Challenge
Atlanta-based innovative product design firm, Thrive, has a two-month buyer cycle. Being visible to the right buyer at the right time often required several touch points in order to remain top of mind. Although Thrive was receiving thousands of engaged users per month, their website wasn’t meeting its primary objective: conversions. Despite driving traffic, the site’s conversion rate was low, suggesting a major disconnect between site users and conversion intention. They partnered with an SEO agency that would effectively optimize their website to increase conversions.
Solution
To meet Thrive’s business goals, SEO agency AIS Media restructured the Thrive website to cater to their users, connected by high-intent keywords. Within the first 30 days, we developed a two-prong keyword strategy broken into two personas: “Validators” and “Problem Solvers”. A Tale of Two Audiences “Validators” already knew the specific services they required. They needed to determine which B2B partner would be best for their needs. The most effective keywords to reach them would follow “product design company”, “industrial design company”, and “customer experience company”. Thrive’s “Problem Solvers” spend time thinking about business operations or technology inefficiencies that are costing their company high dollar amounts. Their search behavior is more knowledge seeking, using high volume keywords such as “product optimization”, “industrial product design”, and “product design development”. Building a Website for Users Once we determined keywords for this two-prong strategy, we mapped the site to nurture ranking growth and benefit user flow. We guided Thrive through a revision of their home page, with the intent of directing traffic between two distinct target audiences. We segmented the needs of each audience by developing content headed under “Show me…” and “I have a problem related to…” The “Validators” persona would opt for “Show me”, which included key validating points, such as case study work for other clients, expertise areas, and the Thrive staff page. We also developed additional landing pages optimized for each keyword that “Validators” would use to search for a B2B partner. Thrive had a history of publishing high-quality thought leadership articles, which resonated well with external publications in the innovation sector. We leveraged new and existing publications to support organic growth through keyword-targeted SEO link building. From the home page, “Problem Solvers” were more likely to select “I have a problem related to…” and start their education through Thrive’s expertise areas and thought leadership. Thrive’s content needs to resonate with “Problem Solvers” in order to give them the confidence that Thrive has the tools to identify and fix problems specific to their business. According to Jon Dalton, CEO at Thrive, their organic leads helped secure major client deals in their first year working with AIS Media. Therefore, the increase in organic leads translated to success in furthering Thrive’s business goals.
Results
The Outcome: Six months into their SEO program, Thrive’s 40% increase in high-intent keyword rankings delivered a 126% boost in organic site traffic, and 133% more web leads than previous years.
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