What Is SEO, and How Important Is It?
Many Web3 brands overlook a powerful marketing tool: Web3 SEO. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. It refers to enhancing a website or online content to improve its visibility and ranking on search engine results pages (SERPs). SEO is not a goal by itself but a tool that helps achieve brand goals.
At its core, SEO is a marketing strategy that companies adopt to generate highly qualified leads at a relatively low cost. Consumer data from Hubspot shows the importance of SEO, with 86% of searchers preferring search engines as their best source of information. SEO yields more returns than paid advertising, making it a crucial aspect of marketing.
Despite the results SEO generates, many Web3 brands overlook it mostly because it takes a relatively longer time to get results with SEO or because they do not know how to begin implementing it.
While working on this article, I noticed that several companies do not rank for keywords they should. Many of these Web3 brands try to boost their SERP position using sponsored ads, which is okay but not sustainable.
You need SEO’s sustainable results for your Web3 brand.
Web3 SEO: What Is It, Anyway?
Web3 SEO involves Web3 brands adopting efficient SEO strategies to achieve their marketing goals.
Don’t get confused.
You still use the same SEO techniques any Web2 brand would use. But, in Web3 SEO, you work with these technologies instead of isolating them since you target a Web3 audience. Also, you deal with:
- Web3-specific keywords.
- New ways of rewarding people, e.g., NFTs. (An article can rank high because a lot of people are visiting it because they are getting an exclusive NFT in return).
- Limited Web3 SEO data.
To execute Web3 SEO effectively, you must understand what it is all about. Knowing these basics helps you effectively communicate with your Web3 SEO team members—writers, website developers, tech SEOs, content marketers, etc. As you read on, you will learn the most effective ways to combine regular SEO tactics with Web3 SEO to improve your organic search results.
Basic SEO Terms:
This list is not exhaustive and is only a compilation of terms relevant to the strategies I will discuss in this article.
Keywords:
Keywords are simply the words or phrases your audience uses when looking for information via search engines. Using the right keywords helps your brand become more visible on search engines.
SERPs (Search Engine Results Page)
A SERP is the result page returned when a user probes a search engine. Ideally, your web page should be at the first, second, or third position on a SERP, as research shows that results further down a SERP have lower click-through rates. An article I wrote for Investopedia ranks top on the SERP for the target keyword. Here is what the SERP looks like.
Click-Through Rate (CTR):
CTR measures the number of people who clicked on your page link divided by the number of people who saw it on SERPs. A high CTR, from 2% onwards, means your page is driving high traffic from a SERP.
Rank:
A rank refers to a position on SERPs. Ranking is a vital SEO metric: the higher your pages rank on SERPs, the higher your visibility.
Backlinks (AKA inbound/incoming links)
These are links from other pages to a particular page. They can be internal (other pages on the same website) or external (pages from another website) backlinks. Backlinks from high-authority websites demonstrate niche authority and can boost SERP rankings.
Keyword Stuffing:
Keyword stuffing refers to forcing keywords into your content to manipulate search engine rankings. Search engines penalize websites for this, so use keywords naturally.
Meta Description:
A meta description is a tag that briefly explains a website page. On SERPs, it is often found immediately below the page title. Although Google claims meta descriptions do not influence page site rankings, a good meta description improves your CTR.
Check out this meta description (picked out by Google) about how to store NFTs.
Title Tag:
A title tag (page title) is the title of a web page as it appears on top of the browser window or in SERP. From the example above, the title tag is “How to Store NFTs.”
Keyword difficulty (KD):
Keyword difficulty measures how hard/easy it would be to rank for a particular keyword phrase, usually ranging from 0 to 100. If you are just starting a blog or trying to revive an existing one, it would be easier to rank for keywords with less difficulty, although you could still go for more difficult ones.
Why Is SEO Important in Web3 Marketing?
SEO is crucial to the success of every marketing strategy, although many Web3 brands overlook it and prioritize influencer marketing, airdrops, and referral programs. These marketing strategies seem more straightforward and practical but yield short-term results.
On the other hand, incorporating SEO into your marketing efforts to support your regular strategies generates long-term success. SEO generates traffic from users actively searching for your products or services rather than only those interested in the hype or rewards.
For instance, if a Web3 beginner searches for “Best NFT Polygon Wallet,” they are actively looking for a reliable wallet to keep their Polygon NFTs or plan to buy some soon. If any of your web pages – landing page, articles, etc. – rank high on Google for that specific keyword, the searcher will likely visit your website and download your wallet.
This example shows how SEO helps you gain new users without excessive investment. If you own or make marketing decisions for a Web3 brand and hope to stay on top, prioritize Web3 SEO and invest long-term. Here are other reasons why SEO is important for Web3 marketing:
Visibility A robust SEO strategy helps your Web3 project rank high on search engines, making it easier for prospects to find your platform when they search with relevant keywords. This increased visibility can lead to more inquiries, leads, and sales.
Trust:
High search engine rankings reflect credibility and trust, as search engines rarely rank pages with low-quality content. Trust is a major Google ranking factor based on the E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) framework. Why is SEO important for web3 brands that want to build trust?
People are extra cautious about Web3 because they have yet to understand it. Plus, scam rates are high, with crypto scams being the most popular—more than 46,000 people admitted to being scammed via crypto between 2021 and 2022. So, searchers need to know you are credible and legitimate before visiting your site or taking action.
Also, fishy websites don’t take the time to invest in SEO and are often ignored by search engines. When you establish yourself as an authority providing trustworthy information to prospects via search engines, searchers will trust you more.
Sustainability:
SEO is a long-term strategy that will increase your traffic, conversions, and revenue over time. By consistently publishing quality content on your website, you establish a strong foundation for sustainable growth. While it may take time to build up your authority on search engines, sustaining it is much easier.
User Experience:
SEO includes optimizing your website or dApp for a good user experience, which is crucial for visitor retention and engagement. A well-structured and user-friendly platform can increase visit durations, lower bounce rates, and boost user engagement. Google, for instance, rewards pages with better user experience.
8 Practical SEO Strategies You Can Begin With Right Away
Now that we have established why you need Web3 SEO and how it can help your company, it’s time to go into the sweet stuff – exploring the best Web3 SEO strategies. Take a seat!
How do you do Web3 SEO correctly? 🤔
By publishing a truckload of blog pieces?
Keyword stuffing?
Buying links?
No, these won’t get you far.
You need a clear strategy and a blueprint that includes a plan, an execution system, and expected results.
Although every organization’s strategies may vary, some tried-and-tested strategies can help you develop an integrated and future-proof Web3 SEO strategy.
Here are some Web3 SEO strategies to adopt:
- Get focus keywords.
- Build a list of relevant long-tail keywords.
- Curate a list of topics and build a topic cluster.
- Own your media, literally.
- Build quality backlinks within the Web3 network.
- Leverage social media and community engagement for SEO.
- Incorporate interactive and engaging elements to enhance user interaction.
- Track and analyze data using blockchain-based analytics tools.
1. Get Focus Keywords:
Focus keywords are words that directly describe your business, products, services, or webpage and that you want to rank high for on search engines.
These keywords are also called primary keywords, and each focus keyword is dedicated to a focus page on a site. The information on a page revolves around a focus keyword supported by semantically related secondary keywords. Every Web3 company has a unique value proposition, but many loosely fall into these categories: payment, infrastructure, media, gaming, DAOs, and Web3 security.
To adopt SEO effectively, you need to identify what major category your company fails in and the major keywords searchers use when searching for information related to your project. For example, if a webpage’s primary keyword is “how to trade crypto,” the secondary keywords could be “crypto trading,” “how to day trade crypto,” “ how to trade crypto,” etc.
Don’t worry. You don’t need to start permutations on your primary keywords to get your secondary keyword. A good Web3 SEO Strategist uses the right keyword research tools, like Semrush, to get the right primary and secondary keywords. Conduct keyword research, analyze the keywords, and select relevant focus keywords, considering search volume, relevance, and difficulty.
Example: For DeFi companies, the keyword ‘DeFi wallet’ and its related keywords are good to rank for. The keyword has a KD of 61%, an average monthly search volume of 2.9k in the US alone, and a cost-per-click value of $3.57. Talk about leaving a lot of money on the table.
2. Build a List of Relevant Long-Tail Keywords:
For companies in highly competitive industries, I always recommend going for the low-hanging fruits of keywords, the long-tail keywords, which are relatively easier to rank for. Building a list of interconnected long-tail keywords helps you be more precise and build a cluster of topics around a shorter generic keyword.
Long-tail keywords are ultra-specific and drive more qualified leads than short-tail or generic keywords. A short-tail keyword like “DeFi” can attract users with different intents, making it difficult to know which user wants what. But a longer keyword like ‘where to learn about DeFi’ is more specific and drives more qualified traffic.
Furthermore, long-tail keywords help you rank better on voice search queries. This can be beneficial because speech-to-text input is an essential part of the Metaverse. If you are going to develop a Metaverse or products that will be Metaverse-friendly, you would want more visibility with long-tail keywords.
Example: A long-tail keyword like “how to invest in DeFi” immediately tells us users searching for this keyword want to invest. If you’re marketing a DeFi product, this is a great target keyword for you.
3. Curate a List of Topics and Build a Topic Cluster:
Building topic clusters is an effective way to win with SEO in Web3. According to Semrush, topic clusters are groups of related web pages with keywords around one central subject, often used to establish authority around that particular subject. This strategy is most effective if you want to be known for particular keywords directly related to your product.
This Hubspot research shows that having a topic cluster leads to better rankings, as Google considers you an authority in that field.
For companies that adopt the long-tail keyword strategy, building a cluster of long-tail keywords becomes easy because you can simply interlink the keywords and have your cluster.
I often recommend to my clients that they build their cluster of long-tail keywords around an overarching generic keyword. That way, they target the generic keyword one long tail at a time. When executed successfully, this strategy can help you take over a highly sought-after keyword with a high keyword difficulty.
Like everything else in content marketing, a topic cluster is not something you jump into. You need to take time to research and know what people are searching for BEFORE crafting your topics. Getting topics to work with is easy once you have the right keywords.
Example: If you own a Metaverse brand, you could create a topic cluster around the keyword ‘Metaverse.’ Some topics that could make up your cluster include: ‘What is the Metaverse?’ ‘How to access the Metaverse,’ ‘How to invest in the Metaverse,’ and ‘How does the Metaverse work?’
Be sure to include other things like YouTube videos, ebooks, and white papers. Here’s a simple example of a topic cluster:
These web pages give your audience in-depth information about the different topics related to the central theme—the metaverse. You can use your metaverse as an example, solidifying your brand in the audience’s minds.
4. Prioritize Owned Media:
To gain search engine visibility, you need to publish your content either on owned media (website, blog, and community forums) or rented media (Medium, Mirror, social media, and YouTube channels). I see many Web3 brands post their content solely on Medium or Web3 publishing platforms like Mirror.
While these platforms might give your brand visibility, they should not be the primary focus of your branding and marketing. There are many advantages of owned media over rented media, but one of the most important is control. You control what content you put out. This is crucial in a highly controversial industry like crypto, where some types of crypto content and advertising can be flagged as inappropriate or misleading.
In 2020, YouTube allegedly took down various crypto videos. It has happened before and can still happen again. With owned media, you have less censorship to worry about and more time to focus on visibility. If you want to be in charge of your data and not be at the mercy of big tech corps, you should start paying more attention to owned media.
Consider starting a blog, which is the easiest owned media to have. Plus, a well-optimized blog can drive website traffic and leads and help your email signups shoot up.
If you already have a blog, ensure you adopt SEO and best blogging practices to drive the right results for your business. If not, start a blog, adopt the right strategies, and use analytics tools like Google Analytics to track your performance.
5. Build Quality Backlinks Within the Web3 Network:
SEO without backlinks is like driving a car with two wheels; you won’t go very far. As a Web3 brand, you want to get quality, relevant backlinks from other Web3 websites like HackerNoon and related Web2 brands like Investopedia. You have to be intentional about your backlinks.
There are many ways to earn genuine backlinks to your website. You can collaborate with Web3 brands with good domain authority to publish an article on their site with a link back to your website. You can publish PR articles on a PR website with links to your website. Another good example is to write a listicle and include your website or product as the first on the list, with a link back to your website.
6. Leverage Social Media:
Social media, which includes community engagement, is another effective strategy for boosting SEO for companies. Since Web3 is all about community, you should employ this strategy. What will social media do for your SEO? Firstly, it will bring in traffic.
Secondly, web pages shared on social media drive traffic that increases that page’s performance, which could improve the page and domain authority. A good way to generate traffic is to use airdrop campaigns on social media and community platforms to direct people to your website, where they can interact and take specific actions.
But for many, this approach is only effective during the pre-airdrop period. The traffic and engagement generated often reduce significantly after the campaign. How do you sustain the engagement after the hype fades? One fail-safe method I always recommend is continuing to publish super-relevant, optimized content during the airdrop campaign period.
Publishing relevant blog pieces and making blog engagement compulsory will cement your authority as a dependable resource for quality information related to your niche. Then, you’ll have people who keep coming around to acquire knowledge and share it with their friends.
Viola, you have a loyal audience!
7. Incorporate Interactive and Engaging Elements to Enhance User Interaction:
Incorporating interactive elements in your content gives your users a unique experience. These elements make you stand out from the competition, be memorable, and get a steady stream of traffic from those who enjoy its uniqueness. This is crucial for branding, so you must show sophistication with these elements.
For instance, Cointelegraph, a crypto news publishing company, makes its news pieces even more interactive by allowing readers to collect them as NFTs, such as this recent FTX article. Here’s another example. If you are more focused on cryptocurrencies, creating a calculator that allows users to estimate potential profits from different cryptocurrencies can be highly engaging.
With this feature, users can input variables like their initial investment and time horizon to see potential returns. This strategy can work for both B2Cs and B2Bs. A B2B can develop a tool that helps businesses evaluate their readiness for blockchain adoption. Potential clients can answer a series of questions, and the tool provides a personalized assessment with recommendations.
Elements like this indirectly boost your SEO efforts by increasing dwell time and increasing the number of return visitors. Longer dwell time signals to search engines that your page satisfies searchers’ queries, leading to better rankings and more visibility.
8. Track and Analyze Data With Web3 Community Tools:
Web2 community tools are great for tracking SEO and marketing metrics. In fact, many Web3 companies use Web2 social media platforms like Discord and Telegram to manage their communities. However, these apps are usually limited to the amount of on-chain data they can track, which is why you need community tools specially designed for Web3.
Some of these tools, such as Paragraph, Galxe, and Tape (formerly Lenstube), can give you real-time updates about user interactions. Take Galxe, for example. Many users log in with their preferred crypto wallet and complete various tasks from different projects. You can include a link to your page on your website and ask them to visit it in exchange for some points.
Site visits like that can increase the page’s dwell time and, subsequently, your SEO. Setting up an account with these Web3 tools could be free or paid, depending on the platform. Some require you to keep a deposit with them after signing up, e.g., Galxe, while some allow you to host and operate at no cost, like TaskOn.
Task On has a dedicated analytics tab where you can see live stats on your campaign’s performance. It also has a distribution management system that works both off- and on-chain, as seen below.
Case Study: Successful Web3 SEO Campaign – Binance
Binance has leveraged SEO and content marketing to become one of the most valuable Web3 companies.
The company is a centralized cryptocurrency exchange founded in 2017 with a net worth is $4.5 billion. By adopting and executing some of these SEO strategies, this relatively new exchange was able to amass about 56 million visits every month and served 128 million users in 2022.
Here is a brief Semrush analysis of their domain.
You want to be like Binance. Aim to rank for both your branded keywords and non-branded keywords related to your company, products, and service.
An SEO approach Binance adopted to rake in those users is publishing educational content. Binance has an academy that provides resources grouped into beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels, which helps people with different crypto experiences know exactly what they need.
The billion-dollar exchange also leverages off-page SEO activities to boost its SEO, SERP authority, traffic, and conversions. The company holds hundreds of meetups worldwide and uses a plethora of ambassadors to boost its brand awareness and website conversions. This approach also helps them generate lots of backlinks from various crypto-related platforms.
Furthermore, Binance regularly launches promotional campaigns by incentivizing users with crypto rewards. Who doesn’t like free money?
For example, in June 2024, the crypto exchange launched a Learn and Earn Campaign for the cryptocurrency, DODO.
In the campaign, Binance made sure it had some key elements like:
- A reward (5 DODO per participant)
- A task related to their ‘Learn’ section
- A limited-time offer (2 weeks)
They also made sure it was available to only KYC-verified users and that the rewards remained on their exchange (DODO remains locked for 150 days). You can use Binance’s campaign to create a blueprint for your SEO campaigns by ensuring you include key elements and visualizing the bigger picture about how a particular campaign would fit your goals as a company. Remember to tailor it to suit your unique marketing goals.
Wrapping This Web3 SEO Guide Up!
Adopting the right Web3 SEO strategies is crucial to remaining relevant, increasing lead generation and conversion, and boosting market share and brand awareness. The future of Web3 is bright, but you need to position your brand to compete favorably.
Web3 SEO might not be a major topic among marketers today, but with Web3’s growth, things are about to change. The more people get into crypto, the more search volumes will increase, and you want your brand to be better positioned to meet searchers’ intent and be rewarded by search engines.
SEO in Web3 is no longer optional. It’s a must for future-oriented and customer-centric Web3 brands. You either adopt the right Web3 SEO strategies and boost your results or be buried in rarely-visited search pages forever.
FAQs:
How long does it take to start seeing results from Web3 SEO?
Your Web3 SEO should start yielding results three to six months from the start of the SEO campaign, depending on several factors. For example, if you are running an airdrop campaign in addition to a well-structured SEO strategy, you might see faster results.
Will SEO still matter with people using AI to search for things like Web3-related items?
Yes, SEO will still play a big part in the search, even with the uprising of AI.
Do you need a Web3 marketer or SEO or both?
Ideally, you would need both. But, getting a Web3 marketer who has a good knowledge of SEO would be a good starting point for your company.