How EAB Helped Lewis & Clark College Increase Organic Traffic and Create a Student-Centric .Edu

While Lewis & Clark College (L&C) had a strong website and a wealth of student voices on their .edu, they struggled to source and convert prospective students because of limited search engine visibility, text-heavy pages, recurring jargon, and confusing navigation. To better utilize their website as an enrollment tool, they desired page-level SEO and content hierarchy improvements.

EAB worked closely with the L&C team to optimize web content and elevate calls to action for prospective audiences—all while leveraging existing website modules and social proof. Following a thorough web audit (including SEO, navigation, and content), EAB worked with L&C to increase web traffic, improve program page visibility in organic search, reduce jargon, and convert that traffic to inquiries. EAB’s content strategies highlighted what differentiates L&C in the Pacific Northwest marketplace and developed content centered on the unique L&C student experience.

In collaboration with EAB’s Web & Digital Solutions team, L&C improved their content hierarchy to showcase their welcoming community while increasing ease of access to enrollment-critical pages such as Admissions and Paying for College. Through search optimized page titles and content-level improvements, each landing page saw a substantial improvement in keyword rankings and user visits have significantly increased.

L&C diversified content and incorporated new keywords, resulting in a 17% increase in overall keyword rankings, with 69% of overall web traffic coming from organic search (versus 60% prior to EAB support). Finally, EAB supported a similar approach to content enhancements across L&C’s Graduate and Law School sub-domains, with another expansion on the horizon.