Bringing Traffic Your Way

You just created that awesome blog site, and your family and friends are proud of you and your work. They come to visit the site a few times a week, reading and commenting on your posts; they actually let you know how cool you are for writing these posts! 

But, you want to tell the world about your blog. You want to start driving traffic your way! Well, I’m going to help you with some cool ideas so your blog can get your first 1 million hits.

 Social Media Working for You 

You did it! Your blog is looking pretty awesome. You have created a cool brand and now you’re ready to take it to the next level. Here’s where social media can help immensely. Go to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+ to create your precious brand personal accounts. Even if you believe your blog won’t be a success right away, is better to avoid headaches by creating your own accounts on every social networking site.

Now that you have created accounts on these, it’s time to start sharing every post to them. Make sure to invite friends to like or join your name so they receive notifications and or emails every time you post a new blog.

Using Analytics to Track Everything

Install Analytics Tools on your blog and let it collect data. Tools like Google Analytics and Adobe Site Catalyst can be installed on the back-end of your blog. These tools track everything from new visits, to time spent on pages. Analytics can also track, where your visits are coming from, if the visitor landed on your blog by an organic search(1) or by a paid keyword(2). These tools can be configured to your liking and they provide detailed information in reports that can be customized and delivered automatically. 

If you have been following this post from the beginning, you should have a Google+ account. That’s all you need to create a Google Analytics account. The interface is very simple and Google provide great documentation for it. You can also take a look at the Universal Analytics brand new tool from Google in this post. Here's a great post about how to use Google Analytics.

Study Your Audience and Write Accordingly to What They Want

Finish your blog posts with specific questions; you’re going to start knowing your visitors based on the answers you get.

You can also try sending surveys via email or post these surveys along with your blog post. This is a quick way to understand what your visitors want. You can start writing about what your visitors wants once you get the necessary data about them.

Again, use social media to interact with your users. Learn from them and become their friend. Participate in communities your visitors visit frequently and learn as much as you can from them.

Use Great Designs on Your Website

Make sure you visit different blog sites to see and learn the trends used. Stay away from using bright colors that can cause temporal blindness on your audience, and use one font type for your posts. Use pictures and videos related to what you’re writing about and listen to feedback from your visitors.

Reply to Comments

Interacting with your audience is just another way to increase traffic to your site.  Make sure you interact with them when they leave a comment. Even if it’s a simple “thank you,” from your part; they will be grateful and come back to visit your blog. Replying to the audience comments creates a great discussion environment. Try to avoid religion or political comments unless your blog was created for these purposes.

Conclusion

We talked about using social media to interact with people and expand your blog to different audiences. We also talked about creating a Google Analytics account and installing these tools in the back-end to learn about your audience. Along with that, we took a look at studying your audience, using great designs and interacting with your visitors. I hope I was able to help you and my words encourage you to start writing about the things you really love.
 

One more thing…

Keep posting and don’t be discouraged if you had a few visitors this week. Don’t give up and be consistent.

Do you have any ideas on how to start bringing blog traffic your way?

References
Seomoz.org
dauofu.blogspot.com
Google.com/Analytics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyword_advertising

Data Visualization and Web Analytics, a Comparison

What is data visualization and what does it have to do with web analytics? According to Matthew Ward of the Worcester Polytechnic Institute, data visualization is “the graphical presentation of information, with the goal of providing the viewer with a qualitative understanding of the information contents.”[1] In other words, data visualization is infographic design. [2] For those of you who don’t know what that is, it is a special form of graphic design that is focused on the visual representation of information. I bring this up, because one of the most important things about digital analytics is understanding, or analyzing, the data. For that reason, these two topics have a lot in common.

Good infographics depict information in a quick and organized way. A lot of the time, a designer is dealing with a lot of information and is faced with the dilemma of how to show that data in a single page or in a single design. The infographic poster to the left depicts the average data consumption in the U.S. in one day. [3] That is a topic that definitely has a large amount of data connected to it. Somehow, the designer sifted through it, organized it and came up with the poster you see now.

Web analytics is similar. Web analytics is defined by Evan LaPointe, author of the blog Atlanta Analytics, as “the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of internet data for purposes of understanding and optimizing web usage.” [4] The key words here are “understanding” and “optimizing.” If all you have is data, it isn’t going to be much use to your business. It is the understanding and optimization of that data that companies look for. It is how that data can be used rather than just ­collected. You and your client must be able to see the data. In a way, it is much like seeing the data in the data usage poster as discussed above.

            The objectives of data visualization and web analytics differ. In the first, the idea is to help others visualize data in such a way as to inform the viewer. In the latter, the goal is to take a large amount of data and understand it in order to make strategic decisions for a company. Regardless, they are both ways of informing others. Thomson Dawson of Pull Brand Innovation states that, “Marketers (and those who cling to big data) are prone to view brand design more narrowly than they should.”[5] The point Dawson makes in his article is that those who are in charge of business strategies often get stuck on a piece of data or an idea, and sometimes it takes someone from the outside with a new and broader view on the subject to make the changes needed to thrive. There will come a time when one of your clients, or the business you work for, will put you in a similar situation. When that happens, just remember, there is always a way to show that person or persons why the data lead you to that decision. It is just a matter of visualizing the data and presenting it in such a way as to persuade.

           

Footnotes

[1] Matthew Ward, “Overview of Data Visualization.” URL: http://web.cs.wpi.edu/~matt/courses/cs563/talks/datavis.html accessed: Jan. 30, 2013.

[2] Amy Balliett, “The Do’s And Don’s Of Infographic Design.” Last modified: Oct. 14, 2011. URL: http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/10/14/the-dos-and-donts-of-infographic-design/ Accessed: Jan. 30,2013.

[3] Bima Arafah, “Huge Infographics Design Resources: Overview, Principles, Tips and Examples.” Last modified: May 12, 2010. URL: http://www.onextrapixel.com/2010/05/21/huge-infographics-design-resources-overview-principles-tips-and-examples/. Accessed: Jan. 30, 2013.

[4] Evan LaPointe, “A Better Definition of Web Analytics.” Last modified: April 22, 2010. URL: http://www.atlantaanalytics.com/practicing-web-analytics/a-better-definition-of-web-analytics/ Accessed: Jan 30, 2013.

[5] Thomson Dawson, “Why Designers Make the Best Brand Strategies.” URL: http://www.pullinc.com/why-designers-make-the-best-brand-strategists/ Accessed: Jan. 30, 2013.­­­­