Conference Buddies

Why Blogs are your #1 Search Marketing Tool

Speaker: Chris Baggott, Compendium Blogware
10/15/2009, 11am – 12pm

Notes:

• Blogging is the number one corporate focus. It is the fastest growing corporate initiative
• Blogging is a great way to get out information (to searchers)
• The goal is to get more first time searchers
• comScore: 43% more searches this year than last year
• Search is a way to find a solution to your problems
• Companies that have blogs have 55% more visitors to their website, with 97% more traffic to inbound links
• Blogging is a way to get people to search on your site
• 1st generation blogging: me, me, me. 2nd generation blogging: look at what I know. 3rd generation blogging: getting business through search
• 3rd generation blogging is to target messages around your specific keywords
• Create multiple blogs that target your keyword phrases
• Corporate mistake: content is organized around an individual. Content should be organized around solving the audiences’ problems and what they care about
• Use words that your customers are using, “speak their language”
• Make searchers happy, convert them into customers
• Problems with blogging is that it takes time and effort
• When we look at a page, we are searching for credibility. If they trust you, you will get the click thru
• Similar-situation sale: tell me a story about how you solved a problem like mine, then I’ll trust you to solve my problem, too.
• Bloggers are free, not assigned. People want to blog, tell a story
• Blog content and volume of blog posts directly correlates with traffic
• How do you measure the value of corporate blogging? Compare organic traffic with how much the keyword is worth ($$ wise). That’s one way to measure ROI
• Targeting key words on blogs is comparable to PPC, measure ROI by engagement, conversion. 1.6% conversion on organic searches, 30 to 40% on blogs
• Call to action: fill out a form, click on a button
• Make blogs look like landing pages
• Doesn’t make any difference whether the blog looks like a regular HTML page
• Search Engines are looking for fresh new content, updating the blog regularly will get you crawled more.
• One good blog vs. many different blogs in corporations: established readers vs. first time searchers. Corporations are interested in getting the conversion as opposed to a loyal reader.
• Corporate blogging should be focused with search in mind
• 90% of customers are coming from search
• Have many blogs, all sub-domains, to make it more search engine friendly

SEO/SEM

Speakers:

Rhea Drysale: Outspoken Media
Stephen Spencer: Net Concepts
Brett Tabke: WebmasterWorld, PubCon
10/16/2009, 4pm – 5pm

SEO/SEM Tools

• seo-browser.com: scans websites for SEO content. Tells you what type of redirect it is.
• Yahoo Site Explorer: free tool, log in to get comprehensive data, exclude internal links, only inbound links from other sites, lists not all, but most of your inbound links
• getlisted.org to claim your business on several local search engines & see how your business is listed at Google, Yahoo, and other top local search engines

SEO/SEM Tips

• Duplicate content is never going to rank as well as original content
• Keyword research: Google Adwords, sort by search volume, use it to base content around those words or phrases
• Every time you get a redirect, you lose a little value. (www versus non-www). Always stick with the same thing.
• Website problems: Lack of 301 redirects, too much duplicate content, http versus https, default is 302 redirect, broad keywords, title tags & body copy should be used, in “description”, title matters.
• Site:yourdomain on Google search. Checks the site for www versus non-www redirects
• Use this at the end of “Site:yourdomain”: &start =990&filter=0
• Shorter, keyword-rich content is better for your page rank and click thru rate
• No index (for Google: don’t index, don’t include in data page) and disallow (page is not accessible), no follow (don’t link the page rank, i.e. all your social buttons so you don‘t hemorrhage on page ranks), don’t vouch for sites that are not relevant to you
• Google webmaster central: verify your website, tell them what pages you want included & not included, lists your back links, have multiple people verify for you to find 404 errors, never use the removal tool because you can’t change your mind for six months,
• SEO Title Tags: a plugin for WordPress. Related words in title tag, but not in the post title, mass edit your title tags, get custom title tags for your various pages and posts without going into each page for editing, they do not conflict
• Blog posts: Use the more tag after the first paragraph, links back to your articles, don’t use your home page, use a tiny URL, (some services do not use a 301, always use one with a 301, NOT a 302) or use a hand-crafted optional excerpt, define that with a code to display the unique content.

SMX @ AD:TECH – Trends & Developments In Search Marketing

MODERATOR:
Danny Sullivan, Editor-in-Chief, SearchEngineLand.com

PRESENTERS:
Dana Todd, CMO, Newsfoce, Inc.
Jeffrey Pruitt, Advisor, iCrossing
Sandor Marik, Direcor of Marketing, Conde Nast Digital
Jim McDonald, Senior Manager, Search and CRM, Match.com

• Search is an Always-on Network
• The Market Opportunity
• Search (SEM) is a $13.5B market (88% paid search, 11% seo, 1% other)
• 75% of Advertisers track performance, 25% track brand impact
• Sempo + emarketer:  Online Advertising = $40B market
• DAO = Digital Asset Optimization, not just SEO
• Search = Social as well

Advertising Platforms:

Ad Platforms include APT, Google, etc.

Convergence of Search and Display:

• Search wants more branding
• Display wants more performance

Brand Model

Program management => Research -> Experience -> Planning -> Optimize -> Advertise

Creating connected brands: Aware, Active, Useful, Trusted

Search/SEM People = More Linear, Analytical

Search People = More Linear, Analytical.  Very analytically minded people

More data in needed, to define and hit target

Know the marginal cost of acquisition

Attribution modeling
Search drives the last click
Engagement mapping

Quote from Jim McDonald (Match.com) Display Advertising, Ad Networks have a hard time to do true A/B testing from cookie to conversion

Social Media and Social Search may be giving Google some competition (i.e. Facebook feed, twitter, etc.). Sandor Marik (Conde Nast Digital)

6% time on search, 94% of time online not utilized by Google

Yahoo APT = Display advertising exchange, has 800 newspapers in consortium.  Now being rebuilt to overcome issues.

How does new search companies differential themselves.

Social has impact on search and search results.

Danny Sullivan: Google not even in the game of Twitter.   Whole space out there.

Introduction to SEO – Miva Merchant 2009
Speaker: Mark Simon, Miva Merchant

Conference Notes/Descriptions:

I. How Search Engines Rank Pages

• Search Engine Rank Pages Not Websites
• What the Search Engines evaluate (Ranking Factors)
• Title
• Description (keyword and selling tool)
• Headline (Header tags, 6 tags, 1 to 6)
• Body Text (Write for your customers, write to convert, then plug in keywords later)
• Anchor Text (keyword vote for that page)
• Links
• File names
• Keyword

II. Keyword Research

• Target Markets & Demographics
• Customer lingo – may not be what you think
• Industry lingo – tribal speak
• Number of Searches
• Number of Competing Pages
• Competitor Strength
• Identifying Opportunity (lowest amount of competition for a keyword phrase vs. number of searches)
• Keyword Tools

III. Competitive Analysis (find keywords, find links, etc.)

• Getting into the Search Engines
• Measure Success
• SEO for the CEO

IV. Getting into the Search Engines

• Links from other websites
• Sitemaps – HTML and XML

V. Metrics – Measuring Success

• PageRank doesn’t matter

What does matter:

• Conversion Rates
• Average value of visitors
• Traffic Sources
• Ranking for highly converting keywords
• Inbounds links
• Bounce rate

Q&A:

What is the difference between Indexing and Caching:
Indexing (google bot) = spider your pages and stores the data in their database
Caching = last version that google has saved

If some of my page isn’t indexed how do I get them in there (site:website.com):

1. Sitemap
2. Interlinking top pages (link from top popular internal pages)
3. Social Bookmarking

Some tools and resources mentioned during the SEO session at Miva Merchant

• SitemapPro.com
• SEORecon.com
• Linkscape Tool from SEOMoz.org
• SEObook.com

• 1.0 was search keyword by volume. Now we have grown past 1.0 to look at navigational query searches and demographic searches.
• Good tools to keep in mind: Google Ad Planner, MS AD Intelligence, and Yahoo Buss Index
• Leverage your Site Search for keyword source
• Google organic is also a great keyword source
• Two great tools but costly to track competitor keyword reporting tools from: ComScore / Hitwise
• Experts recommend using keyword tools to research, collect data and as data point but not for automated optimization

Speakers/Panelists:

Mona Elesseily, Director of Marketing Strategy, Page Zero
Matt Van Wagner, President, Find Me Faster

Conference Notes/Description:

The basics of how to purchase ad placement, usually on a Cost-Per-Click (CPC) or Pay-Per-Click (PPC) basis, from major search engines including best practices.

Paid Search Flow Chart:

Campaign -> Ad Group(s) -> Keywords -> Ads -> Landing Pages
Note: Don’t forget the landing page

Ask.com:

Displays own ads as well as fill its extra space with Google Ads resulting in possible double display of your ads.

Additional Features:

• Geographic Targeting
• Time of Day, Day of Week
• Demographic Targeting
  • MSN: Available but when used does not mean the ad is exclusive within the area. Those targeted sites will have the Bid Boost.
  • Google: Available but only within the Content Network.

Use Ad Targeting Preview Tool for testing preview of your ads so to not count as an impression and skew the metrics.

Keyword Tools:

• www.compete.com
• Wordtracker
• www.spyfu.com

Tips for Ad Text:

• Stick to 2 to 3 words keywords
• Use 1 word keyword conservatively
• Test phone numbers on Ads (phone numbers give a sense of authority)
• Include keywords and Call to Actions (CTA)
• Lead generation sites does well for Content Ads
• People do not like acronyms
• Filter clicks by targeting specific audience
• Use appropriate tone

Test:

1. Price
2. Reassurance (official site or 24/7 phone support)
3. Deals (offer ending soon)
   • Free Multivariate Testing Tool: www.adcomparator.com
   • At least 100 clicks for sufficient data

Multivariate Testing:

Buy Cycle:

Different Ad Copy during beginning or end of buy cycle.

Speaker: Marsha Collier, Author, eBay For Dummies Series
Conference Notes:

Changing mindset of the customer

1. Online customers are more sophisticated and demand to be engaged
2. Returning back to the personalized, engaging business mindset of your local business
3. People want personalized, meaningful, relevant information – not spam or just product promotions

• Good Example: Zappos advertising on LAX security bin when you place your shoes and items during security check
• Bad Example:Overstock running a promotion on “Free Shipping” when they only charge $2.95 for shipping on all purchases.

Engage the customer beyond just products and price

1. Don’t rule out any target audience
2. Use social media (MySpace, Twitter, Facebook) to reach audience that you may not have anticipated