b3seminar: how a great creative strategy can boost your seo - andrew machin

#B3Seminar

How a great Creative Strategy can boost

your SEO Andrew Machin – Head of Creative

The current

CITATIONS

BUILD

CONVERSATIONS

NEWS

Sentiment

SOCIAL

Authority Relevance

Freshness

is listening to…

DESIGN

CONTENT

BLOG

Engagement

Satisfaction

Structure Quality

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How can you use design to improve your SEO?

STEP 1

The fundamental paradigm of engagement online

Sentiment

Authority

Relevance

Freshness

Engagement

Satisfaction

Structure

Quality is looking for

‘human’ signals

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Sentiment

Authority

Relevance

Freshness

Engagement

Satisfaction

Structure

Quality can express all of this

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What should we be creating to get people interested in your brand?

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“We are interested in others when they are interested in us.”

Publilius Syrus – 1BC

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“You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.” Dale Carnegie – 1934

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Emotional Response

Your ‘Brand’ is the

of others towards you.

“You can design and create, and build the most wonderful place in the world. But it takes people to make the dream a reality.”

Walt Disney

Them!

Step 1. Summary

Think less in terms of “About Us”

Listen to your audience

Take a sincere interest in them

Tailor your digital presence to their needs

People will take more interest in you

You’ll feed the ZMOT

STEP 2

Designing your website

The most important place creativity can affect your

SEO is your website

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CONVERSION

ENGAGEMENT

USABILITY

STRUCTURE

TRUST

AUTHORITY

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First, it is important to understand how people read web pages…

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First, it is important to understand how people read web pages…

THEY DON’T

Jacob Nielson – useit.com

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How long do you have to engage a user?

Jacob Nielson – useit.com

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How long do you have to engage a user?

3.8 seconds Jacob Nielson – useit.com

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Why is this? • We all can suffer from Analysis Paralysis

• This is why we stereotype – we create mental shortcuts

• The same rules apply to your site

• This is why we find visualisations (such as info-graphics) so engaging

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Your design 3.8 seconds to establish…

Relevance • Are you right for me? • Have you answered my

question?

Trust • Do you look credible? • Can I trust you with my

money?

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Or else…

The user returned to search. You did not satisfy their objectives.

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How do we establish

Relevance?

Relevance

• Have a clear, succinct opening proposition

• Relevant, quality imagery that backs up the proposition

• Visually outline Benefits/ USPs/Features

• Ask/Give the user what they are looking for

• Large amounts of text

• Sell hard

• Be ambiguous

• Unclear CTAs

• Focus content around “you”

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Relevance

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Relevance

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How do we establish

Trust?

Trust

• A great looking site

• Social/professional proofing

• Feature authoritative content

• Accreditations/Awards

• Case studies

• Real photography

• Responsive/Mobile friendly

• Stick with an old, dated looking site

• Poor content (inc. photography)

• Unsupported technology

• “Under construction”

• No mobile support

• No security assurance

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Trust

We engaged the user…

What next…? Jacob Nielson – useit.com

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GOAL

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£ Traffic % achieve an

objective

YOUR SITE

GOAL

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£ Traffic % achieve an

objective

YOUR SITE

GOAL

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Satisfaction?

GOAL

Remember; Google wants the full picture…

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Ensure your web design is

Usable

Why is this important?

If a website is difficult to use…

If the homepage fails to clearly state what a company offers and/what users can do on the site…

If users get lost on a website…

If a website's information is hard to read or doesn't answer users’ key questions…

…they leave

Usability

• Is your site design easy to navigate?

• Does the design conform to best interface usability practice? • Checkouts • Forms • IA • Etc.

• Bring user-goal content to the fore

• Test, test, test!

• Unsupported technology

• Unnecessary obstructions

• Cluttered design that obscure objectives for the user

• Only show, or make salient, relevant content to the user at that time

• Pop-ups

• And of course…

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Ensure your web design is

Responsive

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Poor experience on mobile…

…they leave

Google has issued clear recommendations on what it expects to see from mobile optimised websites

https://developers.google.com/webmasters/smartphone-sites/details

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You have 3 options…

Fully responsive Dynamically served HTML & CSS

Mobile version

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It will massively affect your performance

+100% MOBILE

CONVERSION

+20% CLICK

THROUGH RATE

+51% MOBILE

CONVERSION

+28% TRAFFIC

INCREASE

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Each require very specific and different methods of technical implementation. Getting it wrong could put you in the

firing line for Panda.

A quick

Example

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Web Design Summary

Make your site as good as it can be, both in terms of

Design

Experience & Usability

Streamline your primary pages to be

Engaging

Relevant

Make it responsive

The current

CITATIONS

BUILD

CONVERSATIONS

NEWS

Sentiment

SOCIAL

Authority Relevance

Freshness

is listening to…

DESIGN

CONTENT

BLOG

Engagement

Satisfaction

Structure Quality

#B3Seminar

STEP 3

Taking an interest in others

Where do we

Start?

…it takes people to make the dream a reality.

Audience

Understanding your audience • Most brands will have an idea of the audience they want to target

• Some go into advanced demographics

• If you don’t, then just get out there and ask…

• Use your social channels

• Conduct surveys

• Etc.

• Listen

• Above and beyond, the key is to discover What are they interested in?

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What can you contribute? • Take an interest

• Look for connections - What do we have in common?

• Use what you have

• Data

• Technology/tools

• Information

• Conduct research

• Surveys

• Use existing data sources

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USEFUL

ENTERTAINING

NEWS WORTHY

ORIGINAL Time to

PROVOCATIVE

APPEALING

What can we

Create?

Info/interactive graphics

On-site tools, games & hubs

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The right

Tools

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A final example

Example

• No data to work with

• Very broad target audience

• Little conversation around the industry in target audience

• Negative sentiment around the industry

• Needed to be relevant

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Overall Summary Listen

Take an interest in your audience

Answer their questions

Streamline your primary pages to be

Engaging

Relevant

Responsive

Get out there and enjoy it

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Andrew.Machin@branded3.com

@The_Machin

Thank You

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