CRO means testing several designs – or versions of a single design – to identify hidden problems with a website that could cost business for the site owner. The simple truth is that esthetics and strategically placed visuals can make a big difference to increase conversions. So, once you know how well visitors are delivering on the business goal/s of the site, you can figure out what to change to increase the conversion rate. A fresh set of eyes – trained in web copywriting and design – can help you interpret the analytics information, and be a valuable source of recommendations.

Of course, you can get CRO services from any number of places. You can go to a big web design firm and, after you dole out 15 grand or more, you will likely have a design that fits your online target audience.

Search engine optimization (SEO) companies do many aspects of CRO well: testing headlines, the call to action, content, images, etc. But SEO firms don’t address conversion-based web design as well as a web designer or design firm.

Testing designs for conversion should be a normal part of any web design project, if the goal is to get a response from web visitors. But testing different designs doesn’t have to be difficult (or expensive), especially for a talented and reasonably priced web developer. The problem is that most talented, reasonably priced web developers don’t have a clue about testing their designs for conversion. But they might invest in getting the proper resources in place if businesses asked for it. Where are the talented, reasonably priced web developers who engage in conversion-based design?

Working upside-down
I find that many websites are designed upside-down. That is, the site is more about what the company wants to communicate than about what the target audience is after. (Case in point: When was the last time you actually clicked – let alone read the information – on  an “About Us” page? Information like that is usually tailored to the ego of the company’s leader/s.)

This kind of upside-down website focuses on getting tons of traffic so they can sell-sell-sell. . . without thinking through how their target audience perceives and interacts with the website.

If conversion is the goal of all marketing, then the key to getting the response you want from a site is to engage the target audience by building the site for and about them and what they want.

Failing to plan is planning. . .
SEO and paid search campaigns play a big part in planning for a good conversion rate, especially when content is designed specifically to engage the target audience. Otherwise, you waste a lot of costly traffic on content that doesn’t convert.

In the past, most web developers did not consider the implications of SEO during the design phase. Thankfully, that has changed, and most web designers now bring in an SEO professional. In fact, it’s rare to find a web designer who does not also attempt SEO, but that’s a discussion for another time.

But that old pattern remains because today, most web developers do not consider the implications of conversion rate optimization during the design phase. Let me illustrate.

Many businesses get into Internet marketing like this:

1. Design or upgrade the website.
2. Implement Google Adwords, social media and/or SEO.
3. Ask what the target market thinks.

It’s a ready-fire-aim approach to internet marketing that wastes time and resources. But there is a better way:

1. Know the target audience.
2. Design the site and develop content to tap into the target market’s motivations, following SEO best practices at each step along the way.
3. Test the site by letting your users’ natural actions help you craft the design and content that gets the best results.
4. Continue testing to gain optimal ROI.

CRO certainly isn’t difficult, but it does require on-target analysis of a site’s strengths and weaknesses (and, sometimes, the willingness to set aside egos) in order to develop a site that truly functions effectively.

For developers and designers, there’s no downside to conversion-based design. Nothing to lose and a whole lot to gain.

Tom Shivers is an SEO consultant and president of Capture Commerce, founded in 2000 to provide tailored Internet marketing that gets conversions.

One question many businesses have when hunting for a search engine optimization (SEO) company is, “Will this company know us and our audience well enough to turn our web business into something profitable, worthy of our investment?” Unfortunately, it’s not easy to discern the answer before you are three months into an agreement.

Web Traffic vs. Engagement
Is the goal of SEO to get as much traffic as possible to a website? Many SEO companies will lead you to believe that more traffic is all there is to it. Granted, getting more traffic is a part of it, but more eyeballs on a web page do not necessarily mean achieving your business goals.

Look at your web analytics – specifically the keywords that brought in the majority of traffic – then evaluate the quality of this traffic over the past month or quarter. A high bounce rate and low average time on site for visits from a particular keyword can indicate one or all of these:

• Searcher cannot find anything relevant to her keyword and bounces.
• Searcher may find something relevant, but the page does not communicate directly with her intent… so she bounces.
• The keyword is not relevant for the site.

Let me suggest that the focus of SEO should be audience engagement, rather than traffic. According to Eric T. Peterson of Web Analytics Demystified, “Engagement is an estimate of the depth of visitor interaction against a clearly defined set of goals.” That’s pretty clear: Without specific goals, driving more traffic to your website sounds like a good option.

But if a visitor hits your site and bounces, your depth of visitor interaction is null. To truly engage a visitor requires relevance and targeted communication. So what is best for your business? Consider a different approach: using SEO to build audience engagement.

Steps to audience engagement via SEO:

1. Define the business goal/s. “Getting on the first page of Google” or “Getting more traffic” are usually not much more than the hopes of individuals who have not defined strategic business goals. Instead, a targeted goal might be, “To generate quality leads from the website that result in 20% of annual business.

2. Prioritize keywords according to relevant intent, rather than potential traffic volume. It’s always interesting to see keyword research sorted to show the most popular to the least popular search terms. But could the real valuable search terms be those that are less popular, but rich with intent?

Most searchers can be divided into one of two camps: the researcher (who doesn’t yet know what he wants) and the purchaser (who has already done the research and knows exactly what she wants).

In some cases it makes sense to target both groups; you can sometimes see the intent with the search phrase. Now with your short list of researcher and purchaser search terms, can you confidently say that 90% of these searchers, if they clicked through to your site, would find something relevant, useful and of value? If you can’t, then your keyword is probably not rich with intent.

3. Prepare content that speaks directly to each motivation behind the searcher’s intent
Researchers want product/service info, comparisons, evaluation criteria and RFP info. Purchasers want the best corporate fit, customer service, implementation and procurement info.

Let’s consider a sales training business as an example. Their most desired keyword is sales training, but it’s easy to see that the search term sales training is general, not descriptive. A person using that phrase is really not in purchase mode at the moment. The researcher’s motivation (sometimes known as “tire kickers”) is probably to get free tips, to compare sales training services and specifics so she can learn something and perhaps make a decision later.

Now consider a more descriptive keyword for this business: sales training consultant. Can you see the motivation behind this search? SEO providers with a “get more traffic” mentality side-step this issue. But to achieve audience engagement, you need guidance in the motivations behind the keywords you select. This drives content development that fits your audience and your site, as well as avoiding awkward or confusing phrasing.

4. Define the unique value proposition (UVP)
Businesses that have invested in uncovering this piece of the puzzle are light-years ahead of their competition in all aspects of marketing. When it comes to SEO, the UVP has to be interpreted and applied to the searcher’s intent. It’s not necessary for an SEO consultant to understand the principles of semantics, but the right interpretation of the UVP can go a long way to achieving audience engagement.

5. Deliver on (and exceed) the UVP to create loyalty
Do what you say you will do. Deliver on the promises you make. Do what is right from your new customer’s perspective, and go beyond their expectations to forge a lasting relationship. These are common sense, good business practices that bring future rewards.

“But,” you ask, “what does that have to do with SEO?” Everything, if you want long-term customer loyalty rather than more, sort-of-qualified traffic. Loyalty is a measurable metric and often comes with SEO rewards like fabulous testimonials and links from customer sites.

At the end of the day, businesses want SEO consultants who tailor their Internet marketing directly to the bottom line by bringing valuable traffic from multiple sources, optimized conversion rates and returning customers – rather than simply getting more traffic to the site.

Author: Tom Shivers is president of Capture Commerce, an Atlanta SEO company, founded in 2000 to provide tailored Internet marketing plans for start ups and entrepreneurs.

How can this be? Let’s go back to the initial discussion with the web developer. While establishing requirements for the new design, I’m sure you and your team were excited about all the possibilities for “wowing” your online audience with cool new gadgets and visual enhancements, but did something like “maintaining or enhancing our good search rankings” ever get into the mix of requirements? If so, then your web developer is responsible for your troubled search rank.

Web developers who take on a requirement like this (also known as website migration) must understand how to properly transition a site to the new design so that search rank is maintained. Here are some tips:

• Top ranking pages and URLs of your site must be redirected to the new URLs so that search engines are instructed that the page has been replaced at the time the new design goes live.
• External links to URLs deep within your site must be accounted for again with redirects.
• Title tags, content and other keyword rich areas of the page must be transferred from the old page to the new page.
• A custom 404 error page should be setup in case someone clicks on an old link that hasn’t been accounted for properly. This will help users find something useful on your site rather than getting the default PAGE NOT FOUND error message.

The type of redirect to use depends on the type of server the old and new design is hosted with (Windows vs. Apache server). In most cases you will want to use the 301 or permanent redirect as opposed to the 302 or temporary redirect. The 301 redirect tells the search engine that all links associated with the old URL are now transferred over to the new URL.

Get the 8 step outline, a whitepaper, on how to transition from the old to the new website (website migration).

Author: Tom Shivers is an SEO consultant and president of Capture Commerce, founded in 2000 to provide tailored Internet marketing plans – valuable traffic from multiple sources, optimized conversion rates and loyal customers.

Here’s the hard truth about SEO. For every keyword phrase you want to gain high organic rank, you must be prepared to create the kind of content for your website that will set you apart from other sites also targeting that keyword, and make your site “authoritative” on these subjects.

Because of the enormous amount of competition for coveted search terms, your site will not have a chance to outrank competitors unless you are committed to doing these two things. The way you approach authoritative and organized content will make all the difference in your organic rankings.

The naïve (Elmer Fudd) approach to SEO – Assumes prospects think like you do, and find your site using the terms and buzzwords you want them to use, so you:

• Prepare content and web pages on important search terms
• Put the keyword in the title, meta tags and all the other places on the page that make sense
• Use the search term in the website, but keep those pages from the main navigation of the site because they do not promote the brand name, positioning statement or exactly what you want to be known for
• Do lots and lots of link building

The informed (Bugs Bunny) approach to SEO – Puts you in your prospects’ shoes by asking:

1. Why would someone use this search term (rather than a different one)?
2. How can we address the real intent of this person on our website?
3. Which media communicates best with this individual: video, articles, music, images, interactive tools or a combination?
4. What’s the best way to encourage this individual to learn more and discover that we are a credible organization in the process?
5. How can we organize the content of our site so that users and search engines can quickly find (within one click) what they are looking for – even if it doesn’t match our brand name initiatives perfectly?

The informed approach knows that, in a new medium, it takes time and effort to learn the new rules and earn respect from your prospective audiences. The Internet is one such medium. Would you begin an advertising campaign targeting New York Giants’ fans before learning what motivates them to listen up and take action? Of course not, and the same is true of the Internet community. Don’t be naïve; be informed.

You might be naïve like Elmer Fudd about SEO if you:

• Are willing to take, scrape or buy pre-developed content to use on your site
• Think SEO is simply making keyword changes to the website and building links
• Think your web visitors buy for the same reasons you would, and set up the selling processes on your site accordingly
• Focus on pushing your brand name messages and industry buzz words
• Fear collaborating with online competitors

You might be informed like Bugs Bunny about SEO if you:

• Are willing to create your own, unique web content that addresses the intent of your online audience
• Think SEO is about engaging your online audience so that they deliver wanted responses and link back to your site from their site, blog, Facebook page, etc.
• Research your online customers to find out what motivates them to buy, and then prepare pathways that fit their decision processes
• Explore new ways of engaging and educating online prospects even if they are naïve about your industry or brand
• Are open to share, collaborate and build relationships online – even with competitors – to creatively engage your online audience

Don’t be naïve; be informed and take your Internet marketing and SEO to the next level.

Author: Tom Shivers is an SEO consultant and president of Capture Commerce, founded in 2000 to provide tailored Internet marketing plans – valuable traffic from multiple sources, optimized conversion rates and loyal customers. Use our SEO process tutorial to get started with the basics of SEO.