According to the discussion here, it seems to be a bad idea (and not normal) to get the majority of your traffic from Google. How do you generate traffic to your sites outside of the search engines?
Outside of search engines, my traffic comes from links from other sites that found the content interesting and mentioned on their site, direct visitors that come back for new content, and affiliates.
New traffic to this site is 90% driven by my other site, experienced-people.co.uk. However, there is a nice curve of repeat visitors - regular members returning to read new material and to post. That's very good traffic because it relies on no external source that can disappear. As long as the forum continues to be a good source of information and debate, those visitors will return.
I do have sites that get more traffic from big Linux sites than they do from Google. I have sites that get a lot of traffic from Wikipedia and About.com (together accounting for more traffic than Google). Digg, stumbleupon, delicious etc., are huge drivers of traffic too, though this traffic comes in sudden peaks. One site of mine gets a huge, huge percentage of traffic from affiliates.
I own another network of very profitable sites that, unfortunately, gets most of its traffic from Google. I consider it a highly risky network, enjoy the earnings while they are there, and am prepared for all income from this network disappearing one day.
I think the trick is to create a site so remarkable people honestly want to share it with others.
http://www.amazon.com/Purple-Cow-Tra.../dp/159184021X
Many times we're just "trying to rank" for a particular keyword through SEO but we don't question whether it really should be at the top.
Give your visitors something to talk about...something really cool and you don't have to have google.
You can get traffic from Yahoo, Bing, Facebook, Digg, Technorati, Twitter, and many other sites that are basically a mini search engine. You can also just be well connected in your industry.
I put this thread aside as I wanted to post a more considered reply. I'd like to return to this now.
While relying on Google may be a cardinal sin, building non-Google traffic is difficult. Building non-Google traffic to the point where it constitutes the bulk of your visitors is very, very difficult. You'd like to keep Google to, say, below 25%, but how do you do it?
I'd like to say that one easy way is to focus on the other engines. But for English language sites trying for traffic from the US and UK, all the other engines put together can't drive in a month what Google does in a day. It's a different story in Russia and China where Yandex and Baidu are big deals. Even in Japan, it's Yahoo that the main engine (though there have been reports in the press that Yahoo Japan is going to use Google rather than Bing for Japanese results).
So if you can't rely on other search engines, what do you rely on? Let's brainstorm. Here are my suggestions
1. Build a community. Many blogs and forum rely on the community - these are not only regular visitors but also visitors who recommend the site via email/twitter/posting in other forums/blogs.
2. Do something newsworthy/viral, something so whacky or useful that other webmasters will send you visitors
3. Get to work on Web 2.0 - the social networks, Digg etc. Warning: Very time consuming unless you've already built reputation/friends/fans/whatever
4. There are the generic drivers like wikipedia where your link will stick if you're genuinely an authority. Build something of authority in a little talked about topic in your niche and you can get your Wikipedia link to stick.
5. Identify big drivers of traffic in your industry and build relationships with them. I remember when I ran a company building video editing PCs, we visited and spoke at local video clubs, courted video enthusiasts etc. We did this even with people who would never buy from us (or had already bought), we did it out of interest in the subject, but we did end up with many links to our on-site info from even places like the BBC.
6. Build an affiliate program. Some merchants don't give a sh*t about Google because their affilates drive so much traffic
7. Advertise on the net. It could be as simple as taking a link in a newsletter likely to be read by your target audience, but there are also PPC opportunities everywhere from Google itself to Facebook. Many small websites don't like spending on advertising. I'd encourage you to break with that mindset. Experiment to ensure you get a positive ROI 'cause $100 ain't as good as $200 less $50 in ad costs. In fact, when the time comes to sell your site you can actually use the marketing figures to demand more for your site (rather than that lame "I haven't had time to market this site but if you market it you'll make millions")
8. Offline advertising - classifieds, student boards, local advertising aggregators, wherever your target customers are likely to see the ads
Problem with a lot of the above is that Google will see all those links and mentions of you and send you even more traffic! Arrggh!
Brainstorming. What are your suggestions?
Chabrenas (Today)
I typed up a post and then realised that these sites say it a lot better:
10 Non-Google SEO Ways
Tips on Using Google Base
9 Ways to Get Traffic (video)
Build Influence and Multiple Spheres of Influence
Which one did you like?
@Clinton: You know I've never really looked at non google traffic in any great length except for with my forum communities, and I must admit the fact, that because you keep bringing it up, it has really opened up my eyes. I will agree with you also though that whilst most webmasters (myself included) probably don't try to advance their skills and understanding of the area as much as we should (again probably due to it actually being a lot more difficult) it does however make me want to re-think my efforts on some of my more mature sites. So thanks for shoving me in this new direction.
@3Six: Thanks for those links, I'll begin reading those!
Build Influence and Multiple Spheres of Influence was a great article by Chris Guillebeau. The guy knows how to get a community of raving fans talking about him.
I think that networking with other site owners inside and outside of your market is very important for getting non-Google traffic. I also find Facebook and Twitter to be pretty great sources too, particularly Facebook. I also like to reach out to people with huge mailing lists and do a mutually beneficial agreement to leverage their list and make their fans my fans. I record podcasts for iTunes and webinars or tutorials for Youtube.
People sometimes forget that Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, iTunes etc are all search engines that will bring diverse traffic that isn't dependant on big G.
Offline stuff works too. If anybody read about the company that makes iPad cases to look like moleskin notebooks (Dodocase) they had a great offline marketing plan. They hired street teams from Craigslist to go out to the queues outside the Apple stores to promote the new case and get people excited by it. They had 10,000 orders in the first few months at $60 a pop. You do the math!
I just wish I had time (and the motivation) to do all of these properly!
Last edited by Clinton; August 22nd, 2010 at 08:14 AM. Reason: added link
I was always under the impression that to get a good rank, and therefore good traffic, from Google in the first place, you tend to need a lot of backlinks (for competitive niches anyway). Surely this helps to kill the reliance on Google aspect somewhat? I know that with a website I'm currently working on, I have a decent amount of good links that are driving traffic, but have next to nothing coming from Google Rankings atm- and I imagine it will be some months before I rank with my current link building strategy.
Of course, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong
That depends on the links. Some links might be from sites that will send you traffic, but that won't pass much SEO juice. And vice versa.Originally Posted by mgallone
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