REPORTING!REPORTING!REPORTING!

I KNOW WHAT YOU’RE THINKING…

DATA DOESN’T HAVE ANY RELATIVES.

DATA DOESN’T HAVE A BEARD.

DATA DOESN’T HAVE EMOTIONS.

IT’S JUST A BIT. LET’S ROLL WITH IT.

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“HI, I’M KERRY DEAN.”

You might remember me from such conference sessions as “The Best SEO Advice You Will Never Hear” at State of Search 2014.

Or perhaps you remember me from such Instagram hits (@fortworth) as “Throwing a Scorpion into a Spider Web.”

Or perhaps you know me from the mega-popular Twitter episode: “How to Lose Credibility AND Followers by Live-Tweeting the Royal Rumble” (@kerrydean).

Actually, unlike Jack Hartounian,I prefer to keep a low profile.

THESE ARE MY JAMS:

BUT MOST OF ALL, HE LOVES..

SAN DIMAS!

MY SEO EXPERIENCE IS PRIMARILY IN RETAIL & TRAVEL.

ONE QUICK NOTE ABOUT SEO IN 2015:

IT’S NEVER THE SAME FROM BRAND TO BRAND, SITE TO SITE, PLATFORM TO PLATFORM, OR

INDUSTRY TO INDUSTRY.

EVERY SITE REQUIRES A UNIQUE STRATEGY.

ENOUGH ABOUT ME.

LET’S TALK ABOUT SEO REPORTING.

“The only true wisdom consists in knowing that you know nothing.” - @Socrates

WITH THE UTMOST RESPECT TO SOCRATES, I BEG TO DIFFER.

“Data is the new currency and is a medium of exchange of value between marketers and consumers.”

Lisa Utzschneider (@Lisa_Utz)Chief Revenue OfficerYahooNov. 10, 2015

When it comes to audience targeting, she said, data can confirm marketers' assumptions about consumers or it can surprise marketers about consumers. http://focustaiwan.tw/news/ast/201511100021.aspx

DO YOU SEE HOW BADASS THAT BIRD IS?

THAT’S HOW BADASS YOU CAN BE IF YOU CAN TELL

A STORY WITH DATA.

#BirdsWithArms

MRW I get access to a client’s analytics data & platforms.

Data gives you power, but don’t be a jerk about it.

SO WAIT…

THE MORE DATA I HAVE, THE MORE POWERFUL I BECOME?

I DON’T THINK SO,

TIM.

BIG DATA ISN’T COOL…YOU KNOW WHAT’S COOL?

#SMALLDATA

“CLIENTS WANT THE STORY, NOT THE DATA.” – KERRY DEAN, SMX East 2012

HEY, HE’S QUOTING HIMSELF. HE CAN’T DO THAT.

#SMALLDATA OFTEN MAKES IT EASIER TO FIND THE STORY THAT NEEDS TO BE TOLD.

LET’S TAKE A LOOK AT TRADITIONAL SEO REPORTING.

CHANNEL REPORTING

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• SESSIONS DATA: VISITS, VISITORS, NEW VISITS, UNIQUE VISITORS, ETC…

• REVENUE DATA: REVENUE, TRANSACTIONS (ORDERS), QUANITITY (UNITS)

• ECOMMERCE DATA: AOV, REV. PER VISIT, REV. PER UNIT

• USER/UX DATA: CONVERSION RATE, BOUNCE RATE, TIME ON SITE, DWELL TIME

• EVENTS DATA: FORM SUBMISSIONS, SIGNUPS, VIDEO PLAYS, SCROLLING

• URL DATA: # OF URLS DRIVING VISITS (DISCOVERY), REVENUE, CONVERSION

• RANKINGS DATA: DESKTOP RANKINGS, MOBILE RANKINGS

STANDARD KPIs FOR ORGANIC SEARCH REPORTING

BASIC ORGANIC SEARCH SESSIONS DATA

SEO IS NOT AN ISLAND.

SEO IS PART OF AN ECOSYSTEM.

ADDING IN TOTAL SITE DATA FOR TREND COMPARISON

ORGANIC SESSIONS AS A % OF TOTAL SITE SESSIONS

LOOK AT THE % CONTRIBUTION OF ALL CHANNELS.

OFTEN A CLOSE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PPC & SEO

WE HAVE ALWAYS VIEWED KPIs BY ENGINE.

ORGANIC SESSIONS BY SEARCH ENGINE

MONITORING TRENDS BY

ENGINE

MONITORING % CONTRIBUTION

BY ENGINE

ORGANIC DATA DASHBOARD BY SEARCH ENGINE

Who’s visiting?

Who’s spending?

Who’s converting?

And how much?

AFTER ALL THAT DATA, THE CLIENT WILL ASK:

DEVICE REPORTING

ORGANIC SEARCH SESSIONS BY DEVICE TYPE

ORGANIC SEARCH SESSIONS BY DEVICE TYPE (TREND)

ORGANIC SEARCH % CONTRIBUTION BY DEVICE TYPE

SEEING THIS TREND ACROSS MULTIPLE CLIENTS

UX DATA BY DEVICE TYPE CAN OFTEN BE A CLUE

because these things matter to the machine learning algos.

WHAT IS CAUSING ORGANIC MOBILE SESSIONS TO DROP SO QUICKLY?

1. LOCAL PACK MOVES ABOVE ORGANIC RESULTSMay-2015 Nov-2015

PAID

LOCAL

ORGANIC

query: motel 6 austin

MOBILE SERPS MAKE ME FEEL LIKE ARIELNov-2015

Up where they walk, up where they runUp where they stay all day in the sunWanderin' free - wish I could bePart of that world

ARIEL NEEDS A NEW SEO-THEMED HASHTAG

#UnderTheSea #BelowTheFold

RECENT HEADLINE

“As far as SEO is, my view on that is it’s more of a desktop thought because as the devices get smaller and smaller and smaller, the number of choices from an SEO perspective on mobile decline dramatically. And so I believe it is a paid world. Google is an advertising engine and they drive paid traffic to advertisers. And I think that’s going to continue for quite some time. We will do our best to play in that environment.”

- Paul Hennessy, CEO, Priceline.com

AGREE TO DISAGREE

SEO ISN’T DEAD. IT’S MORE LIKE THIS:

2. MORE PAID ADS & MORE PAID SITELINKS

PAID:2 adsNo sitelinks

ORGANIC

PAID:3 ads2 rows of sitelinks

ORGANIC

May-2015 Nov-2015query: running shoes

ANOTHER EXAMPLE

ORGANIC

ORGANIC

PAID2 ads4 rows of sitelinks

query: j crew sweatersMay-2015 Nov-2015

3. INCREASED PLA REAL ESTATE

PAID:2 adsNo PLAs

ORGANIC

PAID:PLA Carousel1 Ad4 Sitelinks

ORGANIC

query: wireless speakers

THESE CHANGES TO THE SEARCH LAYOUTS & AD FORMATS HAVE CAUSED A SIGNIFICANT SHIFT IN BRAND & NON-BRAND SESSIONS

FROM ORGANIC LISTINGS TO PAID LISTINGS.

“ALL RIGHT, WE’LL CALL IT A DRAW.”

GOOGLE MAY NOT BE A MONOPOLY, BUT…

THEY ARE PLAYING MONOPOLY WITH THE REAL ESTATE IN THE

SERPS.

THE DESKTOP SERPS WERE *SO* MUCH EASIER IN 2001.

WHEN I TALK ABOUT THE PAST, I FEEL LIKE AN OLD MAN.

THE REALITY IS:

GOOGLE SOLD ALL THE REAL ESTATE.

KEY TAKEAWAY:

IF YOU ARE SEEING YEAR-OVER-YEAR GROWTH IN BRAND AND/OR NON-BRAND ORGANIC SESSIONS, YOU ARE FRIGGIN’ AWESOME.

#BelowTheFold

#BelowTheFold

Here’s Google ranking

themselves #1 for flights

“If you’re a 3rd party aggregating site and/or comparison shopping, you’re in a dying model. Google has been cannibalizing those because Google wants to be that 3rd party aggregator. You need to adjust your business model because it’s just going to keep going: travel, education, comparison shopping, it goes on…”

- @GregBoserSMX Advanced 2012

WE WERE WARNED.

ANNNNNNDDDD – WE HAVE DERAILED.

LET’S GET THIS TRAIN BACK ON THE TRACKS.

URL-LEVEL REPORTING

80

Traditional SEO

Technical SEO

Mobile / AppSEO

LocalSEO

Digital Asset Management

International SEO

Digital Content

UX + IA + CRO

SEO IS BIG – AND GETTING EVEN BIGGER!

ALL REPORTING MUST ALIGN WITH A STRATEGY AND/OR A PROJECT.

OR ELSE YOU RUN THE RISK OF WASTING YOUR TIME REPORTING ON KPIs THAT DON’T

MATTER TO THE STRATEGY AND/OR PROJECT.

CASE STUDY: ORGANIC SESSIONS GROWTH

For the first 9 weeks of FY’16, we are averaging 25% growth vs FY’15. That is an additional 20,000+ visits each week from organic search – for

a total of 185k additional organic search visits in FY’16.

ORGANIC SESSIONS BY WEEK (YoY)

Non-Brand rankings grew steadily during the past 12 months. This trend aligns with the growth we are seeing in organic traffic and revenue. There are 780 additional keywords – an 84% increase – ranking on Page 1 in Google. Page 2 saw 43% growth.

GOOGLE RANKINGS (15-MONTH TREND)

First 9 weeks of FY’15. First 9 weeks of FY’16.

4 MAIN BUCKETS:1. HomePage2. Category Pages3. Product Pages4. All Other Pages

ORGANIC SESSIONS BY URL GROUPS

SEO STRATEGIES GENERALLY AIM TO DRIVE MORE ORGANIC SESSIONS TO

PRODUCT AND CATEGORY PAGES.

ORGANIC SESSIONS GROWTH TO HOMEPAGE

HOMEPAGE SAW 7% GROWTH YOY.

Category Pages: +7,597 visits/wk Product Pages: +7,250 visits/wk All Other Pages: +3,190 visits/wk

Category Pages & Product Pages are accounting for 72% of YoY growth.

ORGANIC SESSIONS GROWTH TO 3 URL GROUPS

CASE STUDY: ORGANIC SESSIONS DECLINES

INTERESTING/TERRIBLE TREND GOING ON

HOW ABOUT THE ENGINE DATA?

A

B

C

D

LOOKED AT THE GOOGLE RANKINGS DATA

4 MAJOR DROPS

PAGE 1 RANKINGS DECLINING SINCE MAY

PAGE 2 RANKINGS DECLINING SINCE MAY

FINAL THOUGHTS

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• Establish the metrics & KPIs that matter - before you create strategies.

• If it can be measured, measure it.

• If a tracked KPI is not needed for reporting on any of the established goals, remove it from the standard reporting.

• Use any & every data source to help tell the story that needs to be told.

• Monthly reports are valuable to diagnose success, failure & issues.

• Many strategies need their own custom reporting to measure success.

• Be open to incorporating new KPIs into reporting as the search industry changes (ex. bounce rate, time on site, sitespeed, engagement metrics, etc…).

HAVE A DATA PHILOSOPHY

SOON ENOUGH, GOOGLE WILL USE MACHINES TO

DO EVERYTHING.

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• Is your site crawlable & indexable?

• Does your store locator work? Is the store information accurate?

• Do your products and categories have optimized names, descriptions and images?

• Are your XML sitemaps accurate and fresh?

• Do you have a steady stream of new content being published on your site?

• Is it easy for a visitor to find what they are looking for on your site?

• Is it simple to buy complete a purchase on your site?

• Are there any friction points for desktop / mobile / tablet users?

BUT FOR NOW, HAVE THE BASICS NAILED DOWN.

CHEERS!