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Feb 20, 2023
Creating SEO Silos That Educate and Nurture Users
You’ve just launched an excellent website for your B2B company.
It's got beautiful, relevant content and all the other things that make a great website. You even included ! But instead of leads pouring in like you expected—nothing (insert cricket chirping here).
You're not alone in this confusing disconnect. Many business owners approach websites like :
"If you build it. They will come."
If only it were that easy.
Unfortunately, even the best-designed websites contain unrelated information, so search engines need help to rank them for specific keywords.
SEO Silos solve this problem.
This article will show you how to create organic search silos that educate and nurture your site visitors.
What are SEO silos?
The term ‘silo’ originates in the world of website design, where it is used to identify a section on a page that contains one distinct subject and has a unique URL that differentiates itself from the rest of your site.
The basic idea is to create distinct, topically-focused sections or "silos" of your website that are organized around a central theme or topic. This allows you to target specific keywords or phrases and create a more streamlined user experience for visitors.
For example, if you have a website about fitness, you might create separate silos for different aspects of fitness such as strength training, cardio, and nutrition. Each silo would include a cluster of related content, such as articles, videos, and product reviews, which all support the overall theme of that silo.
The main purpose of silos is to rank specific pages for specific keywords and improve user experience.
The benefits of creating SEO silos
SEO silos are a website structure strategy used in search engine optimization (SEO) that organizes content into different groups or themes, with the goal of improving the relevance and authority of a website for specific topics or keywords. Let’s take a look at some other benefits of siloing.
Improved user experience (UX):
By using SEO silos, you can create dedicated sections or pages on your site that are optimized for specific keywords or phrases related to that information or problem. This makes it more likely that visitors will find what they are looking for immediately, without having to wade through pages of irrelevant content.
By providing a more focused and streamlined user experience, visitors are more likely to stay on your site and browse other related content within the same silo. This can also improve your website's bounce rate, which is an important metric in determining the overall quality and relevance of your website.
Heightened brand trust and authority:
SEO silos require that you create high-quality, in-depth content that is relevant to a specific theme or topic. This can increase the value of your content for visitors and position your website as an authoritative resource.
By organizing content into silos, you can demonstrate your expertise and authority in a particular field or industry. This can increase the trust and credibility of your website and brand.
Clarified calls-to-action:
By providing a clear and focused user experience, you can guide visitors towards specific calls-to-action (CTAs). Events such as signing up for a newsletter, making a purchase, or filling out a contact form are able to be easily pushed front and center. This can increase the chances of conversion by removing distractions and focusing visitors on the desired outcome.
Enhanced conversion rates:
Silos make it easier for people to find the information they need immediately without having to scroll through all those extra pages on your site. By organizing content into different groups or themes, SEO silos enable visitors to navigate your website more intuitively, without having to scroll through irrelevant or extraneous pages.
SEO silos allow you to target specific keywords or phrases for each silo, which can improve the relevancy of your website in search engine results pages (SERPs). By attracting more targeted traffic to your website, you increase the chances of conversion.
Increased search engine rankings:
By creating a clear and logical structure for your content, you help search engines understand the relationships between your pages and improve the relevance and authority of your website for specific topics. This can result in higher rankings and increased traffic from search engines.
Share of voice growth:
By organizing your content into SEO silos, you make it easier for search engines to crawl and index your website’s information. The higher the number of rankings website pages have—and therefore their visibility in search results—the more likely you are to reach your target audience and increase sales.
Creating a successful SEO silo structure
Creating a successful SEO silo structure requires the silo structure to be easy to navigate and understand, both for visitors and search engines. This means using clear, descriptive headings and subheadings, and ensuring that each silo and page is linked logically and coherently to other related pages. Let’s break down this into steps.
Step 1: Decide on the main topic categories for each silo
The first step is to identify the main topics or themes that are relevant to your website or business. These might include product categories, services, industry topics, or other areas of interest to your audience.
Once you have identified your topics, group them into silos or categories. Each silo should contain related topics that are closely connected in terms of theme, purpose, or content.
Step 2: Group topics into a clear hierarchy
Group your topics into silos and develop a hierarchy for each silo. This involves organizing the content within each silo in a logical and coherent way so that visitors can easily navigate between highly related topics. Create clear and descriptive labels for each silo and topic, so visitors can quickly understand the content and purpose of each section of your website.
For example, suppose you are an architecture firm wanting to target other architecture, electrical, and construction businesses () with relevant content. In this case, your silo list might look something like this:
How do you make your site more search engine friendly while also siloing content for SEO?
Step 3: Clarify experiences with consistent layouts and clean navigation
Using a consistent layout and design for in silos allows visitors to quickly and easily recognize the different sections of your website. This involves using a consistent color scheme, , or layout for each silo.
Include clear and prominent navigation links within each silo so visitors can easily navigate between related topics. Using drop-down menus, sidebars, or other navigation tools help visitors find the content they are looking for quickly and easily.
Testing and refining your navigation structure starts with analytics and user feedback to identify any areas of confusion or difficulty for visitors. This will enable you to iterate and optimize your navigation and improve the overall user experience on your website.
Using the architecture firm example above, siloed URLs may look like this:
Step 4: Use internal links to drive traffic and engagement to your silos
It is important to build a strong internal linking structure to improve the .
You should use various keywords and phrases relevant to your brand, products, and services when creating a website. This will help increase the visibility of your page on search engines like Google. It will also help you improve your site's ranking in ).
To build a solid internal linking structure for your site, you should ensure that each page links back to other parts. Internal links help you connect all your pages, making it easier for users to navigate them when they visit your site. The less clicks the user path has, the more performant the silo is likely to become. Both users and search engines like it when there isn’t a huge number of engagements that need to happen to access valuable information and content.
Step 5: Silos require consistent updates to remain effective
Don’t rely on a one-time effort to populate your website with content. Continually add new material to each silo so that people keep coming back for more.
The process of building effective silos for SEO continues after you reorganize the existing pages on your site. These groups are starting points.
Your goal should be to provide comprehensive coverage of your silo topics. Examine the pages in each group and look for any information gaps, then use these as ideas for new pages.
You can do keyword research to identify additional opportunities for each of your silos. This should be an ongoing process and a significant part of your content marketing strategy.
As you continue adding new content and links to each of your silos, you show search engines that you’re an authority on your chosen topics.
Need to refresh your website, or just start from scratch? Check out these resources curated by our team of experts before you start:
Conclusion
Search engine optimization (SEO), including SEO silos, can be a daunting and complicated task, especially for busy B2B business owners who don't have the time to teach themselves SEO, web design, and development.
At , we ensure you have a team of experts who can help you navigate these marketing complexities. We have the expertise to integrate SEO, content, web design, and development seamlessly, enabling you to achieve higher page rankings and increased conversions for your business. We are a full-service .
Save time, money, and stress! Let Watermark help you with your SEO silos, UX and web design, and overall .
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