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Search Engine Optimization: From the Ground Up

Case Study: Custom Avenue

I'm often asked by clients what can be done about Search Engine Optimization (SEO) when building a new site, and can it make that much of a difference. This article isn't a be-all and end-all to SEO. Instead, it's a real-world look at what we did (and anyone can do) to take a brand new domain (Custom Avenue) and turn it into a viable site that works. SEO isn't something you get by hiring an expensive firm to tweak your site. Building your site properly from the start is the most important thing you can do.

About the Site

Custom Avenue is an online design studio that allows anyone to create a t-shirt by either uploading their own design, or creating one on the site using one of the templates provided. The site is at the end of its current stage. The company is being sold and the new owners are completely re-making it to meet future demands and marketing direction. The site was originally designed as it is to move up as quickly as possible in the search engines. The new site will be more focussed on getting users into the design studio and creating business (orders) in as few steps as possible. Later in this article I will discuss the results of this approach, but for now let's look at how we got this far.

Site Structure

Content Management

In order to get any traction with the search engines constant updates for any site are required. There is no doubt that the 'content is king' mantra is fact. Any site that wishes to move up in a natural search has to be updated frequently and with relevant content. Custom Avenue was built around this idea. We used a Content Management System (CMS) for the initial phase of the site knowing that it would eventually be changed to a more direct CMS / ecommerce application. Every week for three months several news items were written and published.

Blogs as Part of the CMS

As part of the strategy to grow exposure we published two blogs that tied into the site. The first was a blog about the Design Studio, the other a basic T-Shirt Blog that covered news from around the web. In addition to this, there is a news section on Custom Avenue where constant updates were posted about new design templates, widgets and other developments. The importance of these was, as I stated before, new content - directly related to what the site was about - so that search engines would take notice.

Search Engine Friendly URLs and Web Standards

It can't be emphasized enough the importance of Search Engine Friendly (SEF) URLs and building the site to web standards. With all of the things that were added (especially third some party items) web standards were necessarily compromised. But the majority of the site met standards. Basically, the combination of SEF URLs and as close-as-possible-standards-design meant that every page in the site was indexed by Google, Yahoo! and MSN. In fact, after three months Google had indexed over 150 pages.

Text Links and Specific Keywords

Throughout the site we focussed on using as many text links as possible, the idea being that they were immediately available to search engines and that there was less chance of link error.

But just as important as text links was the use of specific keywords. The custom t-shirt business is very competitive. To buy the keyword 'custom t-shirt' cost $2.50 per click on Google to get the top spot (at that time). But to buy 'custom softball t-shirt' was as little as $0.15. Throughout the site we tried to use specific combinations of keywords to enhance that page's viability in searches.

Toot Your Horn! - Outside Marketing Efforts

Blogs, Forums, and More Blogs

Aside from running the site's blogs we also participated on other industry blogs and forums. The participation included leaving comments on articles of interest and submitting articles about t-shirts that came from one of the Custom Avenue blogs. This provided exposure, and links back to Custom Avenue. Quality links back have a huge influence in increasing the Google Page Ranking for a new site.

Press Release Heaven

Never assume news isn't news. Every once in a while we would publish a press release and send it out across the net (the free services were used). New templates, important milestones in the application development, new widgets - all were part of our releases. To those involved it didn't always seem like much news. But those press releases helped generate links back to the site - and a few more visitors, as well.

Partners

We also developed an Affiliate program which aided in the site's exposure. (Not all sites, of course, will have items for sale that make an affiliate program possible.) Custom Avenue also partnered with Amazon to sell products online but the images for Amazon stored on the Custom Avenue server.

About Those Specific Keywords - Advertising

As I mentioned earlier in this article, very specific keywords were used in the metatags, body content, and to advertise the site. By specific keywords I mean combinations of keywords that narrow the focus, including: custom softball t-shirts, custom football t-shirt, etc. The ad program with Google AdWords was effective because people clicking on the ads were specifically searching for what Custom Avenue was offering on a very narrow spectrum. More importantly, Custom Avenue catapulted to the top of natural searches. A search today for 'Custom Landscaping T-shirts' shows Custom Avenue occupies the top two positions in a natural search (that was after six months!). A search for 'Custom Football Shirts' - a much more competitive search - still puts Custom Avenue on the first page of a Google search. And 'Custom Maternity T-Shirt' also has Custom Avenue on the first page - as do almost all other specific searches. All of this occurred within six months. A phenomenal rate of growth with Google and Yahoo!.

Why was there a focus on specific keywords? There are two key reasons. Custom Avenue wanted traffic that was specific to what it was doing - selling custom t-shirts. Lots of traffic is the ultimate goal, but building very specific traffic at first seemed the quickest way convert sales. The second reason is that specific keywords are relatively inexpensive (depending on the industry). There may not be a lot of traffic for each term, but if you have a lot of terms (for all of the different categories) then it adds up to a significant amount of very targeted traffic.

End Game: Results

The net result is that in six months Custom Avenue attained a page ranking with Google of 6. (The current page rank is 5 because the site hasn't been maintained while it is being sold and re-worked.) And the company can be found towards the top of almost any natural search for its industry for every specific keyword search. That's an incredibly quick rise for a brand new company and website in a very competitive online industry. And it just goes to show what can be accomplished with a focussed plan of attack that is properly executed.

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