What are the best SEO strategies to increase the traffic of a website?
I like how visual and easy to understand this is. In one glance, you see what impacts your ranking, and how much.
This is an infographic from searchmetrics. It shows how Google ranks your website. Some factors increase your rank, and some decrease it.
The main positive factors are:
- CTR
- social media
- https
- backlinks
The main negatives are:
5. URL length
6. bounce rate
What do they mean?
1. CTR (click-through-rate)
Let’s say you go on Google and search for ‘best SEO strategies to increase the traffic’.
Many websites appear. You scroll and choose to click on the Quora link. Quora has now one view and one click. Its CTR is 100%. May you have decided to click on neilpatel.com, Quora’d have 0% CTR and neilpatel.com 100%.
CTR shows you how many people click to go to your website compared to how many just scrolled through it. The higher, the better.
In our example, if your website is about ‘best SEO strategies to increase the traffic’, then people searching for those words on Google will be interested and click on your website. Your CTR is high. But, if your website has nothing to do with SEO or website traffic, no one will click and your CTR will be low.
2. Social media
You can post links to your website on your social media profiles and posts. Even better. Other people can post links to your website.
The more links you get on social media, the higher your website ranks on Google. Pretty straightforward, right?
3. https
Now all websites have https. All? Not so sure.
If you look up in your browser — yes, right there — you’ll see the URL, or the address bar. It’s also where you type to search for stuff on Google. At the very beginning of the URL, there’s ‘https’.
A few years ago, it was only ‘http’. What happened?
The Internet got more secure and now almost all websites have an SSL certificate. It’s a standard now so your website should have it too.
Go check real quick if you have it too.
If you don’t, you’re in a bad place. But it’s easy. Just ask your website hosting provider for it and you’ll get it.
4. Backlinks
Posts on social media can have a link to your website, so do other websites. The better the website is, the better your backlink.
How do you how good a website is?
Well, you’re at the right place. It should have:
- high CTR
- many backlinks from other good websites and social media
- and, of course, https
Just like yours.
In short, it should have good content that will interest your and their audience.
Negatives
5. URL length
We saw it here above, the URL is at the top of your browser, it’s the address and search bar. The longer it gets, the worse your ranking.
To keep it short:
1. only use a few keywords, not a long, long title
2. don’t use the ‘the’, ‘of’, ‘and’, you can use a ‘–‘ instead
3. keep your website architecture simple
Let’s say you’re a design freelancer and sell social media posts design. Your architecture could look like this:
1. homepage
2. services
2.1. social media
3. portfolio
4. contact
That’s it. You don’t need a page named ‘2.1.1.5. case study of a social media post for the health industry’. That’s too long.
6. Bounce rate
It refers to people bouncing on your website, like a ball.
Remember we went to Google, looked for ‘best SEO strategies to increase the traffic’, and clicked on Quora?
Well, if we go to that Quora page, but then leave Quora website without doing anything else, that’s a bounce.
If you go to Quora and look at the related questions like ‘what are the best ways to drive traffic to your website for free?’ Or ‘how can I increase the traffic on my website?’, Then you did something else. It’s not a bounce anymore.
You bounce on a website when you’re not interested in learning more. Just like when you scroll on Google and don’t click. Meaning it’s not that interesting and shouldn’t rank high.
Hi, thanks for reading my article! I’m Fanny and help busy freelancers simplify their marketing, and finally relax.
Check how I can help you: https://www.fanny-marcoux.com/
Read more about marketing basics: https://www.thefreelancerjungle.com/
