360 Digital Influence

SEO in the Web 2.0 EraNovember 10, 2008

Agenda

1. SEO vs. SEM

2. Keyword Research

3. On-page Optimization

4. Off-page Optimization

5. Personalized Search & Google’s SearchWiki

6. Workshop

SEO vs. SEM

SEO vs SEM

• If you know the difference you’re already a step a head of the game.

SEO vs. SEMSEO SEM (PPC)

Time

I t can take several months to see meaningful results.

When achieved they are the holy grail of online marketing – free website promotion and website visitors.

The quickest way to generate website visitors is via the use of an SEM campaign.

Once running, any changes to your campaign are also immediate.

Cost

Requires a significant upfront investment.

On an ongoing basis the cost involved is smaller.

The setup cost for your initial campaign will be less than SEO.

There is a greater ongoing cost, as you need to pay according to the volume of ongoing traffic you derive from the campaign, as well as the continued cost of monitoring and adjusting your campaign.

Risk

The risk increases over time as the competition is much greater (anyone can participate), and the rules continually change (as search engines are continually changing their algorithms).

There is no guarantee that you will achieve improvements in your ranking, nor retain any improvements achieved.

The risk involved in implementing an SEM campaign is much less than with a SEO project because the results are predictable, the costs pre-determined and there is (currently) more limited competition.

Effort

In general an SEO project requires considerably more time and effort to undertake than a PPC campaign.

SEO projects require a continual cycle of optimisation, assessment of improvements and an understanding of changes in how search engines rank sites

The creation of a SEM campaign requires much less up front effort but, to be successful, still requires almost daily attention to monitor the result and make any necessary adjustments to the campaign.

SEO vs SEM: Ranking Factors

• SEO: Google’s organic rankings factor in an estimated 200+ components when determining search rankings (http://www.seomoz.org/article/search-ranking-factors)

• SEM: Cost per click and “Quality Score” (http://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=10215)

Keyword Research

Keyword Research: Search Behavior

• Understand How Your Audience is Searching

• 55% of all searches are done using 3 or more words

Keyword Research: Head of Tail vs. Long Tail Strategy

• https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Keyword Research: Head of Tail vs. Long Tail Strategy

• Long tail keywords lead to more conversions

• Long tail phrases build the foundation for

targeting highly competitive phrases

•Interest - "car insurance" •Research - "sports car insurance“•Research - "california car insurance“•Research - "best car insurance company“•Purchase - "car insurance instant online quote"

Keyword Research: Measuring Success

• Your strategy should be about conversions & engagement NOT rankings.

• Define goals and assess which keywords are leading to traffic that achieves those goals.

• Goals: sale, lead capture, RSS subscription, social bookmark, whitepaper download etc…

On-page Optimization

On-page Optimization: The Title Tag

On-page Optimization: Why Search Engines Loves Blogs

• Search engine spiders love fresh content and the more frequently you update your content

the more frequently spiders crawl your site.

On-page Optimization: Choosing the Right Domain

• Branding vs. Keyword Rich

– Given enough time and effort, any site can rank for any keyword with any domain name.

– Having core keywords in your domain can, however, help you rank faster initially.

– Ideally, you want to accomplish both branding & keyword use in your domain.

– Often the domain you want is taken, but it may be worth the price to buy.

On-page Optimization: The All Powerful 301 Redirect

On-page Optimization: Google Webmaster Tools

• See What Google Sees:

www.google.com/webmasters/tools/

Off-page Optimization

Off-page Optimization: Inbound Links

• PageRank was developed at Stanford University by Larry Page (hence the name Page-Rank) and later Sergey Brin as part of a research project about a new kind of search engine. The project started in 1995 and led to a functional prototype, named Google, in 1998. Shortly after, Page and Brin founded Google Inc. While just one of many factors which determine the ranking of Google search results, PageRank is a significant factor in

determining a site’s organic search ranking.

• Google’s Description of PageRank:

PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link

structure as an indicator of an individual page's value. In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves "important" weigh more heavily and

help to make other pages "important".

Off-page Optimization: Inbound Links

• Google Toolbar PageRank

– Real PageRank is always changing, but “toolbar PageRank” only updates about once every 3 months.

• http://toolbar.google.com

– Settings Options More

Off-page Optimization: Inbound Links

• How to find quality inbound links?

– Competitive Research: Who is linking to the sites that are ranking for your target keywords?

• link:www.npr.org

• link:www.worldpeace.org

– Which of your properties can you leverage?

• teen resources site:www.pbs.org

• conflict resolution site:www.seedsofpeace.org

– Strategic searching

• useful sites library site:.edu

• helpful links library site:.edu

Off-page Optimization: Inbound Links

• rel =“nofollow” Explained • nofollow is an HTML attribute value used to instruct some search engines that a hyperlink should not influence the link target's ranking in the search engine's index.

• It is intended to reduce the effectiveness of certain types of search engine spam, thereby improving the quality of search engine results.

Off-page Optimization: Inbound Links

• “Show your commenters that you appreciate them. Spread the link love.” (

http://randaclay.com/blogging/the-i-follow-movement/)

Off-page Optimization: Inbound Links

• Twitter uses “nofollow” in profile link:

• “My personal twitter page has 1700 links, 1500+ followers, contains over 7000 tweets and is a toolbar PR of 5. Last I checked, I got all those links. I wrote all that content. All those people were following me as a person. I developed that link popularity. Why on earth would I not deserve ALL the benefits (including that in the form of a profile link) from building up the value of that page?”

• http://www.sugarrae.com/twitter-lays-down-for-google/

Off-page Optimization: Inbound Links

• 10 Myths about…

• 7 Secrets for…

• The Beginners Guide to…

• How to…

• Interviews

Off-page Optimization: TrustRank

• TrustRank is a link analysis technique described in a paper by Standford University and Yahoo! researchers for semi-automatically separating useful webpages from spam.

• The starting point of the algorithm is the selection of good (trusted) pages by hand. These pages are the sources of trust. Trust can be transferred to other page by linking to them.

Off-page Optimization: Universal Search

Off-page Optimization: Universal Search

Off-page Optimization: Universal Search

• Content Distribution Strategy

– Website Partners to Host Content

– Article / Whitepaper Submission Sites (EzineArticles, GoArticles, etc…)

– Social Media Tagging (Digg, Reddit, Delicious, StumbleUpon, etc…)

– PowerPoint Submissions (SlideShare)

– Video Submissions (YouTube, Blip.tv, Google Video, etc…)

– Photo & Image Submissions (Flickr, PhotoBucket, Picasa)

– Really Simple Syndication (RSS) Format for All Content

• Allows for content (i.e. blog posts, videos, podcasts, articles, event updates, etc.) to be easily syndicated to other websites.

Off-page Optimization: Universal Search

Off-page Optimization: Universal Search

Personalized Search & Google’s SearchWiki

WORKSHOP SESSION

1. Divide into client groups (PBS.org / Seeds of Peace)

2. Conduct keyword research

• Come up with 10 head of tail keywords and 10 long tail keywords

3. Come up with 5 potential domain names for you client’s website

4. Inbound Link Research

• Download Google’s PageRank Toolbar

• Find 5 different web pages where your client’s website would benefit by obtaining a link from that page.