Aitchison Raffety is a UK property consulting leader, delivering a full range of property and advisory services. They’re well-known, reputable and have no trouble winning business. However, there are always new leads online, and their website traffic and conversion had huge potential to do more.
When AR first engaged us three years ago, a new website was not in the budget or part of their plan. They wanted us to boost traffic and increase their conversion rate, but we had to work with what we had. Our caveat was that we could drive and increase relevant traffic through SEO, Content Marketing and Social Media, but without a site redesign, we could not control or guarantee that the conversion rate would be high.
Despite the caution, we were able to deliver impressive results. We increased traffic to the existing site through SEO, keyword research, and site optimisation. Then we introduced Melu’s live chat service to help convert those leads.
So impressed with the results, Managing Director, Phil Waite, participated in a YouTube video praising the Melu solution. Through our SEO and Melu, they saw £4,000-5,000 per month in new business.
Since then, we have been AR’s strategic digital marketing partner and continued to suggest that a new commercially focused website would be a game changer.
MissionRe-design and develop a user-friendly website that drives traffic and conversions
After three years of working together and delivering solid results, we felt confident that this new website project was going to be fun. They knew us. We knew them. It was going to be a breeze. But that didn’t go exactly to plan.
We knew the expectations of this project were high. We had financial targets and goals to hit, and we had been the ones touting how this new site could deliver more. It was imperative that we met the hype we had set.
What we faced was a huge site with infrastructure that had to be completely rethought. The content and imagery had to be revisited. The quality control process and user acceptance testing went over budget and almost missed the deadline. With the iterations and some scope creep, we were at risk of missing their big launch. We were now frustrating the client and causing some concern.
Our scope was to rethink, re-design and build a brand-new WordPress site that involved multiple 301 redirects. We had to increase enquiries, drive visitors to specialist sector pages and most importantly improve the bottom line.
Getting uncomfortably close to the deadline, the team had to dig deep. MD Natasha Ellard project managed, our Head of SEO was part of the project team, our Developer on the project worked overtime, and we maintained tight communications with the AR internal team.
After two more user acceptance testing meetings and one final push, we went live before their big launch.
What we delivered was an aesthetically pleasing site that was on profile for their target audience. It delivered the anticipated high conversion rates and performed as a commercial vehicle rather than just a pretty site.
A concern when Aitchison Raffety first came to us was that the majority of their organic website traffic was coming from branded search terms. Going forwards, a key goal of theirs was to improve their online visibility for non-branded terms.
After the new site launched and with the solid SEO considerations in place, we managed to achieve 33 significant improvements for non-branded keywords. Organic visibility improved, average position for keywords increased, and within 7 months the site recorded 252 goal conversions (form submissions, emails clicks, and phone number taps on the website).
Another objective was to reduce bounce rate by 10% and increase average session duration by 25%. We are pleased to say that the introduction of the new website reduced bounce rate by 13% and increased average session duration by 29%.
In addition to this;
WHAT THEY SAYUrban Element have demonstrated real expertise in Search Engine Optimisation, Lead Generation, and Web Design. We like the way they set goals, targets and measure results. The ROI to date has been great and we look forward to working with them in 2023.Philip Waite, Managing Director
