The Q3 2024 benchmarking report for UK online opticians has just been published. Learn how the top 10 opticians perform across the digital space.

The latest Q3 2024 benchmarking report for UK online opticians has just been published. It covers the largest 10 UK online opticians, including Black & Lizars, Bayfields Opticians and Audiologists, David Clulow, Specsavers, Eyesite, Scrivens Opticians & Hearing Care, Eye Emporium, Vision Express, Duncan and Todd Group, and Leightons Opticians and Hearing Care.

The research gives an inside track on who is winning the biggest share of voice online, and quantifies the gaps, risks and missed opportunities for other online opticians to win brand exposure, drive traffic online and, for those with bricks and mortar locations, even increase in-store footfall. The report highlights quick wins that will improve enquiries from your online strategy and identifies the barriers that may be reducing your site’s ability to optimise digital performance.

To see a preview and contents page of the Q3 report, click here. To get a copy of the full report and the key takeaways, please complete the enquiry form below or schedule a call.

Q3 2024 winners leader board

For a glance into just 6 of the metrics, we evaluated these top 10 online opticians on, check out our quick-look table below;

Request the Report

Continue reading for further detail on this quarter's best and poorest-performing UK online opticians or request a copy of the report for the full review.

What The Industry Research Report Covers

The 70+ pages of research benchmarks each site based on 50+ metrics and indicators of successful digital strategy, including organic visibility, domain authority, paid media ads, conversion performance, technical performance, site speed, universal search, content, social ads, accessibility, and mobile performance.  

Driving Optimal ROAS from Paid Media Channels

Some of the leading players in the space are high spenders on paid media channels such as Google, Bing & Facebook - but have a poor or sub-optimal conversion improvement strategy. Without an optimised, sophisticated conversion strategy that maximises the conversion rate, the return on investment is unsustainable or will underperform. Scaling spend on paid media is not achievable unless the conversion rate delivers optimal performance in the sector. Some in the space have paid media spend levels from 30k+ per month but dedicate minimal resources and budgets to conversion testing.  Given the cost per clicks on ad networks will continue to rise, we recommend spending at least 10% of your paid media budget on ongoing conversion optimisation testing schedules to ensure your paid media ROI maintains long-term viability, competitive advantage, and sustainability.

Technical Website Compliance

Savvy digital marketers know that having a technically sound website is an essential component of a successful fully integrated digital strategy - plus a site capable of maximising conversion performance. Online opticians will want to ensure that key pages are easy to navigate to and access, such as prescription information, any trial packages they offer, or store locators.

Eyesite reported 16 4xx errors — the highest of all UK online opticians. It’s important that this optician — and any other that encountered 4xx errors — reviews URLs for spelling mistakes and fixes any broken links to prevent negatively impacting the user’s experience and trust in the brand.

Site Speed & Conversion Rate Performance

When 62% of consumers are less likely to convert if they have a negative mobile site experience, ensuring that your site is quick and easy to load makes a significant improvement on your overall conversion rates. For online opticians, they’ll want to ensure their site is fast, and well-prepared for customers to browse new frames on the go.

In our previous report, Bayfields Opticians and Audiologists flagged the slowest mobile site speed (7). This quarter, this UK online optician has increased this figure to 58. Vision Express now has the slowest site speed (31), while Eye Emporium has the fastest site speed (59). It’s important that all brands aim for at least 50% to prevent customers from becoming frustrated with a slow website.

Building Competitive Advantage with Domain Authority

Domain authority is an essential metric for measuring the effectiveness of SEO performance, and helps create a reliable overall gauge of how effective your site is at achieving organic traffic, i.e. ‘free’ traffic that isn’t gained through sponsored ads. As the nine opticians in our report range from online-only, to well known, long-standing retail chains, we’d expect to see a wide range of scores in domain authority.

A ‘good’ DA really comes down to how your competitors are performing, however it’s generally considered average between 40 and 50, good between 50 and 60, and excellent above 60. The DA for this quarter ranged between 73 and 29, with Eye Emporium and Black & Lizars reporting the lowest DA scores. Both opticians should adopt a PR strategy to help increase the number of domains that provide backlinks, as they were in the bottom 3 for this category. Receiving backlinks from high-authoritative websites with a similar audience can increase a brand’s DA score and improve its ranking in SERPs.

Organic Performance – Mobile & Desktop

A strong organic performance is strategically important as it ensures your site ranks above competitors for key, transactional keywords. When 93% of your customers won’t go past the first page of Google, your absence or lack of targeting for essential keywords will cost you conversions. We’ve noted that the cost-of-living crisis has impacted traffic levels in many sectors, with consumers putting off purchases of treats and expendables for later dates. However, as opticians provide essential items, we’d expect brands to be able to maintain performance year on year, even if they may be seeing a reduction in traffic to high end ranges, and more traffic to lower to mid-range products.

In our previous report, 3 brands reported a loss in organic desktop traffic, while 7 reported a loss in organic mobile traffic. This quarter, 4 brands saw a decrease in organic mobile traffic, while all brands saw an increase in organic desktop traffic. It’s to be expected that there will be a fluctuation in organic traffic each quarter, and brands can increase their traffic by adopting a successful keyword strategy.

Universal Search Opportunity

Google Universal Search Results is an evolving opportunity to make your pages visible on a SERP (Search Engine Results Page). Universal results often appear before traditional listings and are eye-catching for users. Universal search results refer to rankings on a SERP that are not the traditional ‘blue line’ Google link, and a site can appear for universal search results without being strong in standard rankings. For opticians with high street branches, ‘Local Pack’ results are a useful way of dominating SERPs and ensuring they can capture attention from users still looking for an in-person experience.

Vision Express remains at the top spot for the most Universal Search appearances (48,086 — an increase from 47,516 in the previous quarter). On the other hand, Duncan and Todd Group reported the fewest Universal Search appearances (6), and it should use images that suit the content’s topic for that page.

The Longtail Keyword Opportunity

Longtail keywords are often considered high intent and potentially more likely to convert as a searcher is being more specific. Optimising for longtail keywords also puts your content strategy in a strong position to rank for brand new search terms as they enter Google’s index. Online opticians may find it particularly useful to optimise for keywords showing both high-conversion intent, and information-seeking phrases that may be more often searched at the consideration phase.

Specsavers continues to secure the most longtail keyword appearances in position 3 (13,188 — an increase from 12,098 in our previous report). Though Leightons Opticians and Hearing Care is further down the leaderboard for position 3, it’s ranking in the top 4 for positions 4–10 (622).

Facebook Adverts

With the number of Facebook users in the United Kingdom (UK) hitting over 44 million users in 2023, it is not surprising that companies have jumped at the opportunity to advertise on the social media platform. Facebook’s UK digital advertising revenue has been estimated to have breached 2.6b GB pounds in 2019. Facebook ads provide an opportunity for opticians to quickly reach audiences with offers, new lines, and key products they’re looking to push.

We’ve included 3 examples of Specsaver’s sponsored Facebook posts. While this UK online optician included vertical videos to cater to users on a mobile, it should focus on writing posts that are across fewer lines and more scannable for scrollers.

Top Social Shares & Content

When it comes to social media and on-site content strategies, it is important to release content that has a longer shelf life. An article is considered 'Evergreen' if it has maintained its relevancy to an audience for longer. It's great for your brand engagement, but great for Google too, who will recognise content which achieves traffic over a long period of time. Though Facebook advertising can be used to boost visibility for brands on the platform, having a strong portfolio of content to draw upon helps build a connection with your audience, as well as providing helpful content that guides them down the conversion funnel.

Specsavers reported the most total engagement (1,625) — a category that all brands should assess to track whether their social media followers are interacting with their content.

Website Readability & Accessibility

20% of people in the UK have a disability – 2 million of which are people living with sight loss. In addition, 1 in 12 men and 1 in 200 women have some degree of colour vision deficiency. When websites are not designed to meet these needs, brands lose customer interest as they turn elsewhere. Online opticians should be particularly mindful of having an accessible site, as being poorly prepared for visually impaired users could not only lose customer confidence but look very poor for their brand!

In our previous report, Eyesite flagged 15 contrast errors, which remains the same this quarter. David Clulow flagged 50 accessibility alerts in our last report, which it’s increased to 59 this quarter. It’s important that brands amend redundant title text, optimise images, avoid very small text, amend suspicious alt txt, and more to help with readability for those using a screen reader.

GET THE FULL 70-PAGE Q3 2024 REPORT

To get a copy of the full report, please complete the enquiry form. If you want to talk to us about accelerating your digital performance, please call us on 01543 410014 or schedule a call with Mike Movassaghi.