How to Drive Traffic to your Website using Social Media

Social Media is a powerful tool to help build your business online. It's a way for you to access your customers in a way never before possible. It's all about engaging with your audience and building a relationship with them. And, driving traffic to your website is a part of utilising social media to its full potential, as once they're on your website you then get your chance to get them into your funnel. Social media allows you to nurture them through this process.

Firstly, it is important to make sure you're choosing the right social media channel for your audience. This is all about knowing your ideal client and where they hang out. Are they young, 11-17year olds? If so, snapchat and Instagram are the social media outlets for your business. Maybe they're Mums in their 30's and 40s - Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest will all be good options for you. Your product(s) or service needs to come into play, too, because they will be more suited to some of the platforms than others. So, spend some time researching your ideal client and where they are, then work on building those social media platforms before looking at the others.

My next tip may seem obvious to some, but you wouldn't believe how often I don't see this very vital piece of the puzzle. Have your website link (or funnel/optin etc) visible and obvious. If you're the CEO of your business, then have it in your personal profiles as well as in the business ones. People buy from people, and so you will find some benefit to having your personal accounts optimised for business, too.

Create and use beautiful images within your social media strategy. People love visuals and they are proven time and time again to have increased engagement than a regular post without an image. So, spend time (or outsource to a graphic designer) creating stunning visuals for your posts. There are some great tools like Canva and Photoshop around to help.

Know when to use hashtags, and when not to. For example, Facebook is a platform that hashtags are of no benefit other than to add a bit of humour to your post. Instagram, however, is a platform that loves hashtags. And you get 30 to use - I recommend using them all. Research what is the recommended amount for the platform you are working with and plan your hashtag strategy. Let's keep Instagram as our example here, for this platform I encourage you to use a mixture of larger hashtags used by many, and smaller ones. Also, create some of your own that are tied to your business and use those, too. Now you can follow hashtags I feel using the larger hashtags is important, but not too many of them as it will be hard to appear in those searches. The smaller ones are where you will gain traction.

Part of your strategy should be about ensuring your content is shareable. You want others to share what you post to encourage more people to come and check you out. Then, if your links are all in the right place that will drive traffic to your website. I recommend using social media shareable plugins on your website or blog so people can share directly from there, too. I use and love Social Warfare on mine.

Be sure you're using a call to action on your posts. You can add them within your caption sharing things like 'visit our website to find out more', or 'comment below' etc. Asking your audience to do something is key to help boost engagement, likes and clicks through to your website.

Personally, I think groups are a great way to help grow your authority and build your presence online. You can network in them much like you would at an in-person networking event. Ensuring your personal profile is optimised for business will then drive traffic to your business pages and website. Inside groups be helpful by answering questions and commenting on as many posts as you can. People will soon start to wonder who you are and what you do, so will click on your profile.

Lastly, taking advantage of influencers within your industry is a great way to drive traffic to your website. Engage with them and build relationships. Perhaps you'll be able to partner with them and they may share your website address to their audience. Influencer marketing is growing exponentially in today's fast-paced media-driven world. So, find who they are in your industry, and work to be-friend them.

I hope you've found this article helpful for you and your business. If so, please do share with your network as there may be other business owners looking to drive traffic to their website using social media, too.