When you think of social media, Facebook, Instagram or Linkedin may come to mind. But maybe it’s time to expand your definition.
The question and answer platform Quora has over 200 million unique users that businesses like yours are now learning to turn into highly qualified leads. But If you want to know how to get traffic from Quora, you need to understand the unique nature of this social community, how they interact, what they’re looking for.
Let’s explore how to harness the lead-generating power of Quora for your business.
The rise of Quora
In 2009, Quora was founded by the former CTO of Facebook, Adam D’Angelo. His goal was to create a user-friendly community where people could ask anything and get answers from the community of users.
You might think this set-up a little dangerous. What about all of the people who give wrong answers?
Fortunately, through the voting and revision request systems in Quora, the Quora community has proven itself quite capable of governing itself and propelling the best answers to the top.
Being this kind of answer is how to get traffic from Quora.
Since its launch, its popularity has grown exponentially starting with a mere 1500 users in 2010 and growing to over 2M. As Quora continues to add new analytics, content and marketing features, you can learn how to get traffic from Quora.
Why is Quora so powerful? (Hint: personal branding)
A major part of learning how to get more traffic from Quora is understanding why it’s such a powerful lead-generating tool.
Quora isn’t a place to openly advertise your products or services unless you buy ads. Instead, it’s a place to build a personal brand through which you can influence buyer decisions.
With 26% of consumers now use ad-blockers, now’s the time to reach customers in a more effective way. Quora’s the place to do it.
People are increasingly tuning out advertisement of all kinds. Instead, they’re looking for brands who add value to their lives. They turn to people who demonstrate that they’re an authority in their industry.
And what better place to demonstrate your expertise than on a site where you answer questions on topics that you likely deal with every day? Connect, relate, and build trust all in one place.
As you grow your personal brand on Quora, you reach more buyers at critical points along their buyer’s journey and organically funnel them back to your business.
This is the more focused customer targeting that businesses today need to compete.
How to get traffic from Quora
Now that you have the fundamentals, let’s talk strategy with 11 tips, hacks and strategies that show you how to get traffic from Quora.
1) Create your profile
Before you begin, create your profile. It should include pertinent information like:
- Education (if applicable)
- Position
- What you and your company do
Add professional images within your profile to help it stand out. It’s okay to be a little self-promotional here. But it’s not CTA-level promotion. Remember, Quora’s all about building a personal brand.
Focus on your ideals and how your brand provides solutions.
Choose a title that includes both you as a person and your brand. People relate to people. So you should never answer questions as a faceless brand.
2) Start with answer later
If you’re new to Quora, you’ll likely find millions of questions that you could potentially answer. But we don’t expect you to answer 1 million questions. Instead, answer the right questions.
As you begin finding questions to answer in the next step, mark them “answer later” in Quora.
3) Revisit your buyer persona to stay focused
Be clear on who your target audience is. This will guide you as you answer questions.
Just because a question falls into your industry, doesn’t mean that it will appeal to your target. To use your time wisely, only focus on questions that align.
Compile a list of questions commonly asked by your target as a guideline to get started.
4) Answer questions that are ranking organically
You probably spend a major portion of your marketing budget on SEO so that you can achieve that coveted #1 spot.
But you can achieve a top spot almost instantly if you answer questions that are already ranking high in searches. This way, 3/4 of the work is already done for you.
To determine which questions rank high, in Google, search for those commonly asked questions you compiled. Make note of the ones that are ranking on page one.
Additionally, do a search for the keywords you target in your own SEO campaign. If any questions rank for those keywords, you have another winner.
5) Find questions with lots of views
You want to answer questions that are getting lots of views.
There’s not an easy way to figure out which questions have the most views from a search. It’s intentionally set up like this so that people don’t spam highly viewed questions.
Instead, you’ll do this in a roundabout way. Using one or more of these methods will help you find the most viewed questions.
You can see how many people are following the questions and infer from that many people are viewing it.
You can also follow industry leaders to see what they’re answering. If industry leaders answered it, then it will be highly viewed.
Finally, you can look for questions that have lots of answers.
After you use one of these methods, you can click on the question to see how many people are actually viewing it. If the number is high, go for it. If it’s not what you expected, pass on it.
6) Follow categories
Follow categories to see what people are asking. When you see a great question, answer it early to get more views.
7) Create the perfect answer
In order to drive traffic to your answer, your answer should stand out in a good way.
Each answer should be:
- Friendly — e.g., “Hi there, great question”
- Visual — Eye-catching pictures, infographics, screenshots, etc.
- Scannable — short paragraphs, headings, bullet points
- Helpful
- Well-organized — a thesis statement followed by points
- Supported — when possible, support with stats or other data
8) Add links
Your answer should never be directly promotional. But it should provide value to the reader. Always have the intention of educating by giving clear and concise information and include a branded link that leads to further resources.
These links will help lead people back to your website.
It’s important to realize that these links are “no follow”, which means that they don’t count as backlinks that would give you link juice to your SEO strategies.
They are for steerage purposes only. With that in mind, these should always be branded short links rather than long, ugly URLs. Branded links, serve 3 very important functions.
1) They increase brand awareness
2) They increase link click through rate by up to 39%.
3) They allow us to track where our traffic is coming from. (More on that below)
9) SEO Your Answer
Just as you want your website to rank, you also want your answers to rank. Use the same keywords that you would use for your own website, knowing that you have the power of Quora behind you, helping you rank.
10) Use Your Community to Upvote Your Answers
Share your answers on your other social media sites to engage customers across channels. Gaining upvotes from followers will help your answers rank higher.
11) Track, analyze and adapt
Take advantage of Quora’s analytics such as views and upvotes to determine which answers are getting the most attention.
To make your efforts even more tangible you can also track the traffic driven to your site from each post in Google Analytics. To do this use Rebrandly’s UTM builder to identify exactly which posts are driving traffic to your site. You can then run reports in Google Analytics to better understand which links are driving the most traffic to your website.
Learn how to get traffic from Quora and continue to hone your strategies.
The 80/20 rule applies here. 80% of your traffic will come from 20% of your answers. As you identify which answers drive the most traffic, re-calibrate your strategy.
Conclusion
Now that you know how to get traffic from Quora, turn this Q&A site into a lead-generating powerhouse. Know your target. Be Selective. Engage your community. Use branded short links. Analyze. Adapt and succeed.
What would you add to our tips on how to get traffic from Quora? Comment below.
Further Reading:
- Using Instagram For Business: Tips From The Experts
- Social Media: How Small Business Can Look Big
- Best Chrome Extensions For Digital Marketers
This Article Is About:
- How to get traffic from Quora
- Quora as a marketing channel
- Quora Marketing