The Maine SEO Blog

This is one of my favorite blogging tricks and regardless of whether you’re running out of ideas or not, this little tip is great wayto re-kindle some traffic and re-inspire using your most popular posts. That said, let’s get right to it.

Start by logging into your Google Analytics account and going to Traffic Sources > Sources > Search > Organic.

If you’re looking at statistics for just your blog, then you’ll probably already see some great ideas for blogposts. Regardless, change the number of rows shown to the maximum number (500), then continue scrolling down for more keyword ideas.

You’ll start to see limited searches for the same term (1, 2, maybe even 3). These longtail search terms are the perfect start for additional blogposts. Sure, people already use these to find you, but why not use what works? Here’s a quick snapshot:

I might take some of these keyword phrases and create posts like:

• The 100 Most Like Pages on Facebook (similar to this post)
• Alt Tags and Image Descriptions in Facebook (similar to this post)
• How do Alt Tags Help with Google Image Search? (similar to this post)
• What’s the Difference Between an Alt Tag, Image Title, Description, and Caption? (similar to this post)
• Analytics Decreasing? Here’s Why.
• My Bounce Rate is Really High. I think… (similar to this post)

This is part three in a four part series on the The Marketer’s Guide To Twitter.

So, now you know what to tweet and who to follow, so now lets try to grow your following through promotion of your Twitter account and then learn how to manage that following.

First, lets talk about off page twitter promotion.  This means putting your twitter handle and URL on any and all printed materials you have, mentioning it in radio advertising, placing an image on a TV ad, having it in your email signature etc. Any place that you already are spending time advertising or spreading the word should include your twitter info.

Second, is using twitter and twitter tools to help promote and manage your account.

Getting Retweeted: The best way to get retweeted is to tweet out good, let me rephrase that, GREAT content.  People will retweet you when you give them something news worthy, different, humorous, or interesting.  Make sure that you are mixing up your tweets as far as what types of messages and content you are promoting but also you can tweet pics and video that are interesting.

Here are a few reasons to try and get retweeted…

• It’s Flattering
• It’s an independent endorsement
• It Virally spreads your message
• Attracts new followers

Types of things that will get Retweeted:

• Headlines
• Valuable knowledge (breaking news, tutorials/how tos, free stuff, contests)
• Calls to action (help me…, vote for…)
• Adding “Please RT” – for contests, deals etc.

One last thing to note is that you need to leave room for RT’s (meaning don’t take up all 140 characters), this gives people the ability to comment or respond in their retweet.

Managing Your Twitter Profile: Staying in the Loop

Many folks talk about how when you start following  a lot of people and vice versa how it gets a little overwhelming as far as keeping up with everything and having conversations.  Twitter has a lists option that helps with this and Tweetdeck makes using and viewing the lists even easier.

Say that you have a list of people from Maine that you follow so you can strictly talk about what’s going on in Maine.  All you have to do is create a new column in Tweetdeck and import your list to that column.  That way it’s separated out from the crowed of “All Friends” and when you are in the mood to talk Maine, it’s right there for you.

You can also separate out your mentions and direct messages so that you can see these more readily.  This tool essentially makes it easier for you to have actual conversations on Twitter and not get bogged down by constantly having to search through tweets to see what people are saying.

Search: Next you may want to see what people are saying about your company, product or service but you may not be following them, or they may not be following you.  Using Twitter Search and Advanced Twitter Search can allow you to search for specific terms and words, as well as local tweets so that you can respond and promote your company or service.

Alerts: Setting up Alerts like “social mention” and google alerts is also a good method to help keep track of what people are saying so that you can respond, help and engage in conversation with others on Twitter.  These are simple to use and come right into your email inbox.

Cross Promoting Your Twitter Feed

Just like adding your twitter url/twitter logo on all your printed and traditional materials you should also add it to your other online profiles, blogs and websites.  This cross promotion allows people who normally visit your blog or website to discover you on Twitter easily.  And, chances are if they are already interested in your other online material they will be interested enough to follow you as well.

Measuring Your Impact

• Create custom landing page for only Twitter traffic, then use customer URL  this helps to measure traffic to your site from Twitter.
• Shorten and Track URLs: Most URL of the tools that you use to shorten URLs also come with an ability to track analytics.  Bit.ly is a favorite as it has great insights as well being the shortest URL you can get.

An important thing to note is that only about 10% of tweets come from twitter.com, the rest come from other Twitter management devices and smartphones.  So, your measurements will always be a little skewed.

Hashtags: helping you find interesting Tweets

• People use the hashtag symbol # before relevant keywords in their Tweet to categorize those Tweets to show more easily in Twitter Search.
• Clicking on a hashtagged word in any message shows you all other Tweets in that category.
• Hashtags can occur anywhere in the Tweet.
• Hashtagged words that become very popular are often Trending Topics.

Using hashtags

• If Tweet with a hashtag on a public account, anyone who does a search for that hashtag may find your Tweet.
• Don’t #spam #with #hashtags. Don’t over-tag a single Tweet. (Best practices recommend using no more than 3 hashtags per Tweet.)
• Use hashtags only on Tweets relevant to the topic.

Stay tuned for part 4 of the Marketer’s Guide to Twitter.

Joan Woodbrey Crocker
Maine SEO

Whether you are celebrating it’s arrival or wishing it away because you don’t want to keep track of yet another social network, Google Plus is here.  We will soon find out whether it is here to stay or a quick fad, but my guess is that this is the real deal.  If you haven’t had the chance to join yet make sure to go check it out.  And, If you are like me and you are thinking HOLY COW there is so much to learn and read.. Here are a few resources I found helpful gathered all in one place.

What is Google Plus and How Do I Use It:

How to Get Started With Google Plus: This is a great guide to getting started on Google + it gives great info and screenshots, but it’s a little less overwhelming than the Google Plus Collaborative Doc (below).

Google Plus a Collaborative Document: This is literally a guide to using Google Plus.  The Table of Contents lays out the document so that you can jump around and learn about the areas that you need help with.  This is probably the most in depth and useful guide I have come across.

The Google Plus Cheat Sheet: Exactly what it sounds like, a cheat sheet or glossary of terms on how to use Google Plus and what things mean…So, in case you don’t have the time (or patience) to go through the doc above.

10 Awesome Video Tips for Getting More out of Google + Don’t like to read? Check out these quick video tips!

How to: Get Your Own Google+ Vanity URL: Since Google Plus doesn’t offer vanity URL’s as of now for fear of spammers figuring out millions of Google+ users email account information, gplus.to has created a small app that makes it easy to create your own Vanity URL to make it easy to share your Google Plus Profile with your friends.

How to Get Google+ On My Phone:

Get Google+ On Your iPhone! And iOS App was released today making it possible for iPhone users to get Google Plus on their iPhones.  It’s been available since the beginning on Android phones and all you need to do is go to the Droid Market, to download your Google+ app for Free.

How To Use Google Plus for Business/Marketing:

10 Things CMOs Need to Know About Google+ Chris Brogan compares Google+ to the launch of Facebook and the leap people made from Myspace to Facebook.  Giving reasons such as Google is the King of Search so they will probably have their social network affect search, they are starting up business pages, it’s connections with gmail and other Google tools you already use and it’s fast growth in it’s first two weeks of it’s launch he thinks it’s the next BIG thing!

3 Ways to Use Google Plus in Your Content Marketing Efforts A lot of great tips here on Google Plus for content marketing as well as  a great list of related articles about Google Plus, such as “Can Google+ Rival Facebook and Twitter? Some Initial Thoughts” and “Top 6 Articles On Google Plus to help you Get the Most Out of Your Experience.”

Google + Now Part of Google Analytics: You can now track your social interaction as well on your Google Analytics by adding a bit of code to your sites.  Currently this tracks Facebook, Twitter and Google Plus.  There isn’t a code yet to track LinkedIn interactions.

More On Google +:

5 Ways Journalists are Using Google Plus
5 Chrome Extensions that Improve Google+
What Your Business Needs To Know About Google+
How does the Google +1 Button Affect Search

The more I research, explore, play and use Google + the more I like it.  It’s incredibly connected, dynamic and the uses are endless. For example…

It recognizes when I take a picture with my Android, and then without me uploading or doing anything it is already in my photos on Google Plus asking me if I want to share it.

My new Tag line: Google Plus… It’s So Smart, It’s Spooky!

Joan Woodbrey Crocker
Maine SEO

Although Online graders, especially free ones are not completely accurate, they are still worth a peek. It can give you some good ideas on how to improve your sites and where you stand at present. So, without further ado here they are…

1. Facebook EdgeRank Checker: This one is probably my favorite so far just because it’s so new.  In my post, “Facebook EdgeRank: What Is It and Why Should you Care?”, I talk a little bit about what EdgeRank is and how the formula works.  This free online grader allows you to quickly check your page’s rank and gives you tips on how you can improve it.  Make sure to check often as recency is part of the formula, so your EdgeRank can change as your posts age.

2.Hubspot Website Grader According to Hubspot their “algorithm uses a proprietary blend of over 50 different variables, including search engine data , website structure, approximate traffic, site performance, and others.”  The Flyte New Media website got a 97!

The website grader bases it’s formula on many different factors including whether or not your site has a blog, indexed web pages, SEO, MozRank, linking domains, Social Media Links, traffic and more.  Check it out for your score today!

3. Hubspot Blog Grader Hubspot Blog Grader gave The Maine SEO blog a score of 92! Which means we ranked ranked 54,207 out of the approximately 757,812 other blogs that they’ve graded.  Not bad.  The blog grader bases it’s grade off of many different factors, it looks at RSS subscriptions, email subscriptions, twitter  and Facebook links.  It also analyzes your blog posts focusing on frequency of posts, average post length, average number of links and images in posts, how many comments you received, tweets and retweets, Facebook likes and sharing abilities. Although it may not be 100% accurate it does give you a great idea of what you can do to make your blog more SEO and user friendly.

4. PageRank Checker Your page rank is a numeric value that Google associates with your page based on links to your page.  Every link in Google’s mind is a vote for your page and the more votes the more important or your web page is considered, therefore giving you a high ranking.  Also, the rank of or importance of the site that is referring you plays a role in how much weight that vote has.  This is important because Page Rank is one of the factors used to determine where you will rank is search results. This Page Rank checker allows you to find out where you stand simply by entering your URL.

5. Online Video Grader The Pixability Online Video Grader measures how you use video on your website, how you rank on Google and other video search engines, and how effective your YouTube channel is.

And, Twitter Grader is kinda fun, although not in my top 5.  What Twitter Grader is trying to measure is the power, reach and authority of a twitter account.  In other words, when you tweet, what kind of an impact does it have? It’s not in my top simply because it doesn’t really give you a great idea of what to do to improve, however it gives you a score and some tips, I just don’t feel they have much of an impact.

My advice would be to not get too hung up on different numbers and grades that you receive.  As I said before these graders are by no means 100% accurate but they are a fun tool to get an idea of some ways you can improve.  If you have any different graders that you use and would like to share let us know in the comments section.

Joan Woodbrey Crocker
Maine SEO

Nicki Hicks
Florida SEO

This is part three in a four part series on the 4 Steps to Getting the Most SEO Bang for your Buck.

Now that you’ve optimized your web presence, it’s time to start measuring. It won’t do much to research and optimize, if you don’t measure your results!

Search Engine Rankings

It’s critical to measure rankings to make sure you’re doing well on the search for the keywords you’ve optimized your website and/or blog for. However, it’s pointless to measure your rankings if you don’t know if people are actually coming to your website using those keywords. Sure, you may rank well for certain keywords – like your brand name – but if no one is using those keywords to find you, then ranking #1 is useless!

I recommend using a tool like Raven Tools to measure rankings. Unfortunately, it is a paid service, but there are a ton of other great features beyond getting rankings.

Google Analytics

To make sure visitors are coming to your website using the keywords you’ve optimized for, use a tool like Google Analytics. Using the search engine and keyword reports, you can quickly see what keywords visitors use when they come to your website. Don’t see the ones you want to be seeing? Go back and try to optimize for them again.

Google Webmaster Tools

Installing Google Webmaster Tools is one more way to be proactive about your website. Sure, you’ll get some statistics including crawl rates, incoming links, and even keywords; but what’s really helpful are the error messages. Before you find out from a customer or visitor that you have broken links on your website, you can find out from Webmaster Tools first.

Incoming Links

Even though search engines are a bit secretive, you can find out how many incoming links from a number of sources, including:

• Google Webmaster Tools – I mentioned it already, and you’ll see some of the most powerful incoming links to your site. The number of incoming links, however, is lower than the actual number of links.
• Yahoo Site Explorer – Slightly more accurate, but destined to disintegrate (thanks to the Bing/Yahoo merger), this is another great (free!) tool.
• Open Site Explorer – A paid tool from SEOmoz. OSE is by far the most accurate tool I’ve seen and a great resource for a competitive link analysis too!

There are a ton of other measurement tools out there, but these are the major ones. Next time, we’ll talk about the final step in getting the most SEO bang for your buck: repeat.

Photo credit: aussiegall

Nicki Hicks
Measure, measure, measure!

The following is a recap from a session at Search Marketing Expo (SMX) East. Follow the conference and this session on Twitter.

Social Media Analytics with Jack Bauer

Preparation is key. Start with a social media checklist.

Part 1: Discovery

Identify your business objectives

• Increase brand awareness
• Increase brand trust
• Increase interaction with customers
• Increase brand loyalty
• Sell more [your service/product]
• Better understanding of user behavoir

What characteristics do you want associated with your brand?

• Great customer service
• Convenience
• Low prices
• Refreshing

How much time and resources are you willing to invest?

A few stats

• 67% of Twitter users who follow a brand, are more like to buy that brand’s products
• 60% of Facebook users who like a brand are more likely to recommend a brand to a friend
• 74% of consumers are influence on buying decisions by fellow socializers

Part 2: Understanding your Audience

Listening – your parents were onto something

• How are your customers using social media
• Where are they participating?
• Are they currently interacting with companies via social media?
• What are they already saying about you?
• What is their activity level on each social network?

Part 3: Defining KPIs

• Define KPIs specific to each business objective
• Cool social media marketing analytics
• Use KPIs to measure, like:
  • Share of voice – Brand mentions/total mentions
  • Audience engagement – Comments + Shares + Trackbacks/Total Views
  • Conversation reach – Total people participating/Total audience views

Examples of Actionable KPIs

• Number of people in a specific location who follow us on Twitter
• Reduction in support costs
• Number of product improvement suggestions from Facebook fans
• Increase in product reviews & ratings
• Reduction in sales cycles

Other KPIs to consider

• Volume of consumer-created buzz
• Seasonality of buzz
• Rate of virality
• Embeds/installs
• Increases in searches
• Rankings improvemnts
• Demographics
• Interaction/engagement rates
• Number of interactions
• Store locator views
• Registrations by channel

KPI Evolution

• The key to successful social media measurement is asking questions

Part 4: Tools for Insight

• Scout Labs
• Radian 6

Configuration Tips

Setup separate searches for:

• Brand mentions
• Product mentions
• Events
• Promotions
• Competitors
• Product launches

Taylor Pratt, Raven Internet Marketing Tools

Social Media Metrics

Content-oriented social media

Consumption = branding and organic social media presence

Benefits

• Traffic
  • Unique visits/page visits
  • CPM revenue
• Visibility
  • Branding/buzz
  • Links
    • Long tail traffic
    • Search rankings (leads/sales)
• Stickiness
  • Newsletter/RSS subscribers
  • Return visitors

Quantitative Metrics (KPIs)

• Engagement
  • Comments (Not including spam, but do include negative comments)
  • Social votes/bookmarks
• Consumption – traffic count
• Micro-conversions
  • Subscribers
  • Fans/followers
• Virality
  • Social shares/mentions
  • Links

Granular Metrics: Links

• Volume of links for a number of pieces of content
• Amount of links based on number of visits
• Shift in link count over time
• Competitive link growth
• Links by category/topic
• Links by social channel

Micro-conversions/Engagement

• Bookmarks
• Downloads
• Favorites
• Feedback
• Forward to a friend
• Groups
• Install widget
• Invite/refer
• Uploads
• Wishlists

URL shorteners

• bit.ly
• Google URL shortener (Goo.gl)

Comment engagement

• Bring social comments into your blog with Disqus
• Conversion rate = # visitor comments/# pieces of content
• Compare to regular content vs. promoted content

Google Analytics

Google URL Builder

• Create trackable link (Google URL builder)
  • Campaign name
  • Promotion start date
  • Delivery method
  • Medium
  • Format
• Shorten your trackable link
• Add your shortened trackable link
• Track your URL in Google Analytics

Advanced Segments

• Segment social visits from regular visits through Advanced Segments
• Tie Advanced Segments to Goals

Other GA social analytics sources

• Content > Content by title > Entrance Source
• Click Map (content overlay)
• Infographic tracking through GA
• Google Social Analytics - GreaseMonkey for Firefox/Chrome
• Google Analytics for Facebook pages – FBML markup

Social Sharing Measurement

• Facebook Insights (through Facebook page)
• Facebook Page Tool
• WebTrends Facebook Analytics Tool
• (Official) Twitter analytics
• Twitter sharing – how many people are RT’ing you?
• Delicious bookmarks
  • View history to see how many times a URL was bookmarked
  • Use SEOQuake plugin to see how your site is bookmarked overall
• YouTube Insight
  • Views over time
  • Demographic/geogrpahic breakouts of views
  • How many imbed codes were shared
• Social sharing measurement - ShareThis
• Social Meter
• PostRank

Data Use

• Start with a baseline measurement
• Then do monthly audits

Takeaways

• Social media metrics vary with strategies, goals, sites, etc.
• Track anything possible for insight
• Social media is not just about numbers
• Measuring social media does not = ROI for social media

Jordan Kasteler, BlueGlass Interactive Inc.

The following is a recap from a session at Search Marketing Expo (SMX) East. Follow the conference and session on Twitter.

Cross Channel Attribution

• Unified Tracking: track interaction of the user with all media channels at one place.
• Attribute and Analyze
  • Model how different factors contribute to conversion
  • Model how factors interact with each other
• Optimize: Allocate media spend based on cross-channel models

Unified Tracking

• On average, there are 4-6 touchpoints across before conversion
• Conversion Data (over 10,000) for several clients
• Identify key variables influencing conversions
• The more time it takes to convert, the less likely a conversion will take place.
• Relative importance of conversions
  • 70% time to convert
  • 20% first touch source
  • 7% search engine
  • 3% brand term

What is the chief limitation of revenue attribution?

Conclusions

• First prerequisite: unified tracking program
• Attribution is a partial solution
• Attribution + Algorithmic Optimization is the solution for answering the media mix question

Siddharth Shah, Efficient Frontier

Improving ROI through Web Analytics

Success means different things to different people.

Test A/B pages with bounce rate, but be sure to check conversion rates down the funnel!

3 Tips for Better Attribution

1. Look at the whole picture
2. Use a fair measure of success
3. Know your limits

1. Look at the whole picture

• Window shopping
• Entering the store
• Asking questions
• Trying it on
• Buying it

Look at the whole sales cycle

• Awareness
• Interest
• Consideration
• Purchase
• Retention

Solution: create a weighted metric

Assigning value to behaviors for “assists”

Which is more valuable?

• Identify online behaviors that correlate with conversion
• Analyze trends to assign to corresponding value
  • Regression Analysis – built into MS Excel
• Optimize to align with weighted metric

When to use weighted metrics

• Long sales cycles
• Multiple “successes”
• Offline sales
• Efficient campaigns

2. Use a fair measure of success

The problem with “last click”

Tools that are starting to get the message

• Omniture Markeitng Channels
• Google Search Trends
• Google Analytics “first click” hack
• Interim solution: combine first + last click

3. Know your limits

• Correlation does not imply causation
• No crystal ball
• Review regularly

Always be testing!

David Sprinkle, ROI Labs

Demystifying Attribution: Two myths

Myth 1: We need to be perfect in order to do it

You don’t need to have a PhD in Math to get attribution right

The perfect is the enemy of the good. -Voltaire

Evolution of Attribution Management

• Last click
• Even
• Exclusions
• Rules based
• Algorithmic

Myth 2: Isn’t attribution just about moving money around?

Just because you have the same amount of money at the end of the month doesn’t mean you should attribute where it comes from so that next month you can optimize accordingly.

Adam Goldberg, ClearSaleing

Demystifying Attribution

Deep down:

• Consumers are constatntly moving around the purchase path
• Multiple touchpoints could all lead to a conversion

Early on looking at attribution:

• Lots of data, no clear takeaways
• Data would only show certain channels based on system redirects
• Or to get the whole picture, you were looking at a hefty price tag

First steps toward attribution:

• Attribution through an ad serving platform
• Able to track 2 channels and 10 touch points
• Found a 15% overlap in revenue attributed
• Proved the need for a deeper level of understanding

What they needed to make some impact:

• A solution built to track all digital activities
• Easy to implement with strong customer support
• Flexible in its attribution models and accommodated multiple views
• Ability to report back at an actual profit level

In action: affiliate valuation

• Ensure affiliates aren’t over inflating credit
• On last click model, affiliate was converting over 10%
• Affiliate was only ‘introducing’ the transaction 2% of the time
• Action: renegotiate pricing structure

In action: network valuation

• Better evaluate individual network performance (consumer path and strength of performance)
• Layer in segmentation (acquisition, LTV)
• Use data to make more targeted and efficient buys

Mixed Media Modeling

• Weight the incrementality of channel buys
• Assign credit in a conversion path against these findings
• Allows for real time ‘exclusion’ set
• Leads to more accurate judgement on each individual channel’s impact

Danielle Smith, Range Online Media

More coverage of this session

• Search Engine Roundtable

The following is a recap from a session at Search Marketing Expo (SMX) East. Follow the conference and session on Twitter.

Optimize the Google Store: SEO in 15 minutes

Steps

1. Sign up for Webmaster Tools email forwarding
2. Utilize search queries
3. Focus on one item

1. Webmaster Tools email forwarding: Receive site alerts from Google straight to your inbox

• Malware notification
• Alerts in crawl errors

2. Make the most of search queries

• Highlight/star the terms for which you want to rank
• Deprioritize queries that are unlikely to help your conversions

Focus on starred search queries within Webmaster Tools

Improve your query in search results:

• Check for appealing titles and snippets (descriptive and matches user’s intent)
• Learn tips from the other results

Sell like hot cakes!

3. Target your content to match your audience (Keywords)

• Write content that matches your query terms
• Webmaster Tools provides an overview of keywords

Check for duplicates in results

• May be possible to consolidate PageRank between duplicate/near duplicate pages
• Pages displayed should be diverse in content

Reduce duplicate content

• Check search queries
• Review HTML suggestions
• Select canonical
• Use 301 permanent redirects where possible
• Implement rel=”canonical”
• Utilize URL parameter handling

Improve crawl efficiency

• Recommend behavior to Googlebot through URL parameter handling
• Check for 404s
• Fix broken links: crawl error sources – bring users and linking properties to the right URLs
• Prioritize your content – internal links
• Help users and engines quickly find your important pages
• Verify you’re linking as expected
• Make text/links accessible
• Fetch as Googlebot
  • Links and text should be clearly visible
  • URL rewriting/redirect issues uncovered
• JS loaded text common issues with video, even Video Sitemaps

User happiness: site performance

• Site performance offers improvements for slow pages
• More information at code.google.com/speed

The recap

• Email forwarding
• Search queries
• Keywords to content
• Reduce duplicated in crawling and indexing
• Crawl errors to fix broken links
• Prioritize content: internal links
• Verify crawler access: Fetch as Googlebot
• Site performance review in Google Webmaster Tools

Maile Ohye, Google

18 Metrics to Answer Questions

1. How much SEO do I really have?

Filter out branded traffic

2. Is my site what I think it is about?

Google Webmaster Tools –> keywords (Does Google think my site is about what I do?)

3. Is my site authoritative?

• SEOmoz authority rank (part 1)
• How many indexed pages does Google have for you? (part 2)

4. How does my site’s authority stack up against competition’s

• How many domains link to your’s vs. your competitor’s
• How many links to your’s vs. your competitor’s
• (Data warning: link data is inconsistent)

5. Am I a good linkbuilder?

How many links do you have to your homepage? (Google Webmaster Tools links to site à links to homepage only)

6. Was that a valuable link? (A valuable link is one that gives you traffic)

Google Analytics – traffic from links

7. Have I lost some links?

Google Webmaster Tools – check 404 errors for pages that are losing links

8. How spammy is my link profile?

SEOmoz report (Domain mozTrust vs. mozRank – should be very similar)

9. Should I give up on this keyword?

SEOmoz report (backlinking report)

10.  Do I nail the long tail?

• Look at the number of keywords bringing traffic to your site (Google Analytics)
• Look at number of landing pages (Google Analytics)
• How many pages does Google have indexed in my site (site: command)

11.  Is my site a bunch of useless templates?

Crawl vs. Index ratio (just because it’s crawled, doesn’t mean it’s indexed)

12.  Does my site look fat in these jeans?

• Site performance (Google Webmaster Tools spped)
• Site speed (YSlow)

13.  Will prospective partners take my call?

Business often starts with PR review

14.  Does my site lack fresh content?

Review site logs to see what your most-crawled pages are

Conrad Saam, Avvo

More Metrics and Diagnostics

Check server log to see how often GoogleBot:

• Number of pages crawled
• Canonicalization
• 302s

Better than rankings reports (combo of Analytics and Webmaster Tools)

• Query clusters
• Traffic
• Search behavior
• Google impressions and clicks

Vanessa Fox, Search Engine Land

Go from Interested to Informed

Social media metrics that count

• Hit the right target
• Social metrics for social intelligence
• Online metrics: bridging the gap
• Additional resources

Hit the right target

Goals ensure that metrics are aimed at the right targets

Answer these 4 questions before you track social media

1. What business questions are we trying to have answered?
2. What are we planning/willing to do with the findings?
3. What are our short-term goals for our social media program?
4. What are our long-term goals for our social media program?

Social media goals

• Increase brand awareness
• Decrease customer attrition
• Uncover valuable market insights and trends

Social metrics for social intelligence

• Brand awareness metrics:
  • Volumes of conversation around your brand
  • Volumes of conversation around your competitors
  • Affinity groups and influencers
  • Sites where your brand conversation happens
• Audience sentiment metrics:
  • Audience sentiment around your brand
  • Audience sentiment around your compeititor’s brand
  • Audience affinity groups and influencers
• Corporate engagement
• Outcomes and findings:
  • Causes in shifts and spikes in volume
  • Causes in shifts and spikes in sentiment
  • Insights and ongoing metrics that track back to your original goal

Vicki Blair, Visible Technologies

More coverage of this session

• Outspoken Media

About a year and a half ago, I wrote a post called What is a Good Bounce Rate in Google Analytics? As it turns out, it ended up being one of the most visited posts on the blog.

The amount of traffic I get from this post got me to thinking:

• Do you always get the kind of traffic you’re hoping for from blogposts?
• If so, how would you find out?
• If not, is it possible to backtrack and try again?

The truth of the matter is a lot of us write blogposts with SEO in mind. [Hopefully those posts naturally balance content with keywords...but that's a topic for another time.] But how many of us double check that the content we created is doing well for those keywords after the fact? Here’s how you can use Google Analytics to do just that.

Content Detail

Let’s start off simple. How much traffic is the page in question getting? Is it still getting traffic after being published or has it gone stale after 6 months or a year?

How about traffic stats – how many unique visitors? How much time do they spend on the page? What’s the bounce rate like – do visitors bounce after reading the post?

The takeaway

• If traffic fell off over time, maybe it’s time to repost the content somewhere. Try giving it a major overhaul and submitting it to an article marketing site or guest blogging it.
• If you’re still getting traffic but time on page seems a little low, try reorganizing the post. Do you split the content up with headers, bullets, etc.? Or try rewriting the copy to keep the reader hooked until the end of the post.
• If your bounce rate is higher than you’d like (which is typical for blogposts), do you have a call to action to entice the reader to stay on the site?

Navigation Summary

We’ll look next at entrance sources outside of your website, but which pages did visitors come from on your site or blog?

The takeaway

If the goal is to decrease bounce rate, think about the linking strategy you use from other pages.

Entrance Sources

How are visitors getting to your page or post? Is it direct, search engine, or referral traffic? The Entrance Sources report will show a mixture of all three sources.

The takeaway

• Didn’t get as much bang for your buck out of Twitter or Facebook? Try reposting it and see if you can get some more ReTweets and comments.
• Looking for more links? Try guest blogging on a similar topic and link to the page or post.
• Not satisfied with Google visits? Read on and we’ll talk keywords…

Entrance Keywords

Probably the most important report you can run, find out what keywords visitors used at the search engines to get to your post/page.

The takeaway

• If you’re not doing as well as you thought you would for the keywords you targeted, try spicing up the title. It may not be that you’re ranking poorly, simply that your blopost doesn’t stand out from the rest of results on Google.
• A title tweak not doing the trick? Make sure you’re tracking your rankings for your top key phrases for the page (using a program like Raven Tools) and tweak the content (naturally) until you’ve got the desired rankings. Rinse and Repeat.

Nicki Hicks
Check and double check