The traffic you bring to your website matters for a variety of reasons. Not only do we, as business owners, want our prospective clients to discover and explore our website  and our business as a whole — but website traffic can also lead to increased brand awareness and help boost Search Engine Optimization, too! Today, we’re going to explore 5 ways to boost website traffic — so your online presence can better connect with and serve your prospective clients, and in turn, grow your business.

5 Ways to Boost Website Traffic

Website traffic refers to the people or users who visit your website. Just like like your social media audience, it’s ideal if your website’s visitors are members of your target audience. We think of it this way: It’s better to have a smaller and more dedicated social media audience than a large audience of people who never plan to hire you or purchase from you. 

Similarly, the users who visit your website should, ideally, be the right visitors — people who are interested in the products and services you offer and eventually hope or plan to hire you or purchase from you. That being said, bringing more visitors to your website can make a meaningful difference for small business owners:

• More website traffic can mean more prospective clients are gathering information about you, your business, your products, and your services,
• More website traffic can grow your website and social media audience overall, leading to increased brand awareness, and
• More website traffic can enhance your Search Engine Optimization. Search Engine Optimization is impacted by a variety of factors — one of which is traffic to your website. So, the more dependable and helpful your website is considered by search engines, the better! 

For all of these reasons and more, bringing the right visitors to your website can make a meaningful difference for your small business. So, let’s explore 5 ways to boost website traffic!

1. Ensure the foundation of your website is rock solid. When creating a web design, we believe organization is key. We put ourselves in the shoes of your prospective clients and aim to create a really seamless, engaging, and user-friendly experience. From having a clear and well-organized navigation menu to ensuring the content of each page leads visitors toward booking your services, organization can make all the difference. Where similar content can be combined — for example, About, Our Team, and Our Mission can all be condensed and included on a single About page — we do so, to ensure your visitors can find all of the information they are looking for in as few clicks as possible.
   
   Creating a user-friendly experience will keep visitors engaged with your website and confidently exploring and clicking from one page to another — which is helpful not only from a user experience standpoint, but also from a Search Engine Optimization standpoint. The longer a visitor spends on your website, the better! Ensure your headings help to answer the questions of who you are, what you do, who you serve, and if your business is location-bound, where you serve. Often times, less is more, so keeping the content of your website clear and concise can make all the difference.
   
   Lastly, ensure all the links within your website are in working order. Linking between pages within your design — for example, creating a call-to-action on each page leading leads visitors to your Services page or to your Contact page — can create a user-friendly and conversion-driven experience. When the foundation of your website is rock solid, you can ensure your website is answering essential questions, creating a user-friendly experience, and equipping your visitors to connect with you and your business in a meaningful and lasting way.
   
2. Create blog content regularly and enhance every post with Search Engine Optimization in mind. We like to think of the foundational pages of your website (Home, About, Services, Portfolio, and Contact) as the body of your website — and think of your blog posts as the arms and legs of your website.  While the foundational pages of your website can make a difference, your blog posts allow your website to cast a wider net for discoverability, and in turn, reach a wider audience. If you are on the fence about blogging, know your blog can make a meaningful difference for your business. Blogging can help you to showcase your expertise, share your recent work in a more personal way, and serve your audience more openly and freely.
   
   If you aren’t quite sure what to blog about, here are a few ideas:
   • Think about the frequently asked questions you receive as a small business. Focus on one of those questions per blog post, and share your expertise and approach with your audience.
   • Blog about your past work or past clients you’ve served. Whether you recap their experience while working with you, or you interview your past clients to share more about their experience, your blog can offer a more detailed look at your past work than your Portfolio may.
   • Blog about your favorite or recommended resources for your prospective clients. If you serve couples through photography, blog about posing, outfit choices, or location choices. If you serve fellow business owners, blog about your favorite business resources. Your blog can serve as an educational resource for your prospective clients, which in turn, helps to build your credibility and can create a more trusting relationship with your blog readers.
   
   As Showit users, we use WordPress for our blog post creation. As WordPress users, we use a plugin called Yoast SEO to enhance every post with Search Engine Optimization in mind. As we compose our blog post, the Yoast SEO plugin lets us know how our blog post can be further strengthened for enhanced SEO. It may let us know our blog post needs to have more words, or it may let us know we need to include more links within our post. This plugin has made all the difference in helping us confidently know our blog content is working on behalf of our website, and therefore, our business.
   
3. Share each blog post you publish on social media regularly. Every time you publish a new blog post, share your blog post on social media — Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, TikTok — focusing on the platform or platforms where your audience can be found. It’s natural to want to be present across all social media platforms, but we recommend focusing on the platforms where your prospective clients or customers can be found. That way, you are focusing your efforts on the platforms most likely to convert your audience members to readers, clients, or customers.
   
   Share each blog post not only on the day it is published, but also in the future. When you write evergreen blog content — content that is relevant to readers no matter the day or time of year — your posts can be shared in the weeks, months, and years that follow. As an example, if you write a blog post about your Top 5 Favorite Business Tools, that blog post will be relevant no matter the time of year — and you can confidently share a link to that blog post with readers anytime. Tools like CoSchedule and Buffer are perfect for scheduling blog post links to be shared across various social media platforms. That way, you can batch all of your social media scheduling in one sitting and rest easy knowing that links to your website and blog are being shared consistently. 
   
4. Pin a Pinterest-friendly graphic for each blog post you publish. Pinterest is more of a search engine than a social media platform — so we also recommend creating a Pinterest-friendly graphic for each blog post you publish. When you pin your graphic to Pinterest, you expose your pin, and therefore, your blog post link, to millions of Pinterest users. We recommend using Tailwind for Pinterest pin scheduling, so you can pin and re-pin your content — and better equip your re-pins to multiply. 
   
5. Seek to have your website linked to from other dependable websites. When your website is linked to from other dependable, high-quality websites, not only does your discoverability improve, but your Search Engine Optimization is also enhanced. Seek to have your business listed in a dependable business directory, or seek to be interviewed on blogs or on podcasts. The more places and the more ways in which your website can be accessed, the better! 

These 5 ways to boost website traffic are a starting place — a handful of actionable ways you can begin to strategically increase your website traffic. Which of these will you try out first? Share today’s episode on Instagram and tag us at @withgraceandgold to let us know!

Since 2014, With Grace and Gold has provided brand and web design for creative small business owners. Hire With Grace and Gold or shop With Grace and Gold’s pre-made designs and Showit website templates – and come away with an elevated brand and web design for your small business!

About Brand It, Build It Podcast, Hosted by Kelly Zugay

Hosted by Kelly Zugay, co-founder of With Grace and Gold, The Brand It, Build It Podcast is a leading small business marketing podcast for small business owners, creatives, founders and entrepreneurs. Enjoy weekly, actionable episodes to build a successful, sustainable small business from the inside out.