How an AI Translation Platform Grew Traffic by 234% in 3 Months
https://maestra.ai/
Stats
297K to 990.8K Monthly Visits
Industry
Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Niche
Transcription & Translation
Reporting Date
December 2024
Maestra is a SaaS provider specializing in AI-powered translations and transcriptions.
In an impressive feat, Maestra experienced explosive organic traffic growth at the end of 2024, achieving a 234% increase in 3 months.
This SEO case study delves into the key strategies that fueled this surge.
You'll learn:
- How they did it
- How you can, too
- Which WordPress tools to use
Let’s get started.
In This Article
The Catalyst: How Maestra More Than Tripled Traffic in 3 Months
1. Unlocking Growth: A Website Redesign & High-Traffic Blog Post
In November 2024, Maestra revealed a new website design.
The update delivered a more modern and professional look while debuting a new navigation menu.
Here we see the former design’s homepage, which lacked a menu:
And here’s the updated version with a user-friendly interface:
Easy navigation is essential for users and search engines. A menu acts like a compass, guiding users to the areas that align with their interests and needs.
This improved user experience can translate to decreased bounce rates and increased time spent on site — two important SEO metrics.
To solidify a seamless navigation experience, Maestra also updated its HTML sitemap.
An HTML sitemap is a list of pages on your website. It’s customer-facing, meaning users can see it when visiting your site.
Here, we can compare the old sitemap:
And the new one:
Sitemaps promote easy navigation, a positive user experience (UX), and accessibility.
It also makes it easier for search engines to crawl and index your website.
These optimizations can ultimately lead to increased rankings in search engine results pages (SERPs.)
I also want to point out another addition to the website that occurred the same month as these changes: a new blog about watching movies online went live.
Ok, so what’s the big deal about that?
Websites publish new content all the time. (Or, at least, they should be.)
But in this case, Maestra hit the jackpot with this singular piece of content.
It’s a post about MoviesJoy alternatives, which is a popular moving streaming platform.
Now, here’s what’s crazy about this post:
It generated a quarter of a million visits in the U.S. alone in December.
That’s 84.4% of Maestra’s total organic traffic.
This SEO win proves that sometimes all it takes is one web page to skyrocket your visibility in SERPs.
That’s why content creation is integral to your SEO strategy.
You never know which one will land you in position 1 and generate the most traffic for your site.
Why this matters:
Maestra's website redesign and blog strategy are a powerful reminder of a multifaceted approach to SEO.
Each optimization puts users at the forefront of their SEO efforts while keeping search engines in mind.
This people-first approach has a two-fold benefit:
- An improved user experience and engagement metrics
- More rankings and organic traffic for your website
How to add sitemaps to your website:
There are two main types of sitemaps:
- XML sitemaps are machine-readable files. They list your website’s URLs in a structured manner, allowing search engines to understand them easily.
- HTML sitemaps are human-readable lists of your key pages. They represent your website’s structure and hierarchy, helping users navigate your site with ease.
This tutorial shows you how to generate both sitemaps for your WordPress site.
Tools for sitemaps:
The easiest way to add sitemaps to your website is by using a sitemap generator. These tools generate the code for you and have customizable options for displaying them to users.
Take All in One SEO (AIOSEO), for example.
It has a WordPress sitemap generator for XML, HTML, and RSS sitemaps.
To get started, navigate to AIOSEO > Sitemaps. You can then select your desired sitemap type from the top menu.
In the example below, we’re enabling XML sitemaps on our WordPress site. (XML sitemaps are enabled as a default setting, but you could switch them back on if you ever turn them off.)
You can also navigate to the HTML tab and customize how you want to display your sitemap on your website.
In this screenshot, we’ve decided to dedicate a page to our sitemap.
Overall, the AIOSEO sitemap generator is intuitive and easy to use. It also has smart default settings that may not even require any changes.
2. Gaining a SERP Advantage: Software Review Schema Markup
Technical SEO involves optimizing website elements for better search engine performance. One crucial aspect of Maestra's technical SEO strategy is schema markup.
Schema markup is structured data that provides search engines with key information about your web pages. This information is presented in a format that search engines can easily understand.
Here's an example:
This screenshot demonstrates how Maestra uses software schema markup on its web pages.
Most notably, they include AggregateRating schema, which shares the average customer rating (4.7) of its software.
This is important because search engines can use this information to generate rich snippets in SERPs.
For example, here’s a review snippet for the web page with schema markup in our previous screenshot:
It shows the average 4.7 rating and number of reviews, as defined in the schema markup.
These rich snippets significantly enhance the appearance of Maestra's search results.
They stand out from standard blue links, capturing user attention and increasing clickthrough rates (CTRs).
Overall, Maestra’s schema markup optimizations proved highly effective.
It received 29.9K review snippets in December, setting a new record for the website.
Why this matters:
Schema markup offers several key advantages:
- Increased Visibility: Rich snippets stand out in search results, boosting brand visibility and attracting more clicks.
- Improved User Experience: Rich snippets provide valuable information directly within search results, enhancing user experience and encouraging clicks.
- Competitive Advantage: By implementing schema markup, Maestra differentiates itself from competitors who may not be using structured data.
How to add schema markup:
There are a few different ways to add schema markup to your website manually.
The linked tutorial outlines three methods, and each requires basic coding knowledge.
You’ll use JSON-LD, which is Google's preferred code language.
Tools for schema markup:
Unfamiliar with JSON-LD?
Or just want a fast, code-free way to implement schema markup on your website?
No problem.
AIOSEO has a rich snippet schema generator that doesn’t require a single line of code. All you have to do is pick your desired schema type from the catalog and follow the prompts.
Here, we can see software schema, which Maestra uses on its website.
AIOSEO then asks questions about your software, like the price and customer rating.
You can add your review details here, and AIOSEO will format the structured data properly for Google.
3. Conquering People Also Ask: FAQ Content Strategy
Review snippets weren’t the only type of enhanced search listing Maestra received in December.
It also experienced a significant increase in People Also Ask (PAA) rankings (2.2K).
This section of Google displays questions related to the user’s initial query.
Users can expand questions to view the answer and source.
As for how Maestra ranked in this coveted section of the SERP, they followed a few best practices:
- Include FAQs in your content. FAQs use the same format as People Also Ask, making it easy for search engines to use them in SERPs.
- Use question-based subheadings. Subheadings are another element that’s easy for search engines to understand. You can research and optimize for question keywords in your H2s, H3s, and so on.
- Include FAQ schema markup. As we saw earlier, using schema markup is an effective way to get rich snippets in SERPs. Maestra uses FAQ schema to stand out in search results.
Why this matters:
The significant increase in PAA rankings highlights the importance of a well-defined FAQ strategy.
People Also Ask boxes are valuable real estate on the SERP. By appearing in these boxes, Maestra:
- Captures user attention: People Also Ask boxes stand out visually, drawing attention to Maestra's content.
- Drives qualified traffic: Users who click on Maestra's answers within PAA boxes are highly likely to be interested in their services.
- Establishes authority: Appearing frequently in PAApositions Maestra as a knowledgeable and authoritative source of information.
How to rank in Google People Also Ask:
Here’s a quick overview of how to optimize for People Also Ask:
- Use the right SEO tool.
- Conduct keyword research, focusing on question keywords.
- Create high-quality content that aligns with search intent.
- Implement FAQ schema on the web page.
- Perform an SEO competitor analysis.
Tools for People Also Ask:
With AIOSEO, you can FAQs to any WordPress post or page using FAQ blocks.
These blocks provide space for your question and answer, and then they implement the FAQ schema automatically for you.
It’s a beginner-friendly method for writing FAQs and encouraging search engines to use them in SERPs.
Standout SEO Wins
Before wrapping things up, I want to highlight a final SEO strategy that's simple to implement and surprisingly impactful:
Implementing Breadcrumbs for Improved Navigation & Sitelinks
Maestra enables breadcrumbs on its website.
Breadcrumbs are navigational links that appear on web pages. They help users situate themselves within the site hierarchy and provide search engines with details about the site structure.
You’ll often see them as a breadcrumb trail at the top of web pages, like in the example below.
Beyond improving user experience, breadcrumbs offer several key SEO benefits:
- Enhanced Crawlability: Breadcrumbs provide search engines with a clear understanding of the website's structure, making it easier for them to crawl and index pages.
- Improved Site Architecture: By clearly defining the relationship between different pages, breadcrumbs contribute to a well-structured website, which is crucial for good SEO.
- Google Sitelinks: One of the most significant benefits of implementing breadcrumbs is the potential to earn Google sitelinks in search results. Google often uses breadcrumbs to populate sitelinks, expanding your website’s visibility in search results (see example below).
Tool: With AIOSEO, it’s easy to add breadcrumbs to your website. Just go to Settings > Breadcrumbs > and toggle the switch On. (For a full tutorial, here’s how to add breadcrumbs to WordPress.)
Takeaways
Now that we've explored how Maestra exploded its traffic, let's recap how you can implement these strategies on your website.
We'll also discuss areas for potential improvement, giving your website a competitive edge.
Top 3 Strategies to Emulate
- Take a holistic approach to SEO. A successful SEO strategy requires on-page, off-page, and technical optimizations. This multifaceted approach ensures all aspects of your website are optimized to work together. It also creates a strong foundation for users and search engines, streamlining content discovery and crawlability.
- Use sitemaps to improve site navigation. XML sitemaps are files that provide search engines with a list of all the pages on your website. They act as a roadmap, helping search engines efficiently crawl and index all the important pages on your site. This ensures that search engines can discover and rank all your relevant content. HTML sitemaps, on the other hand, are visible on the front end of your website. These sitemaps are intended to help users navigate your site. For optimal results, you should include both types on your website.
- Implement schema markup to win SERP features. Leverage schema markup to provide search engines with structured data about your website. This can result in SERP features, like review snippets, People Also Ask rankings, and sitelinks. Start with the most relevant schema types for your business (e.g., organization, product, software) and expand your schema as needed. This approach will ensure you cover the most important bases first and optimize for a more comprehensive SERP presence.
Bottom 3 Strategies to Reconsider
- Don’t neglect image titles. While Maestra does a good job optimizing its alt text, image title tags seem to slip through the cracks. Image titles appear when users hover or click on an image. They provide additional context for users and search engines. It's important to optimize all areas of image SEO to ensure accessibility and maximum visibility in organic search. You can use an image SEO plugin to automate many of these optimizations, saving you valuable time.
- Don’t forget to include H1s. Most of Maestra's pages have H1s, which are the title of your page. However, a handful of URLs do not. This oversight can be confusing for users and search engines since it's supposed to communicate the main topic of your page. For our website, make sure every indexable URL has a unique H1 tag. TruSEO can help you with this because it checks your on-page optimizations, including your H1, for your focus keyword. If you've forgotten to include it in your H1, it will remind you to optimize it.
- Don’t exceed SEO title character limits. Speaking of titles, you also want to pay special attention to your SEO titles. Unlike H1s, which appear on the page itself, SEO title tags appear as blue hyperlinks in SERPs. They have a direct impact on clickthrough rates and organic traffic, so it’s important to get them right. Some of Maestra’s SEO titles exceed character limits, which leads to truncation. To avoid this issue, keep your titles under 160 characters. You can also run them through a SERP snippet tool to preview how they’ll look in SERPs.
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Streamline Your SEO & Grow Your Traffic With AIOSEO
Maestra's SEO success demonstrates the power of a well-executed strategy. However, implementing and maintaining such a strategy can be time-consuming and complex.
All in One SEO simplifies the process.
AIOSEO is the best WordPress plugin for SEO. You'll get the tools and guidance you need to implement key SEO best practices and gain valuable insights into site performance.
Here are some of our favorite tools for taking control of your site's organic traffic and rankings:
- TruSEO Score: Level up your content and go beyond a simple pass or fail. TruSEO analyzes your on-page SEO, giving you actionable insights to maximize your content's reach.
- Headline Analyzer: Get more clicks with compelling and keyword-rich headlines. This innovative tool uses various factors to determine the efficacy of your headline. Plus, you'll get actionable insights to improve it.
- Smart Sitemaps: Easily generate HTML, XML, and RSS sitemaps with the help of AIOSEO. These dynamic sitemaps ensure all your content is crawled and indexed efficiently for faster rankings.
- Rich Snippets Schema: AIOSEO offers various schema markup options to help you claim more rich results on the SERP. It’s as simple as choosing the schema you want; then, we’ll format the structured data 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 breadcrumb trail that shows users where they are on your site in relation to the homepage. You can customize the look and show them exactly where you want on your site.
- 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.
