SEO for Startups: Worth the Effort?

Posted on Apr 30, 2011 by Joey to SEO

Things get heated from time to time in the SEO world, and the question, “Is SEO dead?” has been asked since almost the inception of its techniques. There is always an “SEO killer” on the loose, and there are always businesses questioning the efficacy of SEO methods. Websites should question whether SEO will help their business, but the answers aren’t always clear. Chris Dixon recently wrote a post for Business Insider entitled, “SEO Is No Longer a Viable Marketing Strategy for Startups.” Should websites shift their focus away from search engine optimization?

Will SEO alone turn your start-up into the next Wikipedia? No. It won’t, and no reputable SEO will tell you otherwise. SEO is a tool, one of many, that can be used to improve your site’s visibility and bottom line. SEO expert Danny Sullivan of Search Engine Land writes, “I gather in the start-up world, perhaps SEO was seen as some type of super-juice that could jump-start a new business. It should have never been seen that way, any more than ANY NEW business or ANY business at all should have relied on it so much. It should have been part of an overall marketing mix — not the primary marketing means.”

Relying solely on SEO would be like relying solely on word of mouth for a non-internet based business. Word of mouth is an excellent tool, and can draw customers your way. But it is not the only way you can, or should, promote your business and build its profile. Similarly, many businesses today are relying heavily on social media to draw traffic, reporting they get more visitors via social media sites, like Facebook or Twitter, than through search. But again, depending on one aspect of a marketing campaign is not effective in the long-run.

The use of social media, well designed sites, and developing quality content are components that work in conjunction with SEO to build visibility.

Tags: SEO

No One is Knocking: No Visitors for 40 Percent of UK Websites

Posted on Apr 11, 2011 by Joey to General, SEO

Picture a scene from an old western: a dusty ghost town, a few tumbleweeds, and a whole lot of nothing. Some UK websites offer the virtual version of the ghost town; incredibly, 40 percent of websites in the UK get no visitors. None. Are these sites unattractive? Hard to navigate? Who knows? No one is going there to find out.

CLICKSCENE Limited studied 10,000 UK websites. Besides the news that about four in ten sites are unvisited, it was revealed that 91 percent did not do any PPC advertising on the internet. Only nine percent used tools like AdWords. Managing Director of CLICKSCENE says, “The internet has been popular for more than 10 years now and individuals seem to have embraced it as an everyday part of life. But, in general, businesses haven’t quite got it yet. There were about one million new domain names registered in the UK in 2010 but if nothing changes, the vast majority of those will be very lonely places indeed.”

Chances are very good indeed that within the 4000 sites studied, there were scores of sites that are aesthetically pleasing, easily navigable, and which provide relevant, high quality content. But all of that means very little if no one is getting there. This is where search engine optimization and pay per click advertising techniques become invaluable. As this study confirms, visibility is key. The best sites are like these ghost towns if traffic has no idea where and what they are.

It is hard to get noticed when there are literally millions of other sites that can offer similar content. That is why an effective SEO campaign is crucial. Making use of established and effective techniques can help you attract visitors. The time to start is now.

Tags: AdWords, SEO

Is SEO Dead – for Start-ups Anyway?

Posted on Apr 7, 2011 by Taylor to SEO

You know those pyramid schemes that involve selling products and then moving up the chain as you add downlines? Multi-level marketing, as it is also called, works beautifully – for the people at the top. They got there first, they entered the market, and they had a large, fresh group of prospects. As more and more downlines sign on, profits are big at the top and trickle down to the bottom. This is similar to the model of SEO that Chris Dixon has described in Business Insider. SEO, he claims, worked beautifully for sites like Wikipedia or Trip Advisor, but is “no longer a viable marketing strategy for start-ups.” Is this true?

Pre-2008, says Dixon, sites like those mentioned above enjoyed the success of SEO and secured strong rankings with Google. But “I talk to lots of start-ups and almost none that I know of post-2008 have gained significant traction through SEO.” If we used the pyramid scheme model (not to imply that these sites are in any way like an MLM), we could compare Wikipedia or Trip Advisor to those people at the top. For those newer websites, it is much harder to beat out the big, older sites even if the content is better or more relevant.

Dixon provides an example: say you search for “Four Seasons New York” on Google. The highest ranking site for the search he conducted was Trip Advisor’s site, which is ad-heavy and may not contain much relevant information for the searcher. On the other hand, Oyster’s uncluttered, informative site ranks much lower.

“And for now, at least, high-quality content seems to be losing. Until that changes, start-ups – who generally have small teams, small budgets, and the scruples to avoid black-hat tactics – should no longer consider SEO a viable marketing strategy.”

While it is true that start-ups face a tough climb to the top, that is true of real businesses as well as any virtual business. Google does tend to reward older sites, but this is shifting as social media plays more of a role in search results and the “farmer update” begins to weed out low quality sites. Danny Sullivan of Search Engine Land rebuts Dixon’s argument:

“SEO doesn’t work for quality content? We’ve got quality content out of our ears here, and we get thousands of visitors per day coming in from search. It’s not black hat SEO that’s doing it, nor a link scheming, nor having a domain that dates back to when Tim Berners-Lee first walked across the web. It’s still the things that anyone should be doing. Is your site accessible to search engines? Are you paying attention to your title tags? Are you thinking about the copy you write? And most of all — do you have good content?”

SEO is not an end-all or magic bullet for ranking; it is a component of marketing that remains not only viable, but necessary.

Tags: SEO

SEO WordPress Plugins Available

Posted on Mar 24, 2011 by Joey to SEO

According to experts, there are over a hundred million blogs in the world. A few years ago, bloggers were intrepid, pioneers in this new online territory. Today, everyone and his business has at least one blog. Standing out among the crowd is tough, and this is where search engine optimization strategies can help. The SEO SmartLinks Premium Word Press Plugin is ready to help you gain visibility, primarily via linking.

What does the new SEO SmartLinks plugin do for your site?

• Automatically builds additional links within your own content or external content controlled by you.
• Creates automatic tags and connections between posts (after you set the criteria).
• Develops anchor text automatically based on content.
• Helps determine custom keywords and where to put them.
• Maintains interlinking and allows specific external links.
• Can add no-follow attributes.
• Provides UTF-8 support for foreign-language sites.

SEO SmartLinks can help strengthen SEO techniques and help potential traffic find different routes to your blog.

Bloggers who aren’t familiar with SEO can still benefit with the All in One SEO Pack, which works out of the box or with setting changes for more experienced users.

With the All in One plugin, you get:

• Advanced canonical URLs to make the search engines happy.
• SEO integration for WP e-commerce sites.
• Automatically optimized titles for search engines.
• Automatic meta tag generation.
• Support for custom post types.
• Support for CMS style WordPress blogs.
• Built-in API for added functionality and versatility.

This is a good solution for any blogger who knows that SEO is important and needs a place to start. Bloggers stand the very real chance of being lost in the fiercely competitive and saturated blogosphere; SEO can help your blog get noticed by the search engines – and more importantly, noticed by real, live actual readers.

Tags: plugins, SEO, wordpress

Will Google Instant Funnel Searches to Fewer Keyword Phrases?

Posted on Mar 20, 2011 by Joey to General, SEO

Prior to Google’s launch of its Instant Search feature in September, search engine pundits were predicting how it would affect optimization campaigns. Immediately after its release, opinions ranged from “Google Instant will have no influence on SEO” to “Instant makes SEO irrelevant.” One of the major concerns was that the new predictive search option would funnel searches to fewer keywords. Has this proven to be the case?

Conspiracy theorists opined that Google was trying to drive traffic towards fewer, more expensive “head terms,” or short term keywords, which would result in tighter competition and higher prices for pay-per-click campaigns. According to a study conducted by Marin Software, Instant has resulted in more queries and clicks, but searchers are moving away from long tail keywords. Shorter phrases are getting more attention. Until the launch of Instant, most searchers were using 3 to 4 word keyword phrases to narrow down search results and obtain more relevant data. This was a plus for those planning SEO campaigns because it allowed smaller websites to gain visibility with less competitive keywords.

Back to the primary concern with funneling results to fewer keywords. There is no clear consensus. According to some SEO experts, Instant actually increases the variations of keywords that can lead traffic to a site, while others say that fewer keywords are being used. This has not had a noticeable effect on traffic volume or keyword competition, however. According to Search Insider, keyword counts after Instant’s launch were virtually unchanged, and those expensive head terms aren’t getting any more play than they were before.

Google makes changes in its search algorithm and page regularly. Most of these changes escape the average user’s notice. Instant has received a lot of attention and appears thus far to be improving search speed. The effects on SEO have not been catastrophic, despite some dire warnings, and good, solid optimization campaigns continue to thrive.

Tags: google, SEO

Google Targeting Low Quality and Duplicate Content

Posted on Mar 12, 2011 by Joey to SEO

When Matt Cutts speaks, the SEO world listens. The head of Google’s Webspam team, Cutts is a respected name in the search engine world, and changes in the world’s largest engine do not pass unnoticed. Cutts recently announced incentives which Google is adopting to stem the slight “uptick” in indexed spam so search results are more relevant. Google is taking aim at low quality and duplicate content in an effort to keep “spammy” sites from ranking highly.

Cutts recently announced that Google had “launched a redesigned document-level classifier that “makes it harder for spammy on-page content to rank highly.” It will work to detect spam, including “spammy” words, such as keyword stuffing. Google has “radically improved” their ability to detect hacked sites, which is a big contributor to spam results. Cutts announced one more change that is aimed at reducing spam: targeting sites with duplicate content or very little original content.

How do the changes affect your site? Even minor changes to Google’s algorithm can produce unpleasant results for sites, including legitimate ones. It is important to keep an eye on SERPs to see if the change is affecting your website. And if it is? It could be that you have duplicated or copied content on your website. This doesn’t necessarily make you a spammer or a plagiarist; it may be that you need to cut back on quotes from other sources and include more of your own original material. It could mean that another site has copied content from you, and Google has mistaken that other site as the originator of the material.

In either case, it is important to look at the content in question and replace it. Even if you are the wronged party and another site has copied your original content, the appeal process is largely nonexistent. A quicker, and ultimately easier, way to handle it is to replace the content with something new and fresh.

Spam is an ongoing issue in the search world, and we can expect to see more changes from Google, as well as other search engines.

Tags: SEO

SEO Copywriting

Posted on Mar 4, 2011 by Taylor to Copywriting, SEO

When it comes to SEO, content is king. Copywriting is an essential component of any business’s online personality and profile, and it can be enhanced using established, and effective, search engine optimization techniques. Here are some tips for optimizing the content that appears on your page so it helps build your brand and, most importantly, sell customers on your products, services, or ideas.

Keyword optimization. One of the factors that search engines consider in their various algorithms is keywords. For a site that is meant to be viewed via computer, opt for long-tail keywords that are descriptive. Searchers are becoming more savvy in trying to locate the most relevant information in the shortest amount of time. For mobile sites, however, opt for keywords that are short and to the point. Also incorporate local search terms if you depend on mobile traffic.

Incorporate keywords into your pages, titles, blog posts, and social media posts and responses. Do not stuff them, but place them naturally without interfering with readability. People can tell when a page is written for search engines rather than them.

Targeted audience. Who are you trying to sell on your business? You don’t have to please everyone every time, but you do have to make a concerted effort to appeal to your target audience. What do they want? What type of tone will they respond to? Should you be conversational, chatty, formal? It all depends on the image you are trying to create.

Length. People do search for longer texts online, but by-and-large, they want short, concise information on topics of interest. Products are a good example. When someone is trying to make a decision between an iPhone and a Blackberry, they want short text, lists, images, video, charts, tables, short but complete customer and expert reviews. They do not want to read blocks of unbroken text, however informational they may be.

There are topics that demand longer pieces, and that’s perfectly fine. Just make sure that is what your audience wants before you invest in the copywriting.

Call to action. What do you want visitors to your site to do? Buy, share, subscribe, sign up for newsletters? The writing must be geared towards that specific goal and intended to prompt users to take the desired action, even if it is to just return to the site for more information.

The goal of good copywriting is to engage readers, keep them on the page, and convert to a sale (or subscription, or whatever your specific call to action). With these SEO techniques, your copywriting can be even more effective.

Tags: SEO, seo copywriting

Has Google Instant Changed SEO?

Posted on Feb 16, 2011 by Taylor to General, SEO

Every so often, a change in search engine practices brings on a new wave of panic. This will be the SEO killer. When Google Instant was launched in September of 2010, there was concern that the new feature, which shows results as you type, would affect keyword strategies in SEO campaigns, which would ultimately impact ranking on the SERPs. Has Google Instant become the search engine optimization killer it was feared?

No. That’s according to senior research analyst at Econsultancy, Jake Hird. The digital marketing firm regards Instant as an agent of change, to be sure, but the change is in improved user experience, not page ranking. Hird says, “We just put out our SEO buyers guide and although it is something to be aware of, it doesn’t actually change how the algorithms rank pages, that’s the key point that a lot of people overlook sadly.”

Among the more dire predictions in September 2010 was Steve Rubel’s prediction that Instant would make SEO “irrelevant.” He posted on Instant’s launch day, “Google today launched an ambitious effort to speed up searching. But what they really did is kill SEO.” He continued, “Google Instant means no one will see the same web anymore, making optimizing it virtually impossible. Real-time feedback will change and personalize people’s search behaviors.”

Has this been borne out? Search has become more customized, particularly with search engines like Blekko. But instead of killing SEO, real-time feedback has created an entirely new range of possibilities for websites and their optimization strategies. One example is the integration of social media results, which has led to more interest in social media optimization, or SMO.

Econsultancy’s Jake Hird points out that quality content, specific keywords, link building, and “that kind of stuff,” is still far more important in terms of ranking. “Because of that, [Instant] hasn’t really had any effect on how pages are ranked on Google – it just means that you might be served up a little bit faster, deeper, but I think the reason why they did it is just to enhance the user experience.” And not, apparently, to conspire to kill SEO.

Tags: google, SEO

Local Business Marketing Part 2: Location is Everything

Posted on Oct 27, 2010 by Rick to Web Marketing

Location, location, location!

As the old saying goes, location is everything. When it comes to local business marketing, this is especially relevant to your customers! What is their location right now? More importantly, which of your potential customers are near you, at this moment? And how can you target them and promote to them without standing out front of your business twirling a ridiculous sign!? In the past, we’ve talked about geo-targeting your Google PPC ads. Now, let’s look a few different channels which allow for geo-targeting.

Local Facebook Ads

Facebook has long offered pay-per-click or CPM advertising opportunities to suite any budget. I think many local businesses don’t take advantage of facebook because they don’t know the ad filtering possibilities. That is, they don’t realize how targeted a business can get with their ad.

Let’s use a small restaurant called Joe’s Pub as an example. Joe’s Pub could utilize facebook’s ad network to show their ads to all people  within their city. This allows them show ads only to individuals who could possibly be customers within reach. If businesses like Joe’s Pub wanted to get even more targeted, they could utilize some of the other facebook ad filters in conjunction with location to target people who:

• Live locally and are also celebrating a birthday today – This is a great demographic to target prospects with an ad which offers a free birthday drink or meal with the purchase of… anything.
• Live locally and are also interest in [insert your niche] – Own a local bike shop? Simply run an ad to locals interested in cycling and triathlon to promote this weekend’s clearance sale.
• Live locally and are engaged – Use these filters to promote this weekend’s bridal show to all engaged females.
• Live locally and are fans of your business on facebook – What better group to advertise to than the one who already knows who you are?

And the list goes on. The point- Just knowing that a person is local will make your advertising much more effective, with the right application. Facebook is just one of many social networks offering this type of targeting.

Mobile Advertising Opportunities

Smart phones have paved the path for improving the consumer’s ability to stay connected in many new ways. At the same time, a variety of smart phone applications continue to make it possible for businesses to target users based on their locations. for the consumer, the tradeoff to using a free application is that they will be periodically shown ads.

Foursquare

Foursquare is an example of a mobile application that seems to be catching on. Simply put, foursquare is an application which allows users to tell their friends where they are at all times. For example, a foursquare user sends a notification to his/her friends that he/she has arrived at a particular location such a park, restaurant or sporting event. While checking-in to a location, users also share tips and advice with other users about that location

From a marketing standpoint, foursquare gives businesses the opportunity to promote a special offer to individuals who are in the immediate area by offering a special of some type. For example, if you just arrived downtown and checked-in to foursquare, you’d be able to easily see all nearby business information, including any specials.  For business, adding a special offer is fairly simple to do and currently doesn’t cost anything which is what makes this a good tactic for almost any local business.

Down the road, we can definitely imagine foursquare offering a variety of other advertising opportunities which can be targeted to users based on their locations. In the meantime, offering a special foursqaure coupon is pretty much the only thing that most local businesses will benefit from.

Please stay tuned for Part 3 of our local marketing series!

Tags: Local Business Marketing, local search, SEO

Local Business Marketing Part 1: The Trickle-Down Effect

Posted on Oct 12, 2010 by Rick to Web Marketing

Have you ever tried to add your business to Google Places, YellowPages.com or other online business directories and noticed that your business was already listed? More importantly, did you ever wonder exactly how your listing got there?  Today, we’re going to look a little deeper into where this information comes from and how it can be applied to increased your local business exposure.

The Trickle-Down Affect

Companies like Google, Bing, Facebook, Foursquare, TomTom, YellowPages and others all, in one way or another, utilize business information within their applications. Search engines like Bing and Google display business listings within their search results. Foursquare is a mobile ‘game’ of sorts which allows users to ‘check-in’ to various businesses and locations to let their friends know where they are and what they are doing. TomTom is one of many GPS providers which also helps users find nearby businesses upon request.

The aforementioned services are only a few of a growing many which reply on various data sources in an effort to get the most accurate business data which is then used for various purposes. By comparing and combining multiple data sources, each of these websites and services are able to create fairly accurate and detailed business profiles, without relying on business owners to claim and update their own listings.

It  makes sense, then, that the most efficient strategy for a local business to improve its visibility across all these channels would be to find out where this initial data comes from and to ensure that their business is not only listed, but also listed accurately. As business data is created or corrected at the top of this data pyramid, it can then trickle down to all of the services which rely on it. While this is especially critical for new businesses, it is also critical for existing businesses who have recently changed locations, phone numbers, websites, etc.

Simplified Data Flow Chart

So Where is the Top of the Information Pyramid?

Several different data aggregating services exist, each of which provides business data to one or many lower level sources. Each user-facing service in turn, accepts data from one or more of these data sources. So, Google, TomTom, etc. could potentially purchase data from several aggregator services, compare the data found, and create listings based on the similarities of each data source. The more similarities that can be found, the more “sure” that these services are about the data and thus, the more practical it would be to use that data. Put simply, if Google finds the same information about your businesses across all its data sources, it may mean more exposure for your business simply because Google is more confident about the data.

Of course, there’s more to Google’s and other similar services ranking algorithm. This small part is an important one, especially if you’re not interested in claiming and updating your listings on hundreds of websites. Utilizing services such as Localeze is a good start. These types of services gather data about businesses and provide it to partner services and websites which include major search engines and location based application companies which can include:

• Search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc.)
• Business directories (Yelp, Yellow Pages, etc.)
• GPS software companies (TomTom, Magellan, etc.)
• Mobile and Web Applications (foursqaure, GoWalla, etc.)

One last note is that it may also be a good idea to pick the biggest players in each of the above categories and claim your business listings there. This speeds up the process and ensures that your information and kept up to date, usually for free or at a low cost.

Tags: gps, Local Business Marketing, local search, SEO