The time when online marketers used to rely solely on search engines for traffic is gone. Today, the world is different; we use AdWords, Bing Ads, create social identities, gather engagement, share and promote via Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest.
Google Ranking still matter, but they are more of an afterthought. Marketers are no more dying for the rankings. So the question arises: do they still matter?
Precursor:
At Intesols, we handle many clients of varying size. What we have noticed over the past few months is a new trend: Bigger websites are subduing their reliance from organic search to other mediums of traffic generation. Meanwhile, Google is making its SEO algorithm progressively impenetrable. The old, cruel SEO tricks are not working at all.
The trend appeared for a reason. Yes, organic matter still matter to them. That’s the reason why they are still working with us. But the prospects are making a time bounded turn. While these websites’ traffic from paid search and social media is constantly rising, the organic traffic has remained one and the same.
The urgency, insecurity of drawing more organic traffic is fading. They are no more concerned by Panda, Penguins or the next Algorithm update. What they are more interested in is bringing more traffic from AdWords, and Social Media Websites. Seems like, Google has finally made them believe that they don’t have any control over their organic traffic.
Seems like they are going in the right direction. So answering the question that I asked earlier, “does organic search still matter?” Short Answer: Yes, but to a lesser extent.
Reasons Organic Still Matters
1. BrightEdge report
IMG
The report clearly indicates that the share of traffic from organic search still beats that from Social, Paid Search, and Emails, irrespective of the website’s niche. So if you’re in a mind-set that non organic result can take your website’s traffic to the next level, you may have to think twice.
2. The Long Term Results
Here is what I believe: Facebook is destined to bring article visits, not whole site traffic and buyers allegiance. Twitter is meant to endorse purchaser’s allegiance, not generate post traffic. Pinterest users barely leave the site except when you are retailing something. In that case, paid ads may offer the reason to pay a visit come visit, but not enough to make them return.
On the other hand, organic is poles apart. Matching keywords to user intending to means you may be existing in many searches. The user may catch you constantly, and once they reach your website, they are more expected to make a stopover. Organic users are still your finest enduring customers. In my knowledge, they have lower bounce rates and more visits per page, and they are more probable to come back.
Conclusion: If you want to sell something or increase brand cognisance, social is an outstanding channel. Otherwise, if you need people to discover your webstore and summon up you, organic is the key.
