Why Social Media PT. 2: Driving Traffic and Improving Your SEO

Check out the first post in this series here.nnIn our last post on social media, we talked about how “social” and “community” have become huge buzzwords in Internet marketing — and how you can make the buzz work for your business.nnThere’s no doubt that social networking sites offer unique opportunities to build relationships and credibility — but did you know that you can use them to drive traffic to your website and improve your search engine ranking at the same time?nnAnd blogging — the granddaddy of all social media activities — actually offers one of the best ways to build the quality inbound links that search engines love, and bring targeted visitors to your website.nnThe key is to provide lots of free, valuable content on your website or blog, and then repurpose or distribute that content across the Web through RSS, content syndication sites, social bookmarking and social networking applications.nnRSS Feeds and Promotionn Create your feed. An RSS feed is a unique URL that your readers can paste into their preferred RSS reader to allow them to receive your content. You can create an RSS feed through your blog software. It’s easy to find out how to do this through their respective websites.nn Or you can use services like FeedBurner (Feedburner.com) or FeedForAll (Feedforall.com) to generate a piece of HTML code you can insert in your blog template. Just go to your blog provider’s “Help” pages to find out how.nn Promote your feed on your site. Once you have a feed, you have to show your readers how to subscribe to it. All you need to do is add a small piece of code that adds the universal RSS button to your blog. When a reader clicks on the button, they can subscribe to your blog’s feed, regardless of the feed reader they use.nn Be sure to insert a short line of text above your feed icon encouraging people to subscribe. Include directions such as, “Subscribe to receive all the latest news by clicking the button below!”nn Promote your feed on the Web. RSS isn’t just a way for your regular readers to access your content, it’s also a way to promote your blog to a wider audience by making sure that you are listed in some of the many RSS directories that exist online.nnSome popular RSS directories include:n

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• 2rss.comn
• w.moreover.comn
• Syndic8.comn
• Newsisfree.comn

nContent syndication/distribution sitesnnContent-syndication sites provide news and articles to thousands of other sites. Getting your article posted with them can be a great way to increase your visibility, and drive scores of visitors back to your site. Plus, the SEO benefits of thousands of sites posting your article will make writing the articles well worth your time.nnTo make this strategy work for you, simply include a link back to your website or blog in the signature file at the end of your articles.nnOther sites offer you the opportunity to be a “resident expert,” offering how-tos and advice to people who search the sites for information. Your author bio then contains a link back to your website or blog.nnThis strategy benefits you in two ways: first, you get a top quality inbound link to your website; and second, if you use your targeted keywords in your advice and responses, your name will show up twice in search engine listings… once for your own site, and once from your post on these high-traffic, well-known sites!nnHere are a few of the more popular content syndication and distribution and “how-to” sites that we recommend you check out:n

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• EzineArticles.comn
• FreeSticky.comn
• IdeaMarketers.comn
• HubPages.comn
• Suite101.comn
• eHow.com
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nSocial bookmarking sitesnnAt social bookmarking sites, people save links to their favorite websites or articles, the same way you might save bookmarks in your web browser. With social bookmarking, however, they’re able to share these links with others using the bookmarking.nnThese sites also give you the opportunity to discuss and comment on links. When you do that, you can include a link to your personal profile, which can contain a link back to your own site.nnSo whether you’re sharing links or commenting on other articles, you’re always directing traffic back to your site or blog!nnSome of our favorite spots to share links include:n

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• Squidoo.comn
• Yelpn
• Stumbleuponn
• Deliciousn
• Redditn
• Diggn
• Sphinn
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nOne more note: Sites like Digg receive millions of visitors a day — so if someone shares your link and others enjoy it, you could end up with tons of traffic headed your way!nnSocial networking sitesnnFinally, don’t forget to link back to your website on social media sites like Facebook or Twitter!nnYou can link to new content on your blog or website in your Twitter updates, or add an RSS feed to your Facebook profile. That way, all your “friends” on these sites have the opportunity to click through and see what you have to say.nnSearch engines count these links as relevant inbound links to your content — AND, since the folks clicking through have already formed a connection with you, they definitely qualify as quality, targeted traffic to your site!