OK, so you just poured hours worth of work and creativity into publishing the most amazing landing page ever.

It’s formatted nicely, you have persuasive calls to action (CTAs) throughout, and you’ve even included visuals that act as social proof (you marketing genius, you).

You sit back and wait for the leads to flow in—but no one’s visiting.

Too many marketers and entrepreneurs miss the mark by thinking one creative asset is enough to cut through the noise of the internet and attract their ideal customers’ attention.

You need to mix up your marketing and put that content to work.

On any given day, Google registers an average of 3.5 billion searches. Unfortunately, it can be an uphill battle to capture some of that traffic unless you know your target audience as well as you know your product.

Understanding where your audience is online and how they engage with your content is critical to setting yourself up for success. When you can confidently identify these traffic sources, you can double down on the messaging to promote your landing page via the appropriate digital channels.

See where we’re going here?

This guide will share 14 different ways to start driving traffic to any page on your website, conversion-focused landing pages included. We’ll break down specific traffic-generating methods across advertising, social media, SEO, and email marketing.

First Things First: Are You Equipped With Top-Notch Content and Optimized Landing Pages?

Before you can think about inviting everybody to see your exciting new page, you need to audit the existing content that will guide their experience and, ultimately, their decision-making.

Conditioned by the speed of the internet and the plethora of options to explore, consumers are careful about choosing which websites to browse. On average, users will spend 5.94 seconds looking at a website’s main image and 5.59 seconds consuming written content.

That’s not enough time to build a relationship, so consumers use their first impression to determine their next click.

With a combination of intentional design and crystal clear copy, you can optimize that first impression and increase the chances of driving relevant traffic to your website, all while learning more about your unique customer journey.

Jump to a Way to Drive More Traffic

Driving Traffic Through Advertising

1. Paid search ads

Pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns are among the most common methods to reach new customers actively searching for the topic you’re promoting. Paid search enables you to boost your advertisement to the top (or bottom) of search engine results pages (SERPs) to position your business as a leading solution to their problem.

You’ve seen this before.

Let’s say you’re searching for frameworks and tactics that can help you craft an effective content strategy. This is what you’d see when you search Google:

Those two results are paid ads, denoted by the little “Ad” text on the left. By paying for these search terms, these companies have purchased the right to show up at the top of the more than 1B results (yes, BILLION) for this query. With placement like that, it’s no surprise that search ads increase brand awareness by as much as 80%!

The winning strategy here, when you’re optimizing for conversion, is to address user intent. Consumers are more likely to click on a paid ad when it answers their query directly. So make sure any paid ads have a clear and relevant call to action to address the searcher’s intent.

2. Paid social ads

Remember when we said, “Understanding where your audience is online and how they engage with your content is critical to setting yourself up for success”?

Well, this is where it pays off.

For most companies in the digital space, building a brand requires building an online presence to leverage the social communities on platforms such as LinkedIn, Twitter, or Instagram and target them directly.

Paying for ads on social platforms allows you to reach your audience and others like them (take that, algorithm) and invite them over to your landing pages.

Paid social ads aren’t just great for sending traffic to your site. They also give you insight into which content formats do best on each platform so you can create accordingly.

3. Display advertising

Some people don’t know they need your product until they see it. Display ads make sure you’re never out of sight.

These are the image banners at the bottom of web pages you visit or the interstitial ad that pops up before you dive into an article. The great thing about display ads is that they convey your message quickly, clearly, and in a way that your audience is used to seeing.

Another bonus: Responsive display ads are retargeting machines.

When you add a variety of assets to your PPC campaign (such as logos, images, and videos), it increases Google’s ability to distribute on your behalf. A machine learning model spreads your campaign further by adjusting the size and formatting on specific platforms to fit available space for ads.

Pretty cool, right?

Just think about it: You’re on Youtube, and you’re about to click that next video when you see an image display ad with the exact message you’re looking for. Eventually, you’re gonna click to find out for yourself whether it’s the real deal or not. As a marketer, that click is all you need.

4. Retargeting ads

Sometimes, one visit just isn’t enough. Retargeting ads help you gain more information on the customer journey and remind specific users to revisit your website.

Retargeting is a powerful form of PPC advertising that uses browser data to deliver personalized ads to consumers who have previously engaged with your content (no more lost leads!). Retargeting essentially helps you exchange bounce rates for conversions.

But don’t neglect the traffic and customers you already have. You can also retarget subsets of your audience to help past customers return and use lookalike profiles to influence their network.

In the game of distribution marketing, you have to make a couple of friends to go far.

Let’s say you notice your customers talking about the awesome content they receive in their inbox every morning from subscribing to SaaStr. If you were to partner with this newsletter for a sponsorship, you would be able to reach over 60,000 people with a validated interest in your area of expertise.

More than 77% of B2B marketers use email newsletters in their content marketing strategy to nurture leads. So think about who you subscribe to, reach out, and find a way to grow together.

6. Podcast sponsorships

While most marketers dive into creating more videos, audio can still be a profitable channel for driving awareness and traffic.

Audio platforms boomed through 2020, and 54% of podcast listeners said they were much more likely to consider buying from a brand after hearing it advertised on a podcast. (Blue Apron, anyone?)

Just like newsletter sponsorships, this form of advertising is all about social listening. Using a tool like Sparktoro, you can identify podcasts your audience loves and subscribes to, and find a way to increase your audience list.

Driving Traffic Through Social Media

7. Post on your company’s social channels

Visibility is paramount to generating traffic to your website and landing pages.

Posting on your company’s social media platforms on a consistent basis is just as valuable as maintaining a sales relationship. Using social media to be transparent about your business and company values offers customers the opportunity to build an emotional connection with your brand.

Since 54% of people use social media to research products, it’s pretty important to make sure your brand adheres to the age-old phrase: Show, don’t tell.

8. Create Twitter threads with your pages included

Marketers are increasingly using Twitter threads to share information that just can’t fit in a single tweet. However, there are still some people out there wondering what the hype is about.

Twitter threads receive higher engagement. That’s it. That’s the tweet.

Really, though, Twitter threads give you more room to tell a longer story. By using threads, marketers can adapt their list-style posts to generate higher engagement than they would by posting the blog on Medium or even on their own website.

For threads to get top engagement, they need to be strategic:

Pay attention to the content your audience engages with.
Identify the pages on your website that are relevant to that topic.
Create a statement to serve as your headline for the tweet (i.e., your hook).
Create at least three main points to follow up on in a thread.
Post links to your pages for further explanation.

9. Share your content in relevant communities

Most of us are already putting in effort on the big four social platforms (Linkedin, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter). Still, niche communities are where you can establish credibility and drive some serious traffic to your website.

Reddit is one such channel. Similarweb analytics found that users spend an average of 10 minutes and 23 seconds on Reddit per visit. Consumers here expect to spend more time digesting content that goes in-depth on a specific area of interest.

If there is a subreddit with thousands of subscribers on quantum computing, Harry Potter, and Game of Thrones, then you can guarantee that there’s a space for you to geek out and share what you know as well.

We always want to show up where our target customers are. If your audience isn’t on Reddit, check out niche communities on Slack, Discord, or Clubhouse.

Answer questions directly or find posts related to your topic, and reverse-engineer that content to introduce a different perspective. You’ve got this: Show what you know.

10. Encourage your team to share on their social accounts

A company is a lot more interesting when employees become product evangelists.

Companies that understand the power of social media encourage their team members to build their online presence and share company announcements. These activities tap into a network of prospects who may not be in your pre-defined target audience but may have warm connections with those who are.

Develop these relationships, and you may discover a competitive advantage you never knew existed.

Drive Traffic Through Organic Search & SEO

11. Start with keyword research

The first rule to capturing attention is knowing what people are searching for. Your business might be about internet acceleration, but if no one is typing those words into search engines, you’re going to have a tough time driving traffic to your website.

Lean on tools like Ahrefs, Keywords Everywhere, Ubersuggest, and Ask the Public to find out:

SERP rankings
Common questions
Backlinks referring to highly ranked pages
Volume of traffic being driven to competitor sites
Keywords and long-tail keywords relevant to your brand

Keyword research will be the foundation of your website visibility. Take the time to outline what words you’ll need to use and what questions you’ll need to answer to generate interest and demand.

12. Double-check SEO settings and optimize page titles

One of the most common SEO mistakes is the lack of detail in the description for web pages. Before clicking “Publish,” make sure each page has enough copy and imagery to be indexed by search engines and social networks.

Not only do you need to include keywords that relate to your website and make sure that each page is public, but you also need to differentiate page titles and meta descriptions specific to the content being displayed. This way, when someone wants to share a page from your website, the value is understood from the URL to the footer.

Let’s do a little experiment to put this in perspective:

Jim just created a new website for his construction business.
Jim’s website URL is jimbuilds.com
Jim has 3 pages on his website revealing how he approaches roofing, outdoor, and wood projects.
The title for those specialty pages is still… Jim Builds.
The meta description for all pages on his website is: “Roofing & General Construction. Morganville, West Virginia.”

Not only is Jim missing the opportunity to index more pages on Google to increase his chances of finding clientele, he also hasn’t provided enough detail in his meta descriptions to explain what makes him different from competitors. These two steps have a dramatic effect on click-through rate (CTR), and 61% of marketers say SEO is their number-one inbound strategy to improve their site ranking. Jim also hasn’t leveraged the long-tail keywords relevant to his business; these can boost his CTR by 3-5% simply because they are more relevant to each one of his specialty pages.

“Jim, what are you doing, buddy?”

Editor’s note: Don’t be like Jim. Instead, use the Landing Page Analyzer for a personalized report on your website copy, design, SEO, page speed, and more.

13. Link to your new pages from existing pages

Another way to make more of your work discoverable is by being your own promoter.

Old content doesn’t need to fade away after being published. Bring it back to life by linking mutual topics together. This helps visitors learn more about your products and strategies, and also demonstrates your expertise concerning the problem they want to solve.

It’s worth mentioning the highest-ranking pages get “followed” frequently—backlinks at a rate of +5% (or 14.5%) per month. The more backlinks a page has, the more organic traffic it receives from Google. So, be your own cheerleader and start boosting your old content in each new piece of content you create until others start doing it for you.

Driving Traffic Through Email Marketing & Outreach

14. Start building an email list (if you haven’t already)

Imagine being able to control your customer’s journey from interest to purchase. Well, with an email list, you can.

When you publish a helpful resource, you can require interested visitors to provide their contact information so you can keep in touch. This info usually includes their email address and their name.

With a subscriber list, you can share success stories, new features, and upcoming events with people interested in your products and services. You can also perform market research at any time to determine the demand for new products.

Here are a few types of email content your audience may want:

Creative, informed, subscription-worthy content
Lead magnets such as checklists, ebooks, etc.
Social buttons visitors can click
Promotions and contests
Compelling upgrades
Discounts and deals
Loyalty programs

Building an email list is a fantastic way to nurture your customers by making them feel like they have exclusive access to everything your business offers. If you need help getting started, we’ve got you covered with easy ways to build your email list from scratch.

Before You Dive In Head First, Get Your Tracking System in Order

Now that you know about all these ways to drive traffic to your website, you want to rush off and get started, right?

Not so fast.

Without a way to track your traffic sources, visitors will remain just that: visitors.

By collecting data on the performance of traffic sources leading to your website, you can adjust the spending in areas that are highly converting and coordinate campaigns that grow your presence.

Let’s say you notice a large amount of traffic coming in from your LinkedIn ads compared to a low volume of website visitors from your PPC ads.

You can either:

Optimize your PPC: Revise ad copy, increase your budget, or bid on keywords.
Lean into LinkedIn: Refine targeting parameters on LinkedIn, create more engaging content, and allocate more budget toward what’s working.

Whichever you choose, your decision is based on real, measurable data that informs you how to optimize a given channel for conversion. What gets measured gets managed.

Get Behind The Wheel and Drive Traffic to Your Pages—Now

OK, we’ve gone over a whole lot. Here’s what you should do first after reading this:

Block out 30 minutes in your calendar to audit your content marketing strategy and choose one or two traffic-driving approaches to experiment with (or, based on data, what you believe would work).

We made this resource a document you can revisit when thinking of creative and tactical ways to get more traffic to your website.

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14 Ways to Drive Traffic to Your Website’s Landing Pages (2021 Guide)

First Things First: Are You Equipped With Top-Notch Content and Optimized Landing Pages?

Jump to a Way to Drive More Traffic