SEO

Is Content marketing good for SEO

Paul TagentLeave a comment

A fact about content

Original and quality content gives Google and its spiders more to look at on your website aiding your organic SEO. This gives you a higher position in search and ultimately generate more clicks to your website, blog and/or online shop.

How and why?

Google likes to see activity on a website and a blog is likely to be the part of your site that you will most frequently update with new information to keep readers engaged.Each new article or post creates a new page with a new URL and hence, allows you to optimise it accordingly. Your content is also vital for building consumer trust, but also for Google SERPs (search engine page results). 

But why is organic SEO so important? 

Regular Content

Organic SEO matters because a staggering 75 percent of searchers don’t even click past the first page of results. If you’re not ranking on that first page when people search for what you offer, you guessed it — your website won’t get any traffic which ultimately means your site will struggle to bring you sales or enquiries.

This means that having well written, authentic and helpful content which gives the reader some value by, for example, answering a question, actually develops relationships with them. Similarly, written (or video) tutorials and how-to guides are a great way to engage your audience and help them. Most content on websites are factual – About Us, What We do, Contact Us….whereas the content you create on a blog or a video really allows you to create a personality for your company. 

Consumers look beyond traditional marketing tactics nowadays and crave more unique and engaging online content. Put simply, today, customers expect high-quality, consistent content from their favourite brands and this is why some organisations rank so well in Google. 

How often should content be generated?

Sit down for this, but ideally weekly. Weekly content is what is suggested by Google as the best way to see increased traction from your content marketing. But, if you are already posting content, it might be just as beneficial to go back and update that content first, especially if after a little while, you want to give certain posts a boost. This is because Blog post traffic is compounding, which means it gains organic results over time. This is why updating posts are important. This gives you more reads, more recognition, and possibly, more subscribers or ‘fans.’

Another way of using content is by engaging the services of an ‘Influencer,’ who is a personality endorsing your product or service via social media. I’ll write a post on this next.

Is there anything you’d like to know about? Drop me a line 01225 436426. 

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What is digital marketing?

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Digital marketing is pretty much any form of marketing that involves electronic devices. When you
think about it, digital marketing is just marketing. It’s how today’s businesses are getting their message in front of their best prospects and customers, but using online platforms. 

Whether we like it or not, most purchasing decisions begin online. None more so than now, customers are online: hanging out in social media, staying updated on current affair sites and blogs, and searching online when they have a need for a product or service. Your customers use Google and YouTube and many are now using voice search on their phones so effective digital marketing puts you in those same channels.

Think about the latest thing you looked for and/or bought. Regardless of what it was, you probably began by searching the Internet to see what was available, who provided them, and what your best options were. Your research may have also included by reviews you read, the friends and family you consulted and pricing. 

Talking to your potential customers on digital platforms means you build brand awareness, set yourself as an industry thought leader, and place your business at the forefront when the customer is ready to buy. Not only that, but digital marketing can collect valuable insights into your prospect market, audience behaviours, customer engagement, traffic sources and customer retention. 

What makes up digital marketing

Search engine optimization (SEO). 

SEO is the process of optimising the content you have online. Primarily, this will be a website and/or Blog. Google indexes pages so elements like the technical setup, the content, the URL, the page properties etc all play an influential part in helping your pages appear at the top of a search engine result for a specific set of keyword terms. 

Having a high, organic position in Google is one of the most desirable elements of effective digital marketing. Not only for visibility, brand building etc but effective SEO drives visitors to your site when they’re actually searching for the services and/or products you offer. Recent figures suggest that over 90% of people look for organic positions over paid ads……….

Paid search. 

Paid search, or pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, typically refers to the sponsored result on the top or side of a search engine results page (SERP). These results take the form of pre designed and written ads which charge you for every click. They have the word Ad next to them.

The beauty of paid search is that you can tailor your ads to appear when the desired search terms are entered into Goggle. This means your ads can be shown to prospects seeking something specific. This is called targeting in marketing speak! However, Google ads work very much like a bidding system; the higher your budget, the more change your ad will show and the more chance of getting a click. This is marketing speak is called visibility!

Content marketing. 

Content marketing has become a vital part of digital marketing. If companies can generate authentic, original and educational content consumers using a blog or a video, tag the item correctly and post to a website, channel or Insights platform, Google will be your friend forever! Some staistics indicate that content marketing gets three times more leads than paid search advertising so make the additional effort.

Social media marketing.

Socials have been all the rage for a while now, but……and it’s a big but, just because there are lots of platforms to use and these platforms are primarily free, it doesn’t mean that every company should have a profile on all of them. 

The key to effective social media marketing goes far beyond simply having active social media accounts. These platforms like Twitter come under the heading of social media as you need to create engaging content and interact with people. The more your audience is inspired to engage with you in return and the content you post, the more likely they are to share it. Once shared, your network will expand. 

Social media though, is time consuming so pick the platform that works for you and that is where your market it. Integrate activity with your other marketing efforts and, above all, don’t tell people you are going for a coffee on Twitter!

Email marketing. 

BMC is a massive fan of email marketing. Very much a push strategy as you push out your message to a database and it is still the quickest and most direct way to reach customers with information, updates, offers etc. Your eshot needs to be engaging, relevant, informative, and entertaining and tick the following 5 boxes – be trustworthy, relevant, engaging, consistent and be considered.

Yes, there are huge amounts of junk emails flying about, but these are simply mass market blasts that have no relevance to you. A quality, clean and relevant database of recipient is also vital.

Mobile marketing. 

Much as we all cannot live without our mobile devices, mobile marketing can be deemed as invasive. Think about a ping on your phone; you pick it up and it is a SMS or in app marketing advert. Delete.

Mobile marketing is quite young as a digital marketing platform but it can be effective. Not only that the ability to reach your customers directly on their devices is attractive, especially if your selling actual products, but consider your other digital marketing channels and the offer you make.

A great article that elaborates on this area is from Megan Mars.

What do I do with marketing during the Coronavirus

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Well, what can I say that hasn’t already been said about the current situation? These are incredibly trying times for us all both personally and professionally.  Peoples’ mental and physical health will be challenged like never before and some of us will lose loved ones well before their time. Quite frankly this is horrible.

On the business front, I already know heads of companies who were running very successful organisations who are now laying off staff and shutting their doors. Dreams in tatters and finances in ruins. Hospitality, retail, finance, marketing, property…….all will suffer as people stop spending and uncertainty kicks in.

Where does this leave us and what can we do when it comes to paying the bills and putting food on the table? A huge amount of client facing roles will be on pause and I pray that these people and people on the front line are looked after by the Government.

For others who trudge into an office each day for work, there was a time when working from home was a pipe dream, but with this virus forcing people to work remotely, there are jobs you can do from your own home.

Whether that’s working remotely for a company or starting your own business, there’s no shortage of work-from-home opportunities that we all need to look at either for the next few months or maybe even permanently.

Affiliate marketer, animator, graphic designer, web designer, bakes, blogger, bookkeeper, research, consultant, data entry person, copywriter, proofreader, online teacher, photographer, translator, virtual assistant, voice over artist, script writer, website tester……are all roles that can be done remotely.

What are we doing at BMC? Well, we are very fortunate that a lot of what we do can be delivered remotely and hence, my team is all working from their respective homes. We are open for business and today we are furiously updating clients’ websites with corona virus messages and making sure that these websites are optimised and performing well.

Ongoing, while I appreciate marketing is probably at letter Z in the alphabet on the priority list, I think website positions in search will be even more in demand in the next 6-12 months. With people at home now, the world wide web will see huge increases in people searching for goods and services and hence, we strongly advise that we all take a look at how we are performing online and how we are utilising social media and video to make sure that, when people are in a position to buy from us, we can be found. Organic SEO, paid search, SEM etc are all initiatives that we can do and we are more than happy to look at any website client or not and do a free audit to try and help.

Local listings do help marketing

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As the struggle to get your business noticed continues, have you thought about local listings?

Basically, if your business has a physical presence, you must get it listed in all the major local directories. Quality directories are still important. Google just changed the name AGAIN. The new name is “Google My Business”. (Old names were Google Places, Google Plus Local, Google Local.) Google has the lion’s share of searches so this is your priority.

Listings in Google

Make sure you use exactly the same name, address, and phone number on every local listing. You can also upgrade your listings with images, videos, mentions of cities and counties you serve, categories that apply, coupons and deals.

Beyond Google there are many more local listing opportunities like Thompson local, Free Index . These are valuable links you can easily get that will help your business site or blog rank better. Even if you are an online only business, if you have a physical location to use do not pass up these listings!

Internet facts for marketing

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According to a recent Nielsen consumer survey:

  1. 86.3% of people indicated the Internet is now vital to their lifestyle
  2. 74% of people determine who to do business with locally using online computerised search engines such as Google and Yahoo
  3. 50% use Internet yellow pages to find new and existing products and services
  4. 65% still use printed yellow pages

The Internet is now the most popular way your existing and potential new customers use to find you. The survey also found:

  1. 67% prefer online yellow pages to traditional printed books
  2. 84% say using the Internet is a much faster way to find local businesses
  3. 63% say the business listings on the Internet are more current
  4. 86% had already used the Internet to find a local business
  5. 78% use the Internet more today than they did last year (Internet usage is still growing)
  6. 52% use the printed yellow pages LESS than they did two years ago
  7. Of those who indicated Internet use is vital, 90% had used the Internet to search for local businesses
  8. 80% of Internet users research their purchases online and 70% then buy within 20 minutes from home

Did you know that your existing clients and neighbours are using online directories instead of the yellow pages telephone book to look up phone numbers and find new businesses?

Get your business listed locally and reap the rewards!

What’s a page title or meta description…

Paul TagentLeave a comment

To help with all he jargon, the below 5 points defines the five
key parts of a Web site that should help in the search results process.

Page Title – The page title text is located between the open and close tags
within the tags. If the title does not exist or is less than eight characters,
the URL is used in place of the title. The page title is the first line of text
that people see when viewing the search results paragraph and is formatted with
a link to the Web site. Each Web page should have a different page title.100 characters is the suggested length.

Meta Description – The meta description tag describes the content of the Web
page. The meta description tag is located within within the tags and formatted
as follows:

Each Web page should have a different meta description tag. – Maximum length is
150 characters.

Body Text – The body text contains the first 300 characters found on the website.
Active Search Results stores the first 1,000 characters of the website and uses
the first 1,000 characters in its indices to provide search results.

Meta Keywords – The meta keywords tag provides to the search engine words to
index the site. Web searchers will type in words to search on and the closer
those words are to the meta keywords on the Web page, the higher the ranking
will be for that Web page. – Maximum length is 100 characters.

Page URL – The Web site’s URL is displayed as the last line of the search
results paragraph to make it clear where the title link points to.

Hope this helps….

tags within the

tags. If the title does not exist or is less than eight characters, the URL is used in place of the title. The page title is the first line of text that people see when viewing the search results paragraph and is formatted with a link to the Web site. Each Web page should have a different page title. – Maximum length is 100 characters.

Meta Description – The meta description tag describes the content of the Web page. The meta description tag is located within within the

tags and formatted as follows:

Each Web page should have a different meta description tag. – Maximum length is 150 characters.

Body Text – The body text contains the first 300 characters found on the website. Active Search Results stores the first 1,000 characters of the website and uses the first 1,000 characters in its indices to provide search results.

Meta Keywords – The meta keywords tag provides to the search engine words to index the site. Web searchers will type in words to search on and the closer those words are to the meta keywords on the Web page, the higher the ranking will be for that Web page. – Maximum length is 100 characters.

Page URL – The Web site’s URL is displayed as the last line of the search results paragraph to make it clear where the title link points to.

SEO is not just a box ticked

Paul TagentLeave a comment

When it comes to getting the best from your website, a lot of emphasis should be placed on how it performs in search and, just as you’d expect to scope out a website design and development project, so too must you scope out a search engine optimization effort.

In Bath Marketing Consultancy’s opinion, SEO shouldn’t be something that is just asked for as a generalist service from marketing companies. It is an essential part of online marketing and, if organisations are prepared to spend money on their websites, they should also be spending money on ensuring that the site is found.

So, questions that I would normally ask clients and/or prospects are –

  • Who’s going to write the content?
  • Who is responsible for PR efforts?
  • Who is handling social marketing?
  • Who’s doing link building?
  • Who’s restructuring the website, as necessary?

Yes, the foundations can be done during the actual website build, but ongoing SEO is the key to success. Work with a specialist, agree a budget, allocate who is doing what and then work together to achieve your goals.

Search Engine Optimization – what not to do.

Paul TagentLeave a comment
Play with a straight bat.
Following on from my previous article about what to do for SEO, please find Bath Marketing Consultancy’s list of don’ts –
1. Avoid cloaking – Cloaking is when you give your visitors one page and then give search engines another page. Google and its friends want to see and index what your visitors see. Getting caught cloaking can have dire consequences on your site ranking.
2. Avoid keyword stuffing/spamming – This is stuffing your webpage with keywords that are only intended at tricking the search engines. Google is wise to this so, to get the best outcome, just write your text, with keywords in mind, towards your audience.
3. Avoid using flash or javascript for your navigation methods – Search engines usually can’t read these, or read them well enough to be dependable. Always use standard html links to be sure your site is easily walk able by search engine spiders.
4. Don’t submit your webpage url too often, if at all – You can submit your url directly to search engines, though search engines prefer to find your website via a backlink or incoming link. Resubmitting weekly or monthly can heavily damage your ranking with the search engines.
5. Avoid the “quickly get submitted to thousands of search engines” deals – While many of these do what they say, keep in mind that 98-99% of all search engines are powered by Google, Yahoo, or MSN. Just keep these 3 in mind and you’re covered.
6. Don’t forget backlinks – Link popularity plays very large into how your site is ranking by search engines, and is always a key element of SEO. Miss the backlinks part, and your SEO will suffer quite a bit.
7. Avoid excessive graphics and flash presentations – This is not to alter how the search engine looks at your site (directly), but at how your visitors view your site. There are many ways to make an effective website without overloading your visitors, and if a website takes more than 5 seconds to load, you will likely lose your visitor before they even get to visit your website.
To me SEO is about ticking the right boxes and making things relevant and easy for Google. Yes, there are tricks of the trade, but playing with a straight bat and making your site relevant, trustworthy and, above all, trustworthy will really help in effective SEO.