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Latin American Software directory doubles organic traffic with effective content
"SEMrush has allowed us to professionalize the content generation process. Since using SEMrush, we have centralized most of our indicators around the tool, and each member of the team knows what their responsibility is and under which parameters we will measure their performance."
About ComparaSoftware:
ComparaSoftware is a free software search and comparison platform dedicated exclusively to the Latin American market. It was founded in 2017 thanks to the support of StartUp Chile. Today, the platform features more than 5,000 programs across more than 150 categories. The site attracts more than 80,000 monthly visits from companies in search of software solutions.
Business objective: to grow traffic in a structured way
ComparaSoftware's key objective is to become the leading resource for software advice in Latin America. For this, they need to drive users with a keen interest in various software technologies to their website.
Essentially, the business’s revenue model was built on two key foundations: PPC and PPL. The PPC model suggests that more website visitors equals more ads clicked on, thus generating income for ComparaSoftware. The PPL model suggests that users end up on the website as a result of their specific software search. They see the platform as an authoritative source and are more inclined to become paying customers.
To achieve their goals, ComparaSoftware’s main strategy was to create relevant content that would attract users and convert them into clients or ad clicks, bringing revenue. From the outset, it was difficult. Ranking in the software industry is a complex task, and, currently, most software acquisition and lead generation is carried out online, with digital channels being the most saturated by software companies.
ComparaSoftware’s CEO Mauricio Cacciavillani, who at the time was in charge of generating web traffic, mentions: "When we found interesting software or software that wanted to register on the platform, we put the whole team to work so that it was supported by all the necessary information. We did an excellent job... that nobody was going to read."
The content they were creating was not related to the actual user searches; it wasn't focused on their interests at all. Organic traffic had demonstrated some positive growth rates but did not fully satisfy investors. For this reason, in September 2019, ComparaSoftware began to work intensively on SEO and opted to incorporate a specific SEO tool.
Solution: keyword research and content tailored for each audience
The search for keywords was one of the most relevant changes made in 2019 in terms of content generation. ComparaSoftware stopped generating content that only its team considered relevant and started researching what information the user was looking for, and creating content to meet readers’ interest.
The new process follows a different path. Keyword search starts with broad terms and is followed by more specific related keywords, which are usually long-tail keywords. Within SEMrush Keyword Analytics, the team selects databases by country with the highest traffic in Latin America, usually Mexico and Colombia.
Next, Mauricio looks at the search volume of the selected keywords, and manually checks the SERP for the kind of articles featured, their length etc. This information is later sent to the Content Management team, describing the specific content they need to produce. In this way, the SEO team is able to provide clear instructions on what to write. For example, “an article about a list of the best tools, which should contain 800 words.”
Integrated with Wordpress, SEMrush SEO Writing Assistant allows Mauricio to run a thorough check on a submitted article. He can see if the text is completely original, its tone of voice (ComparaSoftware prefer it to be ‘neutral’), if it has been properly SEO optimized, etc. “Whenever we have to outsource our copywriting I can be assured that there is no plagiarism taking place and the content is of the highest quality.”
Each content professional knows which KPIs they are going to be measured against. For ComparaSoftware, it’s not the number of visits, but how the keywords are positioned. Mauricio uses the Position Tracking tool within SEMrush to check on this.
"The questions section in the Keyword Magic Tool is our secret weapon. It allows us to quickly identify interests behind different software categories and earn rich snippets," says ComparaSoftware’s SEO analyst Leomerly Salismey, who logs in daily to extract key information for the writing team. Below is an example of a rich snippet that generates more than 1,200 monthly visits.
In addition to content production, Mauricio uses SEMrush Backlink Gap tool to check on the competitors, to see which keywords they are targeting and ComparaSoftware are not. It was particularly useful at the beginning when Mauricio could have a quick look at where competitors were getting their backlinks from so they could target the same domains. However, this is no longer necessary as ComparaSoftware now have their own backlinks strategy.
ComparaSoftware have an interesting way of using the Keyword Gap Tool - they use it on a weekly basis to target new software. The team identifies new software on capterra and then checks if it has any search volume in Latin America. If it does, they include it on their website.
Results
"SEMrush has allowed us to professionalize the content generation process. Since using SEMrush, we have centralized most of our indicators around the tool, and each member of the team knows what their responsibility is and under which parameters we will measure their performance," says Mauricio.
In specific terms, ComparaSoftware has reported:
- A 100% traffic growth over 6 months and an increase in the number of unique visitors, each bringing more ad revenue.
- Immediate effect on PPC results, and hence the overall financial performance
- Improved content efficiency. Content is finally working, and it is easy to review and approve. ComparaSoftware manage to do more, with less.
In 2020, the team has decided to expand the platform to the Brazilian market. For this, they have decided to acquire a new domain, CompararSoftware (similar, only with an extra letter ‘r’), and all the development of the SEO strategy and its monitoring will be done with SEMrush.
