Over time, I have shared many different ways to drive traffic to your website, but as most of us know, traffic from countries such as the U.S. and the U.K. convert better in terms of advertising and affiliate sales.
This is because of the “purchasing power” of users from these countries.
For many businesses, it makes sense to target traffic from specific countries.
But, how do we do that?
There are many factors that can help you to get country-specific traffic. For example, ShoutMeLoud is a popular blog in India & also globally.
I could actually work on targeting more U.S.-based traffic, but whenever I iterate my blogging business plan, I realize that it’s better to target an Indian audience as it provides less competition and a better supply: demand ratio.
There are very few blogs in India that teach how to make money from blogging in a practical manner. Being in this niche for several years, ShoutMeLoud has an advantage.
This reflects my particular case, but I’m sure there are many of you who are blogging for money, and you may want to target traffic from specific countries (like the U.S.A.).
In this post, I will share some ideas that will help you improve the traffic from your target country.
There is, of course, the easy solution of buying country-specific traffic, which can work in the case of commercial and e-commerce sites.
But for a blog, going natural is the best way.
7 Ways Of Driving Country-Specific Website Traffic:
1. Domain Name Extension
Top-level domain extensions like .com and .org usually rank higher on global search engines, but in order to have your blog or website target a specific country, buying a country-specific domain is always a good idea.
You may notice that most Aussie bloggers use the .au domain extension, ranking pretty high in Australian Google.
Similarly, for India, you can target .in as your domain extensions with good results in India. For traffic from the U.K. (United Kingdom), grab a .co.uk domain extension for the best results.
To preserve your brand, you can also buy other TLDs like .com or .org. But one major disadvantage of this idea is that you will find it very hard to rank on other country-specific search engines.
So, if your goal is clear and you know your target audience, a country-specific domain extension is your best bet.
- Here you can find a list of generic TLDs.
You can buy domains from NameSilo or Namecheap.
Also see: Where to buy cheap domain names from?
2. Google Search console Geo-Targeting
Update: Google team has removed this feature in August 2022.
Google search console, a free tool from Google for bloggers and webmasters, will be very helpful to a blogger or webmaster seeking country-specific traffic. This tool allows you to set which country your website is targeted to, which helps you get traffic from that targeted country.
Here is to use the country targeting feature of search console.
Login to Google search console
Click on international targeting under legacy tools and reports
3. Web Hosting Server Location
Another significant factor in driving geo-targeted traffic is your server location. If your target country for traffic is the U.S. (United States), you will want to host your website on U.S.-based servers. If you’re targeting traffic from Australia, host your website on Australian servers.
Example:
- U.S.-based servers: Bluehost, SiteGround
- India-based servers: A2Hosting
- Europe server: SiteGround, Kinsta
Other factors like CDNs also help to speed up your website in different countries, but to remain focused on your target, host your website only in the country whose traffic you’re targeting.
This will ensure that your website will load faster in that country due to the server’s IP, and search engines bots will be able to determine the location of your server.
All of this will help your site to rank higher in your target country.
4. Backlinks
When Google Search was launched, it used backlinks to determine the popularity of content. Much has changed over time, but the importance of backlinks remains significant. For this reason, it is a good idea to target country-specific backlinks.
For example, if your target audience is in the U.K., try to get more backlinks from U.K.-based websites.
You can get country-based backlinks by taking advantage of guest blogging opportunities, or by spending some time learning the art of blog commenting. Both methods are proven and Penguin-safe… if done properly.
5. Content Level Targeting
Your content is the main signal that Google uses to determine which country you are targeting. If you are targeting multiple countries with your generic domain name extension (.com, .org), add the country’s name in your posts’ meta titles and descriptions. This will not only make your content more keyword-targeted, but it will also give a clear signal that you are targeting a specific country.
Additionally, the kind of content and language you are using in your articles will also determine the ranking of your website.
We all know that readability is a known SEO factor, and if your language is following Indian standards, targeting U.S. traffic will be very difficult. For this reason, you need to be sure to improve your language for the specific country whose traffic you’re targeting.
You can also hire writers or editors from that specific country who have excellent writing and grammatical skills in that country’s language.
6. Local SEO Using Google my business
This may not apply to a generic blog, but if you are running a service blog or an e-commerce website, Google business is going to be very handy.
Claim your business in Google business, and add all related information such as an address, phone number, etc.
This will help Google to determine the location of your business.
You can also create social media profiles on various websites, and fill out the information in an effort to help you to get more local citations. You can use Knowem to check the availability of social media profiles.
7. Submit Website To Local Search Engines & Directories
I have previously shared a list of places to submit your website that are targeted to a global audience.
For country-based traffic, you should submit your website to local search engines and local web directories.
This will eventually become a very useful tool for getting country-specific backlinks, which will become a significant factor in determining the geo-location of your traffic.
8. Use Google Trends
As I mentioned previously, you should target your blog’s content toward keywords that are popular in a specific country whose traffic you are targeting.
For example, the keyword Bitcoin is very popular in India, but not in the rest of the world.
Try to find keywords that are popular with the audience in your target country, and craft a content strategy based on that.
For example, most iPhone blogs will have large chunks of traffic from the U.S. or the U.K, as the iPhone is more popular in those countries when compared to Asian countries.
Track Keyword Progress In Country-Specific Searches:
So far we have discussed techniques that you can use to target your website traffic for specific countries.
Next, you will need to keep track of the keyword’s progress in your target country. This will help you to find out which strategies are working and which are not.
When you identify a strategy that works, you can focus on that strategy and work on it to push it to the next level.
You can use SEMrush to check keyword rankings in particular countries.
Whenever you are writing a business plan for your blog, your targeted country should be at the top of your priority list. This will help you to efficiently plan your content marketing and guest blogging campaigns.
Do you follow any other methods to target website traffic for a particular country? Let me know in the comments section below!
If you find this article useful, do consider sharing it with your friends and colleagues on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn!
Here are a few hand-picked articles for you to read next:
- How to Remove Effect of Spam Backlinks Using Google Disavow links Tool
- 5 Mobile SEO Mistakes That Are Sabotaging Your Mobile Marketing Efforts
- The Ultimate Guide to Google Search Console
- How to Submit Your Blog’s Sitemap to Google Search Console
Honestly, You have written very informative blog and it is very important to use the standard of language according to your targeted audience. I really appreciate your effort that you have shared such essential tips with us sire
I’ve been looking for ways to increase my US based traffic in order to meet requirements for certain ad agencies. This article is super helpful. Thank you!
Hi Harsh, thanks for another article. What are your thoughts on multi-lingual websites then? Say a .com that does English (main language) then also /es for Spanish and maybe /fr for French?
I have personally seen that the .com for the results in US are higher than UK (but that had to do with backlinks and main server being in the US i guess). The results in google FR and ES however have been quite a lot lower, even with similar content. Even if the website is for a local Spanish business (mainly with EN speaking clients though)…
Thanks
@Nouweb
This post will answer your query: https://www.shoutmeloud.com/translate-wordpress-site-wegot-plugin.html
Great article. I will follow all the advice, thanks !
sir help me,
I want to start a blog related to Himachal Pradesh gk. And I had already bought a domain named www(dot)hpgk(dot)online. Know everyone is saying that .online domain is not performed well in ranking.
I am very much confused about that, please reply me, sir. The domain I bought is good or not?
Hey ajay,
.online is a good extension. Google states that “our systems treat new gTLDs just like other gTLDs (like .com & .org)”. So, there is no problem in using .online.
thank you sir,
for clearing my all doubts about .online extension…
Hey Harsh Agrawal,
Again fabulous article from your side, great to read.
Some of them known to me, but most of the techniques are new to me, i will implement on my new domain.
I have a quick question for you?
I want to get traffic from US,UK,Canada, Should i go with .com extension to rank in US country(US is my major target Country)?
If i choose .com it is a bit hard to rank in Local, right? So what do you say If i go with .us extension instead of .com?
I am a great fan of your ShoutMeLoud Blog,
Thanks for sharing outstanding ideas.
@Anand
I believe you should go for .com
Such a helpful post. I didn’t know a lot that I’m even blushing to mention them
Thanks for sharing!
You have written very informative blog and it is very important to use the standard of language according to your targeted audience. I really appreciate your effort that you have shared such essential tips with us.
Hello Harsh,
if I use .in domain will I get traffic from india only or from other countries as well.
I need only US traffic on my site. is it possible?
Nice tips! Just a few days I created a website, and I was looking to drive only Indian traffic, and see you’ve come up with a right article at the right time. 🙂
Hi Harsh ,
Thank you for sharing your techniques to get specific country visitors. As a new blogger, my experience is it’s very hard to get a visitor in a blog! Really, I don’t know how you can do others?
Here I’ve an idea. I think anbody can get specific country visitor if he/she can make a popularity in social media site targeting these countries reknown pages, ids, news page or any other popular pages. He must be regular in that pages. He’s to present what he has, he knows. In alternative way, he/she can be successful.
Thank you
Sadhan Pal
Hello, Harsh!
I can’t thank you enough to list down the gems for us.
They are truly the best ones and I will be following each and everyone for my experiments. 🙂
I did set the geo-location for my blog through Google Search Console and yet to find its result to see if it is working well or not.
So, actions are necessary to experience the results. 🙂
Thanks once again, buddy!
~ Adeel
Thanks Harsh for sharing. I can’t believe less with your analysis as a practical look at my blog traffic proves you right. My blog is hosted in the U.S. and my major traffic comes from U.S and Nigeria (my location). I will add my blog to the local search engine so that I can start ranking well in Nigeria. My reason is because I want to participate in next year’s Blog Award for Entrepreneurship Blog of the Year.
Well written post man, Once again you nailed it. This is always a good idea to target country specific website traffic if content is country oriented only.
Worth reading..!!
Hi Harsh,
My blog is having .in extension and i want to target US traffic so if i write US specific contents then will it rank for US Google?
nope. you will have to move your blog to .com
Thanks HARSH,
I want to write guest post for writers in charge , are they paying really $1000 per article,& They had send me 110 websites name to write guest post, but i am not sure about payment.
plz guide me about it.
Hey Pranita,
It is up to 1000$. it means that the maximum which you can earn is 1000$ for an article. but you will not get 1000$ per article. it all depends on the type of blog and the experience and quality of the article.
This country related website traffic is a big issue we are facing today in our projects.And now by reading this article, I have got a clear idea regarding this matter. I will first work out on my website and then will be used in my other projects.
My one of the project is, I have that domain in 5 different countries, and I need traffic from the particular area. I was struggling with that. But now I will implement all these tips and work on this and will share you my experience soon.
I agree too….But is it good to target such country whose cpc value is low as well as the competition?
Hey Vikrant,
Sometimes, if the competition is also low, you can target that country. because low competition means chances of getting ranked on the top google result is easy. so even with low CPC, you can earn more as clicks will be more.
Hello Harsh,
Once again brilliant share. I was well aware of Google webmaster tool geo-targeting. And it really does what it says. I have tried this webmaster tool geo-targeting, it prioritizes website’s location for search engines.
But the reason I disabled this geo-targeting. That I noticed less engagement in other countries. So do test it out and let us know what can be the solution or is it good to use geo-targeting for a blogging niche like yours.
Thanks