Know Your Traffic
“My website doesn’t work!”
That usually means one or both of two things:
- your website sucks and/or
- your traffic sucks.
If you’re anything like most of our Clients, all the attention seems to go into making a nice-looking website. Little to no attention goes into how they’re going to get traffic to the site.
“Build it and they’ll come” is a total myth when it comes to winning online. Sure, overtime you may build up some search rank and get organic traffic. But it probably won’t be enough unless you’ve really cornered some high search keywords. These days, having a plan for traffic to your website is an important part of any local professional’s marketing plan.
Results Is A Matter of Simple Math
Assuming you’ve got a conversion-optimized website, it needs traffic. For example, let’s assume a 4% conversion rate. That means 4% of people who go to your website will reach out and make direct contact, i.e., become a Lead. If you want 6 Leads from your website every month you need 150 visitors.
But not just any 150 visitors. You need 150 visitors who are within your service area. When you look at your Google Analytics, you want to start by filtering out all the traffic outside of your service area. We usually look at traffic from the Province you’re in, but you could filter down to the city.
The reason we usually don’t filter to just the city is that you’ll miss legitimate traffic. For example, let’s say you’re an interior designer based in Barrie. Your Prospective Client may very well live in a city near by like Innisfil or perhaps they commute to work in Toronto and are Googling interior decorators in Barrie on lunch break.
What To Do Next
The place to start is logging in to your Google Analytics account. (How long has it been since you did last? Many of our Clients never have!) We suggest bookmarking the link for quick access.
Here are some metrics to get started with:
- # visitors in the last 30 days
- Are you achieving your target (e.g., the 150 from the example above)
- Is your traffic volume trending up/down?
- If it’s trending down, what are you going to do to fix it?
- Bounce rate. This is the percentage of people who land on a single page and leave without going anywhere else. Be careful interpreting this number. If lots of people are Googling you to find your business hours, address, or phone number, then your bounce rate will legitimately be high. However, if you have a high bounce rate and it doesn’t correspond to looking up your phone number, then you’ve got a conversion problem.
- What are your most popular pages?
- Are people going where you want them to? If they’re not, you’ve got a navigation/conversion problem.
There’s a lot (a lot!) more you can look at but get started with the basics.
Help, I’m Lost!
If you’re lost with your Google Analytics, you can book a time with us and we’ll go through it with you and make sure you’re set-up for easy viewing. We’ll do this by way of a web meeting so we can share screens and talk you through it. A tutorial session like this usually only takes 20-30 minutes and then you’re good to.
What’s Your Gravity Score?
Find Out What It Takes To Get The Best Clients
The Top 3 Professionals in your city have an unfair advantage in the market. It’s unfair because the Top 3—regardless of how good you are—get 80% of all the Best Clients.
Your Gravity Score tells you how much gravitational pull you currently have in your market. It’s also your marketing blueprint that shows you exactly what you need to work on and in what order to achieve coveted Top 3 status and get the Best Clients Advantage.
