Click Magic PT 1: Standing out in search engines
If you search for snorkels on Google, you’ll get a ton of results that are indeed snorkels.
You knew that already. This isn’t a waiter in Zizzi’s rushing around, managing 37 tables and randomly appearing to offer you a margarita instead of the mega calzone that you’d ordered, like some sort of win-lose negotiation.
It’s Google.
It knows that when you type something into the search box, that’s what you’re hoping to find.
‘Have you got some liquorice shoe laces?
‘Nah mate, but I’ve got a can a Baked Beans and sausages made from soggy rat meat, if they’ll do the job?’
If nobody is clicking through to your website, your search engine rankings are an ego metric. You might be number one but if you’re banking nothing what’s the point? It needs to make business sense.
What makes you click on a link in search engines?
In the most basic sense, this wonderful list of things, not necessarily in this order:
- The brand name/reputation/reviews
- If it looks like what you were searching for
- Compelling snippet titles
- Compelling meta descriptions
The first point is very hard for new businesses and is more of a long term goal. Brand awareness will always take a while to develop so we need to focus on the bottom 3 points to give you a little bit of leverage. The meta description doesn’t directly impact SEO but your title tag should probably contain your target search term, ideally towards the start.
I asked, what makes you click on a link in search engines?
Only true wizards of marketing know the answer to that, Harry.
There are ways to stand out a mile like a pink, zany pony in a field of grey, miserable ones. Keep that analogy in mind when you think about anything and everything related to marketing.
SEO does not end at ranking, you’re looking for sales, right? There are businesses ranking for search terms with MEGA search volumes resulting in very few clicks. You could be ranking for thousands yourself and achieving absolutely nothing. This is why rankings are a vanity metric and an almost pointless measure. Be that pink pony on the first page of search engines.
Today, we’re going to learn the sacred clicking spells from the great elves of search that deal directly with two areas known as ‘meta descriptions’ and ‘title tags.’
If you treat SEO it with the same snoreful attitude as everything else about business, this probably isn’t for you but if you genuinely want to make the most of search engine results then follow me down this glittery rabbit hole and emerge the other side as a shiny little unicorn.
Spell 1: Pengardium Tagiosa —for the pengest of title tags!
The first thing you’ll see when you search for a new broom, as us wizards regularly do, is an assortment of results. This one was somewhere near the top:
The part I’ve highlighted is the title. This is where words play a key role in clicks. FYI I am not affiliated with Toolstation in anyway, I’d probably get my nimbus 2000 from somewhere else, right now, my budget would probably extend to CeX or a discounted, sad looking one from Homebase.
As you can see, they’ve used the title tag to describe what you’ll see when you click through. Awesome, right? It works, there’s no real criticism to make of this page.
It definitely looks like what we were looking for but as you’ll see, it’s identical to all of the others, which can be a problem.
Imagine if the title tag said:
From the humble duster to the Nimbus 2000 | Brooms starting at £8.99
Or
Broom, Shake, Shake, Shake the room | Our Extensive Range of Brooms
You could, of course, be a little less fun and create a title like this:
Cleaning takes ages | Make sweeping a breeze | Browse our brooms.
The last example above follows a simple copywriting formula that I call ‘world, promised land, journey.’
You can apply it to anything and everything in copy.
- World: Express a problem your target audience are having.
- Promised Land: What does their world look like with the problem solved?
- Journey: How do they get there?
I’ll spare you too many details on this for now, just keep that structure in mind when you write. It’s one of many structure you can use in copy but you don’t have to.
Spell 2: Metaliamus — getting magic with meta
I’ve highlighted the meta description in the image below, because you might not know what it is. I appreciate some of these ideas are alien to some people.
It’s the part that appears in search engines below the title, like a paragraph that previews the page. If you leave your meta description empty, search engines will actually show a preview from the page, which is often a bit dull.
We don’t like that.
As you can see in the example, it’s a description. This one looks like a category page with a product feed/archive
Imagine if the broom shop meta description said:
Catch the golden snitch with one of these bad boys and win Hermione’s heart for good. Both left and right handed brooms in stock.
Or
If we don’t have the broom of your dreams, we’ll forge it with the bones of elves. Take a look at our full range here but careful you don’t fall in love.
Think of snippets and the contained meta description and title tags as the first impression. It’s what your website visitors see before they click, just like the subject line in an email but with a little less personalisation available.
If you can get their attention, chances are you’ll get a click through at which point, I hope your content is good. This is such an overlooked area in SEO and I’ve not seen anyone write any creative examples, hence this article.
Think about it like this: nobody likes plain, white, Mini Milks. They’re boring and unwanted, often left in the freezer, alone and cold forever.
Indifference is the enemy of the modern marketer.
People who engage with and encounter your business should feel something, whether that’s a smile forming at the corners of their mouths or empowerment or enraged, it really doesn’t matter.
If you make them feel, you’ve won.
✌🏼
