5 Free Ways to Grow Your Traffic

It’s always a pleasure to feature guests on our website, but it’s especially a pleasure when that guest is also an expert in digital marketing strategies—especially SEO!

So of course we were thrilled when Marie O’Sullivan, a talented Web Designer and SEO Specialist, accepted our invitation to share her wisdom on traffic growth strategies with our readers.

Here’s her top 5 FREE ways to grow your own website traffic. Enjoy!

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If you have a brand new (or neglected!) website, you’re probably not getting much traffic yet. It doesn’t take long to figure out that crossing your fingers and hoping that your ideal client will stumble across your website isn’t the best marketing strategy. 

Don’t despair, there are easy ways to get more eyes on your website, and in this post, I’m going to share my favorite (free!) strategies to get more visitors to your website that you’ve probably overlooked. 

1. Add the Website URL to Your Social Media Profiles

Don’t forget to add your website URL to all your social media bios (including your personal profile) – you’d be surprised at how often people click on these links. Check out this article if you’re not sure how to add a link to your Instagram bio.

It’s great to build your social media following, but make sure you’re making it easy for these followers to visit your website, read your blogs, sign up for your freebies, and check out your offers. 

If you’re active and helpful in Facebook groups where your ideal client hangs out, they’re likely to click on your bio, even if promo isn’t allowed in the group. 

2. Put a Link to Your Website in Your Email Signature

Have you been growing your email list with a freebie? If so, well done. Remember though that many of your email subscribers are likely to be on a huge number of email lists.

Just because they’re signed up for your newsletter, doesn’t mean they’re actively engaging with your website or have read all of your content.

Make sure you stay top of mind by making it easy for newsletter subscribers to remember who you are and what you do. Make it easy for your newsletter list to visit your website by adding a link to your website in your email signature.

If you’re not sure how to create an email signature, Signature Hound is a free email signature generator that can help you easily customize a professional-looking signature that matches your branding.   

3. Include a Link on Social Media Images

The easiest way to remember to do this is to create a template in Canva and add a text block that includes your website URL. 

4. Write Guest Posts

Writing guest posts can help you reach a wider audience. Plus, it’s a great way to grow your blog traffic when you’re just starting out. 

Benefits of Guest Posting

• Often you’ll get a “do follow” backlink to your site 

• It positions you as an expert to your existing audience because they’ll sit up and take notice if you’re being featured elsewhere (you can share the guest post on your social media and in your newsletter)

• Get to know other bloggers and raise your profile in your niche

• Boosts your domain ranking 

You might have tried cold emailing bloggers and not had much success. Luckily, there’s an easier way to search for blogs that are likely to accept a guest blog! 

Be selective about the sites you choose to guest blog on. Of course, make sure they are reputable sites and aligned with what you do so that the traffic coming to your blog is highly targeted.

Pro tip: Don’t be tempted to pay for backlinks, this is known as “black hat SEO” and is a sure-fire way to get penalized if you’re caught!

Bear in mind that there’s not much point in writing a guest blog for a website that’s completely unrelated to your niche! Don’t worry though, there’s an easy way to narrow down potential blogs that complement what you do.

You can find guest posting opportunities by typing “[your niche] write for us” into Google. Try other variations such as [your niche] too.

Normally the search results will highlight several guest posting opportunities. Make sure to read any guidelines about how to format your post. These guidelines might include things like: 

How to Filter Guest Post Opportunities to Find the Best Fit:

• Check if the blogger is active on social media – they are likely to share your posts on their channels 

• Read their About Page and figure out if their audience is made up of your ideal clients

• Type the website URL into Mozbar to check the domain authority

• Do a bit of sleuthing! Is the blog regularly updated (Google loves fresh content), or does it seem to be abandoned?

• This will sound obvious but it’s often overlooked – make sure you READ the blog you intend to pitch so that you’re not pitching a blog post idea that has already been covered on the site!

Once you have filtered for the guest post opportunities that are likely to be the best fit for what you offer and who you want to work with, make a list of blogs you intend to pitch.

It’s a good idea to create a simple spreadsheet or add these shortlisted opportunities to a project management tool such as Asana or Trello so that you can track your efforts over time. 

For example, you might want to list the name of the blog, a link to their submission guidelines, the date you sent your pitch, the date you followed up, the date you submitted your article, and a link to the live post. 

Finally, make sure to promote the guest blog and thank the host for helping you to build your audience. 

5. Apply to Be a Podcast Guest

This is a very similar strategy to tip number 4, but it has the added benefit that your ideal client will get to hear your voice and can form a connection with your vision and values.

Appearing on a podcast can help people who are new to your world to feel like they know you and to decide to check out any freebies or offers that are mentioned on the show.

I hope you found these tips helpful. Comment below to let me know which ones you hadn’t thought of and are going to implement right away. And of course, if you’ve got an idea that I haven’t covered, I’d love to hear it!