3 Ways To Evaluate Your B2B Web Presence

Organic conversions are the bread and butter of many B2B organizations, yet many companies forget to keep an eye on the small details that can affect them. Instead, B2B organizations should evaluate their Web presence periodically from an organic user’s perspective, as a “set it and forget it” frame of mind is not reasonable in […]

Chat with SearchBot

Organic conversions are the bread and butter of many B2B organizations, yet many companies forget to keep an eye on the small details that can affect them. Instead, B2B organizations should evaluate their Web presence periodically from an organic user’s perspective, as a “set it and forget it” frame of mind is not reasonable in this ever-changing Web environment.

Why It Matters

Because the search landscape can change immensely on a weekly or even daily basis, marketers should evaluate their organization’s Web presence regularly. Doing so can help you discover opportunities that could improve the customer experience and possibly increase your number of organic conversions.

For example, small changes to things like organic sitelinks can prove to boost traffic dramatically. Smart B2B marketers will strive to perform such an evaluation every few months.

Understanding The Risks & Opportunities

Consider David’s situation. He is a business owner in the technology sector, and he was experiencing a steady decline in organic traffic. Clearly, he needed to take some quick action to turn the situation around.

After performing a thorough evaluation of his website, David found that one of his sitelinks was leading to “404 – Page Not Found.”  But by logging into Google Webmaster tools, he was able to block that sitelink from showing again. (Alternatively, he could have had his web department fix the broken sitelink or 301 it to a similar page.)

Additionally, he discovered that during the lead flow process, the product choices appeared “below the fold,” and users weren’t able to view the entire page without scrolling down.

David called his web designer and had him move the ‘Try Now’ buttons to the top of the page where they could be seen upon entry to the page. By implementing these two changes, he saw his traffic volume bounce back to healthy numbers.

Three Tips To Increase Organic Conversions

B2B marketers looking to boost conversions and improve the user experience should follow these three tips to perform an audit of their organic presence.

1.  Evaluate organic sitelinks and sitelink navigation

Google organic sitelinks are shown below some sites on the search engine results page (SERP) and assist to create visibility and help users navigate to your site. Unfortunately, these sitelinks cannot be bought and are instead discretionary — Google decides what shortcuts are valuable to the user based on your website link structure.
Maya 1
When performing the sitelink audit, check each sitelink to ensure that they are directing the user to a valuable page. Usually, Google does a great job in directing the user to the proper page, but there are times when you may not agree with the chosen sitelink.

In this case, Google allows you to remove sitelinks you don’t want displayed. To block a sitelink, login to your Google Webmaster Tools account and navigate to ‘Sitelinks’, which is listed under ‘Site configuration’ on the left hand side of this page. From there, click the ‘block’ button and the link will be blocked from showing up on future organic listings.

2.  Discover top organic keywords bringing traffic to your site Maya 2

Using your Google Analytics account, you can access your top organic keywords in respect to traffic by clicking on ‘Traffic Sources’ and then ‘Keywords’ shown in the image below. Be sure to sort by “unpaid” only. Once you have your list of keywords, you can get started reviewing the organic user experience on those terms.

You should review your own SERP presence on each major term and evaluate the value of the resulting page. If a page is not ranking well, you may want to consider incorporating the keyword into the content of the best fit page. You can also evaluate the competitive space on those same terms and gain further insight into your industry.

3.  Evaluate organic lead flow process

Most B2B marketers use landing pages and/or web forms to collect leads. It is good practice to go through the lead flow process on occasion to ensure that it’s simple and intuitive.

Keep in mind that the conversion process should not include any links other than what is needed to fill out the form in addition to a link to the home page, as this will lower the form abandonment rate and likely increase conversions.

When evaluating the lead flow process, it is critical that all buttons are ‘above the fold’ to ensure they are visible to the user. Lastly, all pages within the lead flow process should have a similar design. This will ensure consistent branding and will improve navigational flow for the customer.

Overall, the online space is changing every day. Smart B2B marketers will regularly review their website from an organic user’s perspective, and make small adjustments. Doing so can increase B2B conversions and yield big returns in the future!


Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.


About the author

Maya Markowitz
Contributor
Maya Markowitz is a Search Marketing Specialist at iProspect. She has worked in marketing for seven years, the last two of which have been SEM. Maya has specialized in the technology vertical and enjoys testing and providing results for her clients.

Get the must-read newsletter for search marketers.