Search Engine Optimization involves the strategies put in place to boost rankings on search engine listings. Successful implementation of SEO in Toronto or anywhere will result in websites organically emerging near the top of the list when keyword searches are done relevant to the product or service offered. There are numerous SEO metrics that can be analyzed to monitor and tweak campaigns on an ongoing basis. Here are four of the most important ones.
Traffic
There are two types of traffic to a website, organic and paid. Measuring both helps to refine content creation to match the keywords that users are typing to seek a particular product or service. Organic traffic refers to the traffic to a website generated from a web search but is not paid for. Paid traffic refers to all sponsored efforts implemented to direct potential customers to a website, for example, Google Ads.
Search Engine Results Page (SERP)
SERP is the list of results generated when a user enters a query on a search engine. The results page will display a variety of elements such as featured snippets (paragraphs, lists and tables), instant answers, knowledge graphs, knowledge panels, images, and rich snippets.
Rich snippets are an appealing type of result as they contain supplementary data pulled from the corresponding website, for example, reviews (star ratings), recipes, flight details, music details (albums, release dates), product information (price, picture, availability) and organization data (address, contact details, picture, or logo).
Tracking visibility provides opportunities to improve rankings by enhancing the specific keyword content of a website.
Click-Through Rate (CTR)
CTR is a measure of how many users saw a link to a website versus how many users actually clicked on it. For example, if 100 users saw a link to a specific site and only 5 of them clicked on the link through to the associated website, that would equate to a 5% CTR. A low CTR indicates that listings appearing on the SERP are uninteresting or unappealing. This provides an opportunity to rethink the content and structure on a website to produce more engaging featured snippets and thereby attract greater positive attention to the link.
Bounce Rate
Bounce rate is the percentage of users that click through to a website and then leave without viewing any other pages on the site. A high bounce rate would indicate that the content is unappealing, irrelevant or confusing and requires a review of the content, layout, and ease of interaction. SEO monitoring and analysis are essential to a successful SEO campaign. SEO operates on an ever-changing landscape, and regular evaluation of these metrics will provide knowledge to keep websites fully optimized and producing the desired benefits.
Takeaways:
- Ensure your website is optimized for search engines.
- Create and execute an SEO campaign specific to your business.
- Target your geographic area (if you have one, i.e. local versus national, international) and your specific audience in your SEO campaign.
- Persist – SEO is the long game and something that should be a constant part of your marketing strategy.
- If you don’t have the time and/or resources in-house for SEO, find a company that will partner with you and has the expertise in this area.
At DIT Web Solutions, we have an experienced team of marketing experts that will design and run your SEO campaign and get the results you are looking for.
