WSI Marketing, Surf, Search and Social

I get this question all the time. Unfortunately, it’s not an easy question to answer.

To back up a bit, there has been a major shift in the marketing rules in just the last few years. Interrupt marketing (commercials, pop-ups, banners) and passive marketing (magazine ads, flyers and mailers, phonebook ads) have become less effective as more people are engaged with the Internet. I give talks to groups of business owners, and at the start of each talk, always ask two questions:

1. How many of you have used the yellow pages in the last month? (a few hands go up)
2. How many of you used Google yesterday? (every single hand in the room goes up)

This is a poignant illustration that we all use Google and the other search engines to search for products and services, and do research before making a purchase or finding a company to do business with. Unfortunately, many businesses still cling to the “old ways”.

As business owners start to realize that their advertising dollars bring fewer new clients in the front door, they start to wonder, “What would it take to get onto Google and the other search engines?” That’s where the question, “How much does SEO cost?” comes in.

There are so many factors that determine who gets to be “king of the Google hill” and who is relegated to the bottom of the heap. We don’t have a magic wand to wave over a client’s website to make it to the top. It’s been documented that Google actually changes the rules every single day! Furthermore, the client’s website itself usually has significant enough problems that prevent it from performing the way it could on the search engines.

We always recommend that a business that wants to get ahead of their competition on the search engines, must have us perform a thorough analysis. It’s kind of like going to the doctor. You may have a pain that’s bothering you, but the doctor isn’t going to just recommend surgery or a prescription. They have to run tests – blood work, diagnostics, x-rays, and so on, before deciding upon a course of action.

Similarly, WSI’s analysis looks at many factors:

• The client’s website coding structure (think of it as their vital signs)
• A 25-point SEO readiness checklist (health history)
• A WebScan™ that looks at on-site and off-site factors (an x-ray)
• Keyword research – what are people really searching for? (We hate shooting in the dark!)
• Competitor research – what do the client’s search engine competitors look like (environmental factors)

Once our diagnostic analysis has been completed, then we can effectively answer the question, “How much does SEO cost?” It may be just fixing a few things on the site, or it may be “major surgery”, depending upon how aggressive and competitive the landscape is.

If you as a business owner want to get to the top, insist that your digital marketing expert run these tests to diagnose the problem. It’s better to know up front what you’re facing, rather than shooting in the dark and completely missing the mark!

Learn more about how WSI Consultants leverage SEO techniques that will help your business gain competitive rankings for your site.

Title tags is one of the most important tags on a web page for on page SEO. A website title (defined with the title tag) is the first thing that appears on search engine result pages (SERP) on which the site visitors click to go to the site.

Simple on page Search Engine Optimization methods like the title tag can make such a big difference on how well a website does on the search result pages. Many website owners are not even aware about the title tag defined within the HTML of the page (<title>page title</title>). Most website owners confuse it with the big bold text on the page.

SEO Title Tag Tips

1. The length of your titles should not exceed 65 characters including the spaces.
2. Use your keyword phrases in the title tag, taking care that the title looks natural and does not appear keyword stuffed.
3. If you wish to use your site name for branding, use your brand or site name at the end of the title tag on every page of your site. A good way to separate your title from your brand/business name is by using the “|” symbol between them.
4. Each page of your site should have a unique, descriptive title tag which should match with your page content. It also makes sense to reuse the text in title tag of each page in H1 header tag too – from the viewpoint of on-page optimization as well as for enhancing user experience.
5. Shorter page titles are usually better than long ones. However, longer titles make sense when you don’t want to lose traffic from long tail keywords. You may also combine or overlap many keyword phrases in the page title. For example, a title such as ‘Search Engine Optimization and Marketing Tips’ can help you to rank for keyword phrases such as ‘Search Engine Marketing’, ‘Search Engine Optimization Tips’, etc.
6. A compelling title can attract more eyeballs and clicks when your page appears in search results. You should therefore focus on the art of writing headlines and titles for improving your conversion rate.

5 Tips for Getting Started In Link Building

We explained in a previous post why it is important to build links to your website.  But after reading that post you are probably wondering “how, exactly, can I get started building links to my site?”

To be honest, there is no surefire, quick way to build up tons of links in a very short amount of time.  And you should be very wary of any person, company or service who tells you they can build massive amounts of links with very little effort because those methods are not usually above board.

With that said, there are some ways that you can start building links now so that you will continually increase the number of sites that link back to yours.

Here are five ways you can get started:

1. Be smart with anchor text. Anchor text refers to the words that you click on in order to be directed to another site. Rather than using yourwebsite.com as the anchor text, you can use words that refer to your product and make sense in the context where the link is found.
2. Try content syndication. Syndication refers to when someone uses an article, blog post or news item you wrote and publishes it on their site. When they give credit to the source, they will link back to your site.
3. Directories can also be a great way to build links. The Yahoo Directory is a great one, or you can try to find one that features topics related to your product or service.
4. Bookmarks. Sites such as Digg allow people to share their bookmarks with one another, allowing people to bookmark and share your site. This works best if you have a particularly interesting picture, blog post, or event on your site that people would like to talk about.
5. Ask clients, associates and organizations to put a link to your website on theirs. When you work with people, it is a good idea to see if it would be possible to use the relationship for link building. Also, for any organizations in which you are a member, ask the people in charge what it would take to get your link on their site, and then see if that is feasible for you.

Aim for Quality over Quantity

I’ll share a quick story with you to demonstrate why quality trumps quantity in link building.  A client of mine in the IT business has a very large company that they serve.  I suggested they request a link in the footer of their very popular and well established site saying “Technology consulting by ABC…”  And within a few weeks, our client moved up quickly in the rankings.

Now, this digital marketing strategy does not yield the same results every time.  However it does demonstrate that when Google, Yahoo and Bing find a link to your site on another site they trust, this helps your credibility in the online world.

A Facebook fan page is an essential part of online marketing. You can see some outstanding examples of how large brands use their pages in this list of the top 50 branded pages of 2010.

1. Use your personal profile for professional networking. Having a personal profile allows you to reach out and add select individuals as friends, comment on their walls, and begin to build key relationships. Plus, be mindful of your status updates and posts—you never know who’s reading your content in their stream!

2. Make use of Friend Lists. To better manage your friends, create lists with specific influentials, for example; you can then more easily view your News Feed each day and quickly Like and Comment as appropriate to continue nurturing those important relationships!

3. Use @ tags strategically. You can have up to six “@ tags” in any update/wall post (on your profile or fan page) consisting of a mix of friends, fan pages, events or groups. Use @ tags to give credit, thank, acknowledge and be enchanting!

4. Add an attractive landing tab to your fan page. A popular tab is a simple “welcome” message with custom graphics and possibly a video message. The purpose of this tab is to inspire visitors to join (like) your fan page. Check out these examples: NHL, EzineArticles, Steve Spangler, SocialMediaExaminer, and my own fan page.

5. Provide an area for your fans to promote themselves. To honor your fans and to help minimize any possible spam posts on your wall, give your fans their own forum using the Discussion tab. Specify exactly how and where you want them to post. For example, I have a long-running, popular thread encouraging fans to promote their Twitter accounts.

6. Respond to fans posts promptly and personally. Implement an effective engagement strategy (you may need team members to help) and reply to your fans’ comments and questions. Personalize your replies and use fans’ first names for an informal feel. BestBuy is an excellent example of enchanting engagement!

7. Surprise your fans and think outside the box. From time to time, give your Facebook fan page a burst of excitement by introducing initiatives like “Fan Page Friday” or “Share Your Blog Day” and invite all your fans to share their links on your wall. Every wall post creates viral visibility for your page throughout Facebook!

8. Give away a special free gift. Using the FBML app on your fan page, you can add any custom content as a tab or in the left column, including an opt-in box. Offer your fans a valuable, free download and you’ll grow your email list as a result. You can then continue building your relationship with your fans via email.

9. Chat live with your fans. Your fans will love to interact with you LIVE from time to time. Use the Vpype or Ustream apps to stream live video and get your fans to interact and chat. Also, try out the Clobby app (Chat Lobby) to chat real-time with your fans. Your fans will love you for the enchanting live element and you’ll stand out from others on Facebook!

10. Get your fans involved in product and content creation. Involve and include your Facebook fans when creating new products or when seeking ideas for new blog posts, etc. This is called “crowdsourcing.” You might also run a contest. Wildfireapp.com is a good choice for contests on Facebook.

Our SEO Explained Series covers a variety of popular topics that business owners want to understand.  And link building is another one of those digital marketing topics that can frighten the average business owner.  For people who do not work in the Internet industry, the idea of actually “building links” is a foreign concept that you might not fully understand.

In order to explain link building, you have to know what a link is. A link is anything such as words, texts, or a graphic that when clicked, directs you to another website on the Internet.  Link building, then, is the process of increasing the number of other websites that feature links to your website.

Why is link building important?

There is a ton of information on the Internet, and many websites cover the same topic, so search engines have to use various factors to decide which pages are the best ones on a given subject. One of the ways they do this is by evaluating the number of quality of other websites that link to your website.

What do links mean to a search engine?

1. Trust factor – Links are one indication that your website has been around for long enough to build that many links, and therefore earns a certain level of trust.
2. An indication of relevance – When other companies trust you enough to link to your site, this generally indicates you have a useful site with relevant information.
3. A measure of popularity – Links are often a sign of a popular website, and search engines look at popularity as an indicator that the website has good, useful information.

Consider this Scenario

Ok, so pretend you are Google for a moment and someone types in the phrase “oil spill news.”  Among the sites for consideration are a nice looking website with a handful of links back to it, as well as a similar sized website but with 1,500 links pointing back to it.  If you knew nothing else about these sites, it would be a logical assumption that the site with more links was probably a better resource on the subject.

Now, links alone do not promise rankings.  And link building can be manipulated in negative ways so it is not simply a game of quantity over quality.  However, it is a very important aspect of how your site fares on search engines and should not be overlooked as part of your digital marketing plan.

And now that you know more, stay tuned for Part 2 – How to build links!

Before you can start compiling your Business blog marketing plan, you should always answer a couple of questions on what you want to accomplish with your business blog. Do you want better organic search engine rankings? Increase your brand authority? Increase visitors? Sales?Find a couple of questions below that can help you with your blog marketing strategy.

At wsi-webdesign, we can get carried away by the details of what we are talking about at any given time, (we love what we do!)  so we’ve decided to change our format just a little and start by presenting the key takeaways of the post. In future, each post will present the key takeaways first in the hope that you, our valued visitors, will be able to quickly decide if the rest of the post is something of interest to you. With that..

1. Get started now on your business blog;
2. Commit a reasonable amount of time to develop and maintain your company’s blog project;
3. The 3 main areas for blog posts are a) General industry commentary, b) Customer service related discussions, c) Information related postings;
4. Use appropriate social media vehicles to promote and amplify your message;
5. Be certain that your posts are optimized so that search engines will pick up your content;
6. Provide your visitors with the opportunity to engage further through some sort of offer using landing pages;
7. Measure everything you do with an analytics package so that you understand what is of greatest value to your visitor.

5 Business blogging tips:

1. Create a list of subjects to cover- Having 20, 30 even 40 blog ideas is easy if you sit down and make a list. If this seems like a challenge, bring in your associates (sales, customer service, administration etc.) and brainstorm;
2. Pre-write some blog posts- When an idea hits you for a blog post, write it and save it so that you have something ready to go for a day when you’re drawing a blank or just don’t have time to create a new post;
3. Use your entire team for blog content development- Too often the blog is given to one person as a responsibility. Sometimes this works but often it’s a little overwhelming. Empower someone to manage the blog who will be a regular contributor, but will also engage your whole team in creating blog post offerings;
4. Invite industry partners and clients to guest blog- Does your company have key industry partners? What about customers who are really happy with your solution? Inviting them to post to your blog can give your company a really interesting blend of perspectives on your solution!
5. Repeat pertinent topics- If you think you can say something once and get your message out and received by your entire target audience, think again. Remember playing “Telephone” around a campfire? How the message got misinterpreted as it went around the circle? You can say one thing to ten people and get ten different interpretations, try saying the same thing ten different ways so that everyone receives the same message…it works!

Blog marketing strategy questions

Objectives: What is the most important thing that you would like to accomplish with your blog? Your objectives can include building up traffic, reaching new potential prospects, open communication with current customers, building up your brand name, etc. You can create a list detailing all of your objectives and then choose the most important one.

List two more of the objectives that are important to you. This will give you a total of three objectives. More than three objectives can be difficult sometimes to focus on. Most of the activity on your blog should be focused around the primary and most important objective.

Visitors: Who will be reading your blog? This should always be your targeted audience. This should also be the same as your targeted customer if one of your main objectives is to increase sales or business leads.

Time: How much time can you commit on your blog? Usually to reach your objectives you will need to commit solid time on your blog. This could either be your own time or the time of one of your employees.