website to buy shoes, not learn about smart TVs.
When creating topics, ask yourself how each post will affect your customers. Is the article designed to help them reach a specific goal? Do you want to help readers overcome a glaring pain point? These goals and roadblocks can vary significantly by industry.
Figure out how you can help your readers and publish content that touches on one or more topics. I want to mention that not every post will resonate with every reader. Keep customer segments in mind, and use your buyer personas to steer your blog posts in the right direction.
Diversify on-page content.
Next, let’s talk about the format of the content you publish on your blog. In the old days, most blog posts were walls of text. Things have changed since then. The evolution of smartphones has led to a surge of users interested in visual content, like videos.
If you want more eyes on your website, experiment with different types of content so you can draw in visitors regardless of their preferences. For example, you could take a written post and include a video version for people who prefer listening to people talk instead of reading.
You can also use posts with statistics and interesting facts to build highly engaging infographics. Not only can this strategy boost your blog traffic, but it can also help you grow your email list because you can turn popular posts into downloadable lead magnets.
Host social media events.
Social media events like webinars are a great way to drive more traffic to your blog. Much like your on-page content, I suggest hosting live events focused on your audience’s needs.
So, if you have an email marketing SaaS, you might host a webinar titled “How we grew our lead list from 0 to 100,000 (+ How you can too!).” A footwear company could host an Ask Me Anything (AMA) event with a well-known personality in the industry.
You have plenty of options to choose from. Think about the people you want to read your content and eventually buy your product and how you can add value to their lives.
Creating a poll with multiple options is a surefire way to find out what your audience wants to see. If a vast majority of people are interested in one topic, you know where to turn your attention.
At the end of each event, encourage attendees to subscribe to your email list and check out the resources on your website. You can safely assume that many attendees will make it to your blog if they were impressed with your event.
Expand your SEO strategy.
Finally, I want to talk a little about search engine optimization. The world of SEO has evolved dramatically over the last decade. You have to take advantage of multiple search strategies if you hope to see more people visit your blog.
Now is the perfect time to add schema markup to your most popular posts if you haven’t already. Schema markup is data added to your website that helps Google understand the intent of each page. Businesses use this technique to show reviews, product availability, images and more from Google.
People are more likely to visit websites with rich snippets because they know what to expect before clicking the link.
I also recommended considering the keywords you’re using in your content. Voice search has exploded in popularity, with most people using voice search to find answers to questions and buy products.
The thing is, people don’t usually talk the way they type. So, a keyboard search might read “ribeye steak recipe,” but as a voice search, it could become “How do I bake a ribeye steak?” Anticipating what users might say in your industry can help you improve your search rank. With some luck, you may find your answer at the top of the search results as a featured snippet under the “people also ask” section, which is bound to draw new traffic to your blog.
One of the most important things to remember about blogging is that you won’t see significant results overnight. It takes a fair amount of time before traffic starts regularly flowing through your site. Engagement and growth will likely follow if you’re patient and work hard to publish content that adds tangible value to your readers’ lives.