What is SEO?
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of maximizing the footprint of your web presence in the major search engines, to ultimately drive more traffic to your website.
A search engine is a website that scours the web, indexing the content of sites it encounters, then serving up search results for that content to users. Major search engines include Google (the undisputed world champion), Microsoft’s Bing, and Yahoo. There are hundreds of other search engines out there, but the big three are the most important to engage.
Search engines must determine how to respond to search requests in a logical matter. Google tries to maintain an air of secrecy around their page ranking efforts, but a little experimentation (and following all the “gurus” on the internet) can give us some clues. Bing, on the other hand, actually publishes their three most important factors in ranking pages (this is a pretty good indicator on how Google and Yahoo rank pages as well):
- Content quality as measured by user behavior
- Social references to a page
- Links to a page
Bing monitors how users react to the pages listed in its search results page. For example, they monitor what percentage of users continue to click through a website beyond the initial page they visited from the search engine link. If searchers return immediately to the search engine results page (called “bounce") Bing assumes the site didn’t match the expectations of the searcher. Pages that have high bounce rates are assumed to not match the search terms the searcher originally used, causing the site to move down in the rankings.
Bing also monitors how much a site is referenced on social network sites (like Facebook and Twitter).
Finally, Bing is interested in the anchor text of words linked from other websites to a particular page. Specific keywords used in a hyperlink should match the content presented on the target page.
Search engine optimization is the process of discovering the proper keywords (or key phrases) that searchers for your product may use, then working to build relevant, authoritative backlinks to your site.
What is the SEO process?
The process of optimizing a website to attract more traffic through the search engines involves five steps:
- Keyword research: determine the keywords, or key phrases (also called “long-tail keywords") that searchers will use to find your business.
- Site Planning: Structuring a website’s content to match the target keywords.
- Creating Quality Content: Write high-quality copy that is relevant and useful for the searcher, content that will keep them engaged and cause them to stick around the website for awhile.
- Building quality links: Work to get inbound links from other websites, especially links with target keywords in the anchor text.
- Tracking Results: Like an airliner, small adjustments must be made frequently to maximize results and stay on track. Tracking involves using an analytics program installed on the web server to reveal patterns in visitors’ behavior, then making improvements or adjustments in the site content.
Over the coming weeks, we’ll cover each of these steps in detai, including maximizing a website's imprint for local markets.
If you need great SEO results now for your website, contact us.
Google Local Search: Are they spying on you?
Well, yes and no.
If you've used Google lately, you may have noticed an interesting phenomenon: type in something you're searching for, say "coffee shop," and by some miracle, Google displays coffee shops near your current location. You didn't even enter a location! How does it know? Is it magic? Is there a trojan horse running on your computer that's giving away your location?
Well, yes and no.
You see, browsing on the web isn't very private. Surprise! When you connect your computer to the internet, it's assigned an IP address (a series of 4 numbers separated by periods like 192.168.1.1) by your internet service provider. If you're at home, it's your DSL or cable company's server doling out that number. If you're in a hotel or a public WiFi spot, that network is assigning an address to your computer. The ISP gets a block of addresses assigned to them, all tracked by some eye in the sky that knows where the ISP is located physically. So every computer knows where it's located physically when it's connected to the internet.
Then, your web browser communicates that with any web server you connect to. It's like "Breaker, breaker, good buddy. This is Sherm's Mac from Ohio. Looks like we got ourselves a convoy." (Sorry, they just had the Larry the Cable Guy Roast running on Comedy Central). Actually, there is a great deal of information sent in the transaction with the server, including your screen size, browser brand and version, and your facial characteristics. Google tracks this information to determine the popularity of a web site and ultimately its page rank in relation to other pages on the same subject.
So Google, being the PhDs and rocket scientists that they are, combines your IP address with your search terms to serve up some finger-lickin' good local content.
As a business owner, you can use this to your advantage. Google actually gives away free web pages for every business listing in the country -- and only 3 percent of those businesses have claimed their listing! We'll cover how to claim that listing in a future post here.
In the meantime, if you just want to just get started attracting local customers to your business, contact me and I'll be happy to show you how.
Facebook per-click ads cost up 54% in Q3
A white paper published today by Efficient Frontier/Context Optional claims that Facebook pay per click ad costs rose 54% Q2 to Q3 this year because of increased competition.
FACEBOOK AD CPCs INCREASED 54% IN Q3 FROM Q2. This indicates that advertiser competition in Facebook marketplaces is rising. Facebook has become an essential marketing channel for many brands. Increased cost per clicks (CPCs) reflect both a higher volume of advertisers and more price competition on the platform.
Ad costs are rising at an alarming rate because advertisers are recognizing the impact of PPC ads placed on that social media site. In the typical PPC ad scenario, advertisers bid competitively for important keywords/search phrases directed at a target market. Increase competition from advertisers forces an upward spiral on cost.
Other interesting tidbits in the paper:
FACEBOOK AD SPEND INCREASED 25% IN Q3 FROM Q2. Advertisers see the value in significantly increasing investments in social.
TABLETS CAPTURE 77% OF ALL RETAIL MOBILE AD SPEND IN SEPTEMBER 2011. Remember a few short years ago when we said "what are we going to do with an iPad?"
MOBILE IS PROJECTED TO BE 7–10% OF ALL PAID SEARCH SPEND BY THE END OF Q4 2011. Google announced that page rank for mobile sites will be influenced by mobile optimization of a website.
All these statements should scream the obvious at the business owner wishing to increase their traffic and bottom line: The fusion of social, mobile and local advertising is here and will continue to grow.
Read the study for yourself here.
5 tactics to engage and convert smartphone users
In a post released Sept 27, Jeri Dube, Freelance Reporter at Marketing Sherpa offers some great guidelines on how to interact with smartphone users based on ExactTarget’s "Subscribers, Fans and Followers May 2011" study.
Some of the interesting stats from the article:
- 38% of US mobile phone users are using smartphones, up from 29.7% in October 2010
- Most smartphone users take advantage of its email capabilities
- 55% of those users take actions based on emails (vs lower action rates for text, Facebook or shopping act
Despite these compelling statistics, many businesses have not built a mobile-friendly experience for their users, according to three experts interviewed for the article.
Their tactics for maximizing mobile:
Tactic #1. Understand your current audience. Are your users READY for mobile? Target your offerings for your audience.
Tactic #2. Strategize your move into mobile emails. Don't go overboard and convert your entire web experience to mobile-only, it still has to work on the desktop. Know that is where the market is headed in the next several years, but we're not quite there yet.
Tactic #3. Leverage other mobile communications to build a mobile email list. This is a MUST for local businesses, engage them while you interact with them at your facility (restaurants, bars, etc.). QR codes are a great way to achieve this. Many users are reluctant to fill out another form to give away their email, but smartphones make it relatively easy.
Tactic #4. Adjust layout for a smartphone’s smaller screen. This is an absolute must. We recommend a browser detection script that will change the site's layout based on the user's browser. Another alternative is a mobile-only subdomain or site.
Tactic #5. Adjust content for the environment. Shorter, succinct emails for the mobile audience, since users will usually be in the middle of another activity.
Go read the article at Marketing Sherpa.
Attract Immediate Local Business with the “Secret” Social Network
Watch this brief video and learn how one guy drives a ton of automated traffic to his sites daily, has built an uber-responsive email list, and created multiple 6-figure business over the last year…
…all from spending a few minutes a day on this social network.
It made me realize that I need to start enhancing my profile on that site immediately.
This is not hype, not a gimmick, not a joke. These are real results that a good friend of mine has received and it's well worth a few minutes of your time to learn more.
I sat through a free intro webinar for two hours this evening and was blown away, literally. As you know, we do a fair amount of social networking and social media management at iNvision Studios, but the content in this program really puts what I knew to shame. My focus was all wrong on this social network site. The material presented in this video changes my entire approach to marketing on that site.
What do you have to lose?
Of course, after you see the intro and feel like it's something you can't (or don't want to) do, just contact us and we'll do all the heavy lifting.
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+Sherm Stevens
- Creative Marketing Genius & founder of iNvision Studios Web Marketing, Sherm Stevens has spent the past 20 years helping SMBs, non-profits and other clients with creative marketing solutions. iNvision Studios offers a mix of technical, creative and marketing services, giving small businesses the opportunity to increase their inbound customer traffic with an SEO-optimized web site, social network marketing, local search marketing, mobile-optimized websites, PPC advertising, and mobile marketing.
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