A spike in website traffic looks great on a report. It is also one of the easiest figures to misunderstand.
Let’s say your website received 5,000 visits last month. On the face of it, this sounds positive. But what did those people actually do? Did they call, buy something or request a quote? Or did they land on a blog, realise it wasn’t relevant and leave 10 seconds later?
Those visits still count as traffic, but they may offer little commercial value.
Targeted traffic is more specific. These visitors usually match the type of customer the business wants to attract. They may be searching for a particular service, looking within the right location or already researching a product they are considering buying.
Imagine you own a commercial cleaning company. An article about cleaning red wine from a carpet could attract plenty of readers, especially if it ranks well on Google. The trouble is, most of those readers are householders looking for a quick tip. They aren’t searching for a company to clean their office every week.
An office manager searching for “commercial cleaners near me” is far more valuable, even if far fewer people search for it.
This doesn’t mean broad content is useless. Helpful articles can introduce people to your business, build trust and improve your visibility. The point is that every visitor shouldn’t be treated as though they have the same value or intention.
This matters when deciding where to spend your marketing budget, and this is why higher traffic does not always mean better results. A smaller number of well-matched visitors can generate more business than a much larger audience with little interest in the company.
Targeted traffic can come from several places. Search engine optimisation (SEO) can help a website appear for relevant Google searches. Paid advertising can target users by location, interests or search terms. Email marketing and social media can also bring previous customers and interested prospects back to the site.
The quality of the targeting matters in every case. A poorly planned campaign may increase visitor numbers while doing little for sales.
Businesses should therefore look beyond how many people visit their website. It is more useful to consider which pages they view, how they found the site and whether they complete an action such as making a purchase, requesting a quote or calling the company.
Traffic tells you how many people arrived. Targeted traffic gives you a better idea of whether the right people arrived.
If you need any help optimising your website’s SEO to ensure you’re getting the most out of it, please get in touch with us at Engage Web.
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