There are two ways of increasing website traffic, paid and organic. The classification is based on where visitors come from. Paid traffic is generated from advertisements. Many people pay webmasters to place banners in their websites or review a post. Organic site traffic is created by search engine results displayed after users type a keyword in a search engine box. Many people are keen on organic traffic because it is free and can be done by anyone with basic knowledge of search engine optimization.
1. Content
Create high quality content and post it on either your site or a third party site. This is one of the most important steps to boosting organic traffic. Content creation has a significant effect on getting good ranking with search engines. However, it is also important not to stuff keywords in the content. The information posted on a webpage should be relevant, helpful and informative. As a general rule of thumb, keyword density should be 2-4%. Just try to remember to write for the user and not the search engine, and you will be on the right path.
2. Search Engine Optimization
Make the webpages search engine-friendly. The optimization techniques should target the most used search engines on the internet. If the webpage has keywords that are frequently searched for, it will experience an increase in organic traffic. Keywords should appear in the title, headers, and body of content.
The site should be user-friendly and with a logical link structure to rank highly on search engines. One method of doing this is by including a breadcrumb trail to ease navigation. Most search engines place certain importance on incoming links that a site has. RSS feeds and press release distribution are some of the methods used to increase incoming links to a site.
3. Images
Some people miss organic traffic generated by image searches because the image files they use on their sites have not been properly optimized. To optimize images, name them using a word or phrase that is closely related to the site’s content. The common mistake that many site owners make is that they use numbers to name their images such as “image 7.jpg”. Such names do not help search engines know what an image displays. Use appropriate alt tags when naming the images. For example, if the site deals with phone apps use the alt tag “how to make phone apps.”
4. Social Networking
Social networks have millions of active users. This creates a platform for organic traffic generation that is free. Social networking sites have pages for businesses and people who deal with various products and services. By posting information on a page, many people can share the information with their friends and clients.
Whenever users interact with a company’s page, an update will display on their profile pages as well. If the users communicate interesting information about the company, other friends can share it and this can go viral. This can significantly boost organic traffic to the company’s website.
5. Keyword Research
Use various web research tools to find out the keywords that most people use when making a search. This helps website owners find search keywords that they can use to optimize their sites. Go for long-tail keywords instead of high volume keywords.
Long-tail keywords have less traffic but less competition. High volume keywords are more competitive, this means people who use high volume keywords are competing against many other sites using the same keywords.
Business owners do not just want to increase traffic to their sites but also attract the interest of people with the right demographics. Organic traffic allows website owners to get the attention of the right clients by using traffic-boosting techniques to optimize their sites.
This is a guest post by Aubrey Phelps, a writer for Nethosting. She studies SEO and spends her spare time with family.
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