When you seek out people that can legitimately benefit from the products or services you’re offering, you have a better chance of turning that person into a customer.
There are a ton of ways to grow your business using digital marketing. One of the most widely used strategies is content marketing. Business owners create content for their audience that’s designed to get them invested in their product and brand as a whole.
Nailing your content marketing strategy can take plenty of time and effort. You need to understand your product, potential customers, and the content you post on your blog and social media.
Ideally, you want to bring targeted prospects to your blog. When you seek out people that can legitimately benefit from the products or services you’re offering, you have a better chance of turning that person into a customer.
The hardest part of the process is understanding your market and making content that matches their pain points and goals. Today, we are going to show you how to start generating more targeted traffic to your blog. Some of our tips involve getting to know your audience, and others involve you reaching targeted consumers across various marketing channels.
Understand your readers
Before you can start getting more people to your site, you should take some time to get to know your readers. If you don’t have your finger on the industry’s pulse, you’re going to have a hard time creating relevant content for your audience.
Let’s say you have a website about professional sports and update your blog weekly with score updates from the latest games. People consistently come to your site because they find value in your content. Now imagine how poorly your site would do if you posted the same game updates but three weeks late. You’d likely get a fraction of the traffic and almost no engagement.
Keeping your readers in mind and consistently delivering relevant content to your blog will improve the chances of attracting more targeted customers.
You should also look through your Google Analytics reports and social media comments to learn about what topics are trending in your industry. If you see one sub-topic with 90% more traffic than you’re other posts, it’s a fair assumption that your audience is much more invested in that specific sub-topic.
Create pillar posts
Now, let’s talk about your pillar posts. Essentially, pillar posts are long-form pieces of content that dive deep into industry topics. An email marketing firm, for example, might create a pillar post about lead generation.
These posts are responsible for most website traffic because they are jam-packed with helpful information, as well as inbound and outbound links. When users are looking for an informative piece of content around your industry, you want them to find your pillar posts.
We suggest you break your industry down into several sub-topics. Obviously, the number of topics will vary depending on your industry. Use those topics as jumping-off points for long, detailed pieces of content. You can easily create smaller, targeted posts and link out to them in your pillar posts.
Research shows that long-form posts are excellent for getting more organic traffic and shares on your posts. As a general rule, keep your posts over 2,000 words for maximum exposure.
Start building an email list
The best way to advertise your blog posts to targeted customers is by building an email list. Email marketing is an extremely popular marketing strategy with an impressive 4,400% return on investment. Marketers use this channel to share their content with email subscribers, which leads to more traffic and engagement.
You can start building your email list directly from your blog. Add a sign-up form to your posts and encourage new visitors to sign up to get the latest content to their inbox. Not only will you build a list of potential customers who are likely to enjoy your content, but this strategy also opens the doors to some exciting personalization opportunities.
When a customer signs up, have them select the kinds of content they want to get delivered. Use the boxes they check to segment them on your lead list. In other words, you can classify customers by their interests and pain points and use this information to send targeted content.
If subscribers start getting content that meets their needs, they will likely come back to your site to browse more of your posts. You have to impress people that sign with thoughtful content if you want them to become customers.
Mix up your content
Diversifying your content is another excellent way to get more targeted traffic. Some people like watching videos, while others prefer reading long posts.
Regardless of who lands on your site, one thing is clear: visual content leads to more engagement and traffic. Articles with images tend to get 94% more views than text-only posts. So, even if you’re creating a pillar post designed for readers, include pictures to break up your content and deliver some of your points in a more digestible format.
Videos are also extremely effective at getting more genuinely interested customers on your site. Generally speaking, video content is 50x more likely to drive organic traffic. People love watching video content, especially when you consider that most people browse websites from their smartphones or tablet.
If you want to create more visual content, consider repurposing some of your existing posts. For example, you can take a stat-based article and create an infographic that’s available as a download. Alternatively, you can repurpose some of your best articles and turn them into a video that’s easier to consume.
Make use of social media
The final tip we are going to touch on today is how to make use of social media. Did you know that 49% of the global population uses social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram? These sites are excellent places to share your content and engage with users.
We suggest scheduling your best content to go out on social media regularly. Upload 1-5 helpful posts a day and respond to users with questions. You’ll find that people are more open to asking questions and learning when communicating on social media.
Use this opportunity to build rapport with your follower and encourage them to check out some of the other relevant posts on your blog. As you grow your audience, you’ll see more people engaging with your posts, most of them looking for answers. Get in there with them and regularly engage if you want to see more targeted traffic to your site.
These folks respond to your post because it touches on a pain point or goal that they have. Show them that you have some free solutions in the form of blog posts that could help them get to the bottom of their problem.
We also recommend going into group conversations centered around your industry. You’ll find targeted groups on Facebook and Reddit, just to name a few places. Talk to the people in these communities and get engaged in conversations. Help them by sharing posts, and ask them what you can do to build a better product. These seemingly small gestures lead to more consumer trust, which means they are likely to visit your website if they need advice in the future.
As you can see, blogging can play a significant role in how consumers see your brand. Don’t neglect content marketing because if you do, you’re leaving money on the table. Spend time getting to know your target audience and creating content that meets their needs.
Generate email and social media leads and start delivering your posts. Keep a list of your customer segments and build content for each part of your site. Before long, your online store will begin to see more sales, engagement, and website traffic.
