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3 Steps to Driving the Right Traffic to Your Website

By Alicia Forest

Republish: EasyPublish™ Published: 15Mar2008 Word count: 1183 Viewed: 200 time(s) Get Free Content For Your Site

One of the biggest challenges many of my clients have is getting enough visitors to their websites. And not just any visitors, but the right kind of visitors - the ones who are high quality prospects for you.

There are literally hundreds of ways you can drive the right kind of traffic to your website, and usually a combination of several brings the best kind of visitor to your site - the ones who are most likely to take action with you - whether that's to sign up for your teleseminar, join your bootcamp, buy your info-product or simply sign up for your ezine list.

But once we get into looking at a client's site, the piece we often find missing is a clearly defined niche. If you don't know who your target clients and customers are, it makes it really difficult to find them and to let them find you.

Step #1. Who is your target market?

Once you define who it is that you're most meant to serve, the easier it will be to know where and how to find them.

Once you have a clearly defined niche, you want to be sure that your website is optimized in the sense that it's ready for the traffic that you're going to be sending to it. There are two essential pieces that you need to have in place before you start driving that traffic to your site:

~ An Invite Site:

This is a simple one-page website where you direct your target market to sign up for your lisst.

~ A Free Taste:

This is your free offering to entice people to join your list once they arrive at your Invite Site.

I'd like to invite you to take a look at your website and make sure that it's super-clear what step people should take when they arrive. The first thing that your visitor should see is the sign-up for your Free Taste.

If you're going to make the effort to get people to your site, you want to make sure you have a way to capture them once they get there to get them on your list and in your marketing & product funnel. Following this model is a foundational piece to building a successful and sustainable business online.

One you have that foundation in place, you need to find ways to access your niche, to get in front of them, so you can drive traffic to your website. There are two key ways to drive traffic to your site:

Step #2. Find Them

The second key to driving traffic to your website is to find out where your target market is hanging out online. Here are some ways you can do that.

> Join Online Networking Groups/Discussion List/Forums/Blogs

Find 3 online networking groups and list your profile and website address that points directly to your sign-up page for your Free Taste. Some great groups can be found on Ryze.com and LinkedIn.com. Search Google Groups or Yahoo Groups for other groups that apply directly to your niche.

The key to utilizing this tool is to build that relationship with your target market, not to sell anything. Every list has it's own set of rules, but most lists will allow you an email signature where you have your URL listed that points to your Free Taste on your website. Many lists also have Promo days where you can point people to your website as well.

> Offer Free Teleseminars

Another way to get in front of your target market is to offer free teleseminars for groups and associations that are made up of your target market. You invite people to visit your site during the teleseminars, and/or when they register - depending on how the association wants it set up. Associations are always looking for speakers, so put together an offer to speak and send these out.

> Do Internet Radio or Podcast Interviews

Offer to be interviewed for a Internet radio or podcast show whose audience is your target market. Make sure you are able to give the URL of where you want people to sign up for your Free Taste. To find an appropriate show, Google "your niche + podcast" or "your niche + radio shows."

Step #3. Let them find you

The third key is to leave clues for people to find you online.

If your niche isn't clear in the sense that they're not necessarily hanging out together, this is sort of a sideways way to reach them.

> Pay-Per-Click Advertising

Google Adwords or Yahoo Overture are the two biggest players in the pay-per-click arena. You can create a PPC campaign for a very small investment, and because you have complete control over your budget, you can set it for whatever amount you feel comfortable with. It's very difficult to get to the top of the "organic" search results (on the left side of the search results page) but can be very easy to get on the first page of results with a PPC, bringing targeted traffic to you. And, the best part is you only pay when someone clicks your ad that takes them to your website.

Use the PPC's research tool to help find the best keywords for your target market (keywords are just search terms that help people find you online), and then use them in your articles to help the search engines drive traffic to your site.

> Write & Submit Articles

There are several reasons why you want to implement this strategy. One is to educate your target market about you and what you do. Another is that it helps to position you as an expert. And another reason is that your articles give people a taste of your style, what it is that you offer, and it gives them an opportunity to get to know you a bit without risking anything.

When someone enters your keywords in the search form, your article will pop up and that will drive traffic to your site.

> Optimize Your Website for the Search Engines

You'd have to be a fulltime search engine optimization expert to keep up with all the changes the major search engines make, but there are a few basic things you can do to help your site come up for relevant searches. Here are some to get you started:

a. Define your keywords - this is how people will find your business online. The trick is to find keywords that are highly relevant to what you offer and popular enough that they will attract decent traffic to your site, but not so competitive that you can't rank well using them. Use your keywords in your web page copy.

b. Create your metatags - this is how the search engines "read" your site. Put your keywords in your metatags on each page of your website.

c. Submit your site to the search engines:

Why wait for the search engines' robots or spiders to find you? Submit your website (it's best if you submit every page individually) to at least these three major search engines manually. It's easy and only takes a minute.

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