- Mobius Audit
Shoe wholesaler Peltz Shoes (Peltz) came to us in October of 2023 as they were unsure where they needed to focus their attention to scale their brand. We conducted a full Mobius audit for the brand, to unpack where the pitfalls lay, and where the largest areas for improvements could be found.
The Challenge
In completing the Mobius audit for Peltz, we were able to pinpoint the main areas for improvement, namely: Branding, SEO, and performance marketing, and the website’s over reliance on third party apps.
- Branding
Peltz own branding was limited, with the website relying heavily on the visual identity of the brands that the wholesaler stocked, rather than having a unique and distinguishable visual identity of their own. In order to build direct trust between potential customers and the Peltz brand, we developed ‘what if’ campaign artwork to be utilised across the website and within marketing. This presented the brand with a recognisable visual identity that could be utilised to build brand awareness and set them apart from competitors, both online and in store.
- SEO and Performance Marketing
From an SEO perspective, only 5.2% of the 30,000 non-branded search terms that Peltz ranked for appeared on page one of Google, however, these non branded search terms resulted in 27 times more searches than branded ones. A primary concern was a decrease in branded organic search impressions, however, we discovered that 82% of Peltz’ sessions were coming from paid, branded traffic. This prioritisation of branded search campaigns was cannibalising organic efforts and ultimately taking budget away from acquisition focused campaigns.
We recommended adjustment to their branded search campaigns to allow for increased efficiency and suggested a trophy search term approach to their SEO strategy moving forward.
- Heavy reliance on third party apps.
Thirdly, the Peltz website made use of 31 third party apps. Third party apps are extremely useful as they provide functionalities that straight out of the box eCommerce platforms, such as Shopify, don’t. However, they should be used sparingly as, not only were a large portion of Peltz’ 31 apps redundant or interfering with one another, but with each app that a site implements, the overall site speed takes a hit. A slow site is an issue in itself, and it can set off a chain reaction of other issues as a result.
83% of consumers expect a website to load in 3 seconds or less, and on desktop, this was not an issue, as Peltz was loading in 2.3 seconds. However, the same can’t be said for their mobile store, which was taking a whopping 12 seconds to load. Since mobile browsing dominates web traffic, mobile site speed has become one of the most important factors in a website’s eCommerce performance. Not only does this frustrate users that reach the store, it was impacting Peltz’ search results, as performance related metrics are used in Google’s algorithm to determine how strongly a website ranks. Furthermore, when running a scan on Peltz’ core web vitals, we found that both the desktop and mobile stores failed the test overall, which only further impacts a site’s organic search ranking.
- Recommendations for Website
- Recommendations for Design and Branding
- Recommendations for Marketing Channels
The Solution
Upon the completion of the audit, which also accounted for Peltz’ website experience, performance in the major eCommerce metrics, and their marketing channels, we presented our findings to Peltz along with recommendations for improvement across all channels.
Key recommendations included, Peltz brand specific campaign framework and a clear visual identity system to allow the brand to be at the forefront of marketing messaging. Streamlining of website functionality to allow for a more concise user journey that does not overwhelm. Refocus on acquisition led SEO tactics and technical optimisations across the website, including page titles and meta descriptions. A full funnel marketing strategy to take potential purchasers from awareness to conversion.
The Outcome
Following our recommendations we took on a new website project for Peltz, helping them to migrate to an upgraded, and custom, Cake Shopify theme. Not only will this allow us to replace the need for a number of their third party apps with custom functionality built into Shopify directly, but it will also play a large part in improving the site speed, creating a more distinguished brand and setting Peltz up for long term success.
Want a Mobius Audit for your brand? Contact us.
Every great relationship starts with a conversation. We’d love to talk with you about your next project and answer any questions you might have about Shopify. But be warned… once we get talking about this stuff, it’s hard to shut us up!
.png)
.png)
