How to Leverage SEO Segmentation

Intro

SEO is no longer just a job title; it has become part of everyone’s job description

So says Rand Fishkin of audience research software company SparkToro. And he has a point. Everybody needs to keep SEO front and centre, no matter what their specialized role might be.

This article explores how to use SEO segmentation to help your brand get ahead. We’ll look at what SEO segmentation is and suggest a few ways of approaching its implementation.

Why use SEO segmentation?

These days, getting SEO right is as fundamental a part of everyday operations as having dedicated business telephone numbers or conducting market research.

So much so, in fact, that it gets increasingly difficult to stand out from the competition. Everyone wants to perfect their search visibility, and it’s no longer sufficient to stick to a basic approach.

With so many companies chasing the same goal, how do you achieve a competitive advantage via SEO best practices?

The answer: SEO segmentation.

SEO segmentation refers to the process of drilling down into the detail of how your SEO is performing and what impact it’s having on your business. It involves breaking down your data into component parts that you then group together depending on your chosen metrics.

The metrics you choose will depend on what you intend to do with the data. Ideally, you’re looking to achieve new insights that you can feed back into your SEO policy to give your search visibility a boost.

Sometimes, implementing top-quality SEO can feel a bit like chasing a moving target. As soon as you think you’ve got there, the rules change, and it seems as if you’ll never quite arrive at your destination.

That’s okay. The search landscape is so dynamic that there’s bound to be a continuous ebb and flow in terms of traffic, conversion rates, and overall rankings. And of course, the algorithm changes regularly too. SEO professionals are constantly updating their understanding of how to achieve the best possible results.

(Image sourced from ranktracker.com)

Nevertheless, using SEO segmentation can give you an edge in this never-ending race. Using tools like the Ranktracker web audit is a suitable place to start. This will give you a deeper knowledge of how your website is performing as a whole when it comes to SEO.

But that’s just the beginning. Let’s dive a little deeper into how to go about the process of SEO segmentation.

The SEO segmentation process

You’re probably already familiar with the concept of customer segmentation analysis. That’s where you divide your customer base into groups according to features such as demographic, geographic, or behavioural similarities. You then analyse your data according to these segments with a view to targeting your customers more effectively.

SEO segmentation runs along similar lines. The idea is to figure out which SEO tactics are working well and which could do with improvement. The procedure can be split into four steps:

Step 1: Identify and select the components you want to focus on. Your choice here should be led by the overall aim of the project, e.g. maximizing conversions or optimizing product page rankings.

Step 2: Determine the similarities between the elements you have selected. This will enable you to run analytics on various subgroups of the components you’re working with.

Step 3: Create groups and analyse them.

Step 4: Action your insights. Bear in mind that SEO segmentation is an ongoing and iterative process. What you learn will not only improve your current performance, but also help you next time round.

This may seem like a complex procedure, but luckily, the best SEO tools out there can help make everything much more straightforward.

(Image sourced from ranktracker.com)

Let’s say you want to look at how you’re ranking for your chosen keywords. If you take a big-picture approach, it can happen that the resulting overview can obscure the detail. For example, looking at broad-brush organic and paid search data for your site won’t help you understand which minor changes in keyword implementation are affecting performance.

For that, you need to get into a more granular level of detail. A rank tracker tool can help you select the components you want to emphasize for segmentation. You can then sort them into subgroups that are genuinely meaningful.

Let’s have a look at the types of choices you might make, depending on your goals.

Types of segmentation

There are many approaches to selecting elements for grouping that can be effective. In fact, with all the analytics data you have available, you’re only really limited by your imagination. You can look at keywords, individual pages, metrics, and topics, or compare your site with your competitors’.

Nevertheless, there are a few standard ways of going about this that are tried and tested. Newcomers to the concept of SEO segmentation are likely to find at least some of these useful.

Branded vs. non-branded keywords

A branded keyword is one that includes the name of your company or brand, while a non-branded one doesn’t. For instance, if you’re looking for a new cloud PBX solution for your business, you might search for any of the following:

• Cloud-hosted PBX
• Hosted PBX
• VoIP comms system

These are all examples of relevant non-branded keywords. However, if you have a specific supplier in mind, you might search for that company by name instead. That’s why it’s standard practice to try to rank for both types of keywords—to attract potential customers coming from both directions.

It’s well known that branded and non-branded keywords tend to perform differently. Branded keywords are by nature more specific, so fewer people are searching on them than on the more generic non-branded ones.

(Image source: Unsplash)

It therefore makes sense that it’s easier to rank higher for branded keywords. They’re generally more stable, in the sense that their position doesn’t change all that much. On the other hand, non-branded keywords will often have a higher search volume but be much more difficult to rank for.

It’s crucial to split these two types of keywords into two distinct groups during your segmentation. Otherwise, the subtle but crucial differences in how they’re performing can easily remain hidden.

Search volume

To get a genuine handle on what’s happening with your SEO, it’s also vital to split out high-volume and low-volume keywords. High-volume keywords are in great demand and as a result you face higher levels of competition to rank well for them.

Lower-volume keywords are searched for less often but are less likely to be chosen as a focus, so if you do choose them, there’s less competition. This type of keyword is also known as a “long-tail” keyword, because if you draw a graph of search volume against conversion rate for various keywords, the low-volume ones spread out along a “long tail” to the right as the conversion rate increases.

Take all of the keywords you aim to be ranking for and break them down into high-volume and low-volume groups. If your website is particularly large and you’re targeting a large number of keywords, consider adding a third “medium-volume” group as well. Define the groups according to search volume per month.

Keyword context

When considering the diverse types of SEO, it’s vital not to lose sight of keyword context.

Revisiting our example of business communications tools, we could segment keywords into categories by topic, like this:

Customer engagement: cloud contact centre, AI contact centre, AI sales tools

Business communications: business phone systems, hosted PBX, VoIP comms system

Small business services: small business phone tools, small business cloud tools

(Image source: Unsplash)

Creating segments that are category-based like this is an excellent approach for establishing how each one is performing on search engines. When new content or backlinks are added or existing content is changed, you then have a reliable way of seeing the impact of these changes on your website.

Other possibilities

There may be specific questions you want to find the answers to which require a different approach. Tools like Google My Business software can help you determine which direction to take. Here are a few specific examples.

Geography: If you operate internationally, this one is essential. Knowing how your SEO is performing in different regions, countries, or languages is critical to success.

Device: Depending on your target market, it can be very helpful to know how your keyword performances vary according to whether the potential customer is using a desktop or mobile device. This will enable you to optimize appropriately.

Site patterns: If you segment according to page type (e.g. product page vs. landing page), this will give you important insights into which parts of your site are in need of improvement.

Find your competitive edge through segmentation

The deeper you dive into your data, the more insight you’ll gain. Experiment with a variety of segmentation categories. Every business is different, and the best approach for you might not work for another organization.

That said, SEO segmentation is an indispensable tool for improving your optimization processes and increasing your brand search visibility. Once you begin applying these techniques, you’ll wonder how you ever did without them!