Jan 26, 2012
Posted in Marketing Ideas
Yesterday I had written about different ways of leveraging Google results for additional traffic to your website and I had mentioned that I’d be sharing a few ideas today about improving the results of your Google Places listings. So without further ado, here are ten Google Places optimization tips:
- 1. Add the search terms (keywords) that you want to work for to your descriptions. Everything on Google is driven by the keywords on your site and Google Places pages. By including the search terms that you want to rank for, Google will know when to display your listings.
- 2. Create pages for multiple locations. If you have more than one location be sure to set up a new Google Places page for each location with a unique phone number. This will increase the chances of your listing appearing and it will be more relevent to local search results.
- 3. Add your own images to your Places page. The space is there so you might as well use it. People like to do business with people they know, like and trust so if you’re a business owner display a picture of yourself. Before and after pictures (for landscaping, revovations, etc.) are also effective. Remember: a picture is worth a thousand words.
- 4. Use videos too. You can also place up to 5 videos on your Places page. To do so, upload your video to YouTube first and then grab the embed code to display the video on your Places page. Customer testimonial videos work wonders here.
- 5. Track everything using Google Analytics. You’re likely already using Analytics to track your website results. Add the tracking code for your Places page as well and you’ll have a better idea of just how well your Places page is working for you.
- 6. Complete your profile entirely. Google loves content and the more words on your Places page the more dedicated you look in the eyes of Google. Be sure to complete all available fields to improve your chances for a higher listing.
- 7. Get reviews. This is likely the most important criteria for higher rankings. Ask your customers to complete reviews on Google as well as Yelp, foursquare, etc. Google has begun harvesting reviews from third party sites and that trend will only continue. The more reviews you have the better.
- 8. Leverage other business listings. Again, while Google doesn’t like you harvesting and displaying duplicate content on your site the Big G is the biggest creator of duplicate content on the web. However, that is good news for you. The more directories in which your business appears (Yelp, Yellow Pages, BlogSpot, UrbanSpoon, etc.) the more important your business will appear.
- 9. Consider using Google Boost. If you follow the suggestions above it should take too long for your Places page to appear at or near the top for most of your search terms. However, if you can’t wait, Google Boost is available. With this you can pay to have your Places page show up at the top of the listings.
- 10. Leverage discounts and special offers. Everyone loves to get a good deal and Google Places allows you to offer coupons right on your Places page. This is great for business and also helps you track the effectiveness of your Places page.
There you go. Ten Google Places optimization tips. I hope you enjoyed them. Now go out and implement!!!
Nov 22, 2010
Posted in Marketing Ideas
At a very high level, the Google robot looks at two aspects of your website when determining where to rank it. The first is your on-site content. This includes how your site is structured and the content (words, audio, pictures and videos) that your site contains.
The second aspect that Google looks at is your in-bound links. When other sites link to your site Google sees it as a ‘vote of confidence’ and the more sites you get, the better your ranking will be. Of course, as with all things related to Google, it isn’t that easy. Where those links are coming from and how other sites link to you are also important. The more important (or higher authority) the site that is linking to you is, the more valuable that link will be.
This is all basic search engine optimization stuff but important to review in light of today’s discussion. What I do want to talk about is linking strategy. Of course, given the information above, it stands to reason that if you get as many links as possible from as many sites as possible your search rankings will improve. That only makes sense.
However, many SEO experts are incredibly paranoid about getting links. They believe that getting too many links too fast will land you in the infamous Google sandbox, your site will get de-index and you’ll never receive another visitor through Google’s organic search results.
Here is why I believe that all of this is hogwash and why you can never build links too fast. That isn’t to say that you should use stupid tactics like link farms and free for all listing sites but you should never be worried about other sites linking to you. Why? Because who links to you is beyond your control. I can’t stop a porn site from linking to my blog anymore than I can stop the rain from falling during the winters in Vancouver. I can control who I link to but I can’t control who links to me.
And Google knows this. Why is this so important? Because if a site could get penalized for what other sites link to it and if I wasn’t such a nice guy, I would spam all of my competitors’ sites. I’d place links to their sites from all these shady sources and they would get de-indexed. Of course, it doesn’t work that way.
All of those links would likely be discounted but it is hard to imagine that Google would destroy a site because of something that is clearly beyond a webmaster’s control AND can be so easily gamed. Same thing goes for duplicate content but that is another discussion.
At the end of the day, inbound links is one of the main criteria that Google looks at when rating your site. I’m not suggesting that you spam to get as many links as possible but I am saying that you shouldn’t worry about getting too many links too quickly.
These are called viral campaigns (people pass around great content) and the number of links to a site increases immediately. This the nature of good marketing on the web and Google expects this to happen. They are not going to penalize you for it.
Nov 21, 2010
Posted in Marketing Ideas
Everyone talks about search engine optimization and how to get a site to the top of the search rankings. SEO experts go around and around in circles debating what Google may or may not be thinking and make every possible excuse not to do something.
I hear it every day. “If that site links to us, Google may not like us anymore” or “We can’t get too many links at once or Google won’t like us anymore.” It drives me absolutely crazy because everyone is just pontificating rather than testing and seeing what works and what doesn’t.
So what does work? I’m glad you asked. Creating good content works and it will always work. Google has always been consistent in the fact that it will reward sites with good content. When a site has good content other sites will mention it and link to it. That is why Google puts such an importance on incoming links.
At the same time your customers and future customers will appreciate you putting out valuable information. And I’m not just talking about good content on your site. You can post helpful information on Facebook, in forums or any of hundreds of social media sites. When people find this content they’ll pass it around.
They’ll tweet about it, they’ll friend you and they’ll send it to their friends and colleagues in their social networks. Guess what all of that does? Right! It creates more and more links and more and more actual traffic back to your website.
Let’s quit trying to ‘game’ Google. Google likes good content and your customers like good content. And at the end of the day, creating good, helpful content is a whole lot more rewarding and enjoyable than buying links or begging site owners to link to you.
What you may be asking is what constitutes good content. That part is easy. Solve your customers’ problems. Whatever you sell – whether it is a product or a service – solves some kind of a problem.
Every day you probably get the same questions over and over about whatever it is that you do. Those are your Frequently Asked Questions or FAQs. Answer those freely both on your site and on remote sites.
If you’re a business owner I know that you’re the expert in your field. Share that expertise whenever and wherever you can online. That effort and the fact that you’re actively and willingly helping people will come back to you in droves.
Nov 20, 2010
Posted in Marketing Ideas
With the end of the year just around the corner and the holiday rush almost upon us you might be thinking that there isn’t enough time left in the year to boost the search rankings of your website. That isn’t the case. Follow these five easy steps and watch the love Google will give your site.
- Structure your site properly. Make sure all of the pages of your site are within two clicks of your home page. Include your keywords in title tags and descriptions and always link your pages together using your main keywords in your links. We geeks call this ‘anchor text’ and it is what Google uses to determine what that page is about.
- Submit a sitemap to Google and the other search engines. It is shocking how many sites Google doesn’t even know about. If your site is built on WordPress or another major CMS system, this will be done automatically for you. If it isn’t you’ll have to submit your sitemap manually. Either way, make sure it is done.
- Get more links to your site. The number and quality of other sites that link to you is the primary factor that Google looks at when ranking your website. It is important to get both a lot of links through social bookmarking, social networking sites and directories but also to get high authority sites to link to you. Press releases and guest blogging both work well for getting high quality links.
- Get social. Many SEO services providers don’t believe that links from sites like Facebook and Twitter count for much but they’re wrong. All links to your site count and leveraging social media is smart. If one person with a large following likes your site it can be passed along through thousands of followers. This doesn’t only increase the number of links to your site but also immediately boost the direct traffic to your site.
- Be helpful. Offer suggestions on forums and provide helpful comments on blogs. Drop in links to your site when they are relevant but provide value to the community first and foremost. Yes, links are important but you’ll be shocked to see your links and direct traffic soar as a result of just being nice.
At the end of the day, the Internet is called the Information Super Highway for a good reason. People are snooping around the web looking for answers to their problems, questions and concerns. When you provide the best solutions you’ll quickly become recognized as the expert in your particular area and guess what? People love to do business with experts. They will come to you and they’ll pay your asking price. They’ll pass around the information you provide to their friends and colleagues and all of this buzz will continue to increase the number of links back to your site. As a result, your search rankings will improve AND you’ll discover than helping people feels pretty darn good too.
Jul 15, 2010
Posted in Marketing Ideas
Here is a very common scenario. You decide that you need a website so you pay good money to have someone design and build a site for your business. You go back and forth with the designer getting everything looking the way you want it to and a month later you have a sparkling new website.
You are excited and you show it off to your friends and family.
Another month passes and you notice that your shiny new website isn’t exactly producing stellar results. You do a Google search on a number of search terms that your potential customers may be entering to find your services and you don’t see your site coming up on the first page of results. Or the second. Or the third.
You take a look at your website traffic logs and you see that your site is getting ZERO visitors. It looks great and contains awesome information but nobody would ever know this because it isn’t being seen by anyone. For all intensive purposes your website is lost in Cyberspace.
This is such a common problem it isn’t even funny. Fortuntely, the solution is simple. Your site must be structured properly right from the get-go so that Google and the other search engines know that a) it exists and b) what your site is about so they know how to rank it.
Rather than going through the entire process of website repair here I’d rather refer you to a report I wrote specifically to address this very problem. It is a short read and yep, it is free. You can download my report by visiting WebsiteRepairTips.com
Check it out and let me know what you think, ok?
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