49 Web Traffic Drivers – Part 4

Ultimate part. Ultimate male. Almost.

Let’s recap really quickly.

Part 1: A bunch of people in Westminster brought you 11 setup tips to bring in traffic.

Part 2: Then Megan Fox presented 10 content ideas.

Part 3: Finally, Emma Watson finished off with 12 more content tips.

Oh, alright, they weren’t really presented by celebrities. Pffft, you readers are so picky!

Today’s ultimate part of the list isn’t presented by Johnny Depp, the ultimate male. Yes, I know he’s usually voted second to Mr. Pitt but he’s married to a Frenchwoman, so he’s cooler, alright? Jeez, talk about pedantic.

Mr. Depp will (not) be bringing you 16 “other” ways to bring extra visitors your way. These include linkage, social, advertising and other-other things. Off we go!

Part 4: Other Drivers

a. Linking

34. Back scratching

The best links are reciprocal links. You scratch my blog and I’ll scratch yours. Most people have a blogroll or some kind of “friends” list on their site and, if you can convince someone popular to add you, you can get some free traffic.

Be careful of untrustworthy types, though. It’s not unknown for site owners to add you until they see your link to them, then wait a few days and whip your link off their page. Run round every now and again to make sure your back’s being scratched, not stabbed. (There’s a plugin for managing this on WordPress.)

35. It’s good on the inside, too

Internal site links do improve an individual page’s PR. They won’t help the whole site’s PR but that’s not really the idea. You’re building a spider’s web for your visitors, where they go from post to post because they’re all so interesting.

The longer someone stays on your site, the more likely they are to want to come back – assuming you’re adding content, anyway. People who land on a page then click away aren’t the visitors you want if you’re trying to build a community (or get lots of click-through revenue off AdSense).

36. It’s better on the outside

Ever heard of trackbacks? They’re like reciprocal links between blog posts rather than whole sites. As a rule of thumb (or any other appendage), you should always link to someone else’s content if you mention it or use it in any way. Like for research or something. If you’re lucky, that person will link to your post and give you a trackback. If you’re luckier, they have lots of traffic.

These links improve PR and can bring millions of visitors to your site. Well, OK, so that’s not likely… lots of visitors, anyway. That’s also the idea behind the bookmarking sites.

37. Ooh, look!

If you find something really cool, point to it. It doesn’t matter if no one’s ever heard of it – in fact, that’s probably better. “Discovering” a killer app for whatever your niche is, an amazing article, a profound yet strangely profitable piece of advice… anything that other people will like. Point to it. Jump up and down and go “Ooh, look!”

And mention your post to whoever created the thing you’re pointing at. A little recognition from their side can’t hurt.

38. In other news

If your site’s advertising something that you can do press releases about, do them. It doesn’t really matter whether you have anything new to say about your product/service these days: people post releases about nothing all the time. Even a release like “Nothing new to announce but the product’s still cool” will go down just fine with the vast majority of brain-dead web-wanderers and tabloid journalists with a column to fill.

Put your announcement on as many free press release sites as you can. I honestly don’t know if anyone reads them but if they do, you might pick up a bunch of extra hits. I was going to link to Mashable‘s list of sites but it’s only got 20 and it’s seriously outdone by the pure simplicity of Avangate’s 50-strong version (plus LOTS more in the comments). So much for the big, popular site having the best info. Ooh, look! Press release sites!

39. Take your shoes off

Ever considered letting someone else post on your site? Why not? Guest posts save you the trouble of coming up with something creative for a day and give your readers a break from you, too. Another point of view is always a good thing.

If you’ve had a barney with another blog, try inviting the owner to guest post and rebut or refute your accusations. Not only will that make you look cool, it’ll give you some fodder for a follow-up. I want a good, clean fight… no hitting below the waist…

b. Social

40. Eggs and spam

Do not spam. I’ll say that again: do not spam. Spamming is any unsolicited email, which means that sending an update to your blog subscribers without their permission is still spam. They only signed up to receive new posts, not your random updates.

Spamming is the worst thing you can ever do unless your business is one of those vomitous Get Rich Quick things, in which case everyone already knows you’re a vile, obnoxious, unethical scum-sucking asshole.

41. How many roads must a spam walk down?

OK, so you’re not spamming. But you can inform people about your amazingly cool site update through as many channels as possible: think Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Plaxo, LinkedIn, Bebo, Pinterest and wherever else you have accounts.

Don’t forget the bookmarking sites, either – Digg, StumbleUpon, Delicious and all the others can pop more people over to your site, especially if you can convince your readership to add their oomph to your listing. That’s how I got a viral thingy – a bunch of people Dugg it.

How many social sites/networks are there out in virtualcrazyland anyway? Wiki knows.

42. Don’t ignore people

You know this, right? I don’t have to tell you to answer comments and email, do I? I do? Yeesh, alright. Answer your comments and email. This is just as critical for a blogger as it is for a business.

A business is measured not only on profit and product/service delivery but on customer service. I’ve written about this several times, both good and bad.

A blog is measured not only on content and originality (and other stuff) but on community participation. If you’re not talking to your readers, how the hell are you supposed to know what they want?

43. Make your mark

Your signature is a great way to publicise your site. Make sure you put your URL in it – and in every version of it. That means in email, forums, social sites, messaging services and absolutely everywhere else you sign your name online. Just a simple URL; no more, no less. Then people know where to find you. Just pray they’re not hiring a hit-man.

c. Other Stuff

44. Sub me, baby

Make sure your visitors know they can subscribe to your site. It can be an RSS, an automated email or some kind of weird subscription list that you manage manually; it doesn’t matter as long as they can subscribe. People rarely cancel subscriptions unless you suck so badly you deserve it.

Feedburner is now owned by Google but still does the same thing it always did: handles RSS and email subscriptions to blogs and sites. Easy to set up, fire-and-forget. My kind of woman. Er, site.

(No, I wasn’t serious: I just couldn’t let such a good joke opportunity pass me by.)

45. Advertising

If you’ve got money to burn or any kind of marketing budget, use it. Print some business cards with your site details and a single-line summary of what you do (your ‘elevator pitch‘), then leave them in public places.

Pay for a PPC campaign on your primary keywords to bring in extra traffic and spread your reputation to a broader audience. (Though don’t end up like those IP telephony ads that appear absolutely everywhere at the moment and are therefore annoying.)

If you don’t have money, visit forums that cover your niche or that interest you and post on them. Not spam – actual, useful posts. You do have your URL in your signature, don’t you? Good.

Create links to your site from article directories. You are posting your best content as articles, aren’t you? You’re not? Go back and read Part 3 of this series, then!

46. Freebie jeebies!

Giving something away is a great way to bring new people to your site. It doesn’t have to be anything immensely valuable. Some people give copies of an ebook, some give vouchers, some give a CD – anything you can think of will encourage folks to visit.

The smart cookies always try to get more than just a visit for their freebie: using an email subscription service to make the offer (you’ll need a landing page and some other stuff) is an excellent option: the visitor gets the freebie in return for being subscribed to your feed or newsletter.

47. Follow up

Remember the viral posts suggestion? If you’re ever lucky enough to get one of these – or just have an exceptional day when loads of people visit – make sure you follow up on it. Otherwise you have good intentions and no follow-through, like a castrated dog sniffing a bitch in heat. And that’s sad.

Take time. Sit down and put together a couple of exceptional updates. Then post them over the following days. A lot of that traffic peak won’t ever come back but some will – following up makes sure you have something cool for them to see and encourages them to subscribe or bookmark.

48. Ping…

Blog updates are automatically sent to your email subscribers but what about RSS readers? Most of them are smart enough to remember the last update they checked but some – especially those built into blog aggregators and the like – need a poke in the arm to tell them you have new content.

This is called ‘pinging’. Like a submarine, your site sends out a ping and anyone listening (i.e. sites that have your blog listed) hears it. They can then add you to their update list and pick up the entry excerpt so everyone knows you’ve written another world-shattering article.

And here’s a tip: Ping-o-matic will send pings to all the major services in one go. It’s free. Neato.

49. Vital statistics

Most site and blogging plaftorms have built-in stats for you to analyse. Make sure you do. Stats give you insight into what your readers like, though you need an awful lot of background info to make sense of sudden peaks and troughs. Even so, keep an eye on them and figure out what’s popular and what’s not.

And there you have it – 49 ways to get a bunch of extra visitors on your site. I’m sure it’s by no means a definitive list…

So help me out here… give me a 50th traffic tip!

This post was originally published on ScrawlBug.com, where you can still read the comments.