The Maine SEO Blog

Flyte recently launched a ProSite for Benjamin College Consulting – a Phoenix, Arizona-based college counselor. Benjamin College Consulting offers a wide variety of services and programs, including:

• Assessment/Evaluation
• Preparation/Identification
• Application/Matriculation
• Comprehensive Guidance

On WordPress, Ben can not only update his website any time he’d like, but he can also update his embedded blog. Benjamin College Consulting works with students of all high school ages to get into the college of their choice.

If you (or your child) needs help getting into the college of their dreams, give Benjamin College Consulting a call. If you need help increasing your search engine visibility, give flyte a call.

Nicki Hicks
Maine SEO

This morning, I put on a presentation sponsored by the kind folks over at Ameriprise Financial. I spoke to the group about Search Engine Optimization basics.

Here are some key takeaways:

• SEO is about making both search engines and users happy. It’s about balance.
• First and foremost, make sure your website is user-friendly – your navigation and information architecture should be intuitive.
• Do a keyword analysis to find out what your audience is searching for online.
• The more quality incoming links, the better. How do you get links?
  • Directory listings
  • Contact bloggers/webmasters
  • Blog
  • Guest blog
  • Article marketing
  • Participate in forums
• Submit a brick-and-mortar business to all of the major local search engines.
• Don’t forget about social. It plays a huge part in SEO these days.

For even more takeaways, view the full presentation below:

If you’ve spent any time on social networks lately, you’ve probably noticed friends and followers using URL shorteners – websites like bit.ly with funny number/letter combinations. So let’s answer the obvious: URL shorteners make URLs shorter. Let’s face it, when you only have 140 characters to get a thought out there, you need every character you can get.

Here are some of the more popular shortening services:

• bit.ly [My personal favorite]
• HootSuite
• TinyURL.com
• Tweetburner (or Twurl)

How to shorten a link

1. To get started, take 30 seconds and create an account at the website of your choosing.
2. Copy and paste your link in the window available.

   

3. Share, share, share! Post the link anywhere you share content – Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc.

Why use URL shorteners?

Sure, there’s the obvious character-saving, but why do we really use URL shorteners? For the metrics.

You can certainly gather quite a bit of information from Google Analytics. But what if you’re sharing a link to a website where you don’t have Google Analytics access? That’s where URL shorteners really come in handy.

These screenshots are from bit.ly, but all of the shorteners listed above will give you similar metrics. Start by seeing how many people clicked on your link:

Then, see clicks over time. (If you want to keep up momentum, maybe you should think about reposting the link.)

See where traffic to the link comes from:

And, finally, where your visitors are coming from, geographically:

Obviously, you’re not going to check statistics for every link you put out there. But for campaigns, important links, and special links (like ones to a client’s site), these shorteners’ metrics are pretty powerful.

Nicki Hicks
Get all you can out of 140 characters

In the other day’s webinar from SEOmoz, a point Rand Fishkin made really stuck out. During the section on Real Time Search, Rand mentioned: “Your blog doesn’t really target long tail searches”. The reason this point stuck out is because I’ve always talked about how blogposts are a great way to leverage the long tail.

With over 200 posts under its belt, this blog has built up a fair amount of trust over the past two years. However, 200 posts aren’t much when it comes to long tail searchers – targeting more or less 250 odd long tail keywords isn’t going to bring in much traffic.

Rand mentioned UGC (user-generated content) websites like Wikipedia…

…that boast over 40 million unique pages and targeted articles. Talk about targeting long tail searchers.

How can you target the long tail?

Just because you have less than 1 million posts doesn’t mean you should throw your hands up and give up on your blog. You can still target those long tail searchers – slowly but surely, and here are a few ways:

• Use tools like WordTracker Keyword Questions to get long tail questions the community has actually asked.
• Don’t neglect Google Analytics. Be sure to check the keyword section – especially near the bottom (with 1 or 2 searches) to see what long tail terms your visitors are already using. You can also leverage search terms in order to optimize better for what people can’t find.
• Use questions your customers ask you in real life; chances are, they’re asking them online too.
• A little experimentation. The sad truth is, long tail keyword research is nearly impossible, and sometimes it’s about taking the keywords you’ve already discovered as powerful and putting a different spin on them.

Nicki Hicks
Long-tailer

Four Methods to Accelerate Your SEO

1. Increase rankings on individual results
2. Earn rankings in alternative results types
3. Improve visibility in the long tail
4. Better convert existing search traffic

1. Strategies to Boost Individual Results

Competitive Analysis Process

Step 1: Determine weak vs. strong metrics

• Determine value vs. difficulty (Low difficulty + good search volume + high conversion rate = WIN) (How difficult is your keyword?)
• Paid search is a great way to test the value of a keyword

Step 2: Establish Analysis Process

• More root domains linking to the page
• Possibly more subtelty in anchor text
• Possibly higher value/relevance in links

Linkbait Ideas:

• Exact match domains (be careful here, and only use what makes sense)
• Widgets and badges (Example: picnik.com)
• Embeddable infographics (Example: this infographic)
• Content & technology licensing (Example: allrecipes.com)
• Link attraction targets with regular updates (Example: SEOmoz’s SE Ranking Factors – SEOmoz updates the same page with their biannual article, adding to the link juice collected from previous articles)

2. Earn Rankings in Alternative Results

Video Results & YouTube

• Huge opportunities for video by creating a keyword rich title, keyword rich URL, and good screenshot
• Title your blogpost containing your video something different than your YouTube video title – that way you’re not competing with your own video
• YouTube is the 2nd most popular search engine = huge opportunity
• Possible YouTube Ranking Factors
  • Title/description
  • Video length
  • Number of comments
  • Propencity for people to view video all the way through
  • History of account uploading video

Local & Maps Results Tips

• David Mihm just updated his Local Ranking Factors article
• Make sure your Google Maps result name matches your name, phone number, and address exactly
• Google will remove suspicious looking reviews, so gather them organically

Image Results Tips

• Not necessarily associated with traditional ranking factors
• For certain industries, image search can be among the highest converting traffic (but watch for first click attribution)
• Possible Google Image Search Ranking Factors:
  • Size – image has to be at least a certain size and below a certain size
  • Relevancy – Google’s doing a great job matching relevancy for images

News Results Tips

• Start by getting site submitted to Google News results, you can do that here
• Rand thinks Google incorporates Real Time Search into News Results
• Including an associated thumbnail image will increase click through rates

Real Time Results Tips

• Real time results don’t get a great click through rate
• HOWEVER, posts and links that get Tweeted a lot will do better for real time results and where real time results are used

Blog Results Tips

• If you have a blog and it has an RSS feed, you can appear in Google Blog Results
• Continue creating keyword rich titles to do well hear

Shopping Results Tips

• It appears a certain quantity – or a certain level of competition for products – must happen before shopping results are displayed
• Read this post to learn more about ranking well for Shopping results: How to Rank Well in Google Products Search & a Big List of Places to Get Reviews

3. Improve visibility in the long tail

25% of queries searched on Google each month are entirely unique and have never previously been searched for in the engine’s 10+year history. -Udi Manber, Head of Search, Google

• How the long tail works
• The long tail is much less competitive
• It’s difficult to compete here, because you can’t (really) do keyword research for it
• You’ve got to create high quantities of unique content (forums and Q&A sites are great ways to combat this)
• Is Blogging a Long Tail Strategy? Not necessarily. (Examples of great long tail strategies: NY Times, Wikipedia, IMDB)

Long Tail Strategies:

• Paid content writers
• Tweets and social updates as content
• User-generated Content (UGC), Examples: Webmaster World, Yahoo! Answers, HowStuffWorks, Answers.com, Reddit, Ezine articles, Etsy, SlickDeals

4. Better Convert Existing Search Traffic

Conversion Rate Optimization Funnel

• Visits to your website (100,000)
• Visits to landing page (25,000)
• Add to cart (500)
• Complete checkout (250)
• Customer lifetime value ($850)

Rand’s review of “Influence: Science & Persuasion”: An Illustrated Guide to the Science of Influence & Persuasion

Conversion rate strategies:

• Anchoring with pricing (Ordering highest price to lowest price, left to right)
• Pre-selected options (most popular, pre-selected, etc)
• Social proof (positive review with picture of person)
• Scarcity (Example: airlines proclaim “2 seats remaining!”)
• Reciprocity (Share with a friend and get more, example: Dropbox)

Rand Fishkin, SEOmoz, @randfish

Not everyone is sold on social media. Why? It’s hard to answer the question What’s in it for me [or my business]? Sure, Facebook’s a great place to connect with long-forgotten friends from high school, Twitter is perfect for sharing your latest blogpost, and LinkedIn is a great spot to become an “Expert”; but is there any more value?

But of course; and here are just a few ways…

Customer service/Crisis management

For larger companies, in particular, social media is great for damage control – or customer service. As consumers, we appreciate the personal touch and when an employee from a company (Fortune 500 or otherwise) reaches out to you, there’s no more personal touch than that.

After I had technical difficulty with the cable man (and tweeted about it), Time Warner Cable replied with this:

Replace your RSS feed

I don’t know the last time I used iGoogle. Why? All the best articles are being shared by my network. Why even sort through the mess when your trusted network is out there sharing the best of the best?

Stay up-to-date on the news

I found out about the Hudson River plane crash landing last year, Michael Jackson’s tragic death, and a traffic jam due to an accident on my would-be commute home all from one source: Twitter. For better or worse, if you pay attention, you’ll learn tonight’s headlines quicker from your social networks than almost any other source.

The “New” Google

I’ve taken up asking friends/followers questions instead of Googling. Better yet, you’ll get answers with the trust of your network behind it – which holds far more weight than any old website Google would churn out. Plus, you’re connecting with your network, strengthening the sense of community.

There are a ton of ways you can use social media, how do you use it?

Nicki Hicks
Social Savant

The Search Marketing Expo (SMX) is one of the best SEO conferences out there. While I’m lucky enough to go back to SMX East in the fall, I’m not able to make it out to Seattle this summer. But, not attending doesn’t have to stop us from not getting some great information, does it?

Here some of the great resources you can follow for up-to-the-minute updates on SMX.

Search Engine Roundtable

Search Engine Roundtable has always been one of the best at liveblogging from major conferences, and this summer’s SMX conference is no different. Even after the liveblogging is finished, you’ll still be able to see the archive. If you’re looking for straight content, Search Engine Roundtable is your best bet.

So far, these are the sessions that have been covered:

• SEO for Google vs. Bing: How Different Are They?
• Twitter, Real Time Search & Real Time SEO
• Show Me The Links: Real Life Link Building
• The Ultimate Social Media Tools Session
• You&A with Matt Cutts (Google Caffiene Index Live)
• Keynote Q&A: Yusuf Mehdi, SVP, Online Audience Business, Microsoft
• So You Want to Test SEO?

Search Engine Land

Search Engine Land is slightly more analytical about the sessions than Search Engine Roundtable – with takeaways and action items. They’re also great about including a few images or video, as they’re applicable. They also, of course, put SMX on. Here are the sessions Search Engine Land has covered thus far:

• SEO for Bing vs. Google
• Google’s Matt Cutts on Caffeine Launch
• Yusef Mehdi Keynote

Twitter Search

If you’re looking for quick snippets, takeaways, and thoughts from the audience, look no further than Twitter Search. Simply follow the hashtag #smx and you’ll get reactions to SMX, rockstar SEOs to follow, and more.

Nicki Hicks
Being there without actually being there

What people search for changes all the time. It changes because of everything from news and events to seasons, and even to the time of day. When you think about it, it’s intimidating to think about how you could possibly keep up with all of the change!

A blog is certainly the easiest and most efficient way to keep up with search trends – by creating keyword rich content that targets popular keywords of the moment. Creating articles, videos, and even images are also great ways to leverage hot keywords. But…where do you find these elusive keywords? Here are a few tools that can help.

Twitter Search

Twitter Search has a section at the bottom of the page for trending topics. You’ll most certainly get up-to-date (or to the minute) information about what the Twitterverse is talking about.

Google Trends

Likewise, Google provides a comprehensive list of what the nation is searching for on the homepage of Google Trends. (Search for topics in your industry to see a graph of trends over time related to that query.)

Google Insights

Google Insights provides “breakout” terms. Simply search for an industry keyword, then scroll through the trend graph, searches by region, and you’ll see a list of “top” and “rising” searches.

WordTracker Keyword Questions

By far one of my favorite tools for blogging inspiration, WordTracker Keyword Questions will give you a list of actual questions people have asked about your query – and how many times that question has been asked in the past year.

I’m sure there are a ton of other tools out there for keeping up with trending topics; but do you really need more than 4?

Nicki Hicks
What’s hot and what’s not

Recently, flyte relaunched a website for Clear Language Group, an organization that specializes in using plain language for health literacy. CLG offers a wide variety of services including:

• Consulting & Coaching
• Strategic Planning & Program Evaluation
• Materials, Multimedia & Website Development
• Training & Presenting
• Teaching & Curriculum Development
• Communicating Across Cultures
• Research & Business Collaborations

Since these ladies specialize in creating content in clear communication, SEO came naturally to them. What’s more is, as we moved their existing website over to WordPress, CLG now has the ability to update their website regularly – as they update their services, or as they target hot, new keyword phrases.

So if you’re interested in improving the health literacy for your organization, give Clear Language Group a call. If you’re interested in increasing your search engine visibility, give flyte a call.

Nicki Hicks
Maine SEO