keywords

Posts Tagged ‘keywords’

SEM Strategy: Writing clearly; it’s the law

Friday, July 29th, 2011

In our last post, we praised the virtues of writing clearly in order to improve SEO results, but this particular post will focus more on a recent legal act that may get search engine marketers thinking more plainly when it comes to the language of their online businesses.

In October 2011, the federal Plain Writing Act will fully take effect. This act requires agencies to write understandably in documents for the public. While your online business may not be a government entity, as a SEM looking to keep your web content fresh and eye-catching to your public, this act might be a good reminder for you to look at your website’s content and make sure your writing, while optimized to your niche industry, isn’t full of jargon.

While it is entirely true that a SEO-focused website needs to have keywords necessary to gain organic search and Internet ranking, keep in mind what plain language advocates are lobbying for—simple, clear writing that a person with a high school education can understand. If the government websites are trending in this general direction, then your online business marketing strategy should most likely follow.

This isn’t a new concept for search engine optimization, since most SEO web content writers know it’s better to use shorter sentences and paragraphs, but, sometimes it can get lost in the shuffle. Just remember, when it is time to evaluate your web content, that plain writing does not mean “dumb writing,” and fancy lingo will not always get your company’s message across.

Tags: clear writing, keywords, online business, optimized writing, Plain Writing Act, search engine marketing, SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION, sem, SEM houston tx, SEO, web content, website business
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SEM Strategy: Building better websites, with logic.

Thursday, July 21st, 2011

As a starting search engine marketing professional working on a brand new Internet marketing website, you are very keen on learning the “rules of SEO” and you dutifully subscribe to the blogs of the biggest heads in search engine optimization and marketing, hanging on their every word in Youtube videos, and doing everything they say to make your website business’ Internet ranking soar through the sky.

Or so you hope.

While we certainly recommend learning the rules, acquiring the books about zen, motorcycles, SEO, and all of that good, optimized stuff, the real lesson you learn is one on one with your website business, its audience, and your analytics page. You build that keyword list, albeit painfully at first, and you make some serious mistakes. Hopefully you don’t get flagged by Google in the process of optimizing your website. Most new SEOs get so caught up in the dramatics of what’s new and good in the industry, that they forget the roots of being a good SEM website manager.

Common sense.

If your website business is small, your Internet marketing business in a tiny niche of the World Wide Web, and it’s lucky enough to be attached to a storefront business that survives those hectic first few years, then your attention shouldn’t just be on what the head of Google is blogging about, but what your Google analytics metrics are saying about your website. Do you have your click paths defined to see your user behavior? Can you find the top 50-100 keywords that are drawing search results to your business? Are you going to bother bidding in AdWords, or will that be for later? Do you own your company’s name on GoDaddy? Does Google Maps, Yahoo Maps, and whatever other registerable map out there, know how to find your business?

Your website is not going to gain a tremendous website following overnight, so, if you are new to SEO, take a deep breath, and write down the first 10 common sense questions you would have about your website business and go to town…you can always Re-Tweet Cutts blog later.

Tags: analytics, internet marketing, Internet marketing business, keywords, optimized, readabiity, search strategies, sem, SEM houston tx, SEO, social media, website business
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SEM Strategy: Do you own your name in AdWords?

Thursday, July 14th, 2011

As part of any search engine marketing strategy, you will eventually come to a point where your online business should consider “purchasing” some words online that target your niche industry. While some people may be hesitant to “buy” their own brand, or related words to their brand as part of a PPC campaign, the argument that “if they type in my company’s name, they will find me,” is no longer valid in the aggressive SEM of website business marketing.

Especially if your competition has bid on that word.

There are two types, generally, of Internet searchers—the type that is “researching” and will click on organic search results, versus the “buyer” who will generally go to the first sponsored ad that looks like it fulfills their search terms. You are trying to appeal to both types of users, so, bidding on keywords in your industry for SEM makes perfect sense in this regard, because your company name shows up as a sponsored, paid search result AND continues to gain organic Internet ranking.

Another positive reason to bid on your online business name and related keywords to your brand is to bid on the common misspellings of your brand name. Search engines like Google might catch the error, or not, depending on what the keyword is, so by purchasing any misspelled words, you are still guaranteeing that user will be able to find you.

Finally, including your targeted terms and company name in your PPC campaign allows your website’s overall click-through-rates to increase and to increase your website’s general Internet ranking. It may be slow going at first, but, it’s a relatively cheap way to boost your presence online, so get out there and get to bidding.

Tags: brand, keywords, organic search, paid search, PPC, PPC campaign, search engine marketing, sem, SEM houston tx, SEM Strategy, SEO keywords, website business
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SEM Strategy: “Internetiquette,” or, the rules of social media engagement (Part 2/5)

Monday, June 6th, 2011

Continuing from our post on Friday about the rules of social media engagement is today’s post, the first step of a plan every search engine marketing expert and online business owner should have—an official social media response plan.

The most important thing for a search engine marketing person to consider, once an online business is getting Internet rankings and consumer interaction, is brand reputation management. When a potential consumer decides to look up your company, many of them will click on reviews that pop up in the organic search results. Companies like Yelp and Angie’s List tend to have high rankings online, so your job as an SEM is to see what is being talked about on these sites. You should create, or claim a business listing online, first, so that the reviews are posted in the correct place for your SEMs to find.

Monitoring, the first step of any social media response plan, should take place on a daily basis. Whether it’s scheduled for once, or twice a day, it is incredibly important for your online brand to know what is being said about you “behind your back” by anonymous reviewers. Although most companies cannot do much to counter blatant lies published about them, they can respond to these types of things in a way that shows people reading these reviews that the company is aware of what the online community is saying.

Although this isn’t a complete list, the major specific review websites are Angie’s list, Yelp, HotPot, Expedia, Twitter, Facebook and Foursquare. Monitor these carefully, and proceed to the next step.

Tags: brand awareness, brand reputation, internet ranking, keywords, organic search, search engine marketing, search engine optimized, sem, SEM houston tx, SEM Strategy, social media, social media response plan
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SEM Strategy: Staying un-focused in SEO

Thursday, May 26th, 2011

We’ve all heard that well-worn, and almost trite idiom, “Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket,” but really, in the world of search engine marketing and SEO, it’s almost difficult not to, at times. A more appropriate idiom would be the one about not seeing the forest for the trees, perhaps. In search engine marketing strategy, it’s good to know your SEO forest has trees, but don’t forget to look at the entire picture.

Hyper-focusing, whether it’s a PPC campaign, blog, web content, or worrying about your paid search results vs. your organic search results, is a pretty awful way to run your online business. For one thing, it’s an incredible waste of time to spend all of your time on, say, your next social media update, instead of fixing your website’s meta and title tags. It makes no sense to create excellent web content, when your web design looks like something the 70s rejected.

SEO is a balancing act of tasks that are better suited to creating organized lists for, and maintaining in some kind of sequential order. The first set of things to do are creating, and optimizing your website’s content, keywords, and all of the internal things like tags, titles and alt text. After that, your job is to promote with social media things like blogs, and close monitoring of review sites. After that, you should be making sure your online business is staying updated in your niche industry with PPC, and organic search results that rival your online competitors.

Tags: blogs, internet ranking, keywords, online business, optimization, organic search, paid search, search engine marketing, search engine marketing strategy, SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION, sem, SEM houston tx, SEM Strategy, SEO, social media, web content, web design
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Posts Tagged ‘keywords’

SEM Strategy: Writing clearly; it’s the law

SEM Strategy: Do you own your name in AdWords?

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