Best Practices for Drupal Search Engine Optimization and Driving Site Conversions

Best Practices for Drupal Search Engine Optimization and Driving Site Conversions
Ben Finklea
CEO
Volacci Search Engine Marketing
@BenFinklea
Bryan House
Sr. Director, Marketing
Acquia
@bryanhouse

Agenda
SEO in Drupal
SEO Checklist module
Better On-Site Search with Acquia Search
Optimizing Landing Pages for Conversions
Wrap-up + Q&A

Introduction
Ben Finklea
CEO, Volacci Search Marketing

Best Practices for Drupal SEO & Driving Site Conversions
Making Drupal work for your bottom line
questions/feedback: @benfinklea / ben@volacci.com

What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?
SEO is communicating clearly to Google and site visitors what you are about and that you are important.

What is a Conversion?
A Conversion is when a website visitor does something that you want them to do.

Why SEO?
SEO Magnet
SEO magnetically attracts buyers who are highly motivated to do business with you now.

Why Drupal?
Drupal enables fantastically gorgeous websites that convert visitors into paying customers.

SEO Magnet

Then shouldn’t we do SEO & Conversions on every Drupal website we touch?

Why Drupal?
Configurable
Easy to Use
Clean Code
Easy Integration with 3rd Party Tools
Fights Spam
Landing Pages
Breadcrumbs
Community
Thriving ecosystem
Ready for the semantic web

“Anyone Can Cook.”
-Chef Gusteau
“Anyone Can Drupal SEO.”
-Ben

The Modules
http://drupal.org/project/seo_checklist
Global Redirect
Google Analytics
HTML Purifier
Mollom
MetaTags (aka Nodewords)
Page Title
PathAuto
Path Redirect
Scheduler
Search 404
Drupal SEO Checklist
New XML Sitemap
Sitemap (Pla in Text)

SEO Checklist Module

More Modules I Like
Validation
Taxonomy Title
Menu Attributes
Apache Solr
Open Calais
More Like This
Google Website Optimizer

“...any Drupal shop should have on the shelf...”
-Greg Holsclaw
“This is definitely a reference guide that any Drupal developer or site manager should read and then keep within close reach.”--Lance Loveday
“...you will have an arsenal of answers to tough questions you're inevitably going to get from potential customers regarding SEO and managing content.”--Chris Shattuck
Book: $35 ebook: $25
2 Free Chapters + Bonus: Volacci.com/webinar

Drupal is the best platform on the planet for SEO!

Conversions
Remember: A Conversion is when someone visiting your site does something that you want them to do.
3 Major Types of Visitors = 3 Different Conversion Goals

Conversions
Visitors want to know:
Is this what I expect to see?
Does this look credible?
What does this company do?
Do they offer what I want?
What should I do now?
How do I contact the company?

eCommerce Conversion

Lead Gen Conversion

Ad Conversion

It’s critical that the first page your visitor sees leads them down the path to conversions.

Acquia Search

© Acquia, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Why On-Site Search Matters
Site evolution
User experience
Content utilization
Conversions

© Acquia, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Unlocking Content with Acquia Search
Built on Apache Solr
Faceted navigation
Content recommendations
No server infrastructure

Landing PagesPutting Content to Work for SEO
Targeted
Is this what I expect to see?
Multimedia
Is it engaging?
Actionable
What should I do now?

Landing PagesContent Recommendations Will Drive Click-Thru’s
Credible
Is there more content here to explore?
Valuable
Should I invest more time?

Landing PagesUsing On-Site Search to Drive Conversions
Seamless
Static and dynamic results tied to SEO action
Actionable
Focus visitor on specific call to action
…/search/apachesolr_search/mountain

Landing PagesPutting Search to Work to Drive Conversions

Predetermined content to focus visitor on specific conversion activity

Query results help visitor assess content value across site

Dynamic query filters focus visitor quickly on content that’s valuable to them

Tie block region to search query terms
Using content top region

Turn search result pages into keyword driven landing pages
Use your top keywords to increase conversions

Performance Matters!
Acquia Search
Drupal core search
Drupal test site
Hardware:
3.2 Ghz processor
1.7 MB RAM
Site:
10,000 content nodes
300 millisecond page load speed
Query result time:
1.5 - 7.7 seconds
Query result time:
< 500 milliseconds
Performance gain with Acquia Search
3x - 16x faster

New Packaging for Acquia Search
Increased capacity with every subscription level
Get started for less than $30 / month

Google website Optimizer
A
B
1000 Visitors
2.3%
97.7%
2%
98%

Installing Website Optimizer
Google.com/websiteoptimizer
Drupal.org/project/google_website_optimizer

New SEO Stuff You Need to Know About
Site structure just got very important
Site speed is a ranking factor.
Video is the New Text
Bahoo/YaBing/Yahoo gives up

What is a Conversion?
Breadcrumbs just got really important
Site speed is a ranking factor.
Pagerank Sculpting is dead
Video is the New Text
Bahoo/YaBing/Yahoo gives up

“What if I do all that and the site is still not making money Online?”

Volacci SEO Program
We wrote the book on Drupal SEO.
Over 95% of clients achieve positive ROI within 1 year.
We focus on both traffic and conversions.
Track record of success - HP, Acquia, Amazon, Inc Mag., eBay, service companies, ecommerce, etc.
Not time consuming (for you).

Drupal is the best platform on the planet for SEO!

Upcoming Acquia Webinars
Thursday January 14th
A Look Under the Hood at Acquia Hosting for Drupal Sites
Thursday January 21st
Integrating Drupal with Enterprise Back-Office Systems to Deliver a Best of Breed e-Commerce Site
Thursday January 28th
Preview of Drupal Gardens
Register Today- http://acquia.com/webinars

Landing PagesDownload A Copy of Ben’s Book Today
http://www.volacci.com/webinar

Questions
Today’s webinar recording
will be posted at:
http://acquia.com/community/resources/recorded_webinars
For more information, visit each of us at:
http://acquia.com
http://twitter.com/acquia
http://twitter.com/volacci
Contact us:
sales@acquia.com
888.9.ACQUIA
Contact Volacci:
http://volacci.com
sales@volacci.com
+1.888.736.4306
Download a copy of Drupal Search Engine Optimization
http://www.volacci.com/webinar
Sign up for a free 30-day Acquia Network Trial
http://acquia.com/trial

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Best Practices for Drupal Search Engine Optimization and Driving Site Conversions

by Bryan House on Jan 08, 2010

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Best Practices for Drupal Search Engine Optimization and Driving Site Conversions — Presentation Transcript