Welcome to Part Four of our Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to drive new traffic automatically to your website using the WordPress CMS.
So far, here is what we have covered in this article series:
In Part One of this article series, we explained why using an expertly configured WordPress website or blog is the key to generating automated web traffic …
(With an expertly configured WordPress blog, all you have to do to generate traffic is add new content consistently!)
In Part 2, we look at the setup phase of the blueprint. We help you understand the best way to start 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 existing website has been built with WordPress.
(In Part two we show you where to set up WordPress on your domain)
In Part Three, we looked at the configuration phase.
Here, we configure all the settings that can affect your website’s traffic-getting ability …
(In Part 3 you will configure all the settings that can affect your site’s traffic-getting ability)
In this section of the series, we discuss ways to automate the traffic-generation process using various plugins.
Why Automating Your Traffic Generation Makes Sense
Depending on which marketing gurus you talk to, you could find yourself investing 1-2 hours every day (or more) promoting your business on social media.
Most small businesses lack the time, human resources and budget to engage in the kind of content marketing that many online marketing experts prescribe. If you are spending hours posting updates on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn in addition to planning and writing articles for your blog or website, how will you get anything in your business done?
(Keeping their business up and running is how most small businesses spend their working hours. Image source: NFIB)
Small businesses spend most of their working hours trying to keep 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 make sales in order to survive.
Marketing research conducted by VerticalResponse – an email and social media marketing company, found that:
- Almost half of all businesses surveyed spent at least 6 hours each week on social media (the other half of businesses surveyed using social media 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 figures would most likely be significantly 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 the activity that consumed the most time online for all businesses surveyed.
(Small businesses spend more time every year marketing and promoting themselves online. Infographic: VerticalResponse.com)
As businesses spend more time on online marketing as a matter of business survival and competition, this leaves less time for under-resourced businesses to focus on other vital areas …
(Businesses with limited budgets, resources, and time and many different areas to focus on need to plan their marketing strategy very carefully.)
One other important thing to keep in mind is that, in addition to spending time promoting and marketing your business on various social media 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 often will make decisions that can significantly affect your business without requiring your input. Why invest so much time and effort building a business on rented real estate? With WordPress (self-hosted), you can control your own real estate and post your content automatically to other websites.
Automating business processes to save time is nothing new. Businesses of all sizes have been doing it since the dawn of the Industrial Age. In the Digital Age, however, the exponential growth marketing channels creates a number of dilemmas for small business owners, especially for those with limited resources, time, and marketing budgets. For example:
- Which of these channels do you focus more 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, LinkedIn, Tumblr, etc.) while neglecting your own domain?
- Do you create new content for every channel you plan to promote and market your business on?
The Benefits Of Automating The Traffic-Getting Process With WordPress
What I’d like to share with you now, is a free, simple, and effective formula for automating the traffic-getting process with WordPress.
With this formula, you will be able to:
- Save time creating content for your website 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, budget, and efforts 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 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 that you stay away from all black hat tools, techniques, sites, and anything that violates the policies and terms of service of sites like Facebook, Twitter, Google, etc..
(Web traffic automation doesn’t need to involve the use of black hat techniques!)
The focus of this article is not to manipulate web services or flaunt their terms of service, but to show you how to be smart with your resources and automate your content distribution in order to leverage your time and efforts, and increase your exposure online to websites frequented by your target audience.
An Automated Content Distribution, Traffic And Lead Generation, And Sales & Marketing System
As we’ve just seen in the previous section, most small business owners lack the time, human resources and financial means to engage in the kind of content marketing that many online experts prescribe. What you want to do, then, is be strategic with your limited budget, resources, and time.
So, instead of posting content to individual marketing channels, which is very time-consuming …
(Posting content to services one by one is extremely time-consuming!)
Why not choose this method 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 one-time, and automate your content distribution to all other services.
You can:
- Automatically distribute content to social media channels and social 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 get all of this done?
Simple … first, set up your site as shown in Part 2. Then, configure things as explained in Part Three. After all 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 System – Traffic Generation Plugins
Let’s take a quick look at some examples of plugins that can be used to:
- Post content automatically to social media sites and social bookmarking accounts
- Post comments automatically to other blogs
- Distribute content automatically via RSS to other online properties
Jetpack Plugin
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 Jetpack has been installed, connect the plugin to the WordPress.com account set up in Part Three …
(Make sure the Jetpack plugin is connected to your WordPress.com account)
Next, activate a feature called Publicize …
(Jetpack – Publicize)
You can share your posts on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, GooglePlus, LinkedIn, and more …
(Share your content automatically on various social accounts.)
After configuring all account and plugin settings, your content is ready for distribution.
The Publicize feature adds a new section to your Publish box …
(Publicize account details displayed in the Publish section.)
Now, as soon as you publish a new post, it will automatically be shared on all of the accounts you have set up …
(As soon as you publish, your content is automatically syndicated online.)
To learn more about the benefits of using this WordPress plugin, go here: Jetpack
CommentLuv
(CommentLuv)
The WordPress native commenting feature allows your visitors to interact with your website or blog, post comments, reply to existing comments and engage with your content as part of an online community.
You can expand the WordPress native commenting feature using third-party plugins like Disqus, IntenseDebate, LiveFyre, or CommentLuv that integrate your comments with social media, helping to share and spread your content around.
For example, using a plugin like CommentLuv (Premium version) can help attract more comments and improve user engagement on your web site. The plugin encourages readers to comment using SEO and social reward features like social enticements for sharing your content, ability to use keywords in the username, backlinks, and the ability to add twitter handles to comments. This plugin will visit the website or blog of the comment author while they enter their comment and retrieve their most recent blog posts, which they can include with their comment when they click submit.
(CommentLuv Premium version can encourage a greater level of commenting and create more user engagement on your website.)
To learn more about using this WordPress plugin, go here:
Social Link Machine
(Social LinkMachine – Content distribution plugin)
Social Link Machine is a set-and-forget plugin that allows you to automatically syndicate and drip-feed your content to many social sites, build anchor text backlinks, include relevant YouTube videos and images, and create 2nd-tier links and social signals on auto-pilot …
(Social LinkMachine – syndicate content to dozens of traffic-generating platforms)
With SocialLinkMachine installed, you can automatically syndicate content to dozens of online sites, such as:
- Social Bookmarking Platforms: e.g. Deviantart, Folkd, Kippt, Zotero, etc.
- Blogging Platforms: e.g. Livejournal, Rebel Mouse, Tribe, etc.
- Social Media Platforms: Google Plus, YouTube, etc.
- Image Sharing: e.g. Flickr, etc.
- Document Sharing Platforms: e.g. Issuu, Sendspace, etc.
Visit this website to learn more about using this plugin: Social Link Machine
Also, if you would like to know more about setting up social media tracking (so you can get actionable information about your content marketing campaigns), we have written a detailed article listing a number of social media monitoring tools that will help you keep track of online trends, monitor competitor activity, see what conversations are taking place online that can affect your business, etc, see what conversations are taking place online that could affect your business,etc. More info:
The above are just a few examples of the many plugins that WordPress makes available for automating the distribution of your content online.
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 Process – Summary
Once you have your website or blog and plugins fully set up and expertly configured, all you then need to do to automatically begin bringing web traffic is post great content on a regular basis.
We have created an entire email series aimed at helping you come up with limitless content for your website or blog:
Once you have configured your WordPress site, the next step is to optimize the web-traffic generation process. This step is covered in the next section of our series.
This is the end of Part Four
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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