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Improvement of the customer relationship, contacts with service providers, budget management, team contribution, recourse to bank loans ... Companies are trying by all means to bypass the health crisis in order to continue their activities with the minimum possible deficit for a good return.

SEO, a considerable lever, even if it is not at the top of the list of priorities, it should not be neglected to resurface more quickly and to demonstrate robustness. The effectiveness of a website and its performance depend on the engagement of its audience.

In this section:

Investing in your SEO strategy: is it important during COVID-19?

All companies have opted for the digitalization of their business processes in order to ensure a good level of service. A general decline in traffic and conversions has been recorded since the onset of the coronavirus, in various sectors of activity.

Google queries relating to online shopping such as “online shopping” saw a remarkable peak during the first wave of the coronavirus in France. (March - April 2020)

The Conductor agency has set up a survey to judge the weight of natural referencing for companies. As it turns out, 63% said SEO is crucial in this time of crisis, 34% said reach is light, and 29% said it has strong reach. Only 5% said SEO was decreasing in importance.

Moreover, in 2019, the most effective acquisition channel for 66% of respondents is SEO, followed by SEA paid referencing and emailing campaigns, both at 50%. This is proof that at this critical time, we must redouble our SEO efforts and invest more.

What is the impact of COVID-19 on website traffic?

There are tools that will allow you to have visibility into traffic fluctuations. Google Search Console will show you your positioning in Google's SERPs as well as the decrease or increase in your website traffic. This will enlighten you on the interest and degree of relevance granted by your audience to your content. You can also detect the importance of some pages relative to others with visit rate statistics. The Search Console and Google Analytics will inform you of the avenues to study by degree of priority.

Benchmarking with position tracking tools will make it easier for you to study SEO competition. Are your competitors also affected by the crisis? How big is this impact? However, this study keeps its consistency only if you focus on optimizing your website for search engines!

According to a study by the consulting firm Allié Conseil, the sectors that have shown growth in traffic are: finance with + 28 %, feeding with + 22 %, health with + 16 %, the media with + 33 % and pharmacies with + 6 %. The business area most affected by COVID-19 is travel with a huge drop in -45%.

Analyze the needs of your target

The Google search tool remains a good method to measure the keywords most searched by its target. SEO consultants need to closely monitor the demand and preferences of their target audience. This is important information that should be shared by the entire marketing team. Think about your long term strategy by adjusting your online platform for the short term.

What steps to follow for SEO?

In view of the current situation, there are actions to be taken to better manage it:

Perform an audit of your website to analyze its technical functioning
Focus on converting traffic
Regularly update commercial and editorial content
Preparing for the post-coronavirus
Rethink your communication strategy by adapting your speech to the current situation
Adjust your SEA strategy

Opt for local SEO

Consumers are increasingly inclined to find alternatives to ensure their usual consumption during containment. They are necessarily restricted to a small radius which covers businesses and businesses that are geographically close. Hence the usefulness of turning to local SEO.

There have recently been major interactions with Google My Business listings: phone call, address search, website visits, consultation of schedules and services offered, etc. In fact, local businesses have seen their traffic improve and the number of calls has exploded in a period when travel is limited. So remember to update your Google My Business listing.

The drive-to-store in figures during confinement (study made by the SEO tool editor Local Partoo):