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Targeted traffic
First of all let’s differentiate between Targeted Traffic and Traffic. Traffic is any visit to web pages on your website. Whereas Targeted Traffic is traffic to web pages on your website that you want! This is achieved by optimising for the correct keywords and keyphrases that will attract the type of website visitors that you are targeting. Simple eh?
Keyword research
Keyword research is the phase of a search engine optimisation campaign in which you discover which keywords and keyphrases your target marketing are typing into the major search to find products and services like yours.
So how do I get more targeted traffic to my website then?
Right now you’re asking the right question. You don’t want just any old traffic because traffic is just that…traffic! I suppose you could alter the old business cliche about turnover and profit and say that traffic is for vanity but targeted traffic is for sanity but that wouldn’t be telling the whole story. There’s a couple of other vitally important factors involved here and those are Click Through Rate (CTR) and Conversions. So basically if you have some great search engine positions on the results pages but are a low click through rate or if you have lots of traffic coming through to your website but you aren’t converting then there is a problem which needs solving. It is the job of your Search Engine Optimisaion pro to discover where the problem resides and tackle it with an appropriate solution.
Potential problems
One problem that you might encounter is an aesthetically unpleasing website with lots of traffic, another problem may be poor information architecture, and yet another problem may be poor usability. Poor page loading speeds are the obvious ones and the most straight forward to fix so I won’t go into the easier solutions too much. So fixing some of these issues will potentially improve your existing traffic conversion rate and then you can get on with some more search engine optimisation tasks.
Driving targeted traffic to your website QUICKLY
Firstly when someone says quick, lots of people immediately think blackhat or even greyhat. But those methods may get you banned from search engines and, especially if you’re a smaller business, you don’t have much if any chance of getting back into the search engine that you’ve been banned from once it’s happened. So don’t do it.
This is why it is so important that you seek the advice and guidance of a Search Engine Optimisation professional. A guy at an event once told me about his new website and asked me “so how do you actually get ranked well on Google then?”. I told him that I can’t really explain the ins and outs in a few minutes but I’ll give him a call soon to discuss it. He said that he had been trying it out himself so later that evening I checked out his website. To my dismay he had white on white text (a typical black hat technique). I asked him what or who had prompted him to incorporate such an ill advised feature into his website. He said he had searched for his keywords and a competitor was doing the same so he had just done the same! He removed the offending hidden text following my advice but it just goes to show that it is worth following the advice of a professional.
White hat search engine optimisation techniques are the way to go. The best way to drive targeted traffic to your website is to write quality, timely and credible content and publish it onto your website. You could have a blog and post regular content. Depending on your time constraints it may also be feasible to monitor and accept comments onto your blog. After a while you’ll begin to recognise which are the spammy ones and which are for real. Blogs are much easier to manage than forums which, essentially, require real time monitoring. In addition, you can use the plethora of available social media websites, authority websites, forums and directories to promote your website.
It must be noted, however, that a sustained link building effort which follows a well defined internet marketing plan is always best. What I mean by this is that I see lots of search engine optimisation efforts which start off well but then begin to taper off. This is sometimes due to complacency but often due to not following a structured plan.
Resting on your laurels when you meet a keyword position target could be a mistake. What about your competition? What are they doing to optimise their sites? This is particular true of highly competitive keywords and keyphrases. Whole marketing departments in the larger firms could be working on these terms right? This leads me on to another point – be realistic! What is your budget? How much are you prepared to pay a Search Engine Optimisation professional to get you your desired search engine positions? Is your budget sufficient? If you aren’t hiring a professional but thinking of doing it yourself then how are you going to undertake the training? How much will this cost in terms of time and money? Wouldn’t you rather be running your business instead? If you are thinking are undertaking enough training to get involved in your own businesses search engine optimisation project then this is a fantastic idea but just be aware that your time does have a value and you must spend your time wisely.
Conclusion
So in conclusion, first of all it is important that your website conveys the correct message about your business. If it doesn’t then change it. There are no quick and easy ways to get good rankings on the major search engines. If the keywords you are going after will drive quality traffic then they are worth spending effort, money and time on because they will produce a return. If you need quick wins then go for long tails keywords are part of your short term strategy and premium keywords for for long term strategy. This makes sense and works for many businesses.
If your website is not aesthetically pleasing, modern, up-to-date or professional then again change it. Even if you’re already actively in the process of search engine optimising your website it is important that the website itself looks good, relfects your business properly, is usable, the pages are linked together in a semantically logical way and so on. If not then the existing traffic that you receiving may not turn into repeat visitors. In fact they may never ever click through to your site again from the search engine results page because they might have already clicked onto a competitor’s website. What I am saying is protect what you already that then go looking for more. Just like a business person will look after his existing customers before prospecting for more customers. It is vital that your site is right before you go for more search engine positions. You wouldn’t invite guests over to an untidy house, direct them towards a dirty table and try to seat them on a broken chair would you? Your house represents you just has your website represents your business.
Happy Search Engine Optimising!
