SEO

5 Ways to Increase Landing Page Conversions. In my last post I talked about marketers that fail to track phone calls and social media ROI.

They track online conversion rates fastidiously, but then they stare at you blankly when you ask how many calls their marketing generates, or when you ask them about social media ROI. Why Google is Smart Banning Agencies For Link Buying. Unless you took an extra long vacation for Memorial Day, you have probably heard the big SEO news of the month.

Google deindexed a search agency, Iacquire, for buying paid links to client sites. Yes, it wasn’t the beneficiary of those paid links who got nuked (which has happened countless times, and no clients have publicly said they got banned due to Iacquire practices that I have seen), but the agency that was buying the links as part of their SEO strategy for clients. Of course, we have to believe that Google was pretty certain that it was that search agency behind it (and all the proof shows that it certainly is) But there are plenty of people shocked (and complaining) that Google will go as far as to remove Iacquire from the Google search index, because previously, Google has banned the sites benefiting from the agency’s tactics, not the agency themselves, when they are caught violating Google’s webmaster guidelines.

How to Do Keyword Research Quickly and Effectively. How Google plans to Control Negative SEO. What to do When Your Split Test Fails. Audience vs Community: Do You Know the Difference? 234 Flares Twitter 134 Facebook 0 StumbleUpon 16 Google+ 6 LinkedIn 56 inShare56 Buffer 20 Reddit 0 Pin It Share 2 2 Email -- Email to a friend 234 Flares × We had an amazing conversation with Allison Aldridge-Saur of Chickasaw Nation on Friday and I would encourage you to listen to it.

Allison has been working on a fascinating project as part of the Digital Vision grant, writing a series on Native American Lessons for Community Building. In part two of her series, Allison discusses Audiences versus Communities. This struck me as one of the most important elements of the entire series. I’m not sure that too many marketers recognize that there is such a distinct difference between an audience and a community. Allison discusses the differences between building your audience – listening, engagement, relevant content, loyalty points, gamification, gifting economy, give-aways and messaging consistency. Building your community is a much different strategy. Don’t Judge Your SEO in a Silo. Writing by Nick Stamoulis in SEO An SEO client of mine came to me one day and wanted to know why their traffic was down.

Five fashion brands boosting traffic with Facebook apps. Pinterest’s rise from niche website to social powerhouse has been built largely on the back of fashion and lifestyle users.

And we’ve seen a few case studies recently that suggest Pinterest users are worth more to e-commerce sites than visitors from Twitter or Facebook. Perhaps to reassert its authority as the number one social network, Facebook has released stats to show that its platform is just as popular with “shopaholics and fashionistas.” A developer blog post by Austin Haugen flags up five examples of fashion brands that have increased traffic and mobile installs through the use of Open Graph apps. Should your Company Have a Blog? Brochure websites are dead.

Having a company website only featuring your contact information, “about us” page and a list of your products and services is no longer good enough if you want to have a successful online presence. Your business must develop a content marketing strategy to actively engage your customers. One of the most effective ways to do this is a company blog. How Businesses Can Increase Word-of-Mouth Recommendations [Data] Yesterday, Search Engine Land released the results of the third and final round of BrightLocal's Local Consumer Review Survey.

Conducted between January 15th and March 1st of this year, this survey looked at the current state of local consumer purchasing behavior, and compared it against results from 2010. We referenced some of the data from previous installments of the survey in an earlier post on this blog about how to accumulate more online reviews for your local business, but the data from this installment of the survey focuses on consumer recommendation behavior for local businesses. In other words, how can you turn your customers into word-of-mouth marketers for your local business? What ‘Doctor Who’ Can Teach Search Marketers. 7 Common mistakes to avoid for building a natural link profile. If you have been following SEO for some time, by now you would have a fair idea that quality links are everything.

Okay okay, if not everything then certainly one of the most important things. All too often however, link building methods have raised quite many questions by being associated with questionable SEO practices such as link buying or link spamming. 1. Using the same anchor text for all the links A very common mistake that many people quite often make. Using 3-4 different anchor text is a good practice to follow while building inbound links. 2. How Unique Can an SEO Firm Really Be?

I was talking with an SEO prospect a few weeks ago and they asked me “What differentiates your SEO firm from everyone else?”

In essence, they wanted to know what my unique selling proposition was so I gave them the usual run down I tell all my prospects; we’re a strictly white hat firm. Since we’re a smaller SEO company that means you get more personalized attention and your account manager isn’t going to change every 3 months. I also only like to take on clients that I truly believe we can help so as to not waste your money or our time. After the call though, it hit me, how many other small, white hat SEO firms could say the exact same thing? Mobile Targeting Definitions Every Marketer Must Know. A number of new terms have come to the marketplace since mobile’s explosion, such as SoLoMo, geo-fencing, UDID, the list goes on.

Some of these terms will become part of popular culture, while others don’t even make sense! But the sooner we all get on board with more correct, local-mobile terminology, the better off our industry will be. We’ll start by highlighting essential industry terms related to mobile targeting, cutting through the overused jargon to handpick and clearly define a number of mobile targeting terms that have become part of the industry landscape for veterans and newbies alike. Geo-Fencing & Geo-targeting. Just How Important is On-page SEO? Ever since we have been able to game search engines optimise websites, huge importance has been placed on an array of on-page factors.

First it was Meta and keyword stuffing, then it was anchor text links and creating unique copy. But in a post-Penguin world, where over-optimisation could result in punishments, the game may be changing ever so slightly. Before plunging headfirst into a festering quagmire of easily disprovable assertions, I should get a few disclaimers out there. First of all, the Penguin and Panda updates haven’t rendered keywords obsolete, nor do they mean that you should immediately abandon everything that you are doing. If you haven’t been negatively impacted, now is not the time to be making rash moves.

However, it is equally important that nobody assumes that the current field of play won’t be altered drastically in the coming months. What makes for a good content strategy? UK paid search market worth more than £4bn – new report. The UK paid search market is expected to grow by 14% and reach a value of £4.19bn by the end of 2012, up from £3.68bn in 2011. The figure, published today in our UK Paid Search Agencies Buyer’s Guide, includes media spend and money spent on agency services and consultancy. Despite challenging economic conditions, the growth in the amount of money being spent on paid search reflects the fact that it remains an effective and measurable channel for generating a positive return on investment.

The flexible nature of paid search, whether in terms of spend, campaign duration and timing, or user targeting, also provides benefits which are not so direct in other forms of marketing. This year’s estimate for marketplace growth, which factors in the worsening economic climate, is broadly in line with published quarterly earnings reports from Google, which now break out UK revenues. Google+ Local to Replace Places as Google Makes a Play for More Mobile Ad Dollars. As Google vies to maintain their dominance of the online advertising market, they made a play today for a bigger chunk of the mobile ads pie. Google Places have been swallowed up by Google+ Local Pages, merging all business listings into one to be used across search, Maps, mobile, and Google+. Users can access enhanced local listings via a new Local tab in the left sidebar of Google+, by performing searches on the fly on their mobile (currently supporting Android, iOS coming soon), in Google searches, and through Maps.

One notable addition: Zagat’s reviews are incorporated, taking the place of Google’s five-star rating system. Google purchased Zagat’s last year and working the review system into Google+ Local has taken down the paywall, making the service free for all users. Here’s how it works, demonstrated in a video released by Google this morning: Recovering from an Over Optimization Penalty - A True Story. As almost anyone reading this post already knows, April 24, 2012 marked a big day in the search industry. Once the initial Penguin update was rolled out (please believe me this is only the beginning and there is much more to come) the SEO industry, as we know it exploded in a flurry of fear and satisfaction. For those of us that had sites get hit (I'll admit I had several sites dinged by this update) what started out as anger quickly turned to fear and curiosity.

Many industry publications jumped the gun and, in my opinion, began publishing tips and processes on how to 'recover from Penguin,' when the truth is, as mentioned by Ian Howells in his recent SEO Podcast, it's really too soon to tell the full effects of these algorithm updates and anyone out there preaching is really just speculating. The best information I have seen thus far is from The HOTH, and that is DON'T PANIC, and BE PATIENT. The Penguin Smack. Tips for Getting Success in Online Business With Twitter Marketing. Your Marketing Analytics Need to Measure Your Revenue Objectives - Not Just Tactics. 10 interesting digital stats we've seen this week. I've rounded up some of the most interesting digital marketing stats I've seen this week.

Topics covered include the use of tablets and other devices while watching TV, search marketing budgets, mobile payments and Google+. Search marketing budgets According to stats from our UK Search Engine Marketing Benchmark Report, based on a survey of over 300 UK in-house marketers and over 200 agency employees, nearly two-thirds of companies (62%) plan to increase their social media spending within the next 12 months.57% plan to increase spending on SEO and almost half (49%) will up their spending on paid search. Multi-screen usage 52% of respondents said that it’s somewhat or very likely that they’re using another device while watching television, according to stats from our Multi-Screen Marketer report.

8 Ways to Integrate Social Media Into Your Lead Nurturing Campaigns. We often fall into the trap of assuming that lead nurturing is a completely email-driven strategy . But technically, lead nurturing is defined as consistent and targeted communication to move your leads further down the funnel. So while email has proven to be a very effective tool for this, it is not the only bridge between your company and its leads. Social media has emerged as an increasingly important part of people’s lives, and the savviest marketers have found ways to integrate it into lead nurturing to build stronger relationships. Consider this for a moment: According to a ATYM Market Research study , 85% of the 2,000 internet users surveyed are on Facebook, 49% have a Twitter account , and most of them visit these sites daily.

Research also shows that social media and purchase decisions are closely linked -- with ecommerce companies specifically, prospects are 71% more likely to purchase a product if referred through social media . Why Readers Lose Interest in Your Email Marketing [Infographic] Google's knowledge graph: key things worth knowing.

Facebook Content Ideas ... Straight from Facebook. Google’s New Mobile Search Inadvertently Removes Review Button From Places Page. Google rolled out a very slick update to their iPhone App several days ago. How to Manage Your Online Reputation Using SEO. Is SEO the Answer for Start-up Marketing? What Advertising Works for Small Business? Local SEO in 90 Minutes. Twitter Allows Firefox Users A ‘Do Not Track’ Option. In-depth Guide To Content Creation [With Infographic] Is your conversion Rate Statistically Significant? by SEO Takeaways. Majority of us take marketing decisions on the basis of conversion rate. There is an industry trend to invest more in the marketing channel which has higher conversion rate.

But sometimes such thinking can backfire and it can backfire really bad. What if the marketing channel with higher conversion rate is actually performing poorly and results in monetary loss if you invested in it. Learn to fix this problem beforehand by determining whether your conversion Rate is Statistically Significant. For e.g. consider the performance of three campaigns A, B and C in the last one month. Too Big to Ignore: The Market Potential for Social Search. One of the effects of a giant infusion of capital, which Facebook is anticipating with its IPO this week, is the ability to expand a business into new ventures. Web Hosting Providers Features: Is Live Chat Worth it for Your Small Business? Demand for digital marketing freelancers soars: trends.

Local Business Online Marketing Blueprint – It’s a Sketch, Not Set in Stone. A Facebook Search Engine to Rival Google? Users Dislike That Idea [Survey] 5 Local Resources to Boost Your Local Rankings. The Social Funnel: What You Lose When You Ignore It. 5 Vital Facebook Reports Every Community Manager Should Know. Which should it be: Pinterest or Google+? Engagement, Not Views, is Driving Today's YouTube. Pimp your web page titles in 6 easy steps. Social Media Ad Spending to Reach $9.8 Billion. Response Codes Explained with Pictures. Is SEO a science? Rand Fiskin Discusses Myths, Realities, and Precautions of Negative SEO. Grey Hat To White Hat Disaster. The_4_Biggest_Ranking_mistakes_infographic1. 69% of tablet owners make a purchase on their device every month. Social media: a business imperative. 3 Tips for Monetising Your Content. UK consumers want more relevant ads but worried about cookies: stats.

The 6-Step SEO Audit Every Marketer Should Conduct. Do Writers Need to Understand SEO? US and UK newspaper sites: who’s leading the way on Google +? Google+ Pages Six Months On: Why You Should Have One. Free eBook: The Complete Guide To Pinterest. 7 Simple Deep Linking Tactics You Ought to Use. 6 Targeting Methods To Reach Your Business Audience Via LinkedIn. How Google Uses Human Raters in Organic Search.

The Wrong Things to Think When Hiring an SEO Company. SEO Metrics for Publishers: How are You Tracking and Measuring Success? What’s A Soft 404 (404-Like Content)? + How To Fix Soft 404 Errors. Are digital marketing shows a waste of time? Google Publishes Newest Style Guide for HTML and CSS. Triple Bottom Line Thinking for Social Media. Are Subdomains Bad for SEO? How to Startle Your Readers with Charismatic Copywriting Online. 3 Pillars of SEO Competitive Analysis. SEO: Are You Relevant, or Are You Vital? Google’s Latest on Mobile and More.

Essential SEO Settings for Every New WordPress Blog. 5 Steps to Getting More Targeted Website Traffic with SEO Copywriting. Web Analytics Book: Web Analytics 2.0 by Avinash Kaushik. SEO Software by Web CEO: Easy and Efficient SEO Tools and Reporting.