Google has long been the king of driving traffic to websites. For years, businesses have worked to make Google happy by being conscientious of certain key website factors: search engine optimization, keywords, meta-tagging, including images, posting new content frequently...the list goes on. Yet, Parse.ly has revealed that Facebook has now overtaken the web search giant as the largest source of incoming website traffic for media sites. This is quite a change from just two years ago in 2013, when Google accounted for 50% of website traffic and Facebook only drove about 10%.

Here’s what this all means in a nutshell according to Livemint.com:

“It is indicative of how social media is gaining as a [website] traffic source as compared to search, which was traditionally seen as the only source of news. Content marketing hub Shareaholic reported that social media is now the #1 driver of all website referral traffic. As of December 2014, 31.24% of all referral traffic was from social media. The difference is notable when compared to 22.71% from the same period in the previous year. Correspondingly, search engine referrals (Google and Google sites) saw a relatively steady downward progression.”

Or as Fortune.com reports about this news:

“Parse.ly CTO said that from the company’s data, it’s clear that search has hit a kind of plateau and isn’t really growing any more as a referral source for media. Meanwhile, Facebook’s influence has “shown it’s on a continued growth trajectory.”

So what does this mean for your business? Let’s break it down into 5 insights.

1. Social networks will continue to account for more and more of website traffic.
2. The best online content will drive website traffic both from search and from social networks.
3. You need to be producing original content consistently and frequently.
4. Having a robust social media presence is more important than ever and will continue to grow in importance.
5. You need to create a culture of content creation in order to keep up and have a constant flow of interesting content to share.

Need help managing it all? Contact us today at info@thegossagency.com.