Stop Overcomplicating Digital Experience Optimization

Marketers know: Budgets aren't growing, but expectations keep climbing. According to Gartner's 2024 CMO Spend Survey, we're living in "the era of less" – and that reality isn't changing anytime soon.

The good news? You don't need to completely overhaul your tech stack or hire more people to achieve meaningful improvements. Digital Experience Optimization (DXO) offers a practical path forward, helping your team maximize ROI by making smarter use of existing tools and resources.

In a recent webinar, Elevated Third CEO Jeff Calderone and I explored how businesses can simplify their approach to DXO while driving better results. Their conversation revealed five key areas where marketing teams can make immediate impact without adding unnecessary complexity.

What Digital Experience Optimization Really Means

Before diving into tactics, let's first clear up the buzzwords. DXO isn't about fancy new technology or complicated processes. Griffin Smith defined it as "the ability to optimize any digital experience that we're creating" by using behavioral data to create more personalized, seamless interactions that drive conversions.

Whether your goal is content consumption, lead generation, or e-commerce sales, DXO helps you get there by focusing on what actually moves the needle. And the best part? You can start with the tools you already have.

Want to hear more about how leading organizations approach DXO? Watch the full webinar for detailed strategies and real-world examples.

Content: Building Trust in the AI Era

Search has fundamentally changed. AI models now directly serve up answers, meaning your content needs to earn trust and authority in new ways. "Content is king, queen, and all things in between," said Griffin Smith – but only if you approach it strategically.

Four key principles drive AI-friendly content:

• Trustworthiness matters more than ever: AI models favor well-sourced, fact-based content with strong external citations and mentions. Building reputation outside your own domain becomes crucial for getting your content surfaced in AI responses.
• Structure beats creativity: Clear, direct content with summaries and bullet points performs better than flowery prose. AI tools can actually help here – Griffin Smith noted that tools like Jasper excel at simplifying complex content into digestible formats.
• Freshness > volume: Outdated content gets ignored by AI systems and can hurt your overall content performance. Regular updates and content audits aren't nice-to-haves anymore – they're essential.
• Context drives discovery: Structured content and schema markup help search engines and AI models understand what your content means, not just what it says.

Accessibility: The Business Case Beyond Compliance

Accessibility often gets treated as a checkbox exercise, but Griffin Smith's experience tells a different story. After implementing accessibility improvements, her team discovered they were missing nearly 17% of potential audience traffic on inaccessible sites.

Beyond the obvious ethical arguments, accessibility improvements deliver measurable business results. Griffin Smith's team saw a 2% increase in form conversions after adding accessibility features – proof that better experiences benefit everyone, not just users with disabilities.

The technology exists to make accessibility easier too. From automated captions that help users in noisy environments to color contrast improvements that enhance readability for everyone, accessibility features often solve problems you didn't even know you had.

Experimentation: Building a Culture of Continuous Improvement

Small tests create big wins, but many teams struggle to make testing a habit. Griffin Smith's approach focuses on empowering teams to test constantly rather than treating it as a special project.

For example, her team recently tested industry-specific copy and imagery on a product page. While conversion rates haven't yet improved, leading indicators like time on page and click-through rates showed promise. Instead of calling it a failure, they're expanding the test to multiple industry pages.

The key insight? Teams need tools and permission to experiment. Having "That scoreboard... unlocks creativity if you know what you're looking for," Calderone shared. When everyone understands the end goal (better conversions, higher engagement, stronger pipeline), they naturally look for ways to improve their piece of the puzzle.

Findability: Balancing Traditional SEO With Answer Engine Optimization

SEO isn't dead, but it's certainly changing. And Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) – optimizing content for AI-powered search responses – works alongside traditional SEO rather than replacing it.

"If you start with thinking about answer engine optimization, then you're actually going to do well with SEO, too," said Griffin Smith. Both strategies require high-quality, structured content that provides clear value to users.

The difference lies in intent. "Answer engine optimization is more likely to be late funnel... late funnel questions are more likely to convert. They're closer to the money, rather than ‘what is a thing’ they’re asking ‘what is the best version of a thing’" said Calderone.

Consider this: someone asking "what is marketing automation?" might browse several articles. Someone asking "best marketing automation for B2B companies" is closer to making a purchase decision – and that's where AEO shines..

Ready to dive deeper into findability strategies? The full webinar includes detailed examples of how to track and optimize for both SEO and AEO.

Measurement: Moving Beyond Vanity Metrics

Most marketing teams can measure everything but struggle to know what actions to take. Griffin Smith advocates for focusing on content performance rather than just channel performance.

"We spend as much on content creation now as we do on those channels," she explained. But most measurement focuses on email click-through rates or website traffic sources rather than identifying the specific content pieces that drive the best results.

Effective content measurement looks at consumption patterns by audience segment, identifies top-performing pieces, and – crucially – flags "corrosive" content that attracts traffic but doesn't convert. Understanding these patterns can help your team double down on what works…and fix what doesn't.

The Path Forward: Integration Over Fragmentation

Perhaps the most important insight from the webinar concerns integration. Acquia's research found that 93% of marketing professionals struggle with fragmented martech stacks that limit efficiency and scale. Meanwhile, 70% prioritize vendor consolidation.

The solution isn't necessarily buying new tools – it's connecting what you already have. Integration matters even more in an AI-driven world: "Simplification is even more important when AI is running the show, because you need to give it very specific parameters. Not only so it is clear what it's supposed to do, but then you know what works," Calderone explained.

When everything is overly complicated, you end up with "a mess both in execution and in reporting," as Calderone put it. Griffin Smith's team recently retired nine individual optimization tools by implementing an integrated approach. The result? Better productivity, clearer insights, and more time for creative work.

Getting Started: Small Steps, Big Impact

You don't need a complete digital transformation to see results from DXO. Start with one area – maybe accessibility improvements or content structure optimization – and build momentum from there.

But here's where many teams get stuck: they wait until after launch to optimize. Calderone warned that "the ‘we'll optimize after launch’ mindset kills momentum." Instead, he advocates for thinking about return on investment from day one: "Can we do these things on our existing site in a way that allows us to get money sooner?"

Griffin Smith agrees, suggesting that teams "free up anybody in your team or give dedicated time for people to be able to go research and learn these tools." Even dedicating one team member to explore and test new approaches can unlock significant improvements.

Remember, the future of marketing lies in doing more with what you have, not constantly adding new complexity. DXO provides the framework to make that happen.

Want to see how other organizations are implementing these strategies? Watch the complete webinar for additional insights, real-world examples, and actionable takeaways you can implement immediately.