image - flicker
Congratulations, so, you’ve now your company website...but what do you do now?
The biggest challenge is to bring in qualified traffic. After all, that’s how you will make more sales and increase your customer base.
Promote your website!
Promoting your website essentially means to attract more customers to your website and keep them interested. In other words, increasing traffic.
So the question is "How to promote your website?"
How do people promote their website? Possibly your website design may have suggested you few tips, or some of them even may have offered you website promotion plan at a good cost, but many of them may not have told you that website promotion is the biggest thing you need to plan even before you create your website.
Website promotion is the biggest thing you need to plan even before you create your website.
… you need a plan to promote your website.
To make your job easy, we went to work, researching all the best tips and strategies for getting a website seen by as many people as possible.
Here’s all we found, and we’re excited to share our findings with you. Please try them and be sure to report back with what works!
Note: We have tested all of these tips and strategies ourselves for Shimbi Labs website and found them working incredibly well.
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How to promote a website: 12 strategies to try
Many thanks to the people and brands who have been generous to share their website promotion tips online.
Here’s the big list of website promotion strategies for you.
Try it and see how your traffic goes from very low to too busy!
FREE Options
Here are FREE but most effective options to promote your website.
1. Write Irresistible Content.
No matter what your website is about - whether about selling lifestyle products, software services or inspiring people- make sure your reader gets hooked to your content of the website. The content of website doesn't necessarily have to be long, but it needs to be informative and entertaining.
Content is anything that adds value to the reader's life. ~ Avinash Kaushik, Google
Make your website content in such a ways that it is well-mixed with a good amount of quantity as well as quality. If you want your website to be ranked high on search results, your articles should be shareable, meaning people should be compelled to read it and share it on social media. The content should be informative enough that your website becomes the expert opinion about that particular product or service.
Here are some interesting Blogging and Content Marketing statistics.
2. Invite Guest Bloggers
Guest blogging may seem like an old-fashioned idea, but it is still well and alive, and receiving the attention of people. Your guest bloggers should be from the same genre of writing as you and your company belong to. This will increase your traffic by letting in the opportunity of some of your guest bloggers’ readers to visit your website. For example, if your guest blogger has 5000 visitors, your website will now have a chance of getting 5000 visits.
Not only is this useful for getting more traffic, but getting linked by a blog or website which is already highly ranked in search engine results, will make your blog or website found too.
Although the idea looks simple and compelling, be aware of bloggers who will not be of much help to you. Here are a few tips to keep away from such people:
- Don’t let just any blogger be your guest. The guest blogger should be an expert in your niche and should be well-versed with what goes into making successful blogs.
- Do a little background research on the blogger before accepting them and their work. Read their published articles and blogs, their responses and the kind of response they have received from the audience.
- You can also start by asking well-known bloggers to write for you.
- If the content they make is not good enough, then consider not publishing it. Always remember to put up those articles through which your readers will gain something and be entertained at the same time.
3. Write On Trending Topics.
It doesn’t matter if the topic dies down in a few days. Write on that topic while it is still hot. People like controversial topics, which ignite their curiosity. You can write about trending topics in the news, film, media or anything you wish. By using Google Trends, you will know what people are discussing currently.
When you write about controversial topics, there is less competition because not many people are taking that risk. So, your chances of coming at the top of search results will also be higher.
If you are a making a website to sell your products, you can use the blogging section to advise people to make the right choices; or about matters which you interest your buyers. Tell them facts about your products, its usefulness and why it is better than anything else in the market.
4. Social Media Marketing
Using social media is a great way to promote your business, website, and blog. There are so many places you can be. But don’t you think people will get bored looking at the same old content everywhere they go? They would, and this is why we suggest coming up and showing many sides of your business through all the available platforms. Keep things simple on Instagram, make witty, funny and informative content on Facebook, be professional on LinkedIn and blog all your wants on Twitter.
More read on how to use different social media platforms
Top 8 Benefits Of Using Facebook For A Small Business
Top 8 Benefits Of Using Twitter For A Small Business
Top 8 Benefits Of Using LinkedIn For A Small Business
Top 8 Benefits of Using Instagram for a Small Business
Top 8 Benefits Of Using Pinterest For A Small Business
5. Search Engine Optimization
SEO (Search Engine OPtimisation) is the first thing you always hear when the topic of promoting a website is discussed. SEO is the process of increasing your website’s visibility in search engine’s organic results through optimizing your pages with the keyword phrases people are likely to search.
SEO is a very important step in promoting your website, but we listed it on the 5th number because 4 points discussed above will help you optimise your search position in search engine results. So once you get them right, SEO becomes little easy.
Popular ways to improve organic search results are -
- Optimising website content
- Making search engine friendly URLs
- Increasing the number of backlinks
- Adding relevant Page Title and Description for each page of website
- Easy Navigation and Sitemap
We have added four separate blog posts on Search Engine Optimization, to cover the topic in depth.
10 Simple Web Design Hacks To Improve Your Search Ranking
7 Elementary Essentials For Search Engine Optimisation
5 Ways To Improve Your SEO
Top 10 Search Engine Disasters to Avoid
6. YouTube
As video adoption for content marketing continues to rise, there’s no doubt that more organizations are looking to online video to improve their brand exposure. Marketing experts and thought leaders have been advocating the video marketing for a while now. Smartphone and tablet adoption has created an unlimited opportunity for more mobile video content.
"The beauty of developing a video marketing plan is that you are making it easier for the viewer to be exposed to the information you are trying to communicate." – Chris Sandoval, Why You Need a Video Marketing Plan Right Now!
Creating videos of your services or products and posting them to YouTube can help your content get found on the additional channel other than Google.
Here are mind blowing YouTube facts, figures and statistics, you should not ignore.
The total number of people who use YouTube – 1,300,000,000. 300 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute! Almost 5 billion videos are watched on Youtube every single day. In an average month, 8 out of 10 18-49 year-olds watch YouTube.
Source - Youtube Statistics - 2017 - FortuneLords.com
You can also advertise on other people’s videos by buying targeted ads relevant to your business -- which could yield a high conversion.
More read on YouTub promotion
Top 8 Benefits of Using YouTube for a Small Business
7. Email Marketing
Among the obstacles a small business or online seller has to face is finding a cost-efficient way to market their brand to a wider audience. That’s where email marketing comes in as very cost effective or sometimes a free option.
Whether it is your grand opening of your company, launch of new product or service, an efficient way to quickly reach out to your audience is sending them an email. Email marketing is the handy and effective option for promotion.
Here are some very insightful Email Marketing statistics from HubSpot.
Email marketing is one of an excellent way to promote your product, service or brand because most people need to be engaged multiple times before they buy from you. Email is the easiest way to reach out directly to your consumer. Email marketing is still one of the strongest ways to engage potential and current customers.
More read on email marketing
Email Marketing Is It A Good Way Of Internet Marketing?
Tools To Send Promotional Emails
10 Tips To Success Your Holiday Season Email Marketing
5 Things You Need To Consider While Your Email Marketing In 2016
The Basics of Effective Email Marketing That Works!
8. Forums/Reviews And Facebook Groups
Forums, Review Pages, and Facebook Groups are the places where people discuss their interest, ask recommendation on almost everything like a new salon in town, a great restaurant in a neighborhood, new movie, shopping mall, plumber service, house moving almost most everything. These sources are key points for driving traffic to your website, too. Be a member of these forums, Facebook Groups, Cora Pages and more and focus on building connections and help people without directly selling them your services. Slowly they will in return start recommending your services and products. This will also drive traffic to your website. You can also comment on relevant blog posts to plug your company without coming off as too promotional.
More read on Facebook Group Marketing
6 Clever Ways to Use Facebook Groups for Marketing
9. PR
Building your reputation and influence among your audience base is an important part of driving traffic to your company website. Through public relations strategies, you can brand yourself as an expert in your niche and build your credibility. This is a little time-consuming task but worth doing it. Just by investing your time you can get free but relevant traffic to your website. Your brand awareness will also increase when you are referred in different articles. For instance, by serving as a source in journalist’s articles, they will typically provide a link back to your website, which is usually significant traffic that converts well. Plus, when you’re mentioned in a trusted source, people will trust you more.
Also, try press releases they can also help drive traffic and generate interest in your product or service.
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Paid Options
Paid options worth trying to boost your marketing efforts.
10. Pay Per Click (PPC)
Google PPC (Pay per click) advertising - Google AdWords is best-paid option to bring in traffic to your website. Here’s how it works you pay a fixed price for every click when your ad gets clicked on Google. So your ultimate goal of the click is to convert that user to buy your product or service. That is your return on investment. With this option, there is no upfront spending requirement; you can set your budget per day budget as little as five dollars and also per a maximum click cost of ten cents for each click. Key to success is choosing a relevant keyword or key phrases that people likely to use while searching your product or service. Before the release of your Adwords Add Google also let you select demography, language and age group of your audience.
More read on Google AdWords Marketing
11. Retargeting
Retargeting or Remarketing is a form of online advertising that can help you keep your brand in front people who visited your website but never done any shopping. Like any other business, online also only 2% of individuals convert as customers on their first visit. Retargeting is a method designed to help an online business to reach
out remaining 98% of users who left the website without shopping.
How does it work?
Image Courtesy: retargeter.com
Retargeting ads work by placing cookies on your website visitor’s computers. So when they leave your website, they start seeing ads on another website, who also use Google AdWords or Display Add network to show advertisements. The idea is to stay in front of your prospect, so them to come back.
Retargeting can be a valuable strategy in getting those lost visitors to come back and convert as customers.
More read on Google AdWords Marketing
A Beginner's Guide to Retargeting Ads
12. Facebook Ads
According to Facebook Company Info Page, Facebook has 1.32 billion daily active users on average for June 2017 and 2.01 billion monthly active users as of June 30, 2017. These numbers make perfect sense for you to consider Facebook Ads as an option to promote your website.
Here are few more interesting statistics by Hootsuite (October 2016)
Additionally, Facebook is not only popular with teenagers and college students but all types of demographics. With Facebook ads, you can target people from a specific location, gender, age group, specific interest and not only that but friends of your current fans, or even folks who “like” other pages.
Facebook Ads are a cost-effective way to bring in new traffic to your website. Like Google Adwords, you can set a daily budget, pay for clicks, or pay when people see your ad. Facebook also allows you to sell your products from within Facebook itself.
More read on Facebook Marketing
The Complete, Always-Updated Guide to Facebook Advertising
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More options
Above are selective and tested 12 ways to market your website. Here are some more traditional and simple yet effective ways to promote your products offline:
- Make Business Cards.
Apart from standard information such as Name, Company name physical contact details, prominently print your website URL and email address. Typically people visit your website before they call, send an email or visit your physical outlet.
- Advertise in Print and Electronic Media
Although this is a costly option if you can afford and if your business demands give Newspapers and/or Television ads. Don't forget to mention your website URL and request users to visit for more details. This works tremendously well for some business. You can consider Radio stations as well.
- During Call Waiting
When callers are put on hold, tell them that you can be reached via your website and through emails as well. This clever little trick can put your website name into the minds of your customers. Instead of making your customers wait, tell them they can get the required information on your website too.
- Email Signature
Add website and some memory hook tag line to your email signature. So every time you send email, the recipient will notice the website address, this is another easy way to increase your website traffic. You may also consider of adding your brand's social networking page link also.
Image HubSpot
You need to do every thing to ensure people notice you and start following you on your website.
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Just in case...
If you are not happy with your current website or the way things are, then Budo is your best resort. Budo is a web platform that does more than just building your website!
Budo has everything that you would need to create your effective online presence be it a website or blog or store. Design your own beautiful website exactly the way you want.
Creating your website is just the beginning. Promoting your website and drive traffic with Budo's built-in social media platform & SEO Booster is very easy. Everything in Budo is designed to be simple and intuitive.
Give a try!
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Further reading
Top 10 Tips To Publish Better Content For Your Small Business Website
8 Ways to Improve Your Small Business Website Today
Why Is Website More Important For Your Business Than Social Media Presence Alone?
Your Website Is Doomed If Your Homepage Doesn't Answer These 6 Question
Top 25 Free Places to Promote Your Website Online
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Over to you
I’ve been fortunate to have learned a lot during research and writing this blog over the past few months from a handful of readers and Shimbi Labs customers. I’d love to keep learning! If you have any tips or wisdom to share about what has worked for you and your website, it’d be awesome to learn from you here in the comments.
Or, if you’re keen to share any thoughts on this blog post or promotion strategies (which ones feel good to you, which ones feel like too much), that’d be great, too!
Excited to keep the conversation going!