18 Tactics For Increasing Traffic To Your Site In 2019

Two people reviewing statistics on a laptop

Last updated on July 16th, 2021 at 02:06 pm

Learn new strategies and proven tactics for increasing traffic to your site using basic strategies, social media, and paid advertising.

The Basics

Social Media

Paid Advertising

Final Takeaway


The Basics

1. Examine Your Analytics Data

Keep track of your analytics data using Google Analytics, SEMRush, or a similar program. Before you can implement a new traffic campaign for your website, you first need to look at your current data analytics. You can determine the source of your traffic, how much time customers are spending on your site, which pages are getting the most views, and when customers leave your site. This information will enable you to create a better strategy on your various channels and then you can increase web traffic.

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2. Speed Up Your Site

The faster your site loads, the better. Customers will not want to wait minutes for your site to load. If your site loads slowly, you will likely lose some potential customers. Check to see that your site and all of your pages are optimized as much as possible. This includes the functionality of third-party plug-ins. A fast site converts better and will also get more organic traffic if search engines can crawl through your site quickly to find more content.

3. Optimize Your Site for Long-tail Keywords

XY graph comparing competition and search frequency in keyword search terms. 1 word phrases have high competition and search frequency. Long description phrases have a low competition and high to low search frequency.

If you are not already targeting long-tail keywords as part of your SEO (search engine optimization) efforts, you are missing a great opportunity. Long-tail keywords refer to specific keyword phrases that have a lower search volume. Long-tail keywords make up the majority of web searches. They are much less competitive and will drive the majority of your traffic.

It is extremely hard to rank for shorter phrases such as “paper” or “printing paper.” Creating highly specific content will result in less competition than content aimed at high-volume keywords. Aiming for long-tail keywords will increase your chances of ranking well in Google for long-tail keywords. While long-tail keywords are less frequently searched, the level of specificity of long-tail keywords is often indicative of a user’s higher likelihood of converting. In addition to driving traffic to your site, you want to ensure that the traffic consists of customers who are ready to purchase your products or services.

4. Publish Long-Form Content

BuzzSumo analyzed a million articles to determine which types of content work the best. The results revealed that long-form content gets more shares and backlinks than short posts, under 1,000 words.

Three charts side by side. Length (words), total shares average, and referring domain links average.

In the chart above, summarizing the findings from BuzzSumo, the longest content, over 3,000 words, was shared the most. This is an average of 208 percent more than articles under 1,000 words.

The amount of times your post gets shared is highly determinative of the number of visitors who will visit your page. According to blogger, Brian Dean, “the simple fact that [his] post is insanely long [6,558 words] is a big reason why it’s been shared 12,909 times. And those shares have sent over 50,000 visitors to [his] website.”

Creating longer form content, you can drive more traffic to your site and convert them into email addresses, which you can then convert into sales.

5. Create Evergreen Content

Evergreen content are posts that continue being relevant regardless of when they were published. For example, certain posts only relate to a specific time, such as a post recommending the top ten digital marketing strategies. As the digital world continues to grow rapidly, a post recommending the top ten digital marketing strategies will eventually become outdated. Content that is time-sensitive is still very beneficial and can generate a substantial amount of traffic in the short-run. However, incorporating evergreen content into your content marketing strategy will give your site passive traffic, long after the content was released.

Periodically updating old posts, even evergreen posts, and republishing them gives you a second chance at gaining traffic. Updating and optimizing older posts can increase exposure. It also saves you the time associated with writing and developing a new post.

6. Link Internally

Incorporating internal links allows customers to better navigate your site. Internal links are links that take the visitor from one page on your site to a different page on your site. Without internal links for your landing pages and posts, your visitors would effectually be limited to the page they land on.

Linking internally helps create a framework for your site. Correct linking throughout your site allows search engines like Google understand which pages are the most relevant or have the most important content. It is crucial for your site’s SEO to assess and improve your internal linking strategy on a regular basis. Overall, you will provide your visitors with a better, more useful experience, which is the foundation of increasing incoming site traffic.

7. Utilize Email Marketing

Email marketing has been around for years and continues to withstand the test of time. Email marketing should be the foundation of your advertising and marketing campaign. Generally, it is very inexpensive and there are many advantages of email marketing.

You can boost traffic to your website by implementing email outreach directed at your target audience. Email marketing one of the best ways to keep your customers engaged. Whether it is sending welcome emails to new subscribers, promoting a new product or service, informing about a new promotional deal, or providing a weekly newsletter with valuable content, these are simple ways to boost your traffic.

It is easy to track and analyze the efficiency of your email marketing campaign. These analytics can reveal the source of new traffic so you can measure the effectiveness of an email you send. Even a moderately successful email blast can result in a surge in your site traffic. Be sure not to bombard customers with too many emails. Keep it short, friendly, and thoughtful.

Social Media

8. Be More Active on Social Media

Graph of social media user grown rapidly increasing since 2010. The number of users is predicted to over triple in 2021 compared to 2010

Your website may have top-notch content but it’s not enough just to have it. You have to be proactive and promote it to increase traffic to your website. One of the most cost-effective methods for promoting your site is to use social media platforms to promote your content. According to Statista Research Department, social media user growth across social networks have been increasing at a rapid pace.

You have to be active across multiple channels, such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, and Snapchat. Post content on a daily or weekly basis.

Create posts that encourage communication and discussion. Keep your channels of communication open and respond to any questions or comments you receive through these channels.

Link your social media to your website to drive traffic directly to your website. Add social sharing buttons to your post. This will allow readers to easily share your posts through their networks.

Similar to your email marketing analytics, you can use unique links to track where your website traffic is originating. Your business can also determine which social platforms and posts are the most engaging and generating the most traffic to your website.

9. Post Content and Advertise on LinkedIn

LinkedIn has become more than just a professional social network used to find another job. It is also a publishing platform for professionals to share polished, thoughtfully authored content. Professionals have been increasing their usage on this platform and taking advantage of ways to network with others and engage with other professionals on a daily basis. This can assist boosting traffic to your website and increase your profile within the industry.

When you post a long-form text post filled with valuable content, make sure that your post does not contain a link. In order to add a link to your site, you can leave a link in the first comment.

Since LinkedIn already has a targeted audience, your followers, you can connect with other business professionals in your industry more easily. LinkedIn’s advertising network allows you to target your ads specifically based on job titles, company size, job functions, etc. You can also use LinkedIn Recommendation Ads to promote your products or services. Every time someone recommends you, it’s shared with their followers, which will hopefully produce a ripple effect, leading to more traffic, referrals, and exposure. 

10.   Advertise on Facebook

Facebook still rewards link-free long-form posts. With increasing changes in social media strategies and advertising, social advertising on Facebook is still relatively inexpensive in comparison to Adwords. While it is one of the cheapest forms of online advertising, it can provide a strong return on investment.

Most social media channels allow you to segment by demographics or target by keywords in order to hit your ideal audience. The key is to creating an effective strategy. Facebook ads can generate excellent returns. If you already have Facebook fans, you will want to use Sponsored Stories and Promoted Posts. Stories appear when followers take actions on your page. You can decide where your Sponsored Stories are placed. You can use them to target news feeds, only desktops, or only mobile devices. Sponsored Stories are best aimed towards mobile device users since it appears right in the newsfeed, rather than on the right side, where it can be overlooked or ignored. They allow you to promote virtually anything, including: links, videos, and quizzes. Sponsored Stories are currently one of the most organic and natural appearing ads. Not surprisingly, they inspire the most user interaction.

11. Create Pinterest Boards

Pinterest is a very strong domain. If you’re a business-to-business (B2B) product company, your business can find great traction with primarily image-based social media platforms like Pinterest and Instagram. It’s no longer enough to simply create content and expect it to rank and drive traffic to your website. More than ever before, rankings are influenced by engagement. Allocate a small amount of your budget to promote pins on Pinterest to your target audience.

Take some typical keyword searches from your website and target them at Pinterest. If you want to take it to the next level, use your other online resources (business website, Instagram, etc.) to get indexed faster and subsequently rank better.

If you decide to take it upon yourself and create blog posts, make sure you include good visuals, particularly infographics. Each blog should have at least 10 unique pins. Just as you would with any other social media platform, make sure you are actively engaged, connect with others in your niche, and re-pin other people’s pins.

12. Comment on a Forum like Quora (or a Blog)

Forum commenting requires strategy and commitment. The goal isn’t to get backlinks. The goal is to make yourself an integral and respected member of the community. Providing insightful and beneficial advice can spark someone’s curiosity to glance at your profile which can provide a link to your site. Consistently responding to questions within your niche can demonstrate your depth of knowledge and your expertise on the topic will make you a valuable asset in the community and in the industry as a whole. Subsequently, this can result in driving more traffic to your site.

Forums exist for nearly every topic. Wikipedia has a list of some of the largest ones or you can Google forums you might be interested in. Quora is a forum that is known for people posting questions and other people providing answers. Try to find a recently dated question to answer. Answer questions related to your niche with thoughtful, relevant responses. Only provide a link to your site where appropriate. Do not try to be overly promotional. If your answer relates to a recently published blog, you may want to provide a link to your site.

For your profile information, use your real name and a professional-looking photo of yourself, rather than your company name and logo. People are psychologically more drawn to a face than a logo. If the community allows, you can provide a link to your site in your profile information.

Try to find a community that is current, active, and very responsive. Some forums have strict “no link” policies whiles others have anti-spam measures if you simply try to spread your link in as many locations as possible. Others have a probationary period before you are allowed to post links. These communities are looking for people who are interested in adding value to their community.

Spend about 10 to 15 minutes each day contributing to the forum(s). Look for questions that are within your niche that aren’t already saturated with responses. Provide quality answers with details and examples. The best part about commenting on a forum is that there is already an established audience within your niche. You’re creating the potential of having your name out there and increasing traffic to your site. Perhaps your comment may even lead to a request to write a guest blog.

13. Write a Quality Guest Post

One of the newest and easiest ways to build traffic to your site is to write a guest blog for a reputable blog. It can also help build your brand’s reputation from its association with the well-known site.

Try to build a relationship with the blog’s owner and connect with them. Offer to provide them content that their blog or site is missing or put together a series of articles. When writing a guest blog, avoid using any tactics to promote your own site. Use simple words, write how-to blogs, add links where appropriate, create a conversation with your new audience, and create powerful headlines. This might take some tweaking but reaching that new audience can have a tremendous pay off.

14. Produce Video Content

Your business should have a YouTube channel set up. Add new videos regularly. People prefer to watch a video about a product or service(s) than read about it. Marketers claim that video content is one of the main tactics that helps increase site traffic.

You can add videos to your email and social media pages or embed video links into your blog. Videos can help you generate new leads and increase your site traffic. While text-based content is important to have, video content can be valuable in attracting new visitors and making your site more engaging. Information retention is significantly higher for visual material than text material, making video marketing a great method of grabbing and holding your audience’s attention, while also boosting traffic to your site.

15. Implement Native Video Advertising

Today’s generation is increasingly more internet and social media savvy and not particularly open to advertising. Companies aware of this have been replacing their display ads with native ads.

If you’ve used LinkedIn or Facebook recently, you must have noticed that native video is killing it. Native video is video content that is uploaded to a social platform and played in-feed. It is inherently non-disruptive and does not interrupt the user experience. It is considered “native” because it is formatted specifically for the platform that’s hosting it. These videos are mainly engaging, educational, and highly-targeted.

Native video ads can be placed on social networks such as: Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, and YouTube. They have better reach and more engagement. Native video has grown to be the most engaging type of video. It will not only bring traffic to your site but also improve your conversion rate.

16. Invest in Sponsored Content

Sponsored posts emulate a site’s style and content but are a form of advertising. Sponsored posts are written by another party and posted on another website. They differ greatly from traditional ads, as they shy away from the typical salesy approach. Sponsored content very subtly promotes another website and gives your business a chance to be presented to their existing site audience.

An example of sponsored content is Qualcomm’s, “Touchpoints” on The Atlantic. For the most part, this content would blend in, were it not for the notation at the bottom that reads, “content is made possible by our sponsor.” If your business has room in its budget, sponsored content can help drive traffic to your site from another site as well as sharing your brand with another audience.

17. Use Influencer Marketing

If your website is credible you will be able to generate more traffic. Leveraging your relationship with influencers is one of the best ways to gain social credibility.

You can pay celebrities or other social media influencers, also known as micro-influencers, to promote your brand. Since celebrities are already well-known, having them promote your brand supports the legitimacy of your brand. Moreover, their endorsements will reach a much wider audience, including all of their biggest fans. However, it is very clear to consumers that these celebrities are getting compensated to endorse your products or services.

Consider using micro-influencers to increase your product credibility instead. This is a cost-effective method to reach audiences without having to pay A-list celebrity prices. Micro-influencers have more user engagement with their audiences than celebrities.

Having influencers promote and endorse your product will get more traffic to your site. In addition to that, these leads will be more likely to trust your brand if the recommendation came from a social influencer they trust. As a result, it will be easier for your business to generate conversions and ultimately driver higher profits.

18. Invite Guest Bloggers

Be on the lookout for other bloggers or brands you would like to collaborate with. Build a community that others will want to join. Invite guest bloggers in your niche to write a blog for your site. Not only will this provide a fresh new voice and perspective but they are likely to attract new readers. Their followers are likely to come to your site to read their content as well, which will provide a traffic boost for your site.

Final Takeaway

When implementing strategies to drive traffic to your website, make sure that they align with your business values and are targeted specifically at your ideal demographic.

While driving more traffic to your site is important, the numbers, alone, aren’t everything. You must also consider the quality of your traffic. You’re likely to see more conversions when your traffic consists of your target audience.

Ivi Kim is a content writer, marketer, and blogger. Ivi graduated with a Juris Doctor from Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law and a Master of Business Administration from Indiana University Kelley School of Business. She has written content for websites and blogs, while increasing their SEO scores. Ivi’s passion for writing is rooted in her desire to facilitate the flow of information from businesses to consumers in a way that is beneficial and engaging.

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