SEO
SEO Best Practices for Migrating to Shopify
Imagine the despair you would feel seeing your new Shopify store’s organic traffic tank, sales evaporate, and page 1 rankings drop from search results.
After spending months building out your new Shopify site, sleepless nights going back and forth with web designers and developers, nail-biting hours spent refreshing your Analytics, and waiting for sales to trickle in again, let’s just say, migrating to a new ecommerce platform can be a daunting task.
But don’t worry, this won’t be you.
By following these SEO best practices for migrating to Shopify, you can eliminate the anxiety and pave the way for a smooth transition to your new Shopify store.
Why Migrate To Shopify?
Shopify is the global leader in supporting independent ecommerce brands to branch out and grow their store on their own terms.
It’s a great alternative to the likes of Amazon, allowing merchants more control over their brand and marketing.
In 2021, merchants sold $175.4 billion in sales through the Shopify platform.
They’ve recently welcomed onboard some massive brands like Hello Fresh and French Connection.
With an inexhaustible library of apps and access to Shopify marketing experts and developers, it’s a comprehensive and attractive platform for taking your business to the next level.
Migrating To Shopify
If you’re ready to take the plunge and migrate your ecommerce store over to Shopify, take the time to understand the SEO implications of migration.
The last thing any business owner wants is to lose all their hard-earned domain authority, backlinks, and organic traffic.
Regardless of how large or small your business is, migrating to a new ecommerce platform is not an easy process but heed this warning don’t migrate your store to Shopify without a plan.
If you don’t plan and execute a migration correctly, organic traffic can be cut by 50% within weeks of migrating.
For instance, while migrating, a web designer treated the new website as a whole new business.
When migration occurred, there were no 301 redirects in place, resulting in 404 pages and crawl errors everywhere.
These errors signaled to the Google bots to stop crawling the pages.
As you can imagine, it didn’t take long for traffic to flatline.
No crawling means no indexing and no indexing means no URLs will show in search results.
And just like that, you can kiss your hard-earning SEO goodbye.
Pre-Migration
1. Set Up The New Shopify Store
Signing up and selecting a plan is the first step.
Select a Shopify theme according to your needs.
Use this as an opportunity to refresh the canonical link structure and SEO setup of your store. Consider the following.
- Navigation structure – Are your top-ranking pages or highest value collections or products accessible through your site’s navigation? Does the flow of your navigation make it easy for your customer to find what they are looking for?
- Collections – Shopify utilizes ‘collections’ to group similar products. These are critical pages for SEO, and you want to ensure your products are categorized logically.
- Pages – Now is the perfect time to audit and review the key pages of your store. In Shopify, ‘pages’ are informational in nature and include your ‘About’ page, ‘Contact’ page, ‘Shipping and Delivery’ pages, etc. Pages like these are important trust signals for your site’s SEO.
- Products – These are your transactional pages, and keywords will most likely be transactional in nature. Shopify automatically creates product URLs based on the product name, but you can edit these as you create or review your products. If there are changes to an already published product, an automatic 301 redirect is created to the new URL.
- Blog – Shopify hosts your blog content within its own platform. Now is the time for a content audit to make sure you’re capitalizing on your blog and not migrating useless content.
2. Review Canonical Link Structure
The canonical link structure tells search engines which page you want to rank.
For example, if you have a variant of a product or a product included in multiple collections, new URLs are automatically created for each.
Allowing these URLs to rank can cause indexing bloat and may take away from your SEO efforts in getting the original product or collection to rank.
You can set your canonical link structure to point back to the original product or collection you wish to rank for using a simple line of code known as a rel canonical tag,
For example, the URL: myonlineshop.com/collections/shoes/products/brown-shoe
or myonlineshop.com/products/brown-shoe?variant=123856445631
will have a canonicalized URL to:
myonlineshop.com/products/brown-shoe.
You can check whether rel canonical is in use by viewing the page source of a couple of pages, collections, or products, and searching for ‘rel canonical’ in the HTML code.
If it is not in use or used incorrectly, the following code can be added between the <head> and </head> lines of your theme.liquid file in Shopify:
<link rel=”canonical” href=”{{ canonical_URL }}” />
So in our example, the rel canonical tag will look like this:
<link rel=”canonical” href=”https://myonlineshop.com/products/brown-shoe” />
If your store contains over 100 SKUs, you likely use tags on collections to filter.
This produces a collection URL like https://myonlineshop.com/collections/shoes/brown.
It’s rare to index these because of the difficulty in editing the content in a way that is different from the parent collections (the exception is if you have a large inventory strategy to capture search intent).
In this case, you want the tagged collection URL to canonicalize to the parent collection.
Find:
<link rel=”canonical” href=”{{ canonical_URL }}” />
And replace it with:
{% if template contains ‘collection’ and current_tags -%}
<link rel=”canonical” href=”{{ shop.url }}{{ collection.url }}{% if current_page > 1 %}?page={{ current_page }}{% endif %}” />
{%- else -%}
<link rel=”canonical” href=”{{ canonical_url }}” />
{%- endif %}
3. Backup Everything
Backup your old website.
The best way to do this varies by platform.
Do a full Screaming Frog scan to capture key SEO data so you can recrawl the list of URLs for 301 status post-migration.
Export the scan to review the data later.
4. Setup 301 Redirects From Old Url To New Shopify URL
This is the most critical step for SEO in migration to Shopify.
You will need to set up 301 redirects from your old website URLs to the new Shopify URLs.
If your domain changes, a domain redirect is not enough.
Each page, collection, and product that you are migrating from your old site will need an appropriate 301 redirect set up.
The easiest way to set up 301 redirects is to export your old domain’s site index either directly from your store following the instructions, or using a program like Screaming Frog.
Using a Google sheet, you can then map out your 301 redirects to your new Shopify URLs.
It’s time-intensive but important to get right.
From an SEO perspective, you don’t want to risk losing valuable backlinks and page authority you may have gained over the years to singular pages.
Redirect won’t come into effect in Shopify unless the old page has been deleted.
You can use Screaming Frog to double-check that all URLs have been correctly redirected.
5. Consider Internationalization
You can run a multi-lingual, multi-regional brand under a single Shopify account.
The best international strategy for a single business is usually multiple Shopify accounts because it allows complete customization of theme, layout, messaging, product offering, and fulfillment.
The primary SEO factor to consider for internationalization SEO is hreflang tags.
We strongly suggest using the Multi-Store Hreflang Tags app to configure hreflang tags across multiple stores.
That way, you avoid duplicate content, pass rank value between alternate pages, avoid 404s, and get the flexibility to customize URL handles to suit the language native to users.
Hundreds of Shopify stores are sabotaging their SEO by keeping the same language structure in their URL handles across all stores. An English store should contain English handles while a Spanish store should contain Spanish handles.
Here’s a screenshot of the allbirds.com homepage.
Screenshot from Allbirds, taken February 2022This is a great example of how even huge global brands can get it wrong.
Allbirds have nine domains serving different countries and languages and there is no cross-referencing between their hreflang tags.
With the correct hreflang tags, you can let Google know the most relevant store to serve in the search results and immediately take customers to the right store straight from the search results.
This will also leverage your local SEO, allowing each store to more aggressively compete on local SERPs rather than against each other.
6. Timing
Migrate outside a peak period.
You’re asking for a death wish doing it on BFCM.
Plan your resources accordingly and make sure to have all your key staff available should anything turn sour.
7. Migrate Content
To perform the actual migration of content, Cart2Cart is recommended. This enables the automated transfer of your store’s content without impacting your existing shopping cart.
Their service supports over 85 ecommerce platforms.
A handy tool on their website shows the services they support and what they cover.
Screenshot from Cart2Cart, taken February 20228. Update Internal Linking Structure
Once you have successfully migrated all of your content, you will notice your new redirects come into effect for internal links.
This isn’t ideal as an SEO best practice to have all links taking the user directly to the URL rather than via a 301 redirect.
While a redirect helps to pass on link authority, it’s important not to rely on them when links can be updated directly.
I’ve seen many clients stuck in the pattern of redirecting redirects, creating an awful redirect chain which often results in broken links and a terrible customer experience.
A program such as Ahrefs makes it easy to identify 301 redirects or any 404 broken internal links that have resulted from the migration.
These can easily be remedied by simply going to the page where the 301 or 404 is occurring, and updating the link to the most appropriate new Shopify URL.
Post-Migration
1. Annotate Launch In Google Analytics
In Google Analytics, select Audience and then Overview.
From here you can click the Create new annotation button.
It’s important to mark the date in Analytics of when the migration took place so you can monitor any traffic or sales changes.
Screenshot from Google Analytics, taken February 20222. Submit New Sitemap To Google And Bing
Open Google Search Console and under Index, select Sitemaps.
Submit your new sitemap.
You can find your sitemap in Shopify at yourdomain.com/sitemap.xml.
Within that parent sitemap, are child sitemaps for each content type.
Proceed to do the same for Bing.
3. Submit Change Of Address Request In Google Search Console And Complete Bing Site Move Tool
This step is only needed if the domain URL changes.
Google has detailed instructions of when and how to use this tool.
Screenshot from Google Search Console, taken February 20224. Check That Google Analytics And Search Console Are Functioning Correctly
Log into both Google Analytics and Google Search Console to make sure all your traffic data is being picked up for your new store.
After 24 hours, you will have more data to determine whether sales and traffic are properly attributed.
There are two reports in Google Analytics that provide the easiest feedback for this:
Channel sales report: A correct setup will show various sales channels being attributed. A broken setup will report most sales coming from referrals or showing incorrect revenue data.
Shopping Behaviour report: This report should display full data including cart abandonment statistics.
Keep in mind these are just benchmarks and there are still many ways incorrectly set up Google Analytics.
Shopify transactions reflected in Analytics, does not ensure correct setup.
For more detailed information about setting up data reporting in Google Analytics for your Shopify store, refer to this guide.
5. Outreach To Highest-authority Backlinks To Get Them To Update To New URLs If Possible.
Use a tool like Ahrefs or Moz to generate a backlink report.
From here, you can review which websites hosting backlinks to your store are worth reaching out to.
The goal is to get any 301 or 404 links updated to your new URLs.
This is also providing the website host value in keeping their content up to date and creating a better reader experience.
Win-win!
For SEO purposes, it’s always best practice to have URLs taking the user to the direct URL in mention, rather than via a 301 redirect.
If it points to a 404 page, and the website host is unwilling or unresponsive to updating the URL for you, the best you can do is create a 301 redirect for the 404 page.
6. Recrawl The Old Website
Now is the time to recrawl the URL from your old website and correct any outstanding 404 broken links.
Setup 301 redirects if needed.
Check and check again.
Did I mention to check again?
7. Monitor 404s
There are several Shopify apps, such as Link Monitor and Easy Redirects, which will automatically monitor and report 404s as they arise.
Ahrefs also does the job with their site audit tool.
Otherwise, you can create a custom Google Analytics report to monitor and rectify 404 errors.
Shopify Migration Success Is Possible
While not every migration to Shopify will be all rainbows and butterflies, following these steps can help get the best possible results.
There’s zero need to migrate and lose all your hard-earned SEO wins.
You’ve worked hard for them and with these SEO best practices for migrating to Shopify, you can take them with you.
More resources:
Featured Image: fatmawati achmad zaenuri/Shutterstock
SEO
The 9 Best Landing Page Builders For 2024
Generating leads is crucial to boosting your sales – but if your landing pages aren’t effective, you’re going to struggle to turn visitors into customers.
Landing pages play a key role in elevating the effectiveness of your marketing efforts and differentiating, refining, and enhancing the user experience.
In this article, we’ll explore how to choose the right landing page builder for your business before highlighting the nine top landing page builders and what makes them stand out.
Let’s get into it.
Choosing The Right Landing Page Builder For Your Business
With so many options to choose from, how can you decide which landing page builder is right for you?
Here are a few things to consider when making your decision.
- Marketing objectives: Start by deciding what you want to achieve with your landing pages. Are you looking to collect email subscribers, drive sales, generate leads, or promote an event? Each platform caters to different use cases, so leading with your goals can help you refine your search.
- Ease of use: Different builders have different learning curves. If you’re a novice, you should probably opt for a tool that caters to beginners. If you have more technical experience, like coding knowledge, you might want to look to more advanced builders to get the most power.
- Integration needs: Do you want your landing pages to integrate with other software or tools you’re already using?
- Mobile optimization: It’s essential that your landing pages cater to mobile users, so make sure your builder considers that with features like responsive design.
- Budget constraints: Unfortunately, budget matters. Landing page builders come with various price tags depending on their capabilities and features. Make sure you’re working within the boundaries of what you can afford.
While this is, by no means, an exhaustive list of considerations, it’s a starting point to help you choose a landing page builder that makes sense for your business needs.
Now, let’s look at nine of the best landing page builders to choose from.
1. Carrd
- Best for: Simple projects, personal use, and small budgets.
Looking for a great landing page builder that won’t break the bank? Look no further than Carrd.
Carrd is a streamlined landing page builder that focuses on creating single-page websites quickly and easily. It’s designed for simplicity, making it ideal for anyone who wants to quickly create a webpage without needing to build a multi-page site.
Think portfolios, personal profiles, project presentations, and small business showcases.
Carrd’s user-friendly interface and selection of themes allow users to create sleek pages in the blink of an eye without even needing an account – you can just visit the website, pick a theme, and get started. However, you will need to sign up to save or publish your site.
It balances simplicity and functionality to help you craft that pages are clean, focused, and responsive across all devices. If you’re just testing the waters or working with slim budgets, this is the right tool for you.
Pros:
- Extremely affordable, with a free tier available.
- Intuitive and user-friendly interface.
- Responsive design.
- Fast and lightweight, making it ideal for quick and simple sites.
Cons:
- Limited to single-page websites.
- Restrictive layouts/themes, which limit creative freedom.
- Lacks advanced features and integrations found in more comprehensive builders.
Pricing:
- Carrd’s free basic plan allows you to launch three sites with Carrd branding to .carrd.co domains.
- Paid plans range from $9 to $49 per year, and offer additional features like no Carrd branding, custom domains, and Google Analytics support (depending on your membership tier).
2. ConvertKit
Screenshot from ConvertKit.com, April 2024- Best for: Content creators, bloggers, and marketers focused on growing their audience through email.
Billing itself as “the creator marketing platform,” ConvertKit’s landing page builder is targeted at creators, bloggers, and marketers who want to expand their email subscriber base.
If your goal is to create a landing page to help you build an email list, ConvertKit might be the right option for you.
ConvertKit’s landing page builder offers a range of high-quality, customizable templates and integrates with third-party tools to help you get the most out of your site.
It also integrates with the stock photo platform Unsplash to offer access to 100,000+ free images for your landing page.
While ConvertKit’s analytics and customization options might not be as extensive as those of some of its competitors, its ease of use and focused approach make it a standout for email-driven campaigns.
Pros:
- No cost for starting (up to 1,000 subscribers).
- Access to thousands of free images.
- Robust third-party integration capabilities.
Cons:
- Limited template customization and flexibility.
- A/B testing and analytics features are less advanced.
- Priced higher than some basic landing page builders.
Pricing:
- Free plan for up to 10,000 subscribers.
- The Creator plan starts at $25/month and includes benefits like automation features and app integrations. Pricing scales are based on subscriber count.
3. Unbounce
Screenshot from Unbounce.com, April 2024Unbounce is a leading landing page builder renowned for its focus on conversion rate optimization (CRO). Its website promises to help you “build high-converting landing pages with ease.”
It offers a suite of advanced tools, such as A/B testing, dynamic text replacement, and the Smart Traffic system, which uses AI to optimize visitor flow to the highest-converting page variant based on user behavior and characteristics.
It also focuses on features that can help you boost your lead gen efforts, such as opt-in email popups and sticky banners.
With 100+ responsive templates, Unbound makes it easy to create landing pages that are both engaging and effective.
Compared to some other options on this list, Unbounce is a particularly robust platform with tons of customization and integrations – and the price point reflects that.
As a premium offering with a steeper learning curve, it might not be the best for beginners – but its AI-powered features and conversion-focused tools make it a formidable tool for achieving your goals.
Pros:
- Advanced A/B testing and AI-driven optimization.
- Large selection of responsive templates.
- Integrated features for enhancing lead capture.
Cons:
- Higher price point than some other builders, which might not work for those with limited budgets.
- Complex setup and steeper learning curve for new users.
- Some customization limitations.
Pricing
- The Build plan starts at $74/month and covers unlimited conversions, one root domain, and up to 20,000 monthly unique visitors.
- Other paid plans range from $112/month up to $649/month.
4. Leadpages
Screenshot from Leadpages.com, April 2024- Best for: Small businesses and entrepreneurs looking to generate sales.
Need a landing page that will help you generate sales? Consider taking a look at Leadpages.
Its strength lies in its user-friendly, drag-and-drop editor and an extensive collection of templates that streamline the page-building process. Plus, according to the Leadpages website, it’s a platform that converts five times better than the industry average.
Leadages offers CRO tools, real-time analytics, and A/B testing capabilities, enabling users to enhance their page performance effectively.
Its various widgets allow you to add videos, images, forms, and even payment integrations directly onto your landing pages, making it a versatile tool for businesses that want to combine content with sales functionality.
On top of all this, Leadpages now includes an AI Engine for creating headlines and images and an AI writing assistant at some membership tiers, which can help you write better content.
Pros:
- Intuitive no-code editor and easy payment integration.
- Comprehensive A/B testing and real-time analytics.
- Extensive template library with over 250 options.
Cons:
- Higher cost compared to some alternatives.
- Limited ecommerce features and potential mobile responsiveness issues.
- Some users report mobile responsiveness issues.
Pricing:
- The standard plan starts at $37/month for one custom domain, unlimited traffic and leads, and 10,000 monthly AI Engine credits.
- More advanced features are available in higher-tier plans, which start at $74/month.
5. Landingi
Screenshot from Landingi.com, April 2024- Best for: Businesses seeking a versatile landing page solution with a wide range of features.
If you’re in the market for versatility, Landingi is worth investigating.
Landingi offers a flexible, comprehensive landing page builder with a robust set of features, including an advanced editor, popups, A/B testing, and a substantial library of 300+ templates.
Its unique Smart Sections feature allows you to reuse and easily update specific page elements across multiple designs, saving time and headaches.
Designed to serve businesses of all sizes, Landingi’s simple, drag-and-drop builder can help you create and optimize various types of landing pages – and if you have any HTML and CSS knowledge, it can be a pretty impressive editor.
Landingi is a particularly strong choice for small businesses looking to target different customer segments with unique landing pages. The integration capabilities with numerous apps, including payment gateways like Stripe, make it a great choice for companies looking to sell products.
While its rich feature set can be overwhelming for newcomers, and creating pages might take a bit longer compared to other platforms, the level of customization and control it offers makes Landingi one of the best landing page builders out there.
Pros:
- Extensive template library with 300+ customizable options.
- Powerful editing capabilities with Smart Sections for efficient design.
- Broad integration with various apps, including payment systems.
Cons:
- Steeper learning curve for beginners.
- Potentially longer time to create landing pages compared to simpler platforms.
Pricing:
- The Lite plan starts at $35/month and gives you 10 digital assets, unlimited conversions, 5,000 visits per month, and one custom domain.
- Landingi also offers Professional and Unlimited tiers with more advanced features and capabilities.
6. Instapage
Screenshot from Instapage.com, April 2024- Best for: Large businesses, marketing teams, or agencies that require collaboration and advanced optimization features.
If you’re seeking a more high-end landing page platform, Instapage might be the one for you. It offers advanced features tailored for professional marketing teams and agencies with a need to create optimized landing pages at scale.
In addition to a drag-and-drop builder and plenty of high-quality templates, Instapage offers a bevy of features, including advanced cloud-based team collaboration tools, heatmaps for user engagement analysis, robust A/B testing capabilities, AI-generated content creation, and more.
One of its standout features is Instablocks, which allows users to create custom page components that can be easily reused across different projects.
Instapage supports advanced marketing goals with features like AdMap to align ads with page content. Plus, its mobile-friendly design ensures a fast, seamless user experience.
While Instapage offers a premium experience with its comprehensive set of tools and features, its higher price point and complex functionalities may be a barrier for smaller businesses or those new to landing page optimization.
Pros:
- Extensive customization with a library of professional templates.
- Instablocks for efficient design and asset reuse.
- Effective team collaboration features.
Cons:
- Premium pricing will be a barrier for many businesses.
- Steep learning curve for utilizing advanced features.
- Limitations in reporting and visitor tracking for lower-tier plans.
Pricing:
- The Build plan starts at $199/month, with a 14-day free trial.
- Customers will need to upgrade to a customized Convert plan to access some of the more complex features, such as AdMap, heatmaps, and more.
7. Wix
Screenshot from Wix.com, April 2024- Best for: Individuals and small businesses seeking creative control without advanced coding.
Now for something much more accessible: Wix is renowned for its user-friendly platform, which is ideal for creating attractive landing pages with minimal effort.
Like other options on this list, Wix offers an accessible drag-and-drop editor and a range of existing templates to help users craft aesthetically pleasing and functional landing pages.
Wix’s platform has a reputation for being particularly beginner-friendly, with a low learning curve and a free plan to help new users get started without any upfront investment.
For those focused on ecommerce, Wix provides specific features to build landing pages that showcase products and promotions, supported by over 50 payment solutions and tools like heatmaps to enhance user engagement and conversion rates.
While it offers a free starter plan, accessing more advanced functionalities and removing Wix ads requires upgrading to a paid subscription.
Wix’s balance of user-friendly design tools, ecommerce support, and cost-effective pricing makes it a favorable option for those new to web design or businesses needing straightforward, visually appealing landing pages.
Pros:
- User-friendly with an intuitive drag-and-drop interface.
- Free plan available, making it accessible for beginners.
- Ecommerce capabilities with extensive payment integration.
Cons:
- Advanced features and ad-free experience require a paid plan.
- Potential limitations in customization for complex requirements.
- Site speed may decrease with more intricate designs.
Pricing:
- A free plan is available, but it includes Wix branding and lacks more advanced features like payments.
- Paid plans start at $17/month, offering additional features.
8. Elementor
Screenshot from Elementor.com, April 2024- Best for: WordPress users looking for a powerful and intuitive landing page builder.
If you’re a WordPress user, you’ll want to know about Elementor.
It’s a WordPress page builder that has gained popularity for its flexibility, comprehensive customization capabilities, and user-friendly interface.
Elementor allows users to design dynamic and detailed landing pages within WordPress. This feature makes it the perfect choice for WordPress users who want to extend the functionality of their website with sleek landing pages that maintain a consistent look and feel with their existing content.
Its real-time editing features allow for immediate feedback on design changes without any coding.
It also offers dozens of designer-made templates to choose from. You can add custom forms and popups to your landing page, save page components for reuse, and seamlessly integrate with your customer relationship management (CRM) tools to create a powerful customer experience.
While Elementor offers a ton in terms of design flexibility and integration, it’s important to note that it’s exclusively for WordPress users and can be resource-intensive – so it might impact site performance, especially on more complex websites.
Pros:
- Advanced customization and design flexibility.
- Real-time editing and instant feedback.
- Seamless WordPress integration.
Cons:
- Exclusively for WordPress users.
- Potentially impacts site performance due to resource intensity.
Pricing:
- Free version with limited functionality.
- Paid versions start at $59/year, providing advanced features and support.
9. Taplink
Screenshot from Taplink.at, April 2024- Best for: Social media influencers and businesses looking to direct traffic from social platforms to other content or actions.
This one’s a little different than some of the other examples here, but it deserves highlighting.
Taplink is a specialized micro-landing page builder optimized for social media profiles. It’s perfect for businesses and influencers that want to drive traffic from social media to other content or actions. You just use Taplink to create landing pages and share them on your social profiles.
Taplink stands out for its simplicity and mobile optimization, which is crucial when targeting social media audiences.
The focus on quick, effective page creation allows users to engage with their audience without the complexities of traditional website development.
For those aiming to convert social media interest into tangible outcomes – such as lead generation, sales, or content promotion – Taplink is a winner.
While its feature set is more limited than some of the more comprehensive builders featured here, its affordability and user-friendly design make it a great tool for those looking to maximize their social engagement with minimal effort and investment.
Pros:
- Simple and quick setup.
- Mobile-optimized for social media engagement.
- Cost-effective for targeted campaigns.
Cons:
- Designed primarily for micro-landing pages, limiting the scope.
- Fewer features and customization options than extensive landing page builders.
Pricing:
- Taplink offers a free basic plan, with premium features available on paid plans starting from $3/month. The most expensive tier, the Business tier, is $6/month.
There’s A Landing Page Platform To Help You Convert Visitors
Choosing the right landing page builder for your business can significantly impact your marketing success – but the decision will depend on your specific goals and needs.
As we’ve explored, each tool has unique strengths and caters to different aspects of the landing page creation and optimization process.
Whether you’re looking for advanced design capabilities, a user-friendly interface, or specific functionalities like CRO, there’s a platform that can help you not just streamline your landing page design process, but start converting visitors into loyal customers.
More resources:
Featured Image: Griboedov/Shutterstock
SEO
Google’s Search Engine Market Share Drops As Competitors’ Grows
According to data from GS Statcounter, Google’s search engine market share has fallen to 86.99%, the lowest point since the firm began tracking search engine share in 2009.
The drop represents a more than 4% decrease from the previous month, marking the largest single-month decline on record.
U.S. Market Impact
The decline is most significant in Google’s key market, the United States, where its share of searches across all devices fell by nearly 10%, reaching 77.52%.
Screenshot from: https://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share/, May 2024.Concurrently, competitors Microsoft Bing and Yahoo Search have seen gains. Bing reached a 13% market share in the U.S. and 5.8% globally, its highest since launching in 2009.
Yahoo Search’s worldwide share nearly tripled to 3.06%, a level not seen since July 2015.
Screenshot from: https://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share/, May 2024.Search Quality Concerns
Many industry experts have recently expressed concerns about the declining quality of Google’s search results.
A portion of the SEO community believes that the search giant’s results have worsened following the latest update.
These concerns have begun to extend to average internet users, who are increasingly voicing complaints about the state of their search results.
Alternative Perspectives
Web analytics platform SimilarWeb provided additional context on X (formerly Twitter), stating that its data for the US for March 2024 suggests Google’s decline may not be as severe as initially reported.
From our data (Search Engine website category, US, March 2024) it doesn’t look like we’re there yet: pic.twitter.com/RBUJp4ZLeb
— Similarweb (@Similarweb) May 1, 2024
SimilarWeb also highlighted Yahoo’s strong performance, categorizing it as a News and Media platform rather than a direct competitor to Google in the Search Engine category.
Don’t underestimate Yahoo. They’re doing great. On our platform they’re categorized as News and Media, and hence not a direct competitor to Google in the Search Engine category. But they rank #10 worldwide, #6 in the US, and #1 in their category. Much higher than Bing and OpenAI. pic.twitter.com/O4yJu5QEK6
— Similarweb (@Similarweb) May 2, 2024
At the same time, Google is slightly declining 👀 pic.twitter.com/9i7paeU1QG
— Similarweb (@Similarweb) May 2, 2024
Why It Matters
The shifting search engine market trends can impact businesses, marketers, and regular users.
Google has been on top for a long time, shaping how we find things online and how users behave.
However, as its market share drops and other search engines gain popularity, publishers may need to rethink their online strategies and optimize for multiple search platforms besides Google.
Users are becoming vocal about Google’s declining search quality over time. As people start trying alternate search engines, the various platforms must prioritize keeping users satisfied if they want to maintain or grow their market position.
It will be interesting to see how they respond to this boost in market share.
What It Means for SEO Pros
As Google’s competitors gain ground, SEO strategies may need to adapt by accounting for how each search engine’s algorithms and ranking factors work.
This could involve diversifying SEO efforts across multiple platforms and staying up-to-date on best practices for each one.
The increased focus on high-quality search results emphasizes the need to create valuable, user-focused content that meets the needs of the target audience.
SEO pros must prioritize informative, engaging, trustworthy content that meets search engine algorithms and user expectations.
Remain flexible, adaptable, and proactive to navigate these shifts. Keeping a pulse on industry trends, user behaviors, and competing search engine strategies will be key for successful SEO campaigns.
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SEO
How To Drive Pipeline With A Silo-Free Strategy
When it comes to B2B strategy, a holistic approach is the only approach.
Revenue organizations usually operate with siloed teams, and often expect a one-size-fits-all solution (usually buying clicks with paid media).
However, without cohesive brand, infrastructure, and pipeline generation efforts, they’re pretty much doomed to fail.
It’s just like rowing crew, where each member of the team must synchronize their movements to propel the boat forward – successful B2B marketing requires an integrated strategy.
So if you’re ready to ditch your disjointed marketing efforts and try a holistic approach, we’ve got you covered.
Join us on May 15, for an insightful live session with Digital Reach Agency on how to craft a compelling brand and PMF.
We’ll walk through the critical infrastructure you need, and the reliances and dependences of the core digital marketing disciplines.
Key takeaways from this webinar:
- Thinking Beyond Traditional Silos: Learn why traditional marketing silos are no longer viable and how they spell doom for modern revenue organizations.
- How To Identify and Fix Silos: Discover actionable strategies for pinpointing and sealing the gaps in your marketing silos.
- The Power of Integration: Uncover the secrets to successfully integrating brand strategy, digital infrastructure, and pipeline generation efforts.
Ben Childs, President and Founder of Digital Reach Agency, and Jordan Gibson, Head of Growth at Digital Reach Agency, will show you how to seamlessly integrate various elements of your marketing strategy for optimal results.
Don’t make the common mistake of using traditional marketing silos – sign up now and learn what it takes to transform your B2B go-to-market.
You’ll also get the opportunity to ask Ben and Jordan your most pressing questions, following the presentation.
And if you can’t make it to the live event, register anyway and we’ll send you a recording shortly after the webinar.
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