When Google Search delivers your traffic, then Google is the traffic source for your visitor. However, if that visitor came from a search on Bing, then Bing is the traffic source. 

As you might consider, it is helpful to be able to group every visitor, which came from, such as “traffic sources (e.g., social media networks and search engines) together. The good news here is that you could group traffic sources, utilizing traffic channels. 

Every traffic channel is a selection of web traffic sources, which belong to a similar group. This is referred to as a medium by Google Analytics. Below are the four typical traffic channels:

1. Paid Traffic – The traffic you paid money to get your site
2. Direct – The traffic from typed in bookmarks, traffic, and non-browser sources
3. Referral – The traffic from other sites.
4. Organic Search – The traffic from the search engines. 

If you are a newbie to online marketing, there’s wisdom in concentrating on one traffic channel at a time. You can move forward to another once you master one channel.