What in the world does Starbucks have to do with website traffic?
You might have read “What Churches Can Learn From St. Arbucks” in your paper this past weekend. In turn, that article got me thinking about what we can learn from Starbucks about getting traffic to our websites.
So, here’s seven things Starbucks can teach you about increasing website traffic:
- Offer premium content – Starbucks gets traffic because they have a great product. Write the best content for your readers that you can create.
- Generate a buzz – Starbucks got great word-of-mouth referrals when they were getting started and it created an avalanche of traffic. Buzz marketing works the same way online, so use it.
- Expand your offerings – Starbucks started out offering just coffee and now they offer hot and cold drinks, pastries, gifts, CDs, etc. Broaden your online offerings by providing more things your visitors want. If you don’t know what they want, offer an exit quiz to capture visitor feedback.
- Provide self-defining mechanisms – Ordering a double caramel macchiatto grande or a blueberry & creme frappuccino in public defines who you are. Similarly, social sites like mySpace and Facebook are all about tweaking your profile and defining who you are.
What ways are you providing on your site to help visitors define themselves? Blog comments only? Or, forums (with avatars), article commenting, wikis, picture sharing, guest bloggers, contests, memberships, rankings, etc.
- Place to meet or gather - Starbucks devotes some premium space on their home page to a “Meet at Starbucks” section which basically encourages people to come and hang out there.
What ways are you encouraging visitors to hang out at your site and interact with each other?
- Free samples – Starbucks hosts coffee tastings to educate people about all the varieties they offer. And guess what? Those people who come in for free samples become even better customers.
What kind of free samples or other freebies are you offering to attract visitors to your website?
- Daily habit – Starbucks is a daily “must-have” for people, even when they’re already late for work. It’s become ingrained in their internal sense of self.
What kind of website traffic could you attract if your visitors became regulars who couldn’t go a day without their fix from your website?
And there you have it, 7 Things Starbucks Can Teach You About Website Traffic.
Tags: free web site traffic, free website traffic, google rankings, media, media attention, Web Site Traffic, website traffic
