Rochford Pianos knew they needed to improve their online presence to gain greater visibility and grow their business. They weren’t completely sure how to get started with a new website, or which direction to take. Refurbishing pianos is their speciality, so Netnerd were happy to help provide some direction and assistance.
A Brief History of Rochford Pianos
Rochford Pianos was established in 1984 by Dominic Rochford. Dominic is a Member of the Institute of Musical Instrument Technology, and attended college in London gaining a City and Guilds in Musical Instrument Technology.
Dominic has a passion for restoring pianos, especially those by quality makers, and is renowned for his attention to detail which he demonstrates with commitment in the restoration workshop.
Historically Rochford Pianos have focussed on selling restored and refurbished pianos, as well as providing supplementary services such as piano tuning and piano hire for events such as concerts or recording sessions.
The online presence Rochford Pianos have historically had was a bespoke flat HTML website.
How Netnerd and Rochford Pianos Started Working Together
In February 2025, Jess at Rochford Pianos phoned in to enquire about pointing their domain to Wix. The person that they spoke to was, at the time, helping a different customer move away from Wix as their website wasn’t able to be found in search engine results.
Because, at Netnerd, we know that the value of a website comes chiefly from visitors, we felt that we should at least try to help in this capacity.
The Wix site had already been partially built so what Netnerd were able to offer was:
- A website remake using WordPress on Netnerd’s platform, for £300
- On page SEO optimisation included in the cost
- Ongoing guidance and input regarding SEO and website updating and usage
Dominic and Jess felt that this was a very reasonable cost for a new website, SEO effort and ongoing guidance. Jess felt that with some guidance she could continue to maintain the website, adding and removing pianos as they were bought and sold, and generating new, supplemental content in the future.
How Netnerd Leveraged Rochford Pianos Offerings
Google’s SEO guidance states “Google’s automated ranking systems are designed to prioritise helpful, reliable information that’s created to benefit people, and not content that’s created to manipulate search engine rankings.”
With over 30 pianos for sale, and numerous additional services available, Rochford Pianos had a lot to say that would be very helpful to anyone looking to buy a piano, hire a piano, have a piano moved, or have a piano tuned.
Netnerd could almost picture the search queries!
Because the pianos being sold were specific makes and models, Netnerd could also leverage long tail keywords to gain rankings when people searched for specific makes and models of Pianos.
Although selling pianos online wasn’t so much of a focus Netnerd decided to use Woocommerce as a product catalogue. This allowed for both an easier management of stock, and also to use Woocommerce’s product and category specific URLs to leverage the use of long tail keywords.
The sum of all of the above was that a new Rochford Pianos website as created that:
- Appeals to existing local owners of Pianos, who needed services such as tuning, repair or renovation.
- Is visible on a national scale to parties looking to purchase specific makes or models of pianos.
- Could be easily updated, maintained and added to, as and when required.
- Allowed for stock management.
A Small Amount of Guidance Goes a Long Way
Netnerd can’t really take the credit for all of this. Jess pretty much picked up the ball and ran with the website, SEO and ongoing updated.
An initial call and with a remote access session was undertaken. This provided an overview of how WordPress, Woocommerce and Rank Math SEO all worked. In addition the concepts of on page SEO were provided, and an explanation covering how to add valuable content that was SEO optimised. This provides more advantageous SEO, as opposed to trying to manipulate Google’s algorithm.
Jess reworked a lot of the piano product pages on the website, providing a deeper level of content, under Dominic’s oversight. Jess also added pages covering topics such as customisation, and how to choose a piano that’s right for you.
Jess had really taken on board what she’d been told about SEO and website content, and come up with some really valuable additions and enhancements to the website.
The Effect of a New SEO Optimised Website
Before the new website was deployed, www.rochfordpianos.co.ukw was averaging around 4 click throughs from Goggle search per week, with a position that was around half way down page 5 of Google search results.
After a month of the new website being online, weekly visits had increased to 12 click throughs from Google search per week, with a position that was around half way down page 3 of Google search results.
At around the 6 month mark, weekly visits had increased to 36 click throughs from Google search per week, with a position that was around half way down page 2 of Google search results for more competitive search terms and on page one of Google for more specific terms (such as parties searching for specific pianos to buy).
This translates as roughly nine times more weekly visitors, and an improvement in search engine rankings of 3 or 4 pages depending on the search query.
From a sales perspective in the last 6 months, Rochford Pianos have seen an increase in sales of around 300%, and a respective increase in turnover.
A Small Investment Goes a Long Way
To gain a ninefold increase in website click throughs, a positional increase to page one, and a 300% increase in turnover, the initial investment of £300 has already been covered.
Rochford Pianos now have a platform on which they can build to increase their online visibility. Although it’s yet to be undertaken, social media promotion is something that Dominic and Jess will soon be starting.
The key takeaway from this exercise, is really that you don’t need to invest an excessive amount to beat all your competitors for your desired search terms. Instead a focussed effort with the objective of reaching your target market helps to maximise the return on a relatively small investment.
Although the days of having a website resulting in a boom in sales are probably passed, a targeted effort, a good product knowledge and some website and SEO insight all being bought together can result in a tangible improvement in sales and revenue.
It’s been a pleasure to work with Jess and Dominic, and to see an improvement in website traffic, and to also hear that sales and revenue are also increasing.
