Poker SEO Metrics

[Randy]

You can't manage what you don't measure. The things you measure when you're managing a business are called "metrics". Most poker affiliates use SEO as a major part of their marketing strategy. In order to best manage a poker SEO campaign, a person should understand what "poker seo metrics" they're using to determine the success or failure of their poker SEO plan.

The obvious poker SEO metric that most people use to measure the success of their poker SEO plan is the number of visitors they get to their site. And if your only marketing strategy is search engine optimization, that's probably as good a metric to use as any. But if you do any other kind of marketing, via links, or offline ads, etc., then the metric you're probably going to look at is number of referrals from search engines.

The number of referrals from search engines can be subdivided into multiple poker SEO metrics:

• Number of poker searchers from Google
• Number of poker searchers from Yahoo
• Number of poker searchers from MSN
• Number of poker searchers from Ask.com

Those can be further subdivided into channels too. All of those engines have an image search, for example, and those can drive traffic. Channel specific poker SEO plans should measure poker SEO metrics specific to those channels.

But the number of visitors to a site isn't the only measure of success for a poker SEO plan. The number of different queries referring traffic to a site is a valid and important poker SEO metric to watch too. If I got traffic from 100 different queries at the start of my poker SEO plan, but I got traffic from 1000 different queries at the end of my poker SEO campaign, then I've done something significant.

And when you rank for a lot of queries, algorithmic changes have less of an effect on your overall business. I'd rather have a site which gets 1 visitor per day from 1000 different queries than a site which gets 10 visitors per day from 100 different queries or a site which gets 100 visitors per day from 10 different queries. If I'm only getting traffic from 10 different queries, and an algorithm shifts so that I no longer rank for 5 of those 10 queries, then I've lost half my traffic. Diversification isn't just an investment term; it's also a poker keyword phrase strategy.

Another poker SEO metric is conversions. Ranking for lots of queries is great, but keeping in mind which queries result in conversions is important too. Even if you only do flat rate ad deals with poker rooms, you can be sure they're watching to see how well your traffic converts. The better it converts, the more money your ads command.

Conversions isn't a direct poker SEO metric; it's a derived poker SEO metric. Other factors affect your conversion rate besides your poker SEO efforts.

What other poker SEO metrics do you manage with your poker SEO plans on your sites? What poker SEO metrics might you measure and manage that you're not currently keeping track of? How would and how does keeping track of these metrics affect your business?

[pokerforfree]

I track all unique outgoing clicks to poker rooms on my website(s). This way I can keep track of outgoing clicks/sign-ups and sign-ups/depositors easily. I also keep track of the page a link has been clicked on, so if I add something new (like a new link in a specific position) I can see the effect + the importance of a particular page.

I also have question regarding Google Analytics. Personally I look at unique visitors and keywords used in the search terms, but I feel I am not using Analytics to the max. Are there any specific items to check daily? Is there something else that you would recommend?

Cheers,

Giorgio

[Randy]

I like to use Google Analytics to find phrases that send me multiple visitors each month even though I'm on the 2nd page of a search engine for the phrase. I figure if I've received 2 visitors in a month 2 months in a row for a phrase that I rank #20 for in the SERP's, then doing some optimization to get to the first page will drive some real traffic.

To me, that's a lot better keyword research strategy than most.

And that's what I use Google Analytics for more than anything.

[eXplicit]

Hey Randy a real interesting subject your touching their. How many more visitors would you expect to get if you move from page 2 to page 1 in google for a phrase giving you like 2 visitors a month?

[punchtheclock]

Originally Posted by eXplicit

How many more visitors would you expect to get if you move from page 2 to page 1 in google for a phrase giving you like 2 visitors a month?

I think I recall hearing that something around 90% of users don't go past page 1.

I'd bet that at least 60% of users don't even scroll down the page.

As usual there is a disclaimer...it depends on what kind of terms. I think that naturally, the terms that convert well are going to have higher click through rates in the first few results above the fold. These are things like specific deals that people might be looking for...people who know exactly what they want.

If people don't know what they want, they might search deeper for things in general, but those people will be tougher to convert.

[Randy]

I'm just guessing, but I think if you've got a page on the 2nd page of results, moving to the 1st page should improve your visits by a factor of at least 10.

But I don't have hard data, and I bet it would vary a lot based on the term. In MSN, I've had terms on page 2 getting more traffic than that term drove my site via Google even though I was on page 1. The difference was that on MSN, all of the sites above mine sucked, and on Google, they all rocked.

Originally Posted by eXplicit

Hey Randy a real interesting subject your touching their. How many more visitors would you expect to get if you move from page 2 to page 1 in google for a phrase giving you like 2 visitors a month?