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Posts Tagged ‘Search engine optimization’

I’m one of those who believes that you can always learn something from your mistakes or things that go wrong. In fact sometimes you don’t know how to get to the right solution without failing miserably in the process of getting there.

SEO is one of those things where you will fail the first several tries. It’s ok. A great example is on page SEO. Meaning everything from Title tags, to H1 headers, content etc. Chances are you will not get the perfect combination of all of these with the “best” use of your keyword the first time around. So if you are wondering, well what can I do each month to improve my site…one thing is to try/test different on page SEO variations.

So technically your first attempts are not a “failure”. Thus every change you make can lead to improvement. You have to try to get anywhere to begin with, and you have to understand that you will not reach your goal of page 1 in the first few months and there is plenty of work you can do to help you get there over time.

If at first you don’t succeed try and try again!

In the world of online marketing it’s all about getting found and having a presence. Good SEO (one means of getting found) has always been about making your site and its content more relevant for search engines (obviously) and also users. Social media (another way to get found) is all about online engagement and connecting with your audience. Combining the two makes for the perfect recipe. And thus (through simple math) Good Search Strategy = Engagement=Use of Social Media

The problem isn’t that social media is useless, but you have to think about what conversions are of value to you. Consider the following value metrics:

• drive people back to your site
• receive large amount inbound links
• appealing to early adopters
• build customer relationships
• learn what your clients want, need and think (help set and meet expectations)
• manage online reputation and brand
• increase traffic from various sources
• share/distribute content yourself, and via others, word of mouth
• chance to position yourself as the best
• have honest conversation and feedback (priceless), that’s why most (successful) industry giants are now involved
• rewarded emotionally
• it’s fun (can’t deny it)
• gives small business the opportunity to leverage themselves

In every one of these cases the feedback and the metrics are coming from real people that I can reply to, hear back from and with whom I can strike up a conversation. I can legitimately justify why updating my status and adding more people to my friend list, replying to feedback and building relationships are valuable to branding, marketing and bottom line metrics for the company. Understanding all of this, and gaining that insight helps promote more conversion driven focus on your site. It helps you interpret what brought your visitors to your site, how the user first became engaged, potentially why they care…it makes all the SEO work worth it and helps those engaged users become “active” through your site.

Other things to consider:

• Find a social medium that works for you, testing and tracking are extremely important.
• Some social media sources, especially Twitter is hard to track because traffic sources are often from other tools used to connect to the application and therefore don’t always register the same with Analytics.
• Good content naturally spreads.
• You have to track visitors, leads and customers.
• Set realistic expectations – Social media cost per conversion is obviously much lower and there tend to be fewer conversions overall. The social media conversion rate almost always is less than SEO because it’s just not the same.
• Outside of time, social media is low cost. Just track how much time you spend and the leads from sources.

Part of any process of converting a visitor to a lead is nurturing and engaging that individual. While Twitter or Facebook may not be the medium for everyone, there is plenty of opportunity to become engaged, and really the question should be, can you afford not to partake?

I am sure you have been among the many recipients of cold calls (or cold emails) from some search engine firm. And if you are like me you find it completely irritating when they send you a completely bogus email with absolute nonsense information…where do they get their information? The letter may sound lucrative. They get to the point and tug on the emotional strings of their prospect, and if you don’t know better you just may go for it…but that’s why I am here to lead you down the right path.

So, here is what the email said:

Hello,

Thank you for taking a few moments to view my introduction of our search engine and web services, it really is greatly appreciated.

To be brief, I’d like to invite you to take a look at how we could greatly improve www.domain.com in terms of achieving top, organic, search engine positions.

I’ve performed a complimentary link analysis for you by utilising 2 different link checks for your website – with a reference at Google.com followed up with a more comprehensive one at Alltheweb.com. Here are your results:

• According to Google.com you have 5 incoming links
• According to Alltheweb.com you have 164 incoming links

(It’s very common for a difference to show between these two numbers, I’ll be happy to explain why if you wish to hear more)

The better your inbound link profile, the higher your website is likely to rank on Google and the more visitors (and ROI) it will bring you.  So, to improve your link profile and have your website rank highly on the search engines for your keywords, we are able to offer you a search engine promotion service that includes ethical, ongoing sourcing of links throughout the Internet with a view to building your link authority – this is achieved through a mix of links from websites, intelligent forum participation, blogs and more.

Additionally, and of equal importance, we will examine the architecture of your website and provide advice to ensure it is correctly set-up for current search engine algorithms.

We aim to achieve Top 10 rankings for your website on the major search engines, whilst protecting your ROI with our unique Performance Agreement that refunds your monthly payments should this target not be reached. Specifically:

1. We will work to achieve first page results for your website across the three most important search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN).
2. The search terms we use will be chosen by you and designed to bring you the maximum level of purchase-motivated traffic possible.
3. If we can’t achieve first page rankings for your site we will refund your money.
4. If we can’t keep your website in the Top 10 we will refund your money.

No-one can promise Top 10 rankings with absolute certainty. What we can do is protect your investment.

We are confident our methods work; they’re tested on our own R&D websites and are currently achieving first page results for many of our existing clients with search terms as tough and massively important as, ‘Graduate’, ‘sales jobs’, ‘Bling’ and ‘dresses’.

As our client, you will be kept fully updated on your campaign progress, with regular ranking reports that show you exactly how your search terms are doing on each of the search engines, and of course, regular contact with your personal technical consultant to answer your questions whenever they arise.

I’d like say thanks once more for your consideration, and you can take a closer look at what we have to offer by visiting a ‘business-card’ website we’ve compiled to provide more information for you…

When you do choose to call or drop me a line, you’ll find our approach refreshingly different, there’s no obligation, and our virtual coffee is the best!

I hope to hear from you soon, very best wishes,

Eva

Hilarious right. So I will dissect this in parts:

1. Professional firms don’t reach out cold to anyone. They work through referrals or are found in organic search or via advertisment. We use the tools that we talk about 24/7 to gain our leads.
2. Using Google for link analysis tells you nothing. When you search link:www.domain.com all that it gives you is a random sample of inbound links. It does not give you a complete list of links (ever)…I wonder if they include that as part of their explanations (doubt it).
3. Your inbound links effect your Google PR (PageRank) which is different from Page Rank (or positioning). Don’t let them fool you. PR is not nearly as influential as it once was. That said, inbound link are important, and you want to gain them naturally and having top search results listings is not the reason you gain inbound links. Sure having top page listings may gain you more traffic, and maybe those visitors will read through your site, and maybe they will share and/or link to information, but it’s not guaranteed. Nor is it guaranteed that having more inbound links will gain you top page rank. It is only one part of a hugely complex formula that helps you achieve that over time.
4. They aim to achieve top 10 rankings…cleverly phrases though still misleading. The parts that they choose to emphasize clearly lead the reader to believe that their site can end up on page 1, which should NEVER be a promise that any SEO makes. SEO should not be about selling ranking. Sure it’s seems like a good sell, that is how it worked years ago, and maybe that’s all you know how to explain.
5. Why would you let a client choose their keywords. I completely agree that keywords should be used that will help motivate leads, however this requires more than just a client telling you what keywords they want. You MUST do research, and research competitors, trends, history, search results etc.
6. As a client I would want to see more than my site’s ranking. Ranking alone does not bring in traffic. You will want to see all organic traffic sources, content viewed, time on site, entrance and exit pages, bounce rate and most importantly the number of leads through your site and specifically the source and what they did while on your site.
7. Sounds to me like a lot of their clients will be getting refunds.

PS: it helps to spell check a letter before sending it out.

What do you think? Would you go for it? Have you gotten any mail like this? What would your response be?

The vitals of success for online marketing should be a three pronged strategy. What are they? I am talking about (1) well-written and relevant content, (2) in-bound links, and (3) fans, friends, and/or subscribers. The first two figures are largely covered by SEO, but once you throw blogging and social media marketing into the mix you open up a whole new realm of possibilities.

One prong, Social media, isn’t really the next big thing anymore, but it’s not too late. Like with all good things it’s best to get started later in the game than not at all. What is new, however, is the way that it’s being used in conjunction with the tried and true search engine marketing practices. I highly recommend using social networks like stumblepon.com, twitter.com, linkedin.com, facebook.com, etc, which allow you to become more engaged with others in your community, keep up to date on trends, manage your company branding and so much more.

Ever curious about what people are saying about you or your business? Through Twitter’s search application you can actually see and monitor what people are saying about you or your business, and then you can subscribe to a feed for your query so you can continue to monitor what is being said. When you become part of larger networking communities like this you’ll start to get more of a sense as to what is being said, and in the event that someone has a negative review about you (whaaaat?)… now you have a means by which you can counter and respectfully disagree, because you are already engaged and part of the community. Of course you’ll also want to promote yourself in a more flattering way any chance that you get. And, don’t forget, all those fans and/or friends that you are gathering will help you promote your content as well.

As Twitter and other social media services evolve, they are becoming a key part of online marketing strategies. All of your efforts should work together; (1) SEO (plus PPC), (2) your blog, and (3) your social marketing. These efforts, combined, help to increase the number of inbound links and spread your content through more and more channels … all of which makes for a highly efficient online marketing strategy.

There are several key features that every blog should posses. I am going to outline some key elements that every blog must have:

Strong Engaging Posts

1. Quality on page SEO – Optimized Titles, URLs, Headers and Content.
2. A theme – your content and overall look and feel of your blog should all be around a similar topic. If you want to talk about your cat or how you helped an old lady cross the street, while that is very sweet of you, …um I don’t think anyone cares to follow that except a few of your close friends and family or unless you are a celebrity in which case you can even write about your bowel movement and people will still follow you.
3. Write posts that draw in your audience and will get them to share your content. Writing information that is helpful will do that for you. “How To” posts are a great place to start.
4. Post at least weekly and if possible twice a week.
5. Pose questions at the end of your posts to encourage engagement and feedback.
6. If you have a successful post follow it up immediately by posting another strong article.

Easy Sign up/Call to Action

1. Give people the optionto sign up via RSS. You want to have that sign up above the fold
2. Also give people the option to sign up via email. It’s old school but people still use it.
3. Show people where else they can find you. While that may mean that they read your content elsewhere my school of thought is that they are at least still following what you write and will still share your content.

An Information “About” Section

1. Make available a snippet of information through a sidebar or at least on your home page that gives your readers a glimpse as to the human side of your blog.
2. Also have a full blown about page. This page can be developed over time and should be a kick ass glimpse at what makes you, you, and what your blog is all about.

Feature this…

1. Highlight you best blog posts. Trying to find ways to keep people on your site? Give them easy access to your most popular posts.
2. Find some cool wordpress plugins that sensible and work for what you offer. Here are some wordpress plugins that I think are key.
3. Write up a post about someone else.
4. Look for new ways to attract people to your site that will hopefully also serve as link bait.

Set Goals

1. Whether your are setting goals for your social media strategy or your overall blog…have them be concrete and realistic.
2. If you are trying to promote your services or you are selling something then track your leads.
3. Consider getting comments as a possible goal/conversion measure.

A strong blog doesn’t happen overnight. You know the saying Rome wasn’t built…neither will your blog. For a lot of people it takes some time to find their voice. Once you do…keep at it.

What are some key elements that you employ on your blog? Anything you think that this list definitely should have?