brightonSEO 2022: The Top 8 Sessions According to Shari & Madée

Tuesday 26 April 2022 - Advertising SEO

You are currently viewing an older story. The content can be outdated. View our latest stories here

Earlier this month, it was time for the UK's largest semi-annual SEO event: brightonSEO. On behalf of Adwise, Shari and Madée crossed the Channel for two days to have a tour of all the new developments, trends and innovations in the field of search engine optimization. In this blog they share their personal top 8 of the sessions they attended.

1. How to Build a Crawler, and also Why You Should - Jess Peck

Jess indicated that SEO specialists use crawlers for various purposes, such as checking schema markup, analyzing search results pages, and detecting broken links. However, there are things that crawling tools like Screaming Frog can't do. For example:

Extracting unsampled data from Analytics
Repeating crawls with different renderings
Running crawls from different countries

Due to the limitations of the current existing crawlers, Jess decided to create her own crawler. During the presentation, she took us through the step-by-step plan she used:
1. Get Google search results
2. Crawl the top-10
3. Clean up the results by excluding tags
4. Analyze the content

After that she went in search of the programming language that best matched. To find it, she asked herself three questions:

What will the input look like?
What should the output look like?
What do I want it to run on and how?

The input the crawler received was keywords. Based on this, she wanted to obtain search results pages, entities and linking pages as output. For this she used the Python library ‘Beautiful Soup’. This standard Python library makes it possible to extract data from HTML and XML files. She then chose Selenium to control it and decided to use a Chrome Driver.

Once the data is available, it must first be stripped by sending it to a CSV. If you work with a team or need to analyze a lot of data, it was recommended to start working with Databases if there is sufficient budget for this.

She then gave various options for analyzing the data:

APIs; by pinging a URL and passing the code/resources on the URL to a library
Use a Software Library, such as SpaCy
Build an analysis tool

During the talk, she presented the entities for the analysis with the free open-source tool SpaCy, which gave the following output:

Jess indicated that she encountered various problems while building. According to her, the best advisor for this is: Google! In addition, she gave us tips to use the documentation of Read The Docs.

She concluded with a catchy statement: "Technical SEO is all about understanding how machines work". In addition, she rightly stated that it is easier to understand ‘how Google works’ if you know how crawlers work.

Check Jess Peck's full presentation here

2. SEO Automation Without Using Hard Code - Tevfik

In many cases, automation requires a lot of knowledge and implementation often takes a lot of time. Tevfik's talk has given us a lot of hands on information that is easy to implement in various strategies. During the presentation, he dealt with the following aspects:

Xpath
G-sheets
Zapier
Tools

Xpath
With the help of Xpath it is possible to scrape different elements on a website. For example: a, p, h (heading), div and li. It is possible to find the Xpath using the inspect tool in Google Chrome. However, it is also possible in a more accessible way by using Xpath Helper Chrome Extension which saves a lot of time.

G-Sheets
It is also possible to retrieve the xpath using a formula in Google Sheets. Using this simple formula, it is possible to scrape different data in one overview: “=importXML(“URL”;”xpath”). In addition, you could also use a script to retrieve the status codes that can be automated with triggers.

Zapier
With Zapier you can automate different workflows within different apps. Such as Trello, Gmail and Spreadsheets, for example. It is also possible to create different SEO Tools with Zapier, including an On-Page SEO checker, Sitemap Keeper and an internal Link Checker.

Watch the SEO Automation Without Using Hard Code presentation here.

3. How to go viral on a budget using Digital PR - Alex Hickson

Alex started off his talk with the advice that you should always think about the feeling you want to evoke with your campaign first. His reasoning was that the emotion you want to evoke with your audience must be the same as the feeling you have as creator of your campaign. He started working on a case with a new brand: ‘2020 Scent’. He wanted to test whether it was possible to elicit a feeling from the target group that is as impactful as the campaigns of big names. He used a budget of 2.16 pounds and achieved the following:

300+ links
20+ airtime on TV
100+ radio fragments

This ultimately resulted in a total return of £20,000.

He then went deeper into the step-by-step plan he used to generate so much revenue with little budget.
1. Link your idea/product to a current trend
2. Validate the trend
3. Identify your target group
4. Sell the story
5. Create the perfect outreach strategy

The order is crucial in the outreach strategy, according to Alex. The step-by-step plan below outlines the outreach strategy he applied to the ‘2020 Scent’.

In short, going viral is certainly possible with a low budget, provided that the strategy is tailored to the target group, current events and stakeholders.

Check out Alex Hickson's full presentation here

4. How to determine search intent for a B2B audience - Adriana Stein

Adriana began her talk with the question of whether the audience takes the B2B search intention into account when developing the SEO content strategy and what difficulties they face in doing so. Aligning the B2B search intention and the purchase intention can be a challenge for SEOs because:

There are several decision-makers in the B2B, making funnels more complex
The difference between B2B and B2C search intent is sometimes difficult to distinguish

In order to properly determine the search intent for a B2B organization, Adriana shared the following information:

Determine your B2B audience's search intent
Help the customer with their search intent:

Adriana gave an example to underline how difficult it can be to find the right search intention of a B2B company. She used a Tech company as an example:

The problem with a Tech company is that it often has a large purchasing department, so that multiple buyer personas can be identified. In addition, the content is often complex and focused on certain technical characteristics.

At the company where Adriana works (AS Marketing Agency), they approached the search intentions for the tech company in the following way:

Step 1: Streamline the buyers personas
Buyer personas often need to be updated and classified into end users, influencers and decision makers

Step 2: Keyword research and clustering
The low search volumes are often very relevant and should not be ignored. In the B2B industry, the keywords with a low search volume are specific to the industry.

Step 3: Keywords map
In the B2B industry, there are often multiple keywords for one product in a different context.

An example of this:
Main Keyword
Omnichannel customer engagement, 140
Related Keywords
Omnichannel customer engagement software, 10
Digital customer engagement solutions, 10
Mobile customer engagement solutions, 10
Customer engagement solutions, 170
Digital customer engagement solutions, 140
SEO content
The Power of Omni Channel Customer Engagement Solutions
Sales funnel stage
Awareness

Stap 4: content creëren
Opportunity: Increases product awareness based on usage scenarios
Focus Keyword: Omnichannel customer engagement
URL: omni-channel-customer-engagement-solutions
H1: The Power Of Omni Channel Customer Engagement Solutions
Main Keyword: customer support automation, 90
Related Keywords:
Customer service chatbot, 590
Customer service and support automation, 50
Automated customer support services, 20
Automated customer support system, 20
SEO content title: Unlock the Power of Customer Support Automation with the Leading Customer Service Chatbot
Sales funnel stage: Consideration

Watch Adriana Stein's full presentation here

5. Goodbye SEO Fck ups! Learn to set a SEO quality Assurance Framework - Aleyda Solis*

At least 85% of SEO Marketers have had at least one average to high SEO incident in the past year. This ranges from indexable to crawlable issues, URL detection, link to content and metadata errors. According to Aleyda, the foundation lies in three core values: training, validation and monitoring. It is important to draw up a checklist to be able to monitor whether everything is going well from different disciplines. In addition, it was recommended to schedule and validate/compare Web Crawls with releases, even if no SEO tasks were included.

If you have a very large website, it is possible to check the changes with unit tests. This can be done through the United Tests template. By linking scheduled crawls of tools, such as Screaming Frog, to the file, you can automatically check your pages for any changes. You can then use Zapier to set a trigger that you can send a notification to through Slack, for example, as soon as a relevant cell changes.

Also, it is possible to set custom notifications in GA4 for, for example, drops in organic visits or sales.

In addition, you can also use Google Trends in combination with Glimpse to be notified of any changes in search behavior immediately.

Finally, she put everything into the following quality framework:

Watch Aleyda Solis's full presentation here

6. How to use search intent to dominate Google Discover - Felipe Bazon

Felipe Bazon stated that the content in Google Discover is primarily based on what Google AI systems consider to be a good match with a user's intention. In other words, Google Discover gives your feed content based on your search history. So you don't have to rank on this.

But how can Google Discover change that SEO 'game'? According to Felipe, the answer to this is to create an even greater intersection between SEO and Content Marketing and to force the inclusion of personas in your strategies. According to Felipe, search intent and the generation of a unique form of engagement between customers and a brand is also important.

Use search intent to optimize Google Discover
The search intent is used to optimize the Google Discover web stories. Felipe gave the following example:

Suppose a company wants to share informational content and the user has the intention to rent a dream house or apartment. Content clusters must then be created for this purpose:

The best cities
The safest cities
The safest neighborhoods
The best schools
Interior decoration tips

The content clusters must be coherent and the right content must be created. When there is a match with the clusters and the user's search behavior, the content is shown in the discover stories.

Other Google web stories tips
Felipe finally gave us two tips that related to the use of Google web stories
- Tip 1: optimization: consistent and frequent placement (1 to 2 times a week)
- Tip 2: Create an attractive poster page for a larger CTR

7. Brand vs. SEO - How to win allies and influence brand guardians - Becky Sinns

Becky Sinns' talk focused on the Nudge Theory. This is a motivational technique aimed at behavioral psychology, in which people are positively influenced to behave in a certain way. She applies this theory by following five steps:

1. Get to know your target group
Research keywords, intent and personas, but do not just look at search volumes. Create the customer journey for a person. Keep a close eye on what your target group is enthusiastic about, so that you can include this in the presentation of a service or product.

2. Reading minds
Make sure you are trained in the relationship with the target group and the product/service in such a way that enables you to identify problems before it becomes a public problem. It is essential for SEO to become part of your brand strategy.

3. Presenting the case
When presenting the case, it is important to not just think as an SEO Marketer, but also as a Brand Owner. Focus on a data-driven approach, but beware; one of the pitfalls according to the nudge theory is that you're looking at it from one point of view. So always check data from different angles to get the most reliable outcome possible. In doing so, also demonstrate the position compared to competitors in the context of ‘safeguarding‘ according to the theory. In addition, it is also important to address the risks of ‘wrong decisions’ that can be made. The advice shared during the talk was to present one route during the presentation that is balanced for the business.

4. The art of compromise
Becky gave a great example of a customer who sold condos and attached great importance to that word. According to the customer, apartments was not a suitable term for the business. However, there was still a lot of potential on apartments + {relevant keyword}. Finally, they agreed to optimize these terms in the metadata, alt-tags, anchor text, outreach content and blogs with a good balance based on the search volume.

5. Impact
The core of this element was transparency. This is because it builds trust between Brand and SEO. Share good SEO performance and emphasize the balance between SEO and Brand.

8. Web design for people and planet - Tom Greenwood

Tom Greenwood started his talk by making the audience aware of the fact that it is often thought that the internet is virtual and therefore not tangible, but that it is also a physical system consisting of data centers, networks and devices that require a lot of energy and put out a lot of emissions. The annual emissions of the internet are comparable to those produced by Germany in one year and even equivalent to those produced by global aviation in one year.

Much attention is paid to global warming in combination with air traffic, but little or no attention is paid to the contribution of ICT and the internet to global warming.

Data centers, transmission networks and devices such as laptops and smartphones consume the most energy. This is also where the greatest savings can be achieved. Tom explains how this can be done:

In web design, energy can be saved by reducing the server load by reducing the amount of data transfers over the network. Reducing the energy used by end-users' devices when they access the websites or web applications will also reduce emissions. Pros:

Energy consumption is reduced,
Improve performance by making websites faster: good for business and usability

Achieving lower energy consumption
The average website speed has deteriorated considerably in recent years due to the page size. According to Tom, the following things can help to achieve lower energy consumption:

Streamlining the customer journey: the more streamlined the customer journey is, the faster the customer achieves their goal on a website and does not unnecessarily visit pages where a lot of unnecessary data has to be loaded, which in turn costs additional energy.
Efficient images: Images are usually the biggest data users. Therefore, use fewer images, more vector images and CSS instead of photos and design your photos in the smallest version.
Efficient videos: videos also cost a lot of data. Therefore, avoid autoplay for videos, compress video files, stream with lower definition and reduce the time of a video.
Replace videos with animations: Animations are a good alternative to replacing videos. Factual information can sometimes even be conveyed better by an animation than by a video. The advantages of animations are that they consume less data, they are SEO-friendly, they are accessible and have a verifiable timeline.
Use lower-energy colors: For example, Google Analytics Dark mode costs more electricity than normal mode

Do you want to know which carbon footprint your website has? Check it out in this tool. If you would like to know more about how we can create websites and web services that are better for people and the planet, then the book 'Sustainable Web Design' by Tom Greenwood is a good read.

Watch the full explanation of Tom Greenwood in this video, as Tom Greenwood's presentation will not be published online.

And that concludes our top 8 BrightonSEO sessions. It was a very interesting and instructive event for us, and we hope we have been able to give you new insights with this blog. If you have any questions about the blog or would you like to discuss SEO with us, please contact us below.