I gave a talk this week at SEO Day in Cologne, Germany, about optimizing for clicks, not just rankings. The premise of my talk was: SEOs tend to think their job is done when they’ve got their top 3 / top 5 listing, when in fact you’re only half way when you’ve reached that.
For those interested, you can see my slides here:
It annoys me that we talk about rich snippets this much, and 90% of the implementations of rich snippets are reviews and ratings, and most of them are, excusez le mot, shit, at best. You’ve probably seen your own share of listings where there are 5 or 6 ratings in a search result, all 4 or 5 stars and all nonsense.
There’s more to rich snippets! There’s more to “standing out” in the SERPs. This is why I built my Video SEO plugin: Video is a really cool way to stand out in the search results. That’s why I love rel=author: it allows you to choose your own picture, to stand out in the search results. And even then, when we get to choose the picture, we forget to market. I use a light blue background for my author image. It stands out. Why do hardly any other people do that?
As I was telling people during that presentation, as you can see in the slides above, SEO and PPC combined form a trade that is called SEM: Search Engine Marketing. No, SEM is not just PPC. That M, for Marketing, is the bit that loads of SEOs seem to forget. I admit, I too like reading about Google patents all day long, I can even enjoy the occasional bit of correlation / ranking research and I can fully geek out on running my own tests and tools too. But that’s only part of what an SEO needs to do.
The most successful SEO campaigns I’ve seen in the last years were campaigns that were properly combined with television advertising and other forms of marketing. But you don’t even have to go that far.
What SEOs should learn from PPC people
A lot of “old-school” SEOs, myself included, speak about PPC with some disdain, calling it “checkbook SEO” and “anyone can do that”. When I do so, I do so in jest, and I know that most of my friends who say stuff like that mean it that way too. But we’re probably not helping our industry when we do that, because the one thing that PPC guys and girls do best, is the one thing that most SEO’s suck at the most: optimization for clicks.
No AdWords campaign will survive if it doesn’t have a decent CTR. SEO campaigns with a ridiculous CTR did survive over the last few years, but it’s getting harder. Some of the research we’ve seen recently is showing that Google is using CTR as a ranking factor in organic search too, which makes sense. They’re measuring bounces back to search result pages too, which makes sense as well.
So talk to your PPC guy or girl and go over your titles and descriptions with them, heck, try some AdWords copy in those meta descriptions. It sometimes works wonders!
Conversion Rate Optimization starts in the SERPs
On conferences, you’ll see tracks about SEO and tracks about Analytics. You’ll see tracks about Conversion Rate Optimization. But you’ll never see a track about SEO and Conversion Rate Optimization at the same time. But that exactly is what we should be studying. How does the title I use for the search results affect not only my ranking, but also my conversion and bounce rate.
Am I making good on the promise I’m making in the SERPs with my title and description, on the page that people land on? That is the question you should be answering when you got that ranking. And when the answer isn’t a very clear “YES!”, you’ve got more work to do, even though you’ve achieved that ranking.
I love, love, love this post. Thank you for bringing up PPC, CRO and SEM and how integral they should be to SEO. Maybe I feel that way because I've never been comfortable calling myself "SEO." I have always considered my self a SEM. But when I say SEM, then no one (neither the SEOs nor the PPCs) will let me into their clubhouse. ;-)
As an in-house SEO, I also run PPC campaigns. Having to do both is a really good exercise, like you say, in appreciating click-thru-rates and CRO.
You're right. You're definitely not done with SEO once you've gained a top 5 SERP ranking. Here's an example. I can't give too many solid numbers here because I don't want to give up too much information to potential competitors for my current company. I was hired an an in-house SEO Strategist. Since being hired a little over a year ago, our organic traffic has increased almost 50%. Great right? So I should be skipping down the road doing a SEO happy dance right? No, no I'm not. I'm actually really concerned because the conversion rate is tanking. So here I am, working to improve our rankings, getting the traffic funneled to the site. Click-thru rates are up. Rankings are up. Heck even sales are up 30% because our average order value has increased astronomically. BUT...our coversion rate has dropped 40%. 40%! I wish I could tell you the dollar value that translates into...you'd fall out of your chair. So here I am, the SEO Strategist who can't seem to shut up about CRO. But you see, I have to. Why? Because it's all about the bottom line. If I can't prove that my SEO contributed to the bottom line I'll be skipping and whistling right out the door. If bad CRO is totally undermining every bit of SEO I do, then I have to care about that.
I really like your "whole-istic" view of SEO and agree with it 100%.
Glad to hear that more people think along these lines, although it is logical I don't think we're vocal enough about it :)
For a while I tried to avoid PPC, some how thinking its just a quick temporary way out of real SEO. This week was something different multiple times I encounter organic SEO folks using PPC to better predict CRO for keywords/SERPS ... and now this post as well.
With the comment I also have a question, generality running PPC campaigns for the sole purpose of keyword research costs $$. Any one know of free/cheap alternatives. I mean beyond what the Adword estimates provides?
Preach it. Trying to talk about conversion rates around here just earns blank stares. Apparently we should just keep trying to throw traffic at the problem and forget about the fact that organic search traffic is converting under 1%. Oy.
PPC and conversion rate optimization have taken my SEO to the next level. Every SEO should at least learn the basics. In recent years, many of my clients have not impressed by clicks alone. They want their phone to ring and a return on their investment.
And if bounce rates are going to be considered in the algorithm maybe Google should give an organic negative keywords tag to fend off the most probable bouncers. :)
It'd be nice if more SEOs would push Google to provide a tool for this that would provide adequate numbers and tests with (similar to PPC). I think a lot of SEOs just won't focus on something that is perceived as difficult to get information on and thus will focus on rankings solely instead.
And before anyone complains: Yes, I know it's in GWT, but
+100 to this.
Thanks for mentioning SEM. I don't understand why "everybody" thinks SEM is PPC only.
SEM yes; but while clicks are important, conversions are what matters to those of us in business.
Hi Casper,
it's not always just conversions. I work for several newspapers, where a "conversion" could be the entrance itself because it's an ad view and a customer who has found the article he's looking for. And in general, for the conversion to happen, you will need that click first :)
'Converting' visitors into customers!
I'm a PPC guy myself, and what you said is very true. PPC guys are forced to be good at the CTR, but even more so the Conversion rate, in order to produce any type of ROI. And that's a good thing...it forces you to be an actual marketer and not just a technical person.
You started to touch on something in the very last bit, which I think is incredibly important - we need to make good on any promises we make (to get a good CTR) if we want a good conversion rate. A lot of PPC people make big promises in an ad to get the CTR, but don't actually deliver on those promises. Only promise what you can deliver on. And if you can't deliver on any promise that would drive someone to click on your listing, then you really need to take a step back and ask yourself why you are in business? If there's nothing that you do better than everyone else, then you should find a new business to be in.
Joost, exceptional as always. Read it thoroughly and love the PPC mix into the SEO. I rank very well on videos, but will definitively take a look at that Video Plugin. Besides I currently use almost all your plugins, this must be a good add, and rel=author added when you first posted on this on June. Thanks for always being on top of things.
What you're saying is a big part of why I recently changed a LOT about my business. I think SEM & CRO are gaining in popularity and we are definitely doing a better job if we can integrate not only rankings and not only clicks but revenue at the end of the day. That's what the companies we all work for care about - increasing sales.
Yup, and not just in the short term, but with a long term view too.
Great post, Yoast :)
MEClabs had a great webinar on just this topic last year, really worth a look for anyone looking for more on SEO and conversion:
SEO Landing Pages webinar
(I have no relationship with MEClabs, apart from being a fan :))
Cheers,
Alastair.
Thx Alastair, I'll check that out!
+1 Yoast for an AWESOME post! Instead of focusing on rank positions, we should try to get more conversions. Regardless if our conversion is a contact us form submission (lead generation) or processing a sale (e-commerce), the main focus should be getting more conversions!!
The last line is So Important, I will repeat it... "Am I making good on the promise I’m making in the SERPs with my title and description, on the page that people land on? That is the question you should be answering when you got that ranking. And when the answer isn’t a very clear “YES!”, you’ve got more work to do, even though you’ve achieved that ranking."
I recently analyzed a baby stroller website that had great rankings, but a conversion rate of around 1% which screams, "Room For Improvement." so, I checked one of their high ranking pages and the title tag said, "Bugaboo Camelon 3 - An In=Depth Review!" the snippet than actually sounds like the first couple lines of a review but when you click through to the page it is just the category page for Bugaboo strollers. I was so shocked at such an obvious oversight... But, the truth is, are people really looking at their SERP listing and asking themselves this crucially important question,"Am I making good on the promise I’m making in the SERPs with my title and description, on the page that people land on?"
Great Post. So Important!!!!
P.S. maybe this is more shocking to me because I have more PPC experience than SEO, even though I enjoy SEO so much more... So, optimizing for clicks seems very obvious to me...So Important though!
Digging the trend to focus more on marketing concepts and not just ranking 1-3. Time to get real.
Love your stuff, Yoast!
Great article. Rand Fishkin of did a great CRO and SEO webinar last week. You can watch it here https://www.slideshare.net/randfish/big-picture-cro
Yost!
Its an incredible post on Conversions Optimization!
However, I would bring update you that if you are topper in industry in term of your product, services, flexibility, pricing, and many more. I don't think so that Conversions Optimization will work for you. At this moment that you need just branding of your product with proper resource on the web. We believe conversions optimization depends on your niche how strong it is on the web.
Anyways, we enjoyed your slide show and its really incredible in order to get gain visibility in search engines and as well as conversions.
One more time thanks!
This is really a nice and specific points noticed post :)
CTR focus & Videos both are important, I am also going to focus on CTR for all my projects and will add videos also for product intro also after all I really admire this post nice sharing dear :)
Thanks.
I think rich snippets has been great for pouring water on all of the SEO is dead folks. Instead of spending more and more budget on trying to rank #1 from #3, just introduce rel author or another microdata and make your listing stand out and wind up getting more traffic than if you were to rank #1. Get in sight, then stand out.
Hi Yoast, thanks for the post. I totally agree with you, especially the section on PPC. I worked in PPC in the past and have to say that I've learned a lot of valuable SEO lessons from it - especially with regards to keyword variations, conversions, copy and CTR. A great point well made!
Couldn't agree more, if only more business owners would realise that rankings on their own mean diddly squat and should not be a goal in their own right ! It's the result of those rankings that really matters, as in CRO & Marketing, getting those relevant clicks through to a page deserved of the ranking. Great job :-)
Definitely worth while investing those 5 minutes on rel author. Biggest win without a doubt would be video. If you don’t want to host your own content Phil Nottingham from @distilled has an awesome guide.
In my opinion Wistia is great to host your content plus analysing how successful your content is. Pro tip would be you may change content by replacing content using same file name then you can see which one works best (i.e more views/ engagement etc without the hassle)
Keep it up Yoast huge fan of your plugins and work.
Groeten!
Youst your article is really amazing. I learned some tips from your article, Your article always be helpful for me. So thanks a lot for sharing this valuable info with us.
Just proving that you can get loads of organic search traffic without conversions sounds like, well, sounds like mental masturbation to me?
What good is it? Anyone can can tweaks their site and get traffic, but if it not honed in and converting then you might as well forget about it!
Your article was right on target! Thanks a lot, it nice to see something worth reading.
Thank you, Joost! Excellent post, and thank you for your awesome WordPress plugins as well. :)
I fully agree with the post idea. On the other hand as long as Google and other search engines are not equipped with some sort of A.I. allowing them to at least partly assess resource's value I believe we are left with subprime click-war where a referred is more important that actual page contents...
Love the idea. However is it effective? yet to be seen.
Here are a lot of things which the SEO people can learn from PPC people and can take their assistance in writing descriptions or creating rich snippets as well. Now a day the more focus is upon author rank , rich snippet, reviews, relationships and the most important one "quality content".
I love your views on this! I think that everyone needs to take a more holistic view on these things and really think of #RCS rather than just link building.
Totally agree, #RCS / Marketing!!
Ranking well is definitely a boon for any site, but like you said ranking well is only 1/2 the battle. I read a study a few months back that showed how CTRs was dropping for the top 10 spots in the SERPs and becoming more evenly distributed. Searchers are smart and they know that the #1 website isn't always the best for them and they are more than willing to dig through the search results to find the site that really meets their needs.
Thanks Joost - as most people on Wordpress, Yoast is something that has become integral to our blogging.
I have a question of the rel=author tag. Will Google attach the authorship, even if the Google+ profile is a Company page, and not a personal profile? The mugshot on the profile, is basically our logo - not a personal photo. What's the best way to make use of authorship markup, in a case like this?
Thanks!!Zak
SEO, PPC and Analytics all together are fulcral to a good performance over the digital world....Inbound Marketing.,,,,is the future :)
The amount that meta descriptions get ignored in the SEO World is unbelievable, but it happens widespread I believe because 1. Changing meta descriptions takes time and isn't largely thought to improve rankings and 2. There is no accurate way to monitor the improvements in CTR from natural search (Webmaster tools SEO analysis is OK but some of the stats are so broad and vague they may as well not be there).
Taking learnings from a PPC campaign and applying them backwards to meta descriptions takes time but is most definitely worth it.
PPC marketing is definitely the art of using a combination of using the right keywords and the right (yet strictly limited) promotional language to create conversions. SEO people can definitely learn a thing or two from them in search marketing.
Great; very informative post, personal view as a consultant, I never been suggest to my clients for PPC instead for SEO. But I have little bit doubt CTR, somewhere I saw it's going very high and low traffic when implemented.
Awesome post buddy, Thumbs up.
Hi Yoast, great to hear from you.
You're right, the job doesn't stop with Rankings. CRO has come up a lot so far this year for me. First, it was Joanna at MozCon on A New Form of CRO, then it was Rand at MozCation on Big Picture CRO. Yes, there have been posts all over the web too, but these were presentations in person and the content has stuck with me more. It is a great time to remember that the work doesn't stop with rankings and I really like the way you describe it, "It's not Search Listing." We need to get people to click!
Thanks for sharing :).
Great post. I think it's very easy to get caught up on all the technical side of things in SEO, including stuff to do with website code, PageRank, Domain Authority, algorithm shifts, etc. and forget at the end of the day that it's still a form of a marketing channel and even a marketing channel in its own right. I know because I'm guilty of it myself at times, and I need to remind myself that we're doing this for people as well as an algorithmic machine.
As I like to say: there's no point having a #1 on page 1 ranking if no one clicks onto your site from your SERPs, or they hate the look of your website, or they can't find what they're looking for on your website, or... etc. etc.
I'm about to start screaming and jumping... and roarring! Yoast FTW!
:D :D
Reminds me of MecLabs approach. Sell the click and let the landing page (if that is optimized for marketing as well) do what it's suppose to.
Yoast is one of the best wordpress plugin for SEO. Its really make our work more simple and faster and this presentation is worth-full for all seo expert.
Yoast, I couldn't agree more. I think the search marketing industry is starting to grow up. SEOs are starting to actually study marketing (which focuses on people.) In the past we just studied algorithms (which focuses on robots.) I love that we are starting to treat CRO and SEO as two sides of the same coin. In response to this concept, I wrote this post...about how cro and seo compliment each other.
Excellent post - you are so right - it is not all about being the top of the SERPs if you have a poor CTR, although as you say this is becoming harder. Its like having a site with thousands of visitors but no conversions, it would be better to have half the visitors but with conversions. SEO is not standalone as you say - good SEO is an amalgamation of numerous different skills and should not be seen as finishing when you have decent rankings, as your visitors are not even in the marketing funnel until they make that click!
Good stuff. Our SEO audits that we offer for clients at the start of a campaign always consist of SEO, user experience and CRO. Plus a social media analysis if applicable. Holistic campaigns and cross-channel optimisation rock the house.
Great post Yoast, I've just got back from the UK SearchLove conference, and I'm really starting to appreciate the value of Rich Snips. You're exactly right, CRO starts in the SERPS! I've only just set-up the simple link for bringing out my author photo in the SERPS, which looks great, particularly alongside video thumbnails too.
Cool, be sure to test with that image too :)
I attended your talk on SEO Day Cologne and enjoyed it very much. Great post now here on SEOmoz. Sad that you cancelled the workshop at the SEOkomm Academy. Hoped to see you there.
@Joost, it's refreshing to hear others encourage a combination of SEO & CRO.
I am curious to see anything you can share in regards to your comment "Google is using CTR as a ranking factor in organic search".
First and foremost, check and dissect the scripts they run on result pages: they're tracking all clicks, if they weren't using that data, it'd make no sense to track it all :)
Great post, something else to consider is the instances where Google rewrites your titles in SERPs. I've found rewriting overly long, repetitive titles can overcome this.
Yeah there's loads to test in that area :)
Nice post, really good to be reminded of things like this. I'm an in-house SEO with a lot of top 5 rankings, and while I've been trying to push for top spots, this post has reminded me that perhaps I should dedicate more time to optimising for conversation/clicks.
Just out of curiosity, is there a video of your presentation or is it just the slides?
I don't think it was recorded, sorry.
I agree 100% with everything going on in this post. Way too many people are optimizing for search engines and not people. This approach is lowering the value of our industry as a whole and a big part of the reason we have problems getting the budgets we deserve compared to the PR / Advertising people. It is seen as a tactical utility of the marketing mix, rather than the customer-centric practice it can (and eventually will) be.
We could be leading the content strategy and communication goals for the whole show, but we get pegged as bottom feeders - or as Wil said in his keynote at Mozcon "The Ugly Fish of Marketing". It's the opportunistic / competitive mindset that has gotten us this far, but is now a big part of what is holding us back.
Put people first in everything you do and the rest will follow.
One dilemna I've faced recently is having 1st position ranking with a 'blended' maps listing that is cramped and doesn't allow for a meta description to 'sell' to searchers.
See https://i.imgur.com/2wPxL.png
I'm looking into removing our places listing entirely to get better CTR, and given we service clients at their location anyway, I think the benefits of removing it outweigh the negatives.
Any ideas/insight relating to this strange phenomenon?
Sometimes webmasters can fall into a rut and not see the changes needed, always keep your mind open to change and move along with the times, Yoast is doing this, and I appreciate the articles he writes.
Thanks Yoast - seo has expanded to encompass new areas and we all must embrace them to be effective on the modern web. The video plugin is great btw - already working for me in the serps.
Thanks for the article. I like to dog on PPC too, but some of what you said kind of jogged my brain to remember that it's a useful tool. Maybe a good rule of thumb for any business just getting into the online world should be togo PPC first to get some useful stats for developing on their organic plan. After all, Adwords still give you the keyword referral data on top of all the other Analytics data and you might be able to get an idea for what searchers tend to respond to a little faster than testing organic landing pages.
Too bad you didn't record your lecture, because it's one of the most important topics to learn about. Regardless, let me use this stage to say that your WP plugin are freak*n awesome. :)
Awesome share mate. I always like yoast and all time love you. I love this yoast plugin for SEO. It's the best for search engine optimization plugin for wordpress site.
I love this blog post because, Rich snippet is creating romance on SERP. I am working on Ecommerce website and was facing issue to improve CTR. I have added my Google Adwords ad structure to my page title and meta description. Honestly, It's creating magic for me. Just have a look at following search result. Special characters to meta description, products with pricing and attractive page title from Google Adwords copy.
https://www.google.com/search?q=cheap+office+chairs&gl=US
I am focusing on Impressions and Clicks data to Google webmaster tools and It's work for me. Rand has arranged such a fabulous White board Friday regarding on page changes in 2012. You and Rand are on same platform to create valuable SERP. Now, I am going to add Videos to my category page. I hope, that will help me more and raise my CTR to next level.
Yourr twitter rants get to you the other day Yoast? :p I've learned a lot from following you on twitter, your blog and now guest posts such as these. Great post - really highlights the need to think about the big picture. Speaking of pictures I have to optimise and test my g+ picture....
I though there is something new in this article but all the old stuff. Come on man we need something new.
Thanks
Yoast, I believe that the minute you start writing a post it is almost guaranteed to generate a lot of interest, because you never provide anything but pure genius and sage advice. Thank You!
great post, Yoast.
Thanks so much for adding rel=author support to your WordPress plugin. It's made a huge difference to the way my content is perceived, and it's also inspired me to make better use of Google+.
In a perfect world clients ill understand that :)
Just the sort of thing I've been thinking about today...SEO is a means to an end, not the end itself.
https://petermahoney.net/for-most-people-the-end-is-more-money/
Great post Yost..
Authorship is the next big thing in SEO (Infact SEM).Worth Reading
What you have stated here is complete restructuring of the web which supposed to be done with Web 2.0. SEO goes along CRO, rich snippets becomes standard, search goes semantic...But it didn't happen yet. Idea of Web 2.0 is still to be seen...
Presenting brand consistently across all marketing platforms is a critical part of transforming business into an extraordinary brand, and social media branding is becoming more important every day.Marry @Ebizsubmit