Impact Media's SEO Blog

Swiss Watch Store are a specialist retailer selling Breitling watches.  With the launch of a new website, the company wanted to raise their profile on the internet and increase online sales.

We have been selected to manage the companies Search Engine Marketing (SEM) strategy, which will see us provide professional Pay Per Click (PPC) Management.

If you want to find out more about how Impact Media can improve the return on investment gained from your paid search marketing activity please visit our Pay Per Click Management page.

Back in the Nineties, if your website had really made it, it was found on Yahoo.  But since its development and massive expansion, Google has been the be-all and end-all of Internet Search Engines.  As Google has expanded their silent monopoly they have changed the way that companies think about advertising and inevitably changed the way we all go about the process of planning on and offline marketing strategies.

In the past 8 years, Google have dramatically influenced or changed:

• How we advertise
• Where we advertise
• Who is advertising
• What we pay to advertise

Google began experimenting with online CPM (Cost Per 1000 clicks) advertising back in 1999. Unlike the then ubiquitous banner ads, Google’s ads were designed to be unobtrusive text ads based on search terms and kept separate from the main search engine results.  At this stage, you bought your ads from a Google Ad Sales Rep, like the traditional offline ads.

In 2000 the Dot Com bubble burst and online advertising briefly vanished.  When Google bounced back, they turned their Search-based Text Ads into the forerunner of the self-service PPC/CPM system we have today.  Google essentially invented PPC or Pay per Click advertising.  Now we bid to hold the primary position for certain search terms and customise our ad campaign to hit matching searches within specified geographic regions.

Google’s Search-based advertising changed the way advertising works online.  For the first time it specifically targeted people who were actively looking for the product or service advertised.  This creates uniquely cost effective advertising and every click has a potential sale attached to it.

Google put the power to design and orchestrate commanding advertising campaigns directly into the hands of anyone with a credit card. Since you can advertise on Google for a price within any budget, you can reach millions of customers across the UK for only a tiny fraction of the cost of television, radio or newspaper advertising. PPC and CPM allow us to set our own budgets and bid for the top advertising spots on the Internet.

Google have changed the way that we all think of advertising and how we use it.   Now a small greengrocer in London can compete for attention with the big high street supermarkets.  Now a small home IT business in Southampton can compete for new business with a massive corporate IT business in Edinburgh.

With 69% of the UK’s population regularly using the Internet, and 87% of online searches using Google, when your potential customer wants to find something, they look to Google.  This has made Google the most powerful advertisement placement position ever.

As Google Pay per Play Video is rapidly advancing and online video advertising overtakes offline video advertising in terms of amount spent, experts believe that Google will strongly influence and change advertising habits on and offline in the future.

Google’s influence is so strong that we no longer ’search’ for something, we Google it, the brand has entered the popular lexicon as a verb and that’s advertising that can’t be bought!

We recently had reason to suspect that one of our client’s Pay per Click campaigns was being targeted by one of their competitors. We suspected that they were clicking the ads to try and use up the daily budget early in the day. The trouble was how to identify who was clicking the Ads.

There are many expensive Click Fraud solutions available but we found a simple and free way of checking who was clicking the ads by using Statcounter.

By putting the Statcounter code on the website pages we were able to easily see the IP addresses of the clickers. This clearly showed that two Competitors were in fact clicking the ads. We then forwarded our findings to Google and hope this will result in a refund for our AdWords client.

Oracle Property Developers are an organisation offering holiday complexes and individual new build properties in Altinkum and Akbuk, Turkey. The company need to increase their visibility across the major search engines in the UK in order to generate a higher volume of web based enquiries.

We are delighted to have been appointed as Oracle Properties Search Engine Marketing (SEM) Partner, and we anticipate a successful Internet Marketing campaign over the coming months.

If you would like to read more about our services please visit our Professional Search Engine Optimisation page

Kids Play Room supply traditional quality toys, made from sustainable materials, ranging from Dolls Houses, Rocking Horses to Puppets and Cukoo Clocks.

We are delighted to announce that we have been appointed to work with Kids Play Room to manage their Google AdWords PPC account to increase sales and create more awareness of the brand.  We look forward to building a lasting business relationship over the coming months.

If you would like to find out more about our service please visit our Pay Per Click Services page.

Fair Judgement specialise in Personal Injury Compensation Claims and Financial Irregularity, and want to increase their online visibility to capture a higher volume of relevant traffic and maximise conversions via the Internet.

We are delighted to have been selected as Fair Judgement’s professional Search Engine Marketing (SEM) partner, in order to implement the companies organic and paid search strategy.

Henry James offer an exclusive range of Patio and Bifolding Doors, made in a variety of materials, catering for both the residential and commercial markets.

We have been selected to manage the companies Search Engine Marketing (SEM) strategy, which will see us implement both the natural Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) campaign as well as provide professional Pay Per Click (PPC) Management.

We are delighted to have been appointed by Henry James, and look forward to working with them as their Search Engine Marketing Partner.

If you would like to find out how Impact Media can help you get more from your website please visit our Search Engine Marketing Services page.

On the Internet, the written word has always dominated.  Whilst a picture may be worth a thousand words, the word holds pride of place in online marketing and advertising.  However, since the development of fully proliferated wireless access and high performance video technology integrated within the World Wide Web, the power of Video has really come into its own and it’s already becoming a multi-billion pound phenomenon across the globe.

The obvious example of the explosion of video on the Internet is from YouTube.   The most popular video site on the Internet is owned and run by Google, the most powerful search engine company on the planet.  If you want to advertise with a video on the front page of YouTube for a day, it will currently cost you a minimum of £25,000.  Cheap enough if you’ve got that kind of budget.  But what if you haven’t?

Internet analyst David Hallerman suggests that while Paid Search is very effective for direct marketing, nothing grabs the surfer’s ‘heart and mind’ like video advertisements.

Video Advertising is now considered an excellent choice if you want to drive brand awareness and sales.  Research has shown that web users have higher levels of interaction with video than they do with traditional online image ads.  The average surfer will click ‘Play’ on a video far more easily than committing to the click on a Paid Search ad.

Google have recently brought together the idea of PPC (Pay per Click) with Video Advertising in attempt to make the most of these rapid changes in the online advertising market.   Like their PPC campaigns, marketers bid the maximum that they would pay per CPM (Cost per 1000 impressions).  Google claim to offer a guarantee against overpaying by reducing the cost you actually pay to one cent more than the nearest next bid.

There are alternatives to the YouTube/Google monopoly, if you want to use Video Advertising as part of your marketing campaign.  Many video advertisers charge via CPM.  This type of advertising has exploded in the US, where sites such as MySpace offer a short 5 second video display at a cost of $25 per CPM.  At the other end scale, the Wall Street Journal charges $90 per CPM.

In the UK, local search site SCOOT already offers video advertising deals.  By building on their relationship with media group ITV, they offer localised video ads around online television programming.  With SCOOT, 25,000 plays is just £500.  Other companies offer more bespoke services and are therefore reticent to publish prices.

Recently, the Guardian predicted that by 2009, Internet Video advertising would outspend traditional television advertising for the first time.  By 2012, it’s considered that £361 million will be spent on Internet Video advertising in the UK alone.

By 2009, to actively compete in the global marketplace, Video Advertising is an area of your online marketing campaign that you simply must factor into your budget.  Whilst the costs are currently high with the most obvious main providers like YouTube, more cost effective video advertising services are being made available from smaller sources all the time.

If you can see video forming part of your marketing stratagy, take a look at our Video Marketing Services to evaluate whether we can help you.

ehouse provide comprehensive property marketing solutions to the residential, commercial and leisure industry. The company offer a complete property marketing service, from virtual tours and professional photography, to brochure design and printing.

We have been appointed to manage the businesses Search Engine Marketing (SEM) campaign, encompassing a blending stategy of both organic and paid search.

We are very much looking forward to working with ehouse on this project; should you wish to find out more about our offering at Impact Media and how we can help you to improve ROI from your internet marketing please visit our Search Engine Marketing Services page.

The importance of Local Search, the industry term for Local Search Engine Marketing, is rising.  Over the past few years, Local Search has gained in sophistication and taken an increasingly significant role in Internet Marketing. Local Search is yet another vital revolution in the way that we search for, buy and sell products and services on the Internet.

Since the Internet first became a major marketplace, online retailers have competed for the attention of the world’s consumers.  This has been great for global business; it means that a small business in Southampton, England can compete with key retailers and sell its products to customers anywhere in the World.  But it also means that any trader with access to the World Wide Web can sell to Southampton too!  Online retailers who want to attract local customers to them need to work to compete on a local level.

In order to increase the profile of local businesses to local customers, Local Search was created.  In 2006, over 20% of all searches made on the Internet were intended to find something local.   The big Search Engine companies like Google and MSN are all spending huge sums of money developing their own search technologies and experts reveal that Local Search is the biggest area of research and development that’s likely to start affecting the way we all buy and sell our products and services from now on.

In order to benefit most from local searches, your company should dominate all local keyword searches. Local Search isn’t going away, it’s only going to develop and grow as a direct, cost-effective method of online marketing.  It’s important to know that any online business wishing to compete locally will need to carefully construct a local search engine marketing plan.

So what are the benefits for online retailers of using Local Search Engine Marketing to reach their target customers?

• Local Search is a cost effective way of marketing.  You only pay to market to customers who are searching within your specified geographical area.
• Local Search Engine Marketing is like placing a giant advert for your product or service in front of qualified traffic. Your ads are positioned to appear to people that are already looking for what you offer within your designated area.
• Unlike the potential expense of dominating keyword searches on a national or international level, Local Search Engine Marketing allows you to completely dominate keyword searches in your area and save money by specifying local searches.
• See increased sales as customers search for you; get a superior ROI for your marketing costs.
• Customers use the Internet to compare potential retailers but are more likely to trust local retailers over those located further away.
• Local Search increases offline traffic such as footfall and telephone enquiries for those businesses with a physical storefront.

Whereas Local Search Engine Marketing was once an optional extra, for businesses retailing on the Internet, it’s now a real necessity! We offer a complete Local Search Engine Marketing Service for any UK business looking to increase visits from searchers in their geographical area.

Everyone wants to be Number 1 on Google!  Why?  Because those businesses that are Number 1 on Google get the greatest share of traffic to their site.  If you have a website and you aren’t placing within the first page on Google or one of the other search engines – then you don’t really exist.  Getting a good ranking equates to increased chances to convert interested visitors into satisfied customers.

Without this, no one will find your site; very few people even look beyond the second search page.  Getting a first page ranking is a priority for all businesses using the web to promote and sell their products and services.

There are various ways to improve your rankings and experts will tell you that it’s difficult to be sure which makes the biggest improvements fastest.

Content

They say that Content is King.  But the truth is that engaging, informative, constantly updated and search engine friendly content is the King of Kings.  Adding content keeps Google’s spiders crawling all over your site.  The content has to be original and make sense in order to cater to your human visitors.  Content can come in the form of articles, blogs, press releases, landing/squeeze pages – whatever style you believe will work best.

Keywords

Using a range of keyword tools, you can find out the best keywords and phrases that will attract the right visitor to your site.  It’s no use getting to Number 1 on Google for keywords that are unrelated to what you have to offer.  Be as specific as possible and think of combining your keywords into the phrases that people would use when searching for your product.  The key to choosing the best keywords is to choose words from the perspective of your potential visitor.  What would someone type if they wanted what you have to offer? This can be very different from how you might market the product traditionally.  The keyword density has to be just right so as not irritate Google, so if you’re not sure, consult an expert.

Links

The search engines look at your popularity with others and if you appear to have a steady stream of people linking to your site, it looks like your website is something that should appear higher up in the rankings.  Many people buy links from Link Farms and once Google finds out, they will punish your site, even making it disappear off the search engine rankings all together.

Black Hat SEOs

There are many dodgy characters out there that can make you Number 1 on Google.  But their tactics and techniques are highly questionable, their results tend to be temporary, they charge very high sums and eventually the search engines catch up with you and punish you and not the black hat SEO. It’s just not worth the risk!

Improving the rankings of your website is a tricky business.  There are many ways that people trying to get higher rankings can mess up their optimization and damage their relationship with the search engines.  No one knows exactly how many different levels or facets the search engine algorithms have, but through years of experience, reputable SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) companies have developed techniques that increase the chances of a good ranking on Google or one of the other search engines.

At Impact Media, we offer a professional search engine optimisation service for UK based businesses that are looking to achieve greater returns from their website.

Online video views in the UK went through the roof  in June 2008 with 3.2 billion videos being viewed online by 27.4 billion UK Internet users according to comscore.

That works out at 78% of the UK’s Internet audience watching video online at an average of 118 videos viewed per viewer. That means that each viewer is watching an average of 4 videos online every single day.

If you would like to get your video out to the masses then why not look at our Video Marketing Services and see how you can increase your online visibility through the use of online video marketing.

Torqueflow Sydex develop an extensive range of progressing cavity pumps which are used extensively all over the world.

We are delighted to announce that we have been appointed to work with Torqueflow Sydex to implement their Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) strategy, and look forward to building a lasting business relationship over the coming months.

If you would like to find out more about our professional services please visit our Search Engine Optimisation page.

Newbridge are a specialist centre providing treatment for eating disorders, they are one of the only centres of it’s kind in the UK, and focus on working with adolescents and young adults up to the age of 22.

Newbridge know the value that professional search engine marketing (SEM) will add to their overall marketing mix, and have appointed Impact Media to manage the implementation of their organic and paid search marketing campaigns.

To find out more about how you can get more targeted traffic to your site please visit our Search Engine Marketing Services page.

Wessex Fertility were established in 1985 and provide the latest techniques in fertility treatment; the company website provides help and support to people who are looking for the right fertility/IVF clinic so it’s important the site is highly visible across the major search engines.

We are delighted to announce that we have been appointed to work with Wessex Fertility to implement their Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) strategy, and look forward to building a lasting business relationship over the coming months.

If you would like to find out more about how we can help your business suceed online please visit our Search Engine Optimsation Services page.