By developing a successful blog, your company can propel itself to the top of the search engine rankings. A wealth of fresh content and links make blogs appealing to both visitors and search engines. Do the math and you see that adding a blog to your site can improve visitor traffic and enhance your optimization efforts at the same time.
Blogging Basics
Put simply, a blog or “weblog” is a journal that is available online. Blogs are often dedicated to the discussion of a single topic, such as company news or industry commentary. One or more writers may contribute content to a blog and most are easy to update, with posts appearing as frequently as every day.
Don’t underestimate the role a blog can play in your search engine marketing strategy. Blogs are, by design, rich with fresh content and tend to attract many inbound links (links from other sites or blogs that link to your blog). By offering relevant, keyword-rich content that brings back readers, a blog establishes your site as a topic expert. The search engines favor this quality in sites.
Your additions to the blogosphere aren’t just informational resources for its visitors; they also pave an avenue for you to reach potential customers. By posting content that makes people return over and over again, you’ve established a regular flow of traffic that can be directed to your commercial site. The people who read your blog may have found it because they were researching a purchase decision. Now, not only have you provided a helpful resource to these people, but you’ve also led them to your products and services. Even if your readers don’t make a purchase today, you’ve begun to build brand loyalty that can lead to future sales conversions.
According to “The Unfair Advantage Book on Winning the Search Engine Wars” by Planet Ocean Communications, blogs score highly when it comes to the three critical elements of top websites – link popularity, page reputation, and page importance. The influx of new content from a blog builds a dedicated visitor following, encourages search engines to index the site more often, and draws inbound links from other sites – all of which improves your standing in the search rankings.
Helpful Hints for Your Blog
Starting a blog is a piece of cake. Turning your blog into a resource that gets attention from readers and search engines is the hard part. To help you give your blog the boost it needs, consider the following points:
- To build loyal readership, identify your audience, stay on topic and provide interesting, easy-to-understand content.
- Include a link to your main site.
- Optimize your blog with keywords, in the same way you would optimize a standard site.
- Post frequently. The more often you update, the more often your readers and the search engines will return.
- Spread the word about your blog by commenting in other blogs and newsgroups that you read. Make sure your comments add substance to the conversation. Include a blog link in the signature or the body of each message.
Blogs combine content, keywords and links in a convenient package that the search engines love. If your site needs an added edge to drive it to the top of the search engines, it’s hard to imagine a better tool for the job. At Digital Brand Expressions, our SEM team creates optimized content for blogs as well as websites for a variety of industries, so if you’re interested in developing a regularly refreshed blog as part of your optimization strategy and want our help in setting it up or maintaining it, let us know. In the meantime, welcome to the blogosphere!
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Friday, May 19, 2006
LSI – It’s not a new crime show but it is helping improve searches
There has been a lot of buzz recently in our industry about “Latent Semantic Indexing” or LSI. It’s being implemented in varying degrees by many search engines, including Google. So it is something you should be aware of as it will impact your site’s visibility and rankings.
Though LSI sounds complicated, it really just has to do with a search engine's ability to identify synonyms and related terms for a keyword. The engine indexes relevant pages based on all the related terms, not just the one you may have included in your search query.
For example, for a search on "cars," a search engine employing LSI might return high-ranking results with pages about autos, trucks, SUVs, or minivans that have significant use of words synonymous with cars. In other words, with LSI, the search engine is smart enough to know that pages containing related terms might be relevant to someone searching for information on “cars.”
LSI and SEO
LSI not only rewards searchers, LSI (along with other SPAM filtering programs used by search engines) rewards “white hat” search engine optimization link-building and content-building techniques and further penalizes “black hat” work-arounds. Simple repetition of keywords won’t get you better visibility with LSI-enhanced engines. It is the context and right combination of all the words in your content that really matters now.
Though LSI sounds complicated, it really just has to do with a search engine's ability to identify synonyms and related terms for a keyword. The engine indexes relevant pages based on all the related terms, not just the one you may have included in your search query.
For example, for a search on "cars," a search engine employing LSI might return high-ranking results with pages about autos, trucks, SUVs, or minivans that have significant use of words synonymous with cars. In other words, with LSI, the search engine is smart enough to know that pages containing related terms might be relevant to someone searching for information on “cars.”
LSI and SEO
LSI not only rewards searchers, LSI (along with other SPAM filtering programs used by search engines) rewards “white hat” search engine optimization link-building and content-building techniques and further penalizes “black hat” work-arounds. Simple repetition of keywords won’t get you better visibility with LSI-enhanced engines. It is the context and right combination of all the words in your content that really matters now.
Friday, May 05, 2006
The SEA vs. SEO Battle…Or is It?
It might not be of Confederate vs. Union caliber, but SEA vs. SEO is a match-up we see time and again in the search engine world. Many of our clients often ask us, “Which programs do I need – SEA (search engine advertising) or SEO (search engine optimization)?” The first thing we like to point out is that it’s not an “either, or” situation – both can be used together to complement and support each other. More on that later, but first, let’s take a quick look at the current SEA/SEO landscape.
The benefits of SEA (also referred to as pay-per-click or paid listings) are that it is easily and quickly implemented, it’s flexible and allows for changes to be made on-the-fly, and, depending on the competitiveness of the keywords you’re advertising on and the expertise of your SEA manager, can be cost effective.
However, when it comes to driving traffic, SEO is king. The numbers vary slightly from survey to survey, but all agree that users are 2 to 3 times more likely to click on a natural listing than a paid one. It makes sense, really – if you search for “gardening tips” are you going to click on the listing that someone paid for, or the listing that someone has because their site is all about gardening tips? In an advertising saturated world, people gravitate towards anything that doesn’t tug at their wallet. I know I do. Combine this with the fact that over time SEO-driven traffic is much less expensive than SEA-driven traffic and it’s a win-win for the advertiser.
And yet despite the fact that SEO will provide more traffic at a fraction of the cost of SEA, advertisers are spending most of their budgets on pay per click campaigns. According to the December 2005 SEMPO/Intellisurvey report, 83% of online dollars are spent on paid placement and only 11.2% is spent on organic search. Contrast that with the findings from the iProspect study that show 61% of internet searchers think natural listings are more relevant and it’s clear that there’s a misallocation of budgets.
We’re not suggesting that SEA be relegated to the trash heap – just proposing a slightly different, smarter approach. As I alluded to earlier, the two programs can and should be used together. Because SEO takes time, both to implement and to take root, we recommend to our clients that an SEA program be instituted while SEO is in the works. This way, our clients still maintain a presence on the search engines and drive traffic to their site while optimization is in progress. Once SEO begins to take hold, we then scale back the SEA program and use it as a complement rather than the main traffic driver.
In short, we propose a truce between SEA and SEO. It might not win you a Nobel Peace prize, but it will certainly improve your site’s performance! And while we’re at it, consider the power and efficiency of the SEA/SEO combo when planning your overall marketing budget. It works, it’s measurable, and it costs a fraction of the cost of traditional media. I know, I know – I work for an SEO firm, of course I’d say that! But truly, for as little as 40¢ per visitor (even less in many cases!), you can build leads, gather behavior information and see measurable results. Can TV or radio say that?
The benefits of SEA (also referred to as pay-per-click or paid listings) are that it is easily and quickly implemented, it’s flexible and allows for changes to be made on-the-fly, and, depending on the competitiveness of the keywords you’re advertising on and the expertise of your SEA manager, can be cost effective.
However, when it comes to driving traffic, SEO is king. The numbers vary slightly from survey to survey, but all agree that users are 2 to 3 times more likely to click on a natural listing than a paid one. It makes sense, really – if you search for “gardening tips” are you going to click on the listing that someone paid for, or the listing that someone has because their site is all about gardening tips? In an advertising saturated world, people gravitate towards anything that doesn’t tug at their wallet. I know I do. Combine this with the fact that over time SEO-driven traffic is much less expensive than SEA-driven traffic and it’s a win-win for the advertiser.
And yet despite the fact that SEO will provide more traffic at a fraction of the cost of SEA, advertisers are spending most of their budgets on pay per click campaigns. According to the December 2005 SEMPO/Intellisurvey report, 83% of online dollars are spent on paid placement and only 11.2% is spent on organic search. Contrast that with the findings from the iProspect study that show 61% of internet searchers think natural listings are more relevant and it’s clear that there’s a misallocation of budgets.
We’re not suggesting that SEA be relegated to the trash heap – just proposing a slightly different, smarter approach. As I alluded to earlier, the two programs can and should be used together. Because SEO takes time, both to implement and to take root, we recommend to our clients that an SEA program be instituted while SEO is in the works. This way, our clients still maintain a presence on the search engines and drive traffic to their site while optimization is in progress. Once SEO begins to take hold, we then scale back the SEA program and use it as a complement rather than the main traffic driver.
In short, we propose a truce between SEA and SEO. It might not win you a Nobel Peace prize, but it will certainly improve your site’s performance! And while we’re at it, consider the power and efficiency of the SEA/SEO combo when planning your overall marketing budget. It works, it’s measurable, and it costs a fraction of the cost of traditional media. I know, I know – I work for an SEO firm, of course I’d say that! But truly, for as little as 40¢ per visitor (even less in many cases!), you can build leads, gather behavior information and see measurable results. Can TV or radio say that?
Monday, May 01, 2006
If Content Is “King”, Link Building Is “Queen”
I have seen some advertisements that promise optimizing your website in one shot by submitting your sites to millions of websites. They always hide the importance of “quality” inbound link building and the ongoing services needed to truly achieve success.
Ongoing Link Building for Search Engine Optimization Success
Building high quality inbound links is the single most important thing you can do to improve your site rankings. It’s the most challenging (but rewarding!) component of an integrated search engine optimization strategy.
Simply put, the more quality inbound links your page has, the more popular it is – and search engines like popular pages.
Search engine algorithms are always evolving and, so should link building techniques:
The continuing evolution of ranking algorithms necessitates a re-evaluation of the link building strategies.
The problem is that a lot of search engine optimization (SEO) firms and websites are still peddling outdated information. The truth is, many of the standard link building techniques that once formed the backbone of an SEO campaign are no longer effective. In fact, they can even be detrimental to your web site's search engine positioning.
Make it “Natural”
Search engines like natural link structure. The challenge for most sites is to accumulate enough incoming links to appear relevant to the engines without tripping any one of the many spam filters and penalties that are applied to sites that cheat.
For example: Artificial links tend to be identical, tend to be reciprocal and can sprout in great numbers all of a sudden. Natural links vary in anchor text and increase gradually as referral sites add links one by one over time.
Keeping these facts in mind, one should strive to build the most natural-looking incoming-link structure possible.
Concluding Thoughts
A good SEO company should analyze your site along with your competition, and come up with strategies for quality link building that will help you now and also in the long run.
The secret to getting it right is to... take the search engine's point of view when building your incoming link structure.
(If you haven’t already, please check out the SEO myths and Old School Practices blog entry for some other out-dated search engine optimization strategies.)
Ongoing Link Building for Search Engine Optimization Success
Building high quality inbound links is the single most important thing you can do to improve your site rankings. It’s the most challenging (but rewarding!) component of an integrated search engine optimization strategy.
Simply put, the more quality inbound links your page has, the more popular it is – and search engines like popular pages.
Search engine algorithms are always evolving and, so should link building techniques:
The continuing evolution of ranking algorithms necessitates a re-evaluation of the link building strategies.
The problem is that a lot of search engine optimization (SEO) firms and websites are still peddling outdated information. The truth is, many of the standard link building techniques that once formed the backbone of an SEO campaign are no longer effective. In fact, they can even be detrimental to your web site's search engine positioning.
Make it “Natural”
Search engines like natural link structure. The challenge for most sites is to accumulate enough incoming links to appear relevant to the engines without tripping any one of the many spam filters and penalties that are applied to sites that cheat.
For example: Artificial links tend to be identical, tend to be reciprocal and can sprout in great numbers all of a sudden. Natural links vary in anchor text and increase gradually as referral sites add links one by one over time.
Keeping these facts in mind, one should strive to build the most natural-looking incoming-link structure possible.
Concluding Thoughts
A good SEO company should analyze your site along with your competition, and come up with strategies for quality link building that will help you now and also in the long run.
The secret to getting it right is to... take the search engine's point of view when building your incoming link structure.
(If you haven’t already, please check out the SEO myths and Old School Practices blog entry for some other out-dated search engine optimization strategies.)
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