SEO for museums: How to get it right
Search Engine Optimisation is not only about increasing the chances that people will find you online; it’s about convincing them to visit your website and take meaningful actions - driving key metrics such as revenue and footfall as a result.
Sounds like something everyone should be doing, right? Absolutely. But it can be tricky to know where to start and what kind of content museums can create to appeal to Google’s algorithms.
First we’ll break down how SEO works and then we’ll cover a few practical, actionable ways that museums can boost their SEO and drive more organic traffic to their site.
Work in a theatre? Check out our guide to SEO for theatres and arts venues
SEO — how does it work?
Actually, before we get to the how, let’s make sure we’re all on the same page about the what: Search Engine Optimisation is the process of strategically adjusting your content so that it can be more visible in search engine results. If somebody searches on Google (other search engines are available) using a query which is related to what you do, you want to make sure that you’re not only in the results but that you’re as close to the top of those results as possible.
The trick is in finding a balance whereby you’re satisfying the search engines’ algorithms while still delivering high quality content to humans. Fortunately that’s what search engines want as well: people will only use a search engine if it provides them with useful results, after all.
Here’s what Google is looking for when it comes to site rankings:
Pages that have relevant information about the search query: Google bots crawl your website content and algorithmically determine whether pages are relevant based on the keywords they contain (more on those later)
High-quality, unique content that accurately answers search queries, is well written and does not keyword-cram or contain clickbait
A good level of engagement on your website’s pages: do readers stay on your site, or immediately bounce back to the search page and click another link?
A fast loading time and mobile-friendly design
While reaching some of these SEO standards will require web development and design upgrades, many are achievable with a good content strategy. High-quality landing page copy that makes it easy for users to navigate your website will be regarded favourably by Google’s algorithm. Delivering varied content like videos, graphics, images and informative blog posts will keep your visitors engaged and make Google happy.
Technical SEO
If your museum is having problems with SEO and you’re not sure why, it might be that Google can’t find your content. Sometimes the technology that a website is built with can make it difficult for Google to efficiently identify a site’s content.
One of our clients’s websites was delivering content dynamically, which provided an effective user experience but had the unintended consequence of making much of the site’s content invisible to search engines. This was negatively impacting SEO performance and organic traffic numbers and we worked with the developer to implement changes to address the issue:
As you can see, once the technical issue was resolved, their site became increasingly visible in search results and more visitors were able to find their content. If you’ve experienced something similar and your site still isn’t ranking as it should, get in touch — we can help.
Keywords
Including keywords in your URL, page titles, blog subheadings and web copy is one of the easiest and most important ways you can achieve good SEO. Keywords are the glue that connects the search terms people entering on Google with the content on your museum’s website.
When deciding which keywords your museum would like to rank for, be mindful of competition. You want to find the balance between specific and generic: if you try and rank for ‘UK museums’ for example, you’ll get lost in the crowd; but get too niche and you might lose out by only reaching a small handful of people. Search volume is the number of people searching for your keyword term and is therefore a good indicator of how many people you’re likely to reach.
Ultimately, it all comes down to knowing your audience: what they’re looking for online, how they search for it on Google, and why they come to your museum for information. Once you understand that you can start creating relevant, quality content and web copy that people can more easily find on search engines.
And remember, when carrying out your strategy, be sure to avoid ‘keyword-cramming’. Google recognises when a website is stuffing copy full of keywords that aren’t necessarily relevant, hiding keywords in invisible text, and generally trying to trick the system. Sites that do this will be penalised greatly in their search ranking, so it’s important to make sure you’re being human, logical and intentional about how you use keywords for SEO.
Content — what should museums be writing about?
When it comes to the type of content that helps museums rank higher in search results, bear in mind that people are more likely to search for the subject matter a museum covers than the individual organisation itself. This means writing content on more generic search terms like ‘Impressionist painting’ or ‘abstract art’, instead of on your museum’s name or exhibition titles, to attract more people to your site.
Knowing that your museum won’t have much trouble being found in search engines by people Googling your museum name or the exhibitions you have on, let’s look at the search terms your museum should create content around - i.e. content that answers what people are searching for.
A classic mistake we see some museums make is aiming to rank #1 for a term that nobody is typing into the search bar. So how do you know what people are searching for? Here are a few tools and techniques we like to use when helping museums optimise content for search engines:
Google - one of the easiest ways to see what people are searching is to go straight to the source. Simply type a keyword or group of words into the search bar and Google will provide three useful tools: As you type, the ‘autocomplete’ suggestions will give insights into what other people have been typing, further down the page ‘People also ask’ shows related questions that people search for, and at the bottom of the page the ‘Related searches’ section lists other keywords and phrases that people are actively seeking out.
AnswerThePublic - this is a nifty database that generates useful phrases and questions people are asking around a search term. After plugging in a search term, the tool creates a circular map of relevant phrases people are typing into search engines, with results organised by subcategories like how, what and when.
Google Search Console - essentially a free, personalised SEO checker tool, Search Console helps you see the top-performing and growing queries that people search to find your website. By showing you how to optimise your website’s content for Google and improve your search results ranking, this one is well worth adding to your SEO content bag of tricks.
SEMrush - this is our go-to tool for SEO projects. It provides a lot of insight into a domain including how much organic search traffic it receives, which keywords are generating the most organic traffic and the websites that are linking to your content. You can use many of its tools for free, but they do limit the data and number of times you can run a report.
Google Trends - Google Trends lets you see how often a search term is entered into Google in comparison to Google’s total search volume over a set period of time. It’s a great way to see what search terms are currently trending and how the search volume for that term has changed over time and in different parts of the world. Another helpful feature is the related topics and queries’ section, showing what people who searched for your term also searched for.
BuzzSumo - to see what kind of content and links are being shared lots on social media, BuzzSumo is a great starting point. You can sort results by content type, date and region to get more targeted data, and also use it to see which websites are linking to a URL or domain.
By writing content that answers people’s online queries and search terms, your museum’s website will start becoming a trusted place that people go when seeking out your museum’s subject matter and expertise. In general, content informed by search results will help build trust with your audience and improve your ranking on Google and other search engines.
Links and shareability
Internal and external linking is a helpful way to show Google that your website is trusted resource for your subject matter and a quality source of information. It demonstrates that others find the site worth linking to and sharing.
Internal links simply link one page of your website to another page of your website so that users and search engines can more easily find related and relevant content. For instance, when you link an article or blog to objects in the collection or subject hub pages, you are pointing visitors and Google to other valuable content on your site.
External links (also known as ‘backlinks’) are links from an external website to your website. These are essentially an endorsement of your website - your museum knows what it’s talking about and has quality content, so I’m going to link to you on my website.
Creating connections between your own pages and outside websites sends a clear signal to search engines that you are a quality, well-structured source of information. In short, more links equals better search rankings and SEO.
Case study: Art UK
Similar to many of our museum clients’ websites, organic search is the biggest driver of traffic to the Art UK website. We were brought in to find out how they could further improve their SEO performance and increase visibility on search.
To help, our team at One Further first carried out a technical search engine optimisation audit. Then we helped refine their content strategy using keyword research and guidance on article structure.
Art UK has since been able to use our recommendations around content and technical improvements to gain more search impressions and organic search sessions on their site. For the full case study, visit here.
Can we help you?
We’ve worked on SEO projects with all sorts of museums, big and small, to perfect their strategy in whichever way works best for them. Our team is based in the UK, but we work for clients internationally.
If you’d like to find out how you can benefit from our expertise please get in touch and let’s have a chat.
(Photo by Christian Wiediger on Unsplash)