Whether we want to admit it or not, some of our content resonates perfectly with our audience… and some falls short.
While it’s vital to continue to develop new content for your website, you should take advantage of content you know works with your audience. In this article, you will learn how you can find your most popular web content and use it to drive new traffic to your website and add names to your email list.
With the new year upon us, now is a great time to promote your most popular blog posts from 2015. Facebook provides a unique format for you to share this type of content in Carousel Ads.
If you haven’t built any ads for 2016, a carousel ad promoting your most popular content should be the first.
Let’s get started.
Finding Your Most popular Content
You don’t need to be an expert in website analytics to find out which of your pieces of content got the most attention. All you need is a Google Analytics!
While there are many layers to Google Analytics, for this exercise we will focus on the content which got the most pageviews.
First, Log into your Google Analytics account.
Near the top of the page, Select the date range you wish to use. In this case we are looking for the whole year of 2015. Click the date bar and then use the calendar or date boxes to adjust the dates in which you data is pulled from and click “Apply”.
Adjusting Dates in Google Analytics
Next, select “Behavior” and “Site Content” from the side navigation bar, then “All Pages”. This will generate a report which displays all of your website content and the total number of pageviews each piece of content has received.
Find Your Most Popular Content in Google Analytics
Your report will look similar to the image below. The metric we will focus on is “Pageviews”. Pageviews are measuring any time your website page has been loaded by a browser and are a very basic way of measuring the popularity of content on your website.
Sorting Your Most Popular Blog Posts In Google Analytics
From this report you will need to identify your top blog posts. Open these blog posts in a new window and save these links to be used later when we are building our ad.
Building Your Facebook Ad
The Carousel Ad format is ideal for promoting multiple pieces of content, such as your most popular website content. When we log into Power Editor or Ads Manager, select the Carousel Ad Format.
Facebook Carousel Ad Format
For a step-by-step guide on how to build a carousel ad, you can read our article “Everything You Need to Know About Carousel Ads”, but for this instance, we will enter the URL’s of our most popular blog posts, that we saved from above, into the destination URL’s of each pane of your carousel ad.
One important thing to note is that under the “Creative Optimization” settings, you should be sure “Automatically select and order images and links” is unchecked. This will ensure that your articles are displayed in the order in which you intended (IE: Your most popular blog post will always be listed first).
Choose copy that resonates with your audience and edit your thumbnails so your message is clear and concise. Be Sure to adjust your targeting and refine it with Retargeting pixels, or Custom and Look-a-like audiences.
Once finished, your ad should look something like this.
Arch carousel
Making It Work For You
Now is the perfect time to be sending out these ads promoting your top blog content from 2015, but this strategy can apply to any time frame you like. For example: If you put out multiple blog posts a month, you can (and should) be promoting your most popular content each month with Facebook ads.
Promoting your top content is great for two reasons: It reinforces your expertise in your niche and it keeps proven content in front of new potential website visitors. By adjusting the time frame of your search in Google Analytics, you can view the most popular blogs quite easily and then develop a promotional strategy that works for you.
Now it’s your turn: What has worked best for you in the past? How do you promote your most popular blog content?