4 SEO lessons from a 48M traffic affiliate site
Welcome to the #109 episode of content marketing VIP.
Here’s what’s covered in today’s episode:
How to write product reviews considering E-EAT
Content strategy to drive affiliate commissions
How to improve blog UX
About GoodHousekeeping 🡭
GoodHousekeeping (GH) is a product review site that covers topics like recipes, home decor accessories, fashion, and food.
Almost 85% of their site traffic comes from search. This shows that GoodHousekeping heavily relied on its SEO and content strategy for growth.
Here are some of the SEO stats about GoodHousekeeping :
48.8M organic visits every month
Drives traffic worth of $10.9M
11.2M backlinks from 148.8k different website
Now, let’s dive into the content strategy breakdown:
1. Product Review Content Strategy
Since Google’s product review updates, many websites have struggled to maintain ranking because of Google’s strict guidelines.
If you’re unaware of product review updates, read this document highlighting best practices for writing high-quality product reviews.
Here are some of the strategies that helpedGoodHousekepingrank their product review articles.
1/ Product Review Process And Editorial Guidelines
GoodHousekeeping has created a dedicated page (3,000+ words) highlighting:
The entire process of how they test products
Why users should trustGoodHousekepingcontent
The expertise in GoodHousekeeping testing and writing high-quality product reviews
Affiliate Disclosure
Experts and writers behind the product review articles
Here’s the landing page screenshot:
Creating this detailed page showing the editorial process will not directly help in ranking higher but build trust and credibility.
2/ Expertise Of Content Creators
One common best practice to improve E-EAT is showcasing the writer’s expertise by adding an author bio at the end of the article.
Here, GoodHousekeeping takes it a step further by creating a dedicated page for each of its content writers and editors.
If you read any article from GoodHousekeeping, you will see a clickable link to the author(s) of the article.
Here’s what it looks like:
And, when you click the author name, you will visit the individual author page with social profiles.
For example:
Why this matters:
In Google’s Quality Raters Guideline, it is mentioned that the high-level expertise of the writer is one of the characteristics of a high page rating.
Also, GoodHousekeeping publishes reviews and informational articles on health topics (which is a YMYL category), so it is important to build EAT by highlighting authors and editors.
Here’s how this strategy helped GoodHousekeeping SEO:
Because of the dedicated author page, GoodHousekepingis able to rank on the first page for these authors’ and editors’ names.
In fact, GoodHousekeeping has over 7k author pages, which drives additional site traffic and has generated 100+ backlinks.
A NOTE FOR YOU: I am not relying on affiliate links or sponsored products to generate income via this newsletter. So, if you want to support my newsletter, do consider sharing this newsletter with other SEOs and content folks.
2. Product review article structure
The information structure of a product review page is important in delivering the best UX and generating a conversion. GoodHousekeping optimizes its product review articles with a similar templated structure.
Here’s the structure:
Key elements of the product review articles from GH:
1/ Pros-cons:
One of the best ways to improve blog UX is by improving the readability of your content. For product reviews, the Pros and Cons table makes it easy for the reader to scan each product from the list.
Here’s the screenshot of using the Pros and cons for each product.
However, one thing that GoodHousekeping can improve is adding the pros and cons of structured data. This will further help GoodHousekeeping win rich results in the SERP.
2/ Product specification table
Another element that helps in readability is HTML tables of product specifications because users don’t want to read a long article to find details about a specific product.
In addition, adding HTML tables for product specifications may help win rich snippets in the SERP.
3/ Button CTAs
Driving traffic isn’t enough for affiliate sites. It also needs to bring conversion to affiliate products.
One of the ways GoodHousekeeping boosts conversion is by adding button CTAs with high-quality product images.
Screenshot of the product CTA:
Also, giving multiple options to readers to shop for the product online is helpful. This increases the chance of conversion rate.
3. Content Update
An XML sitemap is a great place to understand the content updating pattern of any website.
For example, studying the sitemap will give you an idea of content publishing/updating frequency and URL structure.
Here’s the graph of GoodHouskeeping’s content updating/publishing pattern in the last few years:
This shows that GoodHousekeping has increased its content updating or publishing frequency.
Updating existing content is important for affiliates as this helps maintain content freshness.
For example, most of the affiliate reviews are time-sensitive topics such as – Best Vacuum Cleaner of 2023, Best Fashion Accessories for 2023 Summer, etc.
Another strategy that differentiates GoodHousekeping from many mediocre affiliate sites is the transparency in the content.
Generally, when a page is updated, many sites mention the last updated date.
❌ Last updated on 20 Dec, 2022
GoodHousekeeping also mentions the information added/edited in the content.
✔️ Last updated on 20 Dec, 2022 to include additional information on X, Y, and Z
An example:
Good Housekeeping(.com) uses a small text box to highlight what changes are done in the latest content update.
Benefits:
Make your editorial process more transparent
Inform users about the latest changes
Differentiate your content from the rest
So, the next time you update an article, take a few minutes to highlight the changes done in the article.
4. Optimizing Blog Categories
One of the mistakes many websites make is not optimizing their blog category pages.
This is a missed opportunity, especially if you have topical authority in the niche and dozens of articles under each category.
Here’s how GoodHouseKeeping optimizes its category pages to rank on the first page:
Unique title and meta description
Short category page description
Internal links to sub-categories
As a result, they are ranking on the first page for terms like:
Home Products
Health and Fitness Products, etc.
Action items
1. Improve E-EAT
Product reviews or affiliate links need to focus on becoming a trustworthy online platform instead of just targeting low-difficulty keywords.
There is not a single way to improve your EEAT information but you can take inspiration from GoodHousekeeping.
Here are some of the things to consider:
Be transparent about the editorial process: it’s not about faking the editorial process. Instead, build a system that uses the products, and get experts or first-hand product users to share their opinions. Document the process and create a detailed content editorial guideline page.
Create individual pages for experts, writers, & editors: This helps build your content’s credibility and make your site associated with industry experts in Google’s knowledge graph.
2. Differentiate Your Content
If you’re just starting a new website with a few hundred pages, it is difficult to stand out if you’re creating similar content.
The better approach is to deliver a 10x better content experience.
Some of the ways:
Focus on improving content readability
Include tables, product pros and cons, CTA boxes, high-quality product images
Highlight what exactly has changed in the last content update, not just the last modified date of the article
Use proper headings
Write content from first-hand product experience
3. Maintain Content Freshness
Most affiliate sites write time-sensitive content. In that case, have a system focused on identifying pages that need improvement and freshness.
You can check URLs in Google Search Console with declined traffic in the last 3 or 6 months.
That’s all.