January 2022 - Verseo Ads

Optimizing a Product Feed

26 January 2022 (update 26 May 2022) | By Olga Badeusz | 0 Comments

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Optimizing a Product Feed

Why Is Product Feed Optimization so Important?
What Must a Product File Contain? – Elements of a Product Feed
How to Optimize Titles in the Product Feed?
How to Optimize Descriptions in the Product Feed?
How to Optimize Product Images in the Product File?
Optional Attributes You Should Add to Optimize Your Product Feed
What Else Can You Do to Optimize Your Product Feed?

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A product feed, also known as a product file, is an essential element of a PLA (Product Listing Ads) campaign in Google’s advertising system. To run any product ads in Google Search or the Shopping tab, you must first create a list of products from your online store (in CSV or XML format) and upload it to your Google Merchant Center account. From there, the advertising system draw information about our offer. The product feed is not created manually; most often it’s created in an easy way by plugins available for particular store systems, where you can assign particular attributes to products. It’s worth knowing that the quality of this file has a huge influence on campaign effectiveness and even the display of our ads to users. That’s why its optimization is one of the most important tasks when launching a PLA campaign. What should you pay attention to in order to create a high-quality product feed?

Why Is Product Feed Optimization so Important?

For starters, it’s worth asking ourselves a basic question: why taking care of the product file stands so high in the hierarchy of actions when creating a PLA campaign. It’s such an important factor for several reasons. Firstly, in this type of campaign we’ve no influence on what key phrases our ad will be displayed on. It’s the Google Ads algorithm itself that decides when to show our product, based on the information contained in the product feed. Therefore, optimization of this file, for example by adding interesting key phrases in the title or item description, gives us at least an indirect influence on who will see our products and in what context.

Secondly, we can add a number of attributes to each product, i.e. product features such as size, color, material, gender (e.g. in the case of clothing) or design. In the Google Shopping tab the user can filter the results based on exactly the same attributes. So the more fields we fill in describing the product, the higher the chance that it will also show up in filtered views. The third reason to optimize your feed is that Google Ads algorithms are constantly determining its quality and rewarding in the displays the products from those files that they consider high quality.

A high quality feed, in addition to affecting your display position, can also help reduce your CPC (cost per click). If the feed is well constructed, our product is more relevant to the customer’s query, so we burn through less budget. This makes it possible for the campaign to achieve much better results, as it produces more clicks within the set budget and reaches a more targeted audience.

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What Must a Product File Contain? – Elements of a Product Feed

In the case of a product file, some information is obligatory for the feed to be accepted by the system and some is optional. Additionally, some options are required only for campaigns for specific countries or product categories. That’swhy when creating a product campaign it’s best to check what the requirements are for the feed in your industry and in the country where you want to publish ads. In a nutshell, however, we can say that the information that must be included in the product file includes:

ID – a unique identifier of the product. Ideally, it should be the same as in our stock ID.
Title – the name of the product and the most important information about it. We will write a bit more about what it should look like later.
Description – in this field you should describe the product in detail, using keywords which are the most accurate in its case.
Link – it should lead to the product page where you can make a purchase.
Image link – the address of the main image of the product, which will be available to be indexed by Google.
Availability – the status of the product. It can have a value of “in stock”, “unavailable”, “temporarily out of stock” or “pre-sale” (in the case of the last two options it’s also mandatory to fill-in an attribute indicating the availability date).
Price – it shall be consistent with the price on the store page and payment page.
GTIN – global trade unit number – this is only required for products that have such a number assigned by the manufacturer, but Google strongly recommends using it for all products.

If the product file contains the elements listed above, it will be accepted by the advertising system, but it’s not equivalent to a high quality feed. These are just the basics and to get a high rating from the algorithm, it’s worth filling-in some of the attributes from the optional list. But before we go on to describe them, let’s say how to optimize this basic product data.

How to Optimize Titles in the Product Feed?

The title is a very important element not only because it’s one of the first pieces of information a user sees. It’s also important because it’s one of the main parameters the algorithm takes into account when deciding which keywords to display for a given product. Therefore, it’s worth including not only the name of the product, but also, for example, its brand, color or size. It’s true that this information will be repeated in other attributes, but if we put them also in the title, we increase the chance that the products will be displayed on the best queries in their case. The order in which the information is provided is also very important and may be slightly different for different product categories. Google states that best practices for title optimization for the most popular industries are:

Clothing: Brand name + Gender + Product type + Product features (color, size, material, etc.)
Food: Brand name + Product type + Product features (flavor, number of pieces per package, weight)
Home & Garden: Brand name + Product type + Product features + Model
Electronics: Brand name + Product features + Product type + Model
Seasonal products: Occasion + Product type + Product features

Of course, however, these are not universal models that will work in all cases. For example, a brand name in the title will only attract an audience if the brand is recognizable and has a good reputation, so it’s best to experiment with names and test various options in order to choose the combination that works best in your case.

It’s also worth remembering that product titles may be displayed differently on different devices and thus the system may cut them off in some cases. In the title field we’ve 150 characters to use and it’s good to use them, but make sure that the most important information is at the beginning of this section. In the Google Shopping tab, titles are truncated after 70 characters, so it’s best to fit the most relevant data in this pool.

How to Optimize Descriptions in the Product Feed?

In the case of the product description in the feed we’ve five thousand characters at our disposal. Of course we don’t have to use all of them, but this field is a place, where we can place many keywords. Admittedly, it won’t guarantee that the product will be displayed on these words, but it significantly increases the chances that this will happen.

However, the description should not only be saturated with keywords, but also valuable for the user. Therefore, it’s worth taking care that it comprehensively describes the product and is of high quality. The description for each product should be unique, which increases the chance that the system will correctly select from the list of our products the one that best matches the given search query. For this field it’s best to use a minimum of 500 characters, although of course the more useful information for the user, the better.

However, there remains the question of where to get information on what keywords will be most valuable for a given product. Here with help comes a free tool called Google Trends. We can enter keywords that are associated with our product and check which of them are most frequently searched by search engine users. Thanks to this, we can include in the description those key phrases which are likely to bring us the most impressions and clicks of the advertisement. For example, if Google Trends shows that the most searched keyword phrase is “black women’s stilettos” than “black women’s pumps”, use the first option in both the description and the title.

How to Optimize Product Images in the Product File?

An obligatory element of the feed is a link to the product photo, which the system may then use in the ads. However, in order to get the best quality of the file, it’s advisable not to stop at one picture, but to add several of them, showing the product in more detail. This can be done by using the attribute Link to additional picture. This attribute can be repeated 10 times per product, which means that we can add a maximum 10 additional photos. However, the standard is that for one product we place 3-5 photos, which show the product from different angles.

All uploaded photos should be of good quality, but their weight cannot exceed 16 MB. Although in the official specification of the feed on Google we can find information that the photos should have a minimum size of 250×250 pixels for clothing and 100×100 pixels for other products, it’s better to bet on photos with higher resolution. The optimal size for product images is 800×800 pixels. It’s worth sticking to these guidelines because high-quality images improve click-through rates and, as a result, can also increase conversions.

Optional Attributes You Should Add to Optimize Your Product Feed

As we’ve already mentioned, apart from the basic data it’s also worth filling in at least some of the attributes which are considered optional by the system. Admittedly, a file without them will be accepted and ads will be displayed, but their effectiveness won’t be as good as if we add additional information. Here are some attributes that are definitely worth completing.

Brand

The Brand attribute is most helpful when you are selling products from well-known and frequently searched brands, but it’s worth using in any case. However, it’s an attribute that is often filled in incorrectly, which may reduce the effectiveness of ads, so it’s worth paying special attention to it. A common mistake is to enter the name of your online store in this place, while the correct value is the name of the manufacturer of a given product. For example, if you sell Nike sneakers in your store named XYZ, you should enter “Nike” in the brand attribute, and not “XYZ”. The name of your e-shop shall be entered here only if your company produces the given item in the offer. If the product doesn’t have a brand or the brand is unknown, do not fill in this attribute. It’s a mistake to enter values such as “not applicable” or “none” here.

Product Group Identifier

This attribute is used for grouping products, which are available in different versions, e.g. sizes or colors. Thanks to this, they won’t be displayed to the users as separate products, but as variants of the same item, which will make it easier to get acquainted with the offer and make a purchase decision. For all products that are to constitute a group, we should add the same product group ID.

Size

This attribute is mandatory for clothing and footwear, but recommended for all products with different size variants. It’s best to use the size most popular in the country for which the campaign is to be run to determine this parameter. If the product comes in multiple sizes, it’s important to add the product group identifier to all versions of the product. In case the garment you are selling has one size, you can enter the value “universal size” in the attribute.

Material

Material is one of the most important attributes for many products, including clothing, accessories, footwear or furniture. If a product comes in different material variants, we add each of them to the file separately and combine them into a single listing using an identical product group ID. However, it sometimes happens that an item is made of several materials, e.g. a mixture of cotton and polyester. Then we add all materials within one version in the Material attribute, separating them with a “/” character without spaces, e.g. “cotton/polyester”.

Mobile Link

In case we’ve different URLs for computer and mobile traffic, we can also fill in the Mobile Link attribute. This way we will make sure that users using smartphones and tablets after clicking the ad will go to subpages of our store optimized for those devices. This in turn will provide them with a better shopping experience related to our brand. If the URL is the same for both desktop and mobile versions, we don’t need to add this attribute.

What Else Can You Do to Optimize Your Product Feed?

The quality of a product feed, aka a product file, is also influenced by placing information about product types in it and completing the Google categories field. Thanks to proper product classification, the system is better at positioning the offer and adjusting it to the needs of the recipients.

Make sure up-to-date information about the product assortment appears in the product file. It’s best to set automatic updates of the product file in Google Merchant Center once a day. You can also set more frequent updates (up to 4 times a day), but frequent refreshing of the product file is necessary only in individual cases. Additionally, if you make changes to your website, e.g. add new products to the offer or launch a promotion, you can force the feed to be updated manually without waiting for the automatic data download. When setting up automatic updates, it’s a good idea to choose night hours so that refreshing the file doesn’t interfere with the display of ads to recipients.

SEO strategy – What Is It?

19 January 2022 (update 19 January 2022) | By Magda Walczak | 0 Comments

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SEO strategy – What Is It?

Changes in SEO Strategies – A Natural Order of Things
Clear Priorities are Essential
Only White-hat SEO!
SEO Strategy – the Role of Cooperation Between the Agency and the Client
Cooperation Must be Based on Trust
Linking Strategy – an Inseparable Element of SEO Strategy
What Makes up SEO Strategy?

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Website positioning is a complex process that should be preceded by a meticulous audit of the website and defining SEO strategy based on business goals that we want to achieve. Only when armed with this basic knowledge a specialist is able to proceed to any work that may increase the visibility of the website in search results. But what should such an SEO strategy look like and how do we know that the plan we are offered has proper structure? Let’s look at these issues a little closer and talk about the process of creating a website SEO strategy.

Changes in SEO Strategies – A Natural Order of Things

When thinking about SEO strategy, first accept the fact that it’s impossible to create a long-term action plan that will work without amendments. Google’s environment is very volatile – new search engine algorithm updates are constantly coming out, which often change the rules of the game. Additionally, what worked for 100 similar sites may not necessarily work for the 101st. Therefore, changes in the strategy are perfectly natural and even advisable if the chosen path does not bring results. Positioning is based on constant monitoring of the effects, modifying, improving, and measuring them again. A properly chosen strategy is therefore flexible and can change over time if changes in the algorithm or simply the specifics of the site require it.

Clear Priorities are Essential

Most websites at the beginning of the positioning process require many changes in various fields – some adjustments are purely technical, others require modification and expansion of the content or taking care of external linking. Such modifications cannot be introduced entirely in a week, month, or even half a year. Therefore SEO strategies should prioritize the tasks to be done, indicating those that are most urgent and those that can be introduced later.

Strategies divided into stages work best so that the client knows what to expect from the positioning agency. Not all changes are visible to the naked eye for someone who is not an expert in a given topic. On the surface it may seem that the positioner does nothing, however, he does a lot of work to improve the visibility of the site. Such changes take time, especially if the site is extensive, has many tabs, and in addition, was often modified.

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Only White-hat SEO!

Properly constructed SEO strategies focus only on good SEO practices, assuming we avoid prohibited or grey area activities. Attempts to take shortcuts and cheat Google’s algorithm may end up in imposing a filter – automatically or manually by an employee – and this causes the website to stop appearing in search results. Of course, you can try to remove the filter, but even if you succeed, the site drops in the search results, and restoring its good reputation in the algorithm’s opinion is extremely difficult.

What actions should you be particularly careful about? Google does not recognize, for example, automatic mass generation of links to the site on unrelated sites, forums or blogs. Attempts to deceive search engine robots by presenting them with a different version of the page than the users or attempts to “hide” text on the page (e.g. creating white text on a white background) are also frowned upon. These types of actions are called Black Hat SEO and should be completely avoided.

SEO Strategy – the Role of Cooperation Between the Agency and the Client

All changes introduced by the positioner must be accepted by the client, and the sooner the acceptance occurs, the sooner the website starts achieving results. Additionally, there are some actions that the client has to carry out on his own according to the recommendation of the positioning company. For example, very important for the visibility of the website is the loading speed, meanwhile some clients use slow and unreliable hosting, which limits SEO possibilities. Then it’s up to the client to change the service provider because without it other activities become much less effective.

Sometimes system on which the website was set up is also a problem. If the client uses a proprietary solution or a less popular CMS, it may turn out that it lacks the functionalities necessary for improving the website’s visibility. In such cases, it’s necessary to transfer the site to another system, which the client must also do using his own resources. At this point, however, such action must be conducted in cooperation with the positioner, who prepares recommendations on how to make the change in order not to lose the power of the site.

Cooperation Must be Based on Trust

The mistake of many customers is to block some of the changes recommended by the positioner. Most often it concerns interference in the content on the page, adding new content or changes in the structural data. Lack of consent for some actions does not completely cancel the efforts to increase the visibility of the site, but it does not allow to use the full potential of the site and achieve optimal results. Therefore, when deciding on services in the field of positioning, it’s worth choosing a proven agency that you can trust. Then the client can be sure that all changes recommended by the positioner are necessary and work in favor of the site. Agreeing to only some of the actions listed in the SEO strategy generally brings neither satisfaction nor tangible benefits to either party.

However, it’s not only important that the client can trust the positioner, but also that the positioner can trust his client. This is because SEO strategies cannot be fully realized if the client makes changes to the website on their own without informing the SEO company. Such actions can destroy months of SEO work and cause an immediate drop in the visibility of the site. What kind of actions are we talking about? Most often it concerns changing the CMS without prior information, changing subpage URLs, deleting subpages or removing content on the page.

Linking Strategy – an Inseparable Element of SEO Strategy

A very important part of SEO strategy is a plan for so-called off-site SEO, i.e. acquiring external links to the website. These types of links can be acquired from a variety of sources, including online forums, product directories, backlink sites or through platforms that sell sponsored articles. Less typical methods of link acquisition are also possible, such as exchanging guest posts with bloggers or linking to your site on social media. It’s important to remember, however, that only good quality links – from thematically related websites, highly ranked by algorithms – will give your website power. Therefore the selection of link sources is one of the most important elements of SEO strategy. It’s equally important to plan the publication of links – too many links appearing at the same time may alarm the algorithm, which will suspect us of fraudulent practices.

The link profile building strategy must be closely matched to the industry and even the specifics of the positioned website. It should also be preceded by a thorough analysis of competitors’ link profile – on the basis of such information we may decide what can be done better and how to expand the link collection to gain a competitive advantage.

What Makes up SEO Strategy?

SEO strategy should consist of all actions that will be carried out in order to position a given website in Google – both those within the website itself, as well as those outside it (external linking). Its main elements are:

a list of keywords for which the website will be positioned – it should contain all the keywords whose positions will be monitored by the positioner. Such a list is prepared by the agency in cooperation with the client, who can determine which areas of activity are most important for him and which sub-pages, product categories or products themselves are key from the business point of view.
a website architecture optimization plan – this means building a category tree, laying out site navigation, arranging tags, etc,
a plan of technical optimization of the website – all those actions which are to increase the speed of the website loading, improve its responsiveness, and comfort of use. Purely technical changes include such actions as code minification, graphics compression, implementation of caching by the browser, the introduction of structural data, creation of sitemap.xml, setting redirects, implementation of canonical tags, and many others,
a strategy for extending the content on the website – at the planning stage it’s necessary to determine which tabs of the website should be enriched with new content, whether it’s worth introducing a place for additional content (e.g. blog or news), at what stages of the work individual contents will be added, etc.
a concept of building an external links profile – this means choosing places to link to, determining how many links to obtain and when to publish them,
planning for building a network of internal links – that is creating links on the page to other subpages of the positioned website. A well-developed internal linking strategy makes it easier for the user to navigate the site and find the information they need.

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Choosing Between Inbound and Outbound Marketing

13 January 2022 (update 13 January 2022) | By Maciek Popiołek | 0 Comments

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Choosing Between Inbound and Outbound Marketing

Inbound Marketing Versus Outbound Marketing
Outbound Marketing – Principles and Advantages
Inbound marketing – Principles and Advantages
When to Use Outbound Marketing?
When to Use Inbound Marketing?
Inbound and Outbound – Together or Separately?
Inbound and Outbound Marketing – How to Measure Effectiveness?

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Marketing is essential to market presence, especially nowadays, when it’s very competitive. Fortunately, conducting extensive and effective marketing activities doesn’t require a huge budget either, so success is in anyone’s reach. First, however, you should decide whether to focus on inbound or outbound marketing. Or maybe both?

Inbound Marketing Versus Outbound Marketing

Why this division into two types of marketing and what does it mean? Outbound marketing is referred to as “going out”. It includes all the activities which consist of addressing the customer and thus encouraging him to take advantage of the offer. This includes direct advertising and promotion.

Inbound marketing, on the other hand, is called “incoming”. It consists in conducting such activities which lead a customer to find a given company on his own and express interest in its offer.

Figuratively speaking, outbound marketing can be compared to a loudspeaker or a megaphone advertising slogans and messages encouraging buying specific services. Inbound marketing activities, on the other hand, can be compared to a magnet that attracts customers to the company and its offer. In practice, outbound strategies include things like:

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graphic advertising on the Internet,
TV and radio advertisements,
outdoor advertising,
telemarketing,
leaflets, advertising catalogs, brochures,
paid links and advertising on various sites,
mailing and SMS campaigns,
on-site advertising: e.g. web push notifications, pop-ups, chat rooms encouraging contact.

Meanwhile, inbound marketing should deal with:

business’s website,
SEO,
content marketing (including blogs, podcasts, webinars, video content, etc.)
social media,
newsletters,
discussion forums.

All of these activities should be based on prior findings about the target audience and its exact profile. Only then can they be tailored to the needs of the potential customer, and therefore effective in attracting them and then generating conversions.

Outbound Marketing – Principles and Advantages

Nowadays the strategies identified with inbound marketing are used much more often, while the “outbound” ones are often considered less beneficial, less effective and even outdated. However, it doesn’t have to be this way. Most often, outbound marketing uses an undefined message – the same for all recipients and usually not fully supported by the expectations of the target group. However, it’s also possible to test different formats and check their effectiveness.

It’s important to remember to adapt the rules of outbound marketing to the needs of the modern consumer. There’s no place for outdated techniques or pushy, annoying advertising. However, it’s worth taking care of:

personalizing communications – wherever possible;
adopting an advisory, expert tone – customers don’t like pushy “pushing” products at them, but they value reliable information and advice from professionals;
careful selection of communication channels – depending on things like the scale of the business, the industry and the target group.

The advantages of outbound marketing include:

control over the message in communication (because it’s usually one-sided),
the possibility of quickly obtaining results such as building brand awareness,
relatively low costs in the case of conducting online campaigns,
possibility of acting on a wide scale.

Certainly, some disadvantages of this type of strategy can also be mentioned. These include:

the risk of causing negative reactions of potential customers (pushy and disturbing advertising),
some difficulties with message targeting (i.e. adjusting its form and content to a specific recipient), especially outside the Internet,
the risk of ignoring the message by the recipients – the society is directly flooded with constant advertising messages, therefore it becomes immune to them,
relatively high costs per acquired lead.

Can inbound marketing be an effective solution for your business?

Inbound marketing – Principles and Advantages

The idea of inbound marketing is based on attracting customers and therefore requires a thorough understanding of their needs. How to make the customer himself want to come just to you? You need to:

develop a detailed marketing strategy – vision, goals and ways to achieve them;
precisely define who is the target recipient of your services – the profile of your model customer should include as much information as possible, including age, gender, profession, habits, expectations or needs;
prepare a website – remembering about its aesthetics, functionality and maximum simplicity, which will facilitate the purchase path and conversion;
create valuable content and constantly supplement the website with it;
maintain social media profiles, ensuring that the content presented there is up-to-date;
use thematic and industry websites;
Take care of constant acquisition of leads and develop a system that will help make sure they become customers;
continually analyse and improve the methods used.

Inbound marketing should be directed primarily at building brand awareness and strength and gaining customer trust. This has its advantages, provided, of course, that the strategy is properly designed and implemented. These include:

ability to reach a large group of customers,
relatively low costs,
many forms of communication and almost unlimited possibilities in terms of creation,
great targeting possibilities,
possibility to simultaneously build brand authority and inspire trust,
message based on purchase intention or customer interest – doesn’t arouse unwillingness, is not pushy,
hard selling.

However, it’s not a method without flaws! These can include:

High entry barrier – inbound is based on tools the complexity of which has increased significantly over the last decade. In principle, you need the support of a specialist to get optimal results.
Limited opportunities to build reach in niche industries – going beyond them can sharply increase customer acquisition costs.
High budget required in some segments.

When to Use Outbound Marketing?

When considering the two types of marketing strategy it’s worth taking certain criteria into account. This is because in some cases outbound marketing works better, while in others it’s better to bet on inbound methods. So when is it worth using outbound strategies and addressing customers directly?

When to Expect Quick Results

You have to wait for the results of inbound activities. So if you need to achieve specific goals, it’s best to turn to outbound techniques or paid ads like Google Ads. They usually allow you to gain some customers or leads in a short period of time. However, it’s worth keeping in mind the rules for running effective outbound campaigns, which are included above.

When You’re New on the Market

It’s difficult for small, new companies to break through in the minds of customers by only conducting inbound marketing activities, and waiting for results can lead to a worsening of the company’s financial situation. Therefore, in order to get your proverbial foot in the door, it’s a good idea to employ outbound strategies to help increase your brand’s visibility while acquiring leads at a much lower cost.

When You Have a Limited Startup Budget

If you have little capital, you certainly can’t wait for the results associated with inbound campaigns. This is when a well thought-out out outbound campaign on paid channels may work. Of course, this doesn’t apply to companies with, for example, low fixed costs and which can afford to wait longer for results despite a limited budget.

When to Use Inbound Marketing?

Of course, there are also situations in which inbound marketing works much better. When is it worth using it?

When You’re Not in a Hurry

Do you want to build a strong brand, but you don’t expect immediate results? If you have an appropriate budget and can afford to build a position slowly, it’s worth betting on intensive inbound activities. Remember that it may take many months from the time you start to gain a customer. Meanwhile, you still have to add time to carefully prepare a marketing strategy.

When You Realize the Importance of Good Content and Have the Ability to Create it

Writing an expert article for your company’s blog from time to time may seem like a simple task that you can do yourself in your spare time. However, this is very harmful. Taking care of the published content is very important, so it should not be a job done “by the way”. You have to make sure that the content is of high quality and complies with SEO rules, which requires appropriate knowledge. Moreover, someone has to watch over the regularity of content publication. Therefore, this should be handled by a specific, designated person who is also qualified. Instead of hiring a new employee, you can entrust this task to an agency – in many ways this is a more cost-effective solution.

When you Know Your Target Audience

The great strength of inbound is the ability to precisely match it to your target audience. That’s why it’s imperative that you know your target audience very well – otherwise your strategy won’t make much sense. You need to know who your customer is, but also what messages they respond to, how they shop, and what values they hold.

When You Have the Right Budget

This is about having the financial backing to wait for results, but also about the amount of money you have allocated to marketing. Developing, implementing, and then refining an inbound strategy is usually resource-intensive and time-consuming, even though it costs less per lead than outbound campaigns. Of course, the exact amount of the required budget depends on many factors, including the industry, area of operation and competition. However, the snowball effect applies to inbound marketing. Consistency over the long term can offer you the cheapest way to acquire leads.

Inbound and Outbound – Together or Separately?

The above content should help you decide which marketing strategies to use. However, there is still a hidden option number three, which is to combine inbound and outbound activities. Does this make sense? Absolutely, and it’s probably the best solution! In many cases, this is how you get the best results. Complementary and intertwining marketing techniques will get you more customers and maximize your profits. An example? You can use an email campaign that includes a link to an educational video or article. Such a combination of outbound and inbound activities is characteristic especially for companies with a bit more seniority in the market, as well as budget, and this is when it proves to be the most profitable.

And how do others do it? Statistics show that smaller companies place by far the greatest emphasis on inbound activities. This trend is particularly visible in companies with up to 25 employees. Companies employing from a few dozen to 200 people clearly increase spending on outbound marketing, while in the largest companies (over 200 employees) outbound and inbound methods are used basically in half.

It’s certainly fair to say that today’s companies are emphasizing inbound marketing. It’s a strategy that seems primarily more effective in the long run. If you want to keep up with your competitors, you definitely shouldn’t base your marketing solely on outbound efforts. However, you should also not abruptly change the strategies you have been using so far. The process of modifying them should always be gradual. Usually, it’s not a good idea to get rid of outbound marketing altogether. As mentioned above, it also has its advantages! If only it’s properly implemented, it will surely bring measurable effects, even though this type of activity is increasingly considered outdated.

Inbound and Outbound Marketing – How to Measure Effectiveness?

Are you still unsure whether to focus primarily on inbound or outbound, or maybe use a mixed strategy? Or maybe you want to check how your existing activities compare in terms of effectiveness with the newly implemented strategy? Comparing the effectiveness of inbound and outbound methods is usually not easy, but it can be done. It’s worth looking at various marketing metrics and indicators. First of all, you should take into account the amount of budget allocated to certain marketing activities and the number of leads acquired and compare their proportions. The key indicator in this case is the so-called CPL, or Cost Per Lead. In addition, it’s worth taking into account:

QL (qualified leads) – the number of leads that are considered potential customers, ready to buy,
CR (conversion rate) – a conversion rate indicating the percentage of leads from a particular source that decide to buy,
Ticket Value – the average value of transactions for each of the customer acquisition sources
Sales cycle length – it often happens that acquiring a customer from some sources takes less time than from others.

By comparing this data, it will be much easier for you to identify which activities bring you the best results, and thus improve your marketing strategy. It’s a good idea to constantly monitor these metrics because nothing is certain in marketing – what works great one day may not work the next.

SXO – What Is It?

07 January 2022 (update 07 January 2022) | By Adam Kubaszewski | 0 Comments

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SXO – What Is It?

SXO – Search Experience Optimization
SEO – Website Positioning
Why Does SEO Matter?
UX – User Experience
Why Does UX Matter?
SXO – The Future of Web Development

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The world of online marketing is constantly evolving. Technology is constantly changing, as are the users, their habits, expectations, and behavior. In response to the needs of users, new trends in web design are constantly emerging. Solutions created by marketers, UX specialists, web developers, and representatives of other related professions are aimed at attracting potential customers to the site and refining the user experience to make it as complete as possible, which ultimately translates into increased conversions.

SXO – Search Experience Optimization

SXO, or Search Experience Optimization, comes first among the relatively new terms that should be taken into account when designing a corporate website. It’s a combination of the terms search engine optimization (SEO) and user experience (UX) that have been popular for years. In a nutshell, the idea is not only to effectively attract search engine users and encourage them to visit a given website (with the help of SEO), but also to keep them on the website for longer and make them convert thanks to proper UX.

SXO will work for basically any type of website. The most common conversion targets are:

Online stores and the broader e-commerce industry – the main goal: to increase the number of transactions; additional goals include increasing the number of newsletter signups or adding a product to a wishlist, etc.;
Service industry – main goal: increasing the number of leads; additional goals: downloading a PDF guide or completing a survey, etc.;
Content services – main goal: increasing the time a user stays on the site, clicking on related articles, secondary goal: for example, playing a video in the content;

Of course, the main and side goals can seamlessly swap places – it depends entirely on the industry and assumptions of the site owner, though it does not change the fact that putting emphasis on SXO (Search Experience Optimization) with proper implementation of solutions will improve conversions – regardless of what specific goal has been set.

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But let’s start from the beginning. As we mentioned above, SXO is a combination of two terms – SEO and UX. Let’s take a look at them one by one:

SEO – Website Positioning

SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the positioning of a website in search engines. This process aims at making the website, in response to a particular phrase, appear at the top of search results – or at least on their first page. According to statistics, not many Internet users after entering keywords look at sites located outside the TOP10 of the displayed results, and the further away, the number decreases. If the site is not located at least in the TOP50, it can be concluded that for a given phrase the site will not attract anyone except individual Internet users who are either very determined or “lost” during the search. The goal of every website owner, who’d like to increase the long-term traffic at a relatively low cost in comparison to social media advertising or Google Ads systems, should be to optimize.

Positioning is a complicated process – over 200 different factors influence the position of a website in the Google search engine. Some of them are officially published by the giant from Mountain View, but a large part of them is not made public. So effective SEO requires considerable knowledge and experience, but also brings with it the necessity to constantly experiment and test new solutions.

The situation is not made easier by the fact that Google often changes these factors by updating the main positioning algorithm. In 2020 alone, these smaller changes took place almost every day, and the larger ones every few months – January 2020 Core Update, Nofollow Update released in March, May 2020 Core Update and December 2020 Update. This means that without a large database, it is difficult to effectively optimize a website.

SEO activities can be divided into two branches. The first one is called on-site SEO and consists in adjusting the website and the content placed on it to Google’s requirements. This includes:

speeding up the website (users often abandon their visit if the loading time is too long – after all, everyone cares about time);
proper responsiveness, i.e. ability of the website to be displayed correctly on various devices (including mobile devices – smartphones and tablets);
enrichment of the content on the page with substantive texts that are properly saturated with key phrases – words for which the page should be displayed to users in search engines;
presentation of content in a friendly form – division into paragraphs, use of headings (H1, H2, H3), appropriate use of graphics, internal linking;

The second branch of activities is off-site SEO, i.e. activities conducted through other sites. Each link on another site leading to the target site strengthens its “power” – that is, it gives a signal to the search engine algorithm that the page is valuable and its position in the rankings should be increased. First of all the link parameter is important – the link may be marked as dofollow or nofollow – in the first case the link “invites” Google bot to visit the page, which translates into SEO. The nofollow parameter also allows the user to click on it, however, it will be ignored by crawlers, thus having zero impact on SEO. Nevertheless, for Google it means linking diversity, which makes it more authentic. This process is called link pillowing and is also used in SEO.

A very important factor in an external linking strategy is the selection of appropriate techniques, pages, NAPs, buffer sites, and linking schedules so that Google understands these activities as real, not “bought”. Otherwise, it can penalize your position, e.g. if you suddenly get a lot of links even from the best and biggest websites.

Why Does SEO Matter?

It’s worth remembering that SEO is the most cost-effective option for generating website traffic in the long run. Both Google Ads and social media advertising systems in the hands of professionals can be effective marketing tools. While using these solutions, when we turn off the campaign, the traffic immediately disappears. The effects of positioning last much longer, which in the long run generates noticeably lower costs of customer acquisition. By investing in SEO, you make sure that your company is always exactly where the potential customer is.

We have written about SEO many times on our blog – read some articles that thoroughly present selected aspects related to SEO.

UX – User Experience

User Experience is the entirety of impressions felt by a visiting Internet user. UX is a multifaceted field, encompassing not only technology, but also psychology, cognitive science and other disciplines.

An important component of the user experience is the UI, or user interface. The UI can be called a demonstration of the way a user gives commands to a program – for example, a content management system (CMS) on a website. A UI element can be considered any part of a page that, when clicked, causes the page to perform a specific command. The interface, or more specifically its graphical representation (GUI – Graphical User Interface) is incredibly important – it is responsible for the simplicity of the site’s navigation and its intuitiveness, as well as various visual aspects. On some sites the combination of colors, fonts or even borders makes the site a hard to define pleasure to use, while on another – very similar – it irritates or arouses some anxiety. Color psychology, typography, composition solutions and many, many others – all these elements must be taken into account when designing the site in terms of the interface.

User interface is an important part of UX, but user experience is a much broader term. Among other things, a UX specialist takes into account the user’s profile – their digital competencies, demographic aspects, brand persona. It is also an in-depth analysis of competitive sites. The most important part of a UX specialist’s work are extensive experiments based on recording sessions, generating heat maps, A/B tests, and even testing the shopping path and payment gateways on dozens of devices, resolutions and browsers.

UX, and more broadly SXO, takes three views into account:

user (who cares about a simple and seamless and enjoyable site experience);
site owner (who emphasizes valuable traffic and high conversion rate);
web crawlers (which analyze the page from different angles, resulting in a specific result in search results).

Why Does UX Matter?

A well-designed user experience can completely transform the statistics on a website. Forrester research from a few years ago showed that simply redesigning the user interface can change conversion rates by 200%, and changing the UX by up to 400%. These are results that can definitely be considered a business game changer. Of course, this is an extreme case and in the vast majority of cases the results of redesigning a website will not be so spectacular (it also depends on what level we start from). But there’s no denying that in the business context every positive change can herald the survival or dynamic development of a company. UX audit is therefore the first step to improve the effectiveness of your own website.

SXO – The Future of Web Development

Search Experience Optimization is an evolutionary approach to web development that combines the advantages of SEO and UX design, while focusing on maximizing conversions. According to SXO, just because a user arrives on a page from search results doesn’t mean anything – it has to be complemented by a personalized experience based on a number of variables.

Set up a free consultation with Verseo’s UX Specialists and SEO specialists and let us skyrocket your website!

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SXO – What Is It?

SXO – Search Experience Optimization

SEO – Website Positioning

Why Does SEO Matter?

UX – User Experience

Why Does UX Matter?

SXO – The Future of Web Development

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