How Long Does It Take To Get Traffic To Your Website Using SEO
Dec 15, 2022HOW LONG DOES SEO TAKE TO SHOW RESULTS A.K.A TRAFFIC TO YOUR WEBSITE?
The number one burning question every business owner has before starting their SEO journey is, “how long does SEO take to see results?". What they're really asking is how long will it take me to get to first place in Google so that I can boost my website traffic, sales and money in the bank?”
How do we know this?
Because this is the first question we get asked every time somebody enquires with us about SEO.
It was the certainly the first thing I wanted to know when I started my SEO journey too.
The truth is, we are all ready from day one to have the business and life we desire (enter uncapped income and more freedom).
With limited time or budget, we are often looking for an affordable quick-fix to take our business to the next level.
Unfortunately everything worthwhile takes a little elbow grease and time to gain momentum - especially if it's free to implement.
We are going to let you in on the answer to that question but before we get into the nitty gritty of how long it will take you to see SEO results A.K.A money in the bank from your SEO efforts, there are a few other factors you need to consider.
It's only right we touch on those first.
Ready to finally start getting traffic to the website you put together yourself back in 2019 from Google so you can ditch posting on social media?
Let's get into it.
Disclaimer: For those of you who are new to SEO - Search Engine Optimisation is all the actions you take on your website and on other websites to help you score the top positions in Google so you get more traffic (and sales) to your website.
SETTING SEO GOALS
- Setting SEO goals (outcomes you’d like to achieve from implementing SEO)
- KPI’s (metrics to measure progress towards your SEO goal/s)
DETERMINE THE RESULTS YOU'D LIKE TO ACHIEVE FROM SEO FROM THE START
Establish the results you want to get from implementing SEO. That way you know exactly what you want to get out of it, have an action plan to get there and can determine how long it will take.
No online business owners want to waste time or energy with their marketing efforts so it's always important to plan from the start.
EXAMPLE SEO GOALS
Goal: Make 'x' amount revenue over the next three months.
KPI: Increase in ranking, organic traffic, engagement and sales by 'x' amount you need to achieve your goal.
For example your goal may be to make $10,000 over the next three months in your business.
To do this, you need to determine how much you need to increase your website traffic by to make this dollar value and have an action plan for how you're going to get the traffic e.g., Google Search (SEO), social media, email campaigns etc.
TRAFFIC REQUIRED TO HIT REVENUE GOALS
Let's go through a real life example.
Write down your desired revenue goal for the next quarter and calculate how much website traffic you need to hit it.
- What is your desired annual revenue goal for the next three months?
- Next determine your average order value (what is the average selling price of each order)
- Divide your desired revenue by your average order value to determine how many sales you need e.g., $10,000 / $100 = 100 sales required
- Determine your conversion rate (how many people out of every 100 that land on your website buy something). You can find this figure in your website analytics or Google Analytics if it's set-up.
- Average conversion rate is 1-5%
- This means on average, for every 100 people that see your website, 1-5 buy.
- To make 2 sales a day, you need to get at least 100 website visitors (with a 2% conversion rate).
- To calculate traffic required, divide the your number of sales required by your conversion rate as a decimal e.g., 100 / 0.02 = 5000 extra website visits over the next quarter.
| Desired Revenue | Average Order Value | Sales Required | Conversion Rate | Traffic Required |
| $10,000 | $100 | 100 | 2% | 5000 |
As you can see, you need quite a few website visits to hit your sales and revenue targets. Hence why it's so important to have a traffic plan.
Now take a moment to set your SEO goals. How much traffic do you need to make your desired level of sales next year?
SEO is the most effective way to get traffic and real buyers to your website.
Take a look and see how many people hit your website from your last social media post and consider how long it's going to take you to reach your traffic goal using just social media alone.
Setting SEO goals will be different for every business. Your goals should be realistic and directly align with what you want to achieve.
Now you’ve determined where you’d like to head, let’s talk about approximately how long you can expect SEO to take to get you more traffic to your website.
HOW LONG DOES SEO TAKE TO SHOW RESULTS
In all honesty, if you’re implementing SEO at an average pace, you should expect to see results within three to six months of implementation (if not quicker). When we say results, we mean a noticeable increase in your websites position in Google's search results pages, traffic to your site, how long people spend on your website and most importantly, how many sales you make.
You may not hit your main traffic and sales goal within three to six months, but you will be on your way and seeing growth in all these areas if you do it right.
Comparatively, if you invest a lot of time up front to get your SEO sorted, you can expect growth much sooner. When you finally see the growth, we just know the excitement you’re going to experience.
The monthly cost of paying your website bill will finally be surpassed for once with real cash money in the bank. There is no point spending hours creating a website and paying a monthly bill if no one is coming to visit. It's a completely pointless exercise.
By implementing SEO, you'll begin to see that this marketing channel is where you should be focussing your marketing efforts and be ready to ditch the social strategy reaping very little web traffic and sales.
FACTORS THAT DETERMINE HOW LONG IT TAKES TO SEE RESULTS
Businesses want to know when they can expect to see an impact from all their hard work and rightfully so. Truth be told, SEO isn’t a quick fix but rather a faithful partner. If you make the right selection in your marketing channel (SEO) and put in the work upfront (with very little maintenance unlike social media), it will consistently bear fruit for years to come.
WHY SEO IS THE RIGHT CHOICE
SEO is entirely free to implement (besides the time it takes to do the work) making it a very sustainable form of advertising like no other. And…we all know when people head to Google, they’re ready to buy. They are looking for exactly what you sell, so why not set-up your SEO properly once and for all so your audience can find you and buy.
SEO is a strategy that has longevity and is super important now that it's becoming harder to track people's actions online and retarget them. Setting up your SEO will mean you can easily attract interested buyers to your website through keywords without relying on ever-changing social media algorithms that barely deliver traffic to your site anyway.
Best part of all you can finally say goodbye to creating humiliating Reels dance routines for good. What's not to love about that.
Ready to start making more money from your site? Download our Free Traffic and Sales Calculator and Planner.
