SEO Questions Answered

March 26th, 2007

I thought I’d post up a mini-interview I was asked to do this weekend.

• Why do you think search engine marketing has developed?

With the massive growth of business on the Internet over the last 5 years, marketing was always destined to have a central role with businesses’ Internet spend. Banner advertising was one of the first attempts by the business sector to boost brand awareness and while it did enjoy limited success in the beginning, the cost effectiveness of banner advertising was reduced over time as Internet users’ behaviour evolved.

Over 90% of people use search engines to find websites, which is no surprise. Given the amount of information on the Internet being able to index and sort this information is paramount to user experience. User experience is based around the need for information and the ease of obtaining this information. If you’re searching for mobile phone deals, the last thing you want to see is an advert for pet insurance, which is where Google hit the jackpot in terms of relevance. One of the main reasons SEM has developed is because it can positively benefit the user experience, with the use of contextual, non-intrusive adverts you are using a type of “pull” advertising. Many businesses can see the benefit of putting their product or service right under the nose of a consumer at the exact moment they have an interest. Imagine if you sold conservatories and you had the ability to put a leaflet through everyone’s door at the exact moment they were thinking about having a conservatory built – this is essentially the power of SEM.

Aside from this, the accountability that SEM offers to businesses is a great attraction. You can tell exactly how many people see your advert, interact with it and how many go on to produce a sale or lead. With strong mutual benefits to both user and business, search engine marketing has grown to be the largest reaching media in the world today, ahead of TV and radio.

• What techniques/strategies are used in response to the popularity of search engines? (Including SEO)

The two main forms of search engine marketing are search engine optimisation and pay per click. Most major search engines offer some kind of contextual pay per click system, which is central to their revenue model.

Pay Per Click is an easy way for companies and individuals to “buy” their way to the top of the search engines. There is a science to pay per click and there are various qualifications such “Google AdWords Professional” that search engine marketers can attain. In itself, PPC has been way for search engines to drive revenue with businesses and although it has definitely helped with the success of many websites, I wouldn’t say it has had anywhere near the impact on the Internet as search engine optimisation.

At a first glance, it might be easy to overlook the impact SEO has had on the Internet. With search engines algorithmically calculating results, the competition for the top spots in almost all sectors is fierce. This has had both positive and negative impacts on the Internet. One of the main contributors to search engine positioning has always been link popularity, which is something some people will go to any lengths to get.

On the positive side, with search engines using techniques such as duplicate content filtering, there has been much new, quality content added to the web, that would not have otherwise existed. The best way to maintain a stable incoming of new links is to have the best, most informative, unique content in your sector – this is what will attract links in the long run. Wikipedia is an excellent example, being arguable one of the most successful sites ever in terms of search engines, it has millions of incredibly high quality articles which are frequently cited on forums, blogs and by other webmasters.

As with most things, once somebody figures out how it works, they want to break it. “Black Hat” SEO is a set of strategies which are against the search engines terms & conditions, which aim to trick search engines into ranking them better than they should. Link spam, is one of the most common black hat methods, most forums, blogs, wikis or social sites such as MySpace, get spammed. Most people set up automated processes to leave their links all over the Internet and unfortunately, sometimes it works which is why the major search engines are constantly refining their algorithms.

As the search engines get smarter and search is more personalised we see ever more “exotic” methods of link garnering. One common technique is to “link bait”, which by some is considered a, walking the line “grey hat” technique. It involves writing an article, or producing some content which will encourage people to link to it, so it could be funny, controversial – anything as long as it gets people talking. Using platforms such as Reddit and Digg, it can be quite easy for these ideas to get off the ground and produce a massive influx of links, which will enhance your rankings.

• Is search engine optimisation an essential part of an online marketing strategy?

I would not say SEO is the be all and end all of online marketing. There is a whole range of online marketing techniques that can work very well depending on the scope of the site. The reason many people find SEO so attractive is because of its long term benefits. Although you may spend a lot of time and resources getting ranked well, once you are, you are capturing highly targeted, free traffic. Most SEOs invest a lot for time making sure sites convert well once they have captured traffic. A lot of the time, doubling your conversion rate can be more beneficially than gaining a few extra places in the search engines.

Some argue that it is essential e-commerce sites rank well organically. Although this would put you at a very strong advantage, it is not always possible because of time, budget or competition restraints. Other techniques such as affiliate marketing can get you an incredible amount of exposure and give you the capital to invest in SEO.

Although success is possible without SEO, it is always worth making sure your site at the very least is accessible and easy for search engines to read.

• What key points do you feel has allowed online advertising to evolve? (introduction of search engines, PPC, Banner, Web 2:0)

As mentioned earlier, I feel online advertising has really evolved because the current system gives an almost “permission marketing” approach for businesses. The web is a place unlike the high street. It is very easy for web consumers to take power away companies and it is not uncommon to see a home-made website outrank a large company because their content is better.

The term “global village” has come from the ease that web users can communicate. If a company offers a poor level of service or product, it is very easy for consumers to get the scoop. I think this is a great positive of the web, which is forcing many companies to evolve and offer the high levels of service they claim to offer or give their business to the competition.

There has been many articles and books on “small is the new big” for business. The “global village” outlook really opens up the playing field to smaller companies, with limited budgets that would not stand a chance on the high street. It is much harder for large companies to buy the amount of coverage and stifle competitors than it once was.

• Do you feel the growing popularity of search engines has affected online marketing strategies? If yes, how?

Definitely. Most businesses tend to be quite reactive and will follow where the consumer goes. It just so happens at the moment (it may not always be so), search engines are the first stop on most peoples’ web voyage, so it makes sense for online marketing to shift towards search engines.

It is hard to dispute the success of SEM, because if it didn’t work, it wouldn’t exist. The fact is, search engines give people the information they need and it provides businesses with a cost-effective opportunity to get their message across, while making search engines the revenue they need to survive.

Interestingly, this had lead to a very delicate balance. A couple of times a year, Google updates its algorithms and rankings can significantly change, this has lead to some companies literally going bust overnight due to the drop in sales. So while online marketing strategies may change, it is always worth heeding “don’t put all your eggs in one basket”. Search engines such as Google are not under any obligation to rank your website well (despite some people trying to sue them believing they are).

A poem about responsibility

March 23rd, 2007

There was a most important job that needed to be done,
And no reason not to do it, there was absolutely none.
But in vital matters such as this, the thing you have to ask
Is who exactly will it be who’ll carry out the task?

Anybody could have told you that everybody knew
That this was something somebody would surely have to do.
Nobody was unwilling; anybody had the ability.
But nobody believed that it was their responsibility.

It seemed to be a job that anybody could have done,
If anybody thought he was supposed to be the one.
But since everybody recognised that anybody could,
Everybody took for granted that somebody would.

But nobody told anybody that we are aware of,
That he would be in charge of seeing it was taken care of.
And nobody took it on himself to follow through,
And do what everybody thought that somebody would do.

When what everybody needed so did not get done at all,
Everybody was complaining that somebody dropped the ball.
Anybody then could see it was an awful crying shame,
And everybody looked around for somebody to blame.

Somebody should have done the job
And Everybody should have,
But in the end Nobody did
What Anybody could have.

Attributed to Charles Osgood

Chances are, this has happened in your company. How did you change your working practices to stop the ‘Nobody told me I had to do it’ issue?

SEO experiments

March 14th, 2007

It’s not often these days that an SEO company/consultant releases their private experiments with SEO for public consumption, so it’s great to see theGooglecache blog in reply to a post on seoMoz with answers to some of the unsolved questions in SEO.

Here’s the link to the original post, and my (hopefully simplified) explanations of the points.

1. The Diminishing Value of Anchor Text

If page A has 2 links to page B, and each of those links uses different link text, then the first link text will be considered by Google as more authoritative.

2. How Far Does Synonymy Go?

Take a search for ‘Bryan Gumbel’ - Google assumes you mean ‘Bryant Gumbel’ (American sports presenter) and gives higher weight to those pages that rank for the correct spelling than you might expect. What is worthy to note though, is that this only applies when the misspelling is a shortened version of the correct one - a search for ‘Brian Gumbel’ weights the misspellings much more. This is probably Google’s way of easily dealing with plurals and contractions.

3. Can Link Removals Hurt Rankings?

If you have a page without many links, and you gain and then subsequently lose an important link, you’ll be worse off than if you never had the link at all. This negates any benefit from sneaking your link onto a high ranking page if the owner then removes it (eg Wikipedia pre no-follow), and should also act as a warning against buying links (if you’re buying them for short periods of time)

4. Does Sharing Registrants with Spammers Hurt You?

Basically, the advice here is that you shouldn’t use the same personal information to register a blackhat domain that you use for whitehat domains.

5. Text Placement Weighting

Text that’s at the top of the source code is given more prominence than that at the bottom. Google has got good at judging what elements of your site are navigation and what is content, but there’s still more than enough evidence about that you should minimise navigational code at the top of your page, and put the most important content at the top. The example given for this is to put the ‘tags’ for an article at the top.

6. Higher links = more weight

If you have 6 links on a page, the one at the top is given more weight than those at the bottom. The perfect example of this is the ‘five seo excuses’ SERPs (Not current any more) which show that a company was able to list subdomains in order to spell out a marketing phrase by having a list of links in preferred order.

Guide to dynamic keyword insertion with Adwords

March 12th, 2007

There isn’t much information about on this in forums or in fact on the AdWords site (In fact i’ve heard it isn’t an officially supported feature!) so I’ve put together this quick guide to DKI and how to use it effectively. Please add your own tips or comments!

What is Dynamic Keyword Insertion? (DKI)

DKI is a feature of AdWords which allows you to dynamically use the keywords that users search for to be displayed as part of your advert. This can be useful for the following reasons:

• Words in your ad copy that match keywords users type in are highlighted in bold, helping your ad stand out from the competition
• Your adverts will appear more relevant to the user as they use the keyterms that triggered the advert, which will usually increase CTR.
• You can use one adgroup to cover a range of slightly different but related keyterms, therefore maximising your ad relevance without having to type an advert for each keyword variation

Where can I use Dynamic Keyword Insertion?

You can use DKI anywhere in your adverts.. in the title, description line 1 or 2, display url and in your destination url (Usually for tracking purposes, be careful not to break your links with this method!)

Ok, how do I use Dynamic Keyword Insertion then?

You specify how you’d like the dynamic keywords displayed, and give a default phrase which will be displayed if your dynamic keywords cannot for whatever reason. The format is below:

{keyword:defaulttext}

You can also use the following capitalization on the work ‘keyword’ to get different effects:

• keyword - no capitalization
• Keyword - First word is capitalized
• KeyWord - Every Word Is Capitalized
• KEYword - EVERY letter in first word is capitalized
• KEYWord - LIKE Above But With Each Word Capitalized
• KEYWORD - EVERY LETTER IS CAPITALIZED

Code:

Example

{KeyWord:Widgets}
Buy your {Keyword:Widgets} here
{KEYword:Widgets} with free delivery!

Keyterm in your adgroup: ‘blue widgets’

Blue Widgets
Buy your Blue widgets here
BLUE widgets with free delivery!

FAQ’s

What if my dynamic keywords are too long?
Maximum character limits still apply, so if the dynamic keywords push your ad text over the line limit, the default text will be used instead. Make your default text short enough to comply with maximum character limit.

Will using dynamic keywords effect my quality score?
I’ve not seen any adverse effects to quality score by using DKI, and neither have other people I’ve spoken to.

Is using dynamic keyword insertion the best solution?
Ideally, no. If you have the time, it’s best to write an individual advert for every keyword/term in your campaign. In practicality though, with a huge range of keywords and/or lack of management time (or budget), dynamic keyword insertion can be a quick way to make your adverts appear more relevant and achieve a higher CTR.

My dynamic keywords aren’t showing up! What’s wrong?
Check that your keywords are short enough to comply with the maximum character limit on the line you’re using them on.
Also remember that dynamic keywords must comply with the same guidelines that normal text must - For example whilst you can bid on copyright words, they cannot appear in your ad text so will not appear as dynamic keywords.

What about dynamic keyword insertion on the content network?
From AdWords Advisor 2 (WMW):

We will insert the most relevant keyword from your Ad Group into the creative, space permitting. The deliver of your ad on the content network is determined by the overall theme of your Ad Group, but the system will select the most relevant term within the Ad Group for insertion. It will also use that keywords maximum CPC and destination URL settings as well.

Can I use dynamic keyword insertion on my display url to increase CTR? (E.g. www.example.com/dynamic-keyword)
Yes, but be aware that if your display url does not actually work as a real url, then your adverts may be disabled after a manual review. Use .htaccess or similar methods to rewrite the display url to your real landing page if you want to try this tactic.

More tips:

Shoemoney claims to be able to increase CTR by making an ‘arrow’ with bolded dynamic keywords. Whilst the experiment is flawed in several key ways, it’s worth a read.

If the quality score of your keyword is low, it will not be used as a dynamic keyword, even when that keyword triggers display of your advert. Make sure your default text is effective, and ideally don’t run low quality keywords/work on improving them.

IMPORTANT:
The dynamic keyword used is what you have bid on, not what the user types into the search box. For example:

Ad Title: {KeyWord:Buy widgets}
In your keywords (broad match): Buy red widgets
User search query: “I want to buy red widgets from an online shop”
Your displayed ad title: Buy Red Widgets