The Coronavirus pandemic has hit businesses hard, particularly small and medium-sized businesses that depend on local Traffic to drive sales.

2020 saw a drastic shift in consumer shopping behaviour, with online sales growing to over $52 billion and expected to reach as high as $79 billion by 2024. However, with a flood of competition hitting the online marketplace, you may find that your website just isn’t getting the number of visitors you expected.

Whether your business had to pivot to an online platform in the wake of shifting consumer behaviour, or you’ve has always had an online presence, there are simple measures you can take today that could have a significant impact on your web traffic, without hurting your bottom line.

Make Use of Internal Links

With a few clicks, you could be capitalizing on the content you already have on your site. Improve your user experience, make navigation easier, reduce bounce rates, and boost your search engine rankings by simply linking content and pages to other content and pages on your website.

Internal linking may sound too good to be true; however, it works for several reasons.

Source: Searchenginejournal

First, Internal Links allow users to get where they want to go quicker. Whether that’s to a product, another page, or a description, internal linking gives readers the information they want without making them search for it on your site. The easier to navigate and more straightforward your website, the longer users will stay, which increases the odds that they will take the desired action, whether to buy something, sign up for a service, or download an app.

Secondly, search engines like Google just love a link. Internal links make it easier for search engines to ‘crawl’ through your site, helping them locate and understand your content, even content found on deeper pages that are not as frequently visited. By guiding these internet crawlers to the right pages through internal links, you can help boost your search rankings and draw attention to the pages you want to share.

Refresh Your GMB Profile

At this stage, most businesses have figured out the importance of having a Google My Business Page, but if not, it is time to set one up. First impressions are fundamental to increasing traffic to your website, and the power of appearance begins long before a user has landed on your page.

Trust and professionalism are crucial to attracting customers to your website, the more professional and trustworthy you appear, the more likely users will be to visit your website. 93% of people look to online reviews before buying a product, and 46% of Google searches are for local businesses.

To help get you noticed, make sure that your Google My Business profile:

• Is complete, including tags and high-quality images
• Has up-to-date NAP (name, address, phone number) information
• Includes a good, keyword-rich description
• Regularly responds to reviews, both positive and negative
• Incorporate Google Q&A

People generally decide whether to visit a site or not within a fraction of a second, so make it count with a strong GMB profile.

Consider Your Colour Choices

There is a whole lot of psychology behind colour choices, and that extends to your website. Research published by KISSMetrics breaks down the different emotions elicited by various colours and how they impact potential buyers.

For example, red tends to imply a sense of urgency, while softer colours are more peaceful.

In another study, marketers found that using a red CTA button instead of green increased conversion by 21%. That’s 21% more clicks by simply changing the colour of a button.

Colour selection doesn’t have to be left to guesswork. If you have the time and resources, A/B testing is a great way to get real life feedback on what works best with your target audience.

Add a Pop-up

There is a subtle art to using pop-ups in promotions, but if you get it right, you can increase conversions by close to 10%. The key to using pop-ups in a way that doesn’t annoy your users is to:

• Wait until they are ready
• Make pop-ups easy to close
• Offer something of value, like a discount, exclusive content, or promotion
• Use short, to the point copy and engaging imagery
• Make offers temporary

Despite the fact people say they don’t like pop-up ads, research shows that they are very effective in getting people to take the desired action, as long as they are presented in a way that doesn’t take away from a user’s experience on your site. Pop-ups marked as ‘intrusive interstitial’ by Google because they are difficult to close, obscure the webpage, or use guilt-tripping language, will suffer in ranking as a result.

In an increasingly saturated online environment, the road to the top of SERPs may seem like an uphill battle. However, armed with the right tools, it is very possible to get there.

These tips alone can’t fix fundamental issues that may be weighing on your web traffic, like slow-loading pages, mobile incompatibility, poor user experience, and sub-par content, but they can potentially drive more traffic to your website without investing heavily in SEO, marketing, or the design of your website.

The post Simple Ways to Boost Website Traffic (That Won’t Break the Bank) appeared first on Nirvana Canada.