What Is Organic Traffic? (And How to Increase It)

What Is Organic Traffic?

Organic postulation refers to visits that travel to your tract via unpaid (i.e., “organic”) hunt results. Meaning it’s hunt motor postulation you get for free—aside from what it costs to make and support the content.

Increasing integrated postulation is 1 of the main hunt motor optimization (SEO) goals businesses have. Because it tin effect successful much leads and sales.

Benefits of Organic Website Traffic

Some advantages of integrated postulation include:

• Affordability: Organic postulation is free
• Targeted traffic: Organic postulation often attracts visitors who are specifically looking for the types of products/services and contented you provide 
• Relationship building: Organic postulation drives radical to your content, and they whitethorn proceed to prosecute with your marque if they similar what they see
• Long-term sustainability: Organic postulation tin supply a dependable watercourse of visitors implicit clip arsenic agelong arsenic your contented remains applicable and optimized
• Scalability: You tin summation integrated postulation with an SEO and contented selling strategy

But integrated postulation besides has imaginable downsides:

• Ongoing investments: Although integrated postulation is free, you inactive request to put successful SEO and contented selling to amended your hunt motor visibility
• Slow growth: Organic postulation maturation takes time, requiring accordant effort earlier you’ll reliably spot results
• Algorithm dependency: Organic postulation is babelike connected hunt motor algorithms, which tin alteration frequently

Organic vs. Paid Traffic

While integrated postulation visits travel from appearing successful modular hunt results, paid postulation visits travel from pay-per-click (PPC) ads connected results pages.

Paid hunt campaigns tin present astir contiguous results and let you to people users based connected circumstantial criteria. Such arsenic demographics, location, and hunt behavior.

But these campaigns tin beryllium costly—especially successful competitory markets. And the postulation stops arsenic soon arsenic you halt paying for ads.

In contrast, integrated postulation has the imaginable to make a ample measurement of clicks to your tract without incurring immoderate costs beyond your archetypal investments.

You tin estimation the full worth of immoderate website’s integrated postulation successful Semrush’s Organic Research tool. 

Just participate a domain and look for “Traffic Cost”:

Here, we spot that it would outgo astir $23.2 cardinal successful moving paid hunt ads to replicate eBay’s August 2024 integrated postulation for the aforesaid keywords

How to Increase Organic Traffic

Now, let’s look astatine however to thrust integrated postulation to a website. Which requires a coherent SEO strategy, utilizing SEO champion practices, and pursuing these 5 steps:

Step 1: Fix Any Technical Issues Your Site Has

Google needs to beryllium capable to discover, crawl, and scale (store successful a database) your website’s contented for you to fertile for applicable queries and pull traffic. So, you’ll privation to guarantee determination are nary method issues getting successful the way. 

Semrush’s Site Audit instrumentality makes it casual to cheque your tract for method issues that could impact its crawlability and indexability.

First, participate your domain into the substance container and click “Start Audit.”

Follow the prompts to configure your audit. 

Once you’ve done that, click the “Start Site Audit” button.

When the audit is complete, you tin spot your site’s wide wellness with the “Site Health” score. The higher the score, the less method issues your tract has.

Head to the “Issues” tab to spot a implicit database of each the problems the instrumentality detected. 

These are categorized into “Errors,” “Warnings,” and “Notices.” 

You should code errors first—they’re the astir terrible issues affecting your site. 

In this example, the instrumentality recovered breached images, redirect chains and loops, a breached interior link, and a duplicate meta description.

Click “Why and however to hole it” adjacent to immoderate contented to larn much astir it and however to code it.

Take immoderate steps you request to resoluteness the archetypal error. Then, enactment done the remainder of the errors, warnings, and notices.

Further reading: How to Perform a Technical SEO Audit successful 10 Steps

Step 2: Find Keywords to Drive Your SEO Strategy

Keyword probe helps you place invaluable queries radical usage erstwhile searching for accusation related to your niche. Which you tin usage to make targeted contented that attracts much integrated postulation to your site. 

Start uncovering applicable hunt presumption with Semrush’s Keyword Magic Tool.

Enter a effect keyword (a wide word related to your niche) into the substance container and your domain successful the “AI-powered feature” box. Then click “Search.”

The instrumentality volition past nutrient a database of applicable keyword suggestions. 

It besides provides important metrics for each keyword, including:

• Search intent (Intent): What users are hoping to execute erstwhile they execute a hunt for that term
• Search volume (Volume): The mean fig of monthly searches for the keyword
• Personal Keyword Difficulty (PKD %): The estimated ranking difficulty for that keyword connected a standard of 0 to 100 for your circumstantial domain. The little the score, the much apt you are to fertile well. 

Your extremity is to find presumption with the close operation of precocious hunt measurement and debased Personal Keyword Difficulty. And past people those presumption with the close benignant of contented to fulfill the searcher’s intent. (More connected that successful the adjacent step.)

You’ll find keyword groups (topically related terms) successful the left-hand menu. Which tin beryllium utile for exploring much circumstantial keyword topics wrong your niche.

Once you find applicable presumption you privation to target, prime the container to the close of those keywords and click “+ Add to keyword list.” 

Then, springiness your database a sanction and click the greenish check.

Repeat this process with different keyword groups to find adjacent much terms

Then, spot which presumption your competitors target. To find adjacent much applicable keywords.

Use Semrush’s Keyword Gap instrumentality for this.

Enter your domain and astatine slightest 1 competitor’s domain. Then click “Compare.”

The instrumentality volition past comparison the keyword profiles of each domain.

The 2 keyword categories you should absorption connected archetypal are:

• Missing: These are keywords your competitors fertile for but you don’t
• Weak: These are keywords your competitors fertile for higher than you

There’s a bully accidental you’ll find immoderate large keyword opportunities here. After all, if your closest competitors are ranking for definite keywords, they’re astir apt applicable to your website arsenic well.

Further reading: Keyword Research for SEO: What It Is & How to Do It

Step 3: Create Search Intent-Focused Content

High-quality SEO content that satisfies users’ needs is much apt to fertile highly successful hunt results. And thrust integrated postulation to your site.

It besides helps you found authorization successful your niche and physique spot with your audience.

First, look astatine your keyword database and find which presumption you already person contented focused on. So you tin optimize those pieces to pull much traffic.

You tin easy find optimization opportunities for your site’s contented utilizing Semrush’s On Page SEO Checker.

Enter your domain into the substance container and click “Get ideas.”

When you get to the “Add pages to optimize” surface during setup, take the “Manually” tab. So you tin specify the pages you privation to optimize based connected your keyword research.

The instrumentality volition past springiness an overview of imaginable betterment areas and database the circumstantial pages you should prioritize.

Click “# ideas” adjacent to immoderate of the listed pages to presumption suggestions for that page.

For example, present we spot that the selected leafage is hard to work and doesn’t person a applicable meta description.

Fixing these issues could amended the page’s relevance for the people keyword successful Google’s eyes.

For keywords you request to make caller contented around, usage Semrush’s SEO Writing Assistant. Which checks the portion for SEO, code of voice, readability, and originality successful existent time.

Step 4: Acquire Quality Backlinks

Earning backlinks (links from different domains that constituent to yours) from different reputable websites increases your site’s authorization and credibility. Which tin pb to amended rankings and much integrated traffic.

The cardinal to gathering prime backlinks is to consistently people high-value contented that different sites people privation to nexus to.

But you tin velocity up the process with dedicated link gathering tactics.

Some examples include:

• Broken nexus building: When you find a tract with a breached outer nexus and suggest replacing it with a nexus to a applicable assets connected your ain site
• The skyscraper technique: When you instrumentality a fashionable portion of contented and make your ain mentation of it that’s amended than what the contention has
• Checking rival backlinks: When you cheque which sites nexus to your competitors and inquire if they tin besides nexus to your site

Speed things up by uncovering caller nexus gathering opportunities for your tract with Semrush’s Link Building Tool.

Enter your domain and click “Start Link Building.”

The instrumentality volition past make a database of prospects (sites that mightiness nexus to you) based connected your domain’s keywords and competitors.

You tin find these successful the “Prospects” tab.

Then, take which prospects to contact. (This is easiest erstwhile you person a applicable portion of contented to share.)

And negociate the full outreach process wrong the Link Building Tool.

Further reading: Link Building for SEO: A Guide to the Basics

Step 5: Set Up Your Google Business Profile (If Applicable)

If you tally a brick-and-mortar concern oregon a section work business, focusing connected local SEO tin importantly boost your integrated traffic.

In the U.S., 32% of radical hunt online for section businesses respective times a week. And 21% of consumers bash truthful each day. 

One of the astir effectual ways to summation your visibility for location-based searches is to acceptable up and optimize your Google Business Profile.

This is simply a escaped concern listing that shows important accusation astir your concern straight successful the hunt results. 

Like this:

You should populate your Google Business Profile with arsenic overmuch applicable accusation arsenic you tin to maximize its visibility. And transportation radical to sojourn your site.

You tin larn much astir however to optimize your illustration successful our in-depth usher to Google Business Profile. 

How to Check Your Site’s Organic Traffic

Now, let’s look astatine immoderate ways to show your integrated traffic.

Organic Research

Follow these steps to usage Semrush’s Organic Research instrumentality to spot immoderate website’s integrated organic postulation estimates:

1. Enter a domain into the substance container and deed “Search”

2. View the “Traffic” fig astatine the apical of this report, which estimates however galore monthly visits integrated rankings thrust to the site

3. Click the “Traffic” conception to spot an estimation of the domain’s integrated postulation implicit time

4. Click connected the “Position changes” study to spot however ranking changes impact traffic

Google Analytics

Follow these steps to cheque integrated postulation successful Google Analytics 4 (GA4):

1. Go to your GA4 account

2. Click connected “Reports”

3. Under the “Life cycle” section, click “Acquisition”>“Traffic acquisition”

4. Here, you tin spot each your postulation sources, including “Organic Search”

5. To spot the circumstantial hunt motor driving your integrated traffic, scroll down the “Traffic acquisition” report. Then adhd “Session source” arsenic a secondary dimension.

Further reading: What Is Organic Traffic successful Google Analytics 4? (+ Analysis Tips)

Google Search Console

Follow these steps to cheque integrated postulation with Google Search Console (GSC):

1. Go to your GSC account

2. Open the “Search results” study nether “Performance.” Here, you’ll spot the full fig of integrated clicks driving postulation to your tract from Google’s hunt results.

3. Scroll down to spot which queries, pages, and countries bring the astir integrated postulation to your site

Keep Track of Your Organic Traffic Performance

Focusing connected integrated postulation tin enactment your business’s semipermanent growth.

And making method improvements, doing keyword research, creating content, and gathering links are each captious ingredients for improving your integrated visibility and traffic. 

As you enactment to amended your SEO efforts, it’s a bully thought to usage a instrumentality similar Position Tracking to show your keyword rankings. Because higher rankings are often an indicator that much integrated postulation is soon to come.

Try it today.