What if we could bring Search-Engine Optimization (SEO) and Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) together, into a single strategy that increases both high-quality organic traffic and facilitates more conversions and revenue? It’s possible when we see them as one and integrate the two strategies.
But first, we need to define more specifically what we mean by “SEO” in this context. There are three primary pillars or components of SEO in my mind:
A popular content SEO definition is “SEO content is online content designed to rank in search engines, and often optimized around a specific keyword.”
Although this is true, the critical differentiator in my SEO/CRO strategy is that “a content SEO strategy should be designed first for people - to answer their specific questions about the problem, symptoms, and solution, as well as questions about the category, the brand, and the specific products. Second, the content should be optimized for the search engines and the target keywords.”
I use this definition because rankings and traffic are irrelevant if the content is not helping the shopper answer their questions, and therefore is not converting. So picking and optimizing the high-purchase intent questions throughout the buyer journey a.k.a. the conversion funnel, is far more important than optimizing for keyword rankings that don’t convert.
The integration of the content SEO and the content conversion strategy is what we will be discussing here.
The Typical Way
It’s been more common for SEO and CRO to be treated as separate strategies, by separate teams, measuring different goals. And rarely, if ever do they collaborate and work systematically together to drive a single goal - conversion, and revenue.
In real-world content SEO however, CRO and revenue growth should be THE goal. Keyword rankings, average position, impressions, traffic, backlinks, page authority, etc. are all significant “leading metrics” that can and do help improve sales and revenue (the training metric), but content SEO is rarely measured by the revenue, AOV and conversion lift that the content actually generates.
And rarely, is the content measured against the conversion rate or revenue lift that it is improving. As practitioners, we should rethink how we treat these two different professions, strategies, budgets, and teams, and consider instead how we can get them both working as an integrated team to create and optimize the right content that drives the right traffic to the site, at every stage of the buyer journey, which ultimately converts.
There are several different types of content that answer different types of buyer questions, at different stages of the buyer journey. And if we knew what these high-intent question categories were at each stage of the journey, and we provided the best content and the best answer to each question, that created more value, engagement, and trust at each stage of the journey, does it stand to reason that we would attract higher quality traffic, and convert that traffic at a higher rate?
Logically, of course, this is a foregone conclusion. So why don’t we do it? I think there are many reasons for this:
The Better Way
In the real world, shoppers don’t care about our internal battles over resources, atta-boys, and attribution. What they seek, and coincidentally what Google also seeks, is pretty simple and consistent, if only we could deliver it:
When we think about all the questions that our existing and past customer has had, all the information they needed to find and process, and the decisions they needed to make along the entire buyer journey to become a customer, we begin to see how and why the content strategy and the conversion strategy must be aligned.
In other words, if we create content that captures the initial problem search with helpful diagnostic content, to solution comparisons, down to product-specific information
Online Influence is the process of building trust and credibility that starts with online search results (SEO and pre-conversion) and continues throughout the buyer journey - all the way to checkout (CRO).
Research over the years has shown that the vast majority of website traffic goes to the top 3 organic search results. Therefore, it is assumed by many that the most effective path to conversion is achieved by obtaining one of these coveted positions. However, just because a top-ranking website receives high levels of traffic does not necessarily mean that this traffic will convert.
There are several aspects to search results that, when optimized, can pre-convert, or predispose more people to buy, such as
Why Websites Don’t Convert More
The average site converts at 2-3% of total site visitors. Is that acceptable? Are we okay with this? Do we even know why the conversion rates are so low?
In this blog post, you will learn some of the key reasons why low conversion rates have become the norm. Such as:
Because quality content is ultimately what search engines and consumers alike are looking for, content is what gets served in the search engine results, and content ultimately drives traffic, SEOs often say that “Content is King.”
I beg to differ just a little, especially in light of the recent Google search algorithm updates, specifically the Helpful Content Update (August 2022) and the September Core Update (September 2022) that focus on high-quality, helpful, trustworthy content, written by humans for humans.
Layer this on top of the fact that it’s “trusted content” that Google and shoppers want, and it’s trusted content that converts, I like to say that “Trust is King, and Content is Queen.” In other words, create amazing, trusted content to win the day.
Content and the Buyer Journey
The classic buyer journey is often represented by a vertical funnel from top to bottom (also called the conversion funnel), or a linear flow of research and consideration stages that flow from left to right.
The concept of the buyer journey however is consistent, where the shopper moves through distinct phases beginning with awareness of a question, a need, pain, or want, and is then a more refined search that consists of research (consideration and comparison of the options), and then culminates in a final decision after the “best option” for the money and situation is chosen.
The “best option” of course is relative and based on the individual’s perceptions, depth of research and research skills, and their own biases, budget, etc.
Although Google admits the funnel or buyer journey is very much alive, their extensive research has found that the journey itself is a lot more “messy”, inconsistent and erratic than a clean and sequential model would suggest, as referenced below, and found in the Google research “Decoding Decisions”.
The above illustration from Google indicates that answering all of these search questions and modifiers above is the right, most beneficial, and most consistently searched content type to produce.
As chaotic as this Google buyer journey image may appear, understanding the search intent, the core content strategies and the search modifiers used within the journey is what changes the game for those who understand and execute it.
However, you care to look at the buyer journey (vertical, horizontal, or a squiggly mess), the right content and learning to think like the consumer, and therefore to think like Google always matters.
The right content will answer the shopper's questions and appear toward the top of the organic search results for the common search terms, keywords, and search modifiers they are using at each stage of the funnel and the buyer journey.
What's Below
There are two parts to the remainder of this research that improves SEO (organic site traffic) and CRO (conversion rate optimization).
Part I
A sequential timeline and overview of many (certainly not all) of the Google Algorithm updates since 2011 indicate Google’s desire for high-quality, original, informative, helpful, and objective content that helps consumers answer their questions, solve their problems, and helps make better buying decisions.
The common thread that becomes apparent in these updates is the following:
Because Google has been basically telling us for years exactly what they are looking for, we certainly can’t blame Google if our search rankings fall, or if we never achieve the results we want. The recipe book is right in front of us, we just need to read it and follow it, and stop trying to game it and take shortcuts that never last.
Part II
An overview of several behavioral science studies that have been proven through scientific rigor to positively impact conversion rate. These are conversion strategies that play on psychology and known human persuasion techniques to enhance or accelerate the content conversion strategy.
In this section, I highlight those conversion principles that show a pattern, or a common thread among 2 or more experts.
Part I: SEO and Googles Updates
What is a Core Update?
A core update means that Google has made significant and broad changes to the algorithm. Core updates tend to have larger impacts on rankings. Sites that are aligned to the core updates perform better in search, and those sites that are not aligned to the new search criteria perform worse.
Core updates occur less frequently than the common and frequent updates that happen several times per year, with little noticeable search impact.
Many SEOs believe that the smaller updates are tests of parts of the algorithm before Google makes the larger core update.
To learn more about core updates:
Timeline of Google's Updates and Algorithms
Panda (2011) - High-Quality Content and User Experience. Core Update
Google Panda first launched in February 2011 as part of Google’s quest to eliminate black hat SEO tactics and webspam (poor quality content and poor quality backlinks)
The Panda update assigned pages a quality classification modeled after human quality ratings, which was incorporated as a ranking factor.
Fast forward to 2021, and you can now see how important it was as Google’s first step to focus on quality and user experience.
“This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites – sites which are low-value add for users, content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful. At the same time, it will provide better rankings for high-quality sites – sites with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis, and so on.”
Singhal (Google) later released the following 23 questions as guiding questions on the Panda algorithm was based on:
In my opinion, these criteria became the basis for what later became the Google E-A-T criteria and update (Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness).
Penguin (2012) - Quality Backlinks Matter, Garbage Links are Dead. Core Update
Google’s war on low quality started with the Panda algorithm, and Penguin was an extension and addition to the arsenal to fight this war.
Penguin worked toward ensuring that natural, authoritative, and relevant links rewarded the websites they pointed to, while manipulative and spammy links were downgraded.
Hummingbird (September 2013) - Keyword Exact Match is Reduced, and Topic Match Improves. Core Update
Hummingbird enabled Google to be more precise about what a query meant. After Hummingbird, Google was no longer exact matching keywords in search queries to keywords in webpages.
And, by moving away from matching keywords in a query to keywords on a webpage, Google became more precise about showing pages that matched the topic inherent in the search query.
There are three key takeaways from Matt’s explanation of what Hummingbird does:
Rankbrain (2015) - Optimize Content for User Intent
RankBrain is a system by which Google can better understand the likely user intent of a search query. This further reduced the significance of “keywords” and keyword stuffing and manipulation in content
At its core, RankBrain is a machine learning system that builds off Hummingbird, which took Google from a “strings” (string of words) to “things” (what are they looking for) environment.
Quality Update (May 2015) - Trustworthy Content
The first Quality Update was launched to demote the rankings of low-quality content in organic search so users could get better, more trustworthy, and authoritative results.
What the Quality Update penalized and de-ranked:
1. Thin Content & Clickbait Articles
Thin content is just like it sounds. It’s skimpy. The information is slim. It doesn’t really provide any answers. Plus, it’s short (and not sweet).
2. Pages with Heavy Advertising
In-your-face ads are annoying – nobody will disagree about that. When you’re trying to find information that’s important to you, getting slammed with a page full of ads is also confusing. It gets in the way of your ability to get the information you need.
3. Content Farm Articles & Mass-Produced ‘How-To’ Pages
A great example of sites the Google update impacted negatively are content farms. They’re definitely not as prevalent in organic search results today, and Google’s updates most likely have plenty to do with that
Fred (March 2017)
Fred was preceded a month earlier by a major Google Core Update, which was said to focus on E-A-T.
A week after Fred, Google announced Project Owl, which was designed to clear away misleading and offensive information based on feedback from their quality raters.
Clearly, Google was highly focused on quality and using data from their quality raters.
Fred was no exception.
Google’s Fred algorithm update was rolled out in an attempt to remove what Google perceived as low-quality results — sites that relied on thin content and aggressive ad placement. Many were affiliate sites, though not all.
However, the quality of the content on the affected sites tended to be very low, with highly prevalent ads. You know the sites. You probably avoid them.
Fred did have to do with E-A-T, and the impacted sites imply that the areas it targeted were some or all of:
If you want a refresher on E-A-T and the Quality Raters’ Guidelines, you’ll find one here.
Medic (2018) - Supports E-A-T
The Medic update improved the identification of Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness (EAT) in online content.
There are a number of factors that influence EAT. At the time of this update, if your website had minimal reviews and backlinks, was thin on content, wasn’t updated frequently, or lacked comprehensive profiles of the business and authors of the content, your pages might have been pushed down in search results in favor of links that completed more of this checklist.
BERT (2019)
The BERT algorithm (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers) is a natural language processing machine learning system. It helps a search engine to understand what words in a sentence mean to a human being. The BERT update enables Google to understand search queries more effectively and determine which content is of higher quality, and more relevant to user search queries. After BERT, Google can determine nuance and subtle distinctions of meaning for words based on context.
How does it work? Well, for example, if you say "he's the GOAT" you don't mean he's a farm animal. You mean he's "the greatest of all time." With Google's natural language processing ability, Google would be able to make that distinction.
BERT changes the way SEO copywriters write about topics. Specific keywords become less important and the natural language associated with specific keywords becomes more important. If you are writing quality content on a given topic, giving the correct information, and are in conversation with others who have already written on the topic (citing sources), then the Google algorithm should be able to pick up on that.
Product Reviews (July 2022) - High-Quality Product Reviews for eCommerce Sites
Publishing high-quality product reviews on your eCommerce or product review site can help shoppers learn more about a product before purchasing. For example, reviews can guide shoppers between competing products, helping shoppers pick the best make or model for their needs and budget.
To help shoppers discover your product reviews in Google Search and on other Google surfaces, follow these best practices:
https://developers.google.com/search/docs/specialty/ecommerce/write-high-quality-product-reviews
Helpful Content (August 2022) - Connect People to Helpful Information
Just in case we didn’t get the hint from Panda, the E-A-T Guidelines, and the Fred update, the Helpful Content update is very similar to the Panda update, with the same focus on high-quality content that helps consumers solve problems and answer their questions. When combined with the recent Product Reviews update, the collective goals between the two are extremely similar in language and intent to Panda.
I think we can only assume that Google is dead serious about what they are looking for in regard to quality content and backlinks. And with each update, the algorithm gets smarter, and more finely tuned at suppressing the sub-par content, and serving only the best of the best.
Google Search is always working to better connect people to helpful information. To this end, we're launching what we're calling the “helpful content update” that's part of a broader effort to ensure people see more original, helpful content written by people, for people, in search results. Below is more about the update and things creators should consider.
The helpful content update aims to better reward content where visitors feel they've had a satisfying experience, while content that doesn't meet a visitor's expectations won't perform as well.
How can you ensure you're creating content that will be successful with our new update? By following our long-standing advice and guidelines to create content for people, not for search engines. People-first content creators focus first on creating satisfying content, while also utilizing SEO best practices to bring searchers additional value. Answering yes to the questions below means you're probably on the right track with a people-first approach:
September Core Update (September 2022)
The September Core Update really gave the Helpful Content update teeth and specificity. There are fourteen content quality considerations in the update
September Product Review Update (9/20/22)
Google’s product review algorithm update aligns to the September Core Update and the Helpful Content Update in terms of helpful, quality, trusted content, but in this case, it is focused on Product Reviews by experts, or publishers (not consumer-generated product reviews).
The Product review Update is designed to reward high-quality product review pages that share in-depth, original, objective research.
Google wants to surface product reviews written by people that have personally tested and experimented with the product they’re reviewing.
You can make this clear to Google, and your readers, by including details such as photos and videos, benefits and drawbacks, comparisons with competing products, and other first-hand observations.
This update applies to websites that publish long-form product reviews, such as those seen on websites like Wirecutter and Tom’s Guide.
When you compare this to the July 2022 Product Review Update, you see the same pattern of objective.
Algorithm Update Summary
It’s my opinion that when you review all the updates listed in this document, the pattern is very clear, and I don’t think Google will ever back down from these quality-seeking criteria
Part II: CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization) and Behavioral Science
Leveraging Behavioral Science To Improve Conversion
Certain cognitive biases identified by behavioral science research have some common themes that are interwoven between the various studies and findings, which further validate their efficacy. For example, some common conversion and motivational themes shared among the studies include:
These elements absolutely must be designed into the UX.
Google’s Cognitive Biases That Drive Conversion
Google has identified six Cognitive Biases for product page content, in rank order of impact on the positive influence of purchase behavior:
The Seven Conversion Principles of Dr. Cialdini – Author of “Influence - The Psychology of Persuasion”
Dr. Cialdini has tested seven proven psychological principles that increase the likelihood of purchase:
6,700 Online Experiments
A 2017 meta-analysis (a compilation of multiple studies to identify common effects) of over 6,700 large eCommerce experiments, mainly from the retail and travel sectors, found some very consistent lift factors in the Revenue Per Customer (RPV). These results also support many of the common themes already discussed by the studies in the body of knowledge above.
The top-six most effective features in relation to their average RPV uplift:
The study also found little, no, or even a negative effect on changing website colors, buttons, or calls to action. This study by Browne and Jones, also found that many of the A/B testing practices at the time were fundamentally flawed. I would argue that they still are. Because oftentimes these “experts” are advocating the testing of the same elements that have proven not to be effective at moving the needle.
Dr. BJ Fogg’s Behavior Design – Stanford University Behavioral Scientist
Desired behavior is the result of creating Motivation to act, making the Ability or action simple, and providing a Prompt to act. His research accomplishes this in the following ways:
CRO Summary
As you can see, the conversion biases research by Google aligns with the research by Dr. Cialdini and Dr. Fogg along the lines of Social Proof, making ratings and reviews “THE” most researched, tested, and relevant single conversion tool across the leading studies.
To learn how Shopper Approved can help your company leverage social proof and high-quality, authoritative content to drive more traffic and conversions, schedule a demo today.
About Shopper Approved
Shopper Approved helps eCommerce websites increase their traffic and conversions by providing tools that collect, syndicate, and display more UGC, in both paid and organic search results, in the way of Seller, Product, and Video Ratings and Reviews, Q&A, and website security.
Based in the USA since 2010, Shopper Approved has been a Certified Google Review Partner since 2013 for both Seller and Product Reviews.
All of our tools help improve both paid and organic traffic, and conversion rates. The Q&A tool, for example, is designed to show the answer to the product search question in the Featured Snippet.
Shopper Approved has collected over 57 million reviews for over 26,000 eCommerce websites, and has been recognized by Inc. as one of the 500 fastest-growing companies for 2-years in a row, while also being recognized by G2, Capterra and others as the highest-rated review platform on the web.
Additional SEO articles
