customer experience and the impact on search -searchlove boston 2015
TRANSCRIPT
CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE & THE IMPACT ON SEARCH
CASIE GILLETTE • DIRECTOR OF ONLINE MARKETING • KOMARKETING
@casieg
I just got back from London. It’s a place I’ve never been and I needed to figure out where to stay, how to get around, what to see, where to eat, …etc. Before when I was planning my trip, I did a lot of searching. I looked at Trip Advisor, read reviews, talked to friends and I asked my social media connecOons for recommendaOons. When I was there, I pulled up Yelp and asked the concierge. It was a lot of asking & a lot of reading reviews. More than ever, I relied on not just my connecOons but random strangers to help me plan my trip. And it turns out I’m not alone in this.
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70% OF PEOPLE CONSULT REVIEWS & RATINGS BEFORE PURCHASING
- BUSINESSWEEK
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15+ MILLION CONSUMERS CONSULT SOCIAL MEDIA BEFORE MAKING PURCHASE DECISIONS
– KNOWLEDGE WEEK
79% OF CONSUMERS TRUST ONLINE REVIEWS AS MUCH AS PERSONAL RECOMMENDATIONS
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- BRIGHTLOCAL
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If you take a look at TwiSer, you’ll see tons of people asking for recommendaOons.
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This doesn’t just apply to travel though. People are asking about products and services. It’s B2B and B2C.
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There are also sites like Quora, which are dedicated to helping people find informaOon by asking their peers.
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GET MONEY
This stuff maSers because it translates to real money. Consumer purchasing decisions are being heavily influenced by others.
90% OF CUSTOMERS SAY BUYING DECISIONS ARE INFLUENCED BY ONLINE REVIEWS
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– DIMENSIONAL RESEARCH
77% OF CONSUMERS ARE MORE LIKELY TO BUY A NEW PRODUCT WHEN LEARNING ABOUT IT FROM FRIENDS OR FAMILY
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- NIELSEN
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Customers now have the power and this is exciOng. With social media, blogs and the ability to be connected 24/7, we as consumers have a much bigger voice. But…the flip side of that is businesses no longer get to dictate their messaging and what people are saying about them, especially when it comes to their online presence.
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And the boSom line is this include search. People are searching in new ways. They are searching for answers and opinions versus simply searching for a product.
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And that’s not where it ends. The search results themselves have changed. Take for example “hotels in London” – that SERP is no longer a list of hotels in London. Instead search results are showing review sites and recommendaOons. As search marketers, our job just got more complicated. We are not just working to be listed in the search results, we now have to figure out how to make sure our businesses are listed in the results within the results.
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And the staOsOcs we just saw tell us those results must be posiOve.
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Because we don’t want this…
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Or this…
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What we do want is this.
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We want people to talk about our business and be so passionate about our company that they are willing to taSoo our logo on themselves.
THIS IS SEARCH.
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But despite the changes, search inevitably comes back to the basics: Keywords, Content & Links
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Keywords are the foundaOon of any SEO strategy and there’s something really important happening here -‐ the way people are searching is changing. For a long Ome, people searched in a very broad way. They used one or two keywords and then based on the results, they clarified their search. Today that’s different. People understand search engines much beSer and they know that search engines can answer their quesOons and their intent beSer than every before.
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40% USE MORE THAN THREE WORDS
via Statista
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KNOWLEDGE GRAPH
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ANSWER BOXES
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And this is where the customer comes in. You need to know what quesOons your customers are asking and offer content that answers it. You need to know intent. How are your customers talking about you online? How are they talking about your product or service or compeOtor or industry?
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CASE STUDY
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CASE STUDY Client A sells cabinets. But it turns out cabinets was not the right term. Their customers were talking about them using words like “industrial” and “heavy-‐duty.” Which forced us to change our strategy and the content on the page.
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2013 2015 2014
50% INCREASE IN ORGANIC TRAFFIC
CABINETS
INDUSTRIAL CABINETS
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2013 2015 2014
50% INCREASE IN ORGANIC CONVERSIONS
CABINETS
INDUSTRIAL CABINETS
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Talk to your customers whenever you have a chance. Along with that, start finding out what people are saying on the web. Check review sites. Take a look at how the site is describing your product or service, and how customers are talking about you. Find out what the negaOves are and what the posiOves are. These will help inform your keyword strategy but more so your content.
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Look at referral traffic. Actually go to the sites and see how they are talking about you.
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AddiOonally, use tools! Tools like FAQFox and SERPstat show you what quesOons people are asking.
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Monitor social media for your brand terms but don’t forget about industry terms & compeOtor names. Understand what people are asking about, what problems they are having, and what terms they are using to describe products.
CONTENT
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CONTENT
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There is a disconnect between the content on the site and the content users want to see.
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CASE STUDY
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Client B had a very product focused site. It wasn’t targeted to what their customers needed or the quesOons their customers were actually asking.
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We found the Spiceworks community had tons of quesOons around their product and industry. We took these quesOons and created arOcles.
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Month 1
53% INCREASE IN ORGANIC TRAFFIC
NEW CONTENT
Month 2 Month 3
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As you think about content creaOon, take into consideraOon what people are asking.
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Talk to you customer support team.
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Find out what’s already driving traffic to you site using analyOcs.
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Buzzsumo can show you top content on your site or your compeOtors to help you understand what your customers like.
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Content markeOng must have markeOng.
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Which social networks drive the most traffic to your site?
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3% of customers drive 90% of social engagement. Find the 3% of people interested in talking about you.
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IdenOfy relevant hashtags that are being used to promote your content.
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LINK BUILDING SUCKS
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These are links! They were driven by posiOve customer experiences.
CASE STUDY @casieg
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50 BLOGGERS = 100 LINKS
To help build Client C’s brand, we targeted customers with influenOal blogs. We sent them products and in return, we generated over 100 links on relevant sites.
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Say thank you.
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Send your customers thank you cards.
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CALL ME Call your customers to check in. Ask how you can help and thank them for being a customer.
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Show your customers you appreciate them by promoOng them on your own site.
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POST Find people you already have relaOonships with and idenOfy any guest post opportuniOes.
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Ask for reviews. People are more likely to review your product or service if you just ask.
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THIS IS SEARCH.
Our jobs aren’t easy and with all of the changes in technology and how people search, these challenges aren’t going away. But the good news is it’s exciOng and we as customers have the insight into what we want from businesses. The key is translaOng that to your exisOng adverOsing and search markeOng programs.
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THANKS! CASIE GILLETTE • DIRECTOR OF ONLINE MARKETING • KOMARKETING