Welcome to Part 4 of our Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we explain how to grow your business online automatically using WordPress.
So far, we have covered the following in this article series:
In Part 1, we explained why using an expertly configured WordPress website is the key to generating automated web traffic …
(With an expertly configured WordPress web site, all you have to do is post web content on a consistent basis to automatically begin attracting new web traffic!)
In Part Two, we focused on critical setup decisions. We explained the best way to get started if you don’t have a web presence yet, how to set things up if you already have a site, and what to do if your website was built with WordPress.
(In Part two we show you how to set up a WordPress website or blog on your domain)
In Part 3, we look at the configuration phase.
Here, we configure all the settings that can affect your website’s traffic-getting ability …
(In Part Three you will configure all the settings (hosting, WordPress and external) that affect your site’s traffic-getting ability)
In Part 4, we look at ways to automate your traffic with different plugins.
Why You Should Automate The Traffic Generation Process
Depending on which marketing guru you get your advice from, you could find yourself spending a couple of hours per day (or more) posting content on social media.
Most businesses lack the time, human resources and budget to employ the services of a full-time marketing department and engage in the kind of content marketing that many marketing experts advise doing. If you are spending half your day checking Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn in addition to planning and writing content for your website or blog, how will you get anything in your business done?
(Small businesses spend most of their working hours keeping their businesses up and running. Source: National Federation Of Independent Businesses)
Many businesses 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 make sales in order to survive.
A study of small businesses conducted in 2012 by email and social media marketing company Vertical Response found that:
- Almost half of all businesses surveyed spent around 6 hours per week on social media (the rest spent even more time – between 6 and 21+ hours per week). This usage of social media was a 66% increase from the previous year, so if the same research was conducted today, the numbers would probably be significantly higher.
- More than half of all small businesses surveyed spent 1-3 hours or more to create a blog post.
- Finding and posting content for social media consumed the most time online.
(Small businesses are spending more time marketing and promoting themselves online. Source: VerticalResponse)
As businesses spend more time on online marketing in order to compete and survive, this leaves less time for under-resourced businesses to focus on other areas …
(Businesses with limited resources, budgets, and time and many business areas to focus on require careful planning of their marketing strategy.)
One other thing to keep in mind is that, in addition to spending time social media websites, you are investing all of your efforts into virtual real estate that you have no control over. You don’t own Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube. These sites often will make decisions that can significantly affect your business without first consulting you. Why invest so much effort and time building content on someone else’s asset? With WordPress, you can control your own real estate and distribute your content automatically to other online properties.
Investing in automation to save time and increase productivity is not new. Businesses have been doing it since the dawn of the Industrial Age. In the Information Age, however, the exponential growth channels for promoting and marketing a business online creates a number of dilemmas for business owners, especially for those with limited budget, time, and resources. For example:
- Which marketing channels do you invest more time, budget, and your efforts on?
- Should you invest so much time and effort building assets on sites that you ultimately have little to no control over (e.g. YouTube, Twitter, Pinterest, etc.) while neglecting the benefits of building content on your own domain?
- Do you create new content for every channel you plan to include in your marketing strategy?
The Benefits Of Automating Your Web Traffic Generation Process With WordPress
What we’d like to show you now, is a free, simple, and effective formula that allows you to automate your traffic generation with WordPress.
With this formula, you will be able to:
- Save time creating content for your website or blog and other marketing channels (e.g. social media),
- Save money on content creation and unnecessary online marketing channels,
- Determine which channels you should focus more time, efforts, and budget on,
- Invest most of your time and efforts building your own asset instead of someone else’s 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 strongly urge that you stay away from all black hat techniques, software, websites, and anything that violates the policies and terms of service of companies like LinkedIn, Google, Facebook, etc..
(Web traffic automation does not require using black hat techniques!)
The purpose of this article series is not to manipulate online services or break their terms of service, but to show you how to automate your content distribution so you can leverage your time and marketing efforts, and increase your exposure online to sites 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, human resources and budget to engage in the kind of content marketing that many online experts prescribe. What you want to do, then, is to be strategic and work smart within your limited budget, resources, and time.
So, instead of choosing this time-consuming approach …
(Posting content to individual marketing channels can be extremely 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 channels.
You can:
- Automatically distribute content to social media services and bookmarking sites,
- Distribute content (and comments) automatically 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 website or blog as explained in Part 2. Then, get it configured as shown in Part Three. Once all of this is in place, you then automate the process using plugins.
The video below shows you how everything works once your WordPress site has been expertly configured …
WordPress Traffic System – Traffic Plugins
Let’s take a quick look at a number of WordPress plugins that can help to:
- Distribute content to social sites and social bookmarking websites
- Distribute comments automatically to other blogs
- Distribute content automatically via RSS to other online properties
Jetpack by WordPress.com
You can get your posts automatically distributed to sites like Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, LinkedIn, GooglePlus and more as soon as you publish new content using a WordPress plugin like JetPack.
Download URL: https://jetpack.com/
Jetpack is a free WordPress plugin with loads of useful functions.
After Jetpack has been installed, you will need to connect the plugin to your WordPress.com account (set up in Part 3.) …
(Connect Jetpack to your WordPress.com account)
Next, activate a feature called Publicize …
(Activate the Publicize feature)
You can share your posts on Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, and more …
(Share your posts automatically on various social accounts.)
After all plugin and account settings have been configured, your content is ready for distribution.
The Publicize feature adds a new section to your Publish box …
(Publicize account settings displayed in your Publish box.)
Now, as soon as you publish new content, it will automatically be shared on all of the accounts you have set up …
(As soon as you publish, your posts are automatically distributed online.)
This is a hands-free way to get more exposure for your content online on social networks.
CommentLuv
(CommentLuv)
The WordPress commenting feature allows your site users to engage with your website or blog, post comments, reply to other users and engage with your content.
You can expand the WordPress built-in commenting feature with a 3rd-party plugin like Disqus, IntenseDebate, LiveFyre, or CommentLuv that integrates with social media, helping to share and spread your content online.
For example, with a plugin like CommentLuv (Premium version), you can create more user engagement on your web site. The plugin encourages readers to comment using SEO and social reward features like social enticements for sharing content, ability to use keywords in the user name, adding twitter handles to comments, and SEO backlinks. This plugin will visit the website or blog of the comment author while they enter their comment and retrieve their latest blog posts, which can be included with their comment after clicking the submit button.
(CommentLuv can attract more comments and visitors and create more user engagement on your site.)
To learn more about the benefits of this plugin, go here:
Social LinkMachine
(Social LinkMachine – WordPress content distribution plugin)
Social Link Machine is a plugin for WordPress that lets you automatically drip-feed your content to many social platforms, build anchor text backlinks, include relevant videos and images, and social signals on auto-pilot …
(Social Link Machine – syndicate your content to over 30 online platforms)
With Social Link Machine installed, you can automatically syndicate your content to dozens of traffic-generating platforms, such as:
- Bookmarking Sites: e.g. Bitly, Linkagogo, Kippt, Zotero, etc.
- Blogs: e.g. Livejournal, Rebel Mouse, Tumblr, etc.
- Social Platforms: Facebook, Twitter, etc.
- Image Sharing Platforms: e.g. Flickr, etc.
- PDF Sharing Platforms: e.g. Docdroid, Scribd, etc.
Go here to learn more about the benefits of using this plugin: Social LinkMachine
Also, if you would like to know more about setting up social media monitoring (in order to get actionable information about your content distribution campaigns), we have created a comprehensive article listing many social media measurement tools and technologies that you may want to check out. More information:
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 System: Content Syndication Stage – Summary
Once your website and plugins have been set up and configured, all you then have to do to automatically drive more traffic is publish new content on a regular basis.
We have created a complete email course designed to help you come up with limitless content ideas for posting to your website or blog:
Once you have expertly configured your WordPress site, the next step is to optimize the process. This step is explained in the next article in our series.
This is the end of Part Four
To read the rest of this article, click here:
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum
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