Search engine optimization (SEO) is an integral part of every successful digital marketing strategy. Whether you’re running a local business, an online store or a global conglomerate, it’s important to optimize your website for search engines. It’s a powerful and cost-effective way of driving organic traffic to your website and converting visitors into leads and customers.

However, a robust and well-rounded SEO strategy can do much more than just skyrocket your website’s search engine ranking. When judiciously used, it can be instrumental in establishing your brand as an industry authority. Also, it can go a long way to deliver an outstanding customer experience.

SEO and Customer Experience: Understanding the Connection

Here’s the thing: Search engines, such as Google and Bing, want to deliver the best search experience to their users. Apart from high-quality content, search engine spiders also consider the user experience (UX) of a website as an important ranking signal. This, in turn, means you can’t optimize your website for search without creating a great customer experience.

From creating meaningful and easily accessible content to improving site speed, there are various SEO tactics that can bolster customer experience. For instance, when you optimize your blog using the right keywords, your customers can easily find relevant content on your website. Likewise, creating a comprehensive and keyword-rich FAQs page helps them find answers to their queries and problems.

Needless to say, it can be instrumental in helping you retain existing customers and converting them into brand loyalists. This, in turn, will positively impact your revenue and overall growth. It’s particularly crucial considering that even a 5 percent increase in customer retention can amplify your profits by 25-95 percent. 

So, what are the best SEO tactics that you can use to create an awesome customer experience? Let’s find out.

1. Prioritize Search Intent Over Keyword Density

SEO is no longer about flooding your blog posts with keywords to rank higher in relevant search engine results pages (SERPs). Instead, you should have a clear idea of why a consumer would use specific keywords in their search queries. In other words, you need to understand the search intent behind every keyword.

Moreover, you have to ensure that your content addresses the intent associated with your target keywords. Let’s say you’re running a blog on vegan food and want to target the keyword “vegan meat substitutes.” People entering this keyword on Google might want one of the following things:

• To learn more about vegan meat substitutes
• To make vegan meat substitutes at home
• To buy vegan meat substitutes from reliable brands

It’s up to you to understand your target audience’s mindset and identify the right intent behind the keywords. It’ll ensure that your content actually resolves their problem or query. This, in turn, will boost your website’s search engine ranking and reinforce the overall customer experience.

2. Publish Relevant and Engaging Content

This is likely the thumb-rule of successfully implementing every SEO strategy. The key is to identify your audience’s pain points and queries and create content that addresses the problem areas. It can be instrumental in positioning your website as the go-to destination for all your audience’s problems and queries. Also, it’ll help educate your existing and potential customers about new products/services, features, etc.

If you’ve done keyword research right, you’ll have a clear idea of the topics and themes that’ll appeal to your audience. You can also use a tool like AnswerThePublic to identify the questions they’ll likely ask about a topic. The next step is to map your shortlisted keywords, topics and questions to various stages of the buyer’s journey. 

Here’s an example:

Image via Moz

Use a powerful customer relationship management (CRM) platform to track how your new and existing customers move through the sales funnel. Next, you need to tailor your content to address your customers’ needs and pain points at each stage. For instance, in-depth user guides and blog posts on specific products can help onboard new customers. Likewise, comprehensive product comparison guides can help customers in the consideration stage make up their minds.

Also, it’s a good idea to publish insightful pillar pages and “ultimate guides” on your website to address key pain points. In addition to boosting your website’s search engine ranking, these pages can be useful in empowering your customers with the right information.

3. Leverage Internal Linking

Internal linking is an effective way of helping search engine spiders navigate your website and index new or recently updated web pages. It even helps search engines understand what a web page is all about and spreads link juice throughout your website. Also, when judiciously used, it improves website engagement metrics, such as bounce rate and time on site.

What many website owners and entrepreneurs overlook is that internal linking can be just as effective in improving customer experience. It’s because when you add relevant internal links in a blog post, you can help customers easily find more meaningful information. You can even use strategically placed internal links to guide your customers to specific product/service pages.

However, make sure any internal link you add organically fits into your content. Also, you should use accurate, relevant and descriptive anchor texts to help customers understand where the link will lead them.

4. Improve Site Speed and Responsiveness

In today’s fast-paced world, no one enjoys waiting for a web page to load. If your website is slow, you’ll end up driving potential and existing customers away. This, in turn, will affect its bounce rate and can even pull your website down in search engine results. That’s why you should optimize your website’s speed to ensure that it doesn’t take too long to load.

From image compression and code minification to choosing a dedicated web hosting plan, there are various ways to amplify site speed. You can even use Google’s PageSpeed Insights to learn more about how to make your website faster. Likewise, it’s essential to make your website mobile-responsive. 

5. Create an Extensive Knowledge Base

Identify the common questions your customers will have while using your product/service to build a rock-solid knowledge base. Make sure it’s easily navigable and optimized using relevant keywords. It’s an excellent way of empowering customers to utilize your product/service to the fullest. Also, it can be effective in taking the load off of your customer support team.

SEO isn’t just about website traffic and search engine ranking. When properly implemented, a good SEO strategy can be just as useful in creating an amazing customer experience. All you have to do is understand your customers’ mindset and deliver content that addresses their pain points. Also, optimizing site speed, responsiveness and navigation can further enhance the customer experience.

Have you used any other SEO tactics to improve customer experience? Share your tips in the comments section below.