Digital marketing is more relevant than ever. Businesses around the world are thriving from their connection to customers on digital forums like websites and social media.
More than ever, this type of business presence is being seen to impact revenue across nearly every industry. Consumer trends are shifting towards the digital, but their underlying habits remain largely the same. One such habit is that of prior research before making a purchase. In today’s digital landscape, one of the most-traversed avenues of pre-purchase research is through Google.
The Power of Search Engines
Google has founded their empire on helping people find information online. Typing something into the Google search gives the results Google believes are most-relevant to the question or keyword asked. When it comes to the businesses listed in these search engine results page (SERP) the order in which they are displayed can make or break them. Results at the top of the Google SERP (Search Engine Ranking Position) get the most clicks obviously, but it’s shocking to learn what small a percentage of click-share can be found as you move down the first page. In this blog post by Novomotus, a digital marketing agency specializing in SEO, several studies describing the click through rate (CTR) percentages in the SERP were averaged together. They describe, on average, the first result receiving 37% CTR; the second receiving 14% CTR; the third receiving 10% CTR, and the fourth receiving 7% CTR. Also shocking, one of the referenced studies used in their data collection noted that 92% of all search clicks were given to results on the first page. The general takeaway here is that websites not found towards the top of the SERP are likely to receive an insignificant amount of website traffic.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
It’s not a quick trip to the top of the SERP, but there are some effective actions to assist in the endeavor. Professionally, these actions are referred to as Search Engine Optimization (SEO). SEO has become a quickly-growing niche within the digital marketing industry. Businesses are starting to recognize the impact that a first position in Google search can have on their bottom line, and are becoming more and more willing to invest in those positions. To help illustrate the value of these types of SERP positions, consider the cost of direct search engine advertising. Google’s main source of revenue comes from their AdWords product. As reported by Investopedia, as much as 77% of this revenue comes directly from Google-owned websites such as Google Search. The fastest way for a small business to have their website appear at the top of the SERP is to simply pay an advertising fee for Google to place them there. By comparison, SEO involves an initial investment by websites to meet the required ranking factors needed for Google to place their website at the top of Organic search results automatically. This is no easy task in most cases, but essentially provides the same advertising exposure offered through Google’s AdWords product for free. SEO agencies have emerged as business service providers to help websites seeking better search engine ranking positions meet their goals.
Ranking Factors
SEO has been traditionally regarded as website optimization tasks focused on technical tasks such as html coding best-practices. In modern application however, SEO has become more of a blanket term to describe many off-site actions such as the building of backlinks. SemRush, one of the SEO industry’s leading data providers, posted an analysis of impacts attributed to different ranking factors in their 2017 Ranking Factors Report. In their blog post here, SemRush describes the most important factors as being total website visits, average time on site, pages-per-session (bounce rate), total referring domains (backlinks), and content length as being the most impactful ranking factors. The big surprise here was the most important ranking factor being overall website visits. This factor essentially means that more authoritative websites are given favor by Google. Websites like Wikipedia, Amazon, and other such behemoths now seemingly have an unfair advantage against smaller, newer websites—so it would seem.
The Future of SEO
SEO changes alongside with Google, as the evolution of user interaction progresses into new and uncharted territories. The surge in mobile users has seen dynamic shifts in how search results are shown. This has greatly impacted the CTR rates websites see in the SERP. In some cases this has been favorable, in others not so much. The SemRush ranking factors report described a large favor towards more authoritative websites, though many SEO professionals would describe an opposing trend. Many SEOs have noted Google’s favor towards smaller, more niche-evolved websites in recent years. These sites tend to have more deeply-developed content compared to larger sites. An example would be an article on a news website about the health benefits of running, compared to an article on a website dedicated to exploring the research associated with the health impacts of running. While the second might receive less overall traffic, it would likely have more relevant information. The Local Pack results have also given smaller websites an advantage over larger ones, allowing small local businesses to compete against national brands. These are all dynamics that must be considered when planning an effective SEO marketing campaign. Even with the technical know-how and financial resources to rank websites, no business is guaranteed the SERP won’t be in a different format a year, month, or even week down the road.