In the olden days of the internet – we’re talking just 5 to 10 years ago – it was seen as rather risky to buy traffic to your website. It was kind of like if you paid someone to be your friend – it isn’t really an authentic or trustworthy thing to do. But, things change. As the search engines became smarter and more sophisticated, marketers found new ways of staying friendly with them. Buying traffic to your website is not a new strategy, but it’s an improved strategy.
To answer the initial question right off the bat, yes it’s in your best interest to buy traffic to your website BUT – and there’s almost always a BUT – it shouldn’t be the only thing you’re doing to get people to come to your website and you want to be smart about it.
Buyer Beware
There are two main ways to buy website traffic:
- Directly by creating paid ads
- Indirectly by hiring a vendor for SEO services
There are tons of scams out there that charge pennies on the dollar and claim if you buy their SEO services they’ll get your website to be on page 1 of Google or guarantee you a high number of website visits a month. Just as we learned over the years that any email from a Nigerian Prince wanting to give you his fortune is a scam, there are red flags that signal a scam when buying website traffic. You can learn more about those here.
It’s important to clarify the two categories that SEO (search engine optimization) falls into:
Black hat techniques refer to the use of aggressive SEO strategies, technique and tactics that focus only on search engines and not a human audience, and usually does not obey search engines’ rules. Black hat SEO is more frequently used by those who are looking for a quick financial return on their web site rather than a long-term investment on their web site.
White hat uses techniques and tactics which can be defended as NOT being contrary to the spirit of Google’s expressed quality desires by citing Google’s own published guidelines. White hat techniques are associated with ethical SEO. Even though websites which are using white hat techniques might not suddenly pop up on the search results, they get long lasting results when they finally do.
(Source: Cognitive SEO)
If you’re buying bad links or purchasing lists of emails to send people content that is linked to your website, that is a black hat technique because they did not opt-in on their own. You’ll be considered spam and nobody likes spam!
If you buy traffic to your website using paid ads campaigns by setting up PPC ads, Facebook ads or boosted posts, or retargeting, these are considered white hat. Learn more about these techniques here.
Buying website traffic used to be seen as a sheisty black hat technique; however, it’s now an acceptable form of online marketing – both to the search engines and your bottom line – when it’s part of a larger strategy. Because what’s the point of creating ads if you don’t have any quality content on your website to send them to? Content can be website pages, blogs, videos, eBooks, case studies, podcasts etc. – anything that speaks to your target audience and what they’re searching for online.
When to Buy Traffic to Your Website
Nobody wants to waste their money buying traffic. So, you only want to start buying traffic when you have a budget and a strategy in place. Even if it’s a small budget. For example, let’s say you’re willing to spend $10 a day. How should you spend it? Some experts weigh in:
Molly Pittman, Digital Marketer
If I had $10/day to spend on paid media, I’d use it to acquire as many customers as possible for Digital Marketer.
How would I do it? I would start by promoting a piece of content.
I spend $6/day to run traffic to this blog post on Facebook Advertising Pixels.
Keith Krance & Ralph Burns, Dominate Web Media
With $10/day, the first thing we would do is set a $7/day budget to amplify a high-value, un-gated blog post using Facebook ads with interest-based targeting.
I’d target our ideal audience whose interests are related to Facebook and the social media niche.
Brian Moran, SamCart
If I only had $10 a day to spend on paid media, I would retarget people who have seen the sales page for my product, and have not bought yet.
Because it’s easy to setup, I would use Facebook’s retargeting pixel by placing the pixel on my sales page and on the “thank you” page after they bought.
Keep in mind this is what has worked for them – but these specific techniques might not be what works best for you.
Why to Buy Traffic
So how do you know what will work for your small business to help you get more website traffic and ultimately get more customers? You need the right online marketing strategy. An inbound marketing consultant at Half a Bubble Out can help you create a strategy that works for you using all facets of inbound marketing – from designing or updating your website to using social media platforms, creating content and implementing ad campaigns.
Buying website traffic is in your best interest if you use white hat techniques, have a budget to work with, and a holistic strategy in place. Ask yourself these questions before you buy SEO services or buy website traffic. Then contact us at Half a Bubble Out.
