Driving the right kind of traffic to your website is one of the most important online business skills you can develop!

High-quality traffic will be made up of people in your target audience who are likely to make a purchase after landing on your website. In this article, we’re going to outline five different skills you need to drive high-quality traffic to your website.

Let’s get started!

You need to know how to target the best keywords

First, let’s talk about search engine optimization, or SEO. There are lots of elements to this area of digital marketing, but one is that you need to be targeting the right keywords to ensure you rank highly on relevant search engine results pages (SERPs). This will help you to reach the people who are actually looking to invest in your products and services.

Start by conducting some keyword research. To do this, head to a keyword research tool like Google Keyword Planner with a list of topics and phrases related to your business. Plug them into the tool and Google will provide you with a list of related keywords and phrases based on their competitiveness and their average monthly search volumes. Be sure to weave these into your copy naturally — don’t force keywords where they don’t belong!

Additionally, it’s important to avoid keyword cannibalization. This means you shouldn’t target the same keyword on multiple pages of your website, as this can make it difficult for Google to work out which is the most appropriate page to rank for related queries. This can then lead to you not ranking at all.

If you’re new to keyword research and targeting, you might be struggling to imagine how you’re going to incorporate all of the relevant phrases into your website’s copy. So, to give you some inspiration and put your concerns to bed, let’s look at a business that does a great job of this.

Bay Property Management Group, a real estate company with various locations on the east coast, is a company that has successfully optimized its service pages with the most appropriate keywords.

For instance, on their web page for their Northern Virginia real estate office, they use relevant local keywords in their page title, headers, and throughout their copy. As a result, they rank on the first page of Google for relevant queries with a collective monthly search volume of 2,740 — an impressive number for a local service page!

If your business is entirely online, it might not make sense for you to target local keywords. However, you should still focus on finding the best product or service-related phrases to incorporate into your copy.

You need to know how to create expert content that boosts your E-A-T

Creating expert content is a great way to bring your target audience to your website. This is part of boosting your E-A-T, or expertise, authority, and trustworthiness. It’s a term that comes from Google Search’s quality rater guidelines, and it’s something the search engine has been paying a lot more attention to since 2018.

Essentially, search engines want to send their users to the most reliable and accurate sources of information possible. So, to help your content rank better, you need to prove that you are a reliable source of accurate and high-quality information.

Let’s look at a few examples of businesses that show off their expertise in their content well to give you some inspiration.

For instance, BlueCross BlueShield, a health insurance company, shows off their expertise well in their piece on the opioid crisis in America.

They discuss the impacts of COVID-19 on the crisis, personalized treatment, and more. This article is excellent at showing BlueCross BlueShield’s expertise! On your website, consider writing articles about relevant newsworthy topics — this is a great way to show you’re a reliable source of up-to-date information, and your website should attract more high-quality traffic as a result.

Dollar Shave Club, a razor subscription service and grooming retailer, also shows off their expertise in articles on how dandruff shampoo works.

They discuss how dandruff is caused and what ingredients are used to eliminate it. This article shows that Dollar Shave Club doesn’t just sell grooming products — they’re experts in their field. This article can attract people looking for more information on dandruff and convince them to make a purchase. On your website, consider writing informative articles on how your products or services work to draw in better traffic!

Check out this article from SkillsYouNeed for more information on putting together a content strategy.

You need to be able to write high-quality guest posts for relevant sites

By writing guest posts for relevant websites, you can reach a wider audience and drive more high-quality traffic to your website. Guest posting is what it sounds like — it involves creating quality content for other websites in your niche. You can find opportunities by reaching out to businesses you have relationships with. Alternatively, take a look at the websites you want to write guest posts for — many of them will have contact information or guest post guidelines.

Furthermore, guest posts can help you boost your SEO. This is because, when you write a guest post, you will have the opportunity to include links back to your website. This is great for link building, which is an important element of SEO. It is the process of acquiring links to your website from other highly reputable sites. When this happens, Google takes it as a vote of confidence in your authority and will give you a boost on the SERPs.

Before you try to secure a guest post opportunity with a particular company, just be sure to investigate the website’s domain authority. This will tell you how likely it is that their backlinks will help you rise through the SERPs.

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You need to know how to promote your website on social media

If you’re active on social media, you should use your accounts to make your business a lot more visible online and attract more of your ideal customers. Reply to their comments and don’t be afraid to share their content if it praises your work — just ask for permission first.

Social media can act as a customer service channel, as well, so expect to receive questions and concerns in your direct messages.

Keep in mind that different social media platforms will work better for different businesses. If your business relies a lot on imagery, Pinterest, Instagram, and TikTok are great choices. If you simply want to reach a large user base, Facebook has, by far, the most members. Alternatively, if you market mostly to other professionals, go with LinkedIn.

You need to know how to create content your customers are looking for

If you create content that answers your customers’ questions and addresses their needs and pain points, you can attract more high-quality traffic to your website. Check in with your customer service team to see if they receive a lot of the same questions time and time again. Basing your content off of these queries is a great way to provide content that they’re looking for!

There are a lot of different types of content that can address customer pain points. These include:

• How-to guides that walk a reader through performing a task
• Buying guides or comparison pieces that give a reader more information before making a purchase
• Free tools that help a customer solve a problem
• Blog posts about industry news

If you’re not sure where to start with this, let’s take a look at some different businesses that do a great job of creating website content that answers their customers’ questions and concerns. This should provide plenty of inspiration that will help you to create your own.

First up, Hasbrook & Hasbrook, a trial attorney law firm based out of Oklahoma City, has an article on the average settlement amount for a car accident that answers their target clients’ questions around this topic.

The article covers injuries, determining fault for an accident, and more. People looking for this type of information likely want a lawyer. And, if these people come across this website, they might want to work with Hasbrook & Hasbrook. On your own website, consider what types of questions you can answer in order to attract high-quality and relevant traffic.

Best Nursing Programs, on the other hand, addresses customer pain points a bit differently. They aim to help their website visitors to choose their next step in their medical career.

For example, one comparison piece that they’ve published outlines the best second degree nursing programs in 2020. They talk through the tuition costs, program lengths, pass rates, and more for their selected schools. This article targets people in the consideration stage prior to attending nursing school, making it excellent for attracting high-quality traffic! On your website, consider creating a buying guide or comparison piece that helps your target audience get closer to making a decision.

Finally, the White House Historical Association is able to draw in high-quality traffic using their virtual White House Tour. The immersive tour shows off all public rooms in the White House.

People who look at this are likely interested in other resources and history from the White House Historical Association, so the traffic the tour brings in is certainly going to be of a high quality. If you have a unique physical location, consider offering your viewers a virtual tour! They’re unique, engaging, and can give your customers an idea of what to expect.

When creating content your customers are looking for, you need to be sure that you aren’t too promotional. Notice how, in the examples above, the websites don’t outwardly push the website visitors to make a purchase. Be subtle in your recommendations, as people tend to not like pushy sales advertisements. Take a look at this article from SkillsYouNeed for more tips on creating good promotional content.

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Summary

Driving high-quality traffic to your website is one of the most important skills you need to develop as an online business owner.

In this article, we outlined how you can conduct keyword research, base your content off of customer pain points, show off your expertise, and more. Take a second look at our examples and see how you can improve your skills!

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