SEO News

Can you tell me a little about Bathrooms.com, traffic, turnover etc?

With over 50,000 customers and venture capital investment in excess of £10m, the company employs more than 50 people across three continents. We have a run rate in excess of £10m and we are growing at between 50-100% per year.  

Our traffic can be in excess of 100,000 visits per month. 

The new site looks impressive, how did you approach the redesign?  

We went through a rebrand/redesign a few years ago and it was a bit of a disaster, so I took a lot of lessons learned from that and applied it to this project.

One of the key challenges for us was to bridge the gap between a rebrand (new logo, TOV, personality, etc) and a redesigned website. Previous experience showed us that if you design the brand outside of the website, it just doesn’t work.  

However, there aren’t that many agencies or people that have great expertise in branding and e-commerce/digital. We ended up deciding to lead with a digital agency with a strong creative team but to bring in a small marketing agency to work on the branding element at the beginning. 

Buying into all the decisions, big and small needed to come right from the top to make sure the resulting brand and website was cohesive and fully integrated into the company’s core strategy.  

This meant that I, as CEO, had to be involved every step of the way and it was a big commitment over the six month project, but it’s been absolutely worth every second of it.

Test and test some more but then just get on with it…  I love my numbers and statistics so we have previously been fanatical about A/B and multivariate testing but this often resulted in inconclusive results (not enough statistical data) or long delays whilst we waited for results.  

With a rebrand, there are so many things changing it’s hard to select one or two of them to test in isolation. This time we focused more on user group testing, with users talking us through their experience, insights and actions.  

The Invision platform helped us rapidly build Hi-Res walkthroughs. We then used this to inform the design and then did A/B testing at the end of the process to make the final refinements.  Now we have the core platform in place we can get back to the more traditional A/B testing approach to refinement.

Throughout the process I was very mindful of focusing on what I think are the two key things the customer wants from an ecommerce company: great products at a great price. We are not about being the cheapest but I believe all online retailers must demonstrate great value.  

The value proposition is often taken too far and ends up creating a discount brand where the customer is left only to focus on price.  

We have achieved the balance by investing heavily in world-class magazine style images and making sure our price offering demonstrates value but doesn’t look like a discount brand – we took inspiration from H&M (hm.com) in doing this.

The bathroom category can have long buying timelines of up to three months, so it was important for me that we created great content and an excellent CRM platform that allows us to engage early on in the buying process and stay in contact with that potential customer until they finalise their buying decision.  

Our Inspiration Blog has proved pivotal in doing this.  We are employing two of the UKs best home décor journalists (previously of channel4/homes and LivingEtc) and arguably the UKs leading stylist (previously of Elle Decor) to create amazing content and imagery that will engage and inspire customers.

What percentage of you traffic and sales comes from search?

We have historically relied predominately on paid search but we are now investing heavily in PR, social, CRM (email) and organic search. 

Why did you decide to take a PR-focused approach to SEO?

I have a fundamental issue with spending our hard earned money on buying links when I can be spending this money communicating our message and mission to customers that share our passion for design and want to be inspired to create more in their home.  

Our approach to links is best defined by a simple question we ask ourselves – would we target a link on this website if Google did not exist?  

One would only answer yes to this if it was a relevant website with visitors that are interested in one’s products.  This is less likely to be the case if the website in question sells links and articles to anyone that is willing to part with some money.

There are plenty of home and design websites and blogs out there with our target customer and it was very clear to me that the people that could help us connect with them would be a PR company that has experience in finding, nurturing and developing long term relationships with journalists (aka Bloggers) – whether that be offline or online. 

What are the benefits of this approach as you see them? Are there any drawbacks?

The benefit is that we spend our time and energy communicating our brand values and inspiring customers and benefit from SEO in the process.  Even if I wasn’t so driven by this, my belief is that Google will get smarter and smarter so that it only rewards those links that meet the criteria I outlined above anyway.  

So the medium to long term risks from a change in Google’s algorithm are almost zero. 

Things are always moving so one can never be 100% sure about an SEO strategy. It may take a little longer to get traction this way?  

However, I know that our approach means we are connecting and engaging with customer in a relevant, timely and inspiring way and if for some reason the SEO element of the strategy doesn’t work (and I have no reason to suspect it won’t), this still would be a good investment strategy for us anyway. 

I’ve seen the list of metrics: blogger outreach, social engagement etc, that you wanted to measure Dynamo (the company’s PR/SEO agency) on. What was the thinking behind these? 

It’s always hard to put firm metrics around a PR programme without losing the focus on quality rather than quantity – but we wanted some measurable targets in there to enable Dynamo to focus and demonstrate progress.  

All of the measures meet the following criteria:

1. Primarily focused on ‘getting our message out there’ in a qualitative way.
2. Easily measurable (we didn’t want to spend ½ our budget measuring performance).
3. Unambiguous and non-subjective.

Separately we then, more subjectively, measure and discuss the quality of the work that sits behind the KPI results.

One key metric was the Facebook engagement rates and number of followers. We aren’t interesting in signing up millions of Facebook ‘followers for the sake of it.  

We want those followers that sign up to share our passion for design and want to be inspired to create more in their home. We clearly communicated to Dynamo that we were far more interested in how our followers interact with us than the numbers of followers.  

A company must have some critical mass on Facebook but that could be reached by numerous tricks and gimmicks out there which typically result in a poorly engaged fan base.  We are due to run a competition this month to increase our fan base but this will only be targeted at consumers interested in home and great design.  

Furthermore, this will be validated by an entry question that asks them to nominate a household item that deserves to be give our Affordable Design Award. So it’s going to be harder to hit the KPI but when we do, we will know we have done it in a way that is brand and with customers that are really interested in having a conversation with us. 

How have these progressed so far?

The main activity so far has been around building a communication and campaign plan for the coming quarter.  It’s early days, but we’ve seen social start to gain momentum.  We’ve been more focused so far on putting in the foundations for this quarter’s activity.  

For example, we have spent a day training sales and customer service staff on how to engage and interact on social channels.

How do you view more ‘traditional’ SEO metrics  – search visibility, improved rankings, organic traffic etc?

Share of online voice is important, so clearly we want to benefit from organic traffic and the traditional SEO metrics that help measure these are as valid today as they have ever been.  

We feel we have a joined up approach to achieving both aims in a way which will give us both short and long term success in developing a recognisable and distinct brand and a market leading share of organic search.

Do you see the position of PRs changing? Are they in a better position to build links, conduct blogger outreach etc? What is the value of this compared to on-site optimization? 

I have no doubt that PRs are ideally positioned to help us create great content, start conversations and are best placed to find, nurture and develop long term relationships with journalists and bloggers, whether they be offline or online.  

It is my belief that in doing these things one will create a strong brand with lots of people interested in having conversations about it. These conversations will be recognised by the search engines and will drive the SEO metrics which are more directly linked and attributable to revenue generation.  

Search engines will always need to analyse a website’s content so on-site optimization is absolutely pivotal. One cannot go without the other if one is to achieve success with organic traffic. 

Develop a brand narrative 

At the core of the Bible is a strong narrative voice. It’s this narrative voice that gets the message of Christianity across so clearly. How does it do this? It tells a story that’s how.

Isn’t this what every blog post about content marketing you’ve ever read tells you to do? Of course it is. Engage with your customers by sharing an interesting story with them? This is what the Bible does in bucket loads.

Think of all the Biblical stories that you know: Adam and Eve. Noah, Moses, Jesus, to name but a few: these are very powerful stories that have been remembered for generations.

It is these stories that have helped spread Christianity and made it one of the world’s leading religions.

How does the Bible tell this story?

At the heart of the Bible and Christianity are the 10 Commandments. These 10 rules are the key set of laws that govern all Christians. It is a framework from which all of the Bible and other Christian teachings and writings stem from. This is what all content strategies need. You need to have your own set of brand rules, establishing tone of voice, target audience and story.

Before any content is created brands and their agencies need to work out what their core beliefs and core outcomes are. As we outlined in our Content Marketing Guide 2013 there are many questions that content marketers need to ask before creating any content at all.

What story do you want to tell? Who do you want to tell it to? What is your ideal outcome? 

The Bible has a creative core of ideas behind it that speaks out to a reader on every single page. How many content marketing campaigns have this creative forethought behind them? Red Bull does and so do Coca-Cola and Amex. More brands need to.

The content marketing wheel keeps on turning

The Bible is just a starting point in terms of content creation for Christianity.  The Bible is the content strategy document for Christianity, but as a brand Christianity provides various “multiple touch points” for consumers to engage with their content message. 

These include:

Hymns

What is a hymn if not music with a religious brand message included? These hymns, if written today by a brand, could be distributed via Spotify, YouTube, ThisisMyJam and countless other online music hubs, including national radio, creating a valuable distribution channel for your content. 

Psalms

The book of Psalms is the longest book in the Bible, which contains 150 short poems. The Bible understands that sometimes consumers are not interested in overly long forms of content; but we are open to shorter, more accessible brand messages.

Many of the messages in the Psalms can be broken down to single sentences. Think Twitter, Facebook updates, message forums, video ads and anywhere else where short messages can work. The Bible got there first.

Art

Some of the greatest works of art have been created with a Christian message behind them. In many instances they have literally tried to illustrate stories from the Bible. The results have been extraordinarily successful, such as Da Vinci’s Last Supper (above).

Content marketers today need to think about how they can develop their content messages around visual concepts; Instagram, Pinterest, infographics and Flickr – these are extremely good ways where there is an opportunity to create something that is in-keeping with your brand and offers another opportunity to connect with your customer base on different platforms.

If you can find a Da Vinci in the process, all the better!

Sermons

Some marketers forget that content marketing takes place offline as well as on. Where is there a better example than in the Bible and Christianity as a whole? This is a religion built around the church service and sermon.

Think about how all of your content marketing activity can be harnessed for face-to-face interactions. Think press conferences, blogger events, Meet-ups, Google+ hang-outs, sales meetings, staff training; anywhere where you can speak directly to your target base and create advocates of your brand message.

And remember, you can film these too, creating more content for your brand stories. 

Inspiring user generated content

If, as a brand, you can inspire others to be so inspired by your content that they start to create content that shares and promotes your brand – content that can often then in turn inspire more and more content to be created – then you are on to an extremely powerful thing.

For example, Michaelangelo’s Sistine Chapel, you could argue, is user generated content promoting the brand of Christianity. How iconic and recognisable a symbol is the below?

What else can the Bible teach us about content marketing? Quite a lot more actually. 

Expert thought leadership

If you look at the New Testament, obviously one character stands out, Jesus. The brand story is, to a large extent, Jesus’ story. All the significant stories in the New Testament follow Jesus.

He is the expert, the storyteller, the one you get behind and support. As a consumer, we all buy into his story. He appeals to all of us in some way or another. 

Content marketers can learn from this

There is a lot to be said about promoting your brand through a recognisable persona, someone that appeals to your customer’s tastes and can promote your brand through dialogue.

A good example is Steve Jobs. Apple customers loved his passion and attention to detail, everything he did, -every talk, every interview, every article he wrote, helped promote Apple. Likewise we have Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook.

Online we have Matt Cutts for Google; Rand Fishkin at SEOMOZ, Pete Cashmore at Mashable and Dale Lovell at Content Amp (wishful thinking on my part here!), all of whom are only marginally less well known than the brands they represent. 

From YouTube video channels to Twitter handles, guest posts to Google Author rank; content marketers need to promote a persona, or multiple personas, that can easily be identified with your brand.

Why? Because the personal approach is one of the best ways to connect with your customers online.

Seasonal hooks

Have you ever wondered how there are so many key events in the Bible around peak holiday times? Easter, Christmas, the Bible has them all covered! How did that brand get so lucky?

Joking aside, it’s worth looking at what inspiration we can get from the Bible here. The thing to remember is that many of what we now view as Christian holidays are actually based on old Pagan festivities – so key events have actually been added to the calendar to tell the brand story of Christianity.

I’m not suggesting you try and create a new brand based holiday, but content marketers should think about what message – and what story – they can tell around key holiday periods that will speak to their customers. 

Try something different

Many content strategies fail because they try to cover all the bases and appeal to everyone. You need to set out your stall and commit to what you believe in. It’s what magazine and newspaper publishers do – and it is what determines their success or failure.

Be bold in your content strategy; if done correctly consumers reward such action. How many content marketing campaigns actually try something different and actually give off an emotion and a sense of themselves as a brand?

The Bible does this. Can you say that for your content marketing strategy?

10 content marketing commandments to take from the Bible:

1. Create a core set of beliefs – develop a content strategy.
2. Use narrative to tell your brand story.
3. Create content that can inspire your customer base.
4. Don’t be afraid to be original with the content you create, the argument you make and the stories you tell.
5. Create different forms of content – long form, short form, video, music and images – multiple touch points for your customer base to engage with your brand.
6. Develop an expert to spread your brand message and to become a brand advocate.
7. Create a content calendar – key dates to inform your story.
8. Amplify your content message using all multiple platforms that are available – spread your message. 
9. Place your content strategy at the heart of your organisation. It shouldn’t be the function of your marketing department; it should be the core of your company ethos.
10. Evangelise; practise what you preach – blog, guest post, social network and share.

About 7 months ago Don Rhoades wrote up a fantastic post on Downtown Ecommerce about building links with forums for ecommerce websites. If you’re in Ecommerce and you haven’t read it yet, I suggest you do before you go any further.

A month or two ago I got a chance to meet up with Don in person, and I caught myself asking a few different questions that weren’t answered in his post. I …

Ecommerce Forum Link Building with Don Rhoades (Part 2) is a post from: Point Blank SEO