How a Family-Friendly Food Blog Grew Traffic by 908% in 6 Months
https://ourbestbites.com/
Stats
67.8K to 683.6K Monthly Visits
Industry
Food & Drink
Niche
Food Blog
Reporting Date
June 2024
Our Best Bites is a popular food blog by Sara Wells. She co-founded it in 2008, creating a haven of delicious family recipes for busy moms.
Today, the blog is thriving and generating more online visits than ever.
In just 6 months, Our Best Bites' experienced a tenfold increase in organic traffic—and you’re about to find out how Wells did it.
This SEO case study dissects Our Best Bites' recipe for success, helping you discover strategies that work.
In This Article
The Catalyst: How Our Best Bites Reached 683.6K Monthly Visits
1. March Algorithm Updates Unlock New Rankings
The SEO landscape is constantly evolving, and keeping up with the latest Google algorithm updates can feel like a moving target.
But often, sticking to the basics is the best course of action.
This means committing to the principles of SEO: high-quality content, a positive user experience, and a strong technical foundation.
Our Best Bites exemplifies all three.
And in March 2024, search engines rewarded them.
Google released two updates this month, core and spam, both of which aimed to improve the search experience and reduce spam in search results.
Our Best Bites was perfectly positioned to benefit from these updates.
They've been:
- Crafting easy family recipes with clear instructions since 2008 (high-quality content).
- Launched a website redesign in spring 2024 (positive UX).
- Adhere to technical SEO best practices like mobile-friendliness, clear site structure, etc.
The result?
Keyword rankings more than doubled by June.
Why this matters:
The success of Our Best Bites highlights the importance of consistency in the face of ever-changing SEO landscapes.
Here's why (and what to do for your website):
- Search engines reward people-first content (even if it takes time). Keep your audience's interests and needs at the forefront of your content creation process. Creating valuable, genuinely helpful content is a long-term SEO strategy with lasting results.
- While SEO trends evolve, core principles will never lead you astray. Commit to high-quality content and a positive UX to ensure users and search engines find your website a valuable resource—always.
- Performance metrics will let you know once you've been rewarded—or hit—by an algorithm update. Develop a plan to monitor your keyword rankings and see how they're affected by algorithm updates. If you start to see a decline, investigate how to adjust your strategy before it becomes an issue.
Note: Algorithm updates are unpredictable. These recommended SEO best practices are intended to safeguard your site’s performance, but it’d be unrealistic to not recognize the volatility of the recent search landscape. However, by focusing on user needs and core SEO principles, you'll be well-positioned to adapt and thrive.
How to monitor SEO performance in WordPress:
The easiest way to monitor the impact of algorithm updates is by using an SEO plugin. The linked tutorial goes into detail, but here’s an overview of the process:
- Install All in One SEO (AIOSEO), the leading WordPress plugin for SEO.
- Open Search Statistics.
- Navigate to the SEO Statistics tab.
- Compare changes in performance around algorithm updates.
Tools for monitoring SEO performance:
Search Statistics streamlines the process of data pulling and tracking of performance metrics.
Its dashboard provides a timeline view with key metrics and Google algorithm markers, allowing you to pinpoint when an update could have affected your site.
Each Google marker also features a read more option to learn about the update. These insights will inform your SEO strategy, allowing you to adjust as necessary.
Next, let’s see how backlinks played a role in Our Best Bites’ recent traffic explosion.
2. Backlinks Promote More Online Visibility
In the last 6 months, Our Best Bites’ backlink profile has experienced tremendous growth.
Backlinks have increased by 67.9% since December, reaching 591.9K in June.
Backlinks are votes of confidence for your website.
They tell search engines that your content is valuable and trustworthy.
They can also boost your content's discoverability, as users find your site through these referring domains.
But here’s the thing about backlinks: they’re not all created equal.
Quality matters.
For a link to be considered high-quality, it needs to come from a reputable website that is relevant to your niche.
A curated list of high-quality backlinks is worth much more in the eyes of search engines than thousands of spammy or junk links.
Unfortunately for Our Best Bites, their backlink profile shows signs of suspicious activity, primarily due to the following two reasons:
- A high follow-to-nofollow ratio.
- A concentration of backlinks sharing IP addresses.
While I can’t speak to their link acquisition strategies, it’s important to consider whether the current approach is sustainable in the long term.
Why this matters:
According to SEO statistics, backlinks are among the top 3 ranking factors.
However, it’s important to prioritize quality over quantity.
A strong backlink profile requires a strategic approach to acquiring high-quality links from relevant websites. This helps with rankings and establishes your website as a trusted authority within your niche.
How to do link building:
Backlinks are one component of an effective linking strategy. This article shows you how to get backlinks, but it’s important to also optimize for the following:
- Internal links (from one page on your site to another page on your site)
- Outbound links (from your site to another external site)
This link-building guide has the steps you need to optimize for all three types of links.
Tools for link building:
Link Assistant is a powerful tool for finding internal linking opportunities. It populates linking suggestions directly in the WordPress editor, so you don't have to scour for related content manually. It also provides recommended anchor text.
See one you want to add?
It's as easy as clicking Add Link.
Now, let’s look at the technical optimizations Our Best Bites uses to stand out on the SERP.
3. Schema Markup Generates Recipe & Review Snippets
Schema markup is code search engines can use to more easily understand your website.
There are various types, and each helps search engines categorize your content.
Some schema types Our Best Bites uses include:
- Recipe
- Review
- Rating
- Author
- Breadcrumbs
Each provides important details about a recipe post.
Search engines can then use this information to generate rich snippets on the SERP.
For example, the recipe snippet below highlights customer ratings and cook time.
This search result is also in the Google recipe carousel, where users can easily access quick links to recipes matching their query.
Overall, Our Best Bites is generous with its implementation of schema markup, and search engines have rewarded them for it.
Our Best Bites ranked for 175.8K keywords with review snippets in June 2024.
They also earned 39.6K rankings with recipe snippets this month.
Why this matters:
Ranking statistics demonstrate that rich results get 58% of all clicks.
This is significantly higher than non-rich results, which have a clickthrough rate (CTR) of 41%.
Plus, according to the latest insights from the search algorithm leak, Google uses clicks as a ranking signal.
This means optimizing your content for clicks is critical, and schema markup can help you do it.
How to implement schema markup:
WordPress users have two options for implementing schema markup: with or without a plugin. (I’d recommend the former.)
Here’s a tutorial for setting schema without a WordPress plugin. You’ll need to obtain the JSON-LD code snippets for your desired schema for this method.
You can use either of the following tools to obtain this code:
For a coding-free option, this article shows you how to add schema using the AIOSEO plugin.
Tools for schema markup:
Many website owners don’t feel comfortable touching the code of their website.
But the good news is you don’t have to.
Schema markup plugins make it faster and easier than ever to add schema markup to your WordPress site. Just select your desired schema from AIOSEO’s Schema Generator, and the plugin will format the structured data for search engines.
Now, let’s see how Our Best Bites optimizes its content to rank in Google’s People Also Ask.
4. Helpful Content Wins People Also Ask Results
The People Also Ask (PAA) section of the SERP provides users with quick answers to questions related to their original query.
Ranking in the PAA box is highly coveted because it places your content near the top of search results.
Here's what the PAA box looks like on the SERP:
Our Best Bites saw a tenfold increase in PAA results in June 2024 compared to 6 months prior.
This success stems from following a few key content best practices:
- They write for people first. Our Best Bites puts themselves in their readers' shoes and asks, “What questions might they have about this recipe? What challenges might they face?” By anticipating these needs and addressing them in their posts, they ensure content that is genuinely helpful—and not just made for rankings.
- They include FAQs in several posts. Our Best Bites doesn't just answer questions within the recipe itself; they also dedicate sections to FAQs at the end of a recipe. This strategy allows them to delve deeper into common concerns and provide clear, concise answers. In addition to helping users, search engines can easily identify and showcase FAQs in PAA results.
- They implement FAQ schema markup. As we saw with the recipe and review snippets, schema markup can greatly impact your SERP visibility and clicks. Our Best Bites uses FAQ schema to help search engines understand their content and win rich results in Google’s PAA box.
Why this matters:
PAA results can provide the following benefits:
- Increased visibility
- Better brand awareness
- Higher clickthrough rates
- Improved user experience
How to optimize for PAA results:
Winning PAA results requires high-quality content that anticipates user needs. Here's a strategic approach to guide your content creation and optimization efforts:
- Target question-based queries. Conduct thorough keyword research that focuses on question-based queries. Look for keywords that begin with phrases like “what,” “why,” “how,” “when,” and “where.”
- Craft content that fulfills search intent. Once you've identified question-based keywords, you’ll need to determine the search intent. Performing a SERP analysis will help you achieve this. Then, create the best piece of content that addresses the user's needs.
- Implement FAQ schema markup. Schema markup provides search engines with additional information about your content. FAQ schema can make it easier for search engines to understand your web page and increase the likelihood of appearing in the PAA box.
For further reading, this guide details how to optimize for Google’s PAA section.
Tools for ranking in the PAA box:
You can use AIOSEO’s FAQ blocks to write popular questions and answers in WordPress. It’s as simple as locating and adding the block to your page or post.
Once you’ve written your question and answer, the plugin implements the FAQ schema, increasing your chances of winning a PAA result.
Standout SEO Wins
Before we wrap up, I’d like to point out a final SEO win for Our Best Bites.
Breadcrumbs: The Recipe for Sitelinks
Clear website navigation is crucial for the user experience (UX) and SEO.
Our Best Bites understands this and uses a clear categorical system and breadcrumbs to aid users' and search engines' content discovery.
Breadcrumbs represent the user's current location within the site hierarchy. They typically appear at the top of a web page, as shown below.
Breadcrumbs are one way to earn sitelinks on the SERP.
Sitelinks are additional links below a search result. They can point to other areas of the same domain or different sections of the same web page.
In the example below, Google displays other dessert recipes within the dessert bars category.
Ultimately, this strategy can be an effective method of introducing users to other areas of your website.
It aids in content discovery and helps you stand out in search results.
Tool: Breadcrumb plugins make adding breadcrumbs to your WordPress site easy.
AIOSEO enables breadcrumbs by default and automatically adds breadcrumb schema markup for you.
You’ll also get full control of how they’re displayed.
Takeaways
Our deep dive into Our Best Bites' SEO strategy reveals valuable insights you can apply to your own website.
Here are some key takeaways, along with actionable steps:
Top 3 Strategies to Emulate
- Track your SEO progress. Establish a process for monitoring key metrics like organic traffic, keyword rankings, and clicks. You'll want to regularly analyze this data to identify areas for improvement and measure the effectiveness of your efforts. This system will also help you recognize when an algorithm update has benefited or hit your site.
- Implement a link-building strategy. The most effective linking strategies are holistic. Focus on acquiring high-quality backlinks, linking internally to relevant pages, and sharing outbound links when helpful for your readers. This comprehensive approach ensures a well-connected site that is trusted by users and search engines.
- Leverage schema markup to win rich snippets. Schema markup provides search engines with helpful information about your web page. It can also increase the likelihood of winning rich snippets on the SERP. Choose the most appropriate schema for your page to aid search engines in crawling and understanding your page.
Bottom 3 Strategies to Reconsider
- Writing non-descriptive alt text. While Our Best Bites typically excels at crafting SEO-friendly alt text, some images could be improved. Images are an essential part of engaging content, but neglecting alt text can hinder SEO and accessibility. Alt text provides a textual description of the image for users who cannot see it, like those using screen readers. It should be concise yet descriptive, explaining the image's content and relevance to the page. For WordPress users, you can use an image SEO plugin to write alt tags automatically.
- Forgetting meta descriptions. Meta descriptions are short summaries displayed beneath web page titles in search results. While not a direct ranking factor, they significantly impact clickthrough rates. A compelling and informative meta description entices users to click on your website. Short on time? You can use a meta description generator to write them for you.
- Exceeding metadata character limits. Some of Our Best Bites’ meta titles and descriptions are too long for the SERP. This leads to truncation, which can negatively impact your CTR. Try running your metadata through a SERP snippet tool to ensure its the correct length before publishing.
Steal Our Winning SEO Strategy: A Checklist for Your Website
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Earn More Clicks and Organic Traffic With AIOSEO
What if you could replicate Our Best Bites' SEO strategies and win more organic traffic for YOUR website?
With AIOSEO, you can.
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Here are a few of our favorites:
- Search Statistics: Track your website’s organic performance with comprehensive and easy-to-understand reports. Search Statistics helps you monitor keyword rankings and understand the effectiveness of your SEO over time.
- Link Assistant: Get link suggestions, edit anchor text, and add internal links to your content in just 1 click. Link Assistant helps you effortlessly build a better linking strategy.
- Rich Snippets Schema: Win more rich results with AIOSEO’s user-friendly schema generator. Just pick the schema type you want, and we’ll format the structured data properly for Google.
- FAQ Blocks: Add FAQs to your content to increase the likelihood of appearing in Google’s People Also Ask box. These results help boost brand awareness and increase clickthrough rates.
- Breadcrumbs: Create a trail for users and search engines to understand where they are in your site hierarchy. Breadcrumbs are a great way of facilitating navigation and can generate sitelinks on the SERP.
- Image SEO: Turn on automatic image alt text and title attributes with a single click. You’ll save time from manual entries while helping users and search engines understand your images.
