September 2007 Archives

According to David Utter of WebPro News in his post Local Search Poised For Marketing Success

"People in the US tend to spend 80 percent of their budgets within 50 miles of their homes, and the Kelsey Group thinks that bodes well for local advertising's $110 billion market to shift more into local search ads."

What this translates into is a potentially big untapped resource and a pretty darn good reason to take some steps of your own in ensuring your local search capabilities are optimized.

Jim Parent from the ClickZ Network runs through 8 Ways to Improve Your Local Search Results.
Here are some thoughts that stood out for me:

• Check out your business listing on the major search engines Check out your business listings on Google, Yahoo Local, and MSN Live Search. If your business is not found, you should submit a listing at Google , Yahoo , and Superpages (for Microsoft Live Search) .
  
• For each business listing, make sure that your information is correct, your business description is complete, and that it uses the same keywords that you are using on your web site.
  
• Get your business rated. Ask your satisfied customers to write reviews and rate your business at Google, Yahoo, and MSN.
• Solicit local links. Find the web directories that are local to your area, and ask them to link to your web site. Contact your local chambers of commerce and ask them to link to your business from their web site.
• Verify directory information Check out your business listing on your local phone company site and other local phone directory sites. Make sure that your business information and description are what you want.

Notice a common thread among these tips? Most should not take too much of your time at all. I am a big believer in maximizing your time for the highest possible return. Another similarity is the sheer simplicity of the tasks. Getting started in local search optimization shouldn't take a boatload of strategy or manuals.

Interested in reading more? You can find more tips from searchengine lands' Local Search Week - Six Easy Steps to Local Optimization
 

More than just being in enough local directories is the understanding of your "digital visibility" -- Brian Wool of the ClickZ network talks about Digital Visibility Is Key to Local Search Success. Here is how he defines it:

Digital visibility is the extent to which your brand is accessible to interactive searchers. Digital visibility isn't just a ranking, it's the quality that generates high rankings.

Simply put, knowing how to tap into the right online resources to optimize your local search capabilities is half the game, the goal is actually getting the right customers into your court.

Let's face it, not all businesses operate on a nationwide scale, and although the internet has certainly "shrunken" the world we live in, in reality your ability to reach out and touch the customers in your proverbial backyard can sometimes spell the difference between a successful or failed online marketing campaign. According to Kevin Newcomb in his post entitled - The Local Search Landscape

"Local search, and local online media in general, is one of the hottest topics in the industry right now. Analysts are falling over themselves to predict just how many billions of dollars in revenue local will represent in five years. New local advertising options seem to appear every day from a major search engine, specialty local search engine or local city guide, yellow pages provider, or local newspaper. "

Marchex has just released a report that examines some of the opportunities in local search Some of the conclusions they reached are as follows:

• Companies wishing to have large-scale success in local search will need to own a critical mass of local traffic and a critical mass of local advertisers, either directly or through partnerships.
• They will also need to provide comprehensive content and information across business listings and all locales, making it just as easy for consumers to find the perfect plumber in Poughkeepsie as it is to find the perfect hotel in New York City.
• Local search providers will have to offer a variety of products and services at scale for SMB advertisers. While the bulk of local advertisers will not self-provision, they will become more sophisticated about local search and will require similar products and services to national advertisers, including analytics and services such as pay-per-call (this topic will be examined further in a report on selling search-based advertising, to be released later this week).

 What we are finding out is that increasingly people are using the internet for local searches more than other applications (except email). Bill Day who used to be the COO of About.com and is now Chief Media Officer for Marchex writes extensively on Local Search Finally Living Up To Its Promise where he shares some of his thoughts on the Marchex findings -- specifically:

1. The consensus is that local online advertising revenue is expected to grow five times to more than $25 billion per year within ten years.
2. No one has really yet created a truly comprehensive local information portal. This frankly is surprising as the opportunity is so large.
3. Plenty of companies are scrambling to harness different segments of this still emerging market, whether industry giants like Google and Yahoo!, directories like YellowPages.com, or more niche focused players, such as Judy's Book. Despite everything that's been under development in the local online space, I am convinced that the best days for local search and online advertising are clearly yet to come.

All arrows point to the need to think micro as well as macro when it comes to your search optimization efforts. Depending on the type of business you operate, focusing on localizing your campaign may prove beneficial and more strategic in the long run.

Next Up: Local Search 101 Where to Start
 

 

Some businesses tend to think that creating a newsletter is a waste of time, that no one really reads them, or that they are already covered by their blogs or articles. Those things may be true some of the time, but not all of the time. As an avid reader (and sender) of e-newsletters myself, I tend to think that your market or customers may find it useful to hear from you without needing to go to your site.  Here are a couple of tips and thoughts in creating your business e-newsletter:

- Your newsletter should have a compelling "offer", be it a coupon for discounted service or a piece of valuable information. Make sure your readers come away from your newsletter with a tangible benefit.

- Hook them with an interesting subject heading or topic.

- A little of something is better than a whole lot of nothing. Short and simple is always better, and you don't need to have a ton of graphics either. Graphics are distracting.

- Connect your e-newsletter to your blog or web site by linking to a post, a web page, or even a landing page specially created to support the newsletter.

- Provide important information about your day-to-day business. Are you going to be open or closed on the holidays? Do you have a new product coming out soon? Do you have a new schedule of events that they can sign up for? A change in your rewards programs? These are topics that will motivate your customers to open that email and feel connected.

- The right frequency and consistency are vital. Too frequently, and your reader will delete your newsletters as quickly as they arrive. Too infrequently, and your reader will mistake your newsletters for spam. Once a month is about right. And timing is important - giving your email recipients an edge in terms of getting news on specials/sales or seasonal promotions before they happen should make them feel compelled to open your email in the future.

Additional reading below:

Newsletter Marketing
 

Score's Guide for Small Business Newsletters
 

Here is the other side of the coin - Converting a Newsletter into a Blog
 

Top 10 Myths
 

 

Search engine marketing can seem impossibly complex, or it can be quite simple. Here's a look on the simple side.

Be relevant.  One way to increase to capture reader attention and lead people to your site is called article marketing - writing and distributing original content on industry specific websites or blogs. Promotional World provides insight with "Article Marketing: Your Secret Weapon to Increasing Your Search Engine Rankings".

Get found. A second SEO must is identifying the right keywords. There can be more to doing that than meets the eye, as illustrated in the case of Initiate Systems, Inc. Understanding your customers, and how they think about your products and services, are paramount.

Measure up. It isn't always easy to calculate the worth of your PPC campaigns, but Peter Grudner's post, "Which Search Engine Works Best?" runs through his very effective method of determining his cost per qualified lead - well worth studying. No matter what kind of search marketing programs you use, it's imperative to evaluate results. You can't go "by feel."

Although we're talking about relevance here, I'll be completely irrelevant for a moment and mention Meme's most exciting find of the month - Google Ice Cream!

Worthwhile reading on search engine marketing from around the blogosphere ...

I always heard that anchor text for links MUST be keyword-rich. But Copyblogger explains very persuasively that anchoring text with "click here" makes a world of sense.

And while we're challenging conventional wisdom, take a look at Search Engine Land's Top Ten Organic SEO Myths. Author Jill Whalen asserts, among other things, that adding fresh content won't necessarily increase your search engine rankings, and that PPC ads have no impact on rankings.

Search Engine Guide reports that 27% of the Top 100 Internet Retailers [are] Still Missing the Boat on SEM. That's a big number, and a big opportunity for smaller retailers who want to develop a strong Internet presence. The opportunity should not be overlooked - it's sometimes easier for a small firm to optimize its site, and always less expensive.

Adding images to your website? Good idea, but even better if you construct your images so the search engines can find them. Search Engine Land details Six Simple Steps to Image Optimization.

And finally, from Pingable, 15 Common Web Design Mistakes that You Should Avoid. Effective search engine marketing is only half the battle. Once visitors come to your site, you need to give them a pleasant experience. Solid web design is a big part of how you make that happen.

Have you been feeling a bit neglected lately? Unvisited and unread? Are you thinking that just maybe you need to start forcusing on marketing your web site? You're not alone. According to search engine guide, 27% of the Top 100 Internet Retailers Still Missing the Boat on SEM  Here, according to the search engine guide are what some of them did right.

A common theme among well optimized sites? Content that went beyond traditional web pages. Well optimized sites were more likely to have blogs, to include podcasts and to make use of video files. Well optimized sites also feature more incoming links than lesser optimized sites, though the report gives many examples of well linked sites that are poorly optimized.

Some of the biggest steps you can take for your site may be the simplest ones- here are some for you to consider:

• Place your web url on all marketing materials, including business cards, letterhead etc.


• Use your website as reference when talking to customers, vendors, etc. If your website is constantly updated with fresh content and filled with valuable information on your product or service this should not be hard to do.

• Register your site in as many relevant places as you can the more places your customers tend to go the easier it will be for them to find you.

Everyday, broadband capability is reaching more and more people. That means regardless of the size of your business, your ability to market your website is becoming more and more crucial. The article on "The Website Traffic Myth" talks more about the common held belief around the build-a-Website-and-they-shall-follow mentality. 

What are other companies doing? PC World talks about industry best practices for e-business and online marketing 

There seems to be TONS of SEO tools out there that purport to help you successfully plan and implement your SEO strategy. What exactly are these tools and what are they trying to do? Here are the most common types of tools you can find and their purpose:

- Keyword suggestion tools - these tools help you analyze and gather different keywords most relevant to your business/product - for instance in SEObook's keyword suggestion tool , results of your keyword query would give the following information:

- Links the search volumes to the related global search results.
- Provides links to price estimate tools from Overture and Google AdWords. That Google AdWords tool shows the necessary bid to rank #1 for 85% of queries, and roughly how much traffic you could expect AdWords to send you based on that bid price.
- Links to Google Trends, Google Suggest, Google Synonyms, Yahoo! Suggest, Keyword Discovery and Wordtracker keyword research results.
- Links to various vertical databases like Topix.net, Google Blogsearch, and Del.icio.us to let you know if people are talking about your topic and what types of resources they are referencing.
- Search engine rank checkers checks where your site ranks in a particular search engine for a specific keyword- some advance tools also have the ability to check for multiple domains and region specific databases.

- General webpage analysis tools such as the one found on webuildpages gives you your yahoo rank, pages that are indexed, backlinks to your website, .edu backlinks, domain age, and phrasecount. This information helps you check your site's SEO "report card".

- Link Checkers are quick and easy tools that help you check your site for dead links.

- Sitemap generators - According to xml-sitemaps.com, the free generator helps you do the following:

• Create an XML sitemap format that can be submitted to Google to help them crawl your website better.
• Create a Text sitemap to submit to Yahoo.
• Create a ROR sitemap, which is an independant XML format for any search engine.
• Generate an HTML site map to allow human visitors to easily navigate on your website.

Many many more tools are at your disposal, but a caveat before you jump into the "free tools" fray - there is still risk of viruses, so definitely do a virus check. Also, some tools are as simple as going on a website and typing a keyword, others require downloading software, be aware that since the tools are free there will be no customer support to help you through possible system problems you may have.

Here are additional resources for you:

SEObooks' Free tools
SEO chat Free tools list
Best 5 Free Search Engine Tools
free-search-engine-optimization-tools.htm ">13 Best Free SEO Tools
Google Rankings