From the Inbox:
Hi Lynn, I have a website that I started back in January of 2010. I believe I am targeting a difficult audience because my audience is teenagers.
I was trying to post everyday on my site, but I have dropped to once a week now. I plan on going back to everyday since I'm not seeing that many visitors.
I am using SEO right now and I post a little bit on teen forums in order to try and bring in traffic.
I have received 218 visits this month and 180 unique visits. I get a few cents in Adsense every month but nothing huge.
How Do I Get Traffic To My Website?
Will it be that difficult since I am targeting teenagers? I have a YouTube channel that I plan on uploading videos to. I have Facebook but I'm not on it much. I'm trying to find someone that can customize it for me. Plus besides having my personal Facebook profile, I'm not sure how my fan page works...
Any advice you could give me would be great. Traffic is key and I've been online with this site for a year now and I'm not where I want to be with it. Barely anyone knows I'm out there. Please help. Thank you, Scarlet of www.teen-babble.com
Hi Scarlet,
Thanks for writing, and for giving me permission to share your email. I'm sure you're not alone with these questions!
I took a look at your website, and would like to start with a few suggestions for you.
While the marketing is important, you want to be sure your site is ready for the targeted traffic you send to it.
Header: The first thing that stood out to me is your header is too deep. If you make it smaller, it will move the content up on the page so that visitors can see it as soon as they land on your site. I would keep the width, but make it about half the size it is now.
Opt-in Box: You'll want a more compelling incentive for your visitors to opt-in. Currently it simply says "Get Teen Babble Updates!" Why should your visitors subscribe? Answer that question, and work that answer into your opt-in copy.
Social Media Icons: Fix your Facebook Page URL. If you haven't already claimed a Vanity URL on Facebook for that page, do that first and then use that link. Create a logo/brand image to use on that page instead of your personal photo. Your YouTube link goes to a "channel does not exist" page. I would also create a channel titled Teen Babble instead of using your name. The same with Twitter - use a logo/brand image and the name "Teen Babble".
Brand: It's important to focus more on the brand than on you personally. This will benefit you in the future if you want to sell the site, or bring on a team of writers. I would guess that your target market (teens) would prefer a more anonymous site to talk or comment about their biggest issues. Use strong branding, and manage the site by your first name only.
About Page: Instead of making this page "About Scarlet", make it about the website (About Teen Babble) - and what they can expect there. Use a stock image of teenagers hanging out. Use the words "me, I, my" less and focus on what's in it for them instead. Remove the comments section, and end that page with a call-to-action (the next best click): What action do you want them to take after reading the page?
Contact Page: You offer to personally reply to email messages. This won't be feasible when you have steady traffic. Instead, allow them to send questions or topics, and address them with new blog posts - then reply with the link to that post. Otherwise you'll be doing "free consultations" instead of growing your site.
Other Pages: Flesh these out with relevant content. They all say "coming soon". Finish each page, and be sure to use a strong call-to-action on each page.
Product Reviews: Make a list of products/brands teens are interested in, that you would like to work with as an affiliate. What are teens buying online? Movies, music, clothes, school books, computers & gadgets, costumes games - those are just a few ideas (from my own teens' purchases). Make a list and start working on those reviews.
Blog Posts: Left align images in individual blog posts. This will keep proper alignment of your site, and draw the eye from left to right - to engage them in the content. Consider how you want to monetize your posts. If you're going to use Adsense, use it IN the post.
Encouraging Comments: Want them to comment? Ask them! End your post with a leading question. You might also consider a category about popular teen shows (what they're watching on television). This will encourage some lively discussion.
How Do I Get Traffic To My Website?
Once you make a few minor changes (above), you're ready to start driving more targeted traffic to your website. Continue optimizing your blog posts for specific keyword phrases. SEO is the best method for getting highly targeted traffic for free.
You'll want to get inbound links, not just to your main page but also to your individual pages & blog posts. This will help your pages rise in the search engine results for their keyword phrases.
Other than Google, consider where your target market hangs out online. YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Forums, etc. It's important to BE where they are. YouTube and Facebook are likely your two biggest targets for teens, so you'll want to get heavily involved there.
Keep your personal Facebook profile *personal*, and use your Fan Page specifically for "Teen Babble talk". Find other Teen related Facebook Pages (that attract your target market) and join discussions on those Pages *AS* your page. You have the option of switching to your page (instead of commenting as your personal profile).
Post daily, upload those videos to YouTube, keep tweeting, and get active on Facebook. Seeing very little results is not a reason to back off, but a reason to dig in and do more. The more you do, the better your results will be.
Keep an eye on Adsense too. It's hard to tell how well it will do with your market until you truly test it. You mentioned not earning very much, but your traffic stats are also low. Pay more attention to the CTR (click through rate) - particularly after you add Adsense to individual posts.
If it's not performing well for you, look for affiliate programs that will. You might also consider taking sponsors or selling advertising space to monetize your website.
Thanks again for sharing your site and your questions. I hope this review & advice has proven helpful to you! Keep us posted on your progress...
Best,
p.s. I host a weekly Brainstorming Hour where I offer site reviews and usability tests. If you would like to get help with YOUR website or marketing plan, join us in my Private Brainstorming Group where you'll get access to FIVE live calls a month plus the multimedia replay of all archives. 😉
Register at the forum then upgrade to Elite Member to access the private group!
About Lynn Terry
Thanks for the Advice Lynn. I'll be sure to take action and do what you suggested. Hopefully everything will work out for me. Thanks again!
Scarlet
Hey Lynn, I'd like to know more about exactly how you "You’ll want to get inbound links, not just to your main page but also to your individual pages & blog posts. This will help your pages rise in the search engine results for their keyword phrases."
Great site with huge potential. You're on your way to creating an authority site.
One additional traffic tip would be to target product and services keywords that teens use. I suspect they search for various products and services by name. You can go after 1000's of keywords this way and will attract teens if they do indeed search for those products and services. You may well attract adults, but that's great as well. of course be an affiliate for these products and services.
Another idea is to add a section targeting and informing parents from a teen perspective. You could create a separate subscribership for parents. I'm just brainstorming here; if you think targeting parents will compromise your site, then of course don't do it.
Check out Yahoo Answers' Teen and preteen section to find out precisely what teens are asking. Same thing with teen forums. Those very questions will form blog posts.
Monetization: You may want to check out some CPA offers which I think teens will click on frequently. Be sure to see if any CPA lead offers have a minimum age for leads in order to receive the lead commission.
The trouble with teens for monetization is they may not have credit cards which is the currency of the Web. Therefore, Adsense and CPA may be your best bet. I could be wrong here, though, since it's been a while since I was a teen. Maybe they all have credit cards now. Could be a good post or series - credit cards for teens that is.
Other topics and categories you might add would be online marketing and blogging for teens. You're no doubt very informed about this. You have a "make money" section, which could be expanded to making money online. I'm sure there are obstacles for teens such as getting affiliate accounts, etc. You could coach them through the process. This could be a great list-building topic, and one where you could maintain those relationships when they graduate from being a teen to an adult.
Anyway, you chose a great niche/market. Keep at it.
Hi Peter,
Thanks for the tips. They are awesome. My main fear is that many teens don't have money to pay for things like you mentioned, so I think my main money source would be Adsense and CPA as well. How do I find out what teens are searching for? That's a toughie.
I'm often of forums and Yahoo Answers. That's how I'm trying to drive traffic. Teens will be tough to crack, but I think if I stay with it, I will eventually see more traffic and more money.
Thanks again!
Two things from my side:
a) Get into contact with Aurelia Williams from the previous case study ("Parenting My Teen") to get an idea of what parents see as problems and handle these from a teens perspective (see also Peters comment above).
b) check your analytics for mobile users. If you have lots of them (and teens become more and more mobile users), then you should make your homepage more mobile friendly (fast loading and easy to read - meaning showing content and not just a logo on the tiny screen).
Good luck with the site.
I have contacted Aurelia. I actually did that about 3 or 4 days ago. I have yet to hear from her. Maybe I'll shoot her another email.
Thanks
Hi there Scarlet... I just replied to you. Sorry for the delay - its been a fun an busy Holday weekend for me and the family here.
For traffic,choose some long tail keywords from your niche and optimize your site under those keywords.Soon you will get targeted traffic when your site will be at top 10 for those keywords.
Great recommendations! I would also suggest adding some images to your homepage. Good luck!
I think that a forum would work well on something like that.
Think about it a teen babble forum. I could see teens just babbling away about all kinds of teenie-bopper subjects.
Definitely potential there.
Mark
Hi Lynn, great article and yes, it answers a question many of us have - especially: how do I get the FIRST visitors, subscribers, fans and followers. It´s just the start which is hard. Once you found out where your target audience is hanging around you feel like you can "push" a button to get traffic. With each new website and niche I try to target I have the same feeling though and think it was much easier for the other niche 😉
Hi there --- thanks to Tom for suggesting that you contact me. Lynn offered some STELLAR advice! She did an awesome review of your site and gave great tips.
The key is to find out what teens are talking about. Now wish school in session they are gearing up for Homecoming, tests, homework battles, sports, bullying...etc. You have to be sure to pull teens out of their shells. Why not ask for a Teen to guest Blog for you? Have a featured Teen of the Month?... something that will get them talking. Once you get a few talking and commenting, they will tell their friends about it and so on.. and so on.
I will reply to your email momentarily. I just received it a few hrs. ago.
Great post. I need to do a better job of encouraging comments. Would love to see more engagement from my readers.
Many thanks to Lynn, Scarlet, and all who contributed to this most informative post...so much to learn, so little time :-)!
All the best,
Jon
I agree with Mark. I think that a teen help forum would work great for your website. You could have categories such as "drugs and alcohol," "dating advice," "sex and sexuality," etc and you could let them help each other out as opposed to you writing all the content. I think there would be a whole lot more interaction that way once the traffic starts coming in. You also wouldn't have to worry as much about incentive when it comes to getting people to join your mailing list since they would be joining as a member...
I also agree with Lynn that Facebook and Youtube are some pretty big targets for finding teens. Getting involved with other Teen Facebook Pages should definitely bring some eyeballs your way. You can also use Quantcast to find out which other major websites teens are going to these days...
As far as getting SEO traffic it's all about building links back to your website. Find the keywords you want to target first, and then start building links back to your internal pages by making web 2.0 sites, writing articles, blog commenting, etc. Link building takes a lot of time and it is pretty boring to do, so it might be something you want to outsource. You can hire a SEO company or try looking on places such as the Warrior Forum.
Hope the feedback helps! You've got some great content there with tons of potential. Keep with it and you will be successful!
You, as well as some of these comments, offered some great tips which can be used for nearly every type of website.
I too have a deep header that I just re-sized to allow more of the body to be seen. What do you think is the most common screen resolution used? My newly re-sized header looks good on my 1280 x 800 laptop screen. I'm just not sure this is the most common size.
Wow good advice Lynn! I'm going to try to do facebook traffic. I think it is the best method for my blog.
As long as passion flows in you nothing can stop you from succeeding in the near future. Just do what you love to do and basically just have fun and everything will follow.
Curious, why don't you outsource the backlinking? I do and get quality links too. I'm assuming a privacy issue? which makes sense, but I was given a name from Viper Chill and he is very reputable. Again, curious.Lisa's last post...Competing On the Internet
Lynn, I like Clicknewz and you're right, there is alot of helpful information on here. That always seem like the hardest part finding the info but I do like your video tutorials.
Thanks for the Advice Lynn.Its really helpful for me, thanks for sharing it.
Lyyn Terry after this post I am a great fan of you now because you suggested Scarlet Murdock with some very helpful tips. I am pretty sure some SEO company might have charge around $100 bucks for the same suggestion, and they might not even help like you did.
I will bookmark your site for more interesting info about how to get more traffic. 😉