If you are a good digital marketer, you don’t target Google. You target users.
Carmen Domínguez is Head of Organic at UK-based Hallam, the award-winning integrated digital marketing agency with a strategic focus. Hallam is one of the UK’s most recommended SEO agencies.
In this episode of Velocitize Talks, Carmen Domínguez shares her thoughts on SEO, Google, and Natural Language Processing. She is also a guest lecturer at Instituto Superior de Estudios Lingüísticos y Traducción, or ISTRAD.
SEO: Search Me
Can Google find it? Because if Google cannot find it, absolutely no user is going to find it.
Given that roughly 80% of web traffic begins with a simple search query, today’s SEO requires a much more intensive strategy than just the use of keywords and backlinks. In order to gain higher visibility in search results, businesses need to prioritize Google rankings and metrics, content analysis, and brand performance.
“Keep an eye on user trends because whatever user trends you see more than likely are going to be replicated any moment in Google,” Domínguez says.
For example, one of the more recent changes to the Google ranking algorithm was the page experience update, which places greater emphasis on the user experience.
When creating a comprehensive SEO plan, Domínguez considers whether the client’s website and usability is technically sound and, most importantly, whether it’s discoverable by Google.
“Can people reach me? Am I a brand that shows that it can be trusted, showcases that it has authority in a field and is known in the right places by the right people?” asks Domínguez.
The Language of AI
The truth is AI has been around a long time. It’s nothing new.
AI relies on Natural Language Processing (NLP) to help computers process language and mimic real human conversations, which is being implemented industry-wide with platforms like ChatGPT. For example, ChatGPT is popular because it offers speed, efficiency, and volume. However, at this point, copying and pasting whatever ChatGPT churns out will not provide content that is truly unique, and easily discoverable.
An estimated 85% of marketers report using AI in some capacity for content. Although AI can help streamline SEO processes, AI-generated content still requires human input and editing to achieve higher rankings and conversions.
Using AI-powered recommendation engines to suggest products based on a user’s browsing history can vastly improve the user experience
“Google is going to consider whatever you search for in your Gmail, whatever you search for in your IP, whatever you search for previously, anything that it has access to,” Domínguez says. “All this information is going to be stored and it will use all of that with machine learning and AI to provide the right search for you.”
Conversion Rates
The closer you think of Google as a potential user, as a person, the more chances you have to actually rank or make a conversion, which is ultimately what you want.
Optimum search functionality can increase the number of qualified leads and conversions, and increasing traffic is just one of the important KPIs. In order to create a proper organic strategy that keeps users on your site and takes them through the sales funnel, you first need to understand who they are.
Although organic conversions tend to be difficult to track, it helps to define what a conversion means to your business.
“Organic traffic is the most important because you’re making sure that people are coming to your site,” Domínguez says. “Then you need to start focusing on the user journey, the touchpoints that that user has with your content and different parts of the websites. You need to make sure that product goes in the end to the cart and then they buy it.”
SEO Audit: Jimmy Fairly
Hallam worked with leading eyeware brand Jimmy Fairly, which was new to the UK market, to conduct an in-depth SEO audit in order to grow visibility and revenue in the UK while increasing organic e-commerce revenue and in-store eye exams.
The audit became the basis of its SEO strategy, which included local SEO, on-page optimization, internal link improvements, and magnifying page speed and Core Web Vitals. The strategy was then implemented into boosting the conversion rate.
Hallam ultimately increased Jimmy Fairly’s organic e-commerce revenue by 47% YoY.
To learn more about Hallam, visit their website and follow them on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and on Twitter at @HallamAgency. To keep up with Carmen Domínguez, follow her on LinkedIn.