Testing content

Unique, relevant, well written website content has never been more important than it is now. The changes in search engine algorithms are penalising websites which have poor quality content (e.g. Google Panda/Farmer Updates).

Using google analytics on your website to see data such as the bounce rate of a page (a guide to how "sticky" your page is, how long someone stays on it) we have a measurable control.. Improvement of bounce rate (the lower the better) shows us that the content is being read. If this is the case we hope to be able to improve our content so that it attracts browsers to your product or service, leading to a better quality score with Google and an improvement of our website conversions. Using hypothesis testing* we can change our content to see if the bounce rate does improve.

Here are some ideas to test

• Is your USP one of the first things a browser sees?
• Write actively not passively - e.g. "we build website that perform" as opposed to "our websites can perform well in search engines".
• Test bullet points instead of larger paragraphs
• Bear in mind the user types putting the salient text first in an active voice. Subsequent paragraphs to serve this requiring more detail.
• Ensure that you sell the benefits of your products or service as well as the features. Provide a benefit for each feature.
• Create demand for your product or services.
• An excellent book written by Tony Dimech (co-founder of Motive9 called
  Don't sell we're British will give you a great insight into this)
• Look at the layout of your content. Is the font right? The size, color, line height?
• Are keywords emphasised in some way (e.g. bold, italic, underline)
• Is your copy persuasive? does it lead to a call to action?
• Are broad exclamations backed up specific reasons?
• Are your page headlines attention grabbing? Do they enforce any scent trails that lead a user to that page?
• Is your content customer focused?
• Is your copy jargon free, speaking to readers of all levels of understanding
• Are grammar and spelling weaknesses addressed and rectified?
• Is your page easy to scan (by good use of sub headings) and is each paragraph easy to skim? That is, do you provide a strong leading and exiting sentence for each paragraph.
• How does your content have an edge over your competitors?
• Has your copy positively enforced your USP?

*Related Information
Improve website conversions - hypothesis testing