SEO content = bad for CRO?

squeebo · 7th Aug 2015, 09:05 PM

I'm reading some great books on SEO and CRO. I'm applying the ideas to my ecommerce site.

For SEO I have some pages with lots of text, particularly category pages, and indeed the prolific use of the right keywords has gotten me good search traffic that I don't want to lose.

But for CRO it seems like it's a bad idea to have so much text that people aren't going to read. They want bullet points, and the paragraphs of text overwhelm them.

How do you balance things when you run into this problem? One thing I'm doing is having most of the SEO text underneath the category or product links, so that it doesn't distract the visitor too badly, but it's still there and has an effect.

Maybe I should avoid doing this and instead write content articles, wiping the category pages as clean as I can get them with very minimal text? The problem is the category pages convert the best and I feel like I'm giving up something when I'm not bringing in search traffic directly to them.

ShoppingSignals · 7th Aug 2015, 09:50 PM

Don't get rid of all of the text on your category pages.

Simply make it more readable. Break up all long paragraphs into no more than 3 or 4 sentences.

Don't worry about grammatically correct paragraph length. Just make it easy to read or scan.

Small chunks of sentences (like your reading right now) do that. Also, do use bullet points, headings, indents, etc. You can do this with any length of content.

The happy by product of doing this?

The reader stays on your page longer, which improves bounce rate, and therefore SEO.

savidge4 · 7th Aug 2015, 10:46 PM

This is really a catch 22. The reality is bringing them into a category page is like shooting yourself in the foot. The other side is the traffic. The BIG question; Is the traffic converting? A better than best guess, I would say they are not.

If you look at this from a user perspective. They search for a red widget, and they get dropped on the widget category page. Now there are a great many choices on the page a bunch of text and ALL THE CUSTOMER WANTS is a red widget. The customer gets frustrated, and does what? bounces.

I personally on commerce sites no-index category pages. I would much prefer the greater amount of control over the user experience and develop product specific lander pages. I get it.. its a pain in the ash. You have to prioritize GETTING traffic, and CONVERTING traffic. I would rather have 50 visitors a day with 10% conversion over 1000 a day with .01% conversion.

SEO is about targeting traffic, and CRO is about segmenting traffic. You CAN complete both tasks with a concerted effort in page development. You simply need to target the segments that are buying and drawing them to pages that are specifically designed to make that conversion happen.

Hope that Helps!

Originally Posted by squeebo

I'm reading some great books on SEO and CRO. I'm applying the ideas to my ecommerce site.

For SEO I have some pages with lots of text, particularly category pages, and indeed the prolific use of the right keywords has gotten me good search traffic that I don't want to lose.

But for CRO it seems like it's a bad idea to have so much text that people aren't going to read. They want bullet points, and the paragraphs of text overwhelm them.

How do you balance things when you run into this problem? One thing I'm doing is having most of the SEO text underneath the category or product links, so that it doesn't distract the visitor too badly, but it's still there and has an effect.

Maybe I should avoid doing this and instead write content articles, wiping the category pages as clean as I can get them with very minimal text? The problem is the category pages convert the best and I feel like I'm giving up something when I'm not bringing in search traffic directly to them.

squeebo · 9th Aug 2015, 11:59 AM

Thanks for the replies!

I think I'll take the category page text and make content pages for it, tidy up the content to make it more readable, and create links on the category pages to the content. A lot of it is useful content, not just SEO fluff.

The products (or subcategories) listing combined with lots of text on the same page is probably too overwhelming and messy and makes visitors lose focus.

7th Aug 2015, 09:05 PM	#1
squeebo HyperActive Warrior Join Date: 2014 Posts: 122 Thanks: 126 Thanked 9 Times in 6 Posts	SEO content = bad for CRO? Share on: I'm reading some great books on SEO and CRO. I'm applying the ideas to my ecommerce site. For SEO I have some pages with lots of text, particularly category pages, and indeed the prolific use of the right keywords has gotten me good search traffic that I don't want to lose. But for CRO it seems like it's a bad idea to have so much text that people aren't going to read. They want bullet points, and the paragraphs of text overwhelm them. How do you balance things when you run into this problem? One thing I'm doing is having most of the SEO text underneath the category or product links, so that it doesn't distract the visitor too badly, but it's still there and has an effect. Maybe I should avoid doing this and instead write content articles, wiping the category pages as clean as I can get them with very minimal text? The problem is the category pages convert the best and I feel like I'm giving up something when I'm not bringing in search traffic directly to them.

7th Aug 2015, 09:50 PM	#2
ShoppingSignals HyperActive Warrior Join Date: 2013 Posts: 155 Thanks: 7 Thanked 47 Times in 44 Posts	Re: SEO content = bad for CRO? Share on: Don't get rid of all of the text on your category pages. Simply make it more readable. Break up all long paragraphs into no more than 3 or 4 sentences. Don't worry about grammatically correct paragraph length. Just make it easy to read or scan. Small chunks of sentences (like your reading right now) do that. Also, do use bullet points, headings, indents, etc. You can do this with any length of content. The happy by product of doing this? The reader stays on your page longer, which improves bounce rate, and therefore SEO.

9th Aug 2015, 11:59 AM	#4
squeebo HyperActive Warrior Join Date: 2014 Posts: 122 Thanks: 126 Thanked 9 Times in 6 Posts	Re: SEO content = bad for CRO? Share on: Thanks for the replies! I think I'll take the category page text and make content pages for it, tidy up the content to make it more readable, and create links on the category pages to the content. A lot of it is useful content, not just SEO fluff. The products (or subcategories) listing combined with lots of text on the same page is probably too overwhelming and messy and makes visitors lose focus.