Well, I am happy to report that my main homepage for our Online Marketplace, ESalesGuru.com jumped from a Google PR of 3 to 5 this week! Yes, I know, Page Rank is not everything, but a  2 point jump in a week is a positive step towards Search Engine Supremacy in my market segment!

With the Page Rank jump, I spent some time this week reflecting on the SEO tasks and activites we had performed over the past few months that might have helped the cause here. Now, before I share my "Simple Truth" (and I mean simple), I must make the disclaimer that I am not a Search Engine Optimization Guru in any way, shape or form. Yes, I read a lot of Search Marketing blogs, ebooks, ezines etc…, but am really just trying to keep up with this rapidly evolving industry like every other business.

Now, as I reviewed our many activities, it all came down to this one simple truth: A steady steam of relevant and keyword-targeted content was the cornerstone to our Search Engine Optimization success! You are probably saying to yourself, "Craig, you are a rocket-scientist, this is revolutionary - NOT! Everybody knows that "Content is King". Yes, content is king no doubt, but what separates the successful SEO campaigns from the medeocre ones is the ability to produce the RIGHT content with the RIGHT keywords via the RIGHT distribution channels. This is where certain web companies leave others in the dust! Not to say that we have arrived with our own SEO efforts, but we are certainly starting to reap the benefits of our content creation and distribution strategies.

I would say right now that 70%+ of our content distribution has occurred via a multitude of Social Media channels, such as Scribd, Digg, Squidoo and Delicious. The other 30% has been focussed on Article Syndication using such tools at ArticleMarketer as well as manual submission to industry-specific article directories.  In looking at our recent results, we have big plans in 2008 to escalate our content writing and syndication via powerful new social media outlets such as Hubpages. There is definitely a Big Web 2.0 Wave that each of us can ride for a time that will be instrumental in improving our SE results.

 For those of you that are still trying to ascertain what keywords you need to be optimizing your content for, I would suggest a couple quick strategies:

1. We started regularly using Word Tracker to find those long-tail keywords that saw the best volume but had the fewest competitors. It does take some some time to separate the wheat from the chaff, but well worth it! You can also use other tools like Keyword Discovery and SEOdigger to help the cause as well. Also, I had featured Hittail a couple weeks back - another great tool that idenfies those long-tail keywords (3-4+ keyword phrases) you might consider using in your blog posts, articles and website content.

2.  I would run a PPC campaign via Google (and possibly Yahoo and MSN) and identify those particular keywords that are converting at the highest level over a period of time and start to optimize those in your website content and syndicate articles and such based around those keywords. This can take 2-3+ months to determine, but again, well worth it in order to target the most relevant keywords for your site and user audience.

In my next post, I am going to outline the most effective traditional and Social Media channels for distributing your relevant content. Have a great weekend everyone!

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If I could be painfully honest, I would have to say that one of the biggest headaches I experience in my business is the ever-changing and highly unpredictable world of Search Engine Optimization. I am an avid reader of Search Marketing trends and still find it difficult at times to stay ahead of the curve.

As you know I am a huge advocate for the Outsourcing of Search Marketing Tasks, primarily because I have personally reaped the benefits of recruiting outside Search Marketing Experts to bolster the success of my campaigns. In 2006, Marketing Sherpa conducted SEO research with 2000 marketers whose sites had been optimized and it revealed the following:

• Marketers who use in-house SEO resources saw a 73% lift in overall traffic
• Marketers who outsourced SEO to an expert saw an average of 110% increase in overall site traffic.

Okay, I will stop preaching the virtues of outsourcing  your Search Marketing tasks!

Whether you choose to outsource or to keep your SE efforts in house, I would HIGHLY recommend an invaluable SEO resource I purchased the other day. SEOBook.com is a 328 page PDF that is full of many nuggets of wisdom for building a successful SEO platform for your business. The great thing about the  resource is that the author, Aaron Wall, updates the content on a regular basis. This is a major bonus, as I have purchased multiple hard-copies of SEO books, only to find that some of the content quickly becomes out-dated and not as relevant. I noticed that Aaron last updated the resource just in January.

For $79 US, you gain access to life-time updates of the SEObook, plus some very useful add-ons such as recommended SEO tools and interviews and resources from SEO and Internet Marketing gurus.

Now, although I outsource a lot of my SEO tasks, in order for me to effectively manage those specialists and projects, it is imperative that I remain in the know on current SEO practices. This is a KEY point when it comes to outsourcing… Some businesses fail to outsource effectively primarily cause they do not have an in-house project manager that has a good working knowledge of the outsourced project at hand - big no no!

I know that I certainly will not able to do all the tasks he includes in the book in-house, but by digesting this current SEO information, I will be in tune with the questions to ask and what to evaluate when managing my Outsourced Search Marketing Specialist.

I have to say that SeoBook.com will be the best $79 you will ever spend on your Search Engine Optimization endeavors… NO, I am not getting paid for this endorsement - this is just the plain truth!

 

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If you are an avid reader of our blog, then you will know that we are keenly interested in helping our readers to distinguish between the good, bad and ugly of SEO Firms on the Web. In fact, at ESalesGuru.com, we have specifically implemented a "Pre-Screening" process in our Outsourcing Portal to ensure that we are recruiting the best quality SEO and other Internet Marketing related specialists and firms in our marketplace.

Now, I am going to presume that not everyone is entirely familiar with the concept of White Hat or Black Hat SEO strategies. Quick Definitions….

Black Hat SEO strategies include particular methods of improving site rankings that are disapproved by the Search Engines and may involve deception. A few examples of black hat techniques include:

• Hidden text or links
• Cloaking or sneaky redirects (Cloaking is the process of delivering one version of a page to search engine spiders/bots and another version to human visitors
• multiple pages
• domains/sub-domains with duplicate content
• doorway pages with little or no content

On the flip side, White Hat SEO strategies include tactics that are approved by the Search Engines and do not involve any deception. White Hat practices are not just about following guidelines, but about ensuring the content a search engine indexes and ranks is the same content a user will see. White Hat SEO firms want to create content that is both user and spider friendly - key distinction.

Now, I am personally quite familiar with the use of black hat strategies as a couple of years, we had a super affiliate that was making killer revenues through a web of doorway pages. He had a good run for sometime, but eventually began to dip in performance as his cloak and dagger game with the SEs went south! Now, we eventually stopped working with this fellow as we recognized that these practices were not good for our product and ultimately could lead to us getting banned in Google. Google certainly does not discriminate who they ban from the SE’s as about a year ago, BMW Germany was black-listed by Google for using deceptive SEO Practices. BMW apologized and eventually was re-instated.

So, whether you are presently outsourcing your SEO campaigns or have plans to, it is important to ask yourself a couple key questions:

1. Is my SEO Firm employing BlackHat practices in attempts to enhance the performance of our campaigns?

2. If so, are you prepared to tow the line and risk the possibility that Google will eventually catch up and ban your site?

The reinstatement process with Google is not exactly a quick and dirty process, so I would think twice about being involved with a SEO Firm that appears to be employing Blackhat practices. Yes, Blackhat SEO experts are VERY smart and can potentially help you get some great rankings for sometime, but is that worth the potential ban of your site and the overall tarnishing of your company and image as a whole?

Most top SEO firms and specialists are commited to WhiteHat Practices, but closely evaluate those specialists that boast top rankings in a unusually short period of time as they might just be using deceptive practices that could hurt you in the long run…

Food for thought……

 

 

 

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