Welcome to Part Four of our Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to grow your business online automatically using WordPress.
So far, here is what we have covered in this series:
In Part 1, we explain why using an expertly configured WordPress website is the key to automating traffic to your website …
(With an expertly configured WordPress web site, all you have to do to automatically start attracting traffic is post fresh content on a consistent basis!)
In Part 2, we focused on critical setup decisions. We helped you understand the best way to get started if you don’t have a website yet, how to set things up if you already have a website, and what to do if your website has been built with WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up WordPress on your domain)
In Part Three, we looked at important configuration decisions.
Here, we configure all the settings (hosting, internal and external) that affect your site’s ability to generate traffic automatically …
(In Part Three you learn how to configure all the settings (hosting, internal and external) that can affect your site’s ability to generate traffic automatically)
In Part 4, we will look at ways to automate traffic to your website using various plugins.
Why Automate The Traffic Generation Process?
Depending on which online marketing gurus you talk to, you could end up trying to spend an hour or two (or more) every day promoting your business on social media in addition to trying to run your business, creating content and managing your web presence.
Many businesses simply lack the time, resources and budget to employ the services of a full-time marketing and content creation department and engage in the kind of content marketing that many online marketing experts are advising. If you are spending half your day posting updates on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn in addition to writing articles for your website or blog, how can anything else in your business get done?
(Small businesses spend most of their time keeping their businesses up and running. Infographic: NFIB)
Small businesses spend most of their time keeping their businesses up and running. In addition to running a business, there’s also sales and marketing. After all, businesses need to stay competitive and grow in order to survive.
A study of small businesses done by email and social media marketing company Vertical Response found that:
- Almost half of all small businesses surveyed spent around six hours each week on social media (the other half 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 figures would most likely be higher.
- More than half of all businesses surveyed spent 1-3 hours or more to create a blog post.
- Finding and posting content for social media was their most time-consuming online activity.
(Small businesses are spending more time marketing and promoting themselves online. Image source: VerticalResponse.com)
As businesses spend more time on online marketing as a matter of business survival and competition, this puts more and more pressure on businesses to prioritize their time on other equally vital areas …
(Businesses with limited resources, time, and budget and many different business areas to focus on require careful planning of their marketing strategy.)
Another important thing to keep in mind is that, in addition to spending time social websites, you are investing all of your efforts into virtual real estate that you have no control over. You don’t own Twitter, Facebook, or YouTube. These companies can and will make decisions that can dramatically affect your business without requiring your input. Why invest so much effort and time building a business on someone else’s real estate? With WordPress (self-hosted), you can control your own virtual real estate and publish your content automatically to other online properties.
Automating business systems and processes to leverage time is not new. Businesses have been doing it since the Industrial Age. In the Digital Age, however, the increasing availability of many new channels for promoting and marketing a business online creates a number of dilemmas for business owners and business managers, especially for those with limited marketing budgets, time, and resources. For example:
- Which of these marketing channels should you focus more of your time, budget, and efforts on?
- Should you invest so much time and effort building assets on sites that you ultimately have no control over (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, etc.) while neglecting your own domain?
- Do you create new content for every channel you plan to include in your marketing strategy?
The Benefits Of Automating Your Traffic Generation With WordPress
What we’d like to show you now, is a free, simple, and effective strategy that lets you automate your traffic-getting process with WordPress.
With this strategy, you will be able to:
- Save time creating web content and other marketing channels (e.g. social media),
- Save money on content creation and unnecessary web marketing costs,
- Determine which marketing channels you should invest more of your time, efforts, and budget on,
- Invest most of your efforts building your own asset instead of someone else’s and still benefit from other people’s marketing channels.
Many automated 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 recommend avoiding black hat sites, tools, methods, and anything that violates the terms of service and policies of companies like Google, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc..
(Web traffic automation does not require the use of black hat techniques!)
The purpose of this article is not to game web services or bypass their terms of service, but to show you how to automate your content distribution so you can leverage your time and marketing efforts, and get additional exposure online from sites used by your target audience.
An Automated Content Distribution, Traffic And Lead Generation, And Sales & Marketing System
We’ve just seen that most small businesses lack the time, resources and budget to engage in the kind of content marketing that many online experts advise doing. What you want to do, then, is to be strategic and work smart within your limited resources, budget, and time.
So, instead of doing this …
(Posting content to individual marketing channels can be very time-consuming!)
Why not opt for this approach 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 your content distribution to all other channels.
You can:
- Distribute content automatically to social channels and social bookmarking sites,
- Automatically distribute content (and comments) 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 get all of this done?
Simple … first, set up your website or blog as described in Part Two. Then, get everything configured as explained in Part Three. Once all of this is in place, you then connect all of the dots using plugins.
The video below shows you how everything works once your WordPress site has been expertly configured …
WordPress Web Traffic Automation Blueprint – Traffic Generation Plugins
Let’s take a look now at a few traffic-generation plugins that can help to:
- Distribute content to social sites and social bookmarking sites
- Syndicate comments automatically to other blogs
- Distribute content automatically to other online properties via RSS feeds
Jetpack
You can get your posts automatically distributed to sites like Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+ 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 many useful functions.
After installing Jetpack, you will need to connect the plugin to the WordPress.com account you set up in Part Three …
(Connect Jetpack to your WordPress.com account)
Next, activate the Publicize feature …
(Jetpack – Publicize)
Configure this section to automatically share your posts on Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, GooglePlus, and more …
(Share your posts automatically on several social media networks.)
After configuring all of the plugin and account settings, your content is ready for distribution.
The Publicize feature adds a new section to your Publish box …
(Publicize account settings displays in the post publishing 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 posts are published, they will be automatically shared online.)
To learn more about the benefits of using this WordPress plugin, go here: Jetpack by WordPress.com
CommentLuv
(CommentLuv)
WordPress has a built-in commenting system that allows your visitors to engage with your site, post comments, reply to other users and participate in discussions as part of an online community.
You can enhance the WordPress default commenting feature using a number of third-party plugins that integrate your comments with social media, helping to share and spread your content around.
For example, using a plugin like CommentLuv (Pro version) can help make your site more attractive to commenters by offering them a choice of backlinks if they +1, tweet, or like your content. This plugin will visit the comment author’s website while they enter their comment and retrieve their most recent blog posts, which can be included with their comment after clicking the submit button.
(CommentLuv can encourage a greater level of commenting and create more user engagement on your website or blog.)
Visit this site for more details about the benefits of using this plugin:
Social LinkMachine
(Social LinkMachine – WordPress content distribution plugin)
SocialLinkMachine is a WordPress plugin that allows you to syndicate and drip-feed your content, build diverse anchor text backlinks, include relevant images and videos, and create 2nd-tier links and social signals on auto-pilot …
(Social LinkMachine – drip-feed your content automatically to dozens of traffic-generating sites)
With SocialLinkMachine installed, you can automatically syndicate your content to dozens of authority websites, like:
- Social Bookmarking Sites: e.g. Delicious, Linkagogo, Instapaper, Zotero, etc.
- Web 2.0 Blogs: e.g. Blogger, Rebel Mouse, Tribe, etc.
- Social Platforms: Google Plus, Xing, etc.
- Image Sharing: e.g. Pinterest, etc.
- Document Sharing Platforms: e.g. Issuu, Scribd, etc.
For more information about the benefits of using this great plugin, visit the plugin website: Social LinkMachine
Also, if you would like to know more about setting up social media monitoring (so you can get useful information about your content marketing campaigns), we have written a detailed article listing many social media monitoring tools that are worth knowing about. More info:
The above are just some examples of the many content distribution plugins that WordPress makes available.
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 Blueprint: Automated Content Syndication Process – Summary
Once your website and plugins have been expertly configured and fully set up, all you need to do then to automatically begin bringing web traffic is add great content on a regular basis.
We have created a complete email training series designed to help you come up with unlimited content for posting to your website or blog:
Once you have configured your WordPress site, the next step is to optimize the process. This step is covered in the next article in our WordPress Traffic Blueprint series.
This is the end of Part Four
To read the rest of this article, click here:
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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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