Welcome to Part Four of our Web Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to create an automated traffic generating machine using the WordPress CMS.
So far, here is what we have covered in this article series:
In Part One, we explain why using an expertly configured WordPress website or blog is the key to automating traffic to your site …
(With an expertly configured WordPress website or blog, all you have to do is post web content on a regular basis to generate more traffic!)
In Part Two, we look at the setup phase of the blueprint. We explain the best way to start if you don’t have a website yet, how to set everything up if you already have a site, and what to do if your existing website was built with WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up a WordPress website or blog on your domain)
In Part Three, we looked at the configuration phase of the traffic automation blueprint.
Here, we configure all the settings that can affect your website’s ability to generate traffic automatically …
(In Part Three you learn how to configure all the settings that affect your website’s ability to generate traffic automatically)
In Part Four, we look at ways to automate the traffic system with different plugins.
Why Automating The Traffic-Getting Process Makes Sense
Depending on which marketing expert you listen to, you could end up investing a couple of hours or more each day posting content on social media.
Many small businesses simply lack the time, resources and financial means to engage in the kind of content marketing that many marketing experts are advising. If you spent hours posting updates on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter in addition to planning and writing content for your blog or website, how would you get anything in your business done?
(Small businesses spend most of their time keeping their businesses up and running. Infographic source: National Federation Of Independent Businesses)
Many business owners spend most of their working hours simply keeping their businesses up and running. On top of this, there’s sales and marketing. After all, businesses need to stay competitive and grow in order to survive.
Marketing research done in 2012 by VerticalResponse – an email and social media marketing company, found that:
- Almost half of all small businesses surveyed spent at least six hours per week on social media (the other half spent even more time – between 6 and 21+ hours per week). This was a 66% increase from the previous year, so if the same research was done today, the numbers would most likely be even higher.
- More than half of all small businesses surveyed spent 1-3 hours or more creating a blog post.
- Finding and posting content for social media was their most time-consuming online activity.
(Businesses are spending more time every year marketing and promoting themselves online. Infographic: VerticalResponse)
As small businesses spend increasingly larger amounts of time promoting and marketing themselves online as a matter of business survival and competition, this leaves even less time for under-resourced businesses to focus on other equally vital areas …
(Businesses with limited time, resources, and budgets and many different business areas to focus on require careful planning of their marketing strategy.)
Another thing to consider is that, in addition to spending time promoting and marketing your business on a number of social media websites, all of your efforts are going into virtual real estate that you have no control over. You don’t own Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn. These companies often will make decisions that can dramatically affect your business without consulting you. Why invest so much effort and time building content on someone else’s real estate? With a self-hosted WordPress site, you can control your own real estate and publish your content automatically to other sites.
Automating systems and process to leverage time is not new. Businesses of all sizes have been doing it ever since the Industrial Age. In the Information Age, however, the increasing availability of hundreds of new channels for promoting and marketing a business creates a number of dilemmas for small business owners and business managers, especially for those with limited time, budget, and resources. For example:
- Which marketing channels should you focus more of your budget, efforts, and time on?
- Should you invest so much time and effort building a web presence on other people’s sites (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, etc.) while ignoring your own domain?
- Do you create new content for every channel you plan to market and promote your business on?
The Benefits Of Automating The Traffic Generation With WordPress
What we’d like to show you now, is a free, simple, and effective method that lets you automate the traffic generation with WordPress.
With this strategy, you will be able to:
- Save time creating content for your website and social media,
- Save money on content creation and unnecessary online marketing costs,
- Determine which marketing channels you should invest more of your efforts, time, and your budget on,
- Invest most of your time building your own asset and still benefit from other people’s marketing channels.
Many automated web traffic solutions tend to focus on black hat methods, such as manipulating search engine results. This is not what the focus of this article series is about. In fact, we urge you to avoid using black hat websites, techniques, solutions, and anything designed to “game” or violate the policies and terms of service of services like Facebook, Pinterest, Google, etc..
(Web traffic automation does not require using black hat techniques!)
What we are focusing in this article series is not to manipulate web services or break their terms of service, but to show you how to automate your content distribution so you can leverage your time and efforts, and get additional exposure online from websites that your target audience frequents.
An Automated Content Distribution, Traffic And Lead Generation, And Sales & Marketing System
We’ve just seen in the previous section how most small businesses lack the time, resources and budget to engage in the kind of content marketing that many online experts recommend. What you want to do, then, is to be strategic and work smart within your limited resources.
So, instead of choosing this approach, which is very time-consuming …
(Posting content to different services one at a time can be very time-consuming!)
Why not choose this time-saving strategy instead …
(Set up an automated content distribution, lead and traffic generation, and sales and marketing system with WordPress)
With an expertly configured WordPress site, you can build more than just a website for your business … you can set up an automated traffic and lead generation and sales & marketing system, where all you do is publish your content and WordPress then automates the rest.
With WordPress, you can publish content once, and automate the distribution of your content to all other services.
You can:
- Automatically distribute content to social sites and social bookmarking sites,
- Automatically distribute comments and content to other blogs and web properties using RSS
- Import content automatically (e.g. videos)
As your business evolves, you can add more functionality and automate processes like:
- Sell products and services with e-commerce,
- Capture leads with opt-in forms and add your subscribers to newsletters and autoresponders,
- Allow visitors to register on your site with different membership levels,
- And so much more!
You can do all of this using inexpensive WordPress plugins. Once these plugins are installed and configured on your site, just direct your visitors to the appropriate sections (e.g. your store, subscription forms, membership area, etc.)
How do you do all of this?
Simple … first, set up your site as shown in Part 2. Then, expertly configure it as described in Part 3. Once all of this is in place, you then automate various processes using plugins.
The video below shows you how everything works once your WordPress site has been expertly configured …
WordPress Web Traffic Blueprint – Plugins
Let’s take a quick look at some examples of traffic-generation plugins that can help:
- Post content automatically to social media sites and social bookmarking sites
- Post comments automatically to other blogs
- Distribute content automatically to other blogs via RSS
Jetpack
You can get your posts automatically distributed to sites like Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, GooglePlus and more as soon as you publish your content using a WordPress plugin like JetPack.
Download URL: https://jetpack.com/
Jetpack is a free WordPress plugin with loads of great features.
After installing Jetpack, connect the plugin to your WordPress.com account (set up in Part 3.) …
(Connect Jetpack to your WordPress.com account)
Next, activate the Publicize feature …
(Activate the Publicize feature on Jetpack)
Configure this section to share your posts on Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, and more …
(Share your content on several social networks.)
After all of the settings have been configured, your content is ready for distribution.
The Publicize feature adds a new section to your Publish box …
(Publicize details in the post publishing box.)
Now, whenever you publish new content, it will automatically be shared online to every account you have set up …
(As soon as new posts are published, they are automatically shared online.)
This is an automated and hands-free way to get more exposure for your content online on social websites.
CommentLuv
(CommentLuv)
The WordPress commenting feature allows your blog readers to engage with your website, post new comments, reply to existing comments and engage with your content.
You can expand the WordPress default commenting feature with third-party plugins that integrate your comments with social media, helping to share and spread your content online.
For example, with a plugin like CommentLuv (Premium version), you can improve user engagement on your web site. The plugin encourages readers to comment using SEO and social reward features like using keywords in the username, backlinks, the ability to add twitter names to comments, and social enticements for sharing your content. This plugin will visit the comment author’s website or blog while they enter their comment and retrieve their last blog posts, which they can choose to include with their comment after clicking the submit button.
(CommentLuv Premium version can attract more comments and visitors and create more user engagement on your web site.)
To learn more about the benefits of using this great plugin, visit this website:
SocialLinkMachine
(SocialLinkMachine – WordPress content distribution plugin)
SocialLinkMachine is a set-and-forget plugin for WordPress that allows you to drip-feed your content to many social sites, build diverse anchor text backlinks, include relevant YouTube videos and images, and create 2nd-tier links and social signals on auto-pilot …
(Social Link Machine – drip-feed content to many traffic-generating platforms)
With Social Link Machine installed, you can automatically syndicate and drip-feed content to over 30 social websites, including:
- Bookmarking Sites: e.g. Deviantart, Diigo, Instapaper, Zotero, etc.
- Web 2.0 Blogging Platforms: e.g. Blog.com, Sett, WordPress.com, etc.
- Social Platforms: Facebook, Xing, etc.
- Image Sharing Platforms: e.g. Flickr, etc.
- Document Sharing: e.g. Issuu, Gett, etc.
For more information about the benefits of using this WordPress plugin, go here: SocialLinkMachine
Also, if you would like to know more about setting up social media monitoring (so you can get actionable information about your content marketing campaigns), we have written a detailed article about social media measurement tools that you may want to check out. For more details, go here:
The above are just a few examples of the many content distribution plugins that are available to WordPress users.
Kickstart Your WordPress Traffic System
After your traffic automation system has been set up, we recommend kickstarting the process of driving traffic to your site with the steps shown in this tutorial:
WordPress Traffic Automation System: Content Syndication Phase – Summary
Once your website and plugins have been configured and set up, all you then have to do to start attracting traffic is publish web content consistently.
If you need endless content ideas for your website or blog, then subscribe to our FREE email training series here:
Once you have expertly configured your WordPress site, the next step is to optimize as much of the process as you can. This step is covered in the next article in the series.
This is the end of Section 4
To read more, click on the link below:
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"If you're new to WordPress, this can stand on its own as a training course and will stay with you as you progress from beginner to advanced and even guru status." - Bruce (Columbus, Ohio)
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