SEO Stakeholders

As SEO and PPC campaigns become more competitive and higher priority in organizations, it is imperative that everyone have at least a basic understanding of what is involved and what results are realistic to expect.

Marketers provide the content. Marketing is right in the name: Search Engine Marketing. Search engines rely on quality content, and this content typically comes from your marketing department.

Web Developers implement the changes. The IT team must work together with the marketing team to upload the new content. Some changes require modifications to coding on the page that only the developers can implement. Also, developers need to understand the implication of renaming files, changing directory structures, or moving to a new web site technology (for example, a change from .php to .aspx has the effect of renaming every page on the site).

Managers & Business Owners must have realistic expectations about how soon to see results and what results are realistically obtainable. Simply put, SEO takes patience. Google, in particular, can take months to reward your SEO efforts. A brand new site may take 6-9 months before it starts to rank well for primary keywords in Google. Managers and business owners need to understand the SEO process in order to accurately measure the success of those on the SEO team.

At our SEO Training Classes, we're seeing registrations from not just web developers, but marketing executives, business owners, and managers. They all need to understand what is involved in managing a SEO campaign and what results are realistic to expect.

Find an upcoming SEO Training Class in your Town

Yahoo and eBay vs. Google and Dell

As summer approaches, the search engine wars heated up quite a bit this week. The stock prices for both Yahoo and Ebay rose this week as they announced a joint partnership to provide services to each other's customer base. Of particular interest to PPC advertisers, Yahoo has become the exclusive sponsored search provider to eBay. That potentially means more eyeballs for Yahoo Search Marketing ads.

Not to be outdone, Google countered with the announcment of a partnership with Dell computers. Of particular interest to organic search marketers, Dell computers will ship with the Google Toolbar and a co-branded Internet homepage. This will likely lead to even more searches on Google, who already control 50% of all Internet searches.

Neither of this is good news for MSN, who maintain a distant third in the search engine race. And Ask.com? Hopefully they won't go the way of Jeeves...

Read more on Cnn.com:
Yahoo, eBay announce partnership
Google chief: We're getting a Dell

Search Tips: Searching by file type

In my article on SEO for PDFs, you learned how to restrict Google search results to PDFs by adding the "filetype:pdf" parameter. Here’s a few other file types you can search by:

• filetype:doc (Microsoft Word)
• filetype:xls (Microsoft Excel)
• filetype:ppt (Microsoft PowerPoint)

So if you're looking for an Excel loan calculator, you can cut through the search clutter and go straight to the files by entering:
loan calculator filetype:xls

Or if you had to find PowerPoint presentations on sea turtles, you could enter:
sea turtle filetype:ppt

There's a lot of sea turtle presentations out there...

Control your web site description

MSN announced this week a new META tag that will allow webmasters to have more control over their site description in search engine results pages (SERPs). Often the SERPs will display a site description (or "snippet") directly from The Open Directory Project (aka ODP or DMOZ), a volunteer-built guide to the web. Because DMOZ uses human editors, the snippets can often be several years out of date or otherwise inaccurate.

The problem was the search engines often displayed these descriptions whether you wanted them to or not. So despite your well-crafted META Description tag or optimized content, the search engines still choose DMOZ’s description over yours.

But now you have a choice. If you don’t like your DMOZ description, enter the following META tag into the head of your default site homepage.

< name="ROBOTS" content="NOODP">*
or
< name="msnbot" content="NOODP">*

*remove the spaces after <>

So far, MSN is the only engine to support this tag, but others may follow. And remember, it may take a few days (weeks, etc.) for the spiders to crawl your page and update the engine’s cache.

SEO Keynote Speech

Last week's Triangle American Marketing Association's Educational Luncheon on SEO was a huge success. The demand was so high, they actually had to turn people away. Here's a testimonial from Jim Tobin, Chapter President:

"Larry's presentation was incredibly popular. In fact, we sold out, and the energy in the room stayed high throughout his presentations. It was clear that the audience was getting what it hoped for, which was a good introduction to this very important topic. I recommend Larry to marketers everywhere. If you're not up to date on this, you're not up to date."

I gave a 30-minute presentation, followed by a dynamic 15 minute Q&A that could have easily lasted for a couple of hours. Here's an outline of the presentation, entitled Search Engine Marketing:The Differentiator:

Introduction

• What is Search Engine Marketing?
• How SEM can add to the Bottom Line
• Focus on Conversions

The SEO Process

• Targeting the Right Keywords
• Optimizing your Content
• Building Link Popularity
• Measuring your Results

Action Items

• Before you Begin
• Ongoing Tasks
• Resources

If given an hour, I would have gone more in-depth into these subjects. I'm used to teaching 8-hour days, so 30 minutes was actually a challenge. This SEO keynote speech is great for Marketing Associations, Chamber of Commerce meetings, Universities, and anwhere people want to learn about SEO.

Need an SEO Speaker? Contact Larry Weaver...

Focus on Revenue, Not Rankings

Suppose you could double your web site traffic today. What would that be worth to you? What if you could instantly obtain 10 new #1 rankings on Google. How much would you pay?

If you answered “It depends,” give yourself a pat on the back. What you don’t know is whether or not the increased traffic is from qualified prospects. And you don’t know two things about the rankings: 1) are the search terms closely related to your web site, and 2) is anyone searching for those terms?

The fact is that search engine rankings and web site traffic should not be your end goal. The goal of your internet marketing campaign should be to increase conversions.

In order to effectively measure the success of your SEO or PPC campaign, you must define what a conversion is for your site. Put another way, what do you want people to do when they come to your web site? Here are a few examples:

• Place an order
• Sign up for a newsletter, webinar, or more information
• Click-through to a specified page
• Call us

Once you define your conversion(s), you must accurately measure your results over time to gauge the effectiveness of your internet marketing efforts. In upcoming posts, we’ll look at conversion scenarios for three types of web sites:

1. transactional
2. lead generation
3. informational

In the meantime, determine what a conversion is for your site. If you don’t already know, how can you possibly determine what those search engine rankings are worth?

Need a measurable plan fast? Sign up for a SEO Training Class...

Nothing attracts a link like a link

Have you ever been to an area with a lot of street performers, like Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica, Chicago’s Navy Pier, or Mallory Square in Key West? Which performers did you stop to watch, and why?

Chances are the performer that caught your attention was the one that had a crowd gathered around. A skillful street performer knows that nothing attracts a crowd like a crowd. They display hard-to-find skills, unique personalities, and a bold call to action to attract people to their act.

Most people know that links are important to search engine rankings, and they’ll try all sorts of tricks to get them: buying links, trading links, even stealing links. They’ll disguise their site with keywords in hopes of hijacking unsuspecting visitors. But like the lonely street performer who has nothing to offer, people see through the schemes and look elsewhere.

So what is on your web site to make people want to visit? What do you offer that is hard-to-find, unique, or attractive to your potential customers?

For many sites, it’s time to stop trying to deceive the search engines and offer something substantial. For performers, it’s about practice. For web sites, it’s about content. Your hard work will pay off as people start linking to your site. Nothing attracts a link like a link.

Finding your top ranking pages

You know your site isn't performing well for your targeted keywords. You know you need to work on the content to improve your ratings. But where do you begin?

A good starting point is the pages on your site that already rank best for that keyword. But how do you find them? You find them by performing a search for your keyword - but limiting the results to your site. Here's how:
site:www.yoursite.com your keyword phrase

Here's an example: if I go to MSN and type site:www.ciinc.com seo training into the search box, MSN returns the top ranking pages from my site for that term. I can take that information and do the following:

• Identify existing top-ranking pages to further optimize for that term.
• Ensure that the top pages are the ones that I actually want returned first for that term.
• Pinpoint pages that I don't want to rank well for that term, and adjust them to move them down the list.

You'll also see how the different engines rank your pages, and begin to draw some conclusions. Here are a few results:

• Google SEO Training from Cii
• Yahoo SEO Training from Cii
• MSN SEO Training from Cii

SEO for PDFs

Are you optimizing the PDFs on your web site for search engines? If you're not sure, you probably aren't. The (good/bad - take your pick) news is that you're not alone. Search for the title "untitled" in Google, and limit your filetype to PDFs. Here's how:
intitle:untitled filetype:pdf

Currently, Google returns nearly 21 million untitled PDFs! Somebody has some work to do...

If you're using Adobe Acrobat, simply choose "File > Document Properties" and you'll see a very intuitive form. Enter your title, description, and keywords - just as you would on a regular web page.

These few extra steps can pay huge dividends in your SEO campaign. You'll often find your PDF documents ranking very well for your targeted keywords.

Need more help? Let me know...

Search Engine Submisson

Question: My site already appears in the search engines. How often do I need to resubmit the URL(s)?

Answer: If you have inbound links to your web site and avoid spider traps*, you should ideally never have to submit or re-submit your site to search engines. With inbound links, the spiders should find your site, index your content, and return to crawl your page at regular intervals.

However, it is a good practice to develop and schedule a regular internal review process for your web site. If you find that key pages are not listed at all, you will want to manually submit them to the search engines.
Google: http://www.google.com/addurl
Yahoo: http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html
MSN: http://search.msn.com/docs/submit.aspx

Additionally, as you continue to tweak and improve pages, you may wish to resubmit individual pages over time to make sure they are spidered and indexed in a timely manner.

*Spider traps are simply anything on your web site that may prevent a search engine from finding or indexing your page. Examples may include frames, complex JavaScript navigation, Flash, dynamic URLs, redirects, or other potential obstacles.

Triangle AMA Educational Luncheon on SEO

For those of you in the Raleigh, NC area, I'll be speaking May 18 at the Triangle American Marketing Association Monthly Educational Luncheon. The event will be held at Brier Creek Country Club, and is open to non-members. Here is the official description from their web site:

Triangle AMA’s Monthly Educational Luncheon
Thursday, May 18, 2006 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Search Engine Optimization: The Differentiator

The May topic for our monthly luncheon is a hot subject. Search engine optimization (SEO). When you see articles about the internet and marketing these days, SEO is mentioned more often than not. With the net growing and taking a bigger share of marketer’s dollars every day, successful SEO is the difference between a thriving online business and venture capital lost.

Larry Weaver, Director of Internet Marketing Services for Cii Associates, will discuss the things you need to know about SEO. He will cover higher search engine rankings, getting to the top, staying at the top, avoiding being blacklisted, managing online campaigns, and setting realistic expectations for results.

Larry has spent over ten years designing web sites that achieve high search engine rankings. He has been quoted in publications that include the Wall Street Journal and Inc. Magazine. He has also appeared as a guest on over 100 radio shows. His clients include software companies, entertainment agencies, television shows, and the real estate industry, just to name a few. Larry is also a homegrown talent, having graduated from the University of North Carolina.

Reserve your seat by noon Monday, May 15th to take advantage of our low registration prices:
$25 for Members, $35 for Non-Members, $20 for Full-time Students-Members, $25 for Full-time Student-Non-Members. Late registrations will be charged an additional $10.

Register for the event

Fun with Google Trends

With Google Trends, you can compare the world's interest in your favorite topics. Enter up to five topics and see how often they've been searched for on Google over time. Google Trends also displays how frequently your topics have appeared in Google News stories, and which geographic regions have searched for them most often. - www.google.com/trends

Show your colors:
http://www.google.com/trends?q=white+sox%2C+red+sox

Who needs blind taste tests?
http://www.google.com/trends?q=coke%2C+pepsi

The Donald is NOT going to like this one:
http://www.google.com/trends?q=donald+trump%2C+martha+stewart

The debate rages on:
http://www.google.com/trends?q=rolling+stones%2C+beatles

A hush falls over the South...
http://www.google.com/trends?q=ford%2C+chevrolet

What trends can you spot?

Search Tips: Intitle and Allintitle

Not getting the results you want from your Google search? Try the "intitle" command. Using this command will only return web pages that have your keyword in the title. Give it a try:

• intitle:landscaping (returns results with the word "landscaping" in the title)
• intitle:"durham landscaping" (returns results with the exact phrase "durham landscaping" in the title)
• allintitle: durham landscaping (returns results with the words "durham" and "landscaping" in the title)

For intitle, do not put a space between "intitle:" and your keyword or phrase.

Robots.txt and Robots Meta Tag

Question: What is a "robots file", and do I need to use one?

Answer: Robots.txt is an optional text file that lives in the root folder of your web site. Using the file, you can specify areas of your web site that you do not want the search engine spiders to crawl or index. Examples could include client pages, admin areas, or other sensitive information. A poorly-formatted robots.txt file could prevent all or some of your optimized pages from being indexed. You can read a lot more about robots.txt here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robots.txt

Similarly, you can employ a Robots Meta Tag in the header of individual pages to keep that page from being indexed by spiders. The following Meta Tag tells spiders to not index this page or follow any of the links on the page:
< name="ROBOTS" content="noindex,nofollow">

Both of these methods are optional, and you do not need to use them unless you are trying to keep specific pages from being indexed. Misuse of these methods can have unwanted consequences. So, if you find a page isn’t showing up in the search engines, check the Robots.txt file and look for an errant robots Meta tag.

Need more help? Let me know

Local Search Case Study: Landscaping Marketing

It has come to my attention that search engine optimization has not exactly caught on fire in the landscaping world. I know this because I’ve been searching for a local residential landscaper for my home in North Carolina. My search frustrations stem from landscaper’s lack of understanding local search.

Residential landscaping is local or regional by nature. A landscaper in Raleigh, NC may find parts of Durham (15-20 minutes away) out of their area. It is imperative for landscapers to include your service areas in the text of your web sites. Not just for SEO purposes, but to save you from having to follow up on out-of-area inquiries that will never convert to sales. Remember, sometimes you want to exclude potential customers.

Local search rule #1 is to include your service area in your page title. SEO experts agree that the title is the most important factor in determining you search engine ranking. Consider the following example page title:
AAA Landscapes – Homepage

Based on this title alone, this page isn’t likely to rank well for anything other than the company name – AAA Landscapes. If this page was lucky enough to rank well in the search engine results pages (SERPs) for my search on “residential landscaping in durham”, it is still missing three key elements: service area, keywords, and compelling marketing language. Now consider this revision:
AAA Landscapes – Award-winning Durham, NC Residential Landscaping since 1981

Look at what a difference a few words make:

• Service Area: By looking at the title, I can see this company is located in my area, Durham, NC (and not Durham, England – a very prominent other “Durham” in search results.)
• Keywords: Now our keywords “residential landscaping” and “durham” are right in the title. This company now has a better chance at ranking higher in the search engine results pages for their target customer base.
• Marketing Language: We can quickly see that this company has won some awards and has been in business for 25 years. Sounds like a reputable company.

Landscapers of the World, you have some work to do:

1. Get a web site (if you don’t already have one).
2. Perform keyword research to uncover the most popular search terms for your business.
3. Include those keywords – along with your service area – in your page titles and content.
4. Include clear contact information on every single page of your web site.
5. Consider pay-per-click advertising on Google, Yahoo! or MSN.

That should keep you busy for now. Contact me if I can be of service…

PPC Keyword Bidding On Your Own Name

Question: We rank #1 for our company name in the organic search results. Does it make sense to also purchase a PPC ad for our company name?

Answer: There are several reasons why you might want to bid on PPC ads for your own name. Perhaps the biggest occurs when your competitors are bidding on your name. A competitor ad may be confusing enough to potentially funnel some visitors to their site – especially if their ad appears above your organic listing.

Another bonus is this: by bidding on your name, your ad appears in related content sites (if you have activated that option). For example, a newspaper or magazine article might have a mention of your company. That same page may have PPC ads on it. By bidding on your name, your ad and link will likely appear on that content site’s page.

Another consideration is that the cost is often very low. It’s probably worth allocating a small percentage of your budget to ensure that you capture these leads that you may or may not have captured from your SEO campaign.