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Search Engine Marketing

Yahoo and Twitter have reached an agreement that will allow for Twitter feeds to be put on various Yahoo sites, including the Yahoo home page as well as search, e-mail accounts, and Yahoo sites devoted to news, finance, sports and entertainment.

The terms of the deal were not announced.

Yahoo also will include Twitter content on its sites containing complementary information. For example, a Yahoo user reading a certain news item may also see Twitter updates on that news on the same page.

Both Google and Microsoft Corp.’s Bing have similar deals integrating Twitter feeds.

To read the entire article, click here.

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Press releases are a great tool to use to promote your business and web site online. SiteProNews has recently published an article that further explains three good reasons why companies should try to create and distribute at least one press release each month.

1. Press Release Distribution is Good For Organic Search Engine Rankings
One of the most important components to getting ranked high on the Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc., search page results – is the number of external web sites that link to your web site.

Your news release appearing on an online or industry news site, a social networking site, a newswire such as BusinessWire or PR NewsWire, or even on a directory of press releases, helps improve your web site’s overall organic search engine rankings. In addition, many other sites and blogs may pick up your release and print it on their pages, further increasing the search engine results for your web site and business.

Did you know that a good news announcement could show up on hundreds or thousands of different sites?!

Most major news sites only keep their press releases online for about a month or so, you need to keep posting new press releases and news announcements every month to maintain your SEO rating and web page search results positions. By optimizing your press releases and embedding hotlinks, you can further increase how high up your web site will appear in the search results.

You should also make sure to post your press releases on your own web site.  By posting your press releases on your site, you increase the amount and quality of content on your site. For most search engines, the two of the most important factors towards getting a high search page result are the amount of quality links pointing to your web site and the amount of quality content you have on your site. News announcements can fulfill both.

2. Press Releases Inform Potential Customers About Your Company & Products
Most people and businesses now rely on a web search as an integral part of their search for products, and services. Seeing your news announcements all over the web – at the magazines they read, at various blogs, and as a result of web searches, can greatly help boost your company’s brand and product awareness in their mind. It is also useful to have news announcements that inform current and past customers of what is new and that you are still successfully in business.

3. Distributing Press Releases May Increase Company Press
Press outlets that come across your press releases may be interested in your news and want to include it as a standalone announcement or as part of a trend article or column. They may be doing an industry overview or product round up. It is also useful to occasionally inform press that you are an expert in your industry and are available for comment as needed. If they don’t see press releases from your company on a regular basis, you may drop off their radar screen. You need to show ongoing, consistent news and growth or the press will forget about you.

To read this article in its entirety, click here.

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Nicole Wagner

Landing Pages

Posted By: Nicole Wagner   Category: Search Engine Marketing| Web 2.0

24 Feb 2010

Landing pages are typically one page websites that are developed to generate a conversion. They are simple and direct and ask for whatever the conversion may be. They rarely lead one to the actual website. Landing pages are primarily used for direct marketing and search programs.

Tips on what makes a good landing page:

  • Content on the page should relay what you are advertising
    The landing page is the follow up to the direct mail piece, search engine or interactive ad that you put out there. The landing page should compliment the reach out advertising and finish the story of what you were trying advertise.
  • Your page should be solely dedicated to a single purpose
    Don’t try to do too much with your landing page. Have a clear focus and make sure it is very clear what that focus is. That doesn’t mean you should have only one link or call to action – it means that everything you communicate on you landing page should all lead to the next desired step you want the reader to take.
  • Should be very clear what you want them to do next with a strong call to action
    You want one outcome from your landing page – to get the user to do the next step. Make is very clear and direct them as to what that next step is.
  • Be Brief and Clear
    Don’t make your readers work for it. Spoon-feed it and make it easy. Sentences should be short, with concise copy that makes your points quickly and directly. Your visitors need to easily scan the page to find the content they are looking for and that fulfills the promise you made in your ad copy. The use of bold headings and bigger “BUY” or “SUBMIT NOW” buttons help increase success rates.
  • Answer all questions your reader may have to increase chances of a conversion
    We don’t want them to leave this page without moving on to the next step, so be sure to answer all questions you believe they will have that will make them hesitate to move forward. Testimonials are good on landing pages because they convey trust. Seals, certifications, anything to eliminate fear and motivate your customer.
  • Forms
    The shorter the form, the more likely people will complete the whole form. The form should also be positioned “above the fold” meaning that your prospect shouldn’t have to scroll down the page to see it.
  • Par down your navigation
    The goal is to complete the transaction on the landing page, but you don’t want them to leave you completely and not come back. Keep the navigation to a minimum and allow readers to go to your website at the very bottom of the landing page if they still feel they need more information.
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In order to take your pay per click campaigns to the next level in the upcoming year, you must go beyond simply measuring leads and transactions and start measuring new goals such as social media engagements and RSS subscriptions. The Search Engine Journal has listed 10 types of conversions marketers should be tracking in the upcoming year.

1. Transactions/Purchases
Measuring purchases is a standard practice for PPC marketers. In addition to tracking the amount of purchases, start measuring your average order value. This is the next most important metric to measure and work to increase in your PPC campaigns.

2. Leads
If the purpose of your PPC campaigns are to generate leads, be sure that you are measuring them and tracking them as conversion goals.

3. Up-Sell or Cross-Sells
Once a visitor converts — whether as a lead or transaction — there is still more conversions to be had on the thank you page. If you are generating leads for a paid online service or subscription, you can up-sell your initial lead conversions with the opportunity to sign up for a trial or make a purchase. This is a great way to lure PPC clicks in with a free, lead gen offer, but also grab any paid opportunities post-conversion.

Likewise, you can cross-sell leads or customers with a relevant offer on the thank you page, and gain more lead data or generate more revenue after the initial conversion.

4. Video Views
There’s no doubt – video is hot right now. And it is a highly effective way to support transactional or lead generation goals. You can test landing pages with video vs. pages without video and see what pages convert higher (meaning, which pages drive more leads or purchases). You should also measure how long visitors watch your video & how they engage with it.

5. RSS Subscriptions
An RSS subscribe is a great, friendly introduction to a brand or company. It’s anonymous and almost as valuable as grabbing a visitor’s email address. You can provide opportunities to subscribe to your RSS along with other goals, such as video views, leads, or transactions.

6. Inbound
Make sure you are setting & measuring inbound goals – anytime a visitor says, “please contact me!” You can cross-sell inbound opportunities on the thank you page after a lead conversion, or include an inbound opportunity alongside a lead conversion, as a secondary choice.

7. Forward To A Friend
Think of forward to a friend as instant word of mouth marketing. Most email marketers have embraced forward to a friend as an easy way to boost the viral distribution of their content, but most PPC marketers haven’t. Forward to a friend functionality is easy to integrate onto your landing pages with simple forms or social networking tools.

8. PDF Download
PDF downloads are extremely popular in lead genereation PPC campaigns — whether a product brochure, white paper, eBook, or brief and you should be measuring how many people actually download these items instead of just requesting them. Just because the visitor converts as a lead, doesn’t mean they are reading or engaging with your offer.

9. Social Engagement
You can easily measure and track how many people click on the social links or feeds on your web sites and landing pages.

10. Landing Page Clicks
A popular best practice for PPC landing pages is to create a multi-step landing experience that segments the visitor according to their audience segment or offers of interest, and subsequently delivers more relevant pitch and information. When creating multi-step experiences, it’s important to measure:

  • How many people engage with that initial page
  • What they click or engage with
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Although video marketing and uploading is becoming more and more popular, video search engine optimization remains a largely overlooked search marketing strategy. As videos continue to gain significant traction in search engines’ natural listings, most companies either ignore them, or remain completely unaware of their potency. That oversight represents a valuable edge your company can use to leapfrog your competitors in the organic rankings.

A recent article posted on SiteProNews explains why companies should consider integrating video SEO into their current search marketing strategy.

Before Google released their Universal Search platform in May 2007, their natural listings were dominated by text-based pages. Videos were rare in the top positions. Universal Search changed the way Google displayed their primary index. Google, Yahoo, and Bing now include entries from their respective video search platforms. What’s more, popular video-sharing sites have been given higher ranking authority and increased link weight.

Video SEO gives a company greater exposure in the search engines through two levers. First, it caters to the algorithm used for Universal Search. By allowing syndication of videos to authoritative video-sharing sites, a company will enjoy more exposure through their increased ranking authority. In effect, those sites will rank higher, drawing more people to your videos.

Second, videos that are placed on your site (as opposed to syndicating them) attract links – both directly and indirectly. As your videos gain popularity, direct links will naturally build, pointing to the pages on your site that host the videos. Indirect links will point from other sites whose owners have embedded your videos. As a result, your inbound link profile will continue to grow and strengthen, lifting your site higher within the search engines’ organic listings.

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A recent article found in Advertising Age titled ‘Friendsoucing’: Search Gone Social explains why marketers today should care about social network users’ friends’ interests.

The article explains how in its purest state, Google’s page rank algorithm serves up the ideal result for everyone, but it is the same ideal result for everyone. How does Google know which articles are right for each individual searcher?

But we may be on the edge of something big in the search world.

Throughout the past year there was a flurry of activity from the major search engines. Bing announced deals with Facebook and Twitter. Next Google unveiled its social search product. Google has also begun integrating real-time, public conversations with hot, trending keyword searches. Marketers have only started to scratch the surface of what these partnerships mean for them and their clients. At the very leas, there are three paradigm shifts to deal with in the future:

  • What brands say and do in social media has an increasingly direct effect on how they will appear in the search engines.
  • The more friends in a user’s social circle that talk about a brand, the more likely it is that another user will see your brand and become another voice.
  • Social media is not just a silo in the marketing mix anymore and the lines will become more increasingly blurred with mass media, CRM, SEO/SEM and other marketing channels.

It is never too late for marketers to launch a social media campaign for their brand. Social media is not just an Internet fad that will disappear as the years pass. It has changed the way marketers promote their brand and reach their audiences. Although social media may evolve throughout the years, it is a marketing channel that is here to stay.

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Meta descriptions were once an important ranking factor when it came to organic search, until Google announced that they were no longer going to use meta descriptions in their search algorithms. However; recent developments in Google’s search algorithm have once again decided to take web sites’ meta descriptions as a ranking factor.

Now, your web site’s meta description can significantly affect your organic search rankings. Here is how:

In December 2009, Google announced that they would be tailoring search results based on a users search history, even when users are not signed into Google.

How does this work? All of the searches that a user runs, whether on Google or not,  are stored in their browser cookies. This data is referred to as ‘Web History’ and Google uses it to customize your search results.

To learn more, click here to read the article recently published on Site Reference.

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Google CEO, Eric Schmidt, envisions a radically changed Internet 5 years from now. Some of his predictions include:

  • Five years from now the internet will be dominated by Chinese-language content
  • Today’s teenagers are the model of how the web will work in 5 years; they jump from one subject to another seamlessly
  • Web content will move towards more video
  • 5 years is a factor of ten in what has been known as “Moore’s Law,” meaning that computers will be capable of far more by that time than they are today
  • Broadband well above 100MB in performance, and distribution distinctions between TV, radio and the web will go away

Google

What do you think of Eric Schmidt’s predictions?

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Google has announced that they are introducing new features that will bring Google Search users results with a dynamic stream of real-time content from across the web. Now, immediately after performing an online search a users can see live updates from people on popular sites such as Twitter and FriendFeed, as well as headlines from news and blog posts published just seconds before the search was conducted. When relevant, Google will rank these latest results to show the freshest information right on the search engine results page.

Google Search Results

This real-time search will enable users to discover breaking news as it’s happening, even if it is not the popular news of the day.

To read more details on the new Google search feature, click here.

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As Google’s algorithm evolves, which is better: have a web site with exceptional links and mediocre content, or a web site with exceptional content and mediocre links?

Watch the video below for answers.

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