The study was conducted with a SearchPilot customer in the travel industry, who was considering a major website update and wanted to ensure that changes would not adversely affect their traffic.
The focus was on the internal linking block—a crucial element for site navigation and SEO.
The hypothesis was straightforward: a smaller, less obtrusive linking block might improve the overall readability and visual appeal of the page.
This, in turn, could enhance the user experience by making the site easier to navigate and the content easier to find.
Improved user experience often leads to better engagement metrics, which are key factors in Google’s ranking algorithms.
To test this theory, the size of the internal linking block was reduced, and the impact on organic traffic was closely monitored.
The results were promising, showing a predicted uplift in traffic of 10.2%.
Although this result was statistically inconclusive at the 95% confidence level, it was positive at the 90% confidence level, suggesting some level of success.
Encouraged by these findings and the absence of any negative impacts, the customer decided to roll out the change across all pages.
Changes to website design, no matter how small, can have measurable impacts on SEO performance.
https://www.searchpilot.com/resources/case-studies/seo-split-test-lessons-reducing-link-block
P.S.
We don’t get any data or info about what, if anything, happened to the pages targeted in those links.
Blocks like these are often for SEO purposes over task completion, and Google may classify such elements as supplementary.
Pure guess, but distance to main content may matter.