3 Ways High Quality Traffic Increases Lead Generation

Driving more high quality traffic to your website is certainly a great thing all on its own - but it also assists in your overall marketing and lead generation efforts. 

Related Article: 30 Greatest Lead Gen Tips, Tricks, and Ideas

To start, what is high quality traffic? When we judge the quality of Internet traffic, we're comparing your traffic to all online traffic. Let's face it: the vast majority of Internet traffic has no specific need, use, or desire for your product/service. In contrast, the traffic that comes through your site should have a real, expressed need for your product. 

Internet users demonstrate their interest in products or services through search engine queries, social media interaction, content views & downloads, and other trackable activities. Your goal is to present yourself strategically so that you show up when and where these users are searching, interacting, viewing, and downloading. 

If you focus your resources on this strategic placement, your traffic will naturally decrease since you're no longer targeting the whole of the Internet. However, the traffic you do get will be extremely high quality - or, much more likely to convert and buy.

Skytap, a self-service provider of cloud automation solutions, implemented a targeted content marketing strategy and saw 124% increased sales leads and a 210% increase in North American site traffic.

What sounds more profitable: 100,000 visitors, one conversion, and thousands of wasted marketing dollars; or 10,000 visitors, twenty conversions, and tangible ROI?

We think you know the answer.

So, we've stated that high quality traffic is traffic that's much more likely to convert into leads and ultimately make a purchase. Why is that the case? Here are a few reasons:

1.  Lower Bounce Rates

The bounce rate of a website indicates how many people have navigated to the site and immediately left without taking any action. High bounce rates have a few possible causes:

• Slow loading speeds - If your site takes more than 3 seconds to load, the average Internet user will give up and leave.
  
  
• Irrelevant landing pages - They clicked on an ad that said "how to lose 20 pounds in 5 minutes" and now they're on a page advertising organic baby food. What?
  
  
• Irrelevant or annoying advertisements - They came for the article on "10 Things No One Knows About House Cats" but the site is 75% ads, and more ads pop up when they try to leave. Super annoying.
  
  
• Poor design - We are visual creatures, and even websites must meet a certain beauty standard. This means lots of white space, easy-to-read typefaces, and a good layout.
  
  
• Walls of text - All of your online content should be scannable. No one likes to squint through a full page of unformatted text.
  
  
• Poor targeting - Ok, so your website loads quickly, your landing pages match their CTAs, you don't have any popups, your site looks great, and your content is easy to read... But your visitors have zero interest in your product/service. Might as well throw your money off a bridge.

Google calculates bounce rates into a website's SEO. So, if your bounce rates are high, you'll show up lower in search results. When you aim to get more high quality traffic, your bounce rates will decrease automatically. Great for your SEO and overall marketing efforts!

Bounce Rate & Lead Gen

A lower bounce rate can increase your lead generation in a few different ways:

• Your visitors are interested in what your site has to offer. When they're interested, they're more likely to convert by downloading something or contacting you. 
  
  
• Longer session durations overall. This means each visitor is spending more time browsing your site, which makes it more likely they'll find a good place to convert.
  
  
• Your site is providing the information your visitors need. The more valuable content they find, the more likely they'll trust you enough to give you their contact information.
  
  
• Your SEO improves, meaning you're showing up higher in search results. More visibility means more high quality traffic and leads.
  
  

2.  Higher ROI

When you aim to get the most traffic rather than the best traffic, it's like eating an entire loaf of white bread for dinner. Yeah, you're full now, but you're not getting anything useful out of that. Where are the vitamins, the minerals, the protein, the good stuff? 

Some of you are reading this and thinking, "But I love bread. If I want to eat a whole loaf for dinner every night, you can't stop me." You're right. I can't stop you. But, personally, I'd rather take a few pieces of that nutritionally void bread and stuff it with some awesome steak, cheese, mushrooms, and onions. 

Know what I'm sayin'?

That's how you should view your website traffic. You're going to have some "meh" traffic - that's just how it goes. But you shouldn't be trying to pull in every Internet user simply because the big numbers make you feel good. As you may know, lots of traffic doesn't necessarily equal leads and sales. The more you target your highest quality traffic, the less likely you are to die from malnutrition. As it were. 

When you invest in food, your ROI starts with the nutrients you gain from consuming it (which gives you the energy to do your job, chase your kids, and build that shed in the backyard).

When you invest in marketing, your ROI starts with your traffic. High quality traffic fuels lead generation, sales, engagement, and brand awareness. All of these things lead to business growth, bigger profits, and a happier you.

If your traffic is bad, everything that follows will suffer as a result. Your marketing efforts won't have the "fuel" to produce the ROI you need.

3.  Social Sharing & Referrals

High quality traffic is more likely to convert and buy, yes - but it's also more likely to share your content and refer new business! 

When your traffic is high quality, it means you're attracting your best buyers or buyer personas. These people are a positive experience for your business (whether in profit, values, or other qualities) and, if you're doing it right, your business will be a great experience for them. 

Great customer experiences get around. Customers are happy to talk about businesses who provide fantastic services. They'll talk on social media, review-based sites, and they'll refer their friends when it comes up in conversation. 

They'll happily share your content if it can benefit their friends, followers, or connections. That's an exponential increase in your reach. And you'll be reaching a great audience for lead generation - people who are connected to your best buyers are more likely to be best buyers themselves.

This network of sharing and referrals leads to even more high quality traffic - because referrals are the highest converting types of traffic you can get. In addition, referral conversions are 2.5 times more likely to result in a sale.

Don't Aim for Just Any Traffic

Let's recap. Some of the greatest lead gen benefits of high quality traffic include:

• Lower bounce rates, which positively impacts SEO as well as lead gen.
• Better ROI from more leads, sales, and engagement.
• More shares and referrals from happy customers to highly qualified potential leads.

These are only three perks that you'll notice when you focus on the quality of your traffic. To learn more about traffic and lead generation, check out these 30 Greatest Lead Gen Tips.