Traffic is less important than you think
Every morning in my inbox I get a handful of quasi-spam (you know, spam messages from "partners" of a list you actually want to be on) telling me that they can get me "more traffic within 48 hours" or "#1 search engine rankings in 24 hours guaranteed". It's all bullshit, but on top of that it plays into our overall misconception about traffic. Pssst, more traffic not nearly as important as you think.
What IS important is the right traffic. Between the sites I own and the sites I've worked with, I've seen every end of the spectrum. The best example is the old SportsLizard (pre Price Guide, which converts 15%+ of visitors into users) vs. the current Detailed Image (before our SEO-friendly redesign). SportsLizard was getting 10 times the traffic but the site was set up poorly to convert the traffic and in turn it didn't make much money. Detailed Image got very little traffic, but all of it came from forums that George and Greg sponsored and spent hours each day describing detailing in depth and "selling" members on what products would work best for them.
How would you feel if your site was getting 50 visitors/day? Not very good unless 15 of them were placing $100+ orders! That's what DI has perfected and it's one of the things I think people miss with web business - the ultimate goal is to make money. Usually that requires the user to take action....either buy something or sign up for something or click a bunch of ads. Getting the "right" user is SO much more efficient than getting 1,000 of the wrong users and hoping he or she is the right user.
It really starts with your marketing plan. If your goal, like many site owners, is simply to get more traffic, than don't be surprised if that's all you get. If your goal is to make money than you'll approach it with the techniques that will create sales, which are usually different than what just drives the most traffic. Maybe it's pure SEO, maybe it's PPC or other paid marketing, maybe it's forum sponsorship like DI, or more likely it's a blend of all of the above and then some. The key is to focus on getting people in your target market to your site, and then focus on converting them to a sale once you get them there. If you become good at that, you'll be profitable regardless of raw traffic numbers.
Trust me on this one. Want to know how to get a bunch of traffic quick so that you can show mommy that 1,000 people came to your site today? Go to Stumble Upon and get some of their cheap traffic, or better yet post an ad on Craigslist. I guarantee you'll get a ton of people in either instance. You'll also get a ton of people that look at your site for 4.3 seconds and then click away to never come back.
What IS important is the right traffic. Between the sites I own and the sites I've worked with, I've seen every end of the spectrum. The best example is the old SportsLizard (pre Price Guide, which converts 15%+ of visitors into users) vs. the current Detailed Image (before our SEO-friendly redesign). SportsLizard was getting 10 times the traffic but the site was set up poorly to convert the traffic and in turn it didn't make much money. Detailed Image got very little traffic, but all of it came from forums that George and Greg sponsored and spent hours each day describing detailing in depth and "selling" members on what products would work best for them.
How would you feel if your site was getting 50 visitors/day? Not very good unless 15 of them were placing $100+ orders! That's what DI has perfected and it's one of the things I think people miss with web business - the ultimate goal is to make money. Usually that requires the user to take action....either buy something or sign up for something or click a bunch of ads. Getting the "right" user is SO much more efficient than getting 1,000 of the wrong users and hoping he or she is the right user.
It really starts with your marketing plan. If your goal, like many site owners, is simply to get more traffic, than don't be surprised if that's all you get. If your goal is to make money than you'll approach it with the techniques that will create sales, which are usually different than what just drives the most traffic. Maybe it's pure SEO, maybe it's PPC or other paid marketing, maybe it's forum sponsorship like DI, or more likely it's a blend of all of the above and then some. The key is to focus on getting people in your target market to your site, and then focus on converting them to a sale once you get them there. If you become good at that, you'll be profitable regardless of raw traffic numbers.
Trust me on this one. Want to know how to get a bunch of traffic quick so that you can show mommy that 1,000 people came to your site today? Go to Stumble Upon and get some of their cheap traffic, or better yet post an ad on Craigslist. I guarantee you'll get a ton of people in either instance. You'll also get a ton of people that look at your site for 4.3 seconds and then click away to never come back.
posted by Adam McFarland at
8/09/2007 08:00:00 AM
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