Archive for November, 2008

Treat your PPC Campaign like your SEO Campaign

Thursday, November 20th, 2008

More and more, managing your PPC campaign is starting to resemble managing your SEO campaign. Once completely separate in thought and practice, the two diverse specialties actually share many of the same characteristics. With that thought in mind, try treating your PPC campaign as you would your SEO campaign.  Why not consider: 

  1. Creating individual landing pages for every one of your major keywords- This may seem like common sense but too many people send the majority of their traffic to just one or two landing pages. Relevancy matters and using this tactic can help you improve your Quality Score Index quickly, lowering your effective cost per click and saving you $$$.
  2. Placing your keywords in the Title Tag of your PPC Landing Pages - All the positive SEO implications aside, having the main keywords in the title tag on each of your landing pages reinforces the reason a customer has come to your site.  While not completely obvious to many, the title tag is visible in the top left corner of every browser and when minimized in a tray. Keeping these tags relevant with keywords shows follow through and can pay nice dividends.
  3. Using the keyword multiple times on your landing pages- Adding keywords in the text again reinforces the relevancy of a search by restating a customer’s search terms throughout the copy.  Just as you do in SEO, consider utilizing the power of the keyword in your landing page content. 
  4. Putting a sitemap and links to other relevant pages of content on your site- Directing a spider to check out other areas of your site is good common sense. However, the majority fail to give PPC customers the same courtesy. Try adding links and a sitemap on your PPC landing pages to guide your new visitor to other relevant and important areas of your site.  
  5. Making sure your page loads quickly – If your page loads slowly, prepare to lose customers and quality score points as well. Whether with SEO or PPC…Long load times is a disaster. Nobody likes to wait.

Thinking about your PPC campaign in these terms, can lead to much better campaign results. Improved quality score indexes, lower effective costs per click, and improved bounce rates all equal better conversions. Treat your PPC campaign as you would your SEO campaign and start enjoying the success.

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How to Spot an SEO Phony

Monday, November 10th, 2008

I have been working in the Online Marketing space for over a decade now and I have never seen such despicable sales tactics as I have in the past year, in regards to selling search engine optimization programs. It seems like its “open season” on the unsuspecting and uninformed and SEO companies are now saying, doing and promising things that they definitely shouldn’t. Yes, I realize that times are tough and that competition for work can be fierce but seriously my fellow SEO’s did you have to really go there?

So how exactly do you spot a legitimate SEO versus a Phony?

  1. Guaranteed Results- In SEO, I guarantee you that there are no such things as a guarantee.  Unless you want to pay for it via “pay per click”, getting to the top of Google takes time, effort, knowledge, and a solid SEO strategy.  And yes a good SEO will get you to the top of Google but the difference is that they would never guarantee it.  If someone is guaranteeing you an SEO result, they are likely doing something that may be putting your site at risk or even worse the guarantee may be on a set of keywords that nobody searches. Being #1 on a keyword that is irrelevant doesn’t help anyone really. If an SEO guarantees placement, you can be sure that this company is a phony. 
  2. Exclusive Partnerships with Google, Yahoo!, MSN- I’ve been hearing this one a lot lately and people are playing up the fact that they apparently have an “exclusive” relationship with Google and therefore can deliver you a better result. The truth is NO ONE has an exclusive relationship with Google and the other search engines.  Ranking organically is free and Google does not profit by ranking someones site over another organically. If you’d like to read more about Google’s SEO Policy, please click here. If an SEO tells you that they have a special relationship with Google, run away quickly.
  3. Misuse of the Word “Optimization” - Lately, I’ve seen all sorts of sales people convince clients that they are optimizing a website when, in fact, they do not truly optimize. Take for example many of the local directory sites that claim they are organically optimizing a site when in fact all they are doing is putting in optimization code into a one page website.  By and large, a one page website cannot and will not show up high in the rankings because it is a one page website. Im afraid you are going to have to do a little more than that to grow your positioning.  If someone tells you they are optimizing your website, make sure that they are doing more than just putting in code. 

I am reminded of the recent Real Estate boom when anyone and everyone was a real estate agent or mortgage loan officer. The entrance barriers were low and the Industry was largely unregulated. SEO is no different. Anyone can claim they are an SEO expert. Hopefully, and unlike the mortgage industry in 2008, I sincerely hope we can withstand the bad name that these SEO Phonies are giving us.

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