Does Traffic Matter?

[doogers]

I am wondering if the amount of traffic helps with getting better google results? I assume my website gets more hits than many people above me because of all the forums and blogs that I post on. If my website continues to have more hits than my competitors can that boost me up in the rankings?

[Micheal Pannell Realtor]

i dont think so

[NealRM]

In the short term No. I know that I get many times the traffic of some sites listed above mine. Yet they are still listed higher.

In the long term, site with more traffic will tend to get more back-links. In that manner it will move up in the listings.

Also, there are some rummers about the number of clicks received in the search engine listings helping to determine the site SERP.

[Dave Kovaleski]

Keep in mind, with added traffic, if your site is compelling and "link worthy", you may get some links if people find that the information on your site is benificial to users of their site.

So although I doubt there is a direct corelation between traffic and eventual better placement in the serps, added traffic, may ( maybe a long shot here) add a few natural inbound links that could definatley help your placement.

After my post I just noticed Neals response, kinda similar to what I said, oops!

[Philman]

I'd have to agree with what was already said here. More traffic = higher probability of people linking back to you.

[36towns]

So like others said, there isn't any direct connection between traffic and serps.

[arscherer]

I am wondering if the amount of traffic helps with getting better google results? I assume my website gets more hits than many people above me because of all the forums and blogs that I post on. If my website continues to have more hits than my competitors can that boost me up in the rankings?

This has been one of my questions for quite some time, but haven't been able to get a definite answer for it as of yet. The best thing that I've heard so far (and it's stated in these responses as well) is that if you have the traffic, the links will follow and therefore the rankings will follow after that.

[Bigtoe]

Google has a patent on an algo that takes usage into account.

Google has spyware on millions of computers that tells them where people go on the internet.

They have set everything up to take this factor into account. Why would they file a patent and build a database of usage if they weren't going to use it?

[Dave Kovaleski]

@Bigtoe, seriously? Can't quite tell if there is sarcasm in there or not

[Bigtoe]

Just the facts.