Biggest SEO Mistakes DTC Brands Make – Part 2
📈 Mistake 3: Forgetting About Conversion Optimization
No matter where you fall on the SEO VS. CRO responsibilities debate, one thing is clear. When no one converts, everybody loses.
Conversions go hand in hand with traffic and when both are optimized, baby, we’ve got something special.
CRO is all about split testing and finding which version of a page generates the most conversions from your traffic.
Will you run an A/B split test, multivariate test, or some other test?
Whatever you decide, you’ll need a testing plan. Your plan should:
- Identify which pages you want to test and build a hypothesis.
- Include a pipeline of things you want to test and prioritize.
- Specify what type of test to run (a/b, multivariate, split URL).
- Define your primary, secondary, and monitoring goals.
- Set a recurring testing schedule.
Once you have your testing plan, you need the right software to carry it out and there’s no shortage of tools like VWO and Google Optimize.
😤 Mistake 4: Avoiding the Technical Stuff
Content is just one part of SEO.
There’s the technical side like JavaScript SEO, mobile web performance, site architecture, and tons more. Brands who lean into the technical piece will come out ahead, as Google’s algorithm continues to evolve.
Web Performance:
In May, Google updated its page experience ranking signals based on what it calls Core Web Vitals.
Google evaluates web pages on desktop and mobile devices and scores the experience. That score factors into search engine ranking.
Use Google’s Measure tool to get your score and a report with highlighted areas for improvement. Making updates can help improve your rankings.
Internal Links:
SEOs generally do a good job of earning links from other sites but often overlook internal links. Internal links are like roads that connect the neighborhoods of your website.
Links create traffic flow.
Pages with no internal links (orphan pages) are unfindable and unusable roads. Pages with only one internal link (dead-end pages) don't allow through traffic and offer limited use to visitors.
Google likes well-planned websites.
The better your roads and infrastructure, the easier it is for Google to navigate your neighborhood, and Google prefers sending traffic to well-planned websites because they offer a good user experience.
The moral of the story is, make your internal links a top priority.
Technical Audit:
Drivers put a lot of wear and tear on cars, so much in fact that they need regular maintenance. Websites are the same.
New pages get added frequently, code changes, and stuff moves all the time.
If an audit isn’t being run on your website at least once a quarter, you’re leaving yourself vulnerable to SEO issues that may start minor but could compound into bigger problems.
Tools like Sitebulb and ContentKing will automate crawling, data collection, and SEO recommendations.
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