Launching a new site is an exciting milestone. All the time, effort and money that went into the site can finally pay off. However, post-launch is often very far from carefree. One situation many site owners find themselves in after they launch their brand-new site is that they have little to no traffic coming in.
The reason behind this is simple: No one knows about the site yet. While site traffic will gradually grow on its own over time, this is far from ideal. To have traffic pouring into your website after it launches, you need to announce it and do so in a way that resonates with people.
Below is a list of eight ways to effectively announce a new site. Before diving in, however, it’s essential to note that marketing typically takes time to see results. That’s why starting your marketing efforts early on is the best strategy for success. By developing a promotional plan well in advance of your site launching, you are setting yourself up to achieve results.
1. Hype up Your Site
One of the best ways to ensure you have traffic coming into your site upon launch is to create hype surrounding the site. The primary reasons users aren’t on your website at launch are that they either don’t know about it or aren’t interested in what you are offering. Creating excitement around your website well in advance of its launch not only lets people know about the site, but it can also motivate users to visit who ordinarily might not. Social media posts are a great way of creating this hype over time.
What makes your site or products unique? These are the qualities you’ll want to highlight in your pre-launch marketing efforts. However, you shouldn’t reveal all the information about your new site or inventory. Once a user has all the information, they don’t have a reason to visit the site — they already know for sure whether they’d make a purchase.
2. Comment on Industry Blogs
Commenting on other blogs is a surprisingly efficient way to market your site. Spending time commenting and responding to comments on someone else’s site may seem pointless at first. However, many site owners have successfully driven traffic to their new website by employing this tactic.
The reason for this success is that when you comment on a blog post, you typically leave your name and website URL, which causes many blogs to get flooded with spam comments. However, many top blogs feature detailed and insightful comment sections that help expand on the author’s content and ideas. Here’s where you want to focus your commenting efforts.
By providing a thorough comment that offers valuable information, you portray yourself as an expert on the topic. You are also providing additional content readers will likely find interesting. By writing the comment and including the link to your site in this way, you increase the odds of the blog readers navigating to your website.
3. Have a Helpful Site
Aside from any products you might be selling, why should searchers visit your site? It is crucial to have an answer to this question when you are looking to launch a brand-new website. To capture traffic on your site, you have to have content that is useful for users.
People turn to the internet to answer their questions. If you want your site to be a success upon launch, it should provide applicable information. What questions do people ask in your industry? What questions do customers ask before buying? What do people misunderstand about your industry? By providing answers to popular things people want to know about your field, you can help capture qualified traffic when your site launches.
4. Send a Press Release
Submitting a press release is another way you can successfully announce your new site. If you are a brick-and-mortar business, contacting a local publication about your site’s launch can help spread the word. Even if you don’t have a physical location or a local presence, you can still use press releases to your advantage. There are numerous online services for press releases, which can help get your information in front of interested searchers.
5. Repeated Social Media Posts
As an essential component of online marketing, social media should play a crucial role in announcing your site’s launch. The larger the following, the more possible traffic you can drive to your new site. However, even if you only have a “small” social media following, it’s still important to post information, updates and photos from your site.
Due to the algorithms of social media sites, you should post more than once about the new website. When you publish an update to Facebook or send out a tweet, your entire following won’t see it. As mentioned earlier, start your social media marketing well in advance of your new site launching. By posting highlights or even teasers of your new site before its launch, then frequently posting after the new website is live, you will reach significantly more of your followers than if you only posted one or two updates.
So, you’ve created content and directed users to your site. That should be it to announce your new site, right? While this is a great start, you want to foster continued success on your site. You also want to ensure users continue to navigate to your website well after launch. One great way to do this is to ensure you have optimized your content for sharing on social media.
Social media can be challenging to navigate. If you have a WordPress site, you may be in luck: There are several great social media plugins to optimize websites. These plugins make sharing on social media easy. That means if users enjoy a blog or article on your site, they can share it to their social media pages with a single click. Doing so can spread awareness and help drive traffic to your new site.
7. Paid Advertising
Paid advertising can be intimidating, especially when launching a new site. And while pay-per-click marketing does incur an additional cost, it is a strategy to consider when working on a new website. With PPC search advertising, or paid social ads, you choose how much you would like to invest. Because paid campaigns are so customizable, the traffic that comes into your site through this channel is more likely to convert than organic searchers.
Additionally, not every searcher who comes into contact with your ad will click on it, which is an opportunity to get your site and brand in front of a lot of searchers, even if they aren’t clicking.
8. Content Blogging and Marketing
Another great way to drive traffic to your site is through blogging and creating content. Once your site is live, regularly adding new blog posts can help increase the number of visitors you are getting. Before the site’s launch, you may even be able to guest blog on some popular sites in your industry.
Not only does this help elevate your credentials, but it also enables you to promote your site and social media in an author bio. Ongoing content additions to your site help increase its performance in search results. While this is more of a long-term strategy, doing so can help promote long-lasting performance. Launching a brand-new website can be a challenge, especially if you aren’t getting any traffic after the site goes live. By careful planning and marketing your site well before its launch, you can effectively announce your new website and set it up for success.
