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Image credit: Sammby/Shutterstock.com
Achieving successful search engine optimisation (SEO) isn’t a dark art. In a previous blog article, we discussed the bad reputation that SEO once carried. This was largely because of a lack of knowledge and transparency within the industry.
Although the veil has well and truly been lifted, we still see common SEO mistakes across scientific and industrial sectors.
People are spending huge amounts on website design, then automatically expecting a higher organic performance. Unfortunately, it doesn’t quite work like that. We tend to see good efforts in one or two of the principles and zero effort in the others.
If you cut corners on the foundations, the whole thing will fall down...
Creating and implementing a sound SEO strategy is like building a house, if you cut corners on the foundations, the whole thing will fall.
Choosing the wrong keywords
Keywords are the backbone of any successful piece of content. Are you choosing the right keywords for each piece of content you produce?
It’s not uncommon to select keywords based on your own perspective and neglect what keywords your target audience is using. Tools like Google trends and Keyword Planner are great for researching what people in your sector are searching.
AZoInsight: Think about what someone might search for if they aren’t aware of your technique, solution, or even your company. For example, let’s assume a metal scrap yard manager needs to find a solution to identify different incoming scrap metals. As a scientist or engineer you would draw on your industry knowledge and might suggest something along the lines of an XRF analyzer.
However, what if this individual doesn’t know what an XRF analyzer is or even if a solution exists? This would impact their search terms (keywords). Their first search would be something more like this… “Determining scrap metal” or “Scrap metal analysis”.
Too many keywords
Don’t be tempted to overuse your keywords. It might seem logical to employ them at every possible opportunity, but keyword stuffing is penalized by Google. This will only result in the opposite of the desired effect and push your content further down the results page.
AZoTopTip: We aim for a 3-4% keyword density per 800-word article.
Duplicate content
Duplicating content was common practice ten years ago. Google has worked very hard to increase the results relevance the user see’s when typing their query. Today, the search engines will punish content that is copied from another source. It simply does not provide any value to the searcher.
AZoTopTip: Think about the value you are providing every time you want to create a new piece of content. Am I giving my target audience something of value?
Advice for Industrial Marketing Managers
Get the onsite SEO right first. Without the correct relevance in place, the website will not improve.
If budget is restricted, use an agency for a shorter period of roughly three months. Get a clear understanding of what work will be completed in that time and what will need managing or implementing after.
71% of B2B researchers start their research with a generic search.
Google, 2015
With organic search the interaction/click-through rates are much higher; WordStream and Hubspot suggest a 1% click through rate with AdWords is ‘good’ whereas the number 1 organic listing on average receives over 42% of the click throughs…
The click through rate does drop consistently the further down the rankings you are, but even the 10th position at the bottom of the organic results averages 2.97% CTR. SEO is a longer-term investment, but the rewards are much greater.
Successes stories
The biggest compliment from Tecman is that not only the number of enquiries has improved, the quality has significantly improved as well.AZoNetwork has been offering SEO services to its clients for over two years. In that time, we have had some great success stories. Tecman has seen their rankings dramatically improve, giving them a 59.03% increase in organic traffic and a near 100% increase in enquiries.
See how we helped Thermcraft increase their inquiries by 24.23% and boost organic traffic by 72.46%
Book a Free SEO Health Check
About AZoNetwork
Having worked in the Advanced Ceramics industry for over a decade in the 90’s, founder, Dr. Ian Birkby recognized that engineers, designers and scientists often required educating in the potential uses and applications of Advanced Materials before they could utilize them in their products and processes.
This recognition of market demand and the emerging power of the internet led to the launch of our first site, AZoM.com – The A to Z of Materials in 2000.
Although the business has grown significantly to include a range of science, technology, medical and life science platforms, it has always stayed true to its principal aim:
We love telling science, technology and medical stories to people who can make a difference. Everything else follows from that.
Today we tell these stories across all digital platforms to a monthly addressable audience in excess of 5 million unique individuals.
Our customers come from all scientific, technological and medical sectors. Our extensive web footprint and subscriber base allows us to display a measurable return on investment to billion dollar multi-nationals and SME start-ups.
From Content Creation, through targeted distribution to closing the loop with the unique AZoIntel Content Performance analytics platform, AZoNetwork now provides a highly effective Science Marketing Platform based on its own unique Marketing Science.
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