Organic traffic - need some fresh thoughts

[col_b]

Hi,

Been a bit of a lurker on here for many years, mainly to keep up to date with the monthly search updates and the thoughts people have on those.

I had thought I had created an account back in the day, but seems not.

Anyway, I run a UK e-commerce site since 2009 and we’ve been fighting a gradual decline in organic traffic since around 2017.

Have had some success over the past 12 months though and have managed to double organic traffic since this time last year.

A lot of this was to do with the creation of a blog which generates a good amount of traffic, but was also from optimising our main keywords for which we now rank top and increasing overall keyword volume.

Whilst this is good traffic, it doesn’t convert to sales and we seem to have plateaued out again in terms of traffic.

Recently it’s conversion rate that seems to have been the issue, but I don’t know to what degree that is to do with the current economics in the UK, or is it now just daft traffic that G is sending us. We have seen a reduction in page views since the beginning of October by around 20%.

Website is good, fast, looks great; it’s had 13 years of work put into it.

What am I missing? What is it that I’m not seeing? Really just need a different point of view or some fresh thoughts from you guys.

Cheers,
Col

[webcat]

Good job doubling traffic! Without seeing the site I'm not sure how much I can offer, but here goes. If you have social followers or newsletter signups you could send users a short survey to learn more about your audience. If not, you could give away a useful freebie related to what you sell in exchange for their email and permission to contact them, or for filling out a short survey. You could analyze past customers' sales funnels and look for similarities in behavior. You could offer a sale or special and see if that shifts the needle. You could think of ways to write around your products in your blog in a way that's helpful to visitors and not spammy, or otherwise entice users to explore your shop via the blog.

And Google's been pushing so many relentless and overlapping updates that I wouldn't worry about that 20% drop quite yet.

Don't know if any of that's useful or not. Good luck!

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

Good job on rocking the rankings with your site but it sounds like you've maxed out on potential buyers from that source.

Hey, I built a football stadium in the woods behind my house and I am paying for some awesome players, why is nobody coming to watch? Build it and they will come, right? As you see, great stadiums and teams aren't enough.

My advice, find out where your likely converting customers are and engage them there, they'll come once they know the way.

- Buyers in social groups, couponers, deal hunters, they'd all buy a good deal but won't be finding you in search because that's not where they are looking. Engage them there and it's likely they convert better than search traffic overall. The trick is how you engage them. Join the group? Might not be welcome. Advertise to it? Contact a key member to tip them off to a sale knowing they may ad you to the places they look for deals? Lots of options.

Congrats on the search results, now find your buyers in other places! It's oddly more satisfying than writing content for search.

[col_b]

Thanks for the advice guys.

The 'find out where your likely converting customers are and engage them there' tip has really got me thinking.

[londrum]

If your blog traffic doesn't convert then maybe you need to focus on what brand new buyers are searching for, rather than people who already have the product.

'how to use this product' is aimed at people who already have it, for example, and aren't looking to buy another one, whereas comparison charts between similar products and stuff like that might tempt interested shoppers to make a decision

[tangor]

All exterior world factors (inflation, politics, climate, etc) COULD be a part of traffic change, but sometimes it is that the niche/topic/product/service has only so many interested parties in every "generation" (usually 10 years rise/fall) and all one can do is wait for the next interest group to mature. If your site is ESSENTIAL goods/service/info then one might expand the keywords and long tail.

Been through a few of these cycles since 1996 and if kind of fits that ebb-and-flow is ALSO part of the game.

[RareBit]

Price? It seems to be the biggest factor in our sales to the point I can tell just from looking at the figures if 1 of our competitors had reduced theirs. I think in the UK at least users are very tech savvy and (more than ever) are willing to look around to find the best deal.

[engine]

I assume it's a B2C ecommerce site.
It'd be a good idea to investigate where it's failing, and here's something i've gleaned some excellent knowledge. Microsoft Clarity [webmasterworld.com...]
Try it and see.

As a user of ecommerce sites, i've come across so many that hide the true cost and stock info, and there are extras to add on after seeing the price. It's a pet peeve of mine, and is often a cart abandonment. People expect free shipping, thanks (or not thanks) to Amazon.

Don't waste the hard earned traffic, and look for every way to capture some data. Try offering specials, or vouchers, or ask why no purchase and add them to a regular prize draw.

[nickZ]

What have you done to counteract?
If you have a dorp out rate above 60 your traffic sources could be well off. Or you have too much to offer on the page, or it loads awfully slow or, or, or,

Whilst this is good traffic, it doesn’t convert to sales and we seem to have plateaued out again in terms of traffic.

[Nutterum]

Keep note that many e-commerce websites despite of niche are seeing decline in sales. The only real winners there are outlet/second hand e-commerce properties, simply because they are the heaviest of discounter sites online. Since September I have spoken with many colleagues and they all repeat the same thing - after the Ukraine war and energy problems + inflation for Europe associated with it, sales have dropped with at least 20% . People have just shut their wallets in preparation to weather the inflation//expenses storm. Now in the UK things are slightly different but with the economic hiatus there, I will not be too surprised you see a similar user trend.

To verify that - do a adwords campaign with a dedicated landing page for one of the top sellers and target the main keyword. If you see a higher volume of conversions and better time on site , then you may start to think how can you improve your product detail page to better meet the user expectations, or ease them to buy faster, or with less hassle. If you don't really see a difference, then you know people just buy less of your products in general due to economic situation and account for that reality, by exploring new product niches, bundling products together etc. etc.

[goodroi]

Think outside the box.

Doubling traffic doesn't mean anything. I intentionally cut the traffic in half for a site & doubled sales at the same time. Not all traffic is high quality. Focus on the money & not the traffic. They usually correlate but not always. Sometimes similar keywords are traps and veer your site off-topic. That could be happening with your blog and isn't good for the bots & AI trying to figure out what your site is about. You also don't want to spend too much effort gaining traffic that doesn't convert. Make sure your efforts are directly flowing into the best value for you.

Blur the lines between organic SEO traffic & social traffic. They are both potential sources of big-time traffic that can convert without paying per click. A strong social presence can potentially deliver more sales than Google SEO (especially if your industry is buried under 4 Google ads, video includes, & other stuff before people see the organic rankings). Plus social media can lead to many indirect SEO benefits.