Here in Ohio, we’ve had a nice week of sunny weather in the mid-70′s, and it’s amazing how a week of sunshine makes you feel! It’s made us feel so good, that part of the crew has made a resolution to start working off that winter weight with an afternoon plank break. I’m realizing just how out-of-shape I am! After the planks, it’s back to the desk to catch our breath and catch up on the latest happenings in the web marketing world. Here’s a sampling of what the crew has been reading this week.
From Google’s announcement that it will close Google Reader in July—some people aren’t too happy—to nifty ways to optimize a PDF for search, we’ve read some great articles this week on analytics, SEO, link building and content marketing. Oh, and don’t be creepy when you network on social media channels.
First, I’ll state the obvious… You do search engine marketing because 80% of web activity starts with a search. You know the more you can appear in front of your target audience based on the search query they perform, the more customers you will acquire (assuming your company and website do their jobs).
You also know the higher you rank for those search queries, the more you will show up, as searchers typically aren’t patient enough or don’t have the time to deep dive with search engine results. Even if you are the best solution out there, if you don’t show up until page 10, a searcher is more likely to settle for a “good enough” solution to avoid the work of finding the best solution (hopefully that’s you).
Check out some of the latest news and views in the world of PPC marketing that will affect your online business…
Are you afraid that you’re missing out on an important event? Concerned that you won’t know what’s being discussed around the water cooler tomorrow? Worried that something is happening in the world right now that you don’t know anything about? Worried that you’re missing out on some very lucrative keyword opportunities?
Worry no more!
Here is a list of 10 tools that will help you stay in the know – from hot keywords that searchers are using on Google to what’s trending on Twitter or Facebook to what’s going viral on YouTube this very moment. These tools will help you stay informed (and potentially fill you with useless information) day by day and even minute by minute. Never get left in the dark again!
There is a lot more to optimizing a page of content than just having an SEO research and throw in a bunch of keywords. The SEO “review” of content should be just one of the many steps in producing good, relevant, keyword-focused and user-friendly content for your website.
Ever wonder what a winning SEO team looks like? Go online and you can see a lot of SEOs writing, commenting, tweeting and communicating in the public spheres like peacocks spreading their feathers in mating season. Conferences are full of SEOs looking for their next delicious nugget of information to turn around and implement on their next SEO project. But none of this really allows you to understand what a true SEO team does or should look like.
While not all SEOs work in teams – there are successful solo SEOs – you’ll find that having an SEO team at your disposal provides some pretty significant advantages. Let’s go on a journey, looking at what an effective SEO team might look like. As you will see, there is more to SEO than meets the eye, and many roles necessary to make SEO effective.
We’re taking a look at how the “average position” metric lies to you (or more accurately, is misunderstood by you). In part one, we studied the reasons behind this and why distributions in Google Webmaster Tools is your sweet release for truly understanding your organic search position listings.
Let me wrap this up by showing you how to examine distributions in your AdWords account, as well. This is really important because, if you believe campaign/ad group/keyword/ad performance equals “My click-through rate/conversion rate/cost per conversion is at an average position of 3,” you’re not getting the real story. Plus, an average number is not actionable. But, if you segment positioning into distributions, you can now see performance differences in different positions on the page, draw some conclusions and take some action.
Not too long ago, I was wrapping up several hours of consulting when something amazing jumped out of my mouth. I almost immediately cringed when I said it because it’s one of those things that backs you into a corner. It’s kind of like a prophet wondering if his prophesies will come true or not. Once spoken, you’re either going to look like you have amazing foresight or are a complete jackass.
But the more I thought about what I said, the more I realized how much I truly believed it. It was actually a turning point in the conversation. Not just for me, but for my client as well. Kind of a game-changer, that realization that everything you’ve been doing is now viewed in a completely different light.
So what was this incredible insight? “You can win anything with engagement.”
I wouldn’t call the “average position” metric pointless, but it’s definitely lying to you. Most people approach this metric with a natural misunderstanding. It’s natural to think, “This is the average position that my organic listing or paid ad shows up at in a search for this keyword.” Sorry, but no. How could a tool just flat out lie to you? Well, the tool isn’t lying to you. It’s your understanding of what that metric is communicating that is lying to you. In a recent article titled, “The big lie of AdWords average position,” light is shed upon this subject. But, this goes beyond AdWords to organic search and many other applications in life as well.
The temptation to use averages goes along with the fact that we really like to have one number that will represent overall performance. It’s easier. The problem is that averages don’t really tell you anything about what’s going on. There are a few reasons for this…
