Site review for a sport betting affiliate
SEO audit & guidance for an Australian sport betting affiliate
Context
First of all, I would like to set the context. So far as your user acquisition plan is to drive users through organic traffic, you shall always remember about Google Panda. It’s especially tough on affiliate sites, so your primary goal is to take yourself out of the risk zone. In general terms, your user acquisition plan boils down to building a Panda compliant website plus developing an effective conversion funnel.
Panda effect on affiliate sites & Panda compliant website
Google’s Panda Update is a search filter introduced in February 2011 meant to stop sites with poor quality content from working their way into Google’s top search results.
Major recent Panda updates have been tough on affiliate sites, especially those who feature thin content and don’t bring much added value to Google users.
Panda’s criteria for website rankings:
Content duplication
Thin content pages
High bounce rate / pageviews to sessions ratio
Heavily template (not genuine) pages
Search Queries Analysis
CTR is rather low
Over the last month the Impressions to Clicks Rate was 0.85% which is low.
Top-performing search terms: betting agencies.
Weak-performing search terms: free bet, odds comparison, betting sites, {agency name} review.
Content keywords are relevant
The site’s semantic kernel is good overall. Top predicates are: compare / review. Yet, the structure of objects is weak. Top objects: agencies, video.
Such terms as: sites, {agency names}, and odds are not really significant.
Now the site’s content triple (subject-predicate-object) looks like that: compare /review betting agencies. No wonder this search phrase has got your page to Top-3 Google results: https://www.google.com.au/?gws_rd=ssl#q=compare+betting+agencies+
Key takeaways
You have to create more expert-level content featuring ‘sites’, ‘{agency names}’, and ‘odds’. This could be done through:
Strengthening agency profiles
Creating odds tables
Producing more insights on betting sites
Competitor review
http://www.punters.com.au/ compares betting odds between Australia bookmakers. The odds comparison tool takes XML odds feed on horse and greyhound bets from 13 major bookmakers. This page provides much added value to a user, so its organic search ranking is solid.
Agency review pages, for example, http://www.punters.com.au/betting/sportsbet/ are rather strong too. Yet, the page’s template is missing: 1) supplementary content and 2) has little internal / external links, 3) has no video review.
Takeaways
Odds comparison table is a powerful traffic building tool as it gives a great utility to a user. Who wouldn’t want to monitor odds before making a bet? So, investing in syndication of events and odds data is a good decision.
Apart from agency insights the ideal template of Review page has to be effectively weaved into the structure of your other pages, has to have multiple video pieces, as well as feature the supplementary content that augments user experience, for example, customer reviews / ratings, etc.
Landing pages review
Create a content that’s hard to compete with
One of the biggest challenges facing affiliate marketers right now is the need to prove their value as middlemen in the value chain. This is something that creates a real added value for a user.
Unusual content formats
How-to guides / Tutorials
In-depth comparisons
Quizzes
Stay focused on your user intent
Your content should be tailored to user intent. You obviously have several ideal user types:
1) users who need reviews & how-to guides,
2) users who need to compare different agencies along certain criteria,
3) users interested in bonuses / free bet offers, and finally
4) users who would like to get updated on the latest promotions.
Likewise, each user segment needs a landing page with user-centered content (see a detailed discussion below).
Agency page
Google specifically states that a site’s owner has to ask himself a question: what added value does my website bring to users as compared to a bulk of other [affiliate] sites? Is it a genuine original review of the products that gives a user useful info and facilitates choice? Or is it just a compilation of trivial content abundant elsewhere on the web?
So, my tactics for the Main content of Agency page is give them all information in one place:
Customer reviews
Questions & Answers
Bonuses
Social Media discussion, etc.
Likewise, I suggest that you enabled an option of reviewing the agency by a site’s user (review form). Also, it’s a good user experience if they can post questions and get answers about betting procedure with an agency right on your page.
‘Free bet’ term that you use does not always comport with actual user experience on agency websites. So, I suggest that you separately feature
1) an explanation of Bonuses option and
2) A Free bet (no deposit) option, if available.
Feature Social feeds / discussion on the Agency on its page with your website.
The key point is to consolidate all agency-relevant info in one place. The page quality test: added value that your type of user would have from that page.
Supplementary content for Advertiser’s page:
Other suggested videos on Agency
Suggested blog posts
Betting guides
Link to Compare All table
Link to Free bets / Bonuses
Google’s rule of thumb on determining what is supplementary (secondary) content: anything on a page that isn’t the main content or advertisements. Googlers consider supplementary content important to the overall user experience.
I suggest that alongside your main review video you suggest other relevant videos on an agency. This could be:
1) an expanded How-to betting guide,
2) promotional videos from an agency,
3) agency app video.
Also, it’s always important to suggest related content on a site to your user:
1) blog posts tagged {agency name},
2) betting guides or a dedicated
3) How-to agency guide.
Likewise, I specifically recommend that you echo relevant guides on an agency’s page or even create a specific walkthrough guide for each of your advertisers.
I also recommend creating visually appealing links (images) leading to your aggregate content pages, i.e. ‘Compare all betting sites’ and ‘All Free bets / Bonuses’.
Agency comparison page
I firmly believe that this page’s template is one of your strongest points. At least, I have not found a better summary review page on the web. In fact, the power of this page lays in comparing, not reviewing agencies, which means that there has to be clear
1) criteria for comparison,
2) the page has to have a Next step (Conversion) point.
I suggest the following content tactics:
1) the comparison page has to capitalize on what you already on the agency and
2) lead a user to the agency review page.
Likewise, the table may include:
User reviews / rating
Questions asked and answered
Social discussion
News / offers
Importantly, the table has to have a ‘Read a Full Review’ link leading to the agency page, which is going to be the main fragment in the Affiliate Conversion funnel.
Supplementary content for Advertiser’s page:
Agency promotions / news
dedicated How-to agency guides (if available)
Link to Free bets / Bonuses
Note: If the video is played from Free bets page http://www.kruzey.com.au/free-bets/ (see below), ‘Click on a link to check an advertiser’ video frame is irrelevant.
Free bet offers page
As suggested above, ‘Free bet’ term that you use does not always comport with actual agency offers. So, I suggest that you separately feature 1) a Free bet (no deposit) options, if available, and 2) Bonuses options.
Supplementary content tactics:
Agency promotions / news
dedicated How-to agency guides (if available)
Link to the Agency comparison page
Static YMYL pages: ‘About us’ & FAQ
Panda takes on the ‘About us’ & FAQ pages: Google judges your E-A-T (expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness) by the static pages, especially when you are in YMYL (“Your Money or Your Life”) area, which I believe is betting. So, I advise you to: expand those pages, include your personal / social / location info there, and specifically provide more FAQs options.
Previously Google stressed that pages in YMYL (“Your Money or Your Life”) areas need to have a page about the site (“About Us”), contact or customer service information, and who is responsible for the upkeep and content of the website. Now, Google would look for at least some of this information on all websites.
Google wisdom part
“Your Money or Your Life” pages are those that can have an impact on your current or future well being (physical, financial, safety, etc.). Google shares five examples of YMYL pages:
Pages that solicit personal information, such as personal identification numbers, bank account numbers, drivers license numbers, etc., which could be used for identify theft.
Pages used for monetary transactions, on which users might give their credit account or bank account information; for example any page that allows you to buy something.
Pages that offer medical or health information that could impact your physical well being.
Pages offering advice on major life decisions, such as pages on parenting, purchasing a home, a vehicle, etc.
Pages offering advice on major life issues that could impact your future happiness and finances, such as pages giving legal or financial advice.
Even if you think you have a website that is strictly information and didn’t really have a need for these types of pages, now would be a good time to go back and expand those pages.
Key takeaways
Expand your ‘About us’ (What is Kruzey) page to include more information on who’s behind the site, your background & social profiles.
Insert Google maps code (where you are) on your Contacts page
Expand FAQs page to make it look more expert-like.
Articles / Blog
The general requirement is that articles have to create a value, instead of being an unnecessary step in the sales funnel. Each article has to address a specific topic from a specific angle, i.e. be relevant and full.
Requirement to an article:
Attractive headline – capture user attention
Subtitles – use a subtitle to explain the headline and feature main keywords (also serve as Meta Description)
Stick to the structure: use <h1> and <h2> tags where there are Headers / Sub-headers featuring main topics
Create a Point of Difference (POD) – write what they are missing.
Include a ‘flash back’ from your customer reviews
Create a series of articles on one topic
I strongly recommend addressing each single topic in a coherent way. It means writing from different angles. Simply saying, always create a series of articles instead of one.
POD
Point of difference (POD) is your approach to 1) topic selection, 2) content style & structure, and 3) page architecture. It’s a one ‘angle’ on a one topic. Still, it’s is something that’s they all miss. And you make up for that.
I suggest the following POD criteria:
Topic selection: you always go by
‘Does & Don’ts’, or
‘Top something’ or
‘Social media ideas’
It means personalized and funny titles that work as Clickbaits and are likeable indeed.
Content style: you always include
Customer Reviews, and
Lots of clickable images
Social comments (spin on the topic)
And you write lots of sections (headers). And most importantly, you are Specific.
Your page architecture includes
In-text links to other articles on the topics
Read more links to other related articles
Links to Comment / Share
Link to your social profiles
Cross link articles from the same topics
Google search Algo will consider the most relevant page one that’s linked most (internally & externally). So, link cross link articles to improve their chances of ranking. In addition to that, by linking all relevant articles together you’ll give Google a signal that you have a Distinct topics established here, not just a couple of random blog posts.
Promote articles on the social media
Include share buttons before and after the body of the articles to make it easy for your users to spread the word on Social media. Also, if it’s possible, you would want to feature your readers’ comment right on the article’s page down below.
Also, promote every article on your Facebook / Twitter page (if you need, create one).
Right length for a well performing article: 500 – 1500 words
Don’t make your article to short. Also, remember it’s not a book – so keep it reasonable. I recommend keeping it within 500 – 1500 words limit so far as the article is concerned.
Betting guides
Betting guides, for example http://www.kruzey.com.au/horse-racing-betting-guide/ or http://www.kruzey.com.au/sports-betting-guide/ are potentially very effective content tactics for an affiliate site.
Their aim is to educate a user while giving him / her links to your main converting pages, i.e. Agency reviews or Agency Comparison pages. That’s why such guides are often called Non-profit pages for an affiliate site.
Yet, to attract users through the organic search those pages have to warrant a high quality of expertise and user experience. Now, you pages are generally OK, but I suggest that you made certain updates.
First of all, make your guides more structured and visually appealing: 1) use headers / subheaders; 2) use images from the advertisers’ sites, 3) use your own or 3rd party video as relevant.
Importantly, you have to be very specific as to the purpose of each guide and its relation to your conversion funnel: 1) create a master plan for guides (how many? Which? How often?); 2) create an editorial calendar; 3) promote guides on other landing pages as well as via Social.
Likewise, you may want to create dedicated ‘How-to’ agency guides. They may give users a look & feel of each agency website and educate them on the best options, tips & tricks and bonuses that only you can deliver to them.
Importantly, I suggest that the ultimate ‘How-to’ agency guide is a video guide. Still, the video context is essential too (see below). That’s why you would want to make accompanying text to the video so Google can index your content accordingly. That’s what your ‘How-to’ agency guide may look like: video + transcript + supplementary content.
Video marketing strategy
How can video help drive more search traffic to your own website?
Videos increase links. Videos have been proven to increase the number of people linking to a given piece of content.
Video can still improve clickthrough rates. Even without snippets, you can create descriptive meta title and description tags that let searchers know you have a video worth watching on your page, which could drive more search traffic to your site.
What tool shall you use?
I suggest that you used Wistia http://wistia.com/ for your video marketing needs. Wistia is a video hosting platform with video marketing tools and analytics.
You would want to create videos (see below for suggested types) and upload them to your Wistia account – there’s a free plan that covers all your basic need. After that you would use a code to embed your video on your page.
What I like about Wistia is:
Video analytics: http://wistia.com/doc/wistia-basics-analytics?dh
Easy MailChimp & Wordpress integration: http://wistia.com/doc/mailchimp, http://wistia.com/doc/wordpress
And, most importantly, enhanced video SEO options: http://wistia.com/doc/video-seo
Types of videos you would want to use
Brand awareness video
Agency Review videos
How-to agency guides
What is a "brand awareness video"? It's a video that connects with a wide audience and introduces or reintroduces them to your brand. The main goal of this video isn't to encourage them to buy your product, but to connect with them on a different, human level.
Agency review videos? You have got them.
How-to agency guides? They may well be a ‘bread and butter’ of your overall video strategy. It’s a walkthrough to the main betting sites mechanics where you would want to reveal some secrets of effective betting to. Predictably, how-to agency guides will be most likely shared through Social as well as ranked highest on the organic search.
The conversion funnels
Brand awareness funnel
A primary goal is to share a word about your website. Obviously, goal conversion would result in attracting more users: through social, mail and organic. The easiest way to convert is make it fun!
Social, Promo eMail campaign or Kruzey-related organic search
See a Brand awareness video
Sign up to Video Reviews and Guides
Share via Social
Agency review funnel
A primary goal is to pipeline visitors to an advertiser’s site. The easiest way to convert is 1) create an instructive educational video, 2) include a right Call to Action (CTA): Get the bonus right now!
Review-related organic search or Promo eMail campaign
See an Agency review video
CTA: Get the bonus right now!
How-to agency guide funnel
A primary goal is to two-pronged: 1) share your expertise, i.e. educate a user, and 2) pipeline visitors to your Agency review Funnel. So, How-to agency guide funnel is a larger conversion funnel that contains Agency review one as its fragment. Obviously, goal conversion would result in 1) attracting more users: both through direct and social and 2) views of agency pages. The easiest way to convert is make it instructive and land them smoothly onto the Agency page.
Brand/problem-related organic search or Social or e-Mail campaign or
See a video
Sign up to Video Reviews and Guides or Share via Social
See a Agency review video
CTA: Get the bonus right now!
Last updated
