The Bing/Yahoo! “search” merger is on its way to becoming a reality. This deal has been talked about forever it seems but now it appears that the likelihood of this occurring is close at hand, now that this deal obtained regulatory approval last week. There are still some hurdles to climb but for all intents and purposes, the Bing Powered Yahoo! Search will be the next new thing in search engine marketing. This merger opens up many new questions, in particular in regards to Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  Will this be easier to do now that we’ll have two major engines instead of three? The answer, of course, remains to be seen but we do know that in preparation of this upcoming change, we suggest the following tactics:

1. Optimize for Bing now – if you haven’t spent much time optimizing for Bing, now is the time to do so. Set up your Bing Webmaster account and get indexed.
2. Add original, unique content to your site – If your site does not have it, time to start writing it.
3. Use well-architected code in your webpages (including images and Sitemaps) so that users’ web browsers and search engine crawlers can read the content you want indexed)
4. Get to know Bing’s Guidelines and Standards for Web Optimization.
5. Read all you can on Optimization via blogs, articles, and news alerts.

Optimizing for Bing isn’t necessarily different than optimizing for any of the other engines who also prefer good content, good links, and good site code. The only difference here is that most people haven’t taken the time yet to get-to-know Bing’s platform. Many, in fact, haven’t bothered to sign up for Bing Webmaster and many haven’t bothered to submit their XML sitemaps to Bing either. However, because of this impending change, perhaps more will act because it soon will become much more important. 25-28% of the market is nothing to sneeze at…

Consider this:

1. If you spend more than $6k per month on Google AdWords you get your OWN Google account rep. Heck, Google will even SET UP your account for you.
2. If you spend more than $20K per month on Paid Search Advertising, you can qualify (to pay even more) for PPC Automation tools like Kenshoo and Marin Software. These tools, are powerful and can automate in seconds what it would take months for people to do without these tools..
3. If you spend more than $10k per month on Publisher Websites, you can expect to obtain remnant ad space, additional impressions, and/or other goodies by being a good advertiser (since you could literally advertise a million other places).
4. If you spend more than $20k on Web Design/Development, your site likely will be built with the latest software, plugins, and accessories. These features are not currently available at your local mom and pop web design shops only at the bigger agencies (some that have $20k minimum on web design projects).
5. If you spend more than $1k per month on Content Development, you can expect to obtain steep discounts. Prices at our shop drop from .20 per word to .08 per word, depending on your page volume.
6. If you are willing to spend more than $750 per month on Link Building, you can get premium link which are ideal for improved search engine optimization rankings.. and frankly the only way to compete these days. Money is usually offered, as sort of a bribe, to website owners with good Google rankings to encourage them to place a link on their site back to yours. It is virtually impossible to obtain a quality link without paying for it, in some way, shape, or form.
7. If you are willing to spend more than $3k per month on a Search Engine Optimization program can get more content, more links, more social media …i.e. more attention from your agencies and, ultimately, from the engines.

While it is true that some people can still make a good living maintaining their current websites, it is getting more complex and more difficult to sustain enviable market positions without sinking more and more money into your website and online marketing programs. Whether you choose to be sad, mad, or indifferent about this new online reality – this is the new way of the web. You must spend money, if you want to compete.

Below is an image of their updated results page.

The new look of Google: May 2010

The new format has been received well, by most people in the Online Marketing Industry, as it will likely give our clients more traffic/better traffic and as searchers get used to the change they are likely to click more options than previously before. However, many users may not be liking the new SERP, as they once did. Search Engine Watch published a blog titled “Google’s New SERP: Hit or Miss” that is definitely worth reading. In it, the writer describes some of the pro’s and cons and reactions of people to the new SERP.

Time will tell, of course, but it would appear that Google is hoping that searchers will get more relevancy and more convenience from their favorite search engine.

Before you start, you should know what-your-end-goal is? Do you need traffic? Leads? Increased Awareness? Fans? Improved SEO? Do you want to reduce the load on Customer Service? Each one of your answers is going give you a different solution on social media. Once you know your end-goal, you can now implement your strategies online. Simply review the social media categories I’ve listed below & use them to implement your program successfully.

• Social Networking -  Publish content that engages friends/fans/followers and allows them to interact with your brand.
• Online PR – Distribute your press releases online for FREE using a variety of publishers to push out relevant, news-worthy marketing messages
• Social Bookmarking – Bookmark your favorite articles, blogs, pages especially YOURS & share them with your friends/fans/followers.
• Article Directories – Publish articles about a topic of your expertise for FREE and establish yourself as an authority in your field. Receive traffic and SEO benefits as well.
• Blogging – Publish content relevant to your area of expertise on both your website’s blog & external blogs that are popular on the web.
• Podcasting – Publish audio content relevant to your area of expertise and establish yourself as an authority in your field.
• Viral Video/Channel – Create a video unique and relevant to your area of expertise and/or as a brand channel to showcase videos related to you/your Industry.
• Dashboards – Syndicate your content in one spot by publishing through a social dashboard. Improve efficiency, save time, and improve reach with one click.

I am sure there are bigger, better, faster incarnations coming sure to shake up the current landscape. But keeping your social media sites lumped into simple categories will help you select the proper vehicles for your campaigns. Eventually, we hope the clutter and the mystery of Social Media will be gone so that people can get to the real task of marketing.

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1. We are working in the most exciting Industry in the world!!! Spoken first by our initial keynote speaker Jaime Cohen Szulc, Senior VP, Levi Strauss & Co. and CMO, Levi’s Brand & then echoed multiple times throughout the conference by many attendees & exhibitors.
2. We have more talent in our Industry than we’ve ever had. As money flows into online marketing (expected to be about 17% of total marketing spend by corporations by 2014), new talent is entering at the same time. Coincidentally, schools are now teaching Online Marketing so the education and skill set is stronger than it has ever been. Online will overtake print this year and is finally moving into the mainstream.
3. Technology continues to impress & amaze. I saw exhibitors doing much more with their technologies than I’ve ever seen before. New ad platforms, click-able video technologies, eye tracking, conversion optimization tools, International marketing, one-click alternative pay methods and much more. While it’s now very confusing at times to navigate the space, technology ultimately is making the bottom line online much better.
4. There is now an “old timers’ club for Internet Marketers, i.e. people that have served 10 years or more in this space. Sadly, I am a member.
5. iPads are a hot item – and an even hotter FREE giveaway for exhibitors.

This year’s conference drew over 15,000 people, making it the largest Online Marketing conference in the world. That statement alone says all it needs to say about the Online Marketing space & what’s happening in 2010 & beyond.

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1.    Directory Submissions – There are millions of directories online. From web directories to local directories to Industry-specific directories. Directory linking is quick, easy & considered the “low-hanging fruit” of link building. As an extra benefit to webmasters, most web directories are FREE.
2.    Social Bookmarking – If you are not producing new web content these days, you a missing out on great linking opportunities. Great content produced by you (blogs, images, viral videos, articles, press releases, tweets, etc) are easy to “share” on social media sites and can produce highly qualified & relevant links to you. Good content can be morphed into new blogs or social mentions, all which help you with your Google rank.
3.    Article Submissions – Become an expert in your space & share your knowledge on article sharing sites like ezines.com. Articles are NOT self-promotions but instead written for the benefit of giving readers information. Oh, and all article sites allow you to place an innocuous link back to your website.
4.    Online Press Releases – Do you have news to share about your products, services, or Organization. Try saying it with an Online Press release. Low risk & high reward for if your story gets picked up by any type of publisher, you could obtain many links for your efforts.
5.    Blogging – There are many free blogging sites out there that allow you to write a blog on their domains. Rather than waiting & hoping that someone will find the blog on your website, by participating on blogging sites, you are bringing the content to the masses; and therefore increasing the likelihood of obtaining links.
6.    One-way Link Requests – The old school way of obtaining links is to simply ask webmasters for one. If you come across a site that you fee would benefit the audience, it never hurts to ask. These requests do nothing for SEO but can be great for obtaining quality traffic.
7.    Reciprocal Link-Building – If the webmaster does not want to give you a one-way link, you can “trade” links so that you have theirs on your site. Usually a good tactic to use if the webmaster is unresponsive to your link request.
8.    Competitive Linking – Check out where your competitors are linked and obtaining links from the same place. Go to Google and type in “link:www.yourcompetitorsite.com” and you will see all of the links they have in Google. Obviously use a real domain and not the one I wrote here.
9.    Premium Link Buying – There are link companies that specialize in contacting webmasters directly & asking them for a link. Much like the one-way linking tactic, this usually involves an offer of compensation to the webmaster for consideration. There is a fine line between whether or not this is advertising or a way to spam the engines but this tactic is being done masterfully by companies with deep pockets. You also can go to “paid link” sites but be warned Google & your competitors are going to be gunning for you. We do not advise this strategy & ask our clients to steer clear of any link buying tactics.

You can, in fact, now report websites that are buying links (link Spam, is the term) for this purpose via a form in Google. To read more about how to report paid links, please click: http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/how-to-report-paid-links/.

If this was the case, I definitely missed the bus and thought perhaps it was time to look into what options were available. As apprehensive as I was, I decided to finally contact a referral I was given in India to have the talk – and boy am I glad I did. My contact not only informed me that I missed the bus (because I did) but that Search Engine Optimization (the process of improving the volume or quality of traffic to a web site via natural search engine listings) was “best left to the Americans.” My contact told me that many of the tactics and strategies that his firm used-to-do are no longer effective and, as such, his firm no longer provides those services. So, even if I wanted to, I couldn’t outsource any optimization work to his team.

Optimization, you see, is more effective when performed by people who “get” how people search including understanding the different phases of a buying cycle and how someone might search differently when browsing versus when buying. The pendulum indeed has swung back in favor of marketing. Search engine optimization does require skills that extend beyond marketing and get into design & development issues. Still, at the crux of any good program is a solid keyword strategy that comes from the marketing team.

For the record, the Indian company I spoke with has moved all of their services completely into Social Media Marketing.

1. Optimize for Bing now – if you haven’t spent much time optimizing for Bing, now is the time to do so. Set up your Bing Webmaster account and get indexed.
2. Add original, unique content to your site – If your site does not have it, time to start writing it.
3. Use well-architected code in your webpages (including images and Sitemaps) so that users’ web browsers and search engine crawlers can read the content you want indexed)
4. Get to know Bing’s Guidelines and Standards for Web Optimization.
5. Read all you can on Optimization via blogs, articles, and news alerts.

Optimizing for Bing isn’t necessarily different than optimizing for any of the other engines who also prefer good content, good links, and good site code. The only difference here is that most people haven’t taken the time yet to get-to-know Bing’s platform. Many, in fact, haven’t bothered to sign up for Bing Webmaster and many haven’t bothered to submit their XML sitemaps to Bing either. However, because of this impending change, perhaps more will act because it soon will become much more important. 25-28% of the market is nothing to sneeze at…