Increasing Year-on-Year Organic Search Clicks by 306% with Strategic Content and SEO
The results are in: A+ in SEO and Content Strategy from our client in the student housing sector! See how, since we started working with the client, we improved their organic search clicks by 306% and organic search impressions by 252% at their most critical time of year.
352%
186%
306%
253%
Our Client's Goals
We started working with our client in the student housing sector in late 2021. After a tough couple of years navigating the pandemic and much of their audience choosing to stay at home thanks to online lectures, our client’s regular customer base fell dramatically.
In addition, Google's core updates in 2020/2021 badly affected their previous agency's SEO strategy, and our client's site's search visibility fell significantly.
Importantly, as a seasonal business, our client wanted to be visible during their peak time of year, August to September, when students are looking for accommodation.
Our Strategy
To boost the clients’ online traffic growth, we devised a multi-step strategy relying on optimised content creation and technical SEO fixes. We followed the process below:
Analysed existing keyword footprint: One of our first steps is always to analyse our clients’ existing keyword footprint. This process is important to see how the client is performing and identify areas of strength and opportunities to improve.
Strategic keyword research: As a business with a customer base in the UK and overseas, we had to be careful with our targeting to ensure that the client appeared in local and international searches for each location they serve.
Competitor gap analysis: Alongside the keyword research, we conducted a competitor gap analysis to see their successes and find gaps and opportunities to capitalise on.
Streamlined page content creation: We worked alongside the client’s team to produce a large amount of SEO-optimised page copy, prioritising quantity and quality. At the core of our strategy was to develop copy in line with the demands of the SERPs while considering local SEO factors and always keeping E-E-A-T in mind.
Developed a relevant blog content strategy: Using the keyword research findings, we created a blog content strategy that targeted the client’s target demographic and also supported the landing pages we were optimising. Through our search-intent-based approach to keyword research, we focused on long-tail, informational terms to provide useful supporting content and give readers more context about their chosen university location. We also structured each piece of content to outperform competitors in SERP features like featured snippets.
Improved internal linking across the site: To ensure that all related content was easily navigable by readers, we linked between location landing pages and supporting content pieces, thus keeping readers on-site and engaged for longer.
Reviewed and optimised images: High-quality imagery on each listing is paramount to our client’s success, as their customers often rely on these alone before committing to a property. So, we had to ensure that each image on the site was optimised for page experience in terms of loading speed and quality.
Completed a successful site migration: We worked extensively with the client and their development team to migrate the optimised website to a new design in September 2022 - and this migration subsequently had very little impact on traffic. Result!
A word on seasonality
The summer holidays might be a break for some - but not our client. As a seasonal business peaking in August, we planned our actions around this, ensuring that optimisation was carried out, indexed and bedded in ahead of time.
Achieving the Results
With all hands on deck at Zelst, plus help from our client’s team, we successfully implemented the keyword strategy and technical site optimisations to achieve results. We have seen:
- A 186% increase in overall organic keyword footprint since we started working with the client.
- An increase in organic traffic by 352% year-on-year, peaking in April 2023 at 99,048 visits - a 378% increase from the previous year.
- An 884% increase in organic image impressions thanks to our optimisation efforts, as 41% of featured snippet results are images.
The increase in highly-ranking keywords has improved our client’s online visibility, resulting in a 262% increase in organic search impressions and a 306% increase in organic search clicks in year-on-year data during their high season.
These impressive figures suggest that the pages and blogs ranking in the SERP are more relevant to the client’s audience and that metadata is optimised to attract traffic.
Benefit from success all year round with the Zelst team
Many industries experience seasonality, and it’s different for everyone, but with a well-developed content and SEO strategy, you can capitalise on your low-season setbacks and spring into action back and better than ever when your business sees its peak.
The team at Zelst, though experts in navigating seasonality for a range of industries, continue to strive for success all year round for our clients. As we did for our client in the education housing sector, we can put together a highly focused and targeted campaign to improve your site traffic and boost your visibility, from targeted keyword research, SEO-friendly content and page optimisation all the way through to site migration, to get you ready for your peak.
Get in touch with us to see how the team can help you reach your goals today. If you can’t wait, why not sign up for our email newsletter? That way, you will receive actionable insights and tips to get the ball rolling before our first meeting.
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