In my previous article, we discussed about frequency in online marketing.

If content frequency is king, then distribution is queen. What do we mean by distribution? Distribution is simply about putting out your content onto places where people can view your work.

Russell Brunson of ClickFunnels put this onto a followable framework – marketing is simply about having good copy written and also good traffic coming in to test the copy. This in turn, creates a funnel. Content distribution activities occurs at the very top of the funnel while copy tackles the middle of the funnel.

Copy is still king in that regard in whatever marketing activities you undertake, because if what you write does not convert, no matter how much traffic you have – it will be useless. You still need traffic coming in, and how do you acquire traffic – it’s through content distribution. Distribution and traffic intertwined with each other and not separate activities.

Traffic Is The Name Of The Game

There are multiple ways to distribute your content, first is through paid traffic and the second is through free traffic. I defined distribution of content is simply putting your content in a place where traffic congregates.

Paid Traffic – If You Want Quick Results

In general, if you want to test the copy you write, paid traffic is the fastest way to validate whether what you wrote will convert or what you wrote bombed. Paid traffic is simply the act of paying a company, website or platform that already has the people that may be interested in your product. Paid traffic is one of the fastest ways to validate your existing copy.

Advantages of paid traffic

• Paid traffic is fast, and is very accessible for the average business to use.
• Paid traffic for scaling is an excellent source of leads.
• Paid traffic can be inexpensive depending on the keyword, and niche.
• Best way to validate copy with an audience.

Disadvantages of paid traffic

• Requires a skilled traffic copywriter or strategist. The copy for your business may be converting well however the copy for your traffic may not necessarily be converting which results in a break in the funnel.
• Costs upfront capital that may be wasted on testing out ads, could be disadvantageous if you do not know what you are doing.
• Paid traffic could also be expensive depending on the source you are buying from.

As you can see, getting paid traffic in can have its advantages and disadvantages. Media buying is known as the skillset of acquiring paid traffic. Media buyers usually have the negotiation skills, and eye for traffic sources and so they are able to funnel these eyeballs onto your website where your copy is written.

Paid traffic can come from the following sources such as:

1. Facebook ads
2. Instagram ads
3. Google Ads
4. Other paid forms of advertisement like programmatic advertising.
5. YouTube ads
6. Buying advertisement space from websites.

Just to give you an example of paid traffic, have you ever seen those annoying ads that pop up on YouTube promoting some brand new education program or something along those lines. That’s paid traffic right there.

Free Traffic – If you want long term results

Free traffic takes on average at least 6 months to over a year to setup. This includes the marketing fields of SEO, social media marketing and community building. Free traffic is basically about going to the places where your ideal customers are already congregating, interacting with people there getting them interested in your business through a funnel.

But hold on a second.

If you just go onto any online community and start promoting your stuff, the immediate response will be the silence of the ban-hammer. This is because people do not want to be advertised to, they want to be taken care of and heard. That’s why getting free traffic takes time and more effort than paid traffic. You have to take time into nurturing your following, your community and be someone that is genuinely helpful to other people. You have to be someone that’s willing to give value first before asking anything in return.

This is a whole another skillset by itself.

However, the traffic you would acquire with this are usually high quality because of the time-invested in it means the people will already be pre-qualified to your brand.

Advantages of free traffic

• Prequalified leads that already have a predisposition towards your brand.
• As a long-term strategy, free traffic is actually superior to paid traffic because you are acquiring people that are likely to be loyal to your brand.
• Free traffic in a way builds up your brand authority in a way that paid traffic can’t.

Disadvantages of free traffic

• Takes time, a lot more time to succeed than you would think.
• Not something you can achieve instant success within a few days.
• Requires interacting with people and building your network, which is requires a different skillset than copywriting.

Free traffic at the end day is a long-term investment, of your time and effort. You are investing into communities, people and platforms without investing any upfront capital. Instead you are investing your personal resources which will require work. However, if done correctly can be very rewarding. Why do many brands pay top YouTube influencers high amounts of money to feature their brands, it’s because of the “free traffic” they have already acquired.

They have already acquired this traffic to their channel and they can now sell that traffic in the form of paid traffic. All traffic starts off as “free traffic” that is why this is really the base of all content distribution.

Summing it up

If you want to distribute the content you are putting out on your business. There are two ways to do so, first is distribution in places that you pay. This is called “Paid traffic”. The second way is to distribute in places where communities that are congregating, this is called “free traffic”.

There is no best way to distribute your work and this is a constantly changing field. There are copywriters that specialize in this field. Find what distribution strategy works for your business and double down on that strategy.

Download my free e-book “Cash Emails“

Learn the best strategies for email marketing by downloading my free e-book: “Cash-Emails”. This is a done for you marketing system that will tell you best strategies on writing copy to acquire more sales. Although this framework is created specifically for email marketing in mind, it can be used for practically any other platform. I wrote this book so you can get the strategies up and running in 7 days or less. Download Cash-email today>>

>> Click here to return to my blog listing.