Everyone knows PPC and SEO compliment one another - increased visibility in search results help increase perceived authority and drive more clickthroughs to your site overall. But are you actively leveraging the wealth of PPC data available to build on your existing SEO strategy? The key to effectively using this information lies in understanding how to test SEO tactics and how to apply the results to your on-page strategies. This session will delve into actionable strategies for using PPC campaign insights to influence on-page SEO and content strategies. Key takeaways include:
- How to us PPC campaigns to test effective meta data
- How to use PPC keyword data to determine content gaps
- How to use PPC data to define striking distance ranking opportunities
- How to use PPC campaign data to determine conversion rate optimization opportunities
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Moz Branded Intro Slides – They will be sending
The Perfect Pair: Using PPC Data to Influence SEO
Stephanie Wallace | Nebo Agency
@SWallaceSEO
40. TO LEARN MORE OR FOR ANY QUESTIONS, PLEASE CONTACT:
Stephanie Wallace
Director, Search Engine Optimization
404.885.1201
swallace@neboagency.com
PLACEHOLDER:
Thank You
Hinweis der Redaktion
Good afternoon!
Thanks to Cyrus, Moz, so excited to be here
We all know SEO & PPC go great together, right? They work better as a pair – you get increased visibility in the SERPs, increased perceived authority, and so forth.
while those classic talking points are true, they’re simply not reality.
It’s not as easy as it sounds. Often teams are siloed and there is very little collaboration or sharing of data. As SEOs, we are too focused on traffic and rankings and all PPCers care about is CTR and Quality Scores.
That image of SEO & PPC as the perfect pair working together simply isn’t real.
We understand why the 2 should work together. But it’s very theoretical and abstract.
We really fall short on the how, on the execution. What do those talking points about increased visibility really mean?
How often do you talk to your PPC neighbors in the office & collaborate on strategy?
I know I’m guilty of skimming PPC reports more often than really deep diving like I should.
So what can we do about it? How can we bridge the gap? The key to effectively using PPC lies in understanding how to test SEO tactics and apply the results.
Believe it or not 63% of marketers optimize sites based on intuition & best practices alone
So we’re going to walk through 4 tactics to help you test & optimize based real data.
First we’ll talk through how to test effective meta data using PPC
Testing organic ad copy - which is what our title tags and meta descriptions are essentially - has historically been a long term process. Once we implement changes on the site, it takes time for search engines to crawl the site and update the index based on the new data. And then - it takes even longer to collect significant data that we can use to measure success.
If we use PPC ads to test our title tags and meta descriptions we expedite the process and get to a well optimized site that much quicker
So for this tactic we start by identifying a poorly performing page in terms of click through rate specifically
you can look at the search analytics report in Google webmaster tools - and filter for Pages rather than queries & I like to include all the data available not just CTR - so I’m looking at all the angles
IS THIS NECESSARY?
once you have identified what page(s) you want to focus on – you can start testing. I use an organic sandbox campaign for all of my SEO tests so their in one place. And for this test create 3-4 different ad variations. So different title tag - or headline - variations and different description / ad copy variations.
The key is the landing page for these ads should be the page we’re testing optimization for and it tends to work better with higher volume queries – so that the ad shows – which often means priority pages on the site where we’re targeting high volume keywords
you can tweak titles & descriptions along the way based on the data you’re seeing but I do suggest only making one change at a time and not trying to test too many ad variations at once
Setting your ad delivery to “optimize for clicks” will help you see a clear winner sooner. This has to be done on the campaign level, so if you want to use this function I do recommend creating an organic sandbox campaign like I mentioned.
On the other hand, for more unbiased results you could run a google experiment within adwords to deliver ads with 50/50 split. It may take a little longer and it’s still in beta technically but it looks promising.
Once you have a winner you can use the key elements of the ad copy to influence your title tag & description.
Which KWs performed better in the headline? Which descriptor terms & messaging performed better in ad copy?
One thing I’m sure everyone is thinking right now, is the difference in character limitations for Ads vs. Meta Data. You will use the themes defined in the ad copy but, of course, you’ll need to build on those for actual meta data creation.
I used this method of leveraging AdWords to test meta descriptions for Beatport, the largest EDM music store for DJs. The professional DJ community really has a language all their own. So finding the correct messaging, specifically for each of the different genres, was key.
As a result of these tests organic entrances for Beatport’s Genre pages increased +65% year over year.
Second we’ll walk through how to identify content gaps within your site using PPC data
For this exercise I start with the top conversion paths from the MultiChannel Funnels report in Google Analytics
I start by setting the lookback window to 90 days so we’re looking at more substantial data.
Also set the path length to “All”, for the same reason.
Next, set the secondary dimension to Keyword
Filter for Paths that begin with Paid Search
The data set should be organized by conversions by default but we do want to look at the most valuable terms.
We’re looking for instances where paid is driving traffic that is converting on the site but Organic is not a part of the buyer journey at all.
Most often that means Paid is the first interaction or even the only interaction
The idea is If organic is not part of the process then we probably have low organic visibility for these terms. We’re not ranking well, if at all, but we know they’re relevant terms for us b/c PPC is driving qualified traffic.
So the questions are: are we even targeting these terms at all with our organic KW strategy? If not, why? If so, why is it not working?
Do we need to expand existing content to speak to these topics? Or do we need to create new content altogether?
Your next steps are based on the answers to those questions.
For Hubbell’s Chance branded website, which specializes in foundation repair solutions, CHANCE identified a huge opportunity for the topic “helical piers” – It was not a core part of our organic KW strategy initially b/c there was no content that spoke to it directly on the site.
Since CHANCE implemented the recommendations for expanded content on the site that speaks to this, Chance is now ranking #3 for the term organically and organic traffic to the helical products page has increased over 51%
Next, let’s talk about Defining Striking Distance Ranking Opportunities
So first, what do I mean by Striking Distance ranking opportunities?
Ranking opportunities within striking distance are those search terms that are performing well for PPC – meaning high CTR, high conversions, etc. – and despite the fact that we are not actively targeting them from an SEO perspective – the site does rank organically. Probably not really well, but we’re at the bottom of page 1, maybe on page 2 or 3.
So the fact that these terms are ranking at all without actively targeting them means that they are within reach – or within striking distance. With a little effort we can dramatically improve rankings.
So start by exporting the top KWs in Google AdWords – I like to filter by conversions greater than or equal to 1 so that we’re not including any extraneous data we don’t need.
And you can really select whatever time frame makes sense – you just want to be sure you have substantial amount of data. For this example I’m using year to date.
Once in excel I start by removing some of the unnecessary columns – you get a lot of data in the initial export. But this is all we really need - keywords, clicks, impressions, CTR, & conversions. And sort by conversions
I also filter out any branded terms so that we’re looking at non-branded terms specifically where there’s opportunity
Next we want to know if we’re already targeting this keyword
And how well we’re ranking for this keyword
Based on all of this data – we can see where the opportunity is and Start assigning value to the KWs. Tier I opportunities are anywhere – again without actively targeting these KWs - we are ranking on page 1 in Google search results. And Tier II opportunities are those where we’re ranking on page 2.
And we all know rankings aren’t strictly 1-10. So you can factor in knowledge boxes, local, mobile, etc. as necessary when assigning values.
Based on this data we incorporate these new keyword phrases into our existing on-page strategies – starting with the title tags and site copy. And just as a side note, I do leave in the different ad types rather than consolidating KW themes from each because they represent different queries.
For Pure TalkUSA, a no contract cell phone provider, we were very focused on the affordability of what they offered. Using this method, Pure Talk was able to define new keyword opportunities and over time shifted the focus to the unlimited aspect of their plans.
And Pure Talk saw a 32% increase in organic entrances to the PLAN pages and 4 new rankings in the top 3 for “unlimited” keyword themes
Lastly, we’ll walk through how to use PPC for CRO
As SEOs we’re all about traffic…that’s what these tactics have focused on so far. But I wanted to talk a little about CRO b/c although it’s not directly SEO – CRO is critical to improving user experience and that’s really what SEO is all about.
When we define KW themes for the different sections and pages of a website, there are often a number of pages that could be appropriate for any given theme. There’s natural overlap as part of any website. Should the landing page be more informational or more conversion driven? What level of granularity does the user expect to see?
On top of that, keyword (not provided) made things more complicated for us, and with semantic search and Google’s algorithm getting better at understanding meaning we can’t look at our keyword themes as a semantic exercise – we have to take into consideration the buyer journey and think about what type of information the user would expect to see when searching for different things.
So we can use PPC landing pages to test which page on the site is more likely to resonate with our target audience and which is more likely to drive conversions where there may be blurry intent.
The thing to remember – conversion rates increase when your goals and your users goals meet.
Use your Organic Sandbox Campaign again to create a new ad group to test different landing pages for the same KW theme.
Create 3 unique ad variations, all similar b/c we’re targeting one KW theme – but driving visits to unique landing pages on the site
And again set your ad delivery to “Show the best performing ad most often” to help identify a winner sooner. In this instance I want to see the highest conversion rates.
Once you have statistically significant data you should see which landing page users respond to best for the given keyword theme, which one has the highest conversion rate.
For the Jekyll Island Club Hotel, which is a historic resort hotel in Georgia, there are a lot of overlapping pages on the site. Especially between the different accommodations pages – there’s rooms & rates, and reservations. So the question was how detailed of a page is the user expecting to see for these keyword themes?
By testing different landing pages for the “reservation” keyword theme Jekyll saw a 48% increase in organic conversions in Q1 2015.
As we wrap up I have a few more tips for you to keep in mind as you get started with your own tests.
Some things work better together and SEO needs PPC. Your SEO strategy is incomplete without leveraging the abundance of data PPC!
And - They have KEYWORD DATA… we should all be using it!
There’s no one right answer - you can come up with your own tactics.
What else can we test – maybe you can identify off-page opportunities by looking at retargeting data.
Or what can we change about these tests? I like to change ad delivery to see a clear winner sooner. I want to be agile with my changes. But maybe you want to take it slower and use Google experiments so you’re comparing equal data sets.
The opportunities are limitless.
And finally, embrace collaboration. It’s more than running tests and data mining. We should be working together. They may be too focused on quality score but the PPC’ers should be our allies, not just co-workers on the other side of the office.
And with that we can open it up for questions.
----- Meeting Notes (7/1/15 12:01) -----
Set up a Google experimetn within AdWords to see results
Use retargeting to identify off-page opps.
SEO help PPC
What if I don’t manage my clients PPC campaigns
What if my client - Specific question
Other apps / tools
How do we break down barriers at nebo
Ad Positioning play a role