SEO Tips For Internet Marketers

February 22, 2012That's all for today!

Why is it, when you visit a tropical island such as Hawaii, everyone asks you why you don't have a tan when you come back?! While we have no tan, we did have fun sightseeing with family, eating at new restaurants, and barhopping. Now we're back in the real world trying to catch up on all that work we swore we'd get to while on vacation ;)

Next "trip" will be NYC for the SES conference March 19?23. Looking forward to it!

Meanwhile, I'll catch you here in 2 weeks! ? Jill

Labels: Wrapup

Posted by admin on February, 22nd 2012

The Real Web SEO team have had a really sugary project to get their teeth into. We’ve recently taken on Hancocks, a giant in the Sweet and confectionery wholesale market.  This project is for the whole of the team including development, design and content writing.

The original Hancocks site was based on a Magento framework, perfect for our team as we have Magento specialists here, we are simply streamlining the site and ensuring that they rank well in Google. So, first things first, we’ve taken all the URLS and made sure that they actually make sense and are relative to the page content, as well as search terms, for example one of their categories is boiled sweets, originally the URL read hancocks.co.uk/boiled, but now reads hancocks.co.uk/boiled-sweets. This is a much more powerful tool when it comes to searching for those items.

Even through this process, the hits to the Hancocks site increased dramatically. Since we began the process of improving the SEO, organic non-branded traffic has risen by 50%, an incredible result. Those numbers come from using SEO, which doesn’t even mention the word Hancocks.  The SEO team has improved the Meta Tags on each Hancocks page and the copywriting team has added content to all of the category pages. We are fully improving the site, but even small changes like improving URLs and meta tags as well as content, makes a huge difference.

We have optimized a range of words for Hancocks including “sweets” “cash and carry” and “wholesale confectionery”. This has had brilliant results and the order amounts going through the site has increase, which not only are we happy about, but Hancocks is very pleased.

It’s amazing what a little bit of work can do to improve site rankings and Real Web SEO believe in using organic, above board methods of doing so, the results speak volumes.

Real Web SEO

Magento SEO Web Design

Magento is a content management system that can handle a complex ecommerce store. It has a lot of advantages over out-dated oscommerce systems including increased flexibility for the user, simple product management by the retailer and customisable meta tag options for the search engines. Magento stores can be linked seamlessly with WordPress blogs which is [...]

Google Sitemaps – What To Look Out For

When looking at your Webmaster Tools which features do you normally look at? The lazy SEO’er will just click through the links on the left hand side of the page, hoping that nothing stands out as odd or wrong. If you’re new to Webmaster Tools or just find it a little daunting, one thing you [...]

SEO Success – #1 position for Magento Web Design

Magento Web Design Reaches #1 For Juno Web Design Nottingham Real Web SEO have helped Juno Web Design reach the top spot for an upcoming form of web design – Magento. Juno Web Design are one of the partner companies of Real Web SEO and are based in Nottingham. The work undertaken by our SEO [...]

How to use the Meta Description tag

The Meta Description tag isn’t there just for the search engines to read, in fact Google pretty much ignores the content in the description tag altogether. What it should be used for is enticing people to click on your listing in the search engine results. Let’s look at a typical Google search result for this [...]

Check your broken links for search spiders

Every search engine (apart from search directories) uses programs called “spiders” to crawl whole websites and grab all the relevant data they can from each page. The spider will enter the homepage of a website and then follow every link it comes across in the code after saving the content.  It will then crawl each [...]

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Labels: sweet

Does your marketing lead anywhere? Is there a plan and a purpose behind your content, or do you just toss something out there and see what happens? While there is a place for general content marketing that keeps us in the forethoughts of our prospects, there is also a need for funnels that strategically guide readers through from introduction to sale.

While there are many ways to construct a content marketing funnel, this easy 3-step model will get you started quickly. Before you begin, you'll want to consider these questions:

1. What result do you want to achieve? At the end of the funnel, what should happen? Are you looking to make more sales of a particular product, for example? When you systematically implement a process that supports that goal, you can instill a marketing funnel that guides prospects to the specific information you want them to see and in the order you want them to see it.

2. What obstacles must be overcome in order to reach this goal? There are friction elements for every product and service. What makes people hesitate before taking the action you want them to take? How can you overcome those obstacles?

3. How can I educate prospects and provide valuable content related to my desired result? This is a win-win. By educating prospects, you're offering them information that they both want and need while also guiding them toward your desired result.

Once you have answers to the questions above, it's time to set up your funnel. During every phase, keep your end result in mind. If you aim to increase the number of product sales, remember to use that in each of the 3 steps.

Step 1 ? Write an Article

If you ask me, the primary goal of any article should be to offer excellent content. I'm not a fan of shallow pieces that are penned just for the sake of trying to increase backlinks.

Think about the result you want to achieve (say, getting people to purchase a particular model of leaf vacuum). Also consider the obstacles you must overcome to accomplish this goal (not being able to see the product firsthand, competitor's products, etc.). How can you educate prospective customers and/or provide valuable content that will encourage them to ultimately purchase? One step at a time, that's how.

Start with an article pertaining to this model of leaf vacuum ? maybe about the product's unique features or benefits, a comparison between your product and manually collecting the leaves from a large lawn or commercial property, etc. Use the link in the Bio or the About the Author section of your article to point people to the next step in the funnel. You might link to the product page of your site or another web page if you feel it is more applicable.

Step 2 ? Free Short Report or Ebook

Once on your site, visitors would find an invitation to download a free report, ebook, whitepaper, case study, or other piece of content. This piece would go into a bit more detail about the product and how it would benefit the prospect.

Remember to keep your focus on the reader, not on your product or service. The goal of the ebook or report is not to create a brag fest that's all about you. It is to highlight how the customer will benefit after using your product or service.

Throughout the short report, offer calls to action for both purchasing and receiving additional information. Those who have seen enough and are ready to buy can then click immediately to your shopping cart or contact page. Others who still need a bit more convincing can request the content available in Step 3.

Step 3 ? In-Depth Content

Whether you choose content in the form of DVDs, CDs, full-length ebooks or other options, Step 3 should provide in-depth information. After a prospect chooses to opt in for the third link of the funnel, you'll want to home in on your desired result and reinforce what you've already provided through Steps 1 and 2.

You can also incorporate incentives to buy into Step 3, such as discount coupon codes, free upgraded shipping, additional service options not available to others, etc.

Not everyone communicates the same way. While some make quick decisions based on limited facts, others want numerous questions answered before feeling confident enough to buy. When you set up a content marketing funnel that purposefully walks prospects through from introduction to purchase, you ensure that every customer gets what s/he needs. More conversions are bound to follow.

Labels: 3Step, Content, Funnel, Generate, Leads, Marketing

February 22, 2012This week I asked my social media followers:

++Do you have a content marketing funnel or plan?++

Here's how they responded:

Twitter

AndyBeal: No, unless you count: Churn it out, when we can. ;-)

Pagesauce: Yep, have a content marketing plan ? sticking to it or getting others to isn't quite so easy.

JTPotts: I have a plan, still trying to sell it to execs though. :-(

Labels: Question, Rankings

Posted by megan on November, 16th 2011

We are pleased to announce that the Juno Web Design homepage has been given a page ranking of 6 from Google. The homepage was previously ranked at 5, showing that it has increased in both popularity and importance over the last few months. The scale of Google page ranking ranges from minus one, which is given to pages considered to be extremely poor, to ten, awarded to pages that are highly important and influential. A ranking of zero is usually given to brand new pages. They get their official ranking once Google update the PageRank algorithm 2-3 times a year on average.

You may be wondering just how Google determines what page ranking to give to pages on the Internet. Unfortunately it isn’t just a straightforward process; there are many factors that contribute to how a page is valued. Originally the Page Ranking system worked much like a popularity contest – the more links you had to your site, the higher your page was ranked. The links to your site were considered to be similar to votes. Now Google considers a range of factors before ranking your page. It will analyse the website that your links or ‘votes’ have come from, to check its quality and validity. Google will also examine the content on pages, and will rank them higher if they are important and relevant to searches for particular keywords.

Page ranking is not the most important factor when it comes to determining how good a page is, though it is certainly a good indication. It is often thought better to have a good search ranking as opposed to page ranking, as this focuses on the keywords that are related to your page, and would be used by users in their searches. Google updates its rankings every 3-4 months.

The higher the ranking your page gains, the harder it is to get to the next level, as there is more and more criteria to meet. Pages with the top ranking of 10 cannot get an even higher ranking, but as they improve, it makes it even harder for pages with a lower number, to increase their score. Think of it as Google constantly moving the goalposts, making it harder to achieve the next target. There are a few things you can do to raise your page ranking, including creating good quality links to your page and improving its SEO. It’s obviously going to look good if you have important PR websites linking to your page, however Google also looks at the context of these links and the relevance to the content on your page. Blogging, participating in forums, article advertising and press releases will all help to create links and should improve your ranking.

Holy Moly….Page 2 for Juno Web Design

We are currently working on the website for Juno Web Design. With careful selection of search terms we have placed Juno in the tops spots already. Juno has just reached paged two for the search term web design on google.co.uk. This is one of the toughest search terms to crack as you would imagine and [...]

Juno Web Design Page one on google.com

Web design is a massively competitive search phrase. We have helped our sister company Juno Web Design onto page one of google.com for the search web design. This means that if you take all of the directories on that page and leave only web design companies, they are currently the fourth highest achieving web design [...]

SEO Debate: Do English skills count as a ranking factor?

Do your English skills count as a ranking factor in SEO or is your general content more important? Say you were building a brand new search engine, what are the advantages and disadvantages of checking and ranking for grammar and spelling? Advantages of ranking well written content highly – If grammar and spelling are correct [...]

Google – Future Predictions of Ranking Factors

Google roll out many minor changes to their search engine results every month. About 2-3 times a year Google roll out a major change to their ranking factors and around 2-3% of sites become massively effected.  The last big update was in May and effected long tail keywords noticed by many webmasters. Some changes to [...]

What is a squeeze page?

You may have heard of “squeeze pages” within fancy ‘internet marketing’ lingo but what does the term really mean? A “squeeze page” is a webpage which directs the visitor to perform one action So what examples are there of an action on a squeeze page? Click an internal link (useful for ecommerce) Click an external link (useful [...]

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Labels: Designs, increases, ranking

January 11, 2012Forum member Michael Martinez provides us with the results of his experiment -- he shows that when you have an iframe embedded on a page, Google follows and indexes the resulting iframe URL.

Read about it and share your comments here:

Confirmed: Google Passed Value From an iframed Link

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Labels: Advanced, Forum, Thread

By Jill Whalen

Have you heard of Google's Authorship program yet? Whether you've heard of it or not, you've likely seen its fruits in the search results. You know those listings that have a photo of the author next to them? Most likely they get that extra cool stuff because they're using Rel=Author correctly and Google has accepted them to participate. Unfortunately, it's been a bit hit-or-miss as to whether your content gets accepted or not. I saw mine accepted for a day or two many months ago, and then *poof!* it was gone. I reviewed their new guidelines recently, however, made a few changes, and sure enough, within a week or so, my content started showing up?yay!

While you may or may not get your content into the program, the only way to know is to try, and persistence is definitely a key.

If you're thinking it's just not worth the trouble, here are 5 reasons why it's super important:

1. It's kinda sorta easy to implement.

While it is a bit confusing to figure out exactly how to enable authorship based on Google's directions  (which seem to keep changing), in reality their latest criteria have made it easier than ever to implement.

I'm not going into the specifics on how to do it, because you can follow Google's directions. Suffice it to say that the main things you need are a Google Profile page  that links to the website where you have author status, and a link back from your website's home page to your Google Profile page.

You can also have an "author page," such as the About Us page on your website, as long as your Google profile page links to that page.

Once you've got that all implemented, every time you write an article, simply link your name in your byline to either your Google Profile page or your author page with the Rel=Author code, as I have here:

By Jill Whalen

Be sure to add the Rel=Author tag to as many of your old content articles as well, especially ones that you know show up well in the search results.

While Google has moved toward having you link directly to your Google Profile page in your Rel=Author links (as opposed to your author page) to make things less confusing, I still link to my author page, and it works fine.

If you go this route, be sure to follow their older, more confusing instructions as well.

2. It makes your content stand out.

Imagine if you could put big stars around your content listings in Google's search results that everyone would see. Rel=Author does exactly that! Only it's not stars, but your name and photo.

Before Rel=Author became widespread, only logged-in users and those who participated in social media might see a little profile photo of you if they happened to search on something that you had tweeted about. But with Rel=Author implemented correctly, even users who aren't logged into their Google accounts or their social media accounts will still see the rich author information and photo.

This is huge, folks, and this reason alone makes it worth figuring out the implementation.

3. Provides credibility and more exposure.

Beyond just seeing my smiling face in the listings for my content, as you can see in the above screenshot, Google is also showing how many people have circled me on Google+ as well as a "More by Jill Whalen" link. Clicking that link shows more information about me from my Google Profile, plus posts I've made on Google+ related to the search query, and all the other articles that I've written on the subject.

I've also seen them show articles others have written on the subject that reference me in one way or another.

4. Higher clickthrough rate.

I'd say this one goes without saying, due to all of the above factors. It would be difficult to *not* click on the listing that Google is screaming for you to click on. Time will tell on this one, but so far it appears that since my authorship status started to show up in the Google results (it's less than 2 weeks now), I've been getting more traffic for certain articles.

5. Additional metrics in Webmaster Tools.

As if all of the above weren't enough, once you have your authorship up and running and showing up in Google results, you'll also see new author stats in your Webmaster Tools account. (Look under "Labs.") The information there shows you approximately how many times each of your content pages showed up in the search results (impressions) and approximately how many times it was clicked on, along with other interesting details that you can't really get elsewhere.

Of course, Google has their own selfish reasons for giving us all of this awesomeness. Their number-one priority this year is Google+ and all that surrounds it. Rel=Author provides anyone who creates online content with a darn good reason (make that 5!) to create a Google Profile. And the more people who do that, the more who might start using Google+, especially if they want to get those circle numbers up as mentioned in #3 above.

Jill

Labels: Content, Reasons, RelAuthor

January 25, 2012That's all for today!

We got Tim back to Brown this weekend after about a month's break. I wish I could say that it's a lot quieter and neater around here, but he's actually very quiet and fairly neat anyway, so we don't notice much difference in that respect. Different story entirely when Corie is visiting :) And Jamie mainly hoards her mess in the cellar where she dwells. As long as we don't have to go down there for anything, it's not too bad.

My husband, Don, and Jamie will be coming with me to Honolulu for PubCon in a few weeks, which we're all looking forward to. Although winter hasn't been too bad (so far) this year, it will still be nice to get away to warmer climes.

Catch you in 2 weeks! ? Jill

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Labels: Wrapup

Posted by megan on December, 2nd 2011

2011 is drawing to a close and here at Real Web SEO Nottingham we have a lot to celebrate. This year has enabled the company to grow and expand, due to the level of projects and success stories we have shared with our clients.

It is apparent and a much talked about subject, that content is king. It is a bit of a cliché saying, but when it comes to optimization and rankings in search engines, the right type of SEO content on a website, makes an incredible difference.

A great looking website is a good starting point, design and interactivity are key to enable the user to have an experience when browsing through the site. When it comes to the content, users want to be able to find exactly what they are looking for quickly and even learn something from the site. If it is taking a while to sift through jargon, spam and over linked pages, this can turn users off. We need to engage, keep them on the site, keep them clicking through the pages, and ultimately contact or purchase from our clients sites.

SEO in Nottingham is not hard but there are ways it can done badly, including over use of keywords and phrases. This can cause search engines to class content as spam. Plagiarism is also a problem, even from the point of copying content from a client’s old site onto their new site. Fresh unique SEO copy is always the best way to move forward, climb the search engine rankings, and ultimately attract more customers to your site.

As a client, if you are having a new website designed and are considering your content options, always opt for fresh professional SEO Content, in the long run it will enable your site to rise up the charts and that extra little investment towards a professional content writer, will bring in those much desired customers.

Blogging 'el – Restaurants in Nottingham gets a boost

Blogs for restaurants in Nottingham boost a website affirming the power of content One thing you will notice if you search around for tips on good SEO is that Google will always recommend one thing over anything else – write good content consistently… It’s true, all the SEO work in the world will get you [...]

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Labels: Nottingham

January 25, 2012By Jill Whalen

What does a good online marketer do when stuck for topic ideas these days? Go to Twitter, what else! I asked my followers to hit me with their burning SEO questions and they didn't disappoint.

Set your stopwatches and I'll grab my buzzer and we'll get started with the SEO Q&A Lightning Round!

Google Search Plus Your World

Lots of people wanted to know my thoughts on Google's Search Plus Your World (SPYW), which is Google's new way of showing results to people who are logged into their Google accounts. So we'll start off with those.

@jillwhalen How about the effect on SEO professionals with the developing Google Search Plus innovation? ? Zachary Starkey (@ZacharyStarkey) January 24, 2012

In all honesty, it's really too soon to tell how Search Plus Your World is going to turn out. Google promoting Google+ at the expense of providing relevant results is quite annoying to many. For instance, just now when trying to find the most appropriate past articles of mine to link to from this one, Google was first showing me content I've posted on Google+ that weren't necessarily related to the topics I was looking for. They did have the content I wanted a bit lower down, but isn't that backwards?

While I hate to say this (because it plays right into Google's greedy little hands), I would definitely recommend that anyone dishing out content on their website be sure they have a Google+ profile and encourage their target audience to circle them. And as I wrote last week, it's critical to try to get into the Google Authorship program. But beyond that, only time will tell. Don't forget that, as part of the tech industry, we are in our own little bubble when it comes to Google+. The rest of the world has barely heard of it and likely hasn't even seen their Google search results change very much because of it.

@jillwhalen Jill, how about an article on what % of search results are now compromised by Google's SPYW results?#SEO ? Aloysius Carl (@aldigital) January 24, 2012

I don't think it's possible to say what percentage of the search results show SPYW. Everyone's results are different depending on whether they have a Google+ account, how many people they have circled, whether they're logged in, and so many other factors.

@jillwhalen The future of Google Search PYW with regard to local search (small biz in the "people and places" box eventually?) ? Mickey Mellen (@mickmel) January 24, 2012

I'm not sure I even want to take a guess at this one, although I can see perhaps Google adding location data somehow to the search results. For instance, I just noticed I could enable location data on my Google phone (Nexus S). I imagine that in the future (if not already), if I do a mobile search when I'm out somewhere, Google might use my previous locations to guess what I might want to see now. Google also has check-in data that they will surely use in a similar way.

Local SEO

Beyond, Search Plus Your World, Google Places Pages and getting found locally was also a recurring theme in my questions:

@jillwhalen: One Google place listing per office location or multiple when it comes to a law firm? ? UXBlunder (@UXblunder) January 24, 2012

Good question! It's my understanding that you're only supposed to have one Google Places page for any one company or location. Because a law firm is one company, I believe it would violate Google's terms of service to attempt to have more. I'm no Google Places expert, however, so I did a bit of research on this, and this post by local SEO expert Mike Blumenthal: Google Places Basics: Two Business Listings or One? seems to agree.

@jillwhalen How about SEO ideas for non-local businesses to compete? ? weboptimist (@weboptimist) January 24, 2012

Because I don't do a lot of local SEO, most of my SEO articles focus on SEO on a national level. However, I think you may mean, "How would one compete for local (city/state) keyword phrases without necessarily having a physical bricks-and-mortar store in the specific locations?" See the next question and answer.

@jillwhalen If a small biz has customers in 5 counties, how do you best target counties & primary towns with SEO, i.e., "stove repair [town]"? ? keethgee (@keethgee) January 24, 2012

Unfortunately, there aren't too many ways to do what you'd like in a non-spammy way. However, while I wouldn't personally do it for myself or a client, it does appear that the ole "location madlib spam" trick continues to work very well for many sites.

SEO Tactics

My favorite questions dealt with rolling up your SEO sleeves and getting your hands dirty with the nitty-gritty how-to stuff.

@jillwhalen Thanks! My SEO question would be: What's the most common tactic you use (or change you make) that your clients have overlooked? ? Will Montanaro (@willmontanaro) January 24, 2012

One of the most common mistakes I see is when clients are concerned with keywords that are not always the ones on which they should be focusing. Making the most overlooked tactic keyword research to find the most appropriate ones. In addition, learning not to concern yourself with just 1 or 2 pet phrases at the expense of the hundreds or thousands of others that should bring targeted traffic.

@jillwhalen Is there a way to check if your SEO results are paying off in the short term, or do you have to wait for long-term results? ? Marta (@MartasAdvice) January 24, 2012

It's a common misconception that SEO takes months or years to start working. For a website that has never done much SEO (or has done SEO poorly), professional SEO work should start showing results within a month or two and continue to get better over time. It's easy to measure success via Google Analytics or your web analytics software of choice. Look for more search engine visitors coming in from a wide variety of the keyword phrases you've optimized for, as well as more of the "small conversions" that can eventually lead to large ones.

@jillwhalen How about a start-to-finish game plan for out-trafficking Wikipedia? ;)#SEO ? Thomas M. Schmitz (@TomSchmitz) January 24, 2012

First of all, you're never going to out-traffic Wikipedia. It's huge, and a great resource for many things. Perhaps you meant outranking them for the phrases that are relevant to your website? If so, it's still going to be tough! For the most part, the content that I see that outranks Wikipedia is generally content from well-established, authoritative websites. I've found that if you have some great older content that is right under Wikipedia, updating it to ensure it's still accurate and then re-promoting it via social media and other forms of online marketing can give it just the boost it needs to rise above Wikipedia. But you've got to have that content in the first place, so this is a super-long-term strategy for anyone just starting out!

@jillwhalen Is there any place for a 3-way link request in today's SEO world? I.e., u link to me and I link to u from a different site. ? Marie Haynes (@Marie_Haynes) January 24, 2012

Absolutely, positively no. It was stupid when it was first dreamed up, and it's even more stupid now. :)

@jillwhalen Ruler of the Google Kingdom for a day, what would you change? ? David Feller (@david_feller) January 24, 2012

Easier said than done, but I would figure out a way to ensure that multiple keyword-rich domain websites owned by the same company no longer show up in the search results. Especially those obvious ones that use the same phone number!

SEO Business Issues and Trends

Another category of questions pertained to SEO as it relates to businesses.

@jillwhalen Why don't more people "get it"? ? John Tully (@dsm_llc) January 24, 2012

See: Who Keeps Spreading Silly SEO Stupidity, and Why?

@jillwhalen How would you suggest a web dev (with mainly on-site SEO exp) looking to enter the SEO field approach an SEO agency for a job? ? Martin Hurford (@martinhurford) January 24, 2012

I think your best bet might be to look for an agency that may lack the technical expertise necessary to do great SEO work. Many companies have content creators, etc., but don't really understand the importance of the website architecture and overall crawlability of the website. If you have a good understanding of that, you'd be a great asset for many SEO agencies. You might also try connecting with a job placement company such as Onward Search that specializes in online marketing jobs.

@jillwhalen What#SEO trends do you see for small business in 2012? ? Hiveling (@Motion_Comic) January 24, 2012

While it's been a long time coming, I think almost all small businesses these days have to start wrapping their head around how to market their websites via social media. As I stated in Why SEO in All the Right Places No Longer Works, participation (real participation, that is) in social media is being a very important signal to Google. The whole Search Plus Your World business shows this to be true in an exaggerated way. Just remember that it's not setting up your Facebook page that is going to make a difference, it's what you do with your social media accounts that is important.

Jill

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Labels: Answer, Lightning, Question, Round

Posted by megan on November, 23rd 2011 By now we are all very aware that search engine optimisation is essential to any online marketing campaign. The higher you rank in search results for keywords relevant to your business and the products you sell, the more traffic you will get flowing to your website, which should in turn, increase your conversion rates. Ranking well in searches gives you a competitive edge over those businesses who fail to rank well, or even at all. With the rapid growth of social media sites, like Facebook, Twitter and now Google+, it has become apparent that they play an important role in any businesses internet marketing strategy. Social media doesn’t directly enhance a company’s SEO but it can help drive traffic to your website, so it should still be treated as important and an essential part of your business. The two go hand in hand and if used effectively, will create much better results for your company.

As well as being a platform for personal and informal interaction with customers, co-workers and friends, social network sites are often used for content sharing. This is where a user will publish a link to an article, advertisement, video, image, product or anything else you can think of, on their profile, to share it with their peers. A user may choose to share something because it’s interesting, amusing, educational, inspirational, or perhaps controversial. Information is shared by using social media buttons, like ‘Tweet Me’ and ‘Like’ buttons, which are often found below articles, images and even products. Many e-commerce websites will display social media buttons under their products, for their users to share, should they wish to. This will publish information such as the product name, an image, the price and even sometimes the description or a review of the product, to a person’s social media profile.

Facebook is a great example of a place in which users will share content with their peers. Businesses can set up their own business page on Facebook, and gain ‘fans’ via people ‘liking’ their page. As well as allowing businesses to engage with their fans on a more personal and friendly level, using Facebook also helps improve brand awareness. Online communities like StumbleUpon are also places where content in regularly shared. On these websites you can generate links to your business website and product pages, along with a description to go with the link. The more votes you receive for your link, the higher it will be valued, and if you’re lucky, it can even be displayed on the online community’s homepage. Links from websites like this are very valuable to improving your SEO. It is essential that you plan the content surrounding the link, to make sure it’s attractive and eye catching to users, who could potentially be your next customers. Content should be straightforward and simple to understand, unique and of a high quality.

When a search engine like Google is determining how to rank a company, for a particular keyword search, they will take into account the activity that occurs surrounding the keywords on social media sites. Likes and Tweets, which are sometimes referred to as social media signals, will help to boost your rankings, which will in turn lead to a rise in traffic and hopefully conversion rates.

Unfortunately it is not as simple as publishing a few links to your website and products on social media sites, for you to gain a better ranking and improve your SEO. Search engines will take a number of factors into account when determining how important your website is. One of these may be the authority of the person or business posting the links. Authority could be judged on how many followers, fans or contacts a person has on a particular social media platform or it could be how long their profile has existed for. Their relevance to the link may also be taken into account, for example it may be valued higher if the link is appropriate to the industry they work in or perhaps is related to something they regularly post about online, on websites and blogs. Gaining links to your website from a number of different sources is highly valued by search engines, as is the popularity of these links, which is often judged by how many ‘likes’ or ‘re-tweets’ they attain. A final key point considered to be of importance is the text surrounding the links to your site. This text should be precise, relevant and generally well written in order to gain the attention of search engines.

Social media and SEO are both essential components in creating a strong internet marketing campaign for your business. Social media is no longer just a tool for businesses to speak to their customers. It takes a lot of hard work over a period of time, to gain better and stronger links to your site, but this will pay off in the long run when you are gaining more traffic to your website and increasing your sales.

Third time lucky? Google tries to go social – again

Circles, sparks and hangouts… no, we’re not talking about a visit to the circus, we are talking about Google’s latest attempt at breaking into the lucrative social media market. After two failed forays into the world of social media, Google announced it’s latest project this week – Google +: https://plus.google.com/ Billed as a more human [...]

How The New Twitter Could Effect Social Marketing

The new Twitter preview video shows some exciting features which could have a profound impact on how people spend their time online: Shortened URL’s no longer are mysterious links to webpages, twitpics and videos, they will soon appear within Twitter on the right-hand sidebar.  The only way to preview shortened URL’s currently is the very [...]

The social networking websites

If you ask your grandparents or even your parents about the great technological god that is known as the World Wide Web’ they will say that they haven’t got a clue as it ‘wasn’t around in my day’. But is this necessarily true? Let’s take social networking sites for example. Back in 2004 a young [...]

SEO and the Press

The best links you can ever wish for are from online news and gossip websites. Websites from the press attract a lot of attention online, some yielding millions of backlinks and hundreds of thousands of unique pages of content.  Sometimes an even better feature of these media sites is that they have little to zero out-going [...]

Will Facebook and Twitter Collusion Thwart Google+?

After Google announced the launch of their new social network, Google+ in June 2011, Facebook was uncharacteristically quiet. Then following the Google+ launch, the search engine Bing (which happens to be a partner of Facebook) bought Skype, an internationally popular piece of internet video and telephone software.  Following the announcement from Google about their new [...]

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February 8, 2012Internet marketing and development consultant, Matthew Coers, has some great tips for how to establish credibility and trust online through email marketing (something very close to my heart!) over here.

And to go along with his great (free) information, he's also providing High Rankings Advisor readers with a $500 discount to help you get started your own email newsletter or email marketing campaign.

Check it out now, and be sure to let Matt know that Jill sent you!

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