Driving and maintain website traffic is an ongoing process and is fairly complex so if anyone offers you a ‘get rich quick’ type plan to rapidly increase your website traffic it’s often too good to be true.
Below are the 5 worst offenders, tactics that won’t generate valuable traffic so stop wasting your time with them:
Clickbait Headlines
He thought that the title of his new eBook needed a change – you won’t believe what he chose…
In the first paragraph I discovered their new product – by the fourth paragraph I was in tear…
Demanding your readers click through in order to find out the rest of your amazing content might work once – especially if it is really amazing – but you might also be recognised for this behaviour by a different name: teasing. Clickbait headlines have become their own punchline. Readers might have been enthralled by them in 2012 but in 2015 they are just plain annoying.
People actually don’t like clicking on links without knowing what they’re committing to; that’s how viruses get launched and how identities are stolen. Your website shouldn’t be operating on the same, shady premise as malware. You’re better than that and so are your readers!
Using the other people’s comments sections to post your links
This is bad to two distinct reasons:
- If you are doing this manually then you sound like a robot
- If you are using a bot program to do this then technically you are a robot
Readers don’t enjoy interacting with robots in their day-to-day online activity so you’re unlikely to receive any love or traffic. Oh, and it’s pretty rude to use someone else’s site to promote your content without their permission. These are not your readers in the first place – trying to steal them or piggyback off their SEO is poor form.
Keyword Stuffing
Keywords are an important tool you can use to generate website traffic, but this tactic is ripe for abuse. Two mentions of your keyword are a great way to make sure Google will point readers to your content. 32 mentions is a great way to sound like a desperate and spammy content-generation program. People aren’t silly these days, they’ll know what you’re up to and they won’t appreciate it. Concentrate on quality content and providing value to the readers you do have – the shares and likes will follow.
Annoying your database with heaps of emails
- Today only! 30% Off Sale! – Monday
- Loyal customers – Check out our new product demo! – Tuesday
- Don’t miss our upcoming podcast! – Wednesday
- Get our new, free product guide! – Thursday
- Tell all your friends about our great new product – Friday
Yes, people signed up to be on your email list because they want to be kept informed of new offers and content but after a week of watching subject lines like the ones above pile up it will become apparent that there are no ‘great deals’ just spam.
If you do plan to email your lists daily because the nature of your business warrants it, ensure you let your subscribers know that they’re signing up for a daily newsletter, as opposed to the more vague ‘subscriber list’. Otherwise, less is more. It’s fairly easy to pester someone into unsubscribing and in some cases that might happen in only a matter of days. Be respectful of your subscriber’s time and don’t continually make them feel ‘monetised’.
Splitting simple content over multiple pages
The more you’re able to generate website traffic, the more you’re able to promote other content throughout your website via call-to-action buttons. This is an accepted reality of web browsing and most readers will tolerate additional CTA buttons here and there in exchange for content they enjoy reading. But splitting simple content across multiple pages; this is just cheating. You know it and your readers know it and will penalise you for it. Give your readers the credit they deserve.
Be careful about turning your website into an ad-revenue generation process instead of a focused lead-generation process. Each click requires a new page load, each page load comes with new content to download and process. Your readers will only have to experience that nightmare once before filing your site away under ‘never visit again’.
Did we just put all your favourite tricks down? Never fear; you can still drive loads of website traffic – it just takes a bit of time and direction. Contact the team at Website Design Centre to learn more about generating long term, authentic traffic for your website.
