Social Proof: Drawing Website Visitors

Question: How can my new website gain traction and improve its Google ranking?

Answer: To effectively boost your website's visibility, focus on creating engaging content that attracts quality visitors beyond just friends and family; utilize social media groups and targeted campaigns to generate genuine interest and build social proof, which are crucial for satisfying search engine criteria.

Helpful Guide to Understanding the Launch Strategy For Your New Website

Social Proof, Launch Phase II

Others built a website using one of those WordPress or Wix or Joomla type platforms.  Others posted about it on Facebook and six of their friends provided it a Like after spending thirty seconds looking at a few pages, and without actually reading the pages.  Their Mom even said, “Oh sweetie, you chose such a pretty background colour and the scales of justice logo is so stylish”.  They then bragged about installing cool keywords and how they included the names of every town and hamlet within 100 miles of their office.  They then excitedly await incredible business results and they go out to party like it is 1999.  And they waited for Google to find and index their website.  And they waited.  And they wonder what is taking so long – after all, their Mom said the website is pretty and therefore Google should know so as ‘Mom always knows best’.

Promoting Your Website

Okay, many people think that a website is supposed to do all the work of promoting a business; however, before that can happen, promoting the website is necessary.  Just as you are unable to go to the top of a hill, roll a snowball, and then run to the bottom of the hill waiting for a snowboulder to arrive without first giving the snowball a nudge at the top of the hill, your website also needs an initial nudge to get it rolling.  This is because we now live in 2019 rather than 1999; and Google, among other search engines, are much more sophisticated than in 1999.  Today, Google and other search engines require ‘social proof’ that your website is about what it says it is about and that it is genuinely interesting to human beings.  The perception that there is some purely mathematical formula that extracts ‘back end’ installed keywords as well as ‘front end’ visible content and compares such to an Internet surfers search phrase is terribly flawed (unless you are truly still partying in 1999).

Today, Google and other search engines want to see ‘social proof’, among various many other factors, all when combined help to create positive rank.  Accordingly, creative campaigns that bring ‘social proof’ are necessary, especially as an early nudge, for your website to grow from snowball into snowboulder.  Today, you are unable to just build a website and expect that Google rank, and the clients that follow, will come.  You must have a ‘social proof’ nudge – and the nudge must be more than your Mom and a few friends taking a few minutes on a Sunday afternoon to say that your website looks pretty.  It is actually highly important that your Mom and a few friends do much more than take a few minutes on a Sunday to say that your website looks pretty.  This is where many businesses that launch a website go terribly wrong - by asking friends and family to spend a few minutes on a website based on a request of, "Let me know what you think!"  We all know that friends and family will provide a positive review.  We also know that friends and family will provide that review in thirty seconds or less.  And what happens when Google tracks the data that a few humans (Google is without knowledge that it is friends and family of the website owner) spent thirty seconds looking at website, is that Google receives 'proof' that the website is disinteresting and worthy of only a thirty second glance.  Accordingly, avoid having anyone, when you can, provide only glances at your website and ensure that everyone, including you, when you can, spend as much quality time interacting with your website.

TIP #1

For yourself, get to know what is where in your website.  Know it well enough to use as your 'go to' when you need to refer to the law.  Yes, use your own website as a secondary source.  If you need to look up the legal test for what constitutes malice when trying to debunk a 'qualified privilege' defence on a defamation case - research this first in your own website!  You have the articles installed, use them.

TIP #2

Use creative ways to build an audience that will visit your website - for more than a quick glance as a quick glance will hurt your rank.  In the past, the What Do You Think?  questions with links to my prior office's website, TIPS & BITS blog with links to my prior office's website, etc., all helped bring visitors to my website.  Drawing lawyers, paralegals, insurance brokers, accountants, among others, to view my prior office's website as an information resource also helped with Google rank.  Remember, in Phase II the main goal is to build Google rank.  Yes, what happens in Phase II will bring some clients, and that is a highly desired effect; however, medium term thinking requires understanding that quality visits are what Phase II is about.

TIP #3

So, how does attracting quality website visitors happen, especially if a 'quality' visitor is someone other than friends and family and especially people other than your Mom?  Well, why reinvent the wheel?  We already know that What Do You Think questions posted in social media groups works whereas I was posting these in various Facebook small business groups for years, especially the Brooklin-Whitby-Oshawa Shout-Out Group, which has 11,000 members.  In the Oshawa area, I became known as the 'What Do You Think' guy.  So, step one is to go to Facebook and find small business groups applicable to your local communities and join those groups and create a list of the groups that you have joined.  When you have joined a few groups, send me your list of groups including a short summary of how many members those groups have and any special niches, if any.  When everyone in the Marketing.Legal community is ready, meaning websites launched and Facebook groups joined with list of groups sent over to me, then we can all get started on Phase II - which gets everyone one step closer to partying like it is 2019.

As always, get in touch with any questions or concerns or thoughts or ideas.