The Q4 2023 benchmarking report for UK kitchen and cookware brands has just been published. Learn how the top 11 UK cookware brands perform across the digital space.
The latest Q4 2023 benchmarking report for UK kitchen and cookware brands has just been published. It covers the largest 11 national kitchen and cookware brands, including ProCook, Portmeirion, Circulon, Denby Pottery Company, Hexclad Cookware, Salter, Our Place, Le Creuset, Home & Cook, Anolon, and Grunwerg - it highlights year-on-year digital performance, plus winner and loser comparisons in 20+ online performance metrics.
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 kitchen brands to win brand exposure, generate online orders, and drive in-store interest & recognition. 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 Q4 report, click here. To get a copy of the full report and the key takeaways, please complete the enquiry form or schedule a call.
Q4 2023 Winners and Losers Summary
For a glance into just 6 of the metrics we evaluated these top 11 kitchen and cookware brands on, check out our quick-look table below;
Continue reading for further detail on this quarter's best and poorest-performing kitchen and cookware brands or request a copy of the report for the full review.
What The Industry Research Report Covers
The 70+ pages of research benchmarks each brand 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. For kitchen and cookware brands, particularly those aiming to offer a luxury cooking experience, a high-performing, easy-to-navigate website is essential for instilling consumer confidence, and ensuring that potential customers can find the products they are looking for.
Circulon has seen a dramatic increase in 4xx errors this quarter from 1,244 to 13,664. This kitchen and cookware brand will need to assess for any broken pages to prevent an additional spike, as 4xx errors can harm a visitors’ browsing experience. On the other hand, Le Creuset has made improvements to its 3xx errors, giving it a total of 2,691, though it needs to focus on fixing this area to enhance its SEO score.
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 sites such as kitchen and cookware brands, who are juggling a wide range of products and may feel the pressure to make items stand out, high-resolution images and content can hold back performance when it comes to site speed.
This quarter, mobile speed scores sit between 5 and 44. Grunwerg and Hexclad Cookware have the lowest scores (5 and 6). Hexclad Cookware uses a variety of images, videos, gifs, and slideshows on its homepage, which could all be optimized to improve the consumer experience.
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, ie. ‘free’ traffic that isn’t gained through sponsored ads. For kitchen and cookware brands, collaborations with online culinary publications, homeware suppliers, or even bloggers in their niche could be a great way to boost these figures.
Domain authority is considered average between 40 and 50, good between 50 and 60, and excellent above 60. A ‘good’ DA score depends on the competition level of the industry. However, a ‘good’ DA really comes down to how your competitors are performing. This quarter shows a DA range between 21 and 59, with ProCook dropping from 60 to 52. With such a low score range and no brands exceeding 60, each will need to build on its website presence, such as increasing inbound links and removing any broken links.
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. For brands within a space that may consider themselves more of a luxury or treat item, such as luxury kitchen and cookware, they may find that their organic traffic naturally starts shrinking, in line with a reduced consumer interest during the cost-of-living crisis.
Only three kitchen cookware brands saw an improvement in mobile traffic, with Hexclad taking the lead with a 2800% growth. While this traffic splurge is impressive, it’s important to note that Hexlcad positions at 8/11 for overall mobile traffic. While Le Creuset has seen a 5% decrease in mobile traffic, it’s received the highest traffic overall.
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 brand can appear for universal search results without being strong in standard rankings. 'Image' and 'review' results would be particularly useful for kitchen and cookware brands, who would be able to show their products to users without them visiting their site and build trust in their products by encouraging customer reviews.
ProCook leads the way with a total of 10,252 universal searches. The highest results come from searches for ‘image’ and ‘reviews’. Salter takes the lead for the number of searches for ‘reviews’ (3,900), this is a key SERP to be ranking for as consumers always want to know what peers think.
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. Kitchen and cookware brands should be optimising for longtail keywords that show high purchase intent - though they may not score highly in terms of search volume or traffic, these keywords will pay off as being more likely to secure purchases.
Le Creuset has the most searches for longtail keywords (15,625), overtaking Procook, which scores a very close second (15,223). While HexClad has second to last for the total top 100, it outperforms Home & Cook, Anolon, and Grunwerg in the top 3–10 category. This implies that HexClad has a strong keyword strategy.
Facebook Adverts
With the number of Facebook users in the United Kingdom (UK) forecast to hit over 42 million users by 2022, 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.
We’ve included Le Creuset’s Facebook ads below. This kitchen cookware brand creates a sense of urgency through its ads to encourage customers to make a purchase, the images are clean and clear but lacking in warmth. Le Creuset could test some influencer video or at home style images to give that warm 'hmmm' feeling to their socials.
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. Kitchen and cookware brands can bridge across both food-focussed recipe content, along with interior design and lifestyle pieces.
This quarter shows that Denby Pottery Company has the highest number of total engagements (10,537). Circulon has seen the biggest drop in total engagements from 563 to 123, implying that its changed its social media tactics or content. It’ll need to revert back to its previous methods, which saw better social media engagements.
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. Though the temptation may be there for luxury brands to choose style over function, they must not underestimate the impact of making their site accessible for all potential customers.
Alerts are concerning for brands, and this quarter saw HexClad with a total of 200. Denby Pottery Company has the highest score for the Flesch Kincaid Reading Ease (121.2), with a value between 60 and 80 being easy for a 12- to 15-year-old to comprehend. Denby Pottery Company also has an average Flesch Kincaid Grade Level of -3.4, making it the lowest-performing brand for readability. It should make enhancements to its readability by firstly increasing written content to be more competitive with the other brands and use simple terms and short sentences.
GET THE FULL 70-PAGE Q4 2023 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.
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