Enterprise SEO Case Study - Cherry Creek Mortgage Company Brands

Win Results Everyone Can See

Client: The Cherry Creek Mortgage Company
Client Since: 2017 - Current
Client Industry/Vertical: Financial Services, B2C
Client Location: The corporate office is centered in Centennial (DTC), Colorado with offices spread throughout the USA.
Services Provided: SEO Strategy, Content Marketing, Data Auditing and Analytics Dashboarding.

Cherry Creek Mortgage, a Gray Dot Company SEO Client

In early 2017, the team at Cherry Creek Mortgage Company approached The Gray Dot Company to support the rebranding and platform migration of their corporate enterprise website. Their goal was to keep and grow their existing organic traffic numbers through a well-researched, effective SEO strategy.

Despite their progress up to this point, their ranking keywords were not connected to a well-defined objective. As a result, the majority of their organic traffic was not converting into sales or other meaningful outcomes. The Gray Dot Company sought to lay a strong foundation for a data-driven strategy and technical SEO plan CCMC could use to laser-focus their goals.

Because the project exceeded expectations, CCMC asked for our help to redesign and deploy all of their existing mortgage lending brands as well as over 150 entirely new ones, including Blue Spot Home Loans, Pentrust Mortgage Company, a variety of Loan Officer-specific vanity sites, and more.

Since then, we have shifted our focus to ongoing enterprise SEO consulting. Our goal: fulfill their technical, strategic, and content search engine optimization needs at a high level across all subdivisions at scale.

Key SEO/Client Concerns:

  • Locality-specific keyword research & targeting
  • On-domain and cross-domain duplicate content
  • “Thin” content pages in need of optimizing
  • Scalable GA tracking and event/conversion tracking
  • Opinionated internal stakeholders who a) want different things to be done in different ways and b) often compete with each other for the same leads rather than bring in their own separate piece of the pie
  • Positive coordination & cooperation with CCMC's large internal marketing strategy & content creation teams - be a partner, not a barrier

CHERRY CREEK MORTGAGE COMPANY & OWNED BRANDS SEO RESULTS:

  • 517% Increase in Search Awareness
  • 97% of Loan Originators on Page 1
  • 95% of Branches in Top 5 Listings
  • 67% of Lead Conversions from Organic Search

ORGANIC SEARCH TRAFFIC

Organic Search traffic results chart

ORGANIC KEYWORD RANKINGS

Organic Keyword Rankings chart

ORGANIC LEAD CONVERSIONS

Organic Lead Conversion Chart

To supercharge traffic and manage the needs of their wide variety of platforms, we created a central decision-making platform. From there we could visualize, plan for, and prevent common stumbling blocks hyper-growth companies typically experience. Problems such as deploying content across all owned sites without creating duplication issues and limiting unnecessary complexities with maintenance (plus technical debt) were high on our list of priorities.

Next, we worked intimately with CCMC’s development team to create a unique plan that defined when and where site-specific customizations were needed. We streamlined how we could replicate solutions across their 100+ properties. We also found other areas in which we could depend on pattern matching dynamic variables to create mid-level customization.

Along the way, we were asked to negotiate the needs of various stakeholders. Each contributor had their own agenda and desires, which often directly conflicted with one another.

To get everyone on the same page we led strategic conversations on meeting those needs, actively discussing and managing each member’s concerns along the way. In the end, we were able to devise solutions that both put CCMC’s best interests front and center while also leaving our group of opinionated stakeholders happy with the outcome.

Afterward, we clearly defined MVP launch and post-launch standards. With this unifying foundation established, we worked to further improve customization for individual websites. Throughout this entire months-long process we kept a keen eye on steady and sustainable organic search growth that would bring in the high-quality targeted leads CCMC needed to skyrocket their goals.

Additional SEO Projects:

  • ‍Backlink Audit & ongoing disavow process
  • Link Building Strategy
  • Algorithm update monitoring
  • Content strategy support: quality content creation, planning, and on-page optimization of existing content.
  • E-A-T audit & recommendations
  • Google Analytics & Tag Manager Audit & maintenance
Blue Spot Home Loans, an SEO client

Example results from the CCMC owned-brand, Blue Spot Home Loans:

ORGANIC SEARCH TRAFFIC - BLUE SPOT HOME LOANS

organic-traffic-bshl

ORGANIC KEYWORD RANKINGS - BLUE SPOT HOME LOANS

organic-keyword-ranking-bshl

Now in 2020, we continue to work with Cherry Creek through hands-on SEO consulting and execution across their suite of websites.

Need help making good, large-scale decisions about SEO for your enterprise lead generation website? Reach out to The Gray Dot Company, an SEO company, now!

UPDATE

Enterprise SEO Results continue to grow for Cherry Creek Mortgage, as we continue to strategize, iterate, and improve. Here’s an updated graph through November 2020. Sustained enterprise SEO growth IS possible!

Even better organic traffic results for CCMC - screenshot from GA
SEO Client Testimonial

David Arnett

CMO @ Cherry Creek Mortgage
Enterprise SEO Case Study - Cherry Creek Mortgage Company Brands
"Without their guidance and advice in building our SEO architecture, we would not be ranking on page one of search as we are."

“Gray Dot has been instrumental in our success as a top mortgage lender. Without their guidance and advice in building our SEO architecture, we would not be ranking on page one of search as we are.  We started contracting with Tory in 2017 when we re-branded our corporate image, which included a launch of the cherrycreekmortgage.com website. Since 2017 we have increased our search awareness by 517%. Ninety seven percent of our originators are on the first page of search and ninety five percent of our branches are in the top 5 listings.  

Tory is an extreme professional and easily translates her ideas to successful campaign strategies. She is not only a contractor but a friend to our company. We enjoy our brainstorming sessions together and always seek her advice before moving on any large search projects. She uses the power of data to justify her advice and always has our best interests at heart.  

We love working with Tory and would highly recommend her to any business.”

Client Location: Centennial, Colorado, USA
Client Industry/Vertical:
Financial Services, B2C
Services Provided: SEO Strategy, Tech SEO, Content Marketing, SEO Copywriting, Data Auditing and Analytics Dashboarding

Read our Enterprise SEO Case Study about our work with CCMC.

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