SEO Case Study Copywriting & Tracking Metrics w/ Erin Ollila
All service providers need at least 1 case study in their marketing tool bag.
Case studies are an incredibly powerful marketing tool—especially for service providers. Think about it… it’s the one way someone gets to “try before they buy” with a service.
Joining me today is Erin Ollila, a fellow SEO strategist & copywriter! She’s sharing the best ways to use case studies for your business, how to optimize them for SEO, if it’s better to create a case study as a blog post or web page, AND what data you should be tracking after you hit “publish.”
Topics covered in this podcast episode:
Why case studies are so powerful
The best way to use case studies for business
Tactics to help you stop feeling so sales-y
How to optimize case studies with SEO
If it’s better to do keyword research before or after writing the story
The different types of keywords to use for case studies
If it’s better to create a case study as a web page or blog post
How to create a group of case studies—and differentiate them
How to ask the best questions during case study interviews
What metrics to track to see if the case study is “working” for you
How to use the data to optimize an existing case study for SEO
What conversions look like for a case study
The best, most user-friendly SEO tools
The importance of regularly sharing your case studies
Meet: Erin Olilla
Conversion copywriter. Copy Coach. Wing Woman. Word slinger. No matter what you call her, Erin Ollila believes in the power of words and how a message can inform—and even transform—its intended audience. When Erin's not creating content for big brands like Oracle, Descript, Amazon, and Contently, you can find her helping small businesses marry strategy, storytelling, and SEO. Erin is the host of the Talk Copy to Me podcast and co-founder of Spry Lit, an online award-winning literary journal.
Mentioned Resources:
Seo titles + meta descriptions
Brittany on Talk Copy to Me (turn testimonials into case studies)
SEO Tools:
Ubersuggest (chrome extension, free) + (paid lifetime plan)
Related Episodes:
Ashleigh’s ep (case study interview example)
Colie’s ep (case study example)
Chantelle’s ep (client quotes)
Jamar’s ep (SEO for YouTube case studies)
Connect w/ Erin:
Connect w/ Brittany:
This episode of The Basic B podcast is brought to you in partnership w/ Leah Bryant Co.! Help me reach more service providers like you by following the show & leaving a rating or review on Apple & Spotify!
The unedited podcast transcript for this episode of The Basic B podcast follows
Welcome back to the Basic Bee podcast. I am so excited to have you back with me and my friend Erin Ollila, who is also an SEO pro. I'm going to read you her cute little bio in a second, but we're going to be talking about case studies, SEO and metrics. And we're probably going to throw in a couple other unexpected topics just because they are of the moment as we're recording. But as always, before I bring her on, here is Erin's quick intro, conversion, copywriter, copy coach, wingwoman, word slinger. No matter what you call her, Erin Alilla believes in the power of words and how a message can inform and even transform its intended audience. When Erin's not creating content for big brands like Oracle, Descript, Amazon, and Contently, you can find her helping small businesses marry strategy, storytelling and SEO. Sound familiar? Erin is the host of the Talk Copy to Me podcast and co founder of Spry lit, an online award winning literary journal. My friend. Hello.
Erin Ollila: Hi. Thank you so much for having me. It's so wild to hear, like, yourself introduced because I'm like, oh, I did that. Oh, wow, that's cool. I'm a cool kid.
Brittany Herzberg: Of course you are. And that's why you're in my world. So, I mean, duh. But I loved reading your bio. When you first sent it over, I was like, of course we love each other. We've got the strategy, storytelling, SEO, like.
Erin Ollila: All of the stuff and we have all the essays. Right. It's not like we could have phrased that so differently. Just so you know, everyone who's listening right now, like, Brittany and I will always joke that we have the same brain. We do very similar things with our clients. We talk about things similarly. We have comparisons that we use. So, A, buckle up. You'll enjoy this because you obviously love B, but buckle yourself up because this is going to be a good one.
Brittany Herzberg: It really is. I'm so excited. Before we get to the main entree, I'm going to ask you the question that I ask everyone, which is not a scary one. And I think you'll be able to handle this like, pro. So which do you believe is the most important for sales, SEO, storytelling or social proof?
Erin Ollila: I mean, all of the above. And like, I know that's a cheat, but I think that they are all so reliant on each other in order to make a conversion. And. But I can kind of talk through that a little bit for you. So when we think about, like, what comes first, I think that we really need to consider the storytelling Aspect that that's what comes first, what comes in the middle, what comes at the end. Because if the copy, if the message, if the branding is off, it does not matter how well invested you are in SEO and how high you rank on the page, because no one cares when they get there. Similarly, if you have the best testimonials where people are, like, sharing your praises, yet your message isn't convincing, it makes people feel like they're unsure of whether they should purchase, then it doesn't matter how good your social proof is. So I think storytelling leads the way. But the reason that I brought that up first is because even if you have the best stories, you need a few things to make sales, right? So SEO will bring a new audience to you. Without SEO, you're reliant on your own built audience. And we know that over time we cannot sell anything and everything to the same people over and over again. You know, we need to widen our sphere. So that's how it's helping sales is bringing people to you that are more primed. Now, the social proof, obviously it's helping convince people the decision that they're going to make is the right decision. So they all win. They all have their own reason why the sale's going to kind of be processed and, I don't know, kind of talked in a circle through that one. So hopefully that was okay.
Brittany Herzberg: That was totally great. I love the circles because they really do just overlap and link together. And it's a domino effect. It's a puzzle that fits together. Whatever analogy you want to make for your brain, whatever picture you need to bring up, they work together. And it doesn't matter how you slice it.
Erin Ollila: No. And any improvement you make on one benefits the others, right? So, like, if you haven't done any SEO work at all, I mean, one, why not? You're listening to these podcasts, like, we talk about this a lot on this show, but if you haven't done any SEO work, just a little effort could boost your sales in regard to the how people embrace that story that you've built. Right. Or whether that social proof is really, like, exciting for them once they get there. If you have so, so testimonials and you do testimonial request or case studies with your clients, that's going to improve your messaging. That's going to improve, like, all of the SEO work. So while they're all kind of, like, working together, any, like, improvement on one will really improve the others too, for sure.
Brittany Herzberg: And that's a really good point. And I've mentioned this before on the podcast, but at least in my world, when people come in, whether it's for SEO or case study copywriting, I'm asking them three big questions. Who do you help? How do you help them? What do you want to be known for? There's a reason for this. People. And some people, it's very easily like flies on the keyboard or flies out of their mouth. And some people really are like, oh man, let me think about that. They may be in a season of transition. They may just not have had anyone ask them that. And that definitely, like you said, it plays into the keyword research. It plays into the stories we're going to tell, how we're going to tell them, and then of course, the way that we are sharing that social proof. So I love your answer is the main point there.
Erin Ollila: Thank you.
Brittany Herzberg: Of course. And no one is shocked by that because we basically do share a brain. It's amazing. It's really fun. So with case studies and SEO and metrics that we're looking to track, let's start first with just like what case studies are and how we see them being used. And what I mean by that is like PDF versus on your website versus a ton of different ways. What are you seeing?
Erin Ollila: Yeah, so I think people are really starting to see the power of case studies, which obviously, you know, it's something you talk about frequently, so your audience is a little bit better informed. But I've been in the marketing world now for well over a decade, and when case studies were brought up even five years ago, people really treated them as a research report, right? Where it was more like, we will ask a few questions and we will present the answer in a very unstorified approach where it was like problem and solution, where we can just highlight that and nothing more. So because they weren't providing a story and because they weren't encouraging people toward a conversion, no one cared in the audience, right? So they weren't actual sales tools for them. They weren't for the businesses. They weren't anything that really inspired people to get to know them, to nurture relationships. So people were not investing in them. And I think what's happening now is people are becoming a lot more curious because with long form content, they can see this story, right? So they learn about the business which allows them to say, hey, you know, that's like me, like put themselves in the same shoes as the business owner. They learn about, like why what they're doing is important for them. You know, using us for an easy Example, if someone came to us to write website copy or content for their site, it could be that they are not doing a good job being visible. It could be that their audience doesn't know exactly what they do. So when we give them the transformation of working with us and updating their copy, a lot of the times you'll hear them say like, oh, I finally feel like I can step into like the spotlight. I finally feel like I know how to describe my business. Like people are telling me that they understand, you know, what I do. And I just feel really excited because now clients are coming to me. So there's the story part of it, right? And there's where people can say, oh yeah, like those are fears I have too. Like those are issues that I'm facing in my business and I would love to have a result like this. Maybe this is where I focus my, you know, marketing budget or this is where I focus my time and energy. So if you create case studies, regardless of whether you have a service based business, a product based business, SaaS, technology, anything like that, when you are creating a storified case study and you are telling the story of your client, what they experienced before working with you, why they came to you in particular, what the goal of your work together was and how that actually played out, like the process, let's say, and then the end results that they achieved as a whole story and showcasing some of those things I just mentioned, like, why does the like actual goal being achieved do anything? Well in that fake example, I just said if you're more able to like give yourself a good elevator pitch or feel confident describing what your business is, you're going to be more likely to network better at events, you're going to be more likely to make connections and have collaborations with people in other fields, you're going to make more sales. Like there's a domino effect on these little things. So if you can showcase the why and the why it's so important, not only will the new audience who's reading the case studies be able to put themselves in the shoes of the individual in the beginning, but they're going to like, this is the wrong word, but like be desperate for that end result. They're going to be like excited about if this business can do that, then imagine what my business could do, you know, like it's the social proof of the content. If you think of it, the business that worked with you that is helping you because they're part of the case study, they're selling your services or your products for you, and not just in like a one or two sentence format on a website page in an actual storied event. And I think that helps people really move toward a sale a lot quicker, but not in a way that feels forced. Right. Like, you're not having flashing bulletins on your case study page. That's like, buy now, quick. Grab this opportunity while it's there. You know, I think when we treat our audience like humans and like individuals who can make their own decision and we tell them the story, we build that connection, they feel a lot more confident about taking their individual steps on their own. Right? Like saying, oh, I'd like this. Look at that one little button at the end of the page that says, like, check out my services. Or like, here's a contact form. It's not forced on them. So they feel so much better themselves about taking the step closer to working with us. And I think that's what all businesses want, right? Like less forced sales, more excited leads. And it works well for the business owner and for their potential client or customer because they're already excited about the potential of working together.
Brittany Herzberg: Exactly. I couldn't agree more. And I will add that not only is the reader able to see themselves in the position of your client that you helped and see themselves go through that journey, they're also connecting to you. They're getting to see what it's like to work with you. And one thing I say pretty frequently is that you're giving them the whole, like, try before you buy, especially with a service that is so hard to do in any other way, shape or form. So by doing that, you're making them everything you just shared, you're making them more comfortable with the idea of this. They're getting this confidence that they can make this empowered buying decision and choose to work with the same person. And something that's come up even just a lot this week in conversations that I've had is that people are so tired of having their chain yanked around. We are so tired of having these terrible purchasing decisions and working in these different containers or with coaches or with buying products and just feeling frankly screwed at the end of the day, which has really come up in the last four or five years. So I could obviously stay on that soapbox for a hot second, but I'm not going to. So let's jump into how can you SEO ify a case study, especially one that's on your website? I should say that because people have case studies in PDFs, people have case studies in other places, take it away.
Erin Ollila: I should have said that earlier too. You mentioned PDFs, like you do want a case study in a PDF? Sure, like clip it and plop it in your Google Drive. But from now on in this conversation, we are not talking PDFs because they do nothing for you.
Brittany Herzberg: Nothing.
Erin Ollila: I couldn't even dream up a scenario where a PDF case study will help you better than a case study that is published on the Internet. Because if you want to, you know, share it, let's say, you know, with a larger group via email or whatever, a hyperlink in your email works just as well to direct them to the Internet. We'll get off that soapbox for a second.
Brittany Herzberg: It's one we like though.
Erin Ollila: Yeah. The reason we feel so passionate about this is because PDFs are not searchable by what I like to call like the Google robots, which is really just is not an actual robot. But it sounds so much funner to talk about like a robot searching your web page than just like a computer generated search program. When you have a case study that is created and published on your website, what you're allowing it to do is to be indexed by search engines like Google or Bing so that it will appear in the search results. Now, the reason I get so excited about things like case studies is because to jump backward, I think an important distinction is the difference between pages and post. Now when we think of our website, the pages are not the blog posts, they're not generally the case studies. While they can be, and I'll get to that in 10 seconds, the pages are quite often things like homepage about services, contact, maybe a media page, a podcast page as an example. So on your website, the pages that exist likely have a lot less words than a case study or a longer form piece of content will have. And because you have less words, you have to put a lot more creative effort into seoing those pages. Can you? Of course, you know, I wouldn't mention it if I didn't think you could. You can absolutely optimize pages so that you can get found for those main website pages in search. But it's just, it's harder and the competition is much more fierce because instead of using things like very detailed local SEO or like extremely long form keywords, you're competing against entire industries or entire tire job titles. Now post as an example are generally things like blog posts, case studies, things that you're allowed to have a lot more words on the page. And in that instance it's easier to take the time you need to tell the story you need to tell to include as many images as you need to include to let the story build. You know, like I said, show that like the need before working with you, talk about the process and all these things because you're not limited by the more specific conversion copywriting that you need to do. Like the sales based. Let's get someone to take an immediate action. Whereas those pages, that's their job, right? We don't want someone to come on our services page and stay on that services page for 15 minutes reading. We want to like give them the information that they need to convert, whether that's purchasing or whether that's filling out a contact form to learn more or booking a discovery call. Now earlier I said case studies could be either pages or post. And I think that's a really important thing to discuss because there are some strategic reasons why one business would choose one and one business would choose another. And I want to say upfront, there's no right answer here at all. But there are reasons why you may adjust them. If you are completely diying this, the easiest approach would probably be just to put post like normal blog post up. You have your title, you can throw some images, you can throw some text in. Now if you are not completely diying this or you have the tech skills while diying, you may want to consider doing pages because quite often you can design a theme for your page that can be replicated, you know, so the design elements look similar so that you can do a little bit more design conversion relation, meaning like if you're going to have like a timeline, let's say, well, you can build that onto a page where you have less availability to do that in a blog post. But again, that doesn't mean that they're better. There are ways to get around that and adjust that for your blog post. I just wanted to like showcase that when we talk about pages specifically, we're often talking about the very easy to like assume website pages. And when we do this case study work, we have the opportunity to develop more of a story, to take the space to even design the like the look of the case study so that it is more conversion eligible, right? So we can convince people more of why they should be the next client or customer. Yet now let's look at SEO for a second. Whereas someone's about page or even their like services page, maybe something like again using you and I, it could be like SEO copywriter for our about page as the keyword we're using as the URL slug or anything like that, well, then I'm competing against people looking for an SEO copywriter on the Internet, people having trainings on how to be an SEO copywriter, other SEO copywriters. For my about page, on my case study, I could do a longer keyword where it was either about the actual work that we did together so that people searching for that very specific thing could find us. I could do a keyword based on my job title so someone searching for that type of individual could find me. I could do a keyword based on my client so that other people in their industry that I may want to work with could find me. And I could do location. So here's a few examples. If you are a wedding photographer, your keyword, if you're going to do either one about like you as in the business owner or the location, it could be something like Lake Tahoe wedding photographer or Lake Tahoe LGBTQ wedding photographer, if you want to get more specific so that those type of clients are finding you, that people in that region are finding you, and that's using a keyword that's about you. But if we want to make the keyword about the people that are working with us, it could be about, like, what the issue is. So maybe like for interior designer, it could be remodeling a kitchen in an old home or like turning an old home kitchen. I mean, that's not a keyword. This is getting descriptive here, but you're talking about, like, the instance of what you're doing in the work. So people searching for that, even if you're not on their radar, even if the actual opportunity to work with you isn't something that they're considering, they're finding that case study and you're kind of lighting that flame for them to get them to consider it further. So you get some great keywords that you can use with case studies and you have more opportunity to use them as well as similar keywords to really, like, beef up the search power for the case studies.
Brittany Herzberg: Yeah. I mean, if you're putting all of this time and effort into creating it, whether you're coming to someone like me and Aaron to write this for you or you're doing this yourself, you really want it to then go and do some marketing for you. So that's one thing that I talk about, is you create these case studies and they join your marketing team. They are out there working for you while you're taking a week off to hang out with your kids in the summer. They are doing that while you're sick with a Migraine for three days. Not that either of us can relate to that or anything. So, I mean, it's an opportunity. And I talk about SEO. You've heard me say this on the show before. SEO is extra credit for business owners. It's the same thing with your case study. So you might as well take advantage of that and really be thoughtful about the types of keywords that you can include and how you're weaving them into your story. Just like I love the ebooks down the different types of keywords that we could incorporate and base a case study around. I do these things, but sometimes I don't always think about how to break it down and explain it to people. So I loved hearing them, like, I've done one like that. I've done one like that. So it's really cool to think about.
Erin Ollila: Well, I think a question that I get asked very often is like, okay, let's say, for example, we'll use the Lake Tahoe wedding photography. You know, they may say, well, I'm going to invest and I'm going to do these six case studies. But, like, how do I make them different? Like, yeah, what's the difference? It's just a wedding in the Lake Tahoe area. So using that as an example, that's why I specifically brought up the type of clientele they might want to work with. You know, there's one way to inject a keyword that's different. Another option could be, like, the vibe of the wedding, you know, like modern Lake Tahoe wedding photography. Or it could be the venue. So you could put your keyword attached to, like, an extremely popular venue. One of my friends got married at the Boston Public Library. So it could be, oh, that's my dream. Yeah, like a wedding photography. Or like photography at Boston Public Library. And then throughout the post, you're talking about, like, why was the library significant? What are the things that you needed to do? Did you need to get approved by the venue? Were there specific photography hours that you could go? Were there any limitations? How did you work around those limitations? Is this something you advised your clients on? And if so, like, I think sometimes people worry, especially on their website pages, that they need to explain their entire process. And I think we all know that even if you do one service using wedding photography as an example, there are different types of processes. An elopement has a different process than a full wedding. You know, maybe like a certain type of culture. Some cultures, their weddings take place over a certain amount of days. So one process on a services page gets Muddled, Right? And sometimes people feel like they need to write paragraphs and all the details, and that is not helpful for your website pages. Like, let us all rein ourselves in. Your website pages should be short and to the point and providing just the details that you need it to. But your case studies are your opportunity to show, like, did your process change? Or, like, how did you go with the flow? How did you provide the best customer experience when XYZ happened? You know, you could bring in the elements. Like, if you were an industry where it was like, winter weddings, like, just because you only do one thing and it seems as if there's not a lot of opportunities for keywords, that is the farthest, farthest thing from your possibility. Like, it's why working with an SEO strategist is better for you, because they're going to be able to kind of create these opportunities for you where if you just approach a keyword tool on your own, you're limited by what you know about yourself and your business. And that sometimes stunts you from, like, stepping outside of the opportunities that you have. And that's why case studies are good, because each type of client you're talking about, even if you provide the same service, the same timeline, the same transformation, their individual needs, their business, their outcomes are greatly different. And if you don't know really what you're going to say until you do these interviews and you're worried, like, well, what will my SEO be? Maybe just forget about SEO while you're doing the interviews and the writing, and then optimize the post, because you'll start to see the story come out even for you, and you'll feel a lot more confident about your SEO approach after you've built the story already.
Brittany Herzberg: Could not agree more. And that's one thing that I advise people, whether I'm working with them, done for you, or I'm guiding them, consulting, or they're in the case study training program. I want you to write how you're going to write first, and then I want you to weave in the SEO. You could do the SEO research, in my opinion, before you even start writing, or you could do it after you've already written the thing and you can see how the story has unfolded. Do you have a preference? I mean, it kind of sounds like we're on the same page there, but yeah.
Erin Ollila: And I think it. It doesn't matter, right? Like, how you approach it. Um, I. I know some people, like, I did a long training for copywriters who wanted to learn the strategy element of SEO So not just like the actual implementation and how you use it in a post, but like, how do we strategize a campaign, how do we build things together? And what I like to talk to them about was there's many options. If you don't research in advance, you may be missing something that is a way better opportunity than what you think. And just like you said, if you research in advance and you limit yourself, you might not be telling the story you need to tell. So I think that my approach has always been to do my research so I know what's out there. You know, maybe what other people are ranking for, maybe what they're not ranking for, and just have an idea of where I'd like to go and then forget it and then do what you said and write the entire thing, develop the story, like edit and adjust as I need and then go back to my research and be like, okay, so what am I going to do with this? Like, where would I like to go? Like, what direction do I take? Maybe you have to do more research at that point, but I think bookending it is probably my preferred angle.
Brittany Herzberg: That's what I like doing. I love listening to the interview. Whether that's one that I've done, I will listen back to it. Or if that's one that my client is sending me and then creating the story arc from there, send that off for approval, which we learned with Ashley's case study, which was a failure, quote, unquote case study. And I'll link that below, which is another type of case study like you were hinting at. Send off the story arc, do my SEO research while I'm waiting for them, see what those possibilities could be. And then I love that you brought up the point of like forgetting it. Just write the story and then come back and check in later with interviews. This is a question that I get a lot. How can we make sure that we're asking questions that are going to give us SEO worthy answers that we can then put in the case study?
Erin Ollila: Well, I mean, I think sometimes people forget that they can even put the SEO keyword into the questions that they ask. So you could say to your client, well, tell me your experience about working with me. Or you could say, tell me your experience of working with an SEO website copywriter. Right? Like, then that at least includes the keyword in the question they may be able to answer and say, well, you know, when I started looking for a website copywriter or whatever, the other thing I like to remind people is I absolutely never edit for Content meaning like I'm not going to change someone's responses or words. So that way it like messes with the intent that they had that they said then. But you can absolutely edit the things that your clients say for clarity.
Brittany Herzberg: Yes.
Erin Ollila: Meaning people love to answer with things like she or it. When we did that, you can insert the keywords there. You know, I personally always like people to check when I make any change. So very often I will say, hey, you know, I was going to put this quote in. Can I adjust your words if they said like working with her or like being on the podcast, you know, because you've talked about before how like the case studies don't actually have to be about the work that you do. You may want to put them towards learnings that you've done as a business owner or whatever. If you're doing something about a podcast, instead of saying the podcast, say the name of the podcast, you know, and that could be what you're trying to rank for the title of the podcast. So you can always edit, especially if it's for clarity, to insert keywords as you'd like them. I again, I like to preach you should always be asking for like approval on edits you make. But in the grand scheme of things like changing the word it for the correct word that they meant to use is not something that really needs to be approved.
Brittany Herzberg: Yeah, you don't have to send that through your whole SOP situation. It's understood. But if it makes you feel better, it makes you feel more on the up and up about using it, go for it. I've very often swapped out like, like you said, she. I'll put my name or the business name or whatever the thing may be and I'll run it by them either while I'm sending them the like, hey, this is on my services page now. Is this cool?
Erin Ollila: Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg: Or I will send it to them quickly. But it, it is typically pretty understood. Like you said though the intent or what I say when I'm talking about the testimonial quote, the essence of it. We don't want to fudge around with that.
Erin Ollila: No.
Brittany Herzberg: With case studies and SEO, let's talk metrics. Let's pretend we have this case study on our website. What should we be paying attention to to see if it's quote unquote working?
Erin Ollila:
- If you need to identify the keyword before you even post it. So what you'll want to do then after publishing is track the keyword. You don't have to do this on your own. There are a billion SEO tools that can do an actual rank tracking for you, where you can pull a rapport or your SEO person can do this for you. And it will say, okay, you know, over the past month or the over the past three months you've risen from out of rankings to spot 58. Now you're at spot 13. So obviously you want to see an increase in ranking. Like you want to move closer or maybe what is that a decline or an increase, Right? I guess it's a decline. You want to decline.
Brittany Herzberg: The number is going down, but you're actually going up.
Erin Ollila: So you want to get as close to page one as possible, which is, you know, like the smaller number that you can be in the ranking so that you're right on the top of the rankings. That's the easiest one, right? It's as simple as knowing what you're searching for. And then while you're doing that, you want to also see are any other terms coming up because you might want to eventually. Not at first. SEO is a slow burn thing like set it and forget it. But over time, maybe a year after you publish, or six or nine months, you may notice another keyword is ranking better. And if that keyword is similar in intent, maybe you do a little edits to the post and that becomes your new preferred keyword that you put into the ranking tool. In addition to that, you want to look at things like the amount of impressions you're getting that's going to be based again on search rankings and the click through rate. Because often I'll see my clients get like a high amount of impressions, but people are not clicking through to the page. And that means Google is or whatever search engine is showing your content to people, but you're not convincing them that what they should do is click over and what a lost opportunity that is, right? And it's such an easy fix. If you have a low click through rate on your post, you want to update the title and the meta description to make it more enticing for the person who looks at the search results to actually go back to your page versus someone else's. And I think that when those updates are made again using the keyword naturally within the title and the meta description, but pulling someone onto the site, you'll notice that the impressions will also then increase as well as the click rate will increase. And I like to tell people, most people forget when they're creating any type of content that it should still be something about conversions with the content. That doesn't mean someone has to purchase something from your case study. A conversion could be that they join your email list. A conversion could be that they click through to a different page in your website, if that is the goal that you have in mind for that page. Using case studies as an example, what I just said of moving through the site, it could be, go check out my services page. So the conversion event is clicking to the services page. You want to know what the goal is for each of the case studies that you create so that you can then measure whether that goal is being met. If it's email signups, are people signing up on this page? If not, and if that's still your goal, well, how can you improve that? Do you want to move your email signup list higher? Do you want to maybe rewrite the copy so it feels less salesy and it feels like someone that's something that someone really want to do to share their email with you? Or maybe you have to change your goal overall. So I think to kind of sum that up, know your keyword, check the ranking, make decisions on whether that's the right keyword, and potentially make updates, look at your click through, rate your impressions and also figure out like whether the conversion event that you set for the page is actually meeting the goal that you're setting.
Brittany Herzberg: I love that. I love it. And that was such a clean way to look through that. I know one of my tools and I would love to hear what you say. One of my tools that I like using is Google Search Console. They do this lovely thing where they send you an email and it's like, hey, check out what content is ranking, check out the keywords. And that is free. You just need to sign up for it, get it all set up on your website and there are tutorials out there for that. Is there another tool that you like using that's paid or free?
Erin Ollila: I think that pretty much any of the main SEO tools are going to do what you want them to do. You know, if you are really on a budget, a tool like ubersuggest could be doing this for you. Even on its paid lifetime plan. It is very affordable. It's not my favorite tool, but what I like about it is it's a very good beginner's tool because it's easy to like click through. You know where you're going to get once you click, like keyword opportunities or whatever it says. I really like Semrush. It's so funny. I just did a podcast interview yesterday where we talked about these tools and I was like, oh, Bummer. I always say the wrong name. Like I never. I'm so used to using them and not so much talking about them and I'm like, is it Semrush? Is it Semrush? Whatever. I like that tool as well. Personally, I do want to point out the differences because you mentioned Google Search Console and what I had said was you want to also know the additional things you're ranking for. What Google Search Console actually is telling you is what's actually happening. Like what people are actually doing, not what you want to happen. The other search SEO tools like Semrush or like ubersuggest, you're inputting what you would like to happen and they are tracking based on what you tell it to track. But Google Search Console is tracking based on what information they have. They don't care what you want to track. Like if you're trying to attract like Lake Tahoe wedding photographer, but you're not using location based SEO keywords and you might actually get like public library, a wedding photographer. Right. Even if the public library happens to be in Tahoe, you're not going to get that because people are not finding you that way. So they're going to give you a really clear understanding of what's actually happening on the Internet. Not what you want to happen, not what you're hoping and not what you're tracking, what is actually happening. So using Search Console to be able to showcase again what those keywords are you may be ranking for, that you didn't even think about is a really great way to audit the work you've already done.
Brittany Herzberg: Yeah, and thank you for explaining that because that is a good point of like, what tools to use, when, for what. And if you have questions, of course, like we'll have all of our contact info below, you can reach out and we can help you. We like doing that. SEO is a long game and if you can stick to the things that Aaron was sharing and answering the questions that you know people are asking, which you discover in keyword research, you discover by, I don't know, talking to your people back.
Erin Ollila: Yes.
Brittany Herzberg: Listening to the questions that you're already getting, I mean, you're going to be golden.
Erin Ollila: Yeah. I would add not just talking to your people, but listening to your people listening. I think that is so often forgotten that like, yeah, I see a lot of business owners like doing surveys and all of these things, but it's. They're still leading with their assumptions versus just like pausing and saying like, what do you have to say now? Let me Internalize what that means and then make marketing decisions.
Brittany Herzberg: Yeah, that's a very good point. Of course it's a very good point that you made. Is there anything else that you want to touch on before we close this out about SEO, case studies, metrics, content?
Erin Ollila: Just go do it. Like, I'm going to be the Nike ad. Like, just do it. Like, actually, I would say I hear a lot more of people who don't want to do this because of things like perfectionism or worry that they don't know what they're doing. And let me tell you, your competitors are not doing it. So if you have a shoddily made case study that you're like, I don't know if this is good, I don't know if this is bad, I tried like, fingers crossed, you're still beating out your competitor who is not creating them. So not that I'm suggesting we add stinky content to the Internet, but I am suggesting that you do what you need to do to get that first draft up and published and then sit on it for a little while, see how it performs. You can make edits to your case studies at any time, you know. And remember that the work that you do with the longer form content should and can be reshared regularly. Social media is a great tool to regularly share your case studies. I don't care if you wrote a case study in 2019. If it's valid, share it today on social media. If it's valid, share it on your email list. Because I think that's probably the biggest mistake I see people who have created content make is they allow it to like, live in the cemetery of their website and they don't take it out to play like. So take your case studies out to play and actually make them if you're nervous about it.
Brittany Herzberg: Yeah, take them to the park, show them around, introduce them to people, introduce.
Erin Ollila: Them to your friends.
Brittany Herzberg: I'm going to make sure I link Jamar's episode because he was just sharing that he created case studies and he gets to use them as objection busters. He gets to pull them out and have them do the answering of the question for people so he doesn't have to repeat it for the 14th time that week.
Erin Ollila: You know, one of my favorite places to use case studies is actually in proposals because I will, like, talk about, like, well, what's included in this project and list the inclusions and I will add a little line that's like, you know, if you want to learn more about, like, the very specifics of what A website copy project would look like. Check out, you know, Harriet's story where we talk about how she didn't expect to receive a brand messaging guide. How she was, like, felt more confident about SEO because of the actual research I turned over. So, like, it gives you an opportunity to sell without writing paragraphs. Like, you don't have to say, like, this one inclusion will do 20 sentences now just listed in bullet form post. So you can understand it like, it can come to life. Because there are different types of buyers. There are people who, like, quick decision, ready to go, and then there are people who, like, really want to do their research. And by hyperlinking out to things like case studies or, you know, including some of the, like, longer testimonials within the proposal itself, what you're doing is you're meeting the needs of both of those buyers. And now I'll zip it. I'll zip it on the case studies and how to use them.
Brittany Herzberg: You can't. You have to tell us where people can connect with you.
Erin Ollila: Oh, well, you're already in a podcast player listening to this or on YouTube. And I have my own podcast, which Bea has been on, which was an awesome conversation about turning testimonials into case studies, if I remember correctly.
Brittany Herzberg: Yeah, you do.
Erin Ollila: It's called Talk Copy To Me. So after you listen to this episode or you catch up on any other episodes of the Basic Bee, find your way over to Talk Copy to me and dive into more of my episodes where we talk about things like marketing, SEO and stor storytelling.
Brittany Herzberg: Definitely. And you hang out anywhere else where you're like, where people can say hi.
Erin Ollila: I mean, I'm everywhere. Different neighborhoods. You can find me on LinkedIn threads is my favorite place, probably just because I'm an add writer, so I can, like, share the random thoughts or hop on other people's, you know, pieces of conversation. But I really am everywhere. Like, I'm on Instagram, LinkedIn threads. I talk to people on my email list. I talk to people on Voxer. Just, like, knock on my door and I'll be sure to answer.
Brittany Herzberg: I'm laughing so hard. This is great. I also just with you sharing that, I just remembered that you are the one that I credit with helping me name this podcast the Basic Bee, which I talk about in an earlier episode. So I'm going to make sure to link to that in case you're like, what? How did that happen?
Erin Ollila: I don't actually think I've heard that episode, to be honest with you.
Brittany Herzberg: It's one of the early Ones.
Erin Ollila: Yeah, I'm going to go find. I'm going back.
Brittany Herzberg: You got to find it. I will share the link with you and with the good people listening. That's one of the things that we really like. And I think I met you because you were doing a presentation somewhere for something, and I was like, SEO. I get to go, like, hear someone else talk. Talk about SEO and geek out about it. And then we became friends because I was like, yeah, hi, I'm going to be your new best friend. And then I was.
Erin Ollila: And thank you. I appreciate it.
Brittany Herzberg: Yeah, of course. No, thank you. One thing that we bonded over was, like, I was reading through your website and I saw that you had this one line which said something about massaging the message. And with me having the background as a massage therapist and being in marketing with messaging, I was like, dang it, this is beautiful. And I have to give you props for it. But, like, it makes me sad that it's on your site. And then you said something.
Erin Ollila: Yes. Be the answer to Google's question or whatever you have, like, that. I was like, can we trade at some point? Like, when you get sick of using yours, you can take mine and I'll take yours and we can switch for a little while.
Brittany Herzberg: I love it. And then we've both brought up, like, Ted Lasso being the Ted Lasso of copywriters.
Erin Ollila: Oh, yes. Yeah. I have an entire blog post about, like, the different types of, like, coaches from Ted Lasso that I am with as being a copywriting coach. I kind of, like, step into the different roles. I think yours is on your website. I remember reading it. About page, maybe, or something.
Brittany Herzberg: Good memory.
Erin Ollila: Well, it's because I'm thinking, well, where would you put this on your web? Like, where. Hello, Ted Lasso. Like, call me Ted Lasso. It makes sense to be on the about page.
Brittany Herzberg: That's great. Well, thank you for this. I'm so glad that we got to break this down and geek out about it. Thank you for being here, Erin. And thank you for listening and tuning in and come find us and ask questions and say things and tell us your aha moments and share your case studies for the love of everything. Share them.
Erin Ollila: Share them.