by: AskPat 323 Episode Transcript
Pat Flynn: What's up, everybody? Pat Flynn here, and welcome to Episode 323 of AskPat. Thank you so much for joining me here today. As always, I'm here to help you by answering your online business questions, five days a week.
All right, here is today's question from Alyce.
Alyce: Hi, Pat. First off, I just want to say thanks so much for your awesome podcast. They are so inspiring, especially the one last week about contributing to big sites like The Huffington Post. My name is Alyce and I have a quick question about traffic strategies. I started a blog, NewStability.com, about four months ago and I want to know: if you were starting out again, what three things you would focus on to generate traffic? I'm starting to get bits and pieces of traffic from things like Twitter, Core, and other social streams. I got about 4,000 unique visitors over the last two months. I want to make sure my traffic generation efforts are being spent in the right places to get the best quality and quantity of traffic. I would really appreciate if you could take the time to answer my questions and also I would love an AskPat t-shirt. Thanks so much for your time.
Pat Flynn: Hey, Alyce. Thanks so much for the question and the kind words and of course now that you have been featured on the show we’re going to send you an AskPat t-shirt so when you get it make sure to take a picture and shoot over to me @PatFlynn #AskPat so I can catch it and share it. So, that's awesome, thank you so much.
Now, I'm going to approach this question almost the same way I would approach if somebody asked me what would you do differently than when you first started out. Now when I first started blogging the first thing I did was just write. And writing is important obviously. But, I didn't know what I was doing I didn't really have a plan and I didn't know about some of the important things out there that I wish I knew about. That would have help me with not only traffic but, with a lot of other things as well with making more money down the road. With building a better relationship with my audience. With getting in front of the right traffic and all those sorts of things. So I'm going to answer this in three parts and hopefully it's going to help you understand how to get more traffic and you'll see why by the end of this.
So, the first thing is really and truly focusing. If I was going to start all over again I would really want to make sure I target and hone down on a very specific niche. Like exactly understanding who my audience is. So picking an audience and understanding exactly who they are. What their pains, wants, needs, problems, and wants are. Where is it they hang out? Who is already serving them? Creating what Neil Patel calls his “200 List.” So a spread sheet of the 200 blogs out there that are talking about this particular topic. 200 forums that are talking about this particular topic. 200 social media account on Twitter. 200 social media accounts of Facebook, and that will help give you a clear picture of who is out there in this space.
And who are the top players? Who's there looking to help and be some of the top players as well and who you could potentially connect with too, to serve this particular audience. And in addition to that you would understand how they were serving those audiences. So you would be able to really understand sort of an overview of what's happening in this space. Again, all around who that particular audience is and there is nobody I know better than John Lee Dumas, who really hones in on who his avatar is. I mean he gives them a name. He's Jimmy and he's' got a certain lifestyle and he does this and that and this. When he explains who his avatar is, I mean, that's how you have to get it. You have to know who your audience is. What their likes are. Where they hang out and also who is serving them already. And how?
And beyond that, thinking ahead. What kind of products, what kind of services, what kind of tools and resources are out there already serving that audience too. Again, this is even before I've started figuring out what platform to publish on. Where I'm going to be publishing content, whether through written format or audio format or video format.
Again, it's just understanding what's out there already serving this audience so I can find my position. That's the next biggest thing. How are you going to position yourself because you would want other people out there already serving this audience. You want that. A lot of people think that when there are competition out there and there are other sites serving an audience already that's bad. Oh, somebody already took my spot. But, no. That's good because a) it validates that market for you that you know other people are doing it already and they're doing it and they're doing well, hopefully, if they're there. That means that there is a market. You know, you don't want to serve an audience with nobody and if there's a bunch of people serving that audience already you know there is a market already. Secondly, you would be able to come in later in the game. Which a lot of people think is a disadvantage but, that's a great advantage because you would be able to see how this target audience is already being served and how they’re not being served. By going to those sites and seeing what people are talking about. What do they like? Do that. What do they not like? Don't do that. Don't incorporate those things. Go to Amazon, find books related to this topic and see what the reviews say. What are people hating about those books? Don't do that or completely address it in the opposite way so that those people will be your biggest fans. Go to the different products, tools and services and use those things and see how your audience is being treated.
So that when you go in there and you create your solutions down the road or however that may be. You're going to have a better understanding what you can do to fill in those gaps that those people really want filled. So, that's the first thing. Understanding exactly who your audience is and how are they being served. Also, your positioning, your unique selling proposition. What makes you special in order to help this audience? And that's really important because even if you could really help this audience, nobody is going to know this. They’re not going to want to know from you unless you have something unique and special to offer.
This was something that Derek Halpern did really well when he came out with SocialTriggers.com. He and I are great friends now and when he came into the scene he definitely wasn't the first one to talk about internet marketing and building a business online and things like that. But he was the first one to talk about it from a psychological point of view. And his unique advantage was that he was one of the only people out there, at least he considered, that would take the time to read all those dense studies. You know marketing studies from universities and things like that and extrapolate that information into terms that people can use on their own websites and in their own businesses. So it was really smart. I mean that's what he went to school for so he used what he knew how to do well and used that as his unique selling proposition. He does it extremely well and that's how he's been able to make a big name for himself. Really quickly, actually.
Now the other thing that goes along with that, that I would do right from the beginning that is also going to help you with getting more traffic. Once you start putting yourself online and finding a platform that works for this audience and then also establishing a relationship and building a base of content. You want to build a relationships with those other top players, or people in your space that are in that 200 list that I was talking about earlier. And you do that by reaching out to them, by linking to them, by conversing with them on social media, by offering value to them as much as possible, by going to conferences where they're at and befriending them and talking about them and talking to them. Talking about them in a good way obviously because that's what is going to help give you the opportunity to get in front of those audiences that are already there.
Perhaps that will give you guest posting opportunities on those sites. Perhaps that gives you opportunities to get on a webinar with them and I will talk more about that in a second. Perhaps that will give you an opportunity for them to become an affiliate with you and the product that you have to offer as well. This is how Caleb Wojcik did it. When he built his website DIYVideoGuy.com he launched from scratch. Yet, when he launched his product, he launched with the relationships that he had. I was one of the people who was a JV with his product. He had a number of other people that he's built a relationship with over time. So even though he had never built an audience before this, he was able to sell and do really well with his product when he launched. He's one of the great examples of somebody who built a product first before building an audience, which is definitely possible.
Now, the webinar thing like I was talking about. If you want more traffic to your site more than anything. I mean, social media is important, yes. Google and SEO is really important, yes. Links from other sites are really important, yes. But, lately the webinars have been killing it in terms of traffic but, not only traffic but, building your email list as well. I mean, the email list is a strategy for traffic building that a lot of people don't really focus on because they feel it's kind of separate from the website but, it can actually help drive traffic back to the website. Which drives up shares, which then drives more people into the email list, which means more shares the next time you come out with a post and share it and that sort of thing. So make sure you're collecting those emails and using your email list to promote those posts obviously.
But, going back to the webinars. The webinars are an amazing way to get more traffic to your site and provide massive value to an audience that's not even yours up front. If you for example collect registrants on Facebook or perhaps through a link on somebody else's website. Maybe you do a joint JV partnership or webinar with somebody and you get that persons' audience to come on why you provide value to them. And even if you do it for free, even if you don't sell anything you are not only getting people onto your email list because they have to sign-up to register for the webinar but, then that will help drive more traffic to your website the next time you come out with a post.
Because, again, they're on your list. But you're also building a relationship with them. You are there in person with your voice or even with your face if you're using something like Google Hangouts on air. There hearing you, you're building a relationship with them. You're interacting with them as well and they are going to be a much better lead. There going to be a more qualified person to read your site and share your content down the road as well. So getting onto webinars, providing value that way. Whether you promote them on Facebook or you promote them in a joint venture similar kind of way with another person. I mean, man, it works really, really well for building your list. And Amy Porterfield, she even said it herself the number one way she's built her list is through these webinars. Even if she's not promoting anything, she's always building her list that way. Which is how she's been able to get so much traffic.
So, hopefully this is some different advice than you might expect Alyce, because I wanted to give you something different. A lot of people know about . . . you know, it's like going to the gym. You know you have the gym, right? Which you have to have good SEO on your website. You have to, you know, write great content. We all hear that already but, hopefully I give you some other things today that you can think about to give you a big boost to your traffic in unique ways that you might not have thought about yet. So Alyce, thank you so much for your question today. I really appreciate it and thank you for all of you out there for listening as well. And if you have question you would like featured here on the show. Just head on over to AskPat.com and if you get your question featured here just like Alyce today, you're going to get a t-shirt. So, Alyce, like I said, send me a quick snapshot of the shirt and I look forward to seeing it. And for those of you listening if you have a question and you would like to get a shirt all you have to do is go to AskPat.com.
Thank you so much, again. As always, I like to end with a quote and today's quote comes from Ben Grossman. He says, “New marketing is about the relationships not the medium.”
Cheers. Take care, and I'll see you on the next episode of AskPat. Thanks guys.