In a recent study I lead for Info-Tech Research Group, entitled Drive Web Traffic with SEO, respondents consistently reported traffic increases after Search Engine Optimization (SEO). This experience from the Marketing Manager for a Professional Services group is typical of what we heard:

Making some major changes to our URL structure, using keyword-rich page titles, and cleaning up code errors has resulted in a nearly 200% traffic growth year-over-year.

We surveyed IT and marketing leaders in over 90 organizations that had recently redesigned their Web sites. We asked them how thorough they were in their SEO efforts and whether their redesigned site showed an increase in traffic compared to their earlier site. Of the responds that were not very through in their SEO efforts, only 26% reported a traffic increase after the redesign, compared to 72% of respondents who were very thorough. This suggests that the more thoroughly you integrate SEO deep into your overall web and marketing strategy, the more impact it has on site traffic. A complete plan for thorough and effective SEO can be found in the report.

These results show that the majority of respondents have confidence that SEO is an effective accelerator of Web traffic. Remember that thorough SEO should be planned from the start and be a key part of a broad web and marketing strategy.

Thorough SEO is shown to increase site traffic. Not only that, but the same Info-Tech study [1] found many other benefits which l have covered in posts on SEO and increased stickiness, improved brand image, and increased revenue and stakeholder engagement.

In addition to these direct benefits, SEO has certain indirect benefits. For example, most of what needs to be done for SEO also makes site content more appealing and increases the number of links back to the site. This combination of direct and indirect benefits makes the case for SEO even stronger, leading to an easy decision: just optimize it!

1. Drive Web Traffic with Search Engine Optimization, Info-Tech Research Group, April 2010

Shareholder interest in a Web property is always about the bottom line: will it generate revenue and increase profits. What about stakeholders? A recent study I led for Info-Tech Research Group, entitled Drive Web Traffic with SEO [1], shows that a thorough Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy integrated into a Web site redesign not only delivered revenue increases, but also impressed stakeholders like corporate executives, managers, and administrators.

We surveyed IT and marketing leaders in 95 organizations that had recently redesigned their Web sites. We asked them how thorough they were in their SEO efforts and whether their redesigned site was associated with an increase in revenue (either ecommerce or overall sales). Of the respondents that were not very through in their SEO efforts, only 12% reported a revenue increase after the redesign, compared to 33% of respondents who were very thorough. This suggests that thoroughly integrating SEO deep into your overall web and marketing strategy increases revenue. A complete plan for thorough and effective SEO can be found in the report.

One business leader interviewed commented on SEO and company top-line:

SEO provides multiple points of value, not the least of which is the ROI from increasing sales through search engine yields. -Marketing Coordinator, Electronic Distribution

SEO’s positive impact on revenue is likely to meet the approval of company shareholders.

Results in the same study also focused on stakeholder engagement: were they impressed by what thorough SEO can do? The graph below shows results:

The results suggest a linear relationship between SEO thoroughness and positively impressing stakeholders: the more thorough the SEO, the more impressed stakeholders became with a Web site redesign project.

Here is an observation on the popularity of SEO among executive stakeholders:

I have found SEO to be a major benefit to garnering executive support.” -Marketing Manager, Professional Services

In addition to these direct benefits, SEO has certain indirect benefits. For example, most of what needs to be done for SEO also makes site content more appealing and increases the number of links back to the site. This combination of direct and indirect benefits makes the case for SEO even stronger, leading to an easy decision: just optimize it!

1. Drive Web Traffic with Search Engine Optimization, Info-Tech Research Group, April 2010

Can Search Engine Optimization (SEO) enhance your brand? A study I led for Info-Tech Research Group entitled Drive Web Traffic with SEO [1] found that it can.

Ranking high on the search engine response page (SERP) will increase your brand visibility, making it easier for your target customers to find your brand and products online, as well as any promotions you are offering. Here is a quote by one marketing practitioner we interviewed in the study:

Having a more prominent search engine response page presence helps proliferate and define your brand, as it creates greater online exposure and accessibility.

Not only does SEO’s impact on brand visibility increase the quantity of potential customers that learn about your brand, it also shapes the quality of their perception. A full 36% of Internet users surveyed said that seeing a company listed among the top SERP listings made them think the company is at the top of its field. Looking at both quantity of impressions and quality of perception together, we see that they are multipliers. Since SEO impacts both, the impact on brand equity is substantial. We can express both of these effects mathematically as follows:

          Increased Quantity of Impressions x Enhanced Quality of Perception = Increased Brand Equity

Perhaps this explains why all study participants with very thorough SEO said it led to improved brand image.

We surveyed IT and marketing leaders in 95 enterprises that redesigned their Web sites. We asked them how thorough they were about their SEO efforts, and if the site-redesign that came out of that raised the image of their brand. We found that the high levels of SEO thoroughness were associated with improved brand image. The chart below summarizes this result:

Of the responds that were not very through in their SEO efforts, only 44% reported an improved brand image after the redesign, compared to a full 100% of respondents who were very thorough.

This suggests that the more thoroughly you integrate SEO deep into your overall web and marketing strategy, the more impact it has on brand image. A complete plan for thorough and effective SEO can be found in the report.

Thorough SEO improves your brand equity. Not only that, but the same Info-Tech study found many other benefits which l have covered in posts on SEO and increased stickiness, increased traffic, and increased revenue and stakeholder engagement.

In addition to these direct benefits, SEO has certain indirect benefits. For example, most of what needs to be done for SEO also makes site content more appealing and increases the number of links back to the site. This combination of direct and indirect benefits makes the case for SEO even stronger, leading to an easy decision: just optimize it!

1. Drive Web Traffic with Search Engine Optimization, Info-Tech Research Group, April 2010

Many Web properties are looking for ways to increase brand value, ecommerce success, or both. This has led to an interest in what is known as “customer stickiness.” On the Web, customer stickiness is the tendency for site users to visit a particular site frequently, spend more time on a site’s pages, and re-browse pages. Stickiness as defined here includes contains two elements:

• Session stickiness: the tendency to spend more time on a site in each site visit;
• Site stickiness: the tendency to spend more total time on a site spread over multiple sessions.

Why is customer stickiness important? A study of over 10,000 households found that purchases on e-commerce sites increased as stickiness increased [1]. This suggests that it is in the financial interest of transactional sites to increase their stickiness. And it’s reasonable to infer that brand marketers will see increases in brand awareness and engagement with an increase in stickiness.

It’s likely that many elements of good Web design will increase site stickiness. The following spring to mind without much effort: increased aesthetic appeal, enhanced usability, improved site performance, engaging content, etc. While Search Engine Optimization (SEO) isn’t the first thing I’d think of investing effort in if I’d wanted to improve site stickiness, in a recent study I led for Info-Tech Research Group entitled Drive Web Traffic with SEO [2], respondents reported that SEO did exactly that.

We surveyed IT and marketing leaders in over 90 organizations that redesigned their Web sites. We asked them how thorough they were about their SEO efforts and whether their redesigned site was stickier than the original site. Of those that reported very thorough SEO implementation, 67% said the redesigned site was stickier, compared to only 11% that rated their SEO efforts as very low. So very through SEO is six times more likely to be associated with increased stickiness when compared with not very through SEO, suggesting that if stickiness is the goal, SEO is worth the effort.

It’s pretty easy to understand how SEO can increase site traffic. Your site is seen by more searchers looking for what you are offering, some of whom click on a link in the search engine results page (SERP), more searchers come to your site, and so you end up with more traffic. The relationship is pretty direct.

But understanding how SEO can improve stickiness is not as straightforward. Here is my take:

• Keyword research provides content developers with an understanding of what is of interest to their users and how those ideas are expressed in specific words.
• Keyword rich content is by definition more interesting to users because it is focused on what they are searching for and expressed in their own language.
• This targeted content is sticker because it’s targeted. It might not be stickier for all potential users, but it’s sticker for users that arrive at site from a SERP, because it has content that is of interest to them.

There are other influencing aspects, but these factors are part of the reason why SEO has an impact on stickiness.

With Web site stickiness being associated with an increase in revenue, and thorough SEO being associated with a six-fold increase stickiness, implementing SEO seems like a no-brainer. Not only that, but the same Info-Tech study [2] found many other benefits which l have covered in posts on SEO and increased traffic, improved brand image, and increased revenue and stakeholder engagement.

In addition to these direct benefits, SEO has certain indirect benefits. For example, most of what needs to be done for SEO also makes site content more appealing and increases the number of links back to the site. This combination of direct and indirect benefits makes the case for SEO even stronger, leading to an easy decision: just optimize it!

1. Is Stickiness Profitable for Electronic Retailers, Lin Lin et al, Communications of the ACM, March 2010
2. Drive Web Traffic with Search Engine Optimization, InfoTech Research Group, April 2010