People love to get things for free. In fact, that’s one of the best ways to drive traffic.
Free things are:
- Enticing
- Eye-catching
- Shareable
- Reciprocated
Free things are enticing because there’s something inside of us that says that if something is free, that there’s something extra-special about it. It’s accessible and FREE.
Free things are eye-catching, especially when the thing being given away for free is something people would otherwise pay for. That makes it extra exciting—people want to grab something like that before it’s gone.
It may or may not have caught their eye if it was something they had to pay for—people have to know, like, and trust you before they’ll hand their money over to you. Having something be free means people will give it more than a passing glance.
Free things are also shareable. If someone has gotten a lot of value out of a freebie or knows of someone else who would get a lot of value out of something, then they’ll be a lot more likely to pass that freebie offer along via word of mouth.
Last but not least, there’s a psychological need to reciprocate when someone has gotten something for free. Consciously or subconsciously, they feel the need to repay you. They’ll be more likely to sign up for your list, visit your site, and even buy from you… just because they’ve gotten something for free from you.
It’s time to use the power of free to drive more traffic.
If you’re an online marketer, you can use the power of free reports.
People love information that helps them solve a problem or entertains them in some way. People pay for information all day long. Maybe you’ve even sold your own reports, infoproducts, and ebooks.
Now you can create a free report that can help you get your footing with another subset of your audience.
It might seem strange or even crazy to spend time creating a report that you’re just going to give away for free. After all, you’re going to take time away from activities that could potentially pay off immediately. Why give something away for free that you could charge for?
It’s time to think in the long term instead of the short term. Create free reports and it will become a lot more attractive to pay attention to you. You’ll be able to get more traffic and build your list and make more sales.
What Should You Write About?
Now that you’ve decided that it could really pay off for you to write free reports, what are you going to write about?
Again, I highly recommend you write reports that people would otherwise pay for. They should feel like they’re really getting away with something when they download your report.
The value should be clear. So, think about topics people in your audience tend to really care about.
What are their biggest problems?
If you could solve one thing for them or help them do just one thing, what would that one thing be?
Note that I’m not recommending you create a huge, all-encompassing product to give away for free. What I’m suggesting you do is really zero in on a specific topic to write about.
You’re creating a short report. Create something people really care about and that will attract the attention of those in your target audience right away.
Take a look at what your competition is giving away for free. If you look at their squeeze page and opt-in forms, you’ll usually find that they’re giving a report away for free, too.
Take notes on what you find, especially when it comes to the most successful marketers in your field. They’ll often have great ideas and have their finger on the pulse of what people in the audience care about.
That’s not to say that you’re going to copy their topics. You’re just getting inspired so you can come up with your own ideas.
Write Your Free Report
Once you have an idea of what you’re going to write about, go ahead and write the free report. This doesn’t have to be anything too long. It can be anywhere from 2,500 to 5,000 words or so—more or less, depending on the needs of your audience.
Create an outline for yourself. Come up with a catchy title that will really entice people who might sign up for your free report.
When you write, make sure you include great, original ideas and research. Inject your personality into what you write. You don’t have to be a world-class writer but you do have to be personable and relatable with your audience.
One of the best things about driving traffic by giving free reports away is that it helps you build relationships with your readers. They’ll want to visit your sites and see what else you have to say if they feel a connection with you, through your writing.
Since your goal is to drive traffic with your free report, then make sure you put a call to action inside the report. Ask people to visit your website for more information, sign up for your list, visit your blog, or check out your paid product.
It’s a good idea to put a call to action at the end of the report. This is when people have had time to get to know you and your style. If they’ve reached the end of the report, they’re likely receptive to seeing what else you have to say.
You can put a link to your website in your free report, share more about yourself, or whatever you think will help you and your business.
Getting Your Report To Go Viral
Writing the report is just part of what you need to do. Next, you have to distribute the free report.
Now, you can definitely give the report away for free on your squeeze page. But, in this case, we’re most concerned with getting traffic with the report. That means spreading it all around the web.
One thing you might do is email your current list with the free report. Ask them to freely give the report to anyone who might find it useful.
You can also allow affiliates to brand the report with affiliate links to products you have for sale. They’ll be motivated to email their lists with the report, post it on their web properties, and so on.
Additionally, you can put the report up on file sharing websites, like Scribd.
You might want to make a list of all the places you can distribute your free report. Then, actively get your report up on the web wherever you can. The more places, the better.
You can share your report via social media.
You can allow other marketers to give it away for free on their download pages for their own products.
You can upload the report or book to Amazon Kindle and give the book away for free (note that this involves also uploading it through something like Smashwords, reporting to Amazon that it’s free on other sites, and having them “price match” your book to free). This is a bit of a more advanced strategy.
Get Started With Free Reports to Drive Traffic
These free reports can truly act like incredible traffic funnels. You could have dozens of these out there, being distributed by yourself and others. Your links will be in the book, getting a great amount of exposure over time.
This is a fantastic way to build your list, drive traffic to your web properties, and make sales of your paid products. Free reports are an underutilized but fantastic strategy for driving traffic.
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