SEMRUSH Meet up in Kolkata at Science City Auditorium

Introduction

Hello peeps, today I am going to share my experience and learning from attending a SEMRUSH meet up held in Kolkata at Science City Mini Auditorium. Information about this event has been shared to me by my friend Anil Lund in LinkedIn There was no reason to miss this event, as it was being held very near to my home. ?

Event Details

Agenda:-

Keynote Speech:- Rohan Ayyar

Conversion Rate optimisation:- Arun Agarwal

Website Audit:- Abhishek Rungta

Speakers:

Abhishek Rungta:

Abhishek Rungta is an entrepreneur, Digital Marketing Consultant, and technology geek and Seed Investor in a high-tech startup. He has single-handedly built an award-winning Web and Digital Marketing Company, Indus Net Technologies in Kolkata, Which has more than 800+ employee, more than 200+ Client. He has started this company with just Rs. 50 in the year 1997.

Arun Agarwal:

Arun Agarwal is a recipient of Gold Medal in Postgraduate from Jadavpur University. His Company Ebizindia is a specialist in Conversion rate Optimisation (CRO). He likes to define himself as “an engineer by profession and a marketer by passion.” Arun has a long list of clients, whom he had helped in getting more leads and Business from the website.

Rohan Ayyar:-

He is the Regional Marketing Manager at SEMRUSH India. He is an experienced digital marketer who has vast experience in SEO, PPC, Social Media, and Content Marketing. He is a blogger and actively contributes to a platform like Search Engine Journal, Fast Company and Social Media Today.

Timing:-

6 PM to 9 PM on 25th October 2018

Venue:-

Science City Mini Auditorium, Kolkata

Entry Fees:-

Rs. 300 per head.

Rohan Ayyar:-

Rohan Ayyar spoke about the Company SEMRUSH, which is a 10-year-old company, having an offices in 4 countries and a total headcount of around 400. In India, they do not have any physical office, and only two people work from India remotely. They regularly conduct SEO SURGERY webinar online, and physical meet up all across major cities in India. The Company was founded by Oleg and Dimitry in 2008 in Russia.

Rohan-Ayyar-SEMRush-Manager-mogisa
Rohan-Ayyar-SEMRush-Manager-mogisa

He began his talk on a lighter note and organised a game for the audience, where he showed two images on the screen and asked which one has a higher search volume in Google.

He showed us “SALMAN KHAN” and “SHAHRUKH KHAN” image on the screen and asked us which one has more search volume in Google. Some people said SALMAN and some said SHAHRUKH KHAN, and he concluded that SALMAN KHAN has higher search volume in Google and gave some gift to the audience, who answered correctly on a random basis.

Similarly, he asked for “GULAB JAMUN” and “RASUGULLAH,” which has a higher search volume in Google.

Rohan Ayyar said that the moment, he got an offer to join SEMRUSH, immediately searched on Google to get details regarding Marketing Manager salary in India, but all he got is shown below in the image. Google showed him result from www1.salary.com, which showed salary data from the USA, whereas he was looking for INDIAN data.

marketing-manager-salary-mogisa
marketing-manager-salary-mogisa

Even, I have researched while writing this blog, and I also found the same USA Data.

Google sometimes, shows irregular, irrelevant and biased information. It is not 100% correct all the time. We can’t trust Google to make assumptions and research, It only pulls data from what is available on the other website. So authenticity of data is sometimes compromised.

Rohan Ayyar was showing stats and facts, which were blowing my mind, and all my prejudice that Google Baba is some God was smashed.

He said that Google is only interested in taking your data to show in Google SERP and give credit to you. It will not give you free traffic anymore.

He showed the next example where he wants to know the net worth of SHAHRUKH KHAN, on the top, Google shows result from Quora answer and data validated from Forbes.

shahrukh-khan-networth-mogisa
shahrukh-khan-networth-mogisa

In the recent time, Google has started to show results in a boxed format taking data from relevant sources, and it occupies the first fold area.

He said that Google is interested in stealing your data, and not giving credit to you. He said that going forward; it will be tough for the Content creator to rank in Google.

hul-share-price-mogisa
hul-share-price-mogisa

He again said that “let us check share price of HUL,” Google showed a share price chart of HUL occupying the entire first fold area, pulling data from moneycontrol.com and this moneycontrol.com website was listed below this Google Knowledge Graph. He said that Google is only interested in your data, and not giving any visibility to your Website.



HUL-share-price-moneycontrol-mogisa
HUL-share-price-moneycontrol-mogisa

He said that we must use Google to beat Google. The travel ticketing company were frustrated and were losing business with changing algorithms of Google, and hence they have successfully come up with a strategy to beat Google on its battlefield. They used PPC that is a Google Ads to display higher above the Organic result. You can see in below images to understand.

travel-ticketing-company-mogisa
travel-ticketing-company-mogisa

All Google wants is money, give them Ads, and it will show your result higher, else it will keep harassing you with changing Google Algorithm.

Mogis-Ahmed-Semrush-mogisa

Arun Agarwal:-

Arun Agarwal tried his best to keep the presentation live and interactive. His topic for the day was “LOTS OF TRAFFIC, BUT FEW LEADS? CRO TO THE RESCUE!” He shared 9 takeaways from his seminar, which are listed below.

Arun-Agarwal-SEMrush-mogisa
Arun-Agarwal-SEMrush-mogisa

Takeaway#1

He advised us to treat our Clients’ sites as ours and business will grow. Lead generation is a game of Psychology and technology. One must learn to master both, to succeed in the online world.

He said to “be your own customer” and try to visit your website.

Takeaway#2

Play Why Game

One must try to find why the customer is buying from us and jot down points and also try to find out why customers are not buying and jot down points.
Do a thorough Analysis and write down the learning.

Takeaway#3

Pleasing Website is a hygiene factor.

Try to keep only 1 important revenue generator product on the home page, do not clutter your website with information.

Takeaway#4

Ads to a Landing page, keep the experience minimal and without any distraction. Whatever you have promised in Ads, deliver on the landing page. Build trust.

Takeaway#5

Use good thank you page.

Takeaway#6

Clarity beats persuasion

Avoid flowery language. Be factual.

Takeaway#7

Security builds trust

Use Security enabled HTTPS website.

Takeaway#8

Fast Site, Better Result

Page speed optimisation is an essential factor. Slow loading website will turn off your visitors.

Takeaway#9

Mobile First index

Your website should be now mobile optimised.

He concluded his seminar by saying “DO IT NOW.”

Abhishek Rungta

Mr. Abhishek Rungta audited 3 websites namely bookbhook.com, mytasker.com, and intex.in

I have jotted a few learning’s from his audit. He has audited these sites from UX and UI point of view and not SEO.

Abhisekh-Rungta-Semrush-Kolkata-mogisa
Abhisekh-Rungta-Semrush-Kolkata-mogisa

Learnings:-

  1. Do not put social media icon on the top itself.
  2. Do A/B testing to understand what works for your audience.
  3. There is no one rule which works well everywhere.
  4. HTTPS is a must for the site.
  5. Build different version for mobile and desktop, use different content if possible.
  6. Show your product which is your largest revenue generator only on Homepage.
  7. Do not clutter with lots of information.
  8. We live in a low trust world. Try to build trust. How we build is “Testimonials.”
  9. Put factual data on site.

Concluding Remarks:-

Keynote talk by Rohan Ayyar was fascinating. He showed some facts, Google Search Results and information which were shocking, entertaining and hilarious.

Session by Arun Agarwal on CRO was enlightening and something which the audience enjoyed. He tried his best to keep the sessions very interactive and always answered questions.

Website Audit done by Abhishek Rungta was from UI/UX point of view. I expected that he would do an audit from a SEO point of view since it was an event backed by SEMRUSH, which is a SEO Audit tools.

Overall, I would rate it as an average event.

Dinner promised was not served, they handed us a packet which contained a sandwich, Patties, and two sweets. ?

It is all I have to say, and now it is over to my reader.

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