St Louis Web Marketing

Posts Tagged ‘search engine optimization’

How do video, social media and advances in mobile effect search? What are the search engines changing?

These were just a few of the questions answered at The Net Impact’s Search Engine Strategies Session on Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010. The seminar covered current trends in search engine optimization and highlighted the best presentations from the The Net Impact’s SEO team’s recent trip to the Search Engine Strategies Session held in Chicago December 2009. The three presentations presented focused on B2B, Blended Search and Linking.

The first presentation, presented by Angela Cicerelli, Web Account Manager at The Net Impact, covered blended search. Blended search enhances user experience and is another way to engage with potential customer. If you are having troubles ranking for a keyword, blended search just may be the answer. The presentation discussed why we should care about images and videos in search. Social media sites, such as Flickr and YouTube, are now becoming major sources of  website traffic and are appearing in search results. What to take away from the session regarding blended search – The web isn’t about pages anymore, it’s all about streams, feeds and syndication. If information is important, it will find you.

The next presentation, led by Lauren Williamson, Web Content Manager at The Net Impact, highlighted the importance of linking. Link popularity measures the quality and quantity of links pointing to a web page. Recently, social media marketing has become one of the most practical and high quality ways to earn links. The Chicago Search Engine Strategies Session touched on three main reasons why it is important to have a linking program: improve rank, boost traffic and to increase brand exposure. Lauren closed with the statement: “Building links is similar to building relationships – it takes works and is all about quality, not quantity”.

Sonya Sawall, Web Account Manager at The Net Impact, led the final conversation on B2B. Business buyers and decision makers are online, using search engines. Business professionals engage in social networking in order to build relationships that bring business. They rely on search, sometimes throughout the whole buying cycle, and in order to be successful, Internet marketing experts must align their messages with buyers needs throughout each phase of the buying process.

The most important thing learned at The Net Impact’s SES Session: There is one certainty about SEO – the game is always changing. “If you are following a best practice that dates back to 2008 or earlier, toss it away.  It’s now wrong”. 2010 is the year of real-time, personalized results, growing importance of social, community and web mobility. We need to continue to adapt our SEO strategies to stay ahead of the curve.

We hope you all enjoyed the presentation as much as we did, and we look forward to seeing you at the next TNI event!

Check out some great pictures from the event on Flickr!

Flickr has become one of the most popular image sharing sites and currently hosts more than 4 billion images. Flickr is such an easy way to store photos, share them with family and friends, and even enhance traffic to your website.

How does Flickr drive traffic to my site?

Just like any other form of social media, Flickr is a great tool that sends traffic exactly where you direct it. Placing images on Flickr can be just as beneficial as uploading videos to YouTube. However, just like your YouTube videos, blogs, and tags, uploading images to Flickr is only beneficial if you optimize your images.

How do you optimize images for Flickr?

• Give your image a descriptive title.
• After you upload your photos, be sure to add tags. Tags are the keywords that describe your image. Be sure to use tags that you think people are searching for.
• Give a quality description with searched keywords. Be sure to always begin the description with your sites URL. This is an easy way to remind viewers where to go next.
• Create thematic sets. Try to organize your photos in to the proper set so there are even more contextual clues provided to the search engine crawlers.

Seems simple right? That’s because it is. Flickr provides you with the space you need to upload your photos and provide the tools for optimization. Be sure to check your Google Analytics Account and see just how many visitors you start getting from Flickr.

Plan- There is much more to Search Engine Optimization than just stuffing keywords on to a website. A good SEO Company will plan out a strategy specific to your site. They know that there isn’t a cookie cutter SEO plan for everyone and will do the research needed to devise the perfect strategy for you.
Educate- Search Engines and their algorithm methods are constantly changing. SEO companies must stay educated of these changes, because these small alterations can make all the difference in results.  The SEO Company must stay educated and also be able to inform their clients of the changes that may affect them.
Remembering Sales- Many SEO companies are only concerned with rankings. A good SEO company is concerned with the overall growth of sales for your company. They will analyze things other than rankings, such as traffic, conversion, and revenue.
Focus- A great site is more than just good keywords. The navigation path, following compliance codes, and architecture of your site are just as important when trying to provide a great site. It is crucial for an SEO company to remember to focus on all of these things when developing a strategy for you.
Exchange- The SEO Company and the client should be exchanging words and thoughts on a regular basis. Without communication, neither the client nor the company is getting the full benefits of working together.
Compromise- An SEO Company may often get frustrated when a client chooses not to or is unable to implement their recommendations. However, a good SEO Company will understand that compromise is essential and will be satisfied with the decision or work with the client to find a better solution.
Test- SEO is an ongoing process that requires a lot of attention, even after the recommendations have been implemented. Testing is necessary to see if things are taking the right path and helps provide information of what should be done in the future. A good SEO Company is always testing, reviewing, and re-strategizing.
If your SEO Company is not PERFECT or your looking for one who is check out The Net Impact.

YouTube… Many of us think of “Charlie Bit My Finger”, “Evolution of Dance”, and other hilarious homemade videos created simply for entertainment. But, in this ever changing world of social media, YouTube is now another source of marketing that can be used as a tool to advance your business.  However, just like any other form of social media (Facebook, Twitter, Blogs), YouTube is only considered effective if it is used properly. Here are some practices that should be followed when creating and optimizing your YouTube videos.

• Videos should be short, sweet, and to the point. Unlike the traditional, specific to entertainment YouTube videos, ones that are created for your business should be direct and informative. Viewers will not want to spend more than a few minutes viewing what you have to offer and desire instant gratification, answers now! Also, longer videos lead to longer upload times, which no one wants to wait around for.
• Save your video as a search friendly name. Just like a URL, you don’t want to save video files as 58756-apx.mov. Save it as something that actually describes your video and use some meaningful keywords.
• Comment and allow comments. Similar to Google Ranking, the more interaction you have with other users the higher you will rank in YouTube optimization. This means watch other videos, comment, subscribe, and make channels and friends. The more you put yourself out there, the more reciprocation you will receive. Also, be sure to post your video on other blogs and sites. If your video is viewed from another site, it still counts as a view.
• Chose ALL text wisely. Your Title should include basic keywords that people are likely to search and should be in conversational format. (How to do… How to make a…Product tutorial). Your URL should be the first thing listed in your Description.  YouTube only displays the first few lines of your description and since the ultimate goal is to get visitors to your site you want to be sure that they see that URL.  Following your URL, you want to illustrate your video with keyword dense sentences. Use as many keywords that make sense, but do not overdo it, that is SPAMMING. Your Tags should contain all variations of likely searched words and phrases. Get rid of non-specific words (and, of, to) and stick to the keywords.

These were just a few tips to get you started. Until next time……..

If you have a website with statistics, you may notice that you’re not getting the amount of traffic you hoped for. Helping your customers find your website is what web marketing is all about. By using keyword-linked advertisements, or placing ads on specific sites, you can promote your site and increase your business.

Search engines are the other key way that people find your business. Getting your site to the top of the list for certain keywords can make the difference between a sale going to you and that same sale being lost to your competitor. By optimizing your site’s content, and using web-placement strategies, your site will be leading the pack in no time.