5 Ways to Avoid The Summer Traffic Slump on Your Blog

Published by Nicole Karlis on Wednesday, June 17, 2015 in Content Marketing, Summer Content.

Summer can be a slow time for traffic, but it doesn't have to be that way -- learn how to capture your readers' attention on, let's say, the beach during these hot months.

Blog traffic can tend to be a little static and slow in the summer months. People either go on vacation, week-long trips or are closing their laptops to relax and enjoy the nice weather. Fortunately, there are ways to keep your audience engaged so you don't lose all the progress you've made this year.

See also: Plan Your Content Around These Summer Holidays

1. Optimize Your Content for Mobile

Make a greater effort to understand where readers go during the summer months by optimizing your content for the platforms where they'll be viewing it. Your audience might leave their laptops at home when they hit the beach, but hardly anyone leaves without a cell phone or tablet device. There are a few best practices you can follow to make your content mobile-friendly, for example: including high-res images, making your articles scannable through subheads and including podcasts in your editorial calendar.

See also: Make Your Content Responsive Now for 2014

2. Keep to a Consistent Publishing Schedule

It's vital to your marketing campaign that you maintain your editorial calendar during the summer and don't disappoint the readers that still visit -- indeed, these are often your best customers. Stay consistent by adhering to a regular publishing schedule which readers can expect to come back to on a daily basis (even on Summer Fridays!).

3. Offer Discounts for Travelers

The following months are an ideal time to promote ongoing summer deals and features. If it makes sense for your business, you can tailor these specifically to vacationing and other summer activities as well. This keeps readers visiting before and during their trip, in addition to fostering new co-marketing relationships.

4. Focus Content on Summer-Related Issues

Shift your focus to themes surrounding summer. These could entail anything from entertaining the kids during break to preparing for emergencies that may arise from the summer swelter. Think about what problems your customers are likely to experience because it's summer and write content with solutions around those issues.

5. Engage Your Newcomers

Finally, one of the best ways to keep your audience engaged is to listen to what they want. Focus some of your energy during the summer on acquiring new followers, subscribers and listening to what they're saying on social media and in the comments section. Additionally, you can write new content around what these newcomers want to read and are interested in learning about.

Summer is a challenging time because both content managers and customers slip into vacation mode. However, if you pay attention these types of factors, you can make the summer months an opportunity to improve the quality of your content and build your audience.

How do you keep readers engaged during the summer? Share your thoughts with us below.