How to get traffic to your new site

You have just bought your first website, it’s flash and looks great – good for you! But now what? How do you get people’s attention and attract visitors to your new fandangle site?

1. Offline Advertising.

Yes we spend more time on line than we do off, but it is still important to include your website address on all pieces of advertising material you have. Make sure it is on your business cards, letterheads, signage, sign written cars, church bulletin, news board, shop window – everywhere! If you have the budget to be spending on flyers, posters, radio, television and other conventional media methods don’t forget to include it there. Don’t ever assume that people won’t remember the address, you’ll be surprised what some people remember when they really want to.

2. Online Directories.

Loads of these on the net - set up a profile for your business on as many as possible, if you already have a profile set up then don’t forget to update it with your new website and a link to it. Free on line directories are even better, you don’t have to pay a cent! I have been asked before whether I would recommend paying to be on some of the sites that require a fee, and I would say you need to check out there stats first

• How much traffic do they get to their own site, in particular to people searching your industry?
• Will they link to your site cleanly and not use the dreaded “nofollow” link. This is a piece of code added to links when you don’t want the link to gain any page rank from it. Don’t waste your money if they use it, it’s no good!
• Where is your listing going to sit amongst your competitors? If you aren’t on the first page, forget it.
• Do you get any added bonuses to paying, more pictures, description, ad space anywhere else?
  
  

Weigh up the answers to these questions and make the call. Personally I don’t recommend it, but some people might find it beneficial – the type of people who pay money to go in the yellow pages – if you have forgotten what those are they are the big chunky yellow books possibly holding up your computer screen right now (Money well spent… *cough*)

Google free directories and a bunch more will come up. It takes time, but gaining traffic to your site always will. Here are a few free directories to get you started anyway.

Finda, Yalwa, Businessme, Mysherrif, NZWebz, Website directory, Hotfrog, NZS.com, Bold Kiwi, Zoomin

3. Social Media.

Love it or hate it, or perhaps don’t understand it but it helps. Add your site to all of your pages, set some pages up if you haven’t already (are you nuts it’s 2012 – join us already!). Always treat your pages as a business page though; don’t go misusing social media if you don’t understand it. Yes it will help with traffic to your site, but it will hinder your sales if you start announcing your personal details, no one needs to know you’re having trouble in your relationship or went to the doctor yesterday about that rash spreading. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Blogger, Flickr, Google+, StumbleUpon… the options are endless, you pick what works for you and think you can keep up to date.

4. Online.

Beware of link farmers they will not help you and may hinder your results. A link farmer is someone who usually sends you a spammy email saying they can gain 100s of visitors by link baiting to your site. They can’t. Well not from anywhere good, and if you are seen fraternising with such scum Google will punish you. Only ever purchase from reputable websites, but even better try get linked to from good websites. If you have something amazing on your site that may be of interest to a reputable company, send it to them! You might be lucky enough that they find it so incredible they link to your site for free. This also illustrates how important it is to keep your web content up to date and fresh, old stale content doesn’t get links.

Don’t forget to include your web address in your email signature guys! And send it out to all of your current customers, let them know you have decided to join the online world. Every click counts.

5. SEO.

Make sure your site is SEO friendly and Google can index it to begin with. This means good content, good META tags and a well coded/designed site. If you’re brand new don’t expect any amazing results straight away, Google has a stand down period where you sit in limbo for 2 months before they even choose to recognise you exist. This gives you plenty of time to get the address out there and linked through though, you’ll jump up the ladder the more links you have and the more relevant your content is.

Getting started can be the hard part of any business, but keep at it. Gaining traffic to your site isn’t a once off thing; it requires constant attention (sorry to disappoint you if you thought it was going to be easy). The most important part is to have a good website, make the content relevant, interesting and easy to navigate and people will enjoy visiting your site over and over.