Most online marketers have one goal in common: increasing the amount of traffic coming into their website. There are various tactics for accomplishing this goal including search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per click advertising (PPC), blogging, and social media marketing. The problem with these is that SEO takes time, PPC can be expensive, Google is becoming over-saturated with blog content, and social media marketing can have problems generating decent ROI. One often overlooked tactic that can potentially have the greatest impact is referral traffic. So, what is referral traffic and how can you use it to generate more revenue?
What Is Referral Traffic?
Visitors that come to your website from sites other than the major search engines is considered referral traffic. When someone clicks a link on a website or social network and is then taken to another site, tracking software, such as Google Analytics, counts that visitor as referral traffic. The originating website is called the “referrer” since it refers the visitor from one website to the other.
Why Is Referral Traffic Important?
Referral traffic is important to inbound marketers because it sends potentially qualified visitors to your website from other trusted websites. This in turn, gets your content in front of new people, giving your website the opportunity to convert that visitor into a lead or sale. But, that’s not all! Referral traffic also has SEO benefits. When someone visits your website from another site they are usually clicking on a link or completing some type of social activity. Google and other search engines consider these links and social signals as positive ranking factors as long as they are coming from trusted websites. Listed below are some helpful tips you can begin implementing today in order to start receiving more referral traffic tomorrow!
Tips To Generate More Referral Traffic
Guest Posting – Guest posts are a great way to build up your referral traffic. Especially in light of the Penguin update, it’s best to focus your guest posting efforts on sites that are related to your business, which means your content will be in front of a relevant audience providing top-notch referral traffic. If you can develop a regular guest posting schedule, all the better, because that allows you to keep your referral traffic from those sources steady over time and increase traffic to your website. The first step in guest posting is getting a feel for the blogs you’d like to post on: Are the blog posts professional and formal or more relaxed and laid-back? Is their reader base advanced or beginner? Many blogs have strict guidelines for guest posts with specific word counts and a certain number of links you are allowed to embed, so always read the guidelines first and keep those restrictions in mind while writing.
Press Releases – Press releases are a quick and easy way to get a wave of fresh traffic from referring URLs. It’s a great idea to do a press release for an event you’ll be hosting or to announce milestones like executive changes, earnings releases, acquisitions, and product launches. However, if you are paying for a press release, you can write about pretty much anything and pretend it’s newsworthy. Some businesses even send out press releases whenever they get a new client.
Social Bookmarking – Social bookmarking sites are another easy fix for your referral traffic cravings. I’ve received tons of traffic in the past from social bookmarking sites like StumbleUpon and Reddit. With over 2 billion page views a month, Reddit has incredible social bookmarking potential, but marketers should be warned that only truly unique, interesting content will be welcomed. It’s an extremely tech-savvy community, so posting spam and irrelevant content could get your business berated by people on the site. If you have content you believe the Reddit community (majority is young, geeky, liberal, and internet-obsessed) would enjoy, you could reap tremendous benefits and earn valuable referral traffic.
