Get Started: A Crash Course on SEO and CRO

The marketing world is so vast, it can seem pretty intimidating at times — and phrases such as search engine optimization (SEO) and conversion rate optimization (CRO) don’t really help with that. That said, both SEO and CRO are hugely important — arguably a requirement — to any successful brand’s digital marketing strategy. 

Therefore, even just knowing the basics can help you win customers and grow your brand. As experts in all things digital and social, we’re here to break SEO and CRO down so you can get a sense of how your business could benefit from these marketing strategies. 

 Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of increasing the quality and quantity of people that visit your website. An example would be if you are a Texas winemaker. If someone searches “Texas wines” on Google, you’d want your website to be the first thing they see and click on.

That is SEO. It has to do with understanding your true audience, what they’re searching for, and what kind of content you could provide that answers their intent (i.e. Texas wine products for Texas wine drinkers). However, it also has to do with the search engine itself, such as Google. Search engines will send out “crawlers” or “bots” to scan your website and determine if it’s a worthy answer to a user’s search query (i.e. it determines that you are a Texas wine producer; therefore, your website has a high chance of showing up in the search results of “Texas wines”). 

SEO is one of the most cost-effective digital marketing strategies that businesses use to draw in crowds of relevant people. CRO, on the other hand, helps turn those visitors into paying customers. 

 Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the marketing tactic that turns website visitors into loyal customers. CRO involves designing a user experience that nurtures leads and convinces them to buy your product or service. 

Similar to SEO, CRO is not a single event or action. It’s the accumulation of multiple tweaks, changes and edits to how a user experiences your website and brand. 

This has become especially pertinent in the smartphone era. The traditional sales funnel is no more. Customers in the 21st century can enter and exit your sales funnel at several different locations and for a variety of reasons. Industry research reveals that over 90% of consumers will visit your website for the first time just to look at it. They want to see that you’ve created a site they want to interact with in the future.

There are several proven benefits to SEO and CRO: 

While you may be ready to jump in now, some prep work must be done first. This makes things much easier down the line as you start tweaking your website’s design and content. It all starts with data, data, data. 

Data is important for a reason. It helps you uncover the “why” behind the users visiting and interacting with your brand. 

There is a myriad of ways of doing so:

So, what’s the point on all of this? By gathering data and truly looking at it from a number of different perspectives, you can get to know your audience like never before and then begin to build a better solution for them with the use of CRO and SEO. 

Every business needs goals, and their website is no exception. Your website should have ONE main focus (or action you want users to take) that falls in line with your overall business goals. 

Here are a few examples of different goals a website has:

Whatever your goal may be, that’s what drives virtually everything on your site, from the content you create to the layout of a page. 

It’s perfectly fine to have a secondary action. However, don’t let those distract users from your one true goal. Let’s go back to our winemaker example:

A part of the preparation phase is determining your keywords. These are words or phrases that users search type into the search bar so they can find the answer or solution to their problem or interest. This is what’s called a query. A keyword or search query can be one word like “wine” but it can also be a long phrase like “Texas wine made with organic grapes.” 

You’ll want to develop an initial list of 25 to 40 keywords to get started. These are the most relevant search terms for your business. If you are a chiropractor, then you’ll want to focus on queries that relate to chiropractic AND possibly your location, such as Texas. 

There have been literal books written on this stuff, but a good place to start is to: 

Now that you’ve adequately prepared, it’s time to act. We recommend re-examining your value proposition, the thing that makes your business unique against your competitors. This is perhaps the most important thing you can do and could have the biggest impact on conversion.