5 Ways to Ensure an SEO Campaign Fails

Obviously no one sets out to create an SEO campaign, or any other kind of business initiative, that fails. However, along the way certain mistakes can be made that will inevitably result in campaign failure. Sometimes the mistake can seem innocent enough, but really SEO is about gaining momentum as time goes on. A mistake that is made early in the process can hinder every effort that follows. Therefore, when implementing an SEO campaign be sure to avoid the following common mistakes:

1. Optimizing for a Bad Website

SEO is a long term process that takes time and resources. The goal of an SEO campaign is to increase website traffic to improve conversion rates. SEO efforts will help to get more visitors to the site, but then the rest of the work is up to the website itself. If it looks bad, has a confusing navigation, or doesn’t have clear call to actions it’s a problem. Before starting an SEO campaign you need to determine whether your website is worth the effort. If it’s not, concentrate on improving that first.

2. Not Conducting Keyword Research

Many website owners make the mistake of assuming that they know how their target audience is searching. In most cases, they are wrong. Keyword research needs to be conducted for every page of the website, since each page serves a different purpose and can be an entry point to a website. Using the wrong keywords can result in getting the wrong kind of visitors that won’t convert. Traffic is good, but sales and leads from qualified visitors are much better.

3. Greedy Link Building

Links are a huge part of SEO. The search engine spiders crawl links to determine website relevancy and trust. It’s tempting to get greedy when it comes to link building. After all there are plenty of advertisements for thousands of links at a low price. But are those links really valuable? Not at all. It’s the quality of a link that really matters, not the quantity.

4. Creating Poor Content

Without content, there is nothing to optimize and publish online, whether it is on site or on other web properties. Content is what ranks in the search engines and helps build links. However, in order to do so the content needs to be good! Publishing lots of low quality content that is only vaguely related to the industry just to get some links will backfire. Focus on the needs of the target audience and create content with that in mind.

5. Not Using Social Media

Social media and SEO continue to converge online. One strategy should not be implemented without the other in mind now that the search engines incorporate social signals into the ranking algorithms.

Google Walks Its Talk and Penalizes Itself

If you haven’t been following the news lately, this week there was a heated discussion about a marketing campaign that Google carried out to promote its Chrome browser. Basically Google hired a marketing company to promote some web videos, and that company in turn hired bloggers to post the videos (obviously paying them). The problem emerged with some SEOs noticed the campaign and found a couple of those bloggers using dofollow links to the Chrome homepage, which in theory if a violation of Google’s guidelines.

The whole story can be found on this Search Engine Land post: Google’s Jaw-Dropping Sponsored Post Campaign For Chrome.

Anyway after the controversy was out there many people started asking (some demanding…) whether or not Google would penalize its own website for the sponsored link violation.

Guess what? Google did it.

The Chrome homepage used to be the first or second result for the term “browser”, but if you search for it now you probably won’t find it anywhere on the first page. Here’s Google’s statement about the case:

We’ve investigated and are taking manual action to demote www.google.com/chrome and lower the site’s PageRank for a period of at least 60 days.
We strive to enforce Google’s webmaster guidelines consistently in order to provide better search results for users.

While Google did not authorize this campaign, and we can find no remaining violations of our webmaster guidelines, we believe Google should be held to a higher standard, so we have taken stricter action than we would against a typical site.

In my opinion Google is actually coming out stronger out of the whole debacle. For one thing it’s giving out a signal that no one is special when it comes to search rankings and penalties, and that it’s willing to walk its talk.

SEO and PPC Work Together to Improve a Search Engine Presence

Search engine marketing novices may not understand all of the different components of an SEM strategy and may be confused by the terminology. SEO? PPC? Is there really much of a difference and is one strategy better than the other? Yes there is a big difference and no, one strategy is not better than the other. SEO and PPC are independent tactics that serve different purposes but they don’t need to be mutually exclusive. In fact, they shouldn’t be. The best SEM strategy is to implement both, especially in the beginning of a search engine marketing campaign.

PPC is also known as paid search. PPC ads appear in the sponsored section of a search result. The websites that appear in this section are there because the advertiser was the highest bidder for the keyword or keyword phrase that was used. Each time the ad is clicked on, the advertiser pays the search engine. Hence the label, “pay per click”. The key to a successful PPC campaign is to target the right keywords that will result in not only traffic, but conversions. Since the website owner is essentially paying for this traffic, it might as well be worth something to them. The costs associated with PPC can be extremely high, especially in a competitive industry.
Search engine optimization, or SEO, is the practice of making changes to the website and other content across the web that will attract the search engine spiders and improve organic, or natural, web page ranking. SEO isn’t considered to be paid search because no money is exchanged between the website owner and the search engine, but there are certainly costs associated with SEO. SEO is a lengthy process that is never really “over”. It starts with industry, competitor, and keyword research. Next is on-site optimization which is followed by ongoing link building. Good link building requires time and resources to create quality content and share it on the web on a regular basis. Many website and business owners simply don’t have the time or resources. Therefore, they need to hire an in house SEO staff member or outsource the work to a trusted agency or consultant. Good SEO is paid for, just in a less direct manner than PPC.

Since web users have become more savvy over the years and understand the difference between an ad and an organic result, there are arguments that SEO is better than PPC. The truth is that both strategies have their place. While SEO is extremely important, it takes a long time to get onto that first page of a search result for targeted keywords. Some websites never even make it to that first page. PPC, while expensive, can ensure that your brand is seen on page 1. Even if the ad isn’t clicked on, it’s still improving brand visibility. As time goes on and an organic presence improves, it’s possible to scale back on PPC but it doesn’t need to be eliminated entirely. Having both a paid and organic presence on the same page really establishes relevancy for particular keyword searches.

Google Changed Its Search Algorithm Again

First of all keep in mind that when we talk about “changes in Google’s algorithm” we are talking about big ones, like the latest Panda update. Small changes are implemented almost daily and you never notice them.

So over the past weeks Google rolled out a new algorithm change. According to Danny Sullivan from Search Engine Land the main aspects affecting search rankings are:

Better “Official” Page Detection & Boosting: This means that official pages will now be detected more effectively and will also show up higher in search queries. For example, it will not be pretty much impossible to outrank an official brand with an affiliate website (in this past this could happen).

Image Search Loses A Ranking Signal: The ranking signal are references from different pages around the web. So even if multiple websites link to a certain image this won’t push its rankings up.

Fresher Results: Newer content will be pushed up no. Google said this change will affect around 35% of the search queries (which is quite a lot compared to previous algorithm changes).

Dominate Google: 7 Steps to Keyword Research Success

If you have a website, you should be doing keyword research. It’s that simple. Whilst you can produce a popular and successful website without considering keyword research or SEO, you will vastly improve your chances of success if you invite Google to the party.

If you haven’t previously done much keyword research (or even if you have), you may feel overwhelmed by its apparent complexity. But when first starting out, you can avoid that feeling by ignoring a lot of the so-called important datasets and focusing on just a few key variables.

Let’s push all of the complexities to one side and get started with some effective keyword research.

Step 1 – Stop Focusing on #1

I had a major mental block when I first started out with keyword research that took me a few months to overcome. I felt that if you couldn’t get to #1 in Google, there was no point in trying to rank at all. I was just plain wrong to think that.

If you rank anywhere from #1 to #10 for any worthwhile keyword, you will get traffic. The amount of traffic will be a percentage of the total number of searches, and that percentage will be affected in part by where you rank.

In reality, there are many factors that affect the click through rate – your ranking position is just one piece of the puzzle. More often than not, if you can get onto the first page of Google for a keyword, it is worth targeting.

Instead of focusing on reaching #1, consider your ranking efforts as an attempt to exceed the average. Treat the first page as a whole, rather than 10 different pages. I’ll explain the logic behind this shortly.

Step 2 – Collect Measureable Data

Whilst keyword research is often more of an art than a science, there are parts of it that you break down mathematically. So let’s do just that.

Say I was looking to rank for the keyword “freelance writing” (I have an interest in this keyword, as I am a freelance writer). There are some key pieces of information that I want:

• PageRank
• Domain Age
• Number of links pointing to the page
• Number of domains linking to the page
• Number of links pointing to any page on the domain
• Number of domains linking to any page on the domain

There are a number of ways in which you can get hold of this information. I personally use and recommend Market Samurai, but if that’s not your cup of tea, you can source the same link data with a free account at Majestic SEO. Alternatively, SEO Quake gives you a whole swathe of data that you can use for keyword research.

Step 3 – Exclude Huge/Brand Domains

Once you have collected your data, plug it all into a spreadsheet. If you are following my example, you should have something that looks like this:

Something should stick out like a sore thumb here – that’s right, the Wikipedia page. If we are going to take an average view of the competitiveness of a keyword, that one page is going to skew our numbers wildly. I want you to remove that from your dataset, so that your spreadsheet now looks like this:

You always should look to exclude any huge domains (such as Wikipedia) from your calculations. Additionally, be on the lookout for brand domains, which are given special treatment by Google. They should also be excluded – the inclusion of data from such sites will affect the usefulness of your results.

Of course, if your results are littered with huge and/or brand domains, you may wish to think twice about targeting the keyword!

Step 4 – Average Out Your Data

You now want to find the average for each of the datasets you have collected. In Excel you would use the formula ‘=AVERAGE(firstcell:lastcell)’.

For the purposes of ascertaining whether or not you should target the keyword, these are your numerical points of reference. You should now have a set of numbers that look something like this:

Step 5 – Analyze Your Data

Whilst PageRank and Domain Age feature as data sets, they are the least important factors. However, when you are presented with high numbers (as we are in this example), you should certainly take note. If you are a brand new site, attempting to rank amongst aged domains with high PageRanks is likely to be tough.

The rest of the data is what really interest us. What we will be mainly focusing on is the number of linking domains, rather than the number of backlinks. Google doesn’t get too excited by multiple links from the same domain – it much prefers to see multiple links from different domains.

So let’s assess the available data. According to the averages we have calculated, we will need to have approximately 8,000 domains linking to our site as whole, and some 3,000 domains linking to the specific page that we wish to rank for, in order to get onto the first page of Google.

At this point, you might say “wait a minute – the domain in 9^th spot only has 983 domains linking to it – shouldn’t that be our start point?” There is an argument for that, but quite frankly, I don’t like it. If you see sites ranking well despite a relatively low number of backlinks, there is likely a special reason for it (for instance, Google loves sites with domain names that match the keyword). Don’t be fooled by potentially erroneous data – averaging out the figures is a far safer play.

Step 6 – Consider Onsite Optimization

There are a few different onsite factors you want to consider. Check to see if the keyword is featured in:

1. The URL
2. The title
3. The header tags
4. The meta description
5. The content

You can do this manually, or use a tool such as Market Samurai, which will return you something looking like this:

How well optimized the pages are can have an impact on your analysis in Step 5. For instance, if the sites are not well-optimized for the keyword in question, you should be able to rank on the first page with less linking domains than the average.

Onsite optimization is a strong ranking factor. The better optimized your content, the higher your chances of ranking are. But please don’t take that as an excuse to use your keyword at every possible opportunity. Your content should still present “naturally” – do not resort to keyword stuffing.

Step 7 – Trial, Error & Experience

This is probably the most important step. Whilst you can read about how to carry out keyword research all day long, you will only ever truly advance your skills by practically executing the advice you have read.

This short guide serves as a good introduction to keyword research, but I’m only just scratching the surface (after all, I recently wrote a 9,000 word eBook on the topic!). In time and with experience, you will learn what works for you and what doesn’t.

Footnote – Search Engine Optimization

I have deliberately excluded any references to SEO up to this point. This is, after all, an article on keyword research, not SEO. But since the two topics are intrinsically linked, it would be remiss of me not to point you in the right direction.

Fixating On Rank Can Actually Hurt Your SEO!

I had a call with a potential client not that long ago and we were discussing her long term SEO goals. She told me her number one goal was to get better rankings for the broad keywords they were targeting.

When we spoke, the company was stuck on page 3 of Google and couldn’t seem to break free; she wanted to know what my company could do to help her get to the top of page 1. I flat out told her, “Don’t worry so much about where your site ranks. Your real long term goal should be visitor growth.”

She was completely floored by that statement. Many site owners and business managers are.

It might seem strange to hear that coming from an SEO professional. Ranking doesn’t matter? What the heck is this guy talking about? Isn’t that the whole point of SEO!? I’m not saying that ranking well isn’t important. There are dozens of reports outlining the percentage of clicks a site is likely to get based on where it falls in the SERP and I can’t argue with the numbers. What I am saying is that site owners shouldn’t become fixated on where their site is ranking because it will cost you the rest of your SEO.

The search results are personalized!

I can guarantee you that if I was to search for “pizza” on my work computer and then on my home computer, the two results pages would be completely different. This is because the search engines are focusing more and more on personalized search results. For instance, if you search for something while logged into your Gmail account, Google is going to remember and track your search behavior. The more times you search the more information it gathers about you and the more personalized it will try to make the search results based on your past search behavior. Bing and Facebook have a partnership where, if you are logged into your Facebook account, Bing will pull up results that your Facebook friends have liked and shared. What might be on page 3 when you aren’t logged into Facebook is suddenly on page 1!

Lesson to be learned: Personalized search results mean your site might rank differently for different people. Therefore it isn’t a 100% accurate measurement of success.

Short term gain in rank usually means black hat SEO is afoot

Let’s say you hired an SEO firm or consultant, told them you wanted to rank on the first page in Google and they guaranteed it would happen inside of a month (even though Google says no SEO firm can promise that). Let’s assume they deliver on their promise and everyone is happy. I’m sorry to say your happiness is going to be short lived. SEO is an incredibly long term process, and even though I have seen websites gain substantial amounts of traffic and jump in the rankings in a relatively short period of time (depending on the industry and level of competition), overnight gains are usually the result of black hat SEO and are only temporary. You might be able to ride the wave for a few months, but the minute you stop paying that SEO firm your rankings drop as fast as they appeared. The worst case scenario is that the search engines flag your site for SEO and remove it from the SEPR entirely!

Lesson to be learned: Fixating on rank will lead to bad decisions that hurt your brand in the long run.

Ranking well is only one piece of the SEO puzzle. When site owners take such a narrow approach to their SEO they are actually limiting the long term potential of their campaign. Yes, a good SEO campaign should help your site move up the SERP, but it can do so much more than that if you just let it!

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Beginner Tips to Optimizing Your Site’s Title Tags

Search engine optimization (SEO) is today’s go to form of marketing for businesses looking to build their online presence and more importantly, their business. There are many factors, both on-site and off that factor in to your rankings.

Optimizing your website’s title is one of the most practiced forms of on-page SEO and is an extremely important ranking factor. In this blog post, I am going to go over some fairly simple, beginner tips to properly optimizing your site’s title tag and hopefully, increasing your organic search engine presence and rankings.

1. Choose the proper keywords: keyword research is one of the most crucial steps to optimizing your website. The right keywords will improve traffic and conversions while the wrong keywords will have your site coming across as misleading to visitors. Take your time conducting keyword research and revisit your research frequently to adapt to search trends, changes in your industry and other factors that may influence the way someone searches for your business.

Make yourself a list of researched keywords that pertain to your business. Keep this list and update it whenever you conduct new research. You can also use this list as a way to track keyword rankings and other metrics.

2. Don’t overdo it: the last thing you want to do is stuff every keyword under the sun into your pages’ titles. Understandably, you want to rank under a variety of key phrases but there are right ways to go about doing so. In my experience as an SEO, I find that one or two phrases per page title works best. Don’t overdo your keyword selection either. Be reasonable in your selections and understand the amount of time you will need to spend to get each one to rank.

A clear and concise message will go a long way.

3. Include a call to action: your title is one of the first things a searcher is going to read so make your title count. In addition to your main keyword(s), try to include a call to action in your title. Blending your keywords with a call to action in your title is sometimes a little harder but is certainly doable.

Let’s take a look at the following example:

You own a pumpkin farm called Benny’s Pumpkin Patch and are optimizing a page on your website that focuses on giant pumpkins. You conducted extensive research and for this particular page, you decide the two main key phrases to target are going to be “giant pumpkin” and “giant pumpkins for sale”.

As I stated above, a clear and concise message is going to go a long way so we can construct a title that reads like this: Giant Pumpkins for Sale | Buy Your Next Giant Pumpkin at Benny’s Pumpkin Patch!

In this example, we are telling the searcher to buy their next pumpkin from our pumpkin patch. This is a subtle call to action and blends right in with your targeted keywords. Give searchers a reason to choose your ad over your competitors’ ads.

In conclusion, don’t forget to optimize your website’s title! Choose the right keywords, keep it simple and create titles that are inviting to your potential customers.

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3 Beginner SEO Tips To Succeed This Holiday Season

Are you and your website prepared for the 2011 online holiday shopping season? As online shoppers and money spent online continue to grow in large numbers, website owners have to be more aware of how their website is performing and when it is not, they need to know why. Below are 3 beginner website SEO tips that every website and business owner should analyze more frequently, especially for the upcoming holiday season.

1. Website Structure

How is your website currently formatted? Is it easy to navigate and are your products and services easy to find and easy to follow? Are you delivering a clear message that properly portrays your search ads? These are all questions you need to ask yourself when either developing a new website or working on improving an existing one. I will break each of these questions down further below:

Website Format – if your website is formatted in a way that is not search engine friendly (flash, all images, etc.), you will most likely see lower rankings, less traffic and more importantly, less sales. Develop your website in a way that is search engine friendly and always keep your users in mind.

Navigation – if your navigation is non-existent or hard to follow, your website visitors will have a hard time reaching interior pages of your site which most likely include your site’s products. Hard to follow or deceiving navigation will lead to higher bounce rates and less return visitors. Design your navigation in a way that is not overwhelming, search engine friendly and simple to understand (you can always break your navigation down more extensively on your interior pages).

Clear Message – if you run paid search campaigns or aggressively market your website via other search marketing strategies, you have to make sure you are delivering a clear message. If your search ad states that you are offering a 15% discount, make sure that discount is visible on your landing page. Similar to the navigation, your message should be easy to follow, easy to locate and easy to execute by your visitors.

2. Keyword Selection

If you haven’t revisited your website’s keywords at all since launching your website, you are going to want to. Keyword trends and competition levels change frequently so it is imperative that your website is staying current and targeting the proper audience. While ranking high on the search engines is great, it does you no good if your keywords are off mark. Conduct frequent research and make changes to your strategies whenever needed to ensure you are putting your search ads in front of the right people.

3. Call(s) to Action

A website needs a clear call to action. Simply described, a call to action is something you hope your website visitors perform upon entering your website. A call to action could be a link to a featured product or sale, an inquiry form, newsletter signup or any other form of lead generation that you can utilize post visit. For every page of your website, ask yourself the following questions – what is the purpose of this page? –and– what am I hoping to get out of this page?

In summary, know what’s going on with your website. If you have little to no experience with the internet and the tips covered above, voicing your concern more frequently to your webmaster or SEO will let them know that you are there and that you care.