When it comes to Inbound Marketing, one of the most common issues that marketers experience is a lack of website traffic. With the rise of online marketing, competition for traffic has expanded considerably, and it takes time to establish a constant flow of website visitors. Getting website traffic, on the other hand, isn’t nearly as tough as it may appear at first — and there are practically endless ways to achieve it (though some work better than others.)
Statistics suggest that every second about 40,000 search inquiries are entered into Google. Daily, this equates to 3.5 billion searches or 1.2 trillion searches annually. If the majority of your company’s traffic comes from Google searches, you’re surely going to do well.
On the other hand, it means that organic results are difficult to achieve as the competition for such a low hanging fruit would be more. That’s because, as stated, billions of searches are conducted every second, and every other website is looking to hold more real estate on the SERPs. So, in order to succeed, you must make sure your search engine optimization is on point.
Some SEO Statistics on Organic Traffic
A Google search generates 93 percent of all search experiences. The top results have a 33% chance of being clicked, resulting in a third of potential traffic to your website. Missing out on this opportunity and landing on Google’s second page will produce little since 75% of consumers will never move on to the following page of search results.
Furthermore, the SERPs on Google’s first page receives 95% of all web traffic. It is distributed to the following pages in a proportion of 5% or less. Such a picture just demonstrates that if you work hard to improve your organic marketing, you have a good possibility of succeeding. Correct SEO allows Google to direct traffic to your business.
What is Organic Traffic?
Organic traffic is simply the flow of visitors received by a website without investing in any paid advertisement. It may come through the Search Engines or from Social Media networks. Organic traffic may also be received when people come to a particular website by clicking a link on some third website.
27% of Marketers say that organic search generates the most leads. However historically, SEO has been one of the most difficult and long-term marketing strategies to implement. Over 90% of blogs don’t receive any search traffic. That means most of the content produced, never sees the light of day. This is true even for well-known publications: Only a small percentage of articles generate organic traffic.
Organic search traffic is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain for a variety of reasons, including increased competition in most categories and a sharper search algorithm that can distinguish between bogus and genuine signals.
Furthermore, Google is much less willing to hand over that traffic. Google is slowly but steadily becoming a search engine that provides answers, as opposed to a search engine that only offers the best resources to consume. In many circumstances, Google’s search results are so thorough that there’s no need to click any further.
Furthermore, many search engine features such as some of google’s featured snippets encourage visitors to stay on Google rather than switching to a third-party site. Take a look at this Google SERPs sample.
What are Organic Leads?
Organic leads are potential clients and consumers who find your business by using a search engine like Google or Bing to look for a certain product, service, or topic.They don’t just land on your website, but they voluntarily give their contact details and consent to be contacted to you.
I know google has the answer to anything from who the vocalist was in that band you forgot about to how to adjust the setting on your webcam or even how to solve complex business or domestic problems.
Essentially, you need to occupy the top search results on the search engines to give yourself a chance to win some organic leads. You may drive traffic through your service pages, or your blogs, but what matters is the right kind of people reaching your website and getting impressed.
In all this, we simply can deduce that inbound leads are a result of majorly 3 things:
- Website Content
- Search Engine Optimization
- UI/UX that enhances lead capture
So, how can you write the content that readers love? How to get to the top of the search engine results? How do you get your leads to take action on your site once they’ve arrived?
Let’s discuss now.
11 Steps to Generate Organic Traffic and Leads
Here are a few ideas to assist you to get organic leads quick, fast and in a scalable manner:
1. Understand your audience
Remember to consider the type of customer your content is seeking to attract while creating your content plan. After all, it’s pointless to create outstanding content if it doesn’t appeal to your target audience, which will influence your organic results.
It would be easier for you to generate content that will resonate with your clients if you have more information about them. Asking yourself the following questions can help you identify your ideal customer:
- What are their distinguishing features? (e.g., demography, behavior)
- What kind of online searchers do they undertake?
- What websites do they visit regularly?
- What are the most pressing issues they’re attempting to address?
There’s a good chance you’ll find more than one type of customer. In this situation, segmentation allows you to group clusters of customers with similar characteristics and market to each group separately. You may create buyer personas as well from all this brainstorming.
2. Research the keywords your audience uses
Knowing what keywords your clients would use is the first step in growing your organic leads. This entails determining what terms or phrases they would type into search engines or speak into speech recognition programs like Siri. You’ll also need to know what terms your rivals are utilizing across the web.
Keep in mind that your clients will be searching for keywords that exactly match, or closely match what they see on your website, blogs, or social media channels.
As a result, it’s critical to choose relevant and exact keywords to describe your products. You’ll be able to incorporate keywords into your content once you’ve compiled a list of keywords. You can use software like Semrush, Ahrefs, Google Keyword Tool, Google Trends, etc to make your Keyword Research on point.
3. Create keyword & intent-specific content
It’s time to start generating tons of fantastic content once you’ve compiled a decent list of keywords. Before you put pen to paper — or, more correctly, keyboard to screen — develop a content plan that lays out your writing and publishing schedule for the quarter (or whatever term you choose).
When producing content, we must remember to avoid the hard sell; doing so will alienate a large number of your readers. Instead, focus your efforts on creating content that people want to read, one that is educating and entertaining. We’re precisely talking about content that is both useful, instructional, and motivating while also being search engine optimized.
You must also publish content regularly. This is because both search engines and readers place a high value on consistency. As a result, the more content you provide, the more organic traffic you’ll receive. More traffic = more leads, as we all know.
4. Utilize media such as video
Did you know that search results with video have a 41% higher click-through rate? Written material is excellent, but video content is more engaging and valuable. A few seconds of video can significantly boost your organic leads, people will understand you more and be more willing to give you their contact information.
Furthermore, videos encourage visitors to stay on your site longer, indicating that your material is more relevant and trustworthy. This will help you to get more from search engines, they will see your content as highly valued.
5. Optimize your website for conversions
Your website must be the starting point for all of your online lead generation initiatives. It’s pointless to drive traffic to your website via Google, social media, or word-of-mouth if those people depart without taking action.
Your website must be optimized to persuade people to take action – whatever that action may be. When it comes to lead generation, you’re usually aiming to get a prospect’s contact information, such as their name, email address, phone number, and other qualifying characteristics that can help you sell more effectively.
An expert UI designer can help you create pages that are conversion optimized. However, once your pages start receiving significant traffic you will have to monitor your pages through heat maps to understand user activity. You may also need to try with different CTAs on different pages to understand what works the best. So, you need to study, analyse and take regular actions to improve your conversions.
6. Add social proof for customer trust
Humans tend to do a commercial activity with someone if they trust them. But when there is no human to human connection, and rather only human to device interaction, how on earth can you earn the trust of your audiences?
1. Testimonials
Testimonials and reviews from existing customers are the most common way to increase social proof to earn prospective customer trust. Once a customer buys from you, try to seek a review from him and showcase that on your website. It is a small activity that will have a big impact on your conversions.
2. FAQs
In-direct engagement, content such as FAQs is preferred by the majority of firms. This isn’t the most efficient way of interacting though.
3. Social Media Feed
Another simple activity that can go far in building customer trust is having your Social Media feed going live on your website. Your audiences can quickly hop onto your social media and earn a feeling of your activities and presence. This will help you seem a lot more reliable.
4. User Generated Content
If you create a wow product, or give spectacular services, your users are going to talk about that. They might do that on your platform, or within their own networks. Your job is to leverage just that. This will quickly escalate your brand image, helping you drive tonnes of traffic and achieve more lead generation targets.
5. Authenticated Badges
There are many digital badges that you can earn in many different ways. You can participate in awards, or at times independent examiners might grant you one. Showcase all of such badges on your prizes to gain trust of your audiences.
6. Chat
One of your key priorities should be of your organic lead generation efforts should be direct customer engagement. Engage directly with your audiences over chat to generate more leads.
Even if you install a bot to chat with your users, a feeling that you are going to talk to a human soon will subconsciously build trust on your site.
7. Forums
Direct interaction can also be sought from forums, and help centres – all of which have customer care representatives on hand at all times to ensure that every concern is correctly handled. A lot better word-of-mouth and more leads arise from more engaged clients.
7. Bring in lead magnets
Usually, it is difficult for a person to give you his contact details without having a clear idea of getting something in return. The great old barter system still exists to work our actions. It is just that the forms have changed. So, if you are going to give out some valuable information in terms of an eBook, a whitepaper or some gated content which is prized, you will see that your lead generation will scale.
8. Involve in thought leadership
If you are in an industry where being a thought leader will get you more business, then invest in your personal brand. You can utilize various content heavy social networks to delve into this.
1. Quora
Quora is a question-and-answer-based social networking platform where millions of individuals from all walks of life post questions. If you are consistently giving answers of value in some single niche, users will notice your profile and most likely visit your website. This is a great way to create your brand and later sell that brand to generate leads.
Over the years, I have judiciously used Quora for lead generation. All it took from my side is constant answering of questions about digital marketing.
2. LinkedIn
LinkedIn, as we all know, is a business-oriented social networking platform. It can also be a useful tool for attracting new customers to your company. I’ve chosen LinkedIn over Facebook or Twitter because people tend to focus more on professional activities on LinkedIn and thus are subconsciously in work mode even out of work.
Create engaging content on LinkedIn; posts, blogs, videos or images all will give you results from LinkedIn. But be sure to be strategic while you are working on it. Don’t be a random spammer. Be a thought leader!
3. Twitter Threads
If you are able to write long twitter threads, your profile is going to explode. Consistently writing articulate threads on twitter on a topic of your expertise will help you get discovered by more and more people who can eventually convert into your leads.
4. Speaking Opportunities
If you are serious about your personal or commercial brand, then you need to be on the lookout for speaking opportunities. These may be in person, online, or on video. The more content there is about you and your work, as a person or as a company, the more people are going to know about you. And that will always work in your favour.
5. Podcasts
Podcasts are the new thing in. In modern lingo, they are in-vogue. Start a podcast if you have the resources. It is definitely going to pay off.
6. Webinars
Webinars are the new way to gain detailed knowledge on a subject. They have by far shadowed seminars by leaps and bounds. You can have a lead sharing arrangement with a webinar host for appearing on their webinar. Or you may host your own webinar and use it as a lead magnet on your site.
7. Participate in Round-ups
If you do not already know, round-ups are basically articles where a publication of repute asks a few experts of the industry about a certain aspect of the industry. Participating in roundups suggests that you are a real thought leader. If you can get into the eyes of some great folks in your industry, you can easily leverage their reputation by being a part of the yearly round-ups they do. And the good thing is that, you just need to give a quote and you’re on the verge of fame.
9. Get a solid content distribution strategy
Just creating content and doing nothing about it? You need to pull your socks and up your game. Start distributing your content to actually gain value from it.
1. Emails
Email is, without a doubt, the most popular lead generation method, and with good reason. Email generates a return on investment of $38 for every $1 spent, a staggering 3,800 percent (ROI). It’s the most popular way for customers to communicate with businesses, so it’s excellent for introductions and follow-ups.
If you know how to get the emails right, you might have very engaged and nurtured audiences around you for your sales team to convert.
2. Social media
Many businesses think of social media as a way to enhance their brand, but it can also be used to generate leads. This is owing to the volume of information that users on social media freely share, as well as the sheer number of people who use Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Here are some ideas for generating new leads:
- Host a live event, such as a Q&A, Ask Me Anything, or Twitter chat, with famous speakers.
- Create polls or surveys that enquire about a specific issue or topic.
- Share content that is password-protected, such as an e-book or an infographic.
- To expand your profile’s reach, try a giveaway or contest with a contributed reward.
Users will come to know you and might hop onto your website for some quick info. So, at a time when they are already impressed with you, enticing them to give in their contacts is rather very easy.
3. Backlinks/Guest Blogging
We have heard that backlinks are good for SEO. But they are good for other things too; thought leadership and content distribution. If you are able to blog on a third part website, you have nothing to lose. You only win. Not a mere backlink that is more probably going to come, but you expose yourself and your ideas to a different audience who might take interest in you and visit your website.
9. Run a Giveaway or Contest
Although not completely organic, contests and giveaways are cost effective means to acquire some leads. In a short amount of time, a giveaway or contest can produce a large number of email and social leads. It works like this: marketers reward participants for referring friends, sharing material, and liking their social media profiles in exchange for a prize.
And since people tend to know who among their family and friends would be interested in a certain product or service, a lot of relevant people might come under your radar.
10. Invest in Digital PR
Social Media, Blogs, Digital News… so much to read. I wonder, if the print newspapers still work? Just kidding. Of course newspapers are getting printed as well as being read. But if you want to succeed as a brand online, your PR efforts need to be on the internet.
Simply called Digital PR, you need to build your reputation on the internet through publications, social media media and company blogs. If you miss investing in it, you miss the opportunity in it.
11. Partner with Influencers
Influencer marketing is a textbook example of “social proof,” or the idea that consumers will adopt the opinions or actions of people they trust. It’s also a rapidly growing lead acquisition channel.
You can use the voice of a thought leader, expert, or influencer to bring your brand’s message to your audience, often in exchange for social media mentions or free samples or services. One mistake businesses make is controlling the influencer’s voice or creativity, damaging the most valuable element — authenticity. Share clear guidelines for your brand and goals, then let them come up with content that fits their voice and style.
The Right Way to Increasing Traffic and Generating Organic Leads
Organic marketing is a longer-term investment. A thought out digital content strategy that establishes reputation & trust. The activity improves traffic, generates more leads, provides a high return on investment, and is a lot more sustainable than paid advertising. Strategizing for it can be tedious, but that’s when you will need expertise, or experts on your side.
Now we know that this might be too much for you, especially if your team is not trained to increase organic leads. That’s why, for all such activities from SEO, Content Writing, Social Media to Inbound Markering, Missive Digital can help you get all the organic leads that you crave for.
