#112: Planning and executing SEO strategy for a new website
Learn about conversion-focused SEO strategy & a conversion hack to increase the # of leads from blog articles.
Hey, Rafiqul here. Welcome to the #112th episode of Content Marketing VIP, which delivers actionable insights, SEO case studies & free resources.
First time here? Read past episodes.
1. How we planned and executed the conversion-first SEO strategy for a client (case study)
Currently, we are working with a well-known IT training institute in India and handling their SEO activities.
Some background of the project before we started:
The company has a strong offline presence in Vijayawada location
Almost no SEO work done previously
Domain rating: 30
<50 pages on the website
~90% of organic traffic was coming from branded searches
Client’s goals:
There are almost 5 training programs that we wanted to rank in three different locations: Bangalore, Hyderabad, and Vijayawada.
Here’s how we planned the entire strategy:
Step 1. Improving the website structure
The first thing we did was optimize the website for better UX and content experience. This includes:
Updating navigation style
Page layout of course training pages and blog posts
Integrating CTA
Redesigning the homepage (adding brand-related content and added a lot of social proof)
Step 2. Planning the location-specific course training pages
Once we performed the keyword research and search intent analysis, we decided to go with a dedicated location-specific page for each training course.
Here’s the structure we created:
The challenge was including this many pages from the navigation and homepage, as we wanted to pass the maximum PageRank by having them in the header navigation.
So, we categorized our total course pages like this for the navigation (using sub-menu):
1. Python training
Vijayawada
Hyderabad
Bangalore
2. Java course
Vijayawada
Hyderabad
And so on…
Step 3. Targeting bottom-of-the-funnel keywords with blog articles
It took us almost 30-45 days to plan, create, publish, and optimize almost 20 landing pages on the website.
Once the basics are covered, we decided to plan our blog strategy. However, we didn’t want to prioritize traffic and create blog articles just for the sake of it.
So, we did interviews with the client to understand the common questions before enrolling in the course and turned the ideas into blog topics. Here are a few examples:
This helped us generate qualified traffic and leads for our primary courses.
Step 4. Setting up conversion tracking
Currently, we are tracking every signup and form fillup on the website through the GA4 conversion events setup.
Step 5. Backlink building
The website is already listed on almost all important directories and NAP listings. So, we started with creating high-quality backlinks to the homepage first (using the Featured platform)
This will help us to pass PageRank to our course pages over time.
The next thing we are doing is reaching out to existing blog articles with ‘Top X course in location Y’ and getting our brand listed with a link back to our course page.
Some of these turned out to be a paid content collaboration and some of them agreed in return for guest articles and social media promotion.
⭐ Results so far
After 1 month of creating our new website, we have generated first-page rankings for some key course terms such as ‘Python training in Vijayawada’, ‘course fees’, etc.
Here’s the improvement in the number of ranking keywords by position:
By the end of March, we will convert those second-page rankings into the first page by creating more contextual and local backlinks.
The best part, we have already started generating leads through our course and syllabus pages.
That’s all.
If you want to learn about my SEO approach, find the details here.
2. This simple SEO hack will improve your leads and conversions
One of the suggestions we give to our B2B clients is to feature blog posts (with buying intent) in:
header navigation
bottom of the homepage
footer section
or sometimes in the sidebar
Here’s an example:
However, we do not randomly create a list of blog posts to feature on our website.
Instead, we make data-driven decisions to increase the number of leads and conversion rate.
Here’s how:
Step 1. Set up the conversion events in GA4. It could be a product demo trial, visiting the thank-you page, downloading a form, form fill-up, etc.
Not sure how to set up your conversion in GA4, watch this video.
Step 2. You need historical data on conversion rates from blog posts. Once you collect enough data (1-3 months) for # of conversions by landing page, you can create a list of articles that generated the most number of conversions.
Here’s an example where we checked the number of conversions by page (including blog posts):
Step 3. Now, we prioritize these blog articles with the most number of conversions and the highest conversion rate.
Why? Because these posts are proven lead-generating machines promoting them more and more will increase your conversions.
Also, featuring these articles from the navigation/header/footer will get them more PageRank—which is good for improving/maintaining your ranking.
ACTION ITEMS:
Set up conversion events in GA4 to track conversion points such as demo signups, form fills, etc.
Collect at least 1-3 months of conversion data (if you don’t have any historical data) on the number of conversions by landing page.
Create a list of blog posts that generate the most conversions and with the highest conversion rate.
Feature these high-converting posts in your header navigation, homepage, footer, etc.
That’s the wrap in today’s newsletter.
See you next week.
In the meantime, go through our past episodes and find actional SEO strategies and case studies.