When it comes to marketing, you need to improve your website’s SEO.
This helps your website get traffic that you can convert into leads and customers.
It sounds simple but to do it right, you need:
- The right metrics
- To monitor them
- To understand how to improve them
So in this post, we will learn:
- Which SEO metrics to monitor
- How to understand these metrics
- How to improve them
Let’s dive right in.
Baseline Metrics
Before improving your SEO, you need to know your baseline metrics.
So the following are the SEO metrics you need know and what they mean:
Keyword Rankings and Performance
This is where your website and its web pages rank for search terms on search engines like Google.
Organic Search Traffic
This is how many unique visitors arrive at your website from a link on the SERPs.
Remember to track the percentage of website traffic from organic searches:
- Every day
- Every week
- Every month
Organic Search Conversion Rates
This is the percentage of visitors who arrive on your website from organic searches then it leads to a conversion.
Unique Search Terms Bringing Traffic
This is the list of search terms visitors use to find your website.
And the amount of organic traffic that comes from these terms.
Remember to track the non-branded keyword terms bringing the most organic traffic to your website.
Note: Non-branded keyword terms are keyword phrases that don’t include:
- Your company name
- Your products or services
Backlinks
This is the number of links coming to your website from other websites.
Traffic and Conversion Rate Based Keywords
Next, find the search terms bringing the most qualified traffic.
Basically, the search terms that bring traffic that converts into leads and customers.
Then you can focus on creating content and getting backlinks for the search terms bringing qualified traffic to your website.
Using analytics to prioritise which keyword terms to target helps you focus your efforts and make more progress on those terms.
So it’s important to focus on keywords that drive organic traffic and convert that traffic into leads and customers.
For example, if term “A” ranks 9th in the SERPs but brings less traffic than term “B” which ranks 2nd in the SERPs.
But the traffic from search term “A” converts five new customers compared to the traffic from term “B” which converts zero.
And although search term “B” brings more traffic to your website, it’s also less valuable to your business.
So you should focus your efforts on improving the position of term “B” in the SERPs because you will convert more customers ranked between 1st and 3rd.
Adjusting Content and SEO Strategies
Now it’s time to create content and get backlinks for the term you found previously.
Remember your content strategy and SEO strategy go hand in hand, because organic success comes from a solid content strategy.
So if you want to improve your SEO, improve your content strategy.
When it comes to creating content to rank for your keyword term, think about the type of content that will:
- Improve your rankings in the SERPs
- Convert organic visitors into leads then eventually customers
So start by:
- Creating content around the search term you found to improve its SERP rank
- Include a related lead generation offer in each of these blog posts
Note: Optimise the landing pages for these offers as they can also rank in organic searches.
And there are other places on your website where you can publish fresh and search-friendly content.
So when working on increasing your rankings for terms, also target new keywords that:
- Are relevant to your business
- Bring in decent traffic
- Are competitive
- You don’t rank for in the top 10 of the SERPs
Basically, balance top 10 keywords with keyword as far back as in the top 100 because:
- Your website doesn’t get organic traffic from those terms
- They could be better at converting leads and customers
So targeting keywords in the top 10 and those further back in the SERPs will increase your organic traffic and ranking over time.
Keyword Balance
The amount of content you need to create around a certain term for it to rank depends on how competitive it is.
Because the more competitive a term is, the more work you need to put in for it to rank.
That means more backlinks and more content over a longer time period to get to page one in the SERPs.
Do to this you need to balance the keyword terms you target being both more and less competitive.
For example, if search term “C” is very competitive, do keyword research to find long-tail variations of that keyword that:
- Are less competitive
- Generate search traffic
Because targeting long tail variations of your search terms will:
- Generate organic traffic while you work on ranking your main term
- Help you rank for your main term that’s in the long-tail keyword variations
Monitor Your Metrics
Most important is to track where you rank for the search terms bringing traffic to your website.
Mainly the terms with high search volume and the ones that are highly competitive.
Doing so will make sure you don’t lose your rank in the SERPs to competitors.
Also keep creating content for the keyword terms you rank highly for in the SERPs and if your rank position slips:
- Make more content
- Increase your link building efforts
Remember it’s easier to stay at the top of the SERPs than to climb back up again.
Conclusion
Now it’s over to you.
Tell me which metrics you look at when improving your search engine optimisation?
Let me know in the comment section below.
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