Stop Guessing, Start Testing - An SEO Experimentation Workshop (SEO Latvia Workshop #4)

SEO Latvia Workshop #4 Ryan Jones | SEOTesting | @RyanJonesSEO
SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Who Am I? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Marketing Manager @ SEOTesting 10+ Years in SEO & Digital Marketing International Conference Speaker Lover of All Things Sports 🏈 Obsessed with US Sitcoms (Expect References 😉)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Who Are SEOTesting? SEO Testing & Experimentation Platform Built for In-House SEOs & Agencies Three Types of Tests Available: - Time-Based Tests - SEO Split Tests - LLM Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop I work for an SEO testing tool. I’ve run hundreds of SEO tests on different sites. I work closely with SEOs to understand what works. I regularly speak and write about SEO testing topics.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop What You’ll Leave With - A clear deﬁnition of SEO testing. - Information about the types of SEO tests you can run. - A full & complete framework for running SEO tests. - Conﬁdence to go away and prove your impact as an SEO.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop This Workshop: - Section 1: Introduction to SEO Testing - Break - Section 2: How to Run SEO Tests - Section 3: Interactive Task for You

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Part 1: Intro to SEO Testing

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop During This Section: - I’ll talk about the problems you’re currently facing. - I’ll talk about how to solve those problems. - I’ll talk about what SEO testing is. - And I’ll talk about what types of SEO tests are available.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop You Lack Time

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop The SEO Hamster Wheel - We make dozens of changes weekly, hoping something works. - When trafﬁc moves, we sometimes can’t explain why. - So… We keep tweaking, guessing, and repeating the cycle.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop The SEO Hamster Wheel That’s the hamster wheel! 😉 - More work → more uncertainty → more work again!

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop “All of that, while we could be testing, ﬁnding what works, doubling down on that, and saving a whole bunch of time!” - Ryan Jones, February 2026.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Show of Hands Who here thinks that they currently experience, or at least have experienced in the past, the SEO Hamster Wheel getting in the way of their work?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Finding What Works

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop The SEO Guesswork Tax - We make changes, metrics improve, but we don’t know why. - Every unmeasured change is a small “guesswork payment.” - These payments compound over time into wasted time and lost focus.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop The SEO Guesswork Tax That’s the SEO Guesswork Tax! 😉 - We can’t double down on what works if we don’t know what did!

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop “When you make changes without testing the impact, you lack the ability to understand what’s actually working for your site.” - Ryan Jones, February 2026.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Show of Hands Who in the audience thinks that they’re “paying” the SEO Guesswork Tax in some way, shape, or form? Maybe you make changes for clients without ﬁrst testing the impact because it’s “best practice” or something like that?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Not Feeling Valued

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop The SEO “Prove-It” Gap - We do the work, but we struggle to show the results. - Wins feel almost anecdotal, not analytical. - Stakeholders ask “What caused this?” And we can’t always answer! - Without proof, SEO looks like guesswork instead of a strategy.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Show of Hands Who here in the room thinks they’ve fallen prey to the SEO Prove-It Gap at some point during the course of their careers? For example, being in a client report meeting and being able to conﬁdently say that results have gone up, but you might not have an answer for why they went up.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Stakeholders Don’t Trust SEO 1⃣ “It Feels Slow” - SEO takes months, but paid ads show results tomorrow. - Progress isn’t always linear. - Early wins are hard to see in dashboards. - Stakeholders operate on quarterly targets, SEO often works on longer arcs.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Stakeholders Don’t Trust SEO 2⃣ They Can’t See Clear Cause & Effect - Trafﬁc goes up… but was it seasonality? - Rankings drop… but was it a Google update? - Multiple changes happen at once. - No isolation of variables.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Stakeholders Don’t Trust SEO 3⃣ Reporting Is Often Vanity-Led - “Impressions increased!” - “Average position improved!” - “We’re ranking for more keywords!” But stakeholders are thinking: - “Did revenue increase?” - “Did pipeline grow?” - “Did we hit targets?”

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Stakeholders Don’t Trust SEO 4⃣ It Feels Like “Best Practice” Guessing - “We updated meta titles because it’s best practice.” - “We added internal links because Google likes it.” - “We refreshed content because it was old.” Without testing: - There’s no proof that this site needed that change. - It feels templated, not strategic.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Stakeholders Don’t Trust SEO 5⃣ Google Is a Black Box - Algorithm updates - AI Overviews - Ranking volatility - No transparency into how rankings are calculated From a CFO’s perspective: - “So… we’re investing in something controlled by an external company that can change overnight?”

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Stakeholders Don’t Trust SEO 6⃣ SEO Has a Reputation Problem - Past agencies have over promised and/or under delivered - “#1 in Google in 30 days” scars still exist - It’s hard to understand all that technical jargon. Even if you’re amazing, it can be hard to ﬁght all that distrust created by years of poor SEO work.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Stakeholders Don’t Trust SEO 7⃣ Too Many Moving Parts SEO touches content, dev, UX, CRO, brand, and PR. When results improve, nobody knows what actually caused it. But when results drop, SEOs get blamed!

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Stakeholders Don’t Trust SEO 8⃣ It’s Hard to Tie Directly to Revenue - Assisted conversions muddy attribution - Organic search often supports branded search - SEO inﬂuences lots of other channels. Stakeholders want to know if they invest €10,000, what do they get back. Your answer cannot be “it depends.”

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop “When you can’t prove your impact, it’s so difficult for stakeholders to trust you enough to give you budget for other work. Leaving you feeling undervalued!” - Ryan Jones, February 2026.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Okay, cool, now I have your attention! 😉 So what’s the thing that solves these problems?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Time-Based Testing (Old)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Checking a rank tracker (such as Ahrefs or Semrush) shows that this page has lost prime position for a crucial keyword: Keyword: Performance Polo Shirts Search Volume: 1,450 Previous Position: 2nd Organic Result New Position: 8th Organic Result Lost Rankings

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop 1) Improve Page Speed 2) Re-Work Wording on the Product Listing Page 3) Improve Internal Linking 4) Remove Intrusive Interstitials Potential Actions

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Following some improvements to the page, we can check our rank tracker and see that the performance of this page for our keyword has improved again. Keyword: Performance Polo Shirts Search Volume: 1,450 Previous Position: 8th Organic Result New Position: 3rd Organic Result Ranking Recovery

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop We now have more/better data (and tools) to do SEO tests the right way.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop MatchWornShirts

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop 1) Added Top-of-the-Fold Text 2) Changed Meta Title (Keyword | Brand | Emotional Language) 3) Improved Filter/Sorting 4) Optimized for On-Page Metrics Work Done (Test)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Clicks Per Day - 524.14% Increase Site Clicks Decreased Impressions Up 42% CTR Up To 1.32% The Results

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop The Results

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Why SEO Testing?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Building a Business Case - Prove what works for your niche/site. - Avoid making costly mistakes. - Prove hypotheses and get larger project buy-in. - Show the impact of your SEO team. - Add team accountability by tracking the results of changes. - Use past tests to build a backlog of what’s happened on the site.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Breaking the Hamster Wheel The SEO Hamster Wheel is motion (work) without learning. - SEO testing gives every change a clear purpose and outcome - You run smart, controlled experiments. Not endless tweaks - You ﬁnd what works, and you double down on that

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Stop Paying the Guesswork Tax The SEO Guesswork Tax is paid every time we act without evidence. - Testing gives us measurable cause and effect, no guessing required - Every test acts as a data point that leads to learning, not confusion - You can replace “it depends” with “I can show.”

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Closing the Prove-It Gap The “Prove-It” Gap is the space between effort and evidence. - Testing bridges that gap with data that we can show off - We can demonstrate the exact impact of the work we do - Testing builds trust with clients, managers, and executives

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Types of SEO Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Three Main Test Types 1) Time-Based SEO Tests 2) SEO Split Tests 3) LLM Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Time-Based SEO Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Time-Based SEO Tests A time-based SEO test is the process of measuring the organic SEO results based on a change you make to a page. This allows you to compare the data before the change was made, to after the change.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Time-Based SEO Tests Before After TIME

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Time-Based SEO Tests We can see data for the “Before” period as well as the “After” period, and a graph that clearly shows clicks rising following the change being made.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Time-Based SEO Tests Time-based SEO tests are great for: - Content refreshes. - Internal linking work. - Video embeds. - One-off schema implementation. Essentially, any one-off changes you might make to a single page or a group of select pages.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop SEO Split Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop SEO Split Tests An SEO split test works in a slightly different way to time-based SEO tests. For a split test, we’re measuring the performance of a group of pages that did not have a change made to them (your control group) to a group of pages that did have a change made to them (your test group).

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop SEO Split Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop SEO Split Tests Results are measured in a slightly different way for SEO split tests. This time, we measure the daily average click difference between our groups, and plot this on our graph.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop SEO Split Tests SEO Split Tests are great for: - Changes to ecommerce PLPs. - Changes to ecommerce PDPs. - Website changes made in bulk.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Example: New Page Design

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Example: Simplifying Page Title

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Example: Adding Action Words

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Example: More Data on PDPs

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Important Note: Not all of the SEO tests that you set up and run are going to be successful tests. Sometimes, tests fail. Here are some examples of that!

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Example: New Page Design

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop LLM Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop LLM Tests An LLM Test works in the same way as a time-based test (measuring metrics for a “before” period and an “after” period). The only difference is, this time, we’re not measuring “SEO” metrics like organic clicks. We’re measuring sessions coming from LLMs like ChatGPT and Gemini.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop LLM Tests Before After TIME

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop LLM Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop LLM Tests We, like all of you, are still learning as we go when it comes to getting cited in LLMs and reporting on this to stakeholders. And we’re aware that referral data from LLMs is… Spotty. At best. But this process takes the same SEO testing principles that have worked for years and applies it to LLMs.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Section 1 Recap

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop What We’ve Covered: - The three main problems facing you as SEOs. - How SEO testing solves these problems that you’re facing. - What SEO testing actually is. - What types of SEO tests are available to use.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Any Questions?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Break: Approx. 30 Minutes

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Section 2: How to Run SEO Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop During This Section: - We’ll run through how to run time-based SEO tests. - We’ll run through how to run SEO split tests. - We’ll run through how to run LLM tests using GA4 data. - I’ll show you an easier way to run SEO tests using SEOTesting. - We’ll run through an interactive task to end the workshop :)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop A General Framework

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Steps For Running SEO Tests 1) Form Your Hypothesis 2) Select Your Test Page/s (Or Control & Variant Pages) 3) Export Your Page/s Data (Before Period) 4) Make Your Page/s Changes 5) Wait & Export Your Page/s Data (After Period) 6) Analyze Results 7) Next Steps (Rollout, Rollback, or Iterate)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Forming a Hypothesis Your hypothesis should be statement-based, including something you’re not happy with, something you can change, and something that you can measure to determine whether you were correct or not.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Bad Hypothesis Example Bad Hypothesis: What will happen if we remove the product carousel from our polo shirt PDP? Will organic trafﬁc / conversions increase or decrease?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Good Hypothesis Example Good Hypothesis: Our category page for “running shoes” has a below average CTR of 2.1% in the SERPs. By adding structured FAQ schema markup answering common questions, we can improve our CTR to 3.5% or above within six weeks.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Why This Hypothesis Works Something You’re Unhappy With: Current CTR (2.1%) Something to Change: Adding FAQ Schema Markup Something to Measure: The Page’s Post-Change CTR

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Selecting Pages (Time-Based) Ask Performance-Based Questions: 1) Which pages get the most impressions but low clicks? 2) Which pages have high exit rates? 3) Which pages have dropped in trafﬁc recently? 4) Which pages have stagnated within the rankings? 5) Which pages rank on Page 2 or 3 for target keywords?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Selecting Pages (Time-Based) Ask Optimization Opportunity Questions: 1) Do any pages lack internal links pointing to them? 2) Do some pages contain outdated or thin content? 3) Are some pages missing structured data? 4) Are any title tags too long, or missing important keywords? 5) Do similar pages perform very differently?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Selecting Pages (Time-Based) Ask Testing Value Questions: 1) Can I isolate this page from others for a test? 2) Will changes on this page impact site performance? 3) Is this page part of a large group I can test across? 4) Can I measure the test result easily? 5) Is this page important for conversions/leads?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Selecting Pages (Split Tests) Rules for Selecting Pages for SEO Testing: - Match Page Templates (PDPs, PLPs) - Select High-Trafﬁc Pages If Possible - Remove Outliers (Performance Outliers) - Match Seasonality (Football Boots and Winter Jumpers)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Exporting Before Data

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Exporting Before Data Steps: 1) Head to Google Search Console 2) Filter-Down to your Test Pages 3) Set the Time Filter to Before Period 4) Export the Data (CSV, Excel, Google Sheets)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Exporting Before Data Caveats: - Do this for every single page you are changing. - Combine this data into one single spreadsheet. - You can use this data to create stakeholder visuals.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Make Page Changes Step 1) Make the change to the test page/s. Step 2) Note the start date of the test internally. Step 3) Inform ANYONE that could impact your test data.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Make Page Changes Who Could Impact Data? - Digital PR teams, running campaigns that could impact. - Development teams working on their own page changes. - UX teams running A/B tests for on-page performance.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Exporting After Data

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Exporting After Data The Same Steps As Before: 1) Head to Google Search Console 2) Filter-Down to your Test Pages 3) Set the Time Filter to Before Period 4) Export the Data (CSV, Excel, Google Sheets)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Exporting After Data Caveats (Again): - Do this for every single page you are changing. - Combine this data into one single spreadsheet. - You can use this data to create stakeholder visuals.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Analyzing Results Metrics to Monitor (SEO): - Clicks - Impressions - Click-Through Rate - Average Position

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Analyzing Results Metrics to Monitor (Business): - Purchases - Free Trial Clicks - Form Fills - Revenue

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Analyzing Results “An SEO test can technically be successful and increase trafﬁc, but if it tanks conversion-based metrics, then was it really a successful test?” - Ryan Jones, February 2026.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Next Steps Caveats (Again): - ✅ Test Worked → Roll-Out Sitewide - ❌ Test Failed → Iterate Further - ❌ Test Failed → Revert & Learn - 🤔 Unclear → Try a New Variation

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Running Time-Based SEO Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Our Example We have this page on the SEOTesting website. Clicks have been doing well, but we have a few ideas on how we could get more clicks from organic search.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “Before” Data We will start by heading to Google Search Console, and then selecting “Search results” from the “Performance” section on the left-hand side.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “Before” Data We then need to ﬁlter out our GSC data so we’re only seeing the data for the page we’re testing on. We can do this using the “Exact URL” Page Filter.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “Before” Data Next, we need to select the date range for our control group. For this example, we’ve chosen the four full weeks starting on the 6th October 2025.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “Before” Data The next step is to export all of this page performance data for the “before” period so we can get this into a spreadsheet.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “Before” Data Now, we have all of our raw data for clicks, impressions, click-through rates, and average position for our test page for each day of the “before” period.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Changing the Page Now we can go ahead and change our page. In this instance, we’re changing the H1 to “Free Sitemap Validator” and also changing the meta title and description to match this keyword.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Changing the Page Don’t forget to request re-indexing with Google once the page change has been made! :)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “After” Data We now need to repeat the process of gathering our SEO data for the page. This time, we’re getting the data for the “after” period.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “After” Data Follow the same steps as before, navigate to the page in question via the Exact URL ﬁlter in Google Search Console.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “After” Data And then select the date range for the “After” period. Since the change was made on the 3rd November 2025, this is where we’ll start. And we’ll match the time frame, so we need the next four weeks.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “After” Data Again, follow the same step as before, and export the data into whatever software you’re more familiar with.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “After” Data And now we have all of the raw, per day data for the “After” period as well as the “Before” period.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Analyzing the Data Now, we can bring these spreadsheets into one single sheet, and then compare the data so we can see whether this was a winning test or not.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Analyzing the Data

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Caveats - This process was just for one page. - You’d need to do this for every single page you are testing. - And then you’d need to get all of that data together. - This can take a lot of time.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Caveats (Part II) You are also at the mercy of Google Search Console data limitations. The sixteen month limit being the main one. You can only run tests where you have the data available, and unless you’ve stored your past data somewhere else, you can’t run SEO tests on things you’ve done more than sixteen months ago.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Running SEO Split Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “Before” Data Follow the same steps we used to get the data for our “Before” period during our Time-Based Test example. Head to the Search results section of the Performance analysis in Google Search Console

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “Before” Data From here, ﬁlter your data again for your Control & Test pages for your “Before” period.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “Before” Data You must do this for every single page that you have in your Control and Test group. So, if there are 25 pages in your Control Group and 25 pages in your Test Group, you will need to do this 50 times.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “After” Data Next, follow the same steps, this time for all of the “After” data. This is the time period after you have made the changes to the pages in your Test group.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “After” Data Again… You must do this for every single page that you have in your Control and Test group. So, if there are 25 pages in your Control Group and 25 pages in your Test Group, you will need to do this 50 times.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Combining Our Data The next step is to create a Google Sheet that houses all of your Before and After data for your Control and Test Groups.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Combining Our Data Next, select the Day, Difference (Before), and Difference (After) columns.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Combining Our Data Click “Insert” and then click “Chart” ready to create your data visualization.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Combining Our Data This gives us a nice data visualization, where we can see the Difference between the control and test clicks for the before period and the test period.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Analyzing the Data

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Running LLM SEO/GEO Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop As mentioned earlier: We can use the same methodology that we do for our time-based SEO tests to run LLM tests. The only thing that’s different here is we are not measuring clicks. We are measuring sessions coming from LLMs. Intro

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop GA4 Exploration Setup Before we can do any actual testing, we need to set up a GA4 exploration that allows us to see the LLM referral trafﬁc for our test page/s.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop GA4 Exploration Setup Head over to the “Explorations” section within GA4 and select “Blank” to create a new blank Exploration to use as the base.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop GA4 Exploration Setup In the “Dimensions” section, add the following: - Date - Session source/medium - Landing page

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop GA4 Exploration Setup In the “Metrics” section, add the following: - Sessions

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop GA4 Exploration Setup Drag the Date, Session source/medium, and Landing page dimensions into the “Rows” section. Drag Sessions into the “Values” section.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop GA4 Exploration Setup Create a Landing Page ﬁlter for your test page/s. We’re using the same example as before (XML Sitemap Validator)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “Before” Data Set the date range in your new GA4 Exploration so it matches the “Before” period for your test.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Exporting “Before” Data Click the “Export” button in the top-right corner, and export it to however you are most comfortable using spreadsheets.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Gathering “After” Data Now, do the same thing as before, and set the date range to your test’s “After” period.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Exporting “After” Data And, again, export the data to your favourite spreadsheet software.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Analyzing the Data (Per Day)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Analyzing the Data (Source)

- We are well aware that LLM referral data is
spotty at best. - LLMs won’t always give you referral data for visits. - But you can use this as a good “yardstick” for measurement. Like all of you, we’re hoping we get more accurate ways to track trafﬁc from LLMs in the future! SEO Latvia Workshop #4 Ryan Jones | SEOTesting | @RyanJonesSEO SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Caveats

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Running SEO Tests: An Easier Way

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Using SEOTesting for Tests Starting on the SEOTesting Dashboard, we can click the “Tests” icon on the left-side navigation bar.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Using SEOTesting for Tests Clicking on the “Actions” dropdown, we can then click “Create” to start creating our SEO test.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Using SEOTesting for Tests This gives us the option to create: - Single Test (Time-Based) - Group Test (Time-Based) - URL Switch Test (Time-Based) - A/B Split Test - LLM Test

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating a Single Test After clicking on “Single Test” we can enter our test name, description, and a tag if we want to help keep ourselves organized.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating a Single Test On the next section, we can select whether we want to test on a: - Page - Page & Query - Query - Site

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating a Single Test There are also some optional settings we can set up, including: - Country Filter - Device Filter - Search Appearance Filter - Search Type Filter

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating a Single Test On this section, we can select the date we made the change to our page, and set how long we want to run our test for.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating a Single Test On the ﬁnal section, we can select any GA4 events we want to track for our test. This helps us establish whether our SEO changes also help with conversion-based metrics.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating a Group Test The process for creating Group Tests in SEOTesting is similar to that of Single Tests. The only difference is we list all the pages (or queries) we want to run our test on.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating URL Switch Tests URL Switch Tests are also very similar when setting up. The difference here is we need to add the “Old URLs” and the “New URLs” for our test during the setup process.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating URL Switch Tests That means URL Switch Tests are great for: - URL Redirection - Topic Cluster Creation - Keyword Cannibalization

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating SEO Split Tests The ﬁrst step, the same as creating time-based tests, is to ﬁll in the name, description, and any tags for our SEO Split Test.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating SEO Split Tests From here, the next step is to enter our “Control” and “Test” URLs, following the same rules we talked about earlier.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating SEO Split Tests Optional settings for SEO Split Tests include: - Country Filters - Device Filters - Search Appearance Filters

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating SEO Split Tests Set the date you made the changes to the URLs in your “Test” group, and select how many weeks you want to run the test for.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Creating LLM Tests The process for creating LLM Tests is the same as creating Time-Based tests in SEOTesting. The only difference is we need to select the LLMs we want to monitor during the test.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Time-Based Test Results Results Table: - Clicks Per Day - Site Clicks Per Day - Impressions Per Day - Average Position - CTR - Queries Per Day Handy Results Visualization for stakeholders.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop SEO Split Test Results Results Table: - Average Click Difference - Clicks Per Day - Impressions Per Day - Average Position - CTR Handy Results Visualization for stakeholders.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop LLM Test Results Results Table: - Sessions Per Day (Total) - Sessions Per Day (ChatGPT) - Sessions Per Day (Claude) - Sessions Per Day (Perplexity) - Sessions Per Day (Gemini) - Sessions Per Day (Microsoft Copilot) Handy Results Visualization for stakeholders.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Other Tools for Running SEO Tests

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Free Tools - Google Search Console - Google Analytics - Any Other Free Analytics Software Remember: Takes time, and you’ll need to pair this with Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Paid Tools

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Section 2 Recap

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop What We’ve Covered: - How to run time-based SEO tests. - How to run SEO split tests. - How to run LLM tests. - Tools you can use to run SEO tests.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Any Questions?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Extended SEOTesting Trial :)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Section 3: An Interactive Task

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop It’s your turn. Time to plan your own SEO test!

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop The Challenge In the next 20 minutes, you'll work in small groups to design an SEO test you could actually run on your website. You'll use the 7-step framework we just learned. At the end, we'll hear from a few groups about what they came up with.

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Group Activity (15 Minutes) 1. Form groups of 3-4 people. 2. Choose one person’s website to focus on. 3. Work through the 7-step framework together. 4. Document your plan on paper or a laptop. 5. Be ready to present your idea (2 minutes).

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop The 7-Step Framework 1. Form Your Hypothesis 2. Select Your Test Page/s (Or Control & Test Pages) 3. Export Your Page/s Data (Before Period) 4. Make Your Page/s Changes 5. Wait & Export Your Page/s Data (After Period) 6. Analyze Results 7. Next Steps (Rollout, Rollback, or Iterate)

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Questions to Help You - What SEO change have you been wanting to test? - Which test type ﬁts best? Time-based, split, or LLM? - What pages on your site are good candidates? - What metric will you measure? Clicks, impressions, CTR, etc? - How long will you run the test? - What result would make you roll out the change?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Let’s Set The Timer

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Let’s Hear Your Ideas! Each group: 2 minutes to share. - What hypothesis are you testing? - What type of test will you use? - What page or pages? - What metrics will you use to establish success?

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Now You’re Ready!

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Now You Have - A clear deﬁnition of SEO testing. - Knowledge of the different test types that are available. - A complete framework for running tests. - A test plan you can execute. Go forth and prove your impact as SEOs!

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Resources

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Useful Resources 1) SEOTesting Blog: https://seotesting.com/blog/ 2) SEOTesting Test Ideas Guide: https://seotesting.com/blog/seo-testing-guide/ 3) Giulia Panozzo’s SEO Testing Workshop: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzTwC77WW5g 4) Adam Gent’s SEO Case Study Database (Paid $125): https://adamgent.gumroad.com/l/seo-case-studies-database

SEO Testing & Experimentation Workshop Extended SEOTesting Trial :)

Stop Guessing, Start Testing - An SEO Experimen...

Stop Guessing, Start Testing - An SEO Experimentation Workshop (SEO Latvia Workshop #4)

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