Enterprise SEO

February 17, 2013 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

If your are an in-house SEO department or an agency, SEO from an enterprise level is always going to be challenging The challenges need to be understood before you can overcome them and be as productive as possible. Let’s talk about some of the main ones:

Education of SEO – Executives love the results of SEO but have very little understanding of the investment that is needed to succeed. If you ar an agency, you tend to be more always chasing the “why do we need them, we can do this in-house”. If you are in-house, you have a ton of competition with other media sources like paid search, email, media buying, affiliates, etc. You also have to deal with “to many cooks in the kitchen” where everyone has a piece of the responsibility. From technical and architectural upkeep, content writing and creation, design, social media, press, are great examples. With all of these influences, you can bet disagreements will happen. This is where you need to be an expert in educating all. Honestly, it does not take much to do this but it is time consuming. Quick presentations, links to specific articles that you put company specifics to, and showcasing competitive SEO strategy (and results) will do this.
Lack of solid teamword – We all know everyone is busy and they are not just sitting around waiting for SEO to come up with tasks that need to be completed. We also have different KPIs to hit. Each one has explicit metrics and goals that they must hit annually so as to be presumed successful in their position. These goals and metrics don’t always align cross-departmentally, which can lead to things not being done that would help what everybody’s final goal should be – increase income or business price for the company. An instance of this is when the SEO team knows that there are basic issues with the site that are prohibiting it from ranking as well as it might , for example non-original content. Because they rely without delay on the Information Technology department to carry out code changes like redirects, canonical tags, country-specific XML sitemaps, etc.

Solving These SEO Challenges

Communication plain and simple – What makes SEO so challenging is that your results (and worth) is based on others. You need overall buy-in for all factors within a company. An occasional email won’t cut it. You need to be able to have open discussions with all facets of an organization including with higher and upper management, with promoting departments, I. T. departments, content writers, branding groups. The list could go on. The point is you must create an environment where SEO is a company-wide adoption where everybody understands its goals and how their individual roles can and do at once influence organic search performance and in turn company performance.

I like to have customized meetings that include easy to understand graphics and presentations to show results, reports promoting the work you have done and the results you have achieved. In the final analysis you need to be pro-active in promoting the value of SEO. I have found success by using WebMaster Tool results to show the impact of work done and then having open discussions with that department on what their ideas are to continue the momentum.

If the client is really big, I highly recommended an SEO project manager, who’s sole job is communication. Marketing team rarely have SEO on the top of mind so it is really important to have that “face” within that team.

Filed Under: Search Engine Optimization Tagged With: code, Information Technology, paid search, SEO, XML

Guest Post Opportunity Bliss

October 1, 2012 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

having the right guest blogging opportunities is a must in determining the right guest post wanted for you and your client.

You might be working with another SEO firm or Agency and they have talked about a great SEO strategy called guest post outreach in which the individual or firm reaches out to other blog sites and pitches the idea (s) for writing content on their site in exchange for links back into your site. It is usually a smart practice for each site proprietor to forcefully police their outward links. Nevertheless we have always been a big believer in the power of guest posting as a valid, highly-effective, white hat link building and site content production strategy. In reality we have been suggesting the practice as far in the past as 2010.

That advice hasn’t changed. The most significant consideration is one you have properly identified the correct blog does the content benefit your website audience? If it does, then that consideration, more than any other ( including the external link you are giving ) must be at forefront of your decision making process. Now, that having been said, there completely exist some best practices you must implement when deciding the “good” from the “bad” via guest post content. Here are our top 3 tips we advocate blog and site controllers use when gauging potential guest post content submissions :

Does the post enhance the value of your blog audience? Is the post freed from grammar and spelling errors? Does it supply a clear benefit or discernment on a problem that your internet site and content audience will be far better off from having read? Penguin and Panda have only added to the Content is King discourse. The guest post must be topically applicable and match the content already existing on your blog.
Is the post a hundred percent fresh content? Obviously this is an easy choice but it is critical you conduct due-diligence and ensure the submitted content hasn’t been syndicated or printed somewhere else. Guest post submissions, more than any other content medium, have a tendency to have cloned content issues due to load issues on the writer. Copied content is a major trigger for any search engine and will do you more damage than good if you erroneously accept a submission without initially researching the uniqueness of that submission. To see unpublished articles for copied content issues you’ll need to use either a premium upgrade on sites like Copyscape or paste the file as a .txt doc into a free tool like Plagiarisma.
Author’s external links. The accepted practice nowadays for guest posts is to provide one dofollow backlink to the author’s site in the author’s box or bio. Any external links from inside the tract content itself should be heavily policed by you and link to a resource that adds some value to the work and audience. We know that “in-context” links are the best but where the author links to after the post goes live is a big challenge. Here is a great example of this – http://goingconcern.com/post/how-completely-bomb-cpa-exam-five-easy-steps. Nice authoritative site with good engagement and related content but look at the in text link. I know I do not want my name or client related to that. Links to sites the writer controls or keyword-rich anchor texts in the article should be minimized or eliminated fully. As for the dofollow link to the writer, you need to use your best judgment. If you’d like to offer a keyword-rich anchor text link that is fine, but if you’ve any doubts on the site then just link back by a direct non-anchor text rich link and go on.

We positively still accept the power of guest blogging as a realistic method to get not only top quality content for your own site audience but as a strategy you need to use to bump out your own content and achieve niche-related dofollow links. Nevertheless blog owners should carry on employing their best judgment when accepting submissions. By paying special notice to the above 3 best practices, we are assured you can make the strategy of guest blog posting a welcome boost to your content generation and link building.

Filed Under: Link Building Tagged With: SEO

Google News Updates

June 6, 2012 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

Google has added some great new features to Google News US : Bigger photographs, realtime updates, and Google+ integration. The real time coverage is now available instantly when a new story hits Google News.

If you are an SEO guy like me, this is an excellent place to look for hot trending subjects for article creation ( if you’re already featured in Google News) and desire some instant traffic. With this feature in place it is a no-brainer on deciding what your new blog post should be about! Naturally adding extra features to a Google product would not be acceptable without injecting Google+ into it somewhere. This suggests you can see Google+ conversations on the side of the live coverage page that is pertinent to the topic you are reading. They are also showing +1’s as well as permitting you to contribute straight to the discussion without needing to go to Google+.

This is another proof of how determined Google is to get +1 to paste. Google adds weight to companies that are active on 1+ if you are attempting to break into Google News, it would not hurt to get active on there as well – just stay applicable and useful! Google News has long been a really powerful place to drive traffic from. The hard part is that it’s hard to get in their network, but when you do it’s worth all of the difficulty.

Filed Under: Search Engine Marketing News Tagged With: google, Google News, SEO

What To Ask Your Link Builder or Company

May 28, 2012 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

We all know that link building is the key to success in terms of SEO. Now with all of the algorithmic changes that have happen and are continuing to happen the need to have a quality link builder or link building company handeling your link acquation is very important. Here are some of the questions you need to ask:

Give Me Examples of Sites That Links From Will Help Me?

I like to keep my questions very generic as the goal here is to have the vendor show their knowledge. I am looking for answers that are multi-pronged. This answer should be no different as link building has many different purposes such as reputation management, traffic, and SEO results. If you get only one of these aspects of link building like SEO results than that should tell you what they have been focused on in the past.

How Do You Execute This?

The link builder should have done their homework on your site. They should have at least 3-5 pages that reside on your site that they are going to use as an example to answer this question. If they have not taken the time to give you answers that are specifically for your site or your client’s site then they are not a true professional.

Give Me A Sense Of Your Discovery Strategy?

Your answer should be competitive back link discovery. You want to hear the tools that they are using link Open Site Explorer, Majestic SEO, and Ahrefs. You also want them to give you top competitors that are in your industry but most importantly, you want them to give you what types of content are driving links to their site. Like white papers, videos, articles, guest posts, etc.

Who Is Doing The Link Building?

Bigger link building agencies are going to have many link builders or they might crowdsource it. Just remember that your hiring the company, not the person you are talking possible business with. Don’t be afraid – ask your contact who is going to be the one doing the grunt work. Get them on a call and ask them these questions and get a good sense of how they are going to do the work. I am not saying that a big agency is bad, just to make sure you do your research. Also, don’t forget about the single guy shops are they can be a bigger asset here are they are cook, waiter, and dishwasher when it comes to doing the work.

What Do You Consider Black & Gray Hat Link Building?

I love this question. I mean, I really love this question as it has so many different possible answers. So of course you should get the standard “buying links is bad” and I agree but really the question lies with what they consider is gray hat. Sponsorships? Scholarships? Paid content? Their answers will give you a sense of the risks they will take. Will they mention paid links in a way that they use them?

So, the reality is these questions should get you to a good place in terms of knowing your potential link builder. Like anything else, it really comes down to you and your thoughts on the risks you are willing to take for your website as depending on that there really is not a good or bad answer to any of these questions.

Filed Under: Search Engine Optimization Tagged With: Open Site Explorer, SEO

Integrated Marketing Campaigns – The Key To Online Marketing Success

February 21, 2012 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

The old saying do not put your eggs in one basket has always been good advice but is really the key to online marketing campaigns being successful. Emarketer reports that Yahoo and Razorfish found that businesses using multichannel web marketing campaigns are most likely to see increased brand visibility, as an increasing amount of consumers access the web on multiple devices every day.

The company found that 49 percent of Americans access the web from their smartphones every day, while 66 percent do so from their laptops or desktop PCs as often. This indicates many are connecting to the web from multiple devices throughout the day. As such, the frequency with which consumers turn to different channels from each device grows every day.

“The proliferation of digital devices and channels provides marketers more ways to reach an audience,” said Lauren Fisher, eMarketer writer/analyst and author of the new report, “Multichannel Marketing: Making the Most of Multiple Screens.” “But as media multitasking has become a common way for people to cram more media minutes into the day, multichannel marketers are finding reach alone is no longer as effective. To compete for consumers’ time and divided attention, brands must also find ways to better resonate with their audiences.”

Successful web online marketing campaigns integrate several different elements. Social media marketing, SEO strategies and custom content offer access to audiences on their smartphones, tablets and laptops. Reaching them on each channel greatly increases brand visibility across the web.

Mobile devices, especially, are important to target, as they continue to become the default computing method for millions of Americans. Aside from those using smartphones, 46 percent of respondents said the use their tablets on a daily basis, with another 28 saying they rely on an e-reader.

Tablets are far more advanced than e-readers, and they’re becoming more affordable and this has caused a boom in tablets overtaking e-readers in sales.

Additional market and survey data findings include:

Of the 1,000 US respondents to In-Stat’s latest end-user survey, 38% own a tablet as compared to the 26% who own an e-reader.
Fueled by low prices and continued expansion of e-book content, global e-reader shipments will reach 40 million by 2015.
Tablet shipments will outpace e-reader shipments.
The total semiconductor opportunity for tablet suppliers will reach $13.8 billion in 2015.
The total semiconductor opportunity for e-reader suppliers will reach $1.6 billion in 2015.
Over 60% of future tablet purchasers plan to buy a tablet equipped with both Wi-Fi and 3G connectivity.
By 2015, 15% of all tablet shipments will go into business markets.

Filed Under: Internet Marketing News Tagged With: campaigns, Lauren Fisher, SEO, Wi Fi

Duck Duck Go – Search Engine

February 20, 2012 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

Here is another up-and-comer search engine called DuckDuckGo. Their philosophy is to create a better search engine experience by offering more instant answers, less SPAM and clutter, real privacy, and lots of “goodies” such as calculations, conversions, dates, facts and more. Last week, DuckDuckGo announced on their Twitter account that they reached over one million direct searches.

Internet marketers should and need to take notice this as the rising search engine is gaining popularity. Indeed, the company’s traffic records shows that it hit 1,067,006 searches on Monday, February 13. Then, on Valentine’s Day, the search portal broke 1 million searches again, fielding 1,019,602 queries.

The success comes in the aftermath of a new interface DuckDuckGo launched in 2012. The company hoped the update would help it win more users, and so far, the new DuckDuckGo is successfully gaining search ground.

SEO, content and paid search marketers will want to monitor continued growth patterns to see if DuckDuckGo can make a name for itself in search. Indeed, the moment seems ripe for a new player to enter the market as nearly half of searchers say they are frustrated by Google’s recent Search, plus Your World updates.

Duck Duck Go vs. Google

The guys over at Differences Between.Net did a real nice job of highlighting the major differences between the two search engines and here are some of them:

First, Duck Duck Go often displays information above the more traditional results. They call this information “Zero-click Info” because you get it with zero-clicks, i.e. right on the page (in a red box). This information includes topic summaries, images and related topics, and often answers your search queries directly. Other information that Duck Duck Go provides on-site are Category Pages, which group topics about similar concepts. These special pages enable you to discover useful topics related to your search that aren’t in normal search results.

Second, Duck Duck Go uses a proprietary technology called semantic topic detection, which allows them to detect topics within your search queries. If you type in an ambiguous term that can have many meanings, e.g. apple, Duck Duck Go asks you what meaning you want. After you select a meaning, you then get results (and Zero-click Info) that is more targeted to that particular topic. If you type in a search that contains topics within it, Duck Duck Go can also detect those topics and similarly adjust search results to target them in particular.

Third, Duck Duck Go tries to strip out all the “garbage” of usual search result pages, with the primary goal of getting you information faster and with less mental effort. That is, Duck Duck Go has much less clutter, much less ads, and much less spam. When people use Google, they often click forward and back a lot, trying to figure out what’s what and if anything has the info they’re actually looking for. That is because a lot of the information displayed in those results just doesn’t make a lot of sense. Duck Duck Go tries to reduce this so-called “clutter.”

Personal Search Engine Experience

Here are some of my experiences:

You will not see any “parked” domains. This is something that Google just does not do and has caused a lot more noise within their organic results.
Lack of local results – I am fine with that for the most part as from a SEO perspective it gives you more real estate for us search engine optimization guys to have!
Keyword match domains are more relevant in DDG than Google – I did a handful of searches like “tax attorney help“, “auto accident attorneys“, and “new homes” and noticed that the majority of sites within DGD’s SERPS have keyword match domains.
Both index punctuation.
Case sensitive searches are much more noticeable on DDG than Google – Actually Google has done a real good job of removing this from their SERPS.

Filed Under: Internet Marketing News Tagged With: DDG, Duck Duck Go, SEO, SPAM

Search Engine Habits

February 15, 2012 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

The guys over at AYTM Market Research had recently done a survey in which they ask 400 corespondents on their search engine habits. Overall it showed basically the same information we as SEO marketers have already know but it is nice to see updated data. Here are some of their findings:

54% of all polled use the search engines multiple times in a day. I would have expected a higher number on this as I am always on the search engine looking for something.
The majority of the people polled split their reasoning on why they use the search engines. Searching for specific answers (44%) and general to specific information gathering (43%) were the top ones. Targeting these users can be difficult. However, using content marketing with original articles centered on an industry will help a business provide a diverse archive of content that can satisfy the desires of a vast audience.
62% of all polled are satisfied with the results a search engine returns to them. Very satisfied was next with 22%. I think this interesting to hear as a lot of talk in the SEO world has been around the lack of relevancy Google in particular has show over the past year in their SERP (search engine result pages).
30% of all polled will not go past the 2nd page when looking at results. Not a big shocker here but I am surprised that it is even that high.
27% of all polled will not go past the 3rd page when looking for results. This is a big shocker and very encouraging in terms of your SEO efforts. To say that 57% of all people in this survey are going past the first page of results is great and gives our SEO a chance to still succeed.
4% of all people polled only made it through half of the first page results but the 18-24 year olds make up 33% of that. That is twice as much as the next age group so if that is your target market you must take this into consideration when performing your search engine marketing services.
Just 15 percent of respondents said they scan five pages of results, with 61 saying if they don’t find what they’re looking for they try a new keyword search.

As we know the landscape has been tilted towards Google for years. I do not foresee this changing, but other engines are becoming more popular and valuable traffic sources for businesses.

Filed Under: Internet Marketing News, Uncategorized Tagged With: search engine marketing, SEO, SERP, target market

Using Long Tail Keywords Still Pays Off

February 14, 2012 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

Over the past years, there has been much talk by the PPC management & SEO communities about long-tail keywords. Do they still work? Are they worth the effort? I will tell you that without a doubt yes, but before we going detail let’s start more from the beginning.

What Are Long Tail Keywords Really?

Long-tail keywords are search phrases that tend to be longer than just 2 – 3 words. Often, a searcher will use a long-tail keyword in a follow-up search after trying a short, broad keyword phrase because the broad phrase returned only general results, not specifically what the searcher was looking for. For example, our friend Matt is looking for a new set of golf clubs. A head search (or general search) would be golf clubs, golf irons, etc. Now if Matt is looking for a specific brand of golf clubs such as Cobra, Titleist, or Taylormade he would be better suited to use a long tail keyword such as Taylormade r11 golf clubs instead. As a rule of thumb, long tail keywords follow these core features:

Consist of at least four words or more.
Have a higher degree of specification specifically to the searcher’s goal. Searchers who use long-tail keywords tend to be further down the purchasing funnel which is a good thing.
Have less competing pages and companies bidding on them. This does make it easier to rank higher for these terms in SEO and get a better results in your PPC management campaign.
Have far less popularity in terms of searches performed on them.
Send you a higher qualified visitor.

Like we discussed earlier, long-tail keywords have undergone some dramatic changes in the past few years in terms of how industry experts value them. These changes are reflected in how long-tail keywords can best be applied in both organic search and Pay-Per-Click (PPC). Let’s look at organic search first.

The use of long-tail keywords in organic search over the past few years has been affected primarily by these things:

The search engine algorithms have gotten increasing more sophisticated they way they display results has changed as well.
Increasing organic search competition due to the inclusion of “blended” search results such as images, videos, tweets, etc.
The increase in highly authoritative social media sites has created more competition for these terms.

Search engines have improved in their ability to determine meaning and intent from search phrases. For example, Google “Instant” really reduces the intent of a users searching behavior including misspellings. More importantly, search engines are better able to “understand” the meaning behind a long-tail search phrase and can present results that are highly relevant. From a SEO perspective this can be troubling as those relevant results don’t contain the exact phrase that the searcher typed and the search engines are improving in their ability to substitute content that has the same meaning as the search phrase without having to match on the exact words.

Second, blended search results, or what Google has called “universal search” do not only include web pages but also tweets, images, video clips, and location-based listings provide a richer environment for the searcher to choose from. Using long-tail keywords not only on your web pages, but on other social media sites as well, can provide a solid benefit in the amount of real estate in the organic results that you can gain ranking for and associate with your brand.

Also the way that social media has increased in popularity changes the way in which organic search is referenced. Highly authoritative and popular online social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn that simplify the creation of content and provide alternative ways to market your brand. In addition, the development of ordinary web pages is greatly simplified through blogging tools like Blogger, WordPress and Typepad. Social media sites provide additional opportunities to rank for long-tail keyword phrases, although the resulting increase in the number of pages indexed by the search engines can make it increasingly difficult to rank on page one for targeted keyword phrases, short or long, that are relevant to your brand.

What About PPC Management Of Long Tail Keywords?

The use of long-tail keywords in PPC management has followed a trend that’s quite the opposite from SEO. While each of the three major search engines has its own set of rules, let’s look specifically at Google AdWords and examine how long-tail keyword usage has changed.Before the day of Quality Score, Google allowed advertisers to sponsor thousands of keywords in an AdWords account. Most paid search marketing experts would take advantage of this fact and exact-match on thousands of long-tail keywords rather than a few short, broad-matched phrases. While most of their keywords would languish unused most of the time, enough clicks would come in to make the plan worthwhile for two reasons. First, long-tail keywords weren’t fought over, so the cost per click was sometimes mere pennies. Second, as we’ve already mentioned, long-tail keywords tend to be highly targeted, so the click quality was excellent as measured by conversion rates.

Of course Google went back to the drawing board and came back with the Quality Score concept, they began penalizing AdGroups that contained lots of low frequency keywords by reducing the overall click-through-rate of the AdGroup. This had the effect of pushing ad positions down while, at the same time, increasing the cost per click for the advertiser.

Today, Google has gone back and done some more tweaks by actually disabling long-tail keywords that were not generating enough impressions, in Google’s opinion. Infrequently-searched keywords generate few clicks and very little revenue for Google, so in a sense, one can understand this move. However, sometimes a low-frequency keyword phrase can actually deliver a few conversions before being shut off, and that hurts.

If you are one that believes in conspiracies, you would think that Google has done this on purpose or just the cost of doing business, but the net result is that Google seems to be forcing advertisers to sponsor mostly broad keywords, using broad and phrase matching options in their paid search marketing campaign. Broad and phrase matched keywords generate a higher number of impressions, but also a greater number of low quality clicks. Ultimately, this has led to higher pay per click costs for advertisers and greater revenues for Google.

In summary, the use of long-tail keywords has seen a shift that you need to be aware of. Today, long-tail keywords can no longer be targeted explicitly and profitably through your paid search marketing campaign, but they still have great shelf life for PPC management. Now with the organic search world, they still are a great sandbox to play in. By no means are long-tail keyword dead!

Filed Under: Paid Search Marketing Tagged With: keyword phrases, paid search, PPC, SEO

January 2012 U.S. Search Engine Ranking Report

February 12, 2012 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

As you know, Google is the king in terms of the search engines but some of the other guys have made some gains. In its January 2012 U.S. search engine rankings report, market research firm comScore found that Google has reassumed control of two-thirds of the search marketing, gaining 0.3 percent in the month. More than 66 percent of search queries in January were conducted on Google, compared to 15.2 percent for Bing and 14.1 percent on Yahoo.

Ask.com also saw some minor gains, moving from 2.9 percent to 3 percent of the market. AOL landed fifth, remaining at 1.6 percent from the previous month’s report market share.

As searchers are getting their holiday shopping out of their system, searches as a whole fell in January as it does most years. Brafton recently reported that Americans spent more than $50 billion online in December, further signaling the value of cross-engine SEO in terms of catching clicks and cash from searchers.

Even though the other search engines did gain some market share, it has done little to cut into Google’s lead. SEO campaigns should still focus on Google users as the company strives to create the best possible search experience – even if the strong January performance for Google and Bing set up an interesting battle between the companies.

We all know it is unlikely that Google is going to get removed from its pedestal anytime soon, but Microsoft’s has made it their mission to fight against Google has hard as it can and this has already manifested itself with two different actions. First, Google’s new privacy policy compelled Microsoft to release a marketing campaign aimed at alerting users to what the policy could mean for them. Additionally, Bing has adjusted its SERPs (search engine ranking positions), which now look very similar to Google’s, to appeal to those users trying a new search engine.

Filed Under: Internet Marketing News Tagged With: AOL, SEO

Your SEO Agency’s Responsibilities – Do You Know What They Are?

February 9, 2012 by Frank Pipolo Leave a Comment

Ever since 1995 Internet marketing and search engine optimization has dramatically grown and changed. This growth has manifested itself in the increasing number of businesses using their traditional marketing, pay per click marketing, and media buying budgets to invest in SEO services when they might have traditionally used it to finance other forms of advertising. With the levels of tools available to measure measure traffic and conversion rates while serving content specifically to a targeted user based on their behavior makes it an attractive prospect for businesses looking for another way of reaching their target demographic. As the search engines have grown, so has the marketplace and I see no reason why the industry will still not evolve. The question I ask to you is ” what should you expect from your SEO agency’s evolution”? Because quite honestly they need to.

Search Engine Optimization Expands

Rewind a few years ago and you can see how a standard search engine optimization campaign would largely consist of an expansive link building strategy, precise keyword research and solid on-page optimization. Let’s not fool ourselves, this today is still the staple of SEO and will be but, a whole host of new methods have been adopted by SEO agencies to give their campaigns more substance and bulk. Strategies that include content management and syndication, competitor research, keyword difficulty analysis, search vertical optimising (local, news, video, product, etc.) and perhaps most importantly social media outreach. These are the strategies that are spreading the boundaries of a traditional search engine marketing strategy and they are the ones that have the potential to yield the best results for clients. Is your SEO agency responsible for these new tactics? Have they try to introduce them to you as part of their on-going SEO strategy? Well they should have but to understand how these changes are affecting SEO agencies, it is worth understanding how these agencies are often structured.

The Structural Set Up Of A SEO Agency

Most SEO agencies have departments – Frank is the sales guy and John and Matt are the account managers. They are responsible for being the management for the agency and the client while establishing KPI’s and goals for the campaigns. Jim is the SEO Tech, Judy is the copywriter/link builder while Tony & Phillip are the programmers. While this departmentalization works well if you are going to use the agency specifically for one SEO service line such as link building, holistic SEO campaigns now require employees to have cross-over knowledge to reach the maximum potential for success. Let’s use a specific example. Google’s new “Freshness update” demands a website to produce high quality content regularly. It is now one of the most important aspects of a SEO campaign as it not only gets a website indexed more often, but it can often be used to develop brand awareness and to build an authoritative and diverse link profile for the website that in turn will help the overall organic placement of the site. We also know that this content has to reach the readers and spread throughout the appropriate online communities including social. We do this through good marketing towards various industry relevant blogs, forums and other social media channels – Judy’s (the copywriter) understanding how these blogs or articles will be marketed is essential in order for this content to be much more effective in an SEO campaign.

The Need For Multi Skilled SEO Personnel

Internal communication becomes paramount here as the increase in SEO techniques happen, clarity of internal communication is more important than ever and employees having a cross-over skillset can be hugely beneficial in SEO campaign management. Judy needs to be somewhat of an SEO tech or at least be trained on the basic principles of search engine optimization in order for her to truly be inline with her job duties and the overall performance of the agency. This may seem small and trivial but it really is not. This is a new responsibility for SEO and search marketing agencies as the evolution of the search engines and their more demanding requirements have to be met in order to achieve a high rankings. Will this change an entire SEO agency’s internal structure or blueprint to success? Of course not but it is worth asking your agency about and having them held accountable on focusing on some of the specific changes so that your SEO grows as the search engines do.

Are You A Web Marketer Or A Strategist”?

One of the biggest changes in the history of search engine optimization happened (and continues to evolve) last year called the Google Panda update – a change in the algorithm that has significantly altered modern SEO practices. The Panda update itself extremely complex yet in theory very simple. Bottom line – Google quality testers analysed a collection of websites they thought were of high quality, and a collection they thought were of low quality. Metrics of these websites are reviewed through means that Google has and we has humans do not and then the quality testers work is leveraged via Google’s algorithm which upgrades the sites that people thought were high quality and downgrading the sites that people thought were low quality. The reason this has affected traditional SEO so greatly is because it meant that producing good content, good accessibility and a strong link profile was no longer the high road to success to rank highly as this doesn’t necessarily equate to quality.
In the post-Panda world, these core SEO values still are the strong center of SEO but thought and strategy must be placed on design quality, improving all-round user experience and building a brand that people trust. Ask your SEO agency this – “Are you a web marketer or a strategist”?

What A Good SEO Firm Does

Good and forward thinking SEO agencies have been more than just “top of the funnel” thinkers for years. Good design, testing, website load times, and creating a positive user experience have been in their toolboxes for years. Has your agency talked to you about these things? Now, creating this positive user experience is a primary objective within an SEO strategy and will positively impact rankings. Search engine users crave this and SEO agencies need to embrace this as another step toward producing content-driven results that avoid the ad-heavy websites that marginalise user experience in favor of making a buck.

You as the client need to know that your SEO agency takes on this new responsibilities. It is no longer acceptable for a search engine marketing firm to just provide the basic SEO services like technically accurate content or to build a website that might be biased towards more frequent search engine indexing. But you as the client have the responsibility to hold your SEO agency accountable as well. You need them to be crafting intelligent, compelling, engaging content that visitors will want to share with their friends and need them to come up with the SEO strategy needed that will help your users deem your site as an authoritative website in your industry. Modern SEO is about creativity and striving for an innovative, professional end product that is optimised for search engine marketing and for user experience – observing how SEO develops from here will be fascinating.

Filed Under: Search Engine Optimization Tagged With: campaigns, optimization, search engine optimization, SEO