WSI Internet Marketing

No the keyword “alligator” would not qualify… unless of course you sold alligators. Even then that single word is not what I am referring to.

“alligator shoes” is better, but not quite the long tail I was looking for. How about “alligator shoes for women”? Now we’re heading in the right direction….

Long Tail Keywords are search phrases that combine 3 or more words. They will get fewer clicks, but they are typically less competitive (facilitating higher page positioning) and more targeted, resulting in a higher conversion rate.

Let’s take something that I am a little more familiar with: “website marketing”. If you were to search on that single keyword you wouldn’t be alone. That word does get a lot of hits, but not everyone with the word “website” on their website has anything to do with website marketing. Your search results would turn up websites that promote:

• Website Design
• Website Hosting
• Website portfolios
• Nothing to do with anything
• Etc.

“website marketing” is better, but still awful competitive, and not nearly as targeted as it can be.  Although my staff and I work with companies all over the Country, people have a tendency to geotarget their searches. Therefore “website marketing california” would be more appropriate for me. There would be fewer searches, but the quality of those searches would be much better.

“website marketing company orange county” is about as long-tailed as you want to get. The number of search results that I am competing with goes down from about 192 million for “website marketing” to fewer than 300 thousand, AND I can be assured that whoever is doing the searching is targeting someone in my area for a reason.

There are 4 things that I want you to take away from this article:

1. For every word that you add to your keyword phrase, there will be fewer searches conducted.
2. For every word that you add to your keyword phrase, there will be fewer competitors in the search results.
3. For every word that you add to your keyword phrase, there is one more opportunity to target your service or location.
4. No alligators were harmed during the posting of this blog

At the end of the day, I would rather have 5% of the traffic from 300,000 searches than 0% of the traffic from  192 million searches.

One-time search engine optimizations are rarely effective unless they are for a localized “niche” or non-competitive market that is tightly geo-targeted (like a chiropractor doing business in a single town). Just putting your meta-tags into the code is still considered industry best practice, but in actuality has very little influence on how search engines rank you.

Search engines now take a very holistic approach to how they view the significance of a website and how they will rank it. Directory listings, Social media, Customer reviews are all part of the mix now. If I were to list all of the factors on this post it would turn into an eBook, so I want to focus on a few of the “big chunks” that are foundational:

1. Content: Search engines look for lots of balanced content. Their theory is the more content about a certain subject, the more of an authority you must be. It is not just sheer quantity of copy (although that is a factor), but the quality of the copy which has more impact. The search engines look at “keyword Density” or the ratio of keyword usage to total volume. The content has to be written very specifically and focus on no more than 1-3 keywords maximum.
2. Internal Linking Structure: Search Engines want to be able to “spider” the entire website by following the links from one page to another. We use a “silo” structure to leverage all the focus onto the Home page or landing page. Although I have to admit that recently even these pages are starting to rank independently (so they have to be more than SEO pages, they have to be marketing pages as well).
3. External Linking: The theory is “the more people who link to you, the more of an authority you must be”. Each link is essentially a vote for your website. However not all links are factored in. only quality links really move the needle. Quality links are links from other high ranking websites and directories. Reciprocal links (linking back and forth to each other) do not count nearly as much. They don’t hurt, but they don’t help as much as you think.
4. Consistency: Search engines reward consistency and penalize blatant attempts to manipulate them. This is a major factor in why one-time optimization events are largely ineffective. If you suddenly flooded your website with content and links that appear to come out of nowhere, the search engines will find that unnatural and flag you.

We typically put together a “content blueprint” that actually defines what is to be done and when. How many pages of content, how many blog postings, how many incoming links will be solicited, how many customer reviews we can cultivate, etc.

If you need instant traffic, turn to Pay-Per-Click (PPC), it’s the fastest surest technique for driving traffic. If you want long-term value, be prepared to engage in a Search Engine Optimization program, not just a SEO event.

Well, they both have their own strengths and weaknesses; however there are actual advantages to each in certain circumstances. Let’s examine Pay-Per-Click for now:

PPC Advantages

PPC is somewhat unique in its ability to drive targeted traffic directly to a website (or a specific web page) that ranks low for targeted keyword phrases (KWP). All you need is a landing page, a budget, and at least some marketing sense.

The three biggest advantages:

1. Immediate Results
2. Control over what keywords you rank for
3. Geotargeting… the ability to control with reasonable precision where your search results are seen.

Companies are able to see immediate results from money that is put towards their marketing efforts. Specific PPC campaign scenarios that can substantially benefit include:

• A website with a new domain name is launched (no history with the search engines).
• The lack of appropriate content on a contact and/or conversion page to rank suitable organically (perhaps a disproportionate amount of images, of just not much content for the search engines to index).
• Seasonal, event related, or time sensitive marketing campaigns that can’t wait for the search engines to index.
• Website architecture that prevents search engines from indexing a site.

When NOT to use PPC…

In a nutshell… low margin items. Let’s assume that you sell printer ink cartridges and you make $14 profit on each. You typically sell them 1 or 2 at a time. Now let’s assume the average cost per click (CPC) is $2.00. Let’s further assume that you convert 10% of your traffic into a sale. Under that scenario you will spend $20 to make $14. Probably not the best use of your marketing dollars. In that scenario you might be better off investing in SEO.

In any event, I caution you about running PPC campaigns yourself. It is not just about getting “clicks”. It’s about getting phone calls and emails and submitted forms and transactions and walk-in traffic…. There are a lot of variables to consider. You might want to talk with a professional first.

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) search marketing and search engine optimization (SEO) are two different strategies for achieving the same result: driving targeted traffic to your website. There is a common misconception that these strategies are independent of each other, often resulting in a search engine marketer relying completely on one method at the expense of the other. Each method has its advantages and disadvantages. PPC drives faster results in terms of pure traffic because you have a tremendous amount of control over everything from the placement to exactly how the search result will appear to the searcher.

The disadvantage of PPC lies in its reliance in one specific factor… your advertising budget. The less money you spend… the less traffic you get. SEO on the other hand is the most cost-effective, long-term solution because after the initial optimization (and some on going maintenance) your site could benefit from free traffic for an extended period of time. The challenge wit h SEO is that it requires a huge amount of initial research, diagnostics and optimizations to be successful. Even then SEO results are unpredictable because search engines are constantly updating their algorithms, and your competitors may be launching similar efforts to pursue those coveted top spots on the search results pages.

The contrasting differences between SEO and PPC can be leveraged into a comprehensive online marketing campaign. In fact, we often use PPC to monitor the results to help us with our keyword research to prepare our SEO program. With the help of a professional who knows how to leverage both strategies you should be able to drive long-term, cost effective SEO traffic and immediate, targeted paid traffic.