Build it and they Will Come… Or will they…?

You started your business and are excited to start serving clients; create a website to share your knowledge and experience and give a way for your clients to connect with you, and develop great content so your website visitors know what you do…

Then silence…

Where are all the people and why aren’t they coming to the site? Why isn’t anybody contacting me through my website…?

Don’t be discouraged. You just entered a new stage of your business development. It’s time to take matters in your hand and get proactive in driving traffic to your site. However, you don’t want just any traffic. You want targeted traffic.

What is targeted traffic?

Targeted traffic is the portion of traffic that is a part of your target market – the ideal clients you’d love to get hired by – and arrives at your site due to marketing strategies and offers crafted specifically to grab their attention. These pre-qualified visitors can turn into leads, which can turn into buyers, then become repeat buyers, and ultimately turn into loyal customers.

With millions of websites on the internet vying for your target market’s attention, you need to actively attract and convert your ideal clients. Of course, before you started your online business venture, you created a persona of your ideal customer and developed a niche and perhaps a sub-niche, as well… right?  If not, this is a crucial step – it’s hard (more like impossible) to drive any type of targeted traffic if you don’t have clarity on who is your “target”/ideal client.

To refresh your memory a little, an example of a broad target audience could be women. Niching that down further, an example could be middle-aged women. Going one-step further, you could target single, middle-aged, women… single middle-aged women managers… single middle-aged women managers who want to transition into self-employment….

As you can see, you can continue niching your audience down as needed. When you know your target audience well, you can successfully market to them by providing the information and solutions they need.

While basic knowledge of online technology and marketing is very helpful, you don’t have to be an expert. You can learn as you go. Implementing what you learn, as you learn it, can make a real difference to your bottom line. Consider beginning with Content Search Engine Optimization (SEO). It’s not as scary as it sounds. In fact, it’s one of the easiest marketing strategies to learn and implement. With a little knowledge about how to use keywords and a keyword research tool, you can get started right away.

At times, SEO-optimized content marketing is (almost) common sense. If you are a weight loss coach, for example, you’d use the term “weight loss” – just place the keywords in prominent places such as in your headlines, links, categories, descriptions, etc., in order to encourage your viewers to click, read more, and take action.

Once you have keywords in place throughout your site, make certain you create engaging content, including posts, images (name your images with your keyword in it – search engines see that too), and other items. Ask pertinent questions in the title or in the first paragraph to keep your audience engaged.

It isn’t enough to have great website content and targeted traffic. If your website is not properly optimized for lead-generation, you can have a million visitors to your website every month and not get hired.  It is crucial to have at least one lead-capture “system” in place, so you can build a tribe of followers and develop a relationship with them. The best way to do both of those is by having an irresistible offer on your home page (and every page, ideally) that’s connected to an email list. Then you can stay in touch with the members of your list, get to know your readers, and introduce them to your offers.  Many compare such lists of prospects to an ATM. Once you have a list of 100s – ideally 1000s – it’s almost impossible not to generate money each time you share an offer with your list (as long as you built a very targeted audience of your ideal clients).

Build a Tribe (eMail List) of 1000 Followers

A gentleman named Kevin Kelly came up with the concept of building a following of 1000 true fans, the concept being that anyone can build a following of 1, 10, 100, 1000 “true” fans – individuals who totally like what you are providing (your services, products, etc.) – and one should be able to make a comfortable living by developing a relationship with their fans.

But, how do you build that tribe… that list? How do you get visitors to join your eMail list?

Offer visitors something they just can’t turn down, in exchange for joining your list. Click Here to explore 25 examples of Irresistible Offer ideas!

Social media platforms like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Reddit, Pinterest, and others can help you gain targeted traffic. Once you discover the social media sites that your readers favor, share teaser posts and other info on those sites to bring more targeted traffic to you. Each social media platform caters and appeals to a slightly different group of people. For you, this means that some social media sites will be a better fit for your business and its goals than other social media sites are. Make note of the social media platforms that generate most engagement to your posts and bring you the most traffic. Make sure NOT to get lost in trying to post to too many social media sites – that can turn into a time-drainer and lots of frustration. It’s best to focus on one or two (3 max) social media platforms and continuously engage with your followers.

In the next post we’ll explore some hands-on traffic-generation strategies. Till then, implement the few tips mentioned above… If need help with any of it, send me a message through LinkedIn or through my website’s contact form (or eMail, if you already have my email address).

To your success,

E.G. Sebastian

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E.G. Sebastian, is a Business-Development Coach, Corporate Trainer. He is the owner of www.TheMarketingNinja.pro digital marketing agency and founder of Corporate Speaker Academy where he helps coaches, consultants, and authors break into the world of delivering Workshops, Group Coaching programs, or Keynotes to corporate teams. Learn more about Sebastian and his workshops at www.egSebstian.com and connect with him on LinkedIn.