Archives : seo
How to Choose the Right SEO Strategy
We have talked about the importance of SEO maintenance previously about how you need a monthly active SEO plan to stay ahead of competition and rank high on the search engine results page (SERP). To help you choose the right SEO strategy, we will focus on what should be included in the SEO maintenance plan.
- Rank Reports – It is important to have a rank report run so you can monitor your rankings on the SERP. There could be fluctuations due to actions done by your competitor, new sites being added, and changes in the search engine algorithms. Rank reports are a must for a SEO strategy.
- Keyword Research – Competitors can try to outrank you for different keywords or long tail phrases. This means that keywords that you used to rank high for might not be optimal for you to appear on the SERP. Some keywords receive more traffic while some receive less. With the keyword research in your SEO strategy, you can determine what keyword phrases will work best for you – such as whether to rank well on high traffic keywords or target niche ones with possible better conversion rates.
- Competitive Analysis – A competitive analysis in a SEO strategy provides you with a summary of where your competitors are in terms of their SEO efforts. You can see how your competitors are ranking for your keywords and other site elements. Also what are they factors contributing to them ranking well on the SERP. Through that, you can decide the direction of your SEO efforts in order to compete. Factors that come into play include inbound links, meta tags and keyword density, and seo content.
- SEO Copywriting – It is important that your SEO strategy includes SEO copywriting because of the need for fresh content. It is important that new pages or articles are added on a regular basis as it can help expand your reach with more keywords and ways your visitors can find you. Having fresh content is also one of the important SEO ranking factors.
We have outlined the components of what we think is important for SEO maintenance, thus should be included in a SEO strategy. There are other components that are important, such as link building and social media—as outlined in SEO ranking factors. Let Smart Solutions come up with a customized active SEO strategy for you. Contact us now to find out how we can help your business.
SEO Maintenance is Ongoing
SEO is not a one-time service, but an ongoing process that businesses should monitor to maintain their organic ranks on the search engine results page (SERP). Your website is an important component of your business and is crucial for you to be found on search engines. A monthly SEO maintenance plan will ensure your business is not ignored. Here’s why:
- Search engines are constantly changing their search algorithms. A recent example is the Google Panda update. Because of the update, many popular websites that used to rank high on the SERP have dropped in ranks—some have fallen from first page of SERP to second. If you rank well for keywords now, do not be complacent. Without SEO maintenance, you might drop in ranks three months from now because of changes in search algorithms.
- Search engines tweak the SERP. When Google announced in May 2007 that they will blend search results with Universal Search, this resulted in news, images, videos and Google Local results showing on the SERP. How does this affect you? If you were previously ranked at position 3 for a certain keyword, related images and videos showing up on the SERP might result in you showing up in position 7 without SEO maintenance.
- Competitors try to and WILL outrank you. You cannot ignore your competitors, because they will not ignore you. If you rank higher than them on the SERP, you can be sure they will be working to outrank you. Ranking factors that come into play include quality of content and backlinks.
Many businesses do not have SEO maintenance because it is time consuming—keeping up with search engine trends, need to make constant SEO tweaks to website, and the importance of keeping content fresh.
Let our SEO analysts do the work for you. Contact us now to find out how we can help you with your SEO maintenance.
The Basics of SEO Copywriting
1. Content is King!
Before you begin copywriting make sure you have done your keyword research and assigned a selection of keywords (ideally shoot for five or six) to each page of your site. Try to utilize each page’s target keywords at least once within the body content. Use the primary keyword (you might choose the one you deem the most important or relevant to the page, or the keyword with the highest search volume) for each page in the first paragraph, the last paragraph and as many times possible throughout the rest of the body text (without getting ‘spammy’ of course – the script should still make sense).
2. Carefully Consider your Title Tags
There are a couple of things to consider when writing a title tag. For SEO purposes you want a title tag to be succinct and keyword rich. The more diluted a title tag becomes, the less emphasis each keyword is given. So… if for a particular page you really want to hit home for one certain keyword, try stripping everything else from your title tag. Alternatively, in a less competitive market, you might wish to target a few different keyword phrases on a single page. Ultimately the choice is yours, just be sure to separate each keyword phrase with a comma (or a symbol of the like). The second point to consider is that most frequently the title tag will be displayed as the ‘heading’ for your listing in the search engine results. Is your title tag going to ‘convince’ a potential consumer to click through to your site over the others? Lastly, to maintain brand identity you may also wish to end each title tag with a dash followed by your company name.
3. Descriptive Description Tags?
Search engines often pull a page’s description tag to act as the short ‘blurb’ in the search results. There are two main points to consider when writing a description tag.
1) Ideally, your description tag will contain your main keyword phrase within the first few words. Words from the ‘search query’ will be in bold in the search results (i.e. if a user searches for ‘brown dogs’, each time the word ‘brown’ or ‘dogs’ appears in your description it will be in bold) and likely catch the eye of a potential visitor to your site.
2) The description should be enticing in order to persuade a potential customer to click through to your site over the others.
4. Utilize Header Tags
Headings should be catchy (from a ‘traditional’ marketing standpoint) to draw in a reader, but also include your main keywords to emphasize these words in the ‘eye of the spider’. You will also want your heading to relate to your title tag (so as to minimize bounce rates) and remain relevant to the overall content of the page (to maintain your site’s reputation for reliability).
5. Internal Linking – Set Yourself Up for Success
Internal linking (a link from one page of your site to another) is very important to your overall SEO efforts. Try to create at least one internal link to every page of your site. But don’t just go adding links willy nilly, using vague phrases such as ‘click here’ and ‘learn more’ – for an internal link to be truly valuable the link text needs to include a keyword for the destination page. This will be easy if you keep the idea of internal linking in the back of your mind whilst writing your copy. When opportunity arises for you to include a keyword for one of your ‘other’ pages, highlight this keyword in another color, that way when it comes time for content placement you’ll have a visual reminder of all the spots where you had intended for an internal link to go.
6. Emphasize Your Keywords
Search engines consider bold text to be important text, so… put a few of your keywords in bold. But don’t get too carried away! You don’t want to your site to look ‘spammy’. Try opting for one bold term in the introductory paragraph, one in the closing paragraph, and a couple more throughout the body text (depending on the length of your page).
7. Don’t Duplicate!
Keep your content fresh! The search engines want to see that you have new, interesting and relevant information, and they don’t look kindly on websites that copy content from other sites (not to mention the plagiarism issues this raises). Search engines also don’t want to see same content across all the pages of your website. Be sure to write new content for each individual page, relevant to the assigned keywords. If you need to talk about similar points on multiple pages, try taking a different angle and paraphrasing your text rather than repeating it word for word.
Choosing the Right Business Name – from an Internet Marketing Perspective
What’s in a name? Frankly, a LOT. Any marketing and branding agency can go through the important details of naming a new business or one that is renaming from a brand perspective. It’s fascinating how business naming research is performed, tested and consumer analysis is created – in fact I totally respect it. However (and this is important), it is essential that this research is embodied from an Internet Marketing perspective.
Here’s how to protect yourself from online blindness when naming your business:
#1 – Make sure the domain name is available or easy to acquire ahead of time. Domain names, i.e. www.yourbusiness.com are the life force of branding online. Your domain availability should include these principles:
- You can “see it, spell it.” In other words, it’s simple
enough to resonate without a lot of possibility for misspellings. - Determine that most or all extensions are available. Everyone thinks of the ‘.com’ but it’s important to grab the important extensions (.net, .org, .us, etc.). If you’re a larger organization – grab as many as you can. Brand hijacking – by your competition buying those domains is not a pleasant situation to find yourself in.
- Misspellings are available. If there is a possibility of misspelling your domain name, grab all the necessary misspellings too. A random example would be: www.smithswarehouse.com – be sure to grab www.smithwarehouse.com and www.smithswearhouse.com
- Moderate length. We get the question, “Is my domain too long?” quite a bit actually. With domain names at a premium these days, it’s more important to “see it, spell it” than it is to keep it short. Moderate length of the domain is okay as long as it’s not overwhelming.
- Domain names (i.e. business names) with search specific keywords have a double advantage. Although sometimes this is not practical, it is helpful.
#2 – Evaluate the competitive landscape of your business name online. If it’s competitive, be prepared to have the resources necessary (time and money) to effectively launch an SEO campaign early. Here are some basic things to check when evaluating the competitiveness of your keyword phrases:
- Review the total number of Google results for your prospective business name. (As a very general rule of thumb – If it’s less than a total 250,000 results, and incorporate SEO from the beginning, you’ll be golden). Any words results over 1 Million – plan ahead for potentially robust ongoing SEO resources.
- Review PPC bids for your phrase, amount of PPC ads. You can use Google’s AdWords tool to evaluate the average bid amount for your business name. Anywhere over $1.00 per click mark may get expensive and is an indicator for the need of a moderately or severely competitive SEO marketplace.
- Evaluate the number of links/number of pages indexed of top results for your keyword phrases using tools such as the: Bruce Clay Toolbar, SEO Book , Yahoo Site Explorer. Plan on acquiring the same amount of links and pages of content indexed as the other top 10 listings. If this will take significant effort, that may be an indicator for a competitive marketplace.
- Evaluate whether you business name of choice has associations outside of your category. For example, a recent organization named their business the same name as a popular TV show – their rankings were buried at onset outside of local specific searches.
#3 – Check to see if your Social Media profiles are available. Social media is essential for business marketing in most all cases, so double check to see if your profiles/usernames are available. The big three would be Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn – but that’s just a start. Social media profiles, such as: www.facebook.com/smartsolutions or www.twitter.com/smartsolutions are just as powerful, and just as limited, as domain names. Check profiles using www.knowem.com.
As you can see, there are many factors to determining a valid, compelling business name at the onset. Along with your branding, marketing research efforts – don’t shoot yourself in the foot before you get out of the gate by not reviewing the online marketplace of your potential business name F-I-R-S-T.
We welcome comments on example stories – please post!
By: Wendy Roe
Web Video and SEO-April SmartGroup Topic Recap
Thanks to all that attended this month’s popular topic of web video. We covered ways to use video to enhance your marketing, brand and search strategy as well as things to review when you decide to produce a video or hire a professional. Thank you to Matt Hand, of Pinnacle Media, for guest speaking at this monthly, local event. SmartGroup just started late last year and we’re already picking up speed!
A recap of this month’s slideshows and links are listed below for your reference. Next month, we’re tackling the ever so popular Social Media. More specifically, how to use Social Media for Small Buisness. To signup for next month’s SmartGroup, register now.
Animoto (Quick Video from Images) …as discussed toward end of class
Holden Outerware …as mentioned from the audience (Marcia from Citrus)
Is Your Site Design Getting in the Way of Your SEO?
If so, it’s time for a redesign! Don’t whine about the cost of a redesign, the lost opportunities without effective SEO will cost you far more in the long run. In today’s highly competitive Internet realm, it’s absolutely critical that your site is based on a search engine friendly structure; but what does this mean?
Your site should be HTML based, with limited use of Flash. Your code should be simple, W3C compliant, and should be kept as light and error free as possible. For instance, I’ve seen a site improve its design and include added functionality, yet cut its actual code length by over 70%. This was accomplished mostly by employing CSS in the design, ridding the site of Viewstate code, and moving all possible elements to external include files.
In addition to having concise HTML, the following should be adhered to:
- Absolutely avoid any type of frame, unless you’re trying to hide its content from the engines
- Your navigation should be text based, with meaningful words that are simple yet targeted to the subject of each page
- Images should be optimized (condensed) for the web and include ALT tags
- URL, Title tags, H1 headers, breadcrumbs, and hyperlinks should all be optimized around the particular subject of each page
- The content of each page should be targeted to the precise topic of that page alone
- Address, phone number, and other contact information should be in text – not image form
- Your SEO Friendly Content Management System should allow full control of all of the above elements
The typical lifespan of a website is 3-5 years before your customers will expect a fresh look and feel, with newly added technology and interactivity. As you’re looking at the investment itself, think about the amortization of a new site. Even a fairly expensive site, amortized over 5 years, is an incredibly inexpensive business tool likely to drive substantial ROI.
Keep in mind, the best design in a search friendly architecture still requires ongoing marketing. Just like your offline business needs branding, marketing, and exposure to gain customers, so does your website. Internet Marketing Services are offered in a myriad of formats, timeframes, and cost structures. Shop carefully to find the right marketing partner for your business.
Should Google Practice What They Preach?
The comparison chart at the bottom of this post was sent to me last week. I thought it was quite funny… and true. In the world of SEO, we really have a love/hate kind of relationship with Google.
The fact is that Google is the best search engine out there. They drive the most traffic and, for most of our clients, bring the highest level of conversion. Unfortunately Google is the most expensive to advertise with through Pay-per-Click, and often the most difficult to rank well with through organic SEO.
Then again, they provide tons of free tools, and a high-level of advice and assistance in all forms of online advertising. As analytics go, Google offers the most comprehensive full-featured analytic tool available (free).
I say, take the good with the bad. With a company like Google, there’s always room for comedy, sarcasm, and a bit of satire. So fellow SEO’s, blackhats, whitehats, whatever you call yourself… enjoy this little comparison of blackhat (some say evil) tactics – to those of the do-no-evil, all whitehat (clean and saintly) search engine…
When will CMS catch up with SEO?
Interesting that the entire first page of Google results for SEO Friendly CMS returns blogs and forums, filled with folks trying to figure out what solution they should use for their business or their clients. See the SERP here.
The consensus seems to be that there isn’t really a CMS out there which was actually built with SEO in mind. It appears that some can handle certain aspects like titles and Meta tags, but the overall vote is that you need to build your own CMS to be fully SEO friendly.
Similar to what is found on David Naylor’s blog, a majority of forum and blog contributors seem to agree that WordPress is the best SEO CMS option available. One problem… WordPress is not a CMS! Don’t get me wrong, WordPress is a great tool… for blogging! I may smack in a loose nail with the butt of a flashlight, or screwdriver, if a hammer isn’t readily available – But if I were building a house, I’m pretty sure I’d invest the $20 for a hammer. You need the right tool for the job. For businesses, WordPress is not the right tool for managing a website.
Unfortunately, too many SEO’s are just SEO’s – and that’s it. They didn’t come from a marketing or business background. Many didn’t even come from a technical background. They simply found themselves doing SEO and created a career out of it. That’s perfectly fine – But without a cursory understanding of business, they still hold to the ‘do whatever it takes’ method of band-aiding tasks and processes and using tools and methods that were not created for sustained efficacy.
But really, what were these SEO’s to do? Nothing existed that would do what they need it to do. No commercially available CMS, free or paid, gave them the flexibility required to effectively optimize a website for organic search, while still giving a business the ability to work in a non-rigid web environment. No CMS gave full HTML access, complete design control, total URL creativity, and complete flexibility over:
• Unique page titles
• Meta tags
• Sitemaps
• Internal links
• 301 redirects
• Image and Alt tag control
I admit I am completely biased about this because I use this tool and work closely with them, but I implore you to check out Pixelsilk. This is not just an SEO friendly CMS – it’s a full on SEO-enabled CMS; the first of its kind, I believe.
It’s everything a CMS should be, and any feedback that they’ve already received from top SEO’s is already being implemented. To be fair, feel free to read up on other CMS’ at either www.cmsreview.com or www.cmsmatrix.org. You may find Pixelsilk on these very soon as well.
The Pioneers of SEO
There’s never been a good place to learn about the SEO pioneers; until now. How did this all get started and who was behind the wheel? When you see big names like Danny Sullivan, Greg Boser, and Bruce Clay – do you ever wonder how they got started, or why they got in to Search Marketing in the first place?
Now there’s a place to read personal interviews from the best of the best. Check out The History of SEO to learn all about the industry and the people behind it. The site is still growing, with 20 or more interviews to be added next month alone – but you’ll see; it’s the place to go when you want to know!
The Dance of Finding an Internet Marketing Partner
For most companies, small and large, Internet Marketing (typically referred to as Search Engine Marketing or SEM) has become the most important aspect of their marketing plan and of their business livelihood in general.
So how do you ensure you’ve got the right agency on your side? Besides the most obvious; check references, here are a few guidelines that will help you find the right dance…uh…Internet Marketing partner:
1) Check out their moves. The partner you choose should have all the moves, and be able to dance to a variety of music. They should have a working knowledge of all components of Search Engine Marketing, including organic Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Pay-per-Click (PPC), link building, Social Media Marketing (SMM), and conversion (sale or lead) enhancement experience.
There is so much interplay between the various disciplines of SEM that if you choose an agency that is not well-rounded and well-versed in all the components, you run the risk of being inefficient with your dollars and missing out on many cross-functional opportunities. For example, if your agency is only focusing on your PPC campaign, then you miss out on all the long-term effects of Search Engine Optimization and ranking organically in the top search engine results.
The latest trends in user behavior suggest that most people searching online do their research through organic search listings, but then make an actual purchase through PPC. If you are only engaged in one of these channels, you may be losing out on a great deal of sales.
2) Daily practice ensures a great performance. Dedication turns a social hip hopper into a competitive pro. Look for an agency that is dedicated to Search Engine Marketing. Dedication means that the agency has committed expert resources to this service offering and that the people working on your project will be focused on your overall business, marketing, and sales goals.
Internet Marketing is a constantly changing field, with new research and market modifications monthly, if not weekly. Ask if they have a dedicated Internet Marketing team. What do they do to stay on top of the industry changes? Why do they think Internet Marketing is important?
3) They can optimize, but can they tango? They may have some decent moves, but when it comes down to it, do they know the dance? How much do they know outside of SEM? Do they have experience effectively tying Internet Marketing strategies and methods into a web site that meets your business goals?
Learn about the agency’s experience working with web designers and developers. Do they understand how to interact with your developer or internal IT team, or your marketing department? Are their recommendations in step with web development best practices and usability trends? Best case scenario – your agency will have all of these disciplines in house; offering you the best in single source marketing methods.
4) An intimate dance builds the fire. You want a trust worthy partner that will dance close and build the heat. Meet with the agency in person, or at the very least converse on the phone. Do they explain things in a way that makes sense to you and helps you truly understand what their services offer? Are they excited to help you learn about Internet marketing? Do they make an effort to get to know your company and your industry? Will they be there when you need it?
5) Back that thang up – the bottom line. They may know how to get down and “drop it like it’s hot”; but will they really deliver in the end? As you are getting to know the agency, make sure they’re focused on your business goals. Are they interested in learning about other aspects of your business? Be wary of any agency that talks only about “getting you a #1 ranking”. While it’s great to rank well on the search engines, no one can guarantee a position, and there is much more to succeeding online than a top search ranking.
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