Welcome to day 8!
There are several ways to increase your traffic and today we will cover social media.
Why do you need social media for your blog?
Well for one, brands look for this when deciding if they want to sponsor you. If you are paired against a blog with lower traffic in the same niche but they have social media channels and you don't? They will choose the one with social media channels every time.
Plus this is a great way to gain readers, share your content, gain traffic, and get other blogs to share your content. Plus you can connect with brands and make money. Who WOULDN'T want to dive into social media?
Facebook
First, you will want to set up a Facebook Page for your blog. Get it set up with a description, profile pic, and cover photo. Invite friends who might be interested (not all your friends) and encourage them to share. Engage with your followers and if you can share videos and do Facebook Live since these hold the most weight right now.
Don't forget the groups, get active in share groups and connect with other bloggers this way as well!
If you want to really dig into Facebook I suggest the Moolah Facebook Marketing Course.
Twitter
While I see the least amount of traffic from Twitter I still get traffic and still keep it active. Why? Because brands LOVE Twitter! I have gotten more sponsored content and brand relationships from Twitter than any other social network out there!
To help manage Twitter I love using Manage Flitter and their Remote Management. I set it up once via Power Mode give them a list of people to follow each month, set up my un-follow parameters, and buy credits and they handle the building of my account. It's like having a VA at my hands just for Twitter!
Suggested Reading: Twitter In 30 Minutes (3rd Edition): How to connect with interesting people, write great tweets, and find information that's relevant to you
Pinterest
I'm not going to lie, Pinterest is the social media account I get most of my social media traffic from. So to me, this means you MUST have a Pinterest account! To get going set up your account, verify it, become a business account and create at least 10 boards relevant to what you blog about. Each board should have at least 25 pins in it and one board should be ONLY your content. Each board needs to have a nice keyword friendly description too.
There are two services I used for Pinterest.
The first is called Tailwind and I use this for the amazing analytics. They also allow you to schedule pins (yours and other peoples) and they have Tribes. These are like groups where you can join based on the topic and share your pins and then repin other people content. It's a great way to get exposure to your content. I highly recommend the Mastering Tailwind course, it's life changing!
The second one is called Board Booster. I use them to pin my own content and help clean up boards. They have a looping tool so once a board gets about 100 pins you can turn it on to loop older pins so you can gain exposure to your older content. I set up campaigns based on content for my group boards. So all my frugal content is on one campaign pinning to my frugal boards. My recipes on another, DIY. Homeschool, travel etc.
If you want to dive further into Pinterest I suggest the Simple Pin Master Course for all the strategies you will need!
Suggested Reading: Pinterest Savvy: Strategies, Plans, and Tips to Grow Your Business with Pinterest
Instagram
I personally use my Instagram to connect more personally my readers. While it is a little harder to drive traffic to your site from Instagram it CAN be done. I suggest using Pretty Links and make one that is www.youblogurl.com/Instagram then when you make a post on Instagram change out where your pretty link directs and in your Instagram post say ‘link in profile'.
Instagram is also a great place to get exposure on products and services are you selling.
Suggested Reading: Instagram Secrets: The Underground Playbook for Growing Your Following Fast, Driving Massive Traffic & Generating Predictable Profits
Google +
Personally, I used Google+ for one thing, to boost my SEO and Google ranking with my posts. So when a post goes live I share it to Google+ many swear it helps with Google ranking and other say it doesn't. Can't hurt to stack the odds right?
YouTube
YouTube is a great way to earn money on your videos. Just remember Facebook hates YouTube so sharing your YouTube videos to Facebook will get you nowhere. Doing product demos on your products is a great way to gain more exposure on it.
Suggested Reading: YouTube: A Beginners’ Guide to Building a YouTube Channel Audience and Make Passive Income (Make Money Online on YouTube with YouTube Marketing)
A Few Tips
Always make sure your blog is linked to each of your social media accounts. What good is gaining all these potential readers if they can't get to your site?!
Remember to treat each account differently. The people that follow you on Facebook most likely will NOT be the same ones to follow you on Pinterest.
Now I will be the first to tell you that social media can eat up all your time. So how to maximize it? Use a site to automate such as Buffer or even using the social media features on Co Schedule (which is my favorite!)
Tomorrow we cover growing traffic from your email list and a few other sources.
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