Catherine Copes, Author at Legal Search Engine Marketing

All About The Different Methods of Search Engine Marketing

July 24, 2019 0 Comment

In the search engine optimization (SEO) and Search engine marketing world, there are several known facts, one of them being that small players in the industry cannot compete with the enormous marketing budgets of larger brands. The good news is that there are some search engine marketing strategies that can help small businesses compete with the big boys. They include:

1. Keyword Selection

It is a known fact that big brands have more money to spend on marketing than smaller players. They can outbid any small business during paid search auctions. For small businesses to be competitive, they need to choose their keywords carefully and strategically. The ideal keywords should generate quality leads for you. Using long-tail keywords is also highly recommended as it can help produce high-quality leads that are cheaper and highly targeted. When using this strategy, however, you should know that your traffic will reduce due to the long-tail keywords. Once you have chosen a suitable keyword strategy, you can reduce your budget by restricting specific keywords with negative keywords and match types. This is a great way to reduce wastage on your spending.

2. Geographic/Dayparting

Another great way to stay ahead of the competition is by using localization as a strategy for staying competitive against the big brands. If you run a small shop that focuses on a specific area, you should limit your geographic targeting. There is no need to show search results from businesses that are located on the other side of the country. By specifying your city, state, or county, you can easily target consumers within that area. Similarly, you can run ads at certain times to limit your searches. For instance, you can run your ads between 4 pm to 7 pm for best results. When you utilize dayparting, you can be assured of remaining competitive against the big guys.

3. Ad Extensions

One of the best ways of including additional information to your adverts is Ad extensions. If you can only run an ad with restrictions, you should pack as much information as possible to the ad. This can make a huge difference. Google offers many ad extensions that can be incredibly helpful. This includes; location information, site links, click-to-call links, and reviews that help to direct traffic to other pages on your website. By providing potential customers with a lot of information, you can get higher conversion rates because they might see something they like on your site.

4 Engaging and Enticing Ad Copy

“When you cannot outbid the competition for keywords, you should think of alternatives that can help you stand out,” says John from Coronation Internet Marketing. One of the best options is writing an enticing and alluring ad copy. A great positioning statement can help your ad stand out. An enticing promotion can also help you stand out from the crowd and increase your clicks. To get the best results, be sure to do some competitive research and make it seem like your business is the best logical option.

5. Look Outside Google

While Google is a dominant player in the search engine marketing industry, there are others. You may be surprised to find out that Google is the most expensive option. A great alternative to Google Ads is the Bing network. This is a cheap and effective alternative that business owners should consider. Please note that there are other second-tier engines you can use. They include Ad marketplace and LookSmart, among others. They are less expensive and may even offer a better return on investment than tier-1 engines. Before making any decision, be sure to conduct the necessary research and consult the experts.

A 4-Step SEO Strategy For Your Business

Catherine Copes

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The objective of search engine optimization (SEO) is to have your webpages indexed on major search engines, as well as to rank on the top search engine results for specific keyword searches. Optimizing your website is a long-term process and requires continuous monitoring, tuning, testing, and maintenance.

Here is a comprehensive four-step strategy that you can use for SEO. Use this checklist as a guide whenever doing SEO work on your websites.

Step 1: Business Analysis of Your Target Market

Website Analysis

Do an analysis of your meta keywords, code, and visible text content to determine how well your pages can rank on the search engine results. In this step, for example, assess your code to text ratio.

Competitive Analysis

Examine the keywords you strive to rank for and check competitor websites to determine an effective way to outrank the competition. For this process, do a keyword search and pick the top five search results. You can choose more than five if necessary. For analysis of competition, you can use SEO services like Keywordspy.com or Semrush.com.

Nominate Keywords

Make a list of priority search terms to target for your potential customers in your specified niche. Begin by asking yourself what search terms would you type in the search engines to find your website or business page. Then, analyze what customers are searching for to find websites similar to yours.

Step 2: Keyword Research and Development

Keyword Analysis

Go further into your analysis to identify the best keywords and phrases to target. Review the list of keywords targeted by your competitors as well. With your preliminary list, determine the recent number of search queries for each keyword and the number of websites currently competing for each keyword. Check for misspellings, plurals, and singulars and make them a priority. Some common keyword searches are usually misspellings of the keywords, so take advantage of that. Just remember that Google usually corrects misspelled words, so be careful when targeting misspelled keywords.

Assessment of Baseline Ranking

In order to assess future rankings accurately, be sure to determine your current rankings. You can input these results in a spreadsheet before proceeding further. Check for ranking improvements every week. As soon as you feel confident in your rankings, you can now monitor every 30 to 45 days. If you see an increase in website traffic, then it is a good sign that your website rankings are improving. Some marketers say that you should not rely on search engine rankings. Although traffic and sales conversions are better, SEO rankings can also be used as a good indicator for good business.

Goals and Objectives

Make sure to have a clear objective in mind in order to have a good measure of ROI in any of your online endeavors. Begin with a small but achievable objective. For example, you can endeavor to increase your website traffic from a baseline of only 100 visitors per day to 200 visitors or more per day in a span of 30 days. If not, you can strive to increase your conversions from 1% to 2% in a given span of time. You can start with overall site objectives, or you may want to get into more specifics like better products, services, or sales.

Step 3: Content Optimization and Submission

Use Page Titles

Making use of keyword-rich titles can help establish a good SEO for your pages.

Use Meta Tags

The use of meta description tags has an effect on click-through rate, although it may not have any effect on rankings. (Google no longer uses tags for ranking anymore.)

Put Keywords Strategically on Pages

Make use of the keywords in your code and text content on your pages. You may make use of one to three keywords on a specific page and add more pages to incorporate your other target keywords. Make sure that the keywords are used naturally in the text content. This makes it easier for the search engines to determine the content of your page. Using a natural approach is the best strategy. Before, a page with 100 to 300 words was recommended. However, tests today show that pages with 800 to 2000 words rank better. At the end of the day, user interaction, content quality, and quality links will determine your current ranking.

Create Updated Sitemaps for Search Engines

Allow the search engines to index your website easily. Make sure to submit both HTML and XML sitemaps. Make an HTML version first. Then, submit an XML version to Google and Bing through their webmaster tools.

Submit to Directories

Professionals who work with SEO do not usually submit URL’s to search engines, but it can be done. The fastest way is to link back to your own URL’s naturally. Remember that link-building is essential for SEO. For better results, you can submit your URL’s to DMOZ, Yahoo! and Business.com. Some marketers use AdSense scripts to get Google spiders to visit their site. This makes indexing quicker.

Step 4: Test and Measure Continuously

Always Test and Measure

Make sure to do an analysis of your website traffic and current rankings to determine if your SEO work is producing results. Always record and track changes in your SEO strategy using an Excel spreadsheet.

Maintenance

Target additional keywords and modify your strategy to improve your SEO rankings. Be sure to review your link building strategies as well, and be sure to get inbound and outbound links. Keep your site updated by posting blogs. If you want help, your hosting company can help you set up a blog.

Legal SEO