seo zero to seo hero intro to search marketing
TRANSCRIPT
@JaspalX
SEO Zero to SEO Hero
What every business owner should know about search marketing
Jaspal Sahota
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I’ll tweet the link @JaspalX
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What can a PR agency tell you about SEO?
Public relations
From local press to the FT – online, print, broadcast media coverage
Main focus is B2B and technical companies
Successful award entries and product reviews work (inc. consumer electronics)
Since 2006, we’ve ranked highly for a broad range of search terms
Around 50% of new business comes from online (UK and abroad)
Our clients rank high in search and win business from the Web
www.WebSearchOne.com
SEO, paid search
SEO training and coaching
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What we’ll cover
What is SEO
How to understand the search engine results pages (SERPs)
Why do some sites rank better than others?
SEO process
SEO for: Local search, E-commerce, Services
Common questions
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What is the point of SEO?
And who’s doing it?
SO WHAT IS SEO
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Rank higherin search
More prospects
More sales
Clicks (SEO) Conversions(CRO)
SEO brings prospects to your website
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Adverts
Usuallyadverts
Top 4 results on page one get 40% of the clicks1
Results can be complex – know what your SERP looks like
Source: Slingshot SEO study 2011
Organic search results.
Most people trust these more thanadverts
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Search for pizza, how complicated can it be?
Anyone for pizza?
Image credit: Avanti Pizza
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Search verticals you could target:
• Maps/places• Images• Shopping (products)• Video• Recipes
Adverts
Adverts
Social connections
Places
Places
Reviews
Images Good SEO can help you own more of the SERP
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Google isn’t telling, but we can make good guesses…
WHAT ARE THE RANKING FACTORS
Why did Dominos & Pizza Hut beat everyone else?
Why do some sites rank higherthan others?
1
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Authoritative, trustworthy links. Good use of keywords. Social sharing. Technical factors
0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25%
Why a page will rank for keyword ‘x’
Source: SEOMoz ranking factors survey 2011 (10k searches, 132 strong panel)
Social promotion
Content(on page & site)
Links(to page & site)
~70%
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To ‘do SEO’ this is what you need to think about
Searchers (keywords)
Content quality and relevance
Links & reviews
Location (local/country)
Search verticals
Technology
Measurement
Searchers (keywords)
Google wants to give the bestresult to the searcher
Links are a bit likevotes
Different verticalsrequire differentsolutions (maps, local,images etc.)
Places/technology
Getting this wrongcan sink your SEOefforts
How do you knowwhen to pat yourselfon the back?
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Thanks for the theory Jas…
…how do I get my site to rank?
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You need to Output/mechanism
1. Do the technical basics Analytics, webmaster tools etc.
2. Know your searchers Identify a handful of ‘personas’
3. Think about searcher intent List common search queries
4. Do the searches Understand which verticals to target
5. How strong is the competition?
Refine your list of queries - should you target ‘pizza’ or ‘pizza delivery in Coventry’?
6. Fix your website content 1-3 phrases for each of the main pages on your site
7. Let Google know you’re loved Get links, reviews, citations
A simplified SEO process: work out where you’re weakest
Track results, rinse and repeat
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Get the technologyright
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Do the technical basics
Make sure you have admin access – it’s your data after all.Use a ‘standard’ CMS unless there’s a good reason not to
You need Google Analytics (GA)
I recommend Google Webmaster Tools and Bing Webmaster Tools
Then link Google Webmaster Tools (and AdWords) to GA
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Remember to exclude your own computer/company.Check out ‘advanced segments’ in Google Analytics
Analytics can tell you…
Where are visitors coming from?Where are sales coming from?
What do people who spend more than average look at?
How important is mobile?
What content should I be creating?
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Personas, queries,keywords
✓
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Know your searchers: personas, keywords, queries
Seed phrases:Short phrases relevantto your searcher personas
Pizza
Pizza delivery
Pizza take away
pizza restaurant
Create variations: use adjectives, adverbs, plurals, locations
Fast pizza delivery
Fast pizza delivery in Solihull
Pizza delivery in Knowle
Pizza delivery in Dorridge
Pizza for parties
Personas:A handful of written‘sketches’ of people you want visiting your site
Dad of young kids
Mum of young kids
Teenagers with money
(TV) sports fans
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Keywords + search volume + rankings = basis for SEO
Expand your list
Analytics
Seed keywords
Forums
Blogs
Social media
Customer feedback
Related search results
Get search volumes from the Google AdWords keyword tool(try phrase match but always check with exact match)
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Keywords + search volume + rankings = basis for SEO
With the right tools you can scale this research to (tens of) thousands of keywords
Search volume
Rankings
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Competition
Image credit: shez.tv
✓✓✓✓
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How strong is the competition?
At least 40% of ranking is attributable to links
We need to know how many links the competition has got and how ‘powerful’ those links are
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Fortunately, there are tools that show links
Try www.opensiteexplorer.org or www.majesticseo.com
Ranking sites:
1. Dominos2. Wikipedia3. Pizza Hut4. Papa John’s
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The number of different sites linking with ‘followed’ links
Use this information to help when prioritising the phrases you will target
Hard for Papa John’sto win for the mostcompetitive phrases
For new entrants, it looks like 300 LRDsis the ‘price of entry’
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Fix your website
✓✓✓✓
✓
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Fix your website – site structure
Site structure, get the foundations right
Try to keep all content within three clicks of home page
Target between one and three keywords at each page
Main menu (and category) links aimed at your main keywords
Google is not great at finding links and content insides Flash and JavaScript
Use a text browser like seo-browser.com
Image credit: www.civilengineergroup.com
Flash
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Fix your website – page content
Page titles – most important words first
Forget meta keywordsunless targeting Baidu, Yandex etc.
Write for people first, search engines second. Would a neutral person link to your content?
Images (use ALT text)
Link out to quality sites
Consolidate ‘thin’ pages and keep the Panda happy.Fixing on page content can lead to significant rank boosts
Source: www.seomoz.org/blog/perfecting-keyword-targeting-on-page-optimization
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Let Google knowyour website is loved
Links, shares, reviews
✓✓✓✓
✓
✓
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Links and anchor text
High quality links
Authoritative sites• The Media• Industry authorities and press• High quality directories
Lower quality• Most blogs• Blog/forum comments• Directories>
Anchor text – tells Google what your links are about
Anchor text is the bit of text you click on.
Rule of thumb: build two brand links for every keyword link
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Links are valuable, two main types
No-follow links can bring valuable visitors(Links in JavaScript and Flash can behave like no-follow)
Followed No-followFacebook, Wikipedia, Twitter, some blog comments, most social media sites, etc.
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You can’t tell a no-follow link just by looking at it
Get a bookmarklet at: http://j.mp/ICnO36 for your browser
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Social sharing impact on SEO
Treat this as a rough guide only – it misses the PR benefit!
More important Less important
?
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Reviews
If you have:
Google Shopping feed (products)
Google Places page (location)Then:
Get customer reviews!
Be wary of:
Creating a sudden spike in number and/or ratings of reviews
Reviews all coming from the same location (IP address)
Product reviews: require changes to your website. Places reviews: you just need a Google Place
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You need to Output/mechanism
1. Do the technical basics Analytics, webmaster tools etc.
2. Know your searchers Identify a handful of ‘personas’
3. Think about searcher intent List common search queries
4. Do the searches Understand which verticals to target
5. How strong is the competition?
Refine your list of queries - should you target ‘pizza’ or ‘pizza delivery in Coventry’?
6. Fix your website content 1-3 phrases for each of the main pages on your site
7. Let Google know you’re loved Get links, reviews, citations
A simplified SEO process
Track results, rinse and repeat
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Some (slightly) special cases
Local, e-commerce, services
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LOCAL SEARCH
ClaimedConsistent name,address, phone – everywhere online
Categories
Description
Reviews
Photos (videoswould be good)
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Build links to category pagesEvaluate by estimating likely value of ranking changes
E-COMMERCE & PRODUCTS
Make your pages stand out
Great images. Use multiple images
Add value with your descriptions
User generated content (reviews, comments)
Technical aspects are more important
Use product markup including: reviews, pricing, stock
Submit a Google product feed
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How much should I invest in SEO? (I sell ‘blue widgets’)
Rank Volume Visits Sales Conversion rate Value
10 1000 10 1 10% £100
Rank Volume Visits Sales Conversion rate Value
1 1000 ~180 ~18 10% £1,800
Source: Slingshot SEO study 2011 of 342 keywords
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SERVICES
Good keyword research is essential
– Identify good-volume low competition opportunities
Create content that is valuable to your targets
Market your content
Who, what, why, when & how for content ideas
Create content for each level in the sales funnel.http://blog.eloqua.com/the-content-grid-v2/
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Just one more thing…
Common questionsImage credit: freecodesource.com
JUST ONE MORE THING…
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Will paying for these slots
Move my site up in these slots?
Will advertising help my rankings?
No. There is no evidence to link spend on AdWords or adCenter with higher rankings
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I see site X ranking in position Y, why do you get site Z?
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Google is watching you
Google knows:
Who you are
What you did online
Where you are
What you like online
Who you know online
What your online friends like
Simplest workaround: use ‘private browsing’ modeBuyers’ social networks represent an opportunity
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Can I buy links/I got a great offer in my email
If you outsource SEO, know what kind of links your agency is getting for you…your business could depend upon it
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Should I tweet?
Your own tweets have little to no direct impact on SEO.
But…pages receive a boost in Google rankings when shared on Twitter
Effect levels out at around 50 tweets then rises around 5,000 tweets
URLs receiving over 7,500 tweets almost always in top 5 results
Tweeting doesn’t help in and of itself. Tweets about your web pages do help.
Source: Branded3 survey 2012 using Twitition.com
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Yes. At least have some kind of news/articles section.
Should I blog?
Source: www.portent.com/blog/seo/long-tail-seo-101-defined.htmimage: http://petworkmarketplace.wordpress.com/2010/11/10/cat-silhouette-socks/
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The more specific a search, the more likely the visitor is to convert
Should I blog?
Source: www.portent.com/blog/seo/long-tail-seo-101-defined.htmimage: http://petworkmarketplace.wordpress.com/2010/11/10/cat-silhouette-socks/
Socks with cats on them
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TL;DR version of the process
Create link-
worthy content
Get lots of good
links
Get some social shares
Evaluate then
update your plan
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Rank higherin search
More prospects
More sales
Come and visit our stand downstairs – we’re offering discounts on SEO audits and SEO training
[email protected]@JaspalXgplus.to/JaspalX