Welcome to WordPress Wednesdays, a weekly series where we will be focusing on a specific aspect of WordPress that we think administrators should be aware of. Today, we address the proliferation of social media and answer the age old question: How do I get my website to be shared out there?
In the old days, business owners often said that “if you build it, they will come”. With the proliferation of social media and websites now numbering in the billions, simply building it is no longer enough. If you want to drive traffic to your website, you not only have to create valuable content, but also foster an interesting and engaging experience while keeping your visitors coming back for more.
One of the ways you keep people coming back for more is to empower them to share content that keeps them interested. When content is shared, it not only brings eyeballs back to your website but also gives you greater credibility. In this blog post, we’ll look at WordPress plugins that will give you a more robust website and rock you up the Alexa Rankings so you can look like the celebrity you’ve always wanted to be or reach those sales figures you’ve always imagined.
Give Your Users a Place to Share To
Social networking buttons are everywhere on the web now, extending the reach and power of social networks to many more web properties than before. One such tool that facilitates this is ShareThis, which offers both a code you can paste into your website as well as a plugin, downloadable from the WordPress directory. ShareThis’ comprehensive tool lets you give your end users the opportunity to share to every social network out there, like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and more. Additionally, you can also choose how the social sharing buttons appear on your website too, by either having visitors open a new window to share your content or sharing the content seamlessly from your website.
Give Your Content a Good Title – Complete with Hashtags and Mentions
Content becomes shareable when a great title is created. Optimizing for SEO is very important and none do this better than Yoast, one of WordPress’ all time popular plugins. In addition to writing headlines that will get picked up by search engines, if you can integrate hashtags and mentions of the right audience in your post, chances are the attention will go up as well. Keep in mind that over-mentioning users should be done sparingly, since you also run the risk of annoying people if you do it too much.
Post your Content – Then Schedule It
Finally, content has exploded immensely over the past 5 years and the challenge of many publishers is posting enough content during the day to get enough traffic. With so much to write and so little time, website owners may consider scheduling their content ahead of time through WordPress’ built-in publishing tool. Additionally, one might consider using a tool likeBuffer, which can schedule posts for all of the major social networks so you can sit back and watch your shares, attention, and credibility increase.
Which tools do you use for your WordPress content and sharing needs? Share your go-to tools in the comments below and let us know how they have worked for you!
