the cumulative effect of seo improvements

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Daren TomeySenior VPCorporate DevelopmentSlingshot SEO @darentomeydaren@slingshotseo.com

Jen DoyleSenior Research ManagerMarketingSherpa

@JenLDoyleJen.Doyle@MECLABS.com

Kaci Bower Research AnalystMarketingSherpa

@KaciBower

Kaci.Bower@MECLABS.com

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About Slingshot SEOA professional search engine optimization practice whose full-service strategic consulting and internet marketing services deliver unparalleled results for its enterprise-caliber clients.

2006 Founded

Named “IT Company of

the Year”

SEO Challenges vs. SEO Objectives Breakout of marketers by SEO maturity phase Impact of SEO maturity on:

• Challenges and Objectives• Execution of SEO tactics• Social media platform effectiveness• Traffic conversion rates, lead quality and lead volume

Strategy Success Story: Become.com• Preparing SEO early to capture future seasonal traffic lifts

Defining Digital Relevancy Methodology to obtain digital relevancy Case Studies of successful SEO campaigns Q&A

Today’s Agenda

Based on 2012 Search Marketing Benchmark Reports – SEO Edition

Fielded April 2011

1,530 Survey participants

Key findings: • Content creation is underutilized in relation to its effectiveness• Better results with a SEO strategy

Research Background: Creating and Capitalizing on a Rich End-User Experience

Challenges from last 12 months

• Traffic• Leads• Strategy• ROI• Social media integration• Brand / Product awareness• Online sales revenue

Objectives for next 12 months

• Traffic• Leads• Brand /Product awareness• ROI• Online sales revenue• Social media integration• Strategy

Summary of Top SEO Challenges and ObjectivesDeveloping a strategy is a top challenge…but bottom objective

Is it worth the effort?

Process in place for planning, executing and measuring the performance of SEO programs and practices

SEO Strategy

Which statement best describes the process your organization uses to plan, execute and measure the performance of your SEARCH ENGINE

OPTIMIZATION (SEO) programs and practices?

SEO MaturityInformal processes still define SEO maturity for most marketers

• Disciplined application of a methodical process for SEO eludes many

• Consistency marks the difference between Transition and Strategic organizations

• Trial and Transition organizations more tactically focused

• Strategic organizations more balanced across all three parameters

• “Right now, it is hit and miss, nothing formal. Management above me sees no real usefulness.”• “We do not have a strategy. It is something we knew we had to do, but we didn't formalize the process.”• “It is not yet defined. Still trying to find our feet.”

Transition

• “It's very informal. We just look for gaps and try to fill them.”• “I read up on best practices and try to implement those as best I can. I'm documenting the process as we go -

which is a move toward a formal process.”• “There is no process. It is done sporadically when there are no other 'more urgent' things to do.”

Strategi

• “A mixture of keyword research and measuring the keywords we already receive for long tail insights. Then we look at keyword mapping, internal link structure and architecture. From that we decide on new content and editorial, and with that we construct new online PR and link building campaigns by assessing who should link to us and the optimum path to getting those links organically, bolstered by social media.”

Marketer Insights, by SEO MaturityQ: Please describe the process your organizations uses to plan your SEO strategy.

Top SEO Challenges, by SEO Maturity Strategic organizations wrestle with the top challenges to a lesser degree

• Challenges for Strategic marketers are not as intense

• Transition organizations most feel the need for a strategy and process

• Trial organizations struggling with increasing website traffic

Increasing online sales revenue

Improving brand/product awareness or reputation

Integrating with social media

Achieving or increasing measurable ROI

Developing an effective and methodical strategy

Increasing lead generation

Increasing website traffic

TrialTransitionStrategic

Top SEO Objectives, by SEO Maturity Developing SEO strategy falls to the bottom of the list

• Developing SEO strategy falls to the bottom of the list

• Strategic organizations are fine-tuning

• Strategic organizations shifting focus from just traffic to leads, revenue and ROI

• Transition and Trial organizations setting sights on more traffic and leads

Developing an effective and methodical strategy

Integrating with social media

Increasing online sales revenue

Achieving or increasing measurable ROI

Improving brand/product awareness or reputation

Increasing lead generation

Increasing website traffic

Top 5 Most Effective SEO Tactics Tactics deemed “very effective” in achieving marketing objectives

Content creation

Keyword/Keyphrase research

Title tags

SEO landing pages

Most Utilized SEO Tactics, by SEO Maturity Strategic process empowers the execution of more tactics

Strategic organizations…

• More heavily employ the most effective SEO tactics

1. Content creation2. Keyphrase research3. Title tags4. SEO landing pages5. External link building

• Dominate in their usage of all tactics• Often by a factor of 2

Digital asset optimization (images, videos, podcasts, webinars, PDFs,

XML sitemap

Competitor benchmarking

SEO landing pages

Blogging

Social media integration

External link building

Content creation

Internal linking

URL structure

Meta description tags

Title tags

Keyword/keyphrase research

3D View of Top 5 SEO Tactics, by SEO Maturity Strategic marketers fare better in terms of usage, effectiveness and difficulty

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%0%

Content creation

Keyword researchKeyword

research

Keyword research

Title tags

SEO landing pages

SEO landingpages

External link building

External link

building

Externallink building

Sphere size indicates level of usage per SEO Tactic

Degree of difficulty per SEO Tactic

l of e

ffecti

Strategic organizations…

• Utilize these tactics to a greater degree

• Have less difficulty executing tactics, in terms of time, effort and expense

• Experience better outcomes with all tactics

Social Media Integration, by SEO MaturityPercentage of organizations integrating social media with SEO campaigns

66% Strategic Organizations

52% Transition

43% Trial

Effectiveness of Social Media PlatformsSocial media platforms deemed very or somewhat effective, by SEO Maturity

Strategic organizations stand out…

• Finding greater success in the crowded spaces:• Blogs• LinkedIn• Facebook• Twitter

• Creating more marketing opportunities from less frequently used platforms

Scribd or other document sharing

Flickr or other photo sharing

Delicious or other social bookmarking

Slideshare or other presentation sharing

Twitter

Facebook

YouTube or other video sharing

Impact on Traffic Conversions, by SEO Maturity Strategic organizations convert more traffic and yield higher quality leads

• Lift in average traffic conversion rates:• 13% Trial to Transition• 12% Transition to

Strategic• 27% Trial to Strategic

• Leads from natural search traffic considered to be of the highest quality by:• 1 of every 33 Trial• 1 of every 4.2 Transition• 1 of every 3.7 Strategic

TRIALWe have no process or guidelines

for performing SEO

TRANSITIONWe have an informal process with a few guidelines we sporadically

perform

STRATEGICWe have a formal process with

thorough guidelines we routinely perform

3% 24% 27%

% Organizations Rating Leads from Organic Search as Highest QualityMedian Conversion Rate on Organic TrafficAverage Conversion Rate on Organic Traffic

Impact on Total Lead Volume, by SEO maturityOrganic search drives more than 75% of all leads for…

11% Trial organizations14% Transition organizations25% Strategic organizationsWhat percentage of your organization's total lead volume

is generated from organic search?

Top SEO Challenges & Objectives

Usage, Effectiveness & Difficulty by SEO Tactic

Extent of Social Media Integration

Traffic Conversion Rates & Quality of Leads

Lead Volume

Cumulative Effect of an SEO ProcessBig Question: What difference does having a process really make?

Impact?

Hypothetical Example of Business Impact The cumulative effect of having a strategy and process for SEO

• Assuming 1,000 total leads, organic leads comprise:• 242 Trial• 277 Transition (14% lift)• 326 Strategic (18% lift)• 35% lift Trial to Strategic

• Net Value of organic leads:• $147K Trial• $204K Transition (39% lift)• $248K Strategic (22% lift)• 69% lift Trial to Strategic

Assumptions for

calculations% Total Leads from

Organic Search Mid point Trial Transition StrategicLess than 10% 0.05 29% 21% 21%

11% - 25% 0.18 14% 24% 26%

26% - 50% 0.38 29% 28% 16%

76% - 90% 0.83 7% 11% 16%

91% - 100% 0.95 4% 3% 9%

Weighted # of Leads from Organic Search

out of 1000 total leads 242 277 326

Quality of Leads from Organic Search Value per Lead

These are our highest quality leads $1,000 3% 24% 27%

The quality is mixed $700 45% 57% 63%

The quality is low $500 16% 11%

Don't know $500 36% 8% 10%

MarketingSherpa Case Study: Become.comCapturing future seasonal traffic lifts by preparing SEO early

• Become.com, a shopping comparison site

• Followed five steps to prepare SEO six months in advance of Cyber Monday

• Resulted in increased traffic, leads and revenue

Business ChallengeEnsure that natural search pays off on Cyber Monday

• Business model is to provide visitors with search tools and content to find the right products

• Generate revenue by sending cost-per-click leads to online merchants

• Dependent upon natural search traffic from a holiday season for sales lifts

• Needed to prepare marketing well in advance to avoid having a major channel like natural search suddenly plummet before Cyber Monday

“Being the online version of Black Friday, [Cyber Monday] is one of the highest days for

site traffic. We have to prepare for it. We want to beat the previous year.“

Arpana TiwariSenior Manager, SEO

Become.com

Step # 1Make sure search engines can index all content

• Gave the site accessibility audit in June

• Identified problems with pages:• Not indexed• Missing• Duplicate content • Outdated meta information

• Prioritized new products over old

“We started …cleaning these up in June, because it takes some engineering time to make sure we get these projects scheduled

and have the resources for them.“

Become.com

Step # 2Identify topics of interest to attract and satisfy more visitors

• Created content focused on high-volume keywords

• Identified topics where they could provide more value than other websites

• Uncovered new product opportunities for merchants to offer

• Stayed abreast of latest trends and topics to support additional content development

“Having such a large number of products and being such a large site means our keyword

research is always ata very large scale...We have to pick and

choose which categories to go after."

Become.com

Step # 3Ensure that inbound links come from reputable sites

• Determined whether links were hurting or helping the search engine rankings

• Encountered bad links from:• Old blogs gone bad• Formerly high-quality relevant sites• Content scrapers• Spammers

• Reached out to site’s owner and requested link removal

“Reaching site owners can be difficult and time consuming, so be persistent."

Become.com

Step # 4Set expectations based on historical traffic data

• Analyzed traffic and clicks from previous year’s Cyber Monday

• Used data to anticipate when traffic spikes would occur

• Understood that previous year’s data was not an exact prediction of the future

“Given that we had all our ducks in a row, we were able to take advantage in the last few weeks and do additional keyword research

and add more content.”

Become.com

Step # 5Give yourself plenty of time and be patient

• Finished site updates one month before Cyber Monday

• Gave search engines plenty of time to process changes

• Avoided making major changes in response to early metrics

• Understood that SEO takes time to show results

“SEO takes time to show results, and you might do more harm than good with last

minute-changes. All the work you have put in could go to waste.”

Become.com

Results Planning and starting SEO work early paid off

7% YOY increase in natural search leads

sent to partners

4% YOY increase in natural search traffic

$250,000 in gross merchandise value for

their merchants

What percentage of your marketing mix makes up SEO?

• Less than 10%• 10-20%• 20-30% • 30-40% • 40% or greater

Audience Poll Question

• Founded in 2006• Headquartered in Indianapolis, IN• 100+ active clients• Over 200 SEO and social media specialists

Some of our clients:

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