21 Feb 2012 07:55 pm
Backlinks are the backbone of just about any effective SEO campaign, but how do you go about finding the sites where you can get these backlinks? There are paid links services like Text Link Ads, but Google has a much easier time detecting those than the more "organic" links that you would get through interacting with the site owner directly.
A simple Google search in your niche is one way to start, but Erin Everhart has come up with at least five other ways for you to find those valuable link partners. She outlines these strategies in a recent blog post published on Search Engine Land.
One tool is called Listorious and it is used to find a list of people tweeting about a certain topic. This is more robust that sifting through hashtags and you can even search for Twitter lists instead of just individuals. Erin also recommends looking through the Facebook likes of pages in your niche to find related businesses and webmasters. Curated lists are another way to go, as are the blogrolls you find on sites that are already in your industry.
Another strategy is to search through LinkedIn. This won't lead you to a directory of websites that could be potential link partners, per se, but it will lead you to the people who are in that niche. You can sift through based on companies, locations, keywords, and so on, finding just the right people in just the right positions. And finally, Erin talks about utilizing guest blogging communities like My Blog Guest and Blogger LinkUp for the same purpose.
What strategies do you use to find potential link partners? How do you ensure you're getting a quality backlink from a quality website?
24 Feb 2012 06:06 pm
Yes, it might be a little hard to believe, but Google rolls out its first Panda update exactly one year ago today on February 24, 2011. Panda was designed to be a "filter" that would penalize content farms and other websites on the Internet that were deemed as being too "thin" to be useful to web users.
Not surprisingly, Google Panda (and its various updated versions) has created many problems for professional SEO specialists and webmasters alike. An infographic has been put together by Search Engine Land and BlueGlass that does a great job of outlining exactly how Panda works and what impact it has had on the Internet at large.
The first version of Panda was designed to target "scraper sites" that copied copyright content from other sites. Google says that 12% of searches in the United States were affected. Subsequent updates expanded language support and made "minor changes" to the algorithm. Now that we are a full twelve months after the initial Panda update, only 13% of those polled by SE Roundtable said they have fully recovered. Only 29% have recovered partially and a whopping 58% say they have not recovered from Panda.
And Panda hasn't only impacted smaller "scraper sites" and "content farms" either, as bigger players like About, Yahoo, and Demand Media have all had their ranking significantly impacted by Google's bamboo-munching creature. So, where do you stand with Panda? Have you recovered? What are you doing to avoid getting hit by the filter?
01 Feb 2012 04:44 pm
We normally talk about search engine optimization (SEO) on this blog and how the changes to Google's algorithms can affect how you rank for certain keywords and keyword phrases, but another huge part of the equation comes from search engine marketing (SEM). This is when advertisers purchase ad spots on the search engine results page. Not surprisingly, we're seeing huge growth here.
According to a new report put out by eMarketer, spending on search advertising is expected to hit $19.51 billion in 2012. That's based on US spending alone and it represents a huge 27 percent growth compared to last year's figure of $15.36 billion. That's a lot of money and, not as you can likely expect, Google is leading the charge when it comes to scooping up that advertising revenue.
Part of this increase in spending is fueled by the upcoming Summer Olympic Games in London, as well as the US Presidential election, along with other major elections around the world. They're saying that Google will have a 77.9% share of that revenue for 2012, followed by Microsoft's Bing at 7%. The growth will slow over the next few years, but search ad spending will continue to rise.
And yes, Yahoo and AOL will be bringing up the rear with a combine share of barely over 5%, eroding down to even less by 2016. Google will be snatching up most of that, but Microsoft gets a small increase too. At least, that's what the predictions are saying.
What does this mean for all the SEOs in the audience? Getting higher rankings could prove even more valuable than ever before if advertisers are willing to spend that much more money for prime spots on the SERPs. Will you be shifting your focus from SEO to SEM? Or will you use some combined effort between the two?
04 Feb 2012 01:31 am
Email is no more a standalone entity. Many online marketers have already integrated their email campaigns with other digital media channels. Since social media is not going to disappear anytime soon, it's just the right time to innovate, and take your email marketing campaign to the next level.
Interact with Your Email Subscribers
The social media fever continues to rise due to an increased conversation component that it leverages. Therer's no doubt that conversations can happen with your email messages as well. Online marketers only need to change their mindset and start looking at emails as also a means to interact with subscribers to enhance engagement.
Emails should not be a direct response marketing tool anymore. They must be combined with other digital messaging channels (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc) to add fuel to your campaigns. All it takes is a more effective management of subscribers' responses. The content messages that you receive from subscribers should be directed to the right department in your organization based on their different nature.
Plan an effective strategy to respond to every subscriber response. It's vital to match your content message with the immediate need of the subscriber. Relevancy and timeliness are always the biggest factors that will play an important role in fulfilling subscribersrs' expectations.
Personalization is Key
By personalizing emails, you can make them even more stable. Just because therer's no person-to-person interaction in email marketing, it doesn't mean you can't personalize those messages. Apart from collecting the basic subscriber information (name and email), you should try to know the interests, likes and dislikes of your email subscribers.
The better you know your subscribers, the more personalized email messages you will be able to create. Segment your subscribers on the basis of their demographics, interests, behavioral attributes etc. Start sending targeted messages to each subscriber group.
Use the Best Advocates (Email List) to Drive Social Momentum
Identify the loyal subscribers (or brand advocates) in your email list. Start interacting with them with a personalized approach. As soon as you get those best advocates to your social media pages, you have a surefire chance of driving social momentum among other users.
Email is not an adversary of social media. In fact, they can be easily integrated to deliver better results, loyalty and conversions. However, it's important to decide which social media tools you should actually integrate with your email marketing campaign to achieve success.
Social networks thrive on email messaging. Emails can be efficiently used to notify users about what's going on in your social network. Whether it's about status updates, followers or fans, you can always use emails to keep users well informed of regular transactions.
Unless you tie your email marketing to other digital messaging channels, you can never expect to create a powerful marketing plan. In an era of rapid socialization, fragmented conversations will lead you nowhere. By bringing together all these channels together, you can create a richer experience for your consumers, build long-term relationships and create brand advocates.
Are you ready to increase brand awareness, create loyal customers and generate more revenue by socializing emails?
04 Feb 2012 07:12 pm
Censorship. If you've ever had the experience of trying to access the Internet from within the Great Firewall of China, you'll know all about it. You may have also heard about the new censorship policy at Twitter where shortened URLs can be blocked on a country-to-country basis. Well, it looks like Google is following suit. with its Blogger platform.
Despite the rise of alternatives like WordPress, Blogger remains one of the most popular blogging platforms out there. It can be great for Internet marketers, for instance, who want to set up multiple "mini" blogs that approach different niches.
The trouble now is that Google will redirect visitors based on their IP address to a country-specific version of Blogger for each blog. If you happen to be in India and try to access http://username.blogger.com, for example, you'll automatically get redirected to http://username.blogger.in. If that blog happens to be censored in India, you'll hit a roadblock.
That's the bad news. The good news is, unlike Twitter's censorship, Blogger is giving you a way to get around those redirect. All you have to do is append the URL with /ncr/ at the end. So, you would visit http://username.blogger.com/ncr/ if you wanted "No Country Redirect." This won't affect bloggers in the United States all that much, but it could mean that you may end up limiting your audience if you get censored for whatever reason somewhere else in the world.
05 Feb 2012 08:52 pm
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07 Feb 2012 02:41 am
When it comes to search engine optimization, there is literally a never-ending list of things that you can do. Some strategies are more effective than others, but a great number of them also happen to be very time-consuming. The irony is that many people forget to take care of the little things. It's like deciding to go on a road trip, only to forget where you left the keys.
Over on Search Engine Watch, Josh McCoy has compiled a list of eight SEO tips that you can accomplish in fifteen minutes or less. Regardless of whether you have a blog, a company website, or a resource site, you'd be foolish not to go through these eight basic steps.
You'll still want to pay attention to things like keyword density and inbound deep-links, of course, but these eight simple steps are so basic that they simply should not be ignored.
The tips include such things as remembering to review your robots.txt file to see if you're withholding pages from search engines, reviewing the most frequently linked pages on your site, looking for duplicate title elements in Google Webmaster Tools, requesting anchor text changes from authority sites, and verifying your Google and Bing Local listings.
Also remember that these aren't one time activities! You should follow up periodically to make sure everything is in check. Do you have any simple SEO tips that you'd like to share? What are some of the most common mistakes you've found?
07 Feb 2012 04:30 am
It feels really nice looking at websites or blogs that rank for competitive keywords. But do you know how much effort goes into making a site rank at the top in search engines? There's plenty of work that goes on 'behind the scenes'. Most of the small businesses don't have the budget to hire a professional SEO service or agency. No wonder, you can conduct the keyword research yourself by following a couple of useful guidelines and tips.
Herer's a 5-point formula to help you with your keyword research:
#1. Familiarize Yourself with Multiple Keyword Tools
There are a wide variety of keyword tools that you can use to conduct research for your site, both free and paid. What's important is that you know how to use each of those tools effectively. By getting familiar with the usage of multiple tools, you'll be able to come up with different ideas.
Here are some free keyword tools that Google offers:
Google Adwords Keyword Tool (helps you find related keywords or phrases)
Google Trends (helps you compare various search terms)
Google Product Search (useful for product-related research)
Google Correlate (helps you find keywords with matching popularity)
Google Insights for Search (helps you compare keywords based on industry, location, time range etc)
Paid tools include Wordtracker, Keyword Spy, Keyword Winner etc. There are so many options that you can utilize to find potential keywords, that increase conversions and make you more money. However, you should first know how to use these tools for maximum benefits.
#2. Understand Your Position
Are you in the right position to launch a powerful attack? While doing the keyword research (and hoping to get results), you must also be quite clear about where you currently stand. Consider the age of your domain, pagerank, quality of links pointing back to your domain etc. In short, you need to make sure whether or not you're a good competitor yourself in the first place. It's vital to plan your SEO keyword strategy in the light of all these points.
#3. Prepare a List of Initial Keywords You'd Like to Target
If you run a small business or manufacture products, you need to get into your customers' shoes quickly. Do some brainstorming to find out what your customers will type into the search box while looking for a product or service you offer. Use the different keyword tools (that you're familiar with) to get some creative ideas. The keyword list that you get is only a preliminary one.
#4. Analyze Keyword Competition
How much time does it take to rank for a specific keyword or phrase? This is the most important point that you need to understand, if you're really serious about achieving success with your keyword research. If you're trying to top-rank for a keyword where you have top 10 competitors like Wikipedia, About.com and WordPress.org, you need to think again. It's by analyzing the competition that you understand what keywords you should actually aim at.
#5. Select the Final Keywords
Now that you understand the competition that you'll face for each of the top level keywords that you want to rank for, it's easier to narrow down that preliminary list of keywords. If you want to generate more leads and increase the revenue, you should focus on high converting search terms.
While finalizing the keyword list, you should:
Select keywords with different search volumes (high, mid and low)
Focus on relevancy rather than chasing only search volume
Have realistic expectations, particularly if you've a new site
Target long-tail keywords for increased conversions
Remember the keywords that your site is already ranking for
As a matter of fact, no keyword list is a final list. Keyword trends continue to change. You should keep a close watch on how certain keywords are performing. After running the SEO campaign for a couple of months, you need to evaluate the keyword statistics again so that you can make necessary alterations. However, whatever you do, do it with some patience. Don't rush!
07 Feb 2012 12:37 pm
Great website design is so important for online success!
Your website іs thе hub оf yоur online business; іt іs thе virtual representation оf yоur company whether yоur company exists physically оr not. Whеn yоu аrе doing business online, people cаnnоt see yоu physically like hоw they could if they were dealing wіth аn offline company. Hence, people do judge yоu by yоur covers. This іs whеrе а good design comes in.
Imagine if yоu аrе running аn offline company. Would yоu allow yоur salespersons tо bе dressed іn shabby оr casual clothes whеn they аrе dealing wіth yоur customers? By making yоur staff wear professionally, yоu аrе telling yоur customers thаt yоu do care аbоut quality. This works simply because first impressions matter.
Similarly, thе same case іs wіth yоur website. If yоur website іs put together shabbily and looks like а 5 minute "quick fix", yоu аrе literally shouting tо yоur visitors thаt yоu аrе nоt professional and yоu do nоt care fоr quality.
On thе opposite, if yоu hаvе а totally professional looking website layout, yоu аrе giving yоur visitors thе perception thаt yоu hаvе givеn meticulous attention tо every detail and yоu care аbоut professionalism. You аrе organised, focused and yоu really mean business.
On thе other hand, yоu should also hаvе аny thing related tо yоur company well designed. From business cards tо letterheads tо promotional brochures, every little bit matters. This іs because аs yоu grow yоur business, these items become thе face оf yоur business. Once again, think оf thе 'salesperson dressed shabbily" anology, and yоu wіll get my point.
10 Feb 2012 11:13 pm
Before we start talking about the bounce rate of a website and how it can hone the skills of a web designer, let's first know what it actually means. When you log into the Google analytics account of your website, you'll see a metric termed 'bounce rate'. It's displayed in percentage (%). This metric tells you how many people are actually abandoning your website without clicking a single link. If the bounce rate shows 72%, it means that 72 out of every 100 people (that visit your site) leave before clicking a second link or viewing another page.
Well, now when it's clear what the bounce rate metric hints at, let's get back to the main topic. Yes, Google analytics is a powerful tool that web designers can use to hone their skills, in order to create a design that truly resonates with the target audience. To create an engaging design, web designers need to step into the target audience's shoes. It is through understanding the requirements of the online consumers that designers can come up with 'responsive design'.
The Value of Bounce Rate Metric
Of course, the web designer needs to make sure that a website accomplishes its commercial goals. And when you want to fulfill those website goals, you must be able to feel the pulse of the consumer in the first place.
The bounce rate of a website decides whether you'll achieve success or failure with your online business goals. Lower bounce rate (below 50%) suggests that visitors to your site are viewing more pages and spending more time exploring the content that you have to offer. On the other hand, a higher bounce rate quickly raises red flags.
A higher bounce rate doesn't always mean you need to reorganize the content structure and links on a website. The design of a website also has a key role to play when it comes to reducing the bounce rate. How quickly a visitor leaves a site (i.e. the average time spent) should tell you more about where things are going wrong. By analyzing the data in Google analytics closely, designers can identify such issues and improve the design.
Yes, Web Design Does Affect a Site's Bounce Rate!
There are several factors that control the bounce rate of a website. In terms of design as well, there are some key issues that can increase the bounce rate of a site. If the design of a website is not very responsive or usable, visitors will leave as quickly as they land on it.
In order to reduce the bounce rate, designers should evaluate:
Download time of a site
Design of the website itself
User-friendliness of the web interface
Navigational structure
Typography
If a website doesn't load quickly, the bounce rate will be higher. Even a bad header design can cause a high bounce rate, as it's the first thing that visitors notice while entering a website. Several usability issues can also compel users to abandon a site pretty quickly. At the same time, typography is also something designers should consider to enhance readability.
In short, a higher bounce rate signals that the design (or/ and the content) of a website is unable to engage the user. Designers can, therefore, evaluate the bounce rate across the entire site. Target those pages first that have the highest bounces. Experiment with new style, design and presentation. Discover what makes the most impact to fulfill the website goals.
What other metrics, do you think, a web designer can use to improve the design of a website? Please feel free to share your views.
