Today’s post is by Barbara Krasner, a senior marketing professional with an extensive customer marketing background. She writes about optimizing case studies, success stories and other customer marketing content for search engines. Enjoy…
If you have case studies or success stories on the web, particularly in text form, are you thinking about all the ways readers can find them?
Putting active thought into writing for search engines can dramatically add to the value of what you are writing by increasing visibility. You don’t have to be an expert in meta titles, meta descriptions, and meta keywords to maximize search engine optimization (SEO) value. Some very simple tips can go a long way towards helping reference management professionals take advantage of SEO.
Here are some ways to get started:
- How you would search—Think about how you, as a representative of the information-seeking population, might search. Make a list of words you would use. Then apply them to your narrative.
- Case study titles—Use a combination of geography, subject, and firm name. Example: “Atlanta Georgia Retail Store Gains $1.3 Million in Benefit with Software Security Solution.”
- Sub-heads—These are really important for SEO and, from my observation, not well used in case studies. Instead of inserting merely Challenge, Solution, and Benefit, make subtitles meaty and meaningful. Example: “Stolen merchandise and profits left clothing retailer” instead of “Challenge.”
- Alternative phrasing—Using alternative word choices increases SEO value. For example, SEO value increases using “retailer” in addition to “retail store.” Try “GA” in addition to “Georgia.” Insert Atlanta metro area in addition to Atlanta. Mention the county and surrounding county names.
- Sometimes being succinct will hurt you—As efficient marketers and writers, we might try to be as brief as possible. In the introductory paragraph above, I used both “case studies” and “success stories.” That was intentional to increase the marketing value of this blog entry. If you have phrases like “pre- and post-installation,” write out “pre-installation and post-installation.” That will increase SEO value.
Make every word in your case study count and work for you and your client. Increase exposure and clicks by maximizing your document’s SEO value. Feel free to contact me with questions.
Barbara Krasner
barbarakrasner@att.net
Barbara,
Thanks for the helpful post on SEO. You offered some great ideas that I had not thought about before. I use descriptive subheads for skimmers, but was overlooking the SEO value of that.
Thanks!
Casey