Getting SEO Testing Right in 2024: Everything You Need to Know!

Such is the rate of proliferation of new businesses in today’s day and age that you can’t bank on the merits of your wares alone to fetch you the spotlight you desire. In order to break into the radar of your target audience, you must double down on your reach and visibility- this is where SEO comes into the picture. 

However, implementing SEO alone isn’t sufficient; for it to achieve the results you desire you must set up a robust and meticulous testing mechanism, too. The more regular you are with SEO testing, the richer the dividends you’ll reap. Wondering what steps can one take to fine-tune their SEO testing efforts? That’s exactly what we talk about in today’s article! Read on and find out.

Types of SEO Testing

Before we delve into the various tips and tricks of SEO testing, let us first familiarize ourselves with the various categories of this practice.

• A/B testing: In SEO A/B testing, you pit two variants against one another- in one, called the variant group, changes are effected, and the other, called the control group, remains unchanged. This strategy helps you understand if the modifications you plan on deploying will be beneficial or not, ultimately enabling you to identify the better-performing variant of your page. 
• Multivariate testing: As the name suggests, multivariate testing is the practice of evaluating multiple variables at once (contrary to A/B testing where you can only test one element at a time; on the flip side, multivariate testing tends to be rather complex). Essentially, then, this tactic allows you to test out different combinations, helping you arrive at the most fruitful one in a highly informed manner. 
• Before-and-after testing: Here, you get to compare critical performance metrics before and after administering changes to them. One of the most grave concerns of this method is that test conditions are not controlled. Moreover, external factors like search engine algorithm updates and seasonality can have a bearing on variants and control groups. 
• Serial testing: In this approach, you implement all the changes to your website’s pages at one go and then observe the effect. The results, however, might not be consistent- there might be an improvement on some pages and a deterioration on some others. And there might still be somewhere you won’t be able to measure any impact whatsoever. Similar to the before-and-after testing method, here, too, the results stand to get influenced by external factors.

Anatomy of a Successful Test

What are the various processes involved in running a constructive test? Let’s take a look.

• Develop a hypothesis. Implementing a “XYZ” change to your website? How do you think that will impact your SEO? How will your users take to it? Form such predictions before you commence testing, and more importantly, make sure their basis lies in solid data. Any testing process that is informed by a thorough hypothesis is assured to fetch superlative results.
• Choose the test you want to conduct. In the previous section, we enumerated all the various kinds of SEO tests. Goes without saying, a single type won’t be able to meet all your use cases. So, you need to pick one that is best-suited to your particular context.
• Be judicious with the pages you select for testing. It is always a good idea to opt for pages that experience higher traffic; the large volume of data they generate improves your likelihood of obtaining actionable and reliable results. Additionally, always prioritize the testing of those pages that are directly relevant to your most urgent SEO goals.
• Clearly define your test variables. By doing so, you’ll be eliminating any ambiguity at the time of reading the results. For instance, if your test variable is an image, you’ll tweak its file name or alt text. Now, when the results come up, you have a clear idea of which element is holding a sway over it.
• Prepare different versions of the element you want to test. If there’s contrast (so long the variations aren’t a hindrance to your SEO or user experience) among your variants, your likelihood of recording penetrating insights shoots up. 
• Lastly, while setting up the test, make sure you are using the right tools. From handling variables to organizing data, there are tools available for all these critical functions. All that remains is for you to identify the most efficient ones and leverage them deftly.

Elements You Should Test

Your ranking in search results is determined by a plethora of factors, meaning there are quite a few things you can test your page for to determine whether your SEO is up to the mark or not. We highlight some of them in this section.

• Page Speed: As many as 83% of users expect their pages to load in three seconds or less. Doesn’t really sound surprising, does it? With internet infrastructure getting only better with time, our tolerance for slow-loading pages has gotten lower and lower. And so, taking stock of just how vital page speed is for user experience, Google’s algorithms take it very seriously while assigning ranking. Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool is a great way for you to test your page’s speed. The best part about this tool is that its functionality isn’t confined to simple assessment; it also offers you recommendations you can utilize to bring about improvements. 
• Content: Your page’s content plays an instrumental role in determining your SEO. Merely identifying and implementing keywords relevant to your domain and target audience isn’t enough; that’s important, of course, but your content will only succeed if it’s high on quality, research, and value. Plus, you need to make certain that your keywords are introduced organically within your text and not stuffed, rendering your content incoherent and unhelpful. Equally important is keyword placement; generally it is advisable to have your most important keywords feature within the first paragraph of your text.
• Images: Besides increasing the appeal of your page, images can contribute to the cause of your SEO, too, if optimized right. To begin with, pay attention to their filenames; they should be brief while giving an accurate description of the image. If the filename has multiple words, separate them using hyphens. Keywords that are relevant to the contents of the image may also be used in the filename. Other measures include optimizing your alt tags and compressing images.
• URL: Curating a SEO-friendly URL is imperative for both users as well as search engines rely on it to understand the nature of a page. So, what makes a URL SEO-agnostic? It should contain a concise description of your page’s contents, should feature your core keyword, and must be of the right length.
• Mobile-friendliness: With the number of mobile users increasing with every passing day, Google now places a heavy emphasis on sites that are mobile-friendly. Thus, adhering to responsivity best practices while creating your page has become absolutely necessary at present. 

Wrapping It Up

Being disciplined about SEO testing is crucial towards ensuring that your plan of action delivers the results you desire it to. We hope the insights shared above will help you go about SEO testing in a methodical manner. To Know more about Technical SEO you might like to explore our “How Pro Is Mavlers At Conducting Technical SEO?“