A stand alone website is no guarantee to lead generation and sales.  In today’s web environment, various online sources need to be tapped in order to reach out and encourage customers visits to your site.

In short, you need a full, online marketing strategy.

This article outlines five ways to build traffic for your e-commerce site.

Using SEO to generate leads

Search engine optimisation is a key factor in getting your webpage seen by the right people.  Search engines must be able to crawl your site, pick out the key words and understand what your site is about. Here are a few steps to make sure your site is optimised:

• Research some key words using free, online tools such as the Google Keyword Tool.  This will help you to understand what your customers are searching for.
• Check your content: Make sure your keyword features in the title of your webpage and that your content is keyword rich.
• Generate back links to your site by using keywords as anchor text on other sites.  This will help direct traffic from external sources back to your site, and by doing so, improve your rankings.

Using pay per click to generate leads

Pay per click, or PPC is an advertising method used on search engines, networks and blogs.  As the name suggests, the advertiser (you) pays the delivery network for every click generated.  PPC can be a tricky tool to master.  Remember, not every click will turn into a lead, meaning you will inevitably, end up paying for dead clicks.  Check out these handy hints to optimising your PPC campaign:

• Set a daily spending limit: So that you don’t break the bank, it is best practise to cap your spend, which can be anything from 25p to £100+.
• Write to get paid: “Tips for successful SEO” will probably generate numerous clicks, but will any visitors actually want to pay for professional help?  More likely, they are searching for free info, and that costs you.
• Send people to the relevant page: Don’t always link the advert to your home page. Direct people through to the information they’re looking for.  By doing so, you avoid losing traction with your visitor.

How does blogging create web traffic?

Having a blog is a free way to generate more web presence.  Before you start writing though, it’s best to have a blog strategy to maximise web traffic:

• Who is your target audience? This is a perfect opportunity to get specific and target a particular audience.  Make the information relevant to them.
• Ensure your blog is optimised: Link keywords back to your SEO optimised pages on your website.
• How often should you blog? Research shows that more frequent bloggers generate more traffic.  But don’t just blog for the sake of it.  2-3 quality blogs per week is more effective than 7 irrelevant posts.
• Respond to comments: It’s important that you engage with your audience here.  And listen to their thoughts, you may well pick up some vital feedback on your product or service.

Can social media really drive web traffic?

Social media is fast becoming an indispensible tool and should definitely make it into your online strategy.  The likes of Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook have millions of followers world wide, across demographics.  So how can you make social media a success for your site?

• Contribute quality content: Comments and updates are really important to engage with your audience, but don’t forget that videos, presentations and links are all useful too.
• Grow your fan base: By contributing good, interesting content, your fan base should spread the word, thereby growing your audience organically.
• Create specific calls to action: Not all contributions require an action from your fans, but when you do need action, be specific and drive them to a relevant landing page.  Don’t lose fans by taking them on a tour of your site.

Posting on forums to source traffic

Identifying useful forums in which to contribute answers and ideas attracts positive attention to your business. The most effective way to do this is pick a few forums closely related to your business type and become a regular contributor.  If your name and business signature places at the top of a forum, week in, week out, this will help to generate confidence in your business and sounds you out as an authority on the topics discussed.

• Find the best forums for you: Go to google.com and type in:  Site:.com”powered by vbulletin” enter you niche here
• Include a signature file: For example;
  • Blogging Expert, Joe Bloggs
  • Need expert blogging advice [url=http://www.websitename.com]Click Here![/url]
• Hyperlink your key words: Back-linking improves your website ratings and gives your audience a direct link into a specific landing page

To really drive traffic to your e-commerce site, it’s important that you don’t simply rely on your website for hits.  However, traffic doesn’t always mean leads.  It’s crucial that your online strategy uses a variety of traffic sources to drive the right people to your site to generate real leads.

Where does your e-commerce traffic come from and are you making the most of all the possible sources listed above?

Image Credit: Duchesssa

This entry was posted on Monday, August 15th, 2011 at 8:00 am and is filed under E-commerce. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.