You spend loads of time working on your website, right? Optimizing keywords, writing content, listening to your audience’s needs and requests–so much energy goes into making your site the best it can be!
Lots of different factors impact the amount of traffic your site gets. But if you’ve put lots of time and thought into your site, but find your pages getting…uh, well, no traffic at all, there’s probably a reason for it.
If your site is getting way less than it used to, or it’s getting no traffic at all, you may want to consider these 7 reasons that may be the cause for your site’s lack of traffic!
1. Your Website is Still Young
Many independent bloggers and businesses who run regular blogs start putting out content with the expectation that it’ll bring readers running to their page. This is, however, rarely the case.
It can take a significant amount of time and meticulous building before your site begins to see traffic. You’ll need to put in work building content, optimizing keywords, and ensuring that all your site’s biggest kinks are worked out before you’re allowed to worry about low traffic on your site.
If your blog or site is less than 6 months old, fear not. It takes even the most successful sites around 3 or 4 months to begin racking up significant visits.
If your site is still young, give it time. Put lots of thought into content and marketing strategy–once it’s matured a bit, you can watch your site blossom as those readers finally flock to your content.
2. Your Site Is Just Plain Slow
Another major factor that may be affecting how much traffic your site is seeing is the speed of the site itself. Multiple studies have shown the impact of page speed on getting visitors to stay on your page and to return to it thereafter.
So, the fact is, even if you’ve taken plenty of time to market your site on social media and email lists, readers will often scurry away when they hit a slow-loading page.
If your page takes more than 4 or 5 seconds to load…well, bye-bye traffic.
Check out your website’s page speed. If you could maybe, possibly imagine an Internet user becoming impatient with the time it takes to load, do everything you can to fix the problem ASAP.
Plus–improving your site’s page speed doesn’t only keep readers on your site once they’re there. It usually serves to boost your site’s rankings overall, too!
3. You’re Targeting Too-Popular Keywords
One of the most common mistakes and biggest reasons websites don’t pull all the traffic they deserve is that often, sites are aiming for super high-competition keywords. Their pages wind up buried in all the other sites that are targeting the same ones!
There are only 10 positions available on the first page of search engine results. Even if your site is fairly well-established, you need to consider whether it’s one of the top 10 most-established in its field and in regards to the keywords at hand.
The bottom line is that the competition for popular keywords is really high. If your site is only employing super-popular keywords, its SEO function isn’t going to be awesome.
Consider getting a bit more creative with your keywords. Stay away from the most popular ones and your content won’t be buried beneath the rest!
4. You’re Being Thwarted by An Algorithm
Most bloggers and other website developers have only a really vague idea of the ways in which algorithms work. That’s because they’re really complicated and really, really confusing.
But the truth is, if your site isn’t getting any traffic, it may be because there’s a tricky algorithm getting in your way!
Chances are, if you were maintaining a steady flow of site traffic at one point, but noticed an abrupt dropoff, your site has probably been subject to the negative effects of an algorithm.
Consult Google Analytics to confirm your suspicions. You may have to take several steps before your site’s traffic is recovered, but it’s not a lost cause!
5. Your Branding is…Blah
Many bloggers and small businesses assume that the best way to drive traffic to their sites is by posting a lot of stuff and optimizing their sites for drawing in visitors. These are, of course, important factors–but they don’t matter much if sites aren’t also supporting really good, consistent branding.
Think about it; has your page sort of started to resemble the Heaven’s Gate cult’s 1999 masterpiece? Or does it sort of look like a collage of content and graphics without any real rhyme or reason?
When it comes to driving traffic to your site, branding matters.
Users tend to avoid sites and companies that neglect to establish good, consistent branding. Often, an “ugly” homepage is enough to drive readers away.
If you can’t take the time to establish a brand and pay attention to the little details, what would make customers think you’d take the time to offer good services?
6. You’re Not Taking Enough Opportunities
You know that blog you started in the 8th grade? The one you never told anyone about except your older brother when he found the page left up on your parents’ desktop computer? Chances are, that blog didn’t see a ton of traffic.
When it comes to establishing a blog or website that’ll pull in loads of traffic, it’s super important to take advantage of all the opportunities possible for advertising.
Establish and maintain all kinds of social media accounts. Run a consistent email marketing list.
Take advantage of the platforms your audience already checks regularly–at the end of the day, no matter how much your customers enjoy your content, they really shouldn’t be trusted to type in your blog’s URL every Tuesday and Thursday.
7. Your Content Isn’t Awesome
Sorry–it had to be said.
If you’ve already checked your page speed, considered the age of your site, revised your keywords, and done every other thing imaginable to diagnose the reason your page isn’t getting any traffic…it may be time to consider your site’s content.
Many bloggers–especially those with backgrounds in marketing–understand the impact of a good marketing campaign. The problem with this, however, is that oftentimes, bloggers and other site builders tend to spend more time boosting their content than they do…well, writing it.
Take the time to curate great content. Put out stuff people really want to read. Pay attention to all other factors that may influence your site’s traffic–but at the end of the day, your site’s traffic and rankings will be determined by what it actually has to offer to readers.
Still Getting No Traffic?
Sometimes self-diagnosing your website and the reasons why it may not be getting as much traffic as you’d hoped can be a tricky game.
If you’ve done your best, but still find your site stuck in a rut with no traffic, no worries. Check out our extensive services, and let’s talk about how we can work to get your site the traffic it deserves!
