Mob vs Smart Mob: Is Social Media Traffic Is Valuable or not
Is social media traffic worth it? Yes and no! As always it depends. Hear me out!
Over the years many people have questioned the value of social media traffic. Are they right?
Yes, I have been among the critics!
Yet I hailed it as the best traffic source in the early days of this blog. Is it valuable then or not?
Are people visiting you from social media sites like
- X/Twitter
still worth having on your site?
Are the numbers even considerable?
What is the actual value of social media traffic? Read below!
Example: steady influx of visitors without new content
Consider my own example of the bike blog I have published in German for years.
In recent years I was unable to take care of it. I mostly updated existing content. Yet
despite the lack of new content and the existing one being in German I got regular social media traffic
How did that happen? People from Pinterest sites from all over the world arrived through my images!
This steady influx of new social media visitors without new content is the exception though.
In recent years Pinterest has changed their user experience so much that clicks to websites are the exception!
Also I was a very successful Pinterest user with millions of views and 100k of followers!
Facebook and X/Twitter visitors usually come to your site because someone recently shared your content.
Instagram users do not even have a link to click. The “link in bio” workaround yield very poor results.
People share your latest content on social media unless they have found it by way of
- search
- links
- bookmarks
Yet that’s the less straightforward way of arrival. Why? People have to know you first!
Social media helps people to discover you! Only then they can search and visit your site directly!
Awareness first – social media traffic vs other types of Web traffic
Let’s make a few things clear before we start.
Social media traffic is different in a few important ways from other types of traffic.
Think direct traffic or search traffic.
Visitors from social media are
- casually interested in you
- they know you in many cases
- they are perusing the Web
- they are not ready to buy yet
What does it mean? How do we explain it in marketing language?
Social media visitors are in the early stages of the sales funnel or not at all in it. Think
- awareness
- interest
- consideration.
Social media is mostly used for discovery.
People discover new places, products, trends or simply news in general on social media sites.
People have to be aware of you to want to buy from you later on.
In case you want to sell on the first date you will be disappointed by social media.
Let’s compare to search or rather Google traffic as they dominate the market.
People often search for the exact product or service they seek.
Social media users are still wondering what they want.
Social media and the value it delivers
Many social media users even wonder whether they want something at all.
They are just wasting time online out of boredom in many cases.
Some people are simply addicted to social media and its gamification aspect.
They don’t want to leave at ll so outgoing links to your site often get ignored.
Yet despite all of this you can build an audience on social media!
You can also get a traffic boost when you do it right and are genuine and helpful in some way.
Let me present widely accepted reasons why social media traffic is valuable and worth the investment.
It’s not just about vanity! I also added some reasons why social media visitors are not valuable.
Relevant visitors: Social media is like a huge recommendation engine.
It delivers huge value beyond mere brand awareness.
Social media users often follow people from certain niches.
People who are already interested in you or your topic follow you on social media and ideally click through to your site.
You get exposed to relevant audiences that way without having one yourself yet.
Sometimes your content gets accidentally or virally exposed to other less relevant audiences which can result in a backlash.
New visitors: Social media traffic often means predominantly new visitors.
These are new visitors that are really interested in your topic not just any visitors. They are friends of friends.
On X/Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook mostly people you already know click the links but sometimes also others who are connected.
On sites like Pinterest or Instagram people who are drawn in by the visual appeal of your content visit your site.
Timely: My bike blog is the exception as explained above.
It has been published originally from 2008 to 2010 and sporadically later on.
Yet it still gets traffic from Pinterest after all those years.
After all great images are evergreen and often timeless.
Reddit, X/Twitter and Facebook traffic in contrast occurs once!
It is timely! What does it mean?
In most cases people visit you once and never again on the same post.
Erratic: Social media traffic can come in erratically with occasional recurring bursts.
Articles from my blog here have gone viral more than once after a few years and updates.
Some blogs simply get steady traffic every single day.
These blogs do create new content on ongoing basis and have already popular accounts on various social sites and apps.
Yet for a small niche blog like mine that has like 100 visitors a day without social media it’s substantial.
Even if it’s like a dozen it’s often important as the people ho arrive are the early adopters and trend setters!
No comments: Social media users already talk about your content on social media.
They don’t waste your time with nagging comments.
In the past the sheer number of comments was a blog quality metric.
Over the years most blog comments turned either spammy, low quality or abusive though.
This way I’m glad that most people limit their conversation to their own accounts.
I don’t have to react or clean that up on my site.
At the same time every comment made on social media means additional exposure for your content.
International: While search and direct traffic is often very limited locally you can tap into completely new and foreign audiences on social media.
when you have something universally appealing to offer people from all over the world will flock to your site. Again my cycling blog comes to mind.
Instant: New blogs and sites won’t get any significant traffic from Google and it takes a while to build links so get Google ranks you at all.
Social media can have an immediate effect though.
You or ideally someone else shares your content and you get traction instantly.
Of course it takes to build an audience on X/Twitter and Facebook. Yet I got traffic from Pinterest long before I even joined the site.
Do not just rely on social media – build an audience yourself
When you set up a new blog or site that serves a niche try to go after the social media audiences that are already there.
Then make the people who share your content your friends all over the place and subscribe to your blog by way of
- feeds
- notifications
You don’t even have to engage on Pinterest as a blogger.
Focus on attracting existing users interested in your topic or send an outreach message to influencers.
Then keep the visitors that come by way of social media! Convince them to return and subscribe.
Also do not solely focus on Google. Google does not send any significant traffic to new sites to prevent spam.
Only older authority sites can generate significant organic Google traffic. It may take years to get there!
Always remember to draw in people to your own platform.
Build an audience of regulars for yourself. They will appear from social media or search but only if you can keep them you will see them regularly.
You can offer incentives to subscribe to your newsletter for example.
Every online store does that by offering some type of discount or voucher for example.
I can help you building an audience of regular visitors to your own online properties.
Getting attention on social media is a good start.
People won’t search for you or come back regularly when they haven’t discovered you on social media first.
