The digital marketing term “traffic” refers to the visitors who come to a website or app. It is an important metric as it indicates the number of users engaging with your online content. Among the various types of traffic, organic traffic (sometimes called SEO traffic) stands out as a marker of a website’s success.
In this overview, we cover why organic website traffic is important and how you can optimize for it. Additionally, we look at why many SMBs do not need to chase the goal of incessant traffic growth.
Organic Traffic Meaning
Organic traffic, or SEO traffic, refers to the visitors that land on your website as a result of unpaid (“organic”) search results. These visitors found your site after using a search engine such as Google, Bing, or Yahoo, not by clicking on a paid advertisement.
Imagine you go to Google and search for “best project management software.” Google returns a list of articles, reviews, and tool websites. You click on a result that isn’t an ad, or marked “Sponsored,” and land on a software review site. Your visit to that site, driven purely by your search without the influence of paid promotions, counts as “organic traffic” for that review website.
Why is organic traffic important?
True website success is multi-faceted, involving not only visibility but also engagement, user satisfaction, and conversions, but the benefits of free organic traffic include:
Cost-effective: Unlike paid traffic, where you pay for each click or impression, organic visits are “free.” Yes, you’ll invest time or money in search engine optimization (SEO), but once content ranks, you don’t pay for clicks from search results.
Credibility and trust: Organic listings, as opposed to paid search listings, are seen as more trustworthy by users. Organic visitors tend to regard sites that rank high as relevant, high-quality, and authoritative.
Sustainability: Organic rankings last longer than advertisements. Paid campaigns give a quick boost, but organic SEO traffic offers long-term stability.
Organic vs. Other Traffic Sources
Each website traffic source brings its own unique set of visitors, each characterized by different levels of engagement, intent, and conversion potential. Whether a user is actively seeking out your brand, exploring via a shared link, or coming across your content in an ad, the path they take can impact their likelihood to engage or convert.
Other types of traffic include:
Paid traffic: Stemming from ads, platforms like Google Ads or Bing Ads showcase your advertisement and you’re billed per click or impression. This is referred to as search engine marketing (SEM), SEM and SEO often work hand-in-hand.
Direct traffic: Represents those who access your site by directly typing your URL or through bookmarks.
Referral traffic: The users arriving at your site from links placed on other websites.
Social traffic: Visitors that come from social media platforms.
You likely will track each of these digital marketing KPIs, but of the varied traffic sources, organic traffic holds a distinctive edge due to its sustained presence over time and its cost-effective nature.
How to Increase Organic Search Traffic
Boosting organic traffic requires a combination of strategies, some key methods used to enhance a site’s visibility include:
High-quality content: Create valuable, original content. Answer questions, offer solutions, and unique insights. The person writing the content should be a true subject matter expert (SME). Keep in mind, business blogging is not appropriate for every website and there are other forms of content marketing available to you.
Keyword research: Identify keywords relevant to your niche. These are the terms people use when searching. Make sure your keywords are used in the SEO content you produce.
On-page SEO: Optimize individual pages for search engines. This includes optimizing the page structure, content, title, meta description, and URL structure.
Technical SEO: Ensure your site is mobile-friendly, properly structured, loads fast, and uses SSL. Learn more in our article on small business SEO.
Local SEO: For businesses with a physical location or that serve a specific area, optimizing for local searches is crucial.
Education: For beginners it is very tempting to believe that tasks such as tweaking H1s or title tags will turn things around, but this is not the case. When learning SEO, be aware of SEO myths, read up on how to avoid SEO scams, use reliable free SEO tools, and if needed learn how to hire for SEO.
Branded vs. Non-Branded Traffic
Distinguishing between search queries can reveal a lot about your online presence:
Branded search terms: These queries are specific to your brand or product, indicating existing brand awareness: “Mailchimp”
Non-branded search terms: Broad searches suggest users are in the discovery phase, exploring options without a brand in mind: “email marketing platform”
If your business’s organic visits are primarily a result of branded search terms, this suggests a limited content marketing strategy. True online success means being visible throughout the entire buyer’s journey—from broad, non-branded searches (top of the funnel) to specific brand recognition (bottom of the funnel)—ensuring you engage both new prospects and loyal customers.
Measuring Traffic
Google Analytics (GA) is the gold standard for measuring website traffic. Here’s how to check organic search traffic in Google Analytics 4:
Open Google Analytics
Go to Reports > Acquisition > Traffic Acquisition, you’ll see metrics like the number of users, sessions, and average engagement time for traffic channel groups. You can toggle the report from high-level channels (organic, direct, referral, etc) to show specific sources (Google, Bing, etc.).
Note, website builders like Squarespace or Wix also offer analytics panels showing visits from search, direct links, referrals, and email. However, unlike GA which allows you to exclude traffic visits from specific IP addresses, the website builder dashboards usually include all visits. This means on sites with low traffic volumes, a significant portion of the recorded visits might be from your own team.
Remember, increasing your organic search traffic is a worthy goal, but you also need to consider the nature and needs of your business. Not all traffic is created equal, and many times, quality and relevance surpass sheer volume.
Aligning Traffic Goals with Business Objectives
Articles on SEO often include graphs showing exponential traffic and impressive growth metrics. But the colossal traffic numbers flaunted by major players aren’t the objective for many SMBs. Traffic goals depend largely on your business model and target audience.
High traffic is literally the lifeblood of affiliate and ad-based sites. And for businesses engaged in B2C marketing, including ecommerce and SaaS sectors, consistent traffic growth helps with:
Brand awareness: Especially in saturated markets, elevated brand visibility can potentially lead to increased sales or sign-ups.
Scaling and growth: Companies, particularly those backed by venture capital, may prioritize rapid growth, making high traffic metrics indicative of their product-market fit and potential to scale.
However, for B2B entities or those offering specialized services, the narrative can shift and for many businesses a lower volume site does the job:
Quality over quantity: Given the longer sales cycles and higher ticket prices, B2B marketing often values quality over quantity. Attracting the right decision-makers or stakeholders can lead to significant deals, even if overall traffic remains modest.
Deep engagements: Service-based companies and B2B entities often hinge on fostering lasting relationships. Thus, metrics such as average session duration or pages per visit might hold more weight than mere visitor count.
Local focus: For many local businesses, geographically targeted traffic can be more valuable than broad online visibility. As a result, their total traffic numbers will be modest, but the percentage of site visitors who convert into actual customers can be significantly higher.
It’s important to discern between sheer volume and attracting the right kind of traffic. High traffic metrics can be alluring, but they don’t always indicate success, especially for niche businesses. In many instances, modest traffic from a highly engaged and relevant audience leads to desired outcomes.
This is not to discount the value of traffic growth, but SMBs must approach SEO with reasonable expectations and clarity on what they aim to achieve. Balance your aspirations with the reality of your market, offerings, and target audience.
Challenges with Organic Search
Competition: The recognition of SEO's value has heightened the competition for prime search rankings. While marketing technology and generative AI level the playing field to some extent, well-established sites can hold a significant advantage, making it challenging for newer businesses to break through.
Requires patience: SEO is a long-term game. It might take months to witness significant results, but your investments today—whether in effort or resources—will yield dividends in the future. Remember the adage: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.”
Changing algorithms: Search engines often update their algorithms, changing how they rank websites. However, sites that follow recommended and ethical SEO strategies—and prioritize quality, helpful content—usually stay fairly consistent in their rankings, even when algorithm changes happen.
AI-based search: The points above are the “usual” challenges, but today’s search environment is changing. As search engines like Google and Bing dive deeper into the world of artificial intelligence, the way search results are presented is undergoing a huge shift. Search engines are leveraging AI to generate direct answers to user queries and these are displayed prominently at the top of search results. While this might improve user experience by providing quick solutions, it poses a new challenge for SMBs as your content is pushed lower in the organic search results.
Concluding Thoughts
Organic traffic is an important metric for any website. It demonstrates a site’s authority, relevance, and quality. This traffic is challenging to earn, but the benefits, including credibility, cost-effectiveness, and sustainability, are undeniable.
If you are serious about your online presence, optimizing your website and content is a must. And remember, while organic visits suggest initial interest, true engagement is ultimately determined by the relevance, quality, and value of your content.
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