Role
Content Strategist & Writer
Timeline
4 months
Tools
Google Analytics, SEMRush, Wix, Photoshop
Lights, camera, action!🎥
Background
A newly created women-led movie studio was prepping for their first movie release on Amazon, but there was a bit of a problem. Because the studio was so new, nobody knew the movie was going to be released! The client was familiar with SEO and wanted to explore how it could be used to boost views on the website and new film trailer on YouTube.
Problem
The studio’s website and film trailer on YouTube don’t have much traffic and the target audience of teens/tweens haven’t heard of the upcoming movie.
Research goals 🥅
What blog topics are highly searched by and resonate with the target audience?
What small or major improvements can be made to the site to improve SEO ranking?
How can language and certain slang terms be used to craft unique blog posts that reflect the film’s tone?
Research
Before a content audit, I interviewed the client to get a better idea of what this initiative looked like. They requested the following:
Blog posts that would attract the new film’s audience of tween/teen girls, but also touched on the horror elements of the film.
An SEO audit for the movie studio site.
Improvements to be made to the site and blogs based on the audit findings.
Content audit
12
813
0
12 unique monthly visitors to the MissDirection site.
81 YouTube views for the Miss Beverly Hills Ghost trailer.
0 website pages rank on the first 10 pages of the SERP.
I went through each of the site’s 53 pages and added related alt text to images, metadata, and new hyperlink names. I also reduced image and video sizes that resulted in a faster loading time.
Backlinks would be part of the new blogging strategy. I would monitor the search rankings and refine them as needed every two weeks.
I performed an SEO audit of the site that revealed some gaps that could harm their search ranking:
Video and photo files were very large, so pages loaded slowly.
Images had no alt text.
There was no metadata for any of the pages.
Page links didn’t have specific names and instead had instantly generated letters and numbers.
There were no backlinks throughout the site.
Writing style guide
To create an SEO-optimized content strategy, I used SEMRush and Google Analytics to see what tween/teen girls ages 12-20 were searching and how it could tie into promotional blog posts. Topics about makeup and clothing were frequently searched as well as news about younger Gen Z celebrities like Dove Cameron and Zendaya.
The initial strategy contained 2 posts a month on the above topics and 2 on old Hollywood mysteries.
Before crafting a content and keyword strategy, it was essential to establish a writing style that would reflect the fun and unique voice of the company and its new film.
Modern slang and abbreviations are encouraged as long as they don’t interfere with comprehension.
A playful and “cool” tone and style is ideal, as if you were talking to the most popular and interesting girl at school.
Posts with darker themes still need to have a playful tone while remaining respectful.
The company and many of its movies are set in LA, so topics related to Southern California and Californian slang are also encouraged.
Reading level no higher than a 6th grade level.
Iterations of the content strategy
From fashion….
To freaky crimes…
After two months, I analyzed the search traffic for the new blog posts and overall site and shared my findings with the client.
Blogs about makeup and clothing appeared on pages 8 to 18 for SERP. Traffic was low for these pages with only a few dozen visitors a month.
Blogs on old Hollywood mysteries and legends typically appeared on the first or second page of the SERP. These posts also had high traffic between 100 and 200 monthly visitors.
Trailer views increased from 813 views to 1,067.
Based on these findings and further discussions with the client, the blogging strategy was adjusted to focus more on topics having to do with mysteries and urban legends.
Site statistics after 4 months
12
813
0
Monthly visitors to the MissDirection site increased from 12 to 2067.
YouTube views for the Miss Beverly Hills Ghost trailer went from 813 to 2042.
The number of site pages that appeared on the SERP for applicable keywords went from 0 to 8 pages that appeared within the frist two pages of Google.
2067
2042
8
Takeaways
This was a very exciting project due to the subject matter and the opportunity to craft an off-beat writing style guide. I enjoyed turning a seemingly straightforward topic, such as ‘fall makeup,’ into a more unique blog with the SoCal slang and film references.
If I were to continue with this project, there are numerous steps I’d take:
Expand the content strategy to extend beyond blogs into new content forms including social media, longform articles, and press releases.
Engage in a more thorough and well-researched social media campaign to advertise current film and upcoming projects.
Tie in UX strategies into next phase by testing content and social media posts with target audience.
