SEO Blog
On March 25, some of college basketball’s best teams will compete in Salt Lake City for a chance to play in the Final Four. But before they tip off, smart marketers will assemble just up the road at the SEO.com headquarters for some March Madness of their own.
We’re hosting our third free workshop. And it’s going to be a barn burner full of SEO, PPC and social media marketing genius; networking opportunities with some of Utah’s brightest minds; and, of course, some great game-day snacks. And we’ll be evaluating two random attendees’ websites on the spot. You’ll be raising the roof, guaranteed.
Here’s the quick skinny:
What: March Madness Rankings Workshop
When: Thursday, March 25 from 2-5 p.m.
Where: 14870 Pony Express Road, # 100 in Bluffdale, Utah — just off I-15 at the point of the mountain
Topics: Pay-Per-Click Advertising, Search Engine Optimization, Social Media Marketing, Website Review
Cost: It’s free, but space is limited so reserve a seat by filling out the form on http://www.seo.com/march-madness/
Companies are putting more and more $$$ toward online marketing. eMarketer.com says $23 billion will be spent online, half of that in search engine optimization. This workshop will show marketers how to maximize those marketing dollars by mixing smart SEO, PPC and Social Media strategies to gain traffic and drive sales.
As usual, we’ll have presenters for each subject followed by a Q&A session. But this time, we’ll be doing something different. Attendees will compete in a short shooting competition to have their websites reviewed on the spot by our trio of all-stars: CEO Dave Bascom, VP of Client Services Nelson James, and the Director of SEO Ash Buckles.
So, before you check out the NCAA Tournament on the 25th, make sure to stop by and get some tips to bring your website more traffic. For more information, to reserve your spot, or to see the list of presenters, go to http://www.seo.com/march-madness/ .
You have trained hard and optimized your content for keywords (SEO basics). You’ve gained respect from your peers (link building), and have battled your competition and fought your way to the top of the search results (queue 80’s training montage). Now comes the championship fight – but it’s not against your top competition. It’s to convert those hard won visitors into customers.
So how do you convert visitors into customers? Make use of the AIDAS formula. There is nothing revolutionary about this age-old idea (it was conceived by psychologist E.K. Strong way back in 1925). There’s a reason it’s still around – because it works. AIDAS is best shown as a funnel:
Attention: Attract the customers’ attention.
You will only have a few seconds here. Having strong headline copy with an appropriate design emphasis or an intriguing image is most effective.
Interest: Get the customer interested.
Sell the benefits and advantages that the customer will enjoy with purchasing your product and or service. Include features if needed but make them less prominent in the design.
Desire: Make them want it.
Tell the customer how it will solve their problems or how it will make them feel.
Action: Tell them how to get it.
Provide clear calls to action and make it easy for the customer to purchase, signup, and or donate.
Satisfaction: Make those customers happy.
While this doesn’t directly increase conversion rates, it is vital for your business. Provide stellar customer service and two things will happen: the customer is much more likely to become a return, and they will recommend your business to friends and colleagues. Provide poor customer service, or worse, make them angry enough to share their bad experience. “Hell hath no fury like an angry customer with a Twitter account.”
AIDAS example in action:
The Mission Bicycle Company’s website is a good example of the AIDAS model in action.
1. Attention: A well photographed, interesting image with their product dead center grabs visitor’s attention.
2. Interest: A strong headline details why you should care about their product, and lets them know that they can afford it.
3. Desire: Showcases recent custom bikes to inspire potential customers.
4. Action: Lets the customer get started designing their own bike.
5. Satisfaction: Lets customers provide feedback, suggestions, ask questions and lets general visitors see how satisfied their current customers are.
Obviously every product and service is different and will require a unique application of this formula, but remember this is the Web. You can easily test variations to see what will be most effective for your business. Google even provides a multivariate testing service for free.
The search engine optimization company blasts away the pounds in a fitness competition to claim coveted tech prizes.
SEO.com salesman, Dale Nguyen, sits in a Bod Pod to discover his total body fat percentage.SALT LAKE CITY – It doesn’t take much to get a team of tech-savvy geeks to trim down and shape up – just a few, sweet tech prizes.
“Mention ‘iPad,’ or ‘Dell Mini 5,’ and then mix in a little friendly competition, and the employees here will do the rest,” said Dave Bascom, CEO of SEO.com, a search marketing firm.
To improve the fitness and the overall health of his employees, Bascom is awarding the person who loses the highest percentage of body fat by June 1 a $500 prize of their choosing.
SEO.com as a whole may benefit in multiple ways with the competition. A study done in 2005 by the American College of Sports Medicine said workers who regularly exercise are more productive, managed time better, and worked better with their co-workers. Studies also show that employees who exercise regularly have fewer sick days, and less health-related expenses.
“If nothing else, we’ll all be a little healthier in 90 days after doing this for three months,” Bascom said. “And the In-N-Out Burger that just opened up by our office may not get as much business for awhile.”
Early on, the competition is already heating up.
“Nothing’s keeping me away from that iPad,” said David Malmborg, senior SEO specialist.
“I don’t want to win just for the iPad,” said Tyson Hymas, senior SEO specialist, “I want to win to beat Malmborg.”
SEO.com employees are coming up with different strategies to lose body fat. Hymas will be following the P90X exercise program and the diet Brad Pitt used to get in shape for the movie, “Fight Club.” Tiana Smith, a copywriter, will be following a routine set up by her personal trainer. Others have more creative tactics.
“You have to have a strategy for yourself; then you have to have another strategy to sabotage the competition,” said Scott Cowley, SEO manager. “I’ve used my social networks to find recipes for innocent looking, but highly fatty treats, which I will be putting around the office.”
About SEO.com
SEO.com is a search marketing firm that makes its clients money by driving traffic to their websites through aggressive search engine optimization, pay per click management, social media marketing and other search engine marketing services. SEO.com then turns those visitors into sales through search-optimized Web design and conversion optimization. Clients range from small startups to Fortune 100 companies.
Baidu has been making key changes to their pay-per-click (PPC) system, which has made the search engine more user friendly and more similar to Google. If you want to optimize your PPC on Baidu, take note of these changes:
As of Dec. 1, 2009, Baidu has retired their old PPC auction system, the Classic Edition. Now all PPC keyword bidding is done through their new system, Phoenix Nest.
The Classic Edition system was not convenient in managing large campaigns with thousands of keywords or more, because the old interface was not user friendly. The old way of keyword bidding was mainly based on keyword cost-per-click (CPC). The new Phoenix Nest system looks and operates more like Google Adwords; the interface is more user friendly and is very suitable for large campaigns.
The keyword bidding system in Phoenix Nest is now based on Baidu PPC keyword quality. Users should focus on optimizing their Baidu campaigns to maximize keyword quality, in a similar fashion to Google Adwords keyword quality optimization. However, there are no significant changes in the display of Baidu Search results. Here is how the display currently looks:
Search results on high traffic keywords:
Left side:10 PPC ads, then 10 organic search results
Right side: 8 PPC ads
Search results on long tail keywords:
Left side: 3 PPC ads, then 10 organic search results
Right side: 8 PPC ads
Search results on keywords with low traffic:
Left side: organic search results
Right side: 8 PPC ads
Baidu has also launched its PPC editor, Baidu Editor 1.0, which is similar to Google Adwords Editor. This tool enables advertisers to create/edit campaigns, ads, ad groups, and keywords offline. Baidu Editor is very beneficial to Baidu advertisers that manage large campaigns.
These two significant upgrades to the Baidu PPC system are going to help Baidu greatly in maintaining their market share in the ever-competitive China search advertising market. Combined with the resignation of Google China President, Lee Kai-Fu, who was mainly responsible for the increase in search market share for Google China, it will be very interesting to see how the battle for the China search market pans out.
Dave Bascom is selected for his overall leadership and guiding his SEO company to record numbers during the recession.
SALT LAKE CITY – Utah Business magazine named SEO.com president, Dave Bascom, among its 2010 Forty Under 40, a distinction recognizing top Utah “business leaders, tech gurus, professionals and entrepreneurs” less than 40 years old.
“I can’t think of anyone who deserves this recognition more than Dave does,” said Nelson James, vice president of client services. “He has put countless hours of blood, sweat, and tears into this company and it shows in our growth, success, and the success of our clients.”
“As his first employee,” James continued, “I’ve been with him from the beginning and can say that his unique understanding of both business principles and the search industry, his unfaltering integrity, and his concern for the future of this company and its employees makes him a worthy recipient of this award.”
The Forty Under 40 was selected by an independent judging panel of Forty Under 40 alumni. Utah Business will present the awards Feb. 25 at The Grand America Hotel in Salt Lake City.
With innovation and persistence, the 34-year-old Bascom led his company to record growth and profits during the recent economic recession. Just a few years ago, he started his company in his basement. In the last year, the search marketing firm has grown from 12 employees to more than 60, moved to a larger office in Salt Lake County, and increased monthly revenue by more than 300 percent. In 2009, SEO.com has been named as one of the top 10 SEO firms in the country by PromotionWorld, one of the top 25 fastest growing companies in Utah by the Utah Valley Entrepreneurial Forum, and among the Emerging Elite by MountainWest Capital Network.
“It’s been a great ride this year, and a lot of fun to see all the hard work pay off,” Bascom said. “To look back at where we came from, as a tiny start up, is quite satisfying.”
Bascom credits his positive attitude, ignorant youth and perseverance for his success.
“I believe that if anyone combines hard work with a good attitude, and a strong belief in yourself, you can be successful,” Bascom said. “Starting out, I was probably too naïve to realize how difficult starting a business can be. And that’s probably a good thing.”
About SEO.com
SEO.com is a search marketing firm that makes its clients money by driving traffic to their websites through aggressive search engine optimization, pay per click management, and social media marketing. SEO.com then turns those visitors into sales through search-optimized Web design and conversion optimization. Clients range from small startups to Fortune 100 companies.
2008 was a bright year for Flash as Google and Adobe teamed up to provide flash indexing techniques for better search results. However, two years later and SEOs are still struggling to rank Flash sites high in search engines. Granted, we have lots of proof that search engines do index Flash text, images, and links. But unfortunately, many limitations still make it difficult to get the kind of rankings we enjoy with plain, old HTML. Indeed, SEO and Flash are like water and oil — mixing the two has been nearly impossible.
Why Flash is Bad for SEO
While Flash is indexable by Google’s virtual user spider, we have yet to see a great deal of quality rankings from completely Flash websites — especially Flash sites for small, local businesses.
Unique URLs
With most Flash websites, many pages are contained, dynamically, in one .swf file. Most Flash sites use a ‘#’ to distinguish between pages. Sadly, Google doesn’t treat different ‘#’ URLS as separate pages. Consequently, Flash sites lose the extra SEO boost that comes from a multi-page website. Flex can fix the URL problem, yet many flash sites still don’t utilize Flex.
Smart Phone Dilemma
Smart phone users increase rapidly, expecting to reach 1 billion this year. Flash websites without an HTML alternative will be missing out on a growing chunk of their market (Restaurant websites really need to catch on here).
Poor User Experience
This heading is debatable as many would argue that Flash allows for a richer, more interactive experience. While this is true, many inexperienced designers aren’t in touch with contemporary Web usability. Flash adds a considerable load time that most users don’t have the patience for. While long intros, blaring music, and hidden buttons may seem like a thing of the Internet past, many websites still employ these revolting techniques.
Less Content
Flash websites typically have less indexable content. Let’s face it; a long page of keyword-rich text has more SEO sway.
When to Use Flash?
In my opinion, only two situations allow for a flash website:
- Big Brand: Because big brands already have a truckload of links and a lot of search credibility, search engine optimization isn’t such a big concern. Pepsi’s principal revenue isn’t generated through their website. Rather, the website acts as a branding tool — much like an interactive television commercial. And, because Pepsi is such a big company and it has “pepsi.com,” we are safe to assume that SEO is not among their priorities (although the website should at least rival Coca-Cola and appear somewhere on the 1st page for “soft drinks.”)
- Link-Thirsty Content: Link-thirsty Flash is not simply a “cool” animation well-liked by the marketing committee. Link-thirsty content clearly has the ability to go social and thus it attracts links like a porch light attracts moths. Mono put a lot of creative effort into their monoface application and consequently, I’ve seen that link passed around quite a bit.
Games and applications might also be considered link-thirsty. Grooveshark’s slick interface and its vast music database gives it the ability to focus more on link-bait and social media rather than SEO.
How to Build an SEO-Friendly Flash website
Here are your options:
- Use SWFObject: SWFObject allows you to place HTML code behind the Flash. It also keeps code cleaner by removing nasty object tags.
- Don’t Call External Files with Flash: Google will treat external files such as XML files as separate pages. Make sure all of your text and links are embedded in the swf.
- Use Minimal Flash: Adobe uses a Flash banner near the top of its website while still including the bulk of the textual content in HTML. This Web development technique is a common among corporate websites.
- Don’t Use Flash: Wollzelle, has an attitude against Flash. The innovative agency in Vienna has developed a surprisingly fresh alternative to using Flash, with JavaScript code that can impress visitors just as well. Unfortunately, there are more visually creative Flash developers than there are JavaScript coders.
While I’ve given Flash a good lashing, I don’t mean to pooh-pooh it altogether. Flash is a powerful branding tool and also provides a good framework for application development.
Three old ladies huddle around a burger with a massive bun and a tiny patty. “It certainly is a big bun.” says one. “It’s a big fluffy bun!” says another. Meanwhile the third stares grumpily at the sandwich and then says, “Where’s the beef!?”
She clearly wanted a real burger — not a bun, not an air sandwich, and she didn’t want to be full on just some fancy baking. No matter how good the bun looked, or tasted, it was ultimately useless without the big, beefy burger she wanted.
Similarly, this is what happens when you have designed a smashing layout with a high bounce rate. If your grids are tight, your typography is engaging, and you are getting loads of traffic, but you have a big bounce rate, then your customers are saying, “Where’s the beef!?”
No matter how fancy your site may look, if it doesn’t convert to sales, your site is lacking serious beef. A few tips to adding beef to your website:
1. Be relevant. If a visitor comes to your site expecting one thing and gets something else, they’ll leave your site with a bad taste and will likely never return. You may dress nice, but you MUST be relevant.
2. Engage users. Do this with relevant content, impeccable design and a clear call to action.
3. Provide quick value. People’s time is valuable. Make sure to give them what they want quickly or else they’ll bounce. Offer enough value so they’ll want to spend time on your site and come back again.
4. Clarity. Explain your product, how it works, what you do and why the user needs you in just a few words. The clearer your message, the quicker the reader will take action.
5. Offer Expert Advice. You can do this through blogs, white papers, webinars, etc. This lends credibility to your brand and provides a purpose behind your website. It also helps with search engine optimization by providing fresh new content, and establishing your site as an expert in your industry.
What is the next phase? While I would argue that content is king and good content strategy accounts for 3/4 of the success for a site, the remaining 1/4 rests squarely on taking that content and making it deliverable and engaging.
You need to take that valuable nugget of information, that hamburger patty you lovingly crafted, and garnish it. Present that information in a clearly legible manner. Use practical infographics that compel the visitor to sit up and pay attention. Engage them with interactive elements to help them really understand what it is they are looking at. Make that game the most amazing thing they have played recently. Compell them. Teach them. Guide them. Don’t make them think.
The New York Times is a great example of great content leading the way for great design to seal the deal. Apple is another but with a more product oriented approach. ESPN is a great example of a leisure brand excelling at this. This final step will set you apart from the rest. If you are not sure how to speak to your user through these means, hire an expert. There are designers out there who speak this language so well they can engage users without them even realizing it, and these subtle successes are often times the most potent.
Never underestimate solid design backing great content strategy.
This one two punch — opening with a focused quality content, and driving it home with a grand user experience — will ultimately lead you to the top of the charts on a given search engine. You will keep the users you gain, lower your bounce rate, raise your conversion rate, and leave no one questioning the substance of your idea, event, or product.
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