Comments on: SEO vs SMO – Traffic Quality Put To The Test

By: JohnTimber

JohnTimber — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 14:05:49 +0000

I tend to think that search engine traffic is a little better and this data supports that conclusion.

However, there’s one other thing to consider… How much effort it requires to drive both kinds of traffic. If we could calculate how many “minutes per visitor” worth of effort both required, we might find that social media traffic provides a better overall ROI–if it’s a lot easier for you to secure traffic from those sources.

Great to see someone crunching a few #s!

By: Tiffany

Tiffany — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 15:04:18 +0000

Very interesting data and it’s great to see something concrete on this instead of the same old guesses. There is a factor missing from your experiment, though, that I think is an important one: the nature of the site. You have here two marketing blogs, and for that topic search traffic will be targeted to the entire site. You are likely to get visitors through search who are looking for information in a subject area, and much of your site will cater to those interests.

On the other hand, I have a webzine that covers a wide variety of social issues. Search traffic isn’t great for this site…people who are looking for information or commentary on a particular event typically search for that event, land to the relevant article, and then move on from there. On the other hand, social media visitors are more likely to be interested in the general type of commentary on the site (as opposed to a particular news story). I haven’t crunched numbers, but anecdotally many of our social media visitors view multiple pages and become return visitors–almost none of our search traffic does.

By: Kasumi

Kasumi — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 09:38:58 +0000

Very interesting article.

Im also not surprised by the findings as traffic driven by search engines, is likely to produce visitors more inclined to be in a search and purchase mode.

My own opinion is that traffic driven solely by social media is more important for business/brand awareness and raising profile, as I am currently finding out by my own research in this area.

Although I was intrigued to see that results for returning visitors as I would have estimated it to have been higher for the web site driven by search engines.

By: Alex Upstream

Alex Upstream — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:37:38 +0000

Interesting reading indeed, but Social Media and SEO go together hand in hand… good SM projects naturally attract a healthy volume of quality links, all of which is handy for PageTrust, surely?

Also, statistics aside, there is branding value in having both top search positions and a high profile on social media sites.

By: Alex the Freelance Twin

Alex the Freelance Twin — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 02:30:16 +0000

I question your graphs! They are deceiving if you don’t read the article (haha) but this is a really good post. I love all traffic, I just work harder for the organic traffic.

By: DazzlinDonna

DazzlinDonna — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 20:52:33 +0000

Relevancy is vital. That should be a mantra we all repeat. 🙂

By: Patricia Beck

Patricia Beck — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 16:33:30 +0000

What an interesting comparison between the two. Clearly, SEO is going to bring more relevant traffic to a site. The bounce rate shows how irrelevant content can hurt a site…the bounce rate graph is so misleading compared to the others!

By: James Duthie

James Duthie — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 04:50:33 +0000

@Batool – I am ok with you reproducing the article, but it’s probably best that we discuss it privately.

You can contact me on jamesduthie2005[@]gmail[dot]com

By: Batool

Batool — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 07:12:00 +0000

hi, Duthie u ve well-organized this research of yours! it is nice to see a grand topic addressed so extensively. i want to ask your permission if i can publish it with your name in a local Telecom & IT magazine… i am waiting for youe reply.
this is a magazine which publishes from Karachi and distributed natrionwide. your article will fecilitate the readers… waiting for your reply, Bye.

By: Jake

Jake — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 12:19:13 +0000

No where do you talk about the different kinds of social media; instead you talk about them across the board. Sites like Digg and StumbleUpon are liable to get a lot of poor quality traffic. However, del.icio.us and FriendFeed (I came here from the latter) are more liable to get high quality traffic. For del.icio.us, people tend to only put the highest quality information on their page. For FriendFeed, they may come and read an article to join the discussion on FriendFeed itself. You can see here where it has been shared and I have clicked through… maybe the discussion will happen:

http://friendfeed.com/e/40b277f5-7a76-9475-4df9-a508ad3ddbcc/study-social-media-traffic-not-as-engaged-as/