What Is Referral Traffic?

Increasing traffic to your website should be one of your primary marketing objectives because it is what allows you to generate revenue. You won’t have any leads to capture, no prospects to convert, and an empty sales funnel full of sadness and broken dreams if you don’t have any traffic.

There are numerous strategies for achieving this goal, such as search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click advertising (PPC), blogging, social media marketing, word of mouth marketing, press releases, and so on. The issue is that SEO takes time, PPC is expensive, Google is becoming oversaturated with blog content, and social media has always struggled to demonstrate ROI.

Referral traffic, on the other hand, comes in a variety of shapes and sizes, so it’s critical to understand not only what it is, but also which types of referral traffic are most important to you.

This guide will help you to understand, what referral traffic is, why referral traffic is important, what are referring links, and how to use referral links.

Let’s dive into it.

What Is Referral Traffic?

Referral traffic refers to visitors who arrive at your website from sources other than the major search engines. When a visitor clicks a link on a website or social network and is redirected to another site, tracking software such as Google Analytics records that visitor as referral traffic. The originating website is referred to as the “referrer” because it refers traffic from one website to another.

When managing a link-building strategy, for example, referral traffic is critical and should be measured. Link building entails generating backlinks to your site from other high-quality external sites as well as placing relevant outward links on your site. As a result, referral traffic has a significant impact on page rank.

When you view your Referrals under Traffic Sources in Google Analytics, you can see the main domains from which traffic to your website originated.

Why Is Referral Traffic Important?

Referral traffic is valuable to inbound marketers because it directs potentially qualified visitors to your website from trusted sources. This puts your content in front of new people, giving your website the chance to convert that visitor into a lead and your sales team the chance to convert that lead into a new customer.

According to estimates from Merkle; Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, experienced a 114% increase in web referrals.But wait, there’s more!

Referral traffic has SEO benefits as well. When someone comes to your website from another site, they are usually following a link or engaging in some type of social activity. Google and other search engines consider these links and social signals to be positive ranking factors if they come from reputable websites. When you link to your YouTube videos from LinkedIn, you will receive 75% more shares.

Referral traffic raises your blog’s “page rank,” which elevates it in Google search results. High Google rankings are sought after because appearing on the first page of a search can result in many more clicks than appearing on the fourth or fifth page of search results.

Referral traffic is also important because it provides a consistent source of traffic in addition to search engine hits.

Referral Traffic FAQ

What does a referral site mean?

A referral site is a URL or hostname that directs a visitor to another website. A visitor has followed a link from the referral website to the website where he is currently located. As a result, the referral website is the source of the traffic to the current page.

When a visitor views a website, the browser transmits the name of the requested website as well as the source of the referral link that directed the visitor to it. Referral websites are important data in web analysis because they allow you to assign traffic to different sources and determine where visitors to a website came from.

What is website referral traffic?

A “referral” in web traffic is similar to a recommendation from one website to another. Google Analytics allows you to view these referrals, which improves your understanding of how customers find your website and what they do once they arrive. Referral traffic can be a strong indicator of which external sources are most valuable in assisting your business in meeting its objectives, proving once and for all, for example, whether your Facebook page truly adds value.

What is a Google referral?

Referral traffic is Google’s method of reporting visits to your site that came from sources other than its search engine. When a user clicks on a link to a new page on another website, Analytics records the click as a referral visit to the second site. The originating site is referred to as a “referrer” because it directs traffic from one location to another. Google Analytics tracks three metrics, one of which is referral traffic. The other types of traffic are search traffic (visits from search engines) and direct traffic to a domain.

What are referring links?

Your rewards program runs on referral links. They enable businesses to track which customers sent referrals to your site and which of those referrals resulted in new sales.
When a customer enrolls in a referral program, they are given their own unique referral link. This link is used to track each referral that originates from a single customer.

A referral link can also track each step of your referral campaign in real-time, from customer sign-ups to new referrals to converted leads, and so on. A referral link can help you improve and maximize your referral marketing efforts by providing a clear picture of your entire referral process.

Another element of the referral link is an employee referral program which may appear to be a cutting-edge concept. However, it is the most underutilized component of any compensation and benefits program. Indeed, numerous studies show that referrals are the most trustworthy form of advertising. When employees know they are to benefit from a referral program they are usually willing to spread the word about your company for free.

How do referral sites work?

Referrals are not a low-cost content marketing tactic. When done correctly, they can be an excellent way to expand your business and provide value to both new and existing customers.
The concept is straightforward: you ask a customer to refer a new prospect to your product or service and you reward either the referring customer or both for taking part in the transaction.
Typically, a unique referral link is created for each of your customers so that you can track who invited whom. You then encourage your customers to share this link with anyone they think might be interested in it.
The reward for a referral system will vary greatly depending on the type of service you provide. Dropbox famously used a referral system that increased storage space for both the advocate and the referred user. FeedbackPanda discounted both parties’ subscriptions. There are numerous other incentives available, such as store credit, coupons, cash, or gift cards.
The math is also straightforward: if the discounted advocate revenue plus the discounted revenue from referred customers exceeds the non-discounted revenue for a user who does not participate in the referral system, your system is effective.

How do you use referral links?

A referral link is a personalized link that allows you to earn reward points whenever someone clicks on it and makes a purchase. For instance, if someone clicks on your referral link and then makes a purchase on the e-commerce website, you will receive 10,000 reward points and your friend will receive a 10% off coupon. Both of you benefitting from it.

Here’s an example of how Polaroid makes use of referral links.

If you’ve already created a Polaroid account, a personalized referral link has been created for you. You may distribute it to anyone who does not already have an account with us in order for them to receive a discount on their first order. Follow the steps below to locate your link:

• You must first log in to your account.
• You select the reward section from the account overview.
• The reward section will be displayed. Scroll down to the “Refer your friends” section.
• You’ll see your personalized referral link, along with the option to copy it.
• Share it with a friend, family, or on your blog

You’ll get points every time someone uses it and then makes a purchase. Please keep in mind that you cannot refer an existing customer: it must be a new customer who hasn’t made a purchase yet and must be in the same region as your account in the online shop (UK, EU, or the US).

When someone clicks on your referral link, a pop-up window appears asking them to enter their email address. They will receive an email with a 10% discount code. This code can be entered during the checkout process. You will receive 10,000 reward points after entering the code.

Ready to Boost Your Traffic?

Hopefully, this article has given you a better understanding of referral traffic

How do you get people to visit your website? The majority of people do it by concentrating solely on search engine optimization. Then they wonder why they aren’t seeing an increase in search traffic and rankings.
The reality is that SEO takes time to produce results. As a result, you must employ additional content marketing strategies, such as social media, word of mouth, press releases, blog posts, and so on, to continue driving search engine traffic your way.

Increasing referral traffic is much more difficult for a beginner than for an authority website. However, it is not impossible. Time is a limited and valuable resource. So, if you want exceptional results for your online business, reach out to Loganix today and we shall help you boost your traffic.