SEO Blog

LinkedIn, the leading business networking platform has just released applications to help its users collaborate and share information.

LinkedIn Applications

There are ten new applications in total with more to come I’m sure.

Highlighted LinkedIn Applications:

Wordpress Application: If you maintain a blog on the Wordpress platform, you can now add it to your LinkedIn profile and ensure your network is connected straightaway to your blog. A great way to keep your business contacts informed about you and your company activities.

LinkedIn Wordpress Application

Company Buzz: This can be used to monitor you, or your company name, in terms of being able to track who’s saying what about you on Twitter. This can develop into showing you trends and even has the ability to drill down into related terms. The phrase matching, e.g. “impact media” isn’t perfect but a useful monitoring tool never-the-less.

Huddle Workspaces: This service allows any LinkedIn member to collaborate online with any of their contacts. Supported by RSS feeds to monitor progress, this is a handy way to create projects.

In addition, there are apps to share blogs, document files, presentations, reading lists and even your travel plans!

This is an innovative step forward and has enhanced LinkedIn still further.

We originally encouraged a client to install Statcounter because they suspected click fraud from competing businesses. Talking to the client recently they said the Statcounter data had also been invaluable for finding new leads.

By looking at the visitor information they could see the name of many of the companies who had visited the site but had not made an inquiry at the time. With a bit of basic detective work they found the telephone number and contacted the business directly a few days later.

So far they have obtained several successful leads using this method.

Comscore have just announced in a press release (spookily dated 30th November) that fourteen and a half million of us in the UK visited at least one blog during August this year, accounting for some 41% of the total UK Internet traffic.

Unsurprisingly, Google came out on top-spot with its Blogger platform taking just over nine million visits followed by Wordpress with just under five million visits.

Thank you for being a visitor to our blog! 

Have you ever wondered what users are actually doing on your website? Or why your traffic to the site is really high but not converting to sales?

In today’s ever competitive online market having a website is simply not enough to guarantee online sales. Every website should have some sort of analytics installed so web site owners are able monitor and react to trends on their site. If finding out about analytics is on your constantly on your to-do list, move it the top quick, as you could be the last to know why your website isn’t converting.

As with most products, there is a great range of varying products to choose from and each has their own benefits and disadvantages. But it will depend on the level of information that you want to retrieve from your analytics package.

Google Analytics is one of the most used analytics packages which could be due in part to the fact that it is free. The functionality of the product in my opinion is great as it allows all sorts of data to be analysed including, traffic sources, e-commerce tracking and the ability to track website specific goals.
The Google Analytics tracking code requires implementation on every page of the site. This sounds quite simple but you will be amazed at the number of people that paste the code incorrectly or not on every page. As mentioned in a previous post Google Analytics is reliant on users having JavaScript enabled on their browser.

Yahoo has recently acquired Index Tools to create Yahoo Web Analytics. I am yet to use this analytics package but one of the benefits stated is that the data within the reports is updated within minutes enabling you to react immediately to website activity. In addition to the standard reports you are also able to create custom-designed reports.

As you would expect free packages are only able to cover a certain amount and as the price tag increases you begin to receive a lot more for your money, plus dedicated support which is ideal if your website is a big e-commerce site.

ClickTracks is a package which can be purchased and contains a whole feast of data and information. In addition to providing comprehensive reports ClickTracks user interface aims to help you find the answers to your questions quicker. Plus if you don’t want to be adding code to your website then ClickTracks is able to analyse your sites’ log files.

WebTrends uses award winning technology which monitors your customer’s behaviour on your site and collects this information which can then be analysed which is really useful for large retail sites. Areas of success on site are easily identified, which can then be used to improve your site’s performance resulting in more conversions.

This is just a short analysis of four different analytics packages which are available and there are many more. But one thing is for sure; there is no excuse not to have an analytics package on your website.

Martin Moore Ltd are designers and manufacturers of fine handmade kitchens and bedrooms; the company approached Impact Media with a requirement for professional Search Engine Marketing (SEM) services in order to dramatically improve their online visibility within their target market.

The brief also includes promotion of the Martin Moore Stone website; a subsidiary of Martin Moore Ltd.

We are proud to have been appointed as the companies professional Search Engine Marketing (SEM) partner, and we very much look forward to working with Martin Moore Ltd over the forthcoming months.

Please visit our Search Engine Marketing page if you would like to find out more about how Impact Media can help raise the profile of your business online.

I mentioned last week how Blogpulse was a great service for online market research.

Given the recent popularity of British politicians socialising on the yachts of Russian billionaires whilst on holiday, I thought it would be interesting to see what the blogging community thought of this:

Osborne, Mandelson and Russian Yacht Trend

As you can see, there’s a spike of interest when it was announced that Peter Mandelson was being ushered back into Government followed by an increase in blogging activity when the news of the (I’m sure entirely innocent) visit to the Queen K, the luxury yacht owned by billionaire, Oleg Deripaska.

Newsnight beckons?

Solar Control install high performance window films that not only help reduce the suns harmful heat, glare and ultra violet light but also improve safety, security and privacy.

We are delighted that the company has selected Impact Media to maximise their visibility across the major search engines natural results pages for both local and national business.

To find out more about natural SEO please visit our Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) page.

With the rise of the Internet as the most powerful business tool created, there has never been such a need for words. Regardless of developments in Internet video, the World Wide Web is still a text-driven medium. With blogs, articles, advertising and website text all needing words, copywriting has taken on a new importance in the battle for online presence. Words have always had great power, now they’ve taken on a vital significance for all companies that do business on the web.

But copywriting for the web is not like copywriting in the traditional sense. The requirements of Internet copy and the psychology of the Internet readership are very different from those involved in print copywriting. What’s more, SEO copywriting, the craft of creating copy that appeals both to human readers but also exploits SEO principles to attract higher Search Engine Rankings (SERPS) is an entirely different game.

The SEO copywriter needs to constantly balance the needs of their human reader with the need to maintain strong connections to Google and the other Search Engines. Writing for the Search Engines requires an awareness of what they are looking for. Ensuring that the article is topical, entirely original and contains the important keywords at an appropriate density is only the starting point of SEO copywriting.

The trouble is that even inserting the keywords is enough to flummox the average amateur copywriter. Sentences stuffed with keywords make little sense and the human reader clicks away to another page immediately.

Instead, SEO copy needs to appear like any other form of copy, well written, informative and engaging whilst retaining the highest possible optimisation factor. This requires expert writing skills to blend the SEO into the already tight copy.

Web copywriting is about grabbing the attention of the human reader who is already distracted by images, offers and enticements. Maintaining their interest with relevant and topical content known as ‘web copy’ is the next essential element of successful web copywriting. Web copy should differ from traditional written English because it is more accessible, less formal, and closer to the way that we speak.

The next stage is to lead the reader to the point of making a decision. The original meaning of the word ‘decision’ means to cut oneself off from all other options and choices. The persuasive copywriter invisibly removes all objections and concerns whilst leading the reader to the point of making the decision to click.

The aim of good web copywriting is to hook the human reader into staying at the website long enough to make that all-important click, to compel them to take action. This is the final stage of web copywriting.

Above all things, SEO copywriting creates crisp, attractive text that moves the reader towards the point of action. At the same time, it blends in optimisation techniques that ensure that the copy gets read. Without the SEO element, no matter how good the copy, if no one can find it, they cannot read it.

Excellent website copy is the correctly judged balance between highly compelling copy and expertly optimised text. If you need SEO copy, use SEO copywriting services.

Unless you’ve been living in a cave (on holiday, of course), you’ll be well aware of the downturn in the global economy and the fact that even our politicians are now confirming the UK is entering a period of recession.

Is this the end of online shopping as we know it? Not at all. Web based businesses should see this as an opportunity to forge ahead and gain a competitive advantage. If consumers are looking to cut back, where will they start searching for bargains? Of course, it’s not always about being cheapest but whatever online business you operate, you should be looking to position your site infront of your prospects.

Perhaps now would be a good time to review your site (design, copy) and your online marketing activities (SEO, PPC)? You may need to get creative with your offers and offer more incentives? One thing is certain. Now is not the time to be cutting back on your online marketing budget!

Ecigonline supply Electronic Cigarettes and Accessories via their online shop, the company realise the customer recruitment potential of the major search engines and want to capitalise upon this opportunity.

We are delighted to have been selected as Ecigonline’s Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) partner and very much look forward to working with them on this project.

If you are looking for more information on professional SEO please visit our Search Engine Optimisation page.

Yesterday, I received an email from Yahoo Search Marketing explaining how that if you want to target a specific country, you can now do so by selecting that country in your campaign settings.

This is a real time saver compared to the previous way where, if you were building a campaign to target the US, you’d have to select each of the individual States. I’d like to have been involved in that brainstorm.

Who says Yahoo doesn’t innovate. Well done Jerry!

Click Forensics have just released a press release highlighting the fact that pay per click fraud for Q3 2008 was 16%, a slight reduction on the previous quarter and the same period in 2007.

Pay Per Click Fraud Rate by Quarter

This data is taken from their Click Fraud Index.

Unfortunately, the UK is listed as one of the PPC fraud hot spots accounting for 3.5% of all fraudulent activity.

If you’re a pay per click advertiser, clearly you need to be vigilant with your traffic. There are professional solutions available for anyone wishing to monitor their paid traffic closely or, as reported last month, there is a simple solution if you do suspect click fraud and want to monitor your traffic.

Although Nielsen Online, the owner of Blogpulse, describe it as an “automated trend discovery system for blogs“, in my opinion, this description doesn’t do it justice.

It goes far beyond that and is a valuable tool for anyone wishing to conduct online market research.

Blogpulse tracks blog activity constantly and you can use it to search by topic, brand or even URL to see who is blogging about you, your company or a topic you may be interested in.

For site owners, this is a gold mine of data and can be used in many ways. For example:

1. Trend Research
The site has free trend analysis so you can compare one, or more, terms with another.

Blogpulse Trend Research Example

2. Conversation Tracker
This feature is a great way to pick up on the ‘buzz’; to find out the flow of conversations on a particular topic across the web.

You could use Blogpulse to stimulate fresh ideas for articles, new web pages or simply to post comments yourself on the latest hot topics. Entering a term that is relevant to you or your business will instantly uncover blog posts that have been made recently on that subject giving you the opportunity to carry out further research or even post comments on these entries to position yourself as a subject matter expert and build up the link popularity for your site.

All in all, this is a really useful site offering free online market research and a ton of useful data.

Pumpkin Tours are a specialist tour operator, offering a wide range of short breaks ranging from party tours right through to racing events.

The company approached Impact Media with the brief of maximising their visibility across the major search engines natural results pages, in order to generate a high volume of targeted enquiries and conversions from web based leads.

We are delighted to have been selected as Pumpkin Tours professional SEO provider, and very much look forward to working with them on the campaign.

Please visit our Search Engine Optimisation Services page to find out more about how professional SEO can benefit your business.

Tailored Home specialise in finding property for customers looking to buy in the UK as well as overseas; with their extensive network of contacts and relationships with all the major house builders they are able to help their clients secure the perfect property for their requirements.

We are delighted to have been appointed as Tailored Home’s professional Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) specialist, and look forward to working with them on the implementation of their campaign.

If you want to increase your presence within the search engines natural listings please visit our Search Engine Optimisation page to find out more about how we can help.

In the Search Engine Marketing Buyer’s Guide (2008) recently published by E-consultancy (September 2008), they reported that the market for spend on search engine marketing was estimated to be worth £2.75 billion this year in the UK alone.

As a UK business owner, you may not be interested in that fact but where the numbers start to tell a story is how they’re split between paid search (£2.42 billion) and search engine optimisation (£330 million).

This split is mirrored by data released by SEMPO which has the US advertisers investing just 11% of their Internet marketing spend on search engine optimisation ($1.3 billion).

As a company that helps businesses with both of these core aspects of search engine marketing, we can appreciate why there is such an investment in PPC advertising. However, we find it intriguing that search engine optimisation (SEO) is so far behind in the spend stakes being treated with the same disregard as an Icelandic bank savings account. Perhaps it suffers from the feeling some site owners have that SEO is free? The notion of free listings is valid but for any business to not be making provision for SEO in their online marketing budget is short-sighted, particularly when you review the following:

Google Eye Tracking Heat Map

This eye tracking heat map from Enquiro clearly highlights the fact that most searchers still go top-left when conducting a search.  It demonstrates that the sites occupying the top 3 slots of the natural search results will attract 100% visibility and only dropping to 50% at position 6. Compare this to the PPC adverts where the ad at position #1 only achieves 50% visibility. This falls dramatically to 10% by the time you get to the ad in position 5.

Hopefully, you’ll appreciate the value in SEO and understand why free isn’t always best.

We offer a range of search engine optimisation services and would welcome the opportunity to demonstrate how we could help your business improve its online visibility.

Further Reading:

Eyetools Eyetracking Research

Despite the general slow down in the global economy, Google continue to buck the trend with an impressive set of financial results for the third quarter of 2008.

The company reported total revenues of $5.54 billion for the quarter ending 30th September 2008. This is an increase of 31% compared to the same period in 2007.

For the UK specifically, Google reported revenues of $776 million. I’m sure that with their recent announcement to allow gambling advertising within AdWords to, ahem, “bring inline with the legal and cultural climate around this issue within the UK” that this figure will continue to rise.

Further Reading:

Google Third Quarter 2008 Results Press Release

Google have just announced a change in their policy for companies wishing to advertise gambling related services online using their AdWords pay per click advertising platform within the UK.

Google’s announcement explains that this policy change for gambling advertisers has come about “due to recent changes in UK law” and to “bring it inline with the legal and cultural climate around this issue in the UK”.

The statement goes on to say “Our review determined that, at this time, we will allow gambling ads to target England, Scotland and Wales as long as the advertiser is registered with the Gambling Commission and provides a valid operating license number.”

Any gambling site wishing to use pay per click advertising to promote their business will first of all need to create a new Google AdWords account and complete an application form for Google. They will then review the application and notify the advertiser whether they have been successful or not.

Given the competitive nature of the industry, we would anticipate pay per click costs being high for AdWords gambling advertising in the UK and would suggest that new advertisers consider using Google AdWords management services if they’re unsure how to build an optimised campaign.

At last, Google have provided its AdWords advertisers with the ability to see statistics for the search network.

AdWords Search Partner Statistics

The search network (not to be confused with the content network) includes sites such as AOL and ask.com. All good stuff, but up to now you couldn’t see the data for these sites as it formed part of the general data from search traffic generally.

With access to these stats, AdWords account owners will now be able to review the Click through Rate (CTR) and conversions from Google’s search partners and be able to make a rational decision as to whether this is good quality traffic.

Well done Google and we look forward to seeing this data available in the reports. Oh, and being able to create search partners only campaigns!

If you’re a Webmaster or site owner, this should be of interest to you! Within Google Webmaster Tools, it has been possible for a while to get a list of those pages that Google has as ‘Not found’ or 404.

First and foremost, if you have pages not found, you should take steps to fix them, e.g. if a page has been renamed, redirect the old page to the new page (301 permanent redirect).

Now though, Webmaster Tools shows you where your 404 pages are being linked from (Diagnostics | Web crawl):

Webmaster Tools Shows Inbound Links for 404 Pages

Once you analyse the inbound links to old or broken 404 pages, you can take the appropriate steps to fix the issue. You could contact the Webmaster of the site that is linking to yours and ask them to update to give their visitors a better experience or you could 301 redirect the old page to new page if there is a suitable replacement.

Whichever route you take, you should definitely keep an eye on your Webmaster Tools account and particularly your diagnostics section. Keep your site in order and you may just get rewarded for it by gaining additional traffic.

Further Reading:

Webmaster Tools Shows Crawl Error Sources
Matt Cutts Tutorial on Using Web Crawl Diagnostics

The Internet presents limitless opportunities for mid-sized businesses that want to compete in the larger market.  Thanks to affordable online marketing options, it’s possible for a medium-sized business to carve a place in their sector and contend with the bigger companies.  The problem is finding or choosing the most suitable way to market your product or service online.

There are a number of options for businesses to choose from when considering cost-effective or affordable Internet marketing solutions, although the combined method or blended mix of marketing might better serve as the best approach.  This blended approach is made up of the five most effective and affordable ways to market your business website online.

SEO

Although SEO, or search engine optimisation, appears to be a rather simple way to increase your share of online traffic, the Natural Search results that it yields are powerfully impressive. SEO is the process of engineering your website so that it most effectively responds to the way that potential customers search for your business online.

Many people believe that SEO is something that can be done by just about anyone, but it takes a professional SEO expert to glean dynamic results without causing some of the very damaging errors that amateurs easily make.

Always choose to work with a professional SEO in order to get the best out of your website’s SEO potential.  The cost of an SEO expert is nothing compared to the potential increase in revenue from having your website optimised.

Articles

The Internet is a word-based medium and very much search driven.  Including articles on your website has a multiplicity of benefits, not least of all providing your customers with up to date expert advice.  Other benefits include:

• Increased credibility
• Improved SEO results from keywords in the articles
• Expanded web presence

You don’t need to be an expert author, there are lots of highly competent and affordable writers that can provide any number of quality articles for your website on any topic.

PPC

PPC, or pay per click, is one of the best methods of bringing traffic to your website and converting it to sales.

Imagine advertising that is read directly by people who are already interested in your product or service.  That’s exactly what PPC offers!  When a potential customer is interested in your ad, they click to find out more.  You only pay for the number of clicks that your ad receives and you can set your budget accordingly.

PPC represents a highly customisable and a truly affordable method of advertising.  Unfortunately, this has been one of the reasons why so many people have attempted DIY PPC, resulting in some quite catastrophic wasted opportunities.

Online PR

Your reputation online matters because it’s easily raised and easily damaged in the same measure.  Online PR can be used to fire fight problems but can also be used to announce important product news, service changes, sales, launches and make the best use of all profile raising opportunities.

Video Marketing

Still relatively in its infancy but drawing increased interest and attention, online video marketing can offer a stunningly effective alternative to television advertising. Many people have found that they can obtain dramatic results from very simple videos.  In the increasingly competitive online market, this is one approach that cannot be ignored.

By using these five methods together, you will create a powerful yet affordable website marketing campaign for your business.

If you feel you need help with any of these areas and would like to work with a professional UK based search marketing agency, please refer to our search engine marketing services page.

U Rank is a search engine with a difference! Although still in prototype, it gives a clear indication of where Microsoft thinks search could be improved.

To quote the U Rank project area, “U Rank is a search engine that allows people to organize, edit and annotate search results, as well as share information with others.”

Now, this could be very good. Imagine, a search engine where the results are a reflection of what you, friends or co-workers believe and trust.

The prototype is only accessible to US users at the moment but keep an eye on the U Rank project area if you’d like to know more and see how it progresses.

The increasingly devastating financial condition known as the Credit Crunch has hit the advertising industry hard. The traditional advertising media of television, radio and newspapers are all recoiling from the strong fall in sales figures for 2008.  Projections for traditional modes of advertising in 2009 are also depressingly glum.

Whilst traditional forms of advertising maintain a failing fingertip grasp on the market, Internet advertising is only percentage points away from surpassing all of these advertising methods in terms of annual market spend.

Steady Growth

Even as far back as 2001, media magnate Rupert Murdoch’s all-powerful ‘NewsCorp’ announced a massive slump in revenue from advertising.  At the same time, although weakened by the Dot Com Crash, Internet advertising revenue continued to grow.  Between 2003 and 2007, Internet advertising transformed itself from a niche in the market, to the third largest advertising source.

Since then things haven’t got much better for traditional advertisers. By 2006, Internet advertising in the UK had convincingly surpassed newspaper ads. In 2007, television giant ITV saw pre-tax advertising profits fall by 39%, as the market already recognised the value for money represented by online options. Reuters, the international news agency reports that during 2008, online ads will overtake television advertising too.

Newspaper advertising has also taken a heavy beating from the Credit Crunch.  Peter Williams, finance director at DMGT – the publisher that owns the Daily Mail, confessed that during the third quarter of 2008, advertising revenue had fallen and “we’re not relying on any pick-up in the near future”.   Businesses recognise the immediate and powerful results obtained by Internet advertising and have deserted newspaper advertising in droves.

Conversely, during this period of economic crisis, Internet advertising continues to grow. Whilst all advertising growth is clearly slowing down, predictions for online advertising in late 2008 and 2009 show a steady growth, revealing a trend towards increasing confidence in the effectiveness of Internet advertising and the valuable ROI it represents.

Internet Advertising Growing in UK

In 2008, Internet advertising presented a growth of 21% whilst traditional media fell.  Internet advertising within the United Kingdom represents 19% of the total share of advertising revenue.  It has been predicted that by 2011, the total online advertising spend will be £4.5 billion in the UK alone; this will be 30% of the UK’s total advertising share.

In the UK, paid search leads the way in web advertising sales with a growth of 28% across 2008.   Natural search hasn’t been slacking either with a 68% increase in growth in last twelve months.  Obviously this supports the message that a blended approach to online advertising is the best way to secure your own share of the market.

Positive Forecast

The Credit Crunch may have affected most of the global economy, with traditional advertising channels suffering badly.  However, online marketing and advertising appears to still be growing because it has proved itself as a cost-effective tool that provides crunch-proof results that matter during a difficult time.

I mentioned in my 11 Tips To Improve Your Google AdWords Campaign (point #11!) that you need to run the Search Query report if you’re bidding on broad match keywords.

To access this report, you need to log in to your AdWords account, select the ‘Reports’ tab and then go to ‘Create Report’ in the sub-menu.

Search Query Report within Google AdWords

The reason we put so much importance on the Search Query report is because it uncovers some* of the actual keywords that AdWords has used as synonym replacements for those PPC advertisers using broad match.

*Whilst it shows some, it also misses a lot. Depending on how many clicks you put through your account, these ‘Other unique queries’ that appear in your report, could add up to a lot of wasted spend. It is possible to identify these keywords too but that involves setting up some advanced filtering in Google Analytics. We do this for all of our clients and their campaigns benefit from this further optimisation.

So why is it important to identify the actual search term rather than the phrase in your account that generated the click? Negatives! Running a successful AdWords campaign is a juggling act between maximising visits to your site whilst restricting wasted clicks, i.e. those searches that still click on your ad even though there’s no or little relevance to what they were looking for. This is where negative keywords come in. Negatives are added to your campaign and are used as a way to tell the AdWords system that your advert should NOT be shown when this keyword is used, normally as part of a longer search string.

A mature campaign will have hundreds, if not thousands, of negative keywords but this takes time, comprehensive keyword research and a detailed analysis of your AdWords account data.

If you’d rather spend time managing other aspects of your business, you should review our AdWords management services and let us improve your return on investment.

If you’ve been trying to get your web pages ranked in the top of the search engines by yourself but are struggling, you may just decide to use the services of a professional search engine optimisation (SEO) company.

The big question is how do you go about picking a company to become your search marketing partner? How do you find a good SEO company that can do this effectively?

Here’s our top tips to choosing a good SEO company:

• Seek a referral from a trusted contact. Sounds obvious but who do you know (supplier, partner, business contact) who may already have gone through this selection process?
• Do a search! What phrase do you think a good search engine optimisation company should be ranked for? Obviously, the phrase you search for is an individual choice but go with what you feel and look through the top 10.
• Do some research about the SEO company. Look at the search engines and see if anyone has written anything positive (or even negative!) about them.
• Review the company’s testimonials but also see if you can talk one or two of their clients directly.
• Don’t believe anyone who promises you the No 1 spot at Google. Google updates regularly and, that aside, no one can guarantee top spot. The search engines just doesn’t work that way! Yes, you can rank highly, but you can’t always be No 1 at Google. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying.
• Read their case studies. If they have none, ask why or just move on to a company that does.
• Cheap isn’t always a bargain. If someone promises to rank you in the top 5 at Google for a really low fee, you know that they are lying.
• Review multiple companies before you decide. Do your due diligence and find the best company for your needs. Compare like for like.
• Find out about contract terms up front. What length of time are you committed for? Yes, SEO can take time to have an effect but that doesn’t mean you should be locked-in to some lengthy contract period.
• Review the appropriate company registration site for your country to ensure you are dealing with a legitimate SEO company.

At Impact Media, we’re proud of the results we’ve achieved for our clients and would encourage you to review our search engine optimisation case studies.