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An Analytics-Based Approach to SEO Best Practices & Website Strategy
- 1. An Analytics-Based Approach to SEO Best Practices & Website Strategy July 16, 2014
- 2. Welcome to the Sparkroom Best Practices Webinar Series
- 3. Transparent, Analytics-Based Enrollment Marketing Solutions 3 Sparkroom Marketing Services • PPI Vendor Management • PPC Enrollment Marketing • Email Marketing • SEO • Social Media • Targeted Display Sparkroom Marketing Software • Performance-Based Automation • Data Integration • Reporting & Analytics Transparency • Marketing Analytics • Multi-Platform Mindset • Compliance
- 4. Oral Seymour Sparkroom SEO Strategist
- 5. Agenda 1. What is SEO? 2. How Analytics Drive SEO Strategy 3. Common SEO Misconceptions 4. Commonalities Among Schools with Low SEO 5. The Sparkroom Approach to SEO
- 6. Why SEO? • 1 – 17% • 2 – 10% • 3 – 8% • 4 – 5% • 5 – 4% • 6 – 2% • 7 – 1% • 8 – 1% • 9 - .04% • 10 - .05% Source: Catalyst Search Marketing 2013 Study Search engine optimization (SEO): The process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine's natural or un-paid (organic) search results.
- 7. Benefits/Drawbacks of SEO Benefits Drawbacks More Traffic Organizational Buy-In (Free) Time & Resources Trust and Credibility Algorithm Changes/Features/Updates Evergreen
- 10. How Analytics Drive SEO Strategy
- 11. Data Points to Analyze Keyword/Phrase Search Traffic • Google Keyword Planner – google.com/sktool/ • Google Trends – google.com/trends/
- 12. Keyword Data • Webmaster Tools – Google & Bing – Impressions – Click-Through Rate (CTR) – Average Position Data Points to Analyze
- 13. Search Engine Use Data Points to Analyze
- 14. Demographic/Behavioral Data • Age • Gender • Interests • User Flow Data Points to Analyze
- 16. “I’m already ranking #1…” Same keyword search… two locations…
- 17. “My site structure is planned…” Accounting Marketing Home Graduate Undergraduate Accounting EntrepreneurshipMBA School of Business
- 18. “I have a guy that does title tags…”
- 19. “I’m producing awesome content…”
- 20. “It’s all about links…”
- 21. “I don’t need to worry about mobile…”
- 22. “I’ve already done SEO…”
- 23. Commonalities Among Schools with Low SEO Visibility
- 24. Information that prospective students want is not easily accessible.
- 25. Terms that faculty/staff use differ from student search terms Competition IT department overload
- 26. The Sparkroom Approach to SEO
- 27. Targeted Local Campaigns and Rankings
- 28. • Make sure your site is accessible – Crawled – Indexed – Sitemaps – Health • Clean-up link profile – Audit and remove/disavow potentially bad links • Content
- 29. Content Marketing For each, identify: • Groups • Influencers • SMEs
Editor's Notes
- It’s simpler than you think! Google, Bing and Yahoo displays sites it believes are authoritative and relevant. They measure relevance by analyzing page content, the words you and I read, and they measure authority (mostly) based on the number and quality of other pages linking to the pages they show, links are like votes.
- Trust and credibility: With high search engine rankings comes a perception of credibility on the part of searchers. High search rankings imply industry authority and leadership. This perception translates into more trust and a greater likelihood to click through to the site. Evergreen: If the content that ranks high is evergreen, then the rankings will also have a more evergreen presence. The specific listing may rank high long after the content was created. Ranking: Once you get high rankings, it’s easier to keep those rankings. You get authority status and build the trust of users and search engines. Click through rates: For “top of funnel” search terms, I.e., don’t show immediate purchase intent, the click through rates are better for organic search results. That’s very important for businesses that have a longer buying cycle. Organic Search Drawbacks Time: Depending on the competitiveness of the keywords involved, it may take months or years to get high rankings. Can you wait that long? Resources: Getting high rankings requires both creating content and using SEO tactics to achieve it. That can be difficult, frustrating and time consuming. Either internal staff or external contractors are needed for both these functions. Algorithm Feature Updates: At any point in time an algorithm change or a new feature can lower the traffic or ctr to your site. Paid Search (PPC): Paid search results are advertisements. A business pays to have their ads displayed when users do a search containing specific keywords. The ads are typically displayed above and to the right of organic search results. The exact placement of the ads is determined by both a bidding process and quality score. The advantages and drawbacks of paid search are often the opposite of organic listings. Paid Ads (PPC) Benefits Time: Unlike organic search rankings that can take months or years, paid results are placed at the top of rankings as soon as you pay for ad placement. Targeting: PPC campaigns can be tailored to reach specific audiences. Examples of segmentation include geo-targeting, income, age, educational level, marital status, industry, etc. Click through rates: Searches using terms that denote high purchase intent such as product or brand-specific keywords will get more clicks than organic results. The advantage of paid search can clearly be seen in the Internet retailers MarketLive Performance Index data. For the year 2013 as a whole, PPC accounted for 36.5% of search traffic but an outsized 47.9% of revenue from search. Paid Ads (PPC) Drawbacks Cost: The more competitive the keyword, the more the bid price is for each click on the displayed ad. Paid search requires a level of expertise to manage these campaigns. Otherwise a lot of money will be spent to attract unqualified traffic. Momentary: The ads disappear as soon as you stop paying for them. Distrust: Consumers don’t always trust paid ads and often avoid them. They place more trust in organic rankings. Together is better! For many businesses, the best approach is a mix of both organic and paid search results. The advantage of this approach is that organic rankings give a business credibility and evergreen search results. Paid search (PPC) provides immediate top-of-the-page listings and greater click through rates, i.e., sales, when consumers are ready to purchase.
- SEO is Search Engine Optimization…
- SEO is Search Engine Optimization…
- It’s all about Links While important as a vote of confidence for the content they point to, there is simply so much link spam these days that it’s tough to know where to turn. Obviously buying links is a dead end, and it doesn’t matter how you split this hair: sharing, encouraging, incentivizing, buying – it’s all the same. You want links to surprise you. You should never know in advance a link is coming, or where it’s coming from. If you do, that’s the wrong path. Links are part of the bigger picture. You want them, but you want them to be natural. If an engine sees you growing tem naturally, you’re rewarded with rankings. If they see you growing them unnaturally, you’re rewarded with penalties.
- Mobile Having a mobile optimized website is more important than ever. (40% of Peterson’s traffic is from mobile devices) We are now starting to see evidence of sites that are not mobile friendly losing to sites that are mobile friendly. The entire optimization funnel should be optimized for mobile, maybe look into removing certain fields from forms ect.
- Commonalities around schools that have low SEO Visibility. Marketing Savvy Many universities, especially the not for profit and large universities, think that they don’t need to advertise or they are overly reliant on techniques such as mailing brochures. In the time it takes a prospective student to receive a brochure, he or she might have seen dozens of ads for other schools online. A school that doesn’t put enough effort into search engine rankings might be outside the running before the race begins. Competition If they don’t see their competition doing it, then many schools aren’t interested in doing it. One of the best ways to demonstrate the importance of search engine rankings is to show universities how their competitors are taking advantage of SEO. IT Department Overload The job of managing the websites and SEO usually falls to the IT department at a school, and the members of those departments are usually overloaded with other tasks
- Commonalities around schools that have low SEO Visibility. Marketing Savvy Many universities, especially the not for profit and large universities, think that they don’t need to advertise or they are overly reliant on techniques such as mailing brochures. In the time it takes a prospective student to receive a brochure, he or she might have seen dozens of ads for other schools online. A school that doesn’t put enough effort into search engine rankings might be outside the running before the race begins. Competition If they don’t see their competition doing it, then many schools aren’t interested in doing it. One of the best ways to demonstrate the importance of search engine rankings is to show universities how their competitors are taking advantage of SEO. IT Department Overload The job of managing the websites and SEO usually falls to the IT department at a school, and the members of those departments are usually overloaded with other tasks
- What to do when optimizing content for searches? Include Target Keywords This is SEO 101 but this is probably the area where most university sites are lacking. Take a few minutes and do some research into what exactly users are searching for. The Google AD Planner is a good place to start. Including target keywords in content creates relevancy. The more relevant the content is to a searcher’s query, the more likely it is to rank higher and get found. · Use headlines and sub headings to break up long and boring program descriptions. · Make sure to frequently mention targeted keywords and their variations without being spammy or reads like a robot wrote it. The text should still read and flow naturally to users. · How frequently should you use your keywords, you ask? Good question. There’s really no magical one-size-fits-all ratio. The key is to use your keywords as much as possible without making the text sound artificial. Link Building Link building is the backbone of SEO, and without page building links, a page simply won’t rank. Everyone wishes that Google and Bing could come up with some other way to find and show the proper content to users, but until then, links rule. The good news is that because of the trust, goodwill, research, sports, and community relations that most universities have, it is relatively easy to build links. Where can schools get links? Opportunities include other colleges; partner schools if part of a larger system; press around research studies; scholarships; sports; community service; and fraternities and sororities. My preferred method is to promote professors who are authorities on their particular subjects areas. Those faculty members can get quotes as experts and the schools will get links — a win win for all!
- What to do when optimizing content for searches? Include Target Keywords This is SEO 101 but this is probably the area where most university sites are lacking. Take a few minutes and do some research into what exactly users are searching for. The Google AD Planner is a good place to start. Including target keywords in content creates relevancy. The more relevant the content is to a searcher’s query, the more likely it is to rank higher and get found. · Use headlines and sub headings to break up long and boring program descriptions. · Make sure to frequently mention targeted keywords and their variations without being spammy or reads like a robot wrote it. The text should still read and flow naturally to users. · How frequently should you use your keywords, you ask? Good question. There’s really no magical one-size-fits-all ratio. The key is to use your keywords as much as possible without making the text sound artificial. Link Building Link building is the backbone of SEO, and without page building links, a page simply won’t rank. Everyone wishes that Google and Bing could come up with some other way to find and show the proper content to users, but until then, links rule. The good news is that because of the trust, goodwill, research, sports, and community relations that most universities have, it is relatively easy to build links. Where can schools get links? Opportunities include other colleges; partner schools if part of a larger system; press around research studies; scholarships; sports; community service; and fraternities and sororities. My preferred method is to promote professors who are authorities on their particular subjects areas. Those faculty members can get quotes as experts and the schools will get links — a win win for all!
- This is where you get real synergy when you combine our Marketing Analytics Data, Google Analytics Demographic Data and other Data about your Target Audience Transparency Talk about personalized results