Search Engine Optimisation is a fickle business, I hear moans all the time from “seo experts” and website owners that Google did this and Bing did that and subsequently they have no visitors … oh this is the hardest year ever to be an SEO … etc.

Whilst not denying this year and the previous few years have been challenging for our industry I do wonder if these people expected an easy ride to high rankings … or if more likely, they had no idea what was going to happen.

This post is about just that, predicting what will have and what to expect over the next 6 to 12 months. Both in terms of SEO, Social Media and other wise, this post is about what I think will change / occur over this period. At the end, let me know what you think of my list of trends for SEO in 2012.

Trends of SEO in 2012

Humans Make Search Rankings – in 2012 a lot of people will be upset at the end of an era of link buying, swapping and baiting. Search Engines will look more and more to humans for ranking, both in the short and long terms – this means both social media and using more human relevancy quality testers (aka someone decides which category a page belongs to or if it’s spam). Google is already using such factors for more “real-time” search, this is the short term aspect to some extent, so expect to see links with long term longevity on social networks rank higher and web page links plus pagerank matter less and less.
Authority in the Hands of the People!.

Quality NOT Quantity – almost all search engines have been known to at some point use quantity of pages to mean the quality is high. Most now do not, and with Google Panda 2 even more focus is on the quality and freshness of the content. This matches in with point one of social longevity being the key, as it means the quality must be pretty good.

SEO’s are no longer just SEO’s! – this is a prediction I made in conversation last year, and I was right, 2011 did see the expansion of what it meant to be an SEO engineer. 2012 will see a different transformation, though along the same lines. In 2012 SEO’s will become more SMO’s (social media optimisers), with a broader focus not just on the on-page factors of SEO but also the off-site marketing with social integration at it’s heart.

SEO’s will realise CRO’s are better – those optimising for traffic will be upset when they get the firing from customers because for all the traffic they can drive they don’t get conversions. Conversions in 2012 will be more important, if traffic doesn’t convert you won’t get paid as an SEO … so become a CRO (conversion rate optimiser) and keep your clients happy – don’t just drive traffic, drive conversions.

Even More Confusion! – 2011 saw lots of great SEO’s crawl around on their knees picking up the pieces in confusion. Lots of this year’s search updates (especially by Google) have stumped a fair few SEO’s – this is where their claim it has been the hardest year yet for SEO’s has come from. Well the bad news is, for those confused at least, it is only going to get worse for you in 2012. With Google now holding keys to a great social network you can expect more undercover changes in rankings and more personalisation of search, making the job of the “old style seo” much harder. Sorry you guys, get with the times.

Speech Search will be Normalised – with the iPhone now having Siri and Google long having it’s own system (which incidentally I believe is far superior if they would only leverage the power of it) searching using voice will become everyday. No longer will you get an odd look for saying “Search Cats Homes” randomly to your phone. I also foresee a better QR tagging system coming along, and I don’t mean Microsoft Tag! I mean something a little more intuitive and easier to use … maybe it will be nicer barcodes or maybe something else, rumours are many so watch out for that.

Mobile Search will be Huge! – whether it’s through talking to your phone, using social networks or tapping a search into your phone, in 2012 you can expect a huge expansion in the mobile search market. No longer is digital marketing for those who have a computer or tablet … mobile search is here to stay and this will likely get to be the biggest search medium in 2012 (I believe).

It’s not yet Telepathy but it’s close – As both Bing and Google grow further in 2012, their links with social networks (google having its own and bing having large facebook integration) along with search histories, social profiles linked to a signed in user etc you can expect search to become much more personalised. By the end of the year I’d expect to see a lot more people worrying about personal privacy, but more website owners concerned with the fact they can’t be found on social networks … these websites will drop like stones as search becomes more personalised and timely.

Trends of Social Media in 2012

Facebook continues to push but falters – in 2012 you can expect to see more privacy issues around Facebook and what it is doing. You can expect facebook to feel more like a gated community with more people having less friends, rather than the previous attitude of more friends is better. You can also expect people to have dual profiles if they are “personalities” or in essence are a business. (see Leo Laporte as a great example of a public and non-public profile. If you are interested in this kind of thing I recommend reading Public Parts, a book by Jeff Jarvis which is about living life in public and how to do it.) But because Facebook continues to push and has more issues, plus the growth of other social networks it will falter and on top of loosing 6m users in the US in 2011 it will see 2 or 3 times this in 2012. Oh and this subscribe to follow thing they have will become a part of history.

Google+ will stay small – as a Google fanboy it hurts me to say that although not another complete failure by Google, Google+ will stay pretty small … it will grow yes but I would suggest to a maximum of 2% of the social networks area (currently at about 0.5%). The only thing which could change this prediction would be a change in the network for businesses which would make it more appealing for them to be on there, the brand pages are currently (and for the foreseeable future) the same as normal profiles, there are no vanity urls (they will come in 2012) but regardless I suspect G+ is set to stay small… for now.

Linking Social Networks will begin to die (again) - It started in 2012 as delicious and other such networks began to get smaller. Digg and Reddit are main-stayers in the arena and wills survive 2012 but other such networks like Slash.Dot may well die off completely. This will also happen to networks such as Quora. I say they will die, before they do they will get swallowed by a bigger fish, for all its worth.

Trends of Blogging in 2012

An End to Corporate Blogging? – no quite. Corporate Blogging will cease being a portal simply to tell the world (or not) about boring corporate crap. It will become an area of sharing news and behind the scenes info. It will become a more open area where companies aren’t scared that if they say something a competitor will thieve an idea! A more open attitude will also begin to appear between companies sharing research and data (that isn’t commercially sensitive), such as pre-trial drug information from pharmaceutical companies.

Mini Blogs Go BOOM – 2010 and 2011 has seen a huge growth in smaller “micro blogs” thanks to tumblr and other such networks. In 2012 this trend will continue as more “normal” people begin to share things in public, not just using facebook (soon to be close gated).

Companies Scrap Blogging – many companies in 2012 will cease to blog on a daily or weekly basis, favouring to spend time and money more on social networking. (if you want to know where to spend your time in social networking for business read our recent post on this). This will be the beginning of the middle bit (yes its already started) of the end of the blogging world as we know it.

More Blogs will Go Video / Audio – In what maybe an odd thing to say for someone typing this article, more blogs will turn to multimedia in 2012. We will see more networks spring up, like the TWiT.TV network. Indeed, this very site will be taking to video-blogging / netcasting / podcasting in early 2012 as we continue to grow. We will also see a huge growth in the YouTube like services, but we’ll also see some audio based start-ups go big like AudioBoo. It will be an exciting time to be in the world of multimedia and blogging.

Trends of Search Analytics in 2012

Bye Bye Referrer Keywords – Google has already begun hiding keywords from Google Analytics. This is a trend that will boom across platforms in 2012, which will move the focus away from “ranking for keywords” towards “ranking for relevance and conversion” … aka more of a concentration on quality and conversion.

Rankings Die … but Slowly – as mentioned earlier in passing, Rankings will begin to die as Search Moves to be more “now” and “social”. This means because of our human way of being lazy it will begin to get harder to get none personalised results. Already +1′s are moving up search pages, latest news / blogs appear higher up, even if they are less relevant. In 2012 this will happen more and more, until eventually Search Rankings become relative to a person – this will add to the effect of concentration on conversion.

RealTime Analytics Takes Off (at last) – for years many competitors to Google Analytics have offered RealTime results, 2011 saw Google catch up somewhat. In 2012 you cane expect lots more features to be made realtime by Google as rankings matter less and keywords mean less. Will we see realtime rankings for “white searches” I doubt that, but we will get more data than ever before, and it will still be free (unlike most competitors).

Can you think of any more trends for 2012 that I have missed off the list? And what do you think of this list, will my prediction come true or not?

PayPal, seeking to challenge Groupon Inc. and LivingSocial.com in the market for daily deals, plans to start offering coupons tailored to users’ buying habits and cell-phone locations.

The San Jose company, which is owned by eBay, will make its first foray into mobile deals in the first quarter of 2012, partnering with some of the top 200 U.S. merchants, PayPal President Scott Thompson said. PayPal is chasing a daily-coupon market that could more than double to $4.17 billion by 2015, according to research firm BIA/Kelsey.

PayPal will use its knowledge about customers’ preferences to develop coupons better than LivingSocial and Groupon with targeted offers that arrive on users’ smart phones as they’re passing stores, Thompson said. By moving into deals, PayPal can make more money from its 103 million members, helping it close in on a goal of revenue as high as $7 billion by 2013, compared with $3.4 billion in 2010.

‘Completely different’

“The experience is going to be completely different than anyone else’s through and through,” Thompson said. “We’ll only give you something that we think fits the category of unique and relevant. Everyone else is going to bombard you.”

PayPal’s services help retailers and individuals exchange funds for purchases or payments, even without a credit card. It already counts Target Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co. and Best Buy Co. as customers for transactions, and 103 million people have accounts for paying using its system.

Daily-deal sites send coupons for discounted goods and services such as groceries, classes or salon treatments to subscribers via e-mail and keep a portion of the revenue from each sale. Though the business is growing, market leaders Groupon and LivingSocial will be tough to topple, said David Spitz, president of ChannelAdvisor, a consulting company.

Groupon and LivingSocial had a combined market share of 73 percent in October, according to an estimate from Yipit, a website that aggregates online offers. Both companies offer real-time deals throughout the day. Groupon’s revenue will surge to $2.35 billion next year, up more than sevenfold from 2010, according to analysts’ estimates.

A head start

PayPal also wants to use mobile deals to get a head start in wireless payments, as credit-card companies collaborate to create a standard using what is called near-field communication technology. Such a standard could be years out and require merchants to change their point-of-sale technology, said Thompson, who worked for a unit of Visa Inc. before joining PayPal in 2005.

As part of the larger push into wireless payments, PayPal will offer what it calls a mobile wallet – usable through phone applications or a PayPal card, or even a name and personal-identification number – that holds a consumer’s information from credit and debit cards from multiple providers.

PayPal will give users the option to choose which provider they want to use to pay for as long as 30 days after the sale, depending on the merchant, as a way to differentiate its system, Thompson said. To spur more sales, PayPal has a team of engineers working to create the smartest coupon yet, he said.

A location-based offer may be the way to maintain engagement, as consumers are more apt to stay glued to the phone if it means they’re getting a deal, Spitz said.

The coupons are supposed to keep customers using eBay beyond the payment process, with the goal of helping the online marketplace widen its user base. More than 95 percent of shoppers still choose to drive to the mall rather than buy online, and e-commerce accounted for just 4.6 percent of the total retail market in the third quarter, according to the Commerce Department.

Internet retailers such as Amazon.com Inc. are also vying for online shoppers’ attention with price-comparison applications and online daily deals.

Ubiquitous

The broader goal is to make PayPal as ubiquitous in stores as cards issued by companies such as Visa, Thompson said. PayPal is working with all of the top 200 U.S. retailers and has persuaded a “significant” number in that group to sign contracts to accept PayPal in their stores.

Installation requires programming at existing point-of-sale terminals, but no change in hardware, he said.

Gaining share in the in-store and mobile-payments market might be easier said than done, as merchants try to figure out the best option among pitches by top credit-card companies and technology companies such as Google Inc., which are all trying to create the next payment standard, Spitz said.

“It probably will be complicated for a while and for the near-term may limit the market opportunity,” Spitz said. “Until there’s a critical mass such that a standard emerges, you may not see enough retailers adopt it.”

Non-bounce rates remained strong at 96.5%, while average volume per client increased by 14.9% from Q3 2010.

Consumer Products CPG Boasts Best Click Rate

Among the categories examined, consumer products CPG (8.1%) had the best click rate, joining the financial services general (6.9%), financial services CC/banks (6.1%), and consumer services general (4.8%) categories in posting an increase of at least 5% compared to Q3 2010. The retail general (6.6%), travel/hospitality travel services (4.5%), and retail apparel (3.8%) categories all experienced year-over-year decreases of at least 5%.

The highest open rates were in the financial services CC/banks (38.6%), financial services general (32.5%), and retail general (27.8%) categories, while the best click to open rates (CTOR) were experienced by the consumer products CPG (43%), consumer publishing/media general (36.9%), and consumer services telecom (31.1%) categories.

Mobile Platforms Catching Up

Meanwhile, mobile platforms appear to be gaining ground when it comes to email viewership, earning 23% of views from April 2011 through September 2011, representing a 34% increase compared to the previous 6-month period, according to [download page] a December 2011 report from ReturnPath. Webmail (44%) and desktop (33%) remained more popular platforms for reading email, but decreased by 11% and more than 9% respectively.

According to a report released in November 2011 by Knotice, the share of all email opens occurring on mobile devices reached 20.24% in the first half of 2011, representing 51% growth from 13.36% in Q4 2010. iPhones accounted for 12.78% of all email opens in H1, up from 8.74% in Q4 2010, while iPads nearly doubled their share, up from 2% to 3.92% during the same time period.

ReturnPath also found growing use of iPads: email views on the device jumped by 12% between March, when the iPad 2 launched, and April, and then grew 73% between April and September.

Day of Week Affects Email Usage

ReturnPath’s research indicates a big dip in desktop email usage over the weekend, with a corresponding rise in mobile and webmail use. However, contrary to the prior 6-month period, which found a jump in webmail use on Sunday and a dip in mobile, the latest data found mobile and webmail use to be largely consistent on both Saturday and Sunday.

Other Findings

• According to ReturnPath’s report, Outlook accounted for 63% of desktop email opens, more than double Apple Mail’s share (31%).
• Webmail views were highest among the finance (49%), shopping (48%), and travel industries (45%), while desktop views were highest among the software (48%) and automotive (47%) industries. Mobile views were largely consistent among industries, with the highest rates seen in the entertainment (27%), social networking (27%), and publishing (26%) industries.

About the Data: The Epsilon study was compiled from 5.7 billion emails sent by Epsilon in Q3 2011, across multiple industries and approximately 140 participating clients. The ReturnPath study used data from more than 200 different clients and examined more than 400 million data points. For email views by industry, the report looked at a subset of the 200 clients that fit into the categories reported.

10 Free SEO Tools

Whenever I meet with a potential SEO client we talked about the importance of choosing the correct keywords. After further explanation of keywords, and the affects of SEO, I’m usually able to walk away from the meeting with a signed contract.

However, on occasion, in an effort to keep my clients costs down, some decide to do their own keyword research and even handle their own page optimization. Some clients are capable of undertaking such tasks. However, I always provide some guidance, to my client, with respect to doing their keyword research.

Here are a few ideas I share with my clients that they should keep in their mind when selecting keywords:

1. Brainstorm a list of keywords someone might use to find the product/service that you’re offering.
2. Use a keyword tool finder (http://www.wordtracker.com/) to see how many searches have been done on these keywords.
3. The keyword tool will also make suggestions of related keywords to try (don’t disregard all suggestions).
4. Conduct searches of your selected keywords (use quotation marks around your search term for stronger results) in Google, Yahoo, and MSN to see who else is out there.
5. Evaluate the popularity of the sites you discover by checking out their Google Page Rank and Alexa ranking.
6. Is regional search important to your company, i.e. city and state?
7. Try to keep each page of your company’s web site focused on one (1) or two (2) keywords, NO more than three (3).

Choosing keywords that are attainable, yet ones that still provide a reasonable search frequency for your particular industry, is of utmost importance. The selection of your keyword phrase should be targeted to help you bring qualified traffic to your site.

Keywords are (and I’ll steal a tag line from an old Ford commercial) “job one”. However, there are many on-site factors that play a role in your search engine rankings.

In my opinion, and according to a some SEO experts, the most important elements of your web site, with regards to search results on Google, is the title tag. The title tag is almost always the heading Google chooses for each of its listings. With that in mind, make sure you have your keyword phrase in your title tag.

Don’t disregard the Meta Description tag. It is still used, occasionally, by Google as the description which appears in the search results themselves. While this used to be a more common practice, Google tends to use it most often on sites with very limited content, or those which are flash based. This is still an important element of your web page.

With respect to the overall ranking of your site, keyword density plays the most important role; however, it is not as cut and dry as it once was. At one time there was a magic number that, when used, could almost guarantee top rankings.

Today, this is no longer the case. The ideal density varies from industry to industry, and phrase to phrase. If you want to find the density you should aim for, take the top 10 or 20 search results for your keyword phrase, and see what percentage of keywords those sites are using. I’m sure if you aim for the percentage (of keywords) that these sites are using, you’ll wind up in the ballpark.

Sprinkle your keyword phrases in your content. Start as close to the top of the page as possible, and continue to use your phrase throughout the page, sticking with your optimum percentage. Do not overwhelm the search engine spiders and site visitors with a bombardment of targeted phrases, rather use them in a natural, meaningful, and strategic fashion.

Never forget synonyms! Yes, synonyms, for your target phrases, are also very effective when it comes to SEO. So make sure you use them within your body text on your site. Google uses these synonyms to tie in the overall relevance of the page for your main target phrases, which can improve your page ranking.

39% of consumers would like to receive emails weekly from retailers with whom they have opted in, according to [ a November 2011 white paper from MarketLive and the e-tailing group. Data from the “2011 Merchant Guide to Maximizing Sales” indicates that this is more than double the proportion indicating the second-most preferred option, twice a month, and triple that of the third-most preferred choice, 2-6 times a week. In fact, more consumers would prefer to receive emails on a monthly basis (13%) than on a daily basis (8%). Retailers ought to pay heed to these preferences: according to a February 2011 report from Exact Target and coTweet, the most common complaint given by consumers as a reason they unsubscribed from a company’s permission-based emails was that they came too frequently (54%). Another 49% (more than one answer permitted to the question) cited the content becoming boring or repetitive over time. Receiving too many emails closely followed, cited by 47% of respondents.

Majority Will Shop on Black Friday

52% of respondents to the Marketlive/etailing group survey plan to shop online on Black Friday, closely followed by the proportion who plan to be in buying mode the weekend after Thanksgiving (51%) and on Cyber Monday (50%). By contrast, just 26% plan to shop online the day before Thanksgiving, compared to 24% who will shop the day after Christmas.

2 in 5 Will Stick to Deals

According to the report, 37% of consumers claim they will not pay full price for gifts over the holiday season under any circumstances. 32% say they would be swayed to purchase a gift at full price if it appeared perfect for someone on their list, while 28% say they would pay full price for items that never go on sale. Just 19% of consumers would pay full price when receiving free shipping on their order, while even less would be influenced by a store where they received rewards points for their purchase (15%) or by excellent customer service coupled with the right product (14%).

In-Store Search Most Popular Device Activity

When asked how likely they would be to engage in certain behaviors via mobile phone or related devices over the holiday season, 9% of consumers say that purchasing gifts as a result of a text message is one of their top 2 very or somewhat likely activities, matched by the proportion who attribute the same importance to purchasing gifts from a mobile phone. In-store searches appear to resonate most with consumers: 14% cite researching gifts on a mobile phone during a store visit as a top 2 very or somewhat likely activity, slightly ahead of those researching gifts on their mobile phone prior to a store visit (12%).

About the Data: The MarketLive/e-tailing group findings are based on an online survey of 1,021 consumers in September 2011. Respondents were evenly split between men and women who had shopped online four or more times in the past year and typically spend $250 or more online annually.

In addition, visitors to coupon websites expect to spend an average of $1,651 online in the next 12 months compared to $1,428 for the typical online shopper. Visitors to coupon websites also make 18% more online purchases than the average online shopper. On average, typical shoppers indicated making 11 online purchases in the past six months, compared to visitors to coupon websites who indicated making 13 online purchases in the past six months.

Online Coupons Close the Deal

Visitors to coupon websites are more likely than the average online shopper to be influenced by an online coupon or promotion code. In fact, 88% of visitors to coupon websites versus 78% of all respondents agreed with the statement that coupons “close the deal” for them when they are undecided on a purchase.

Active Online Coupon Users More Brand Receptive

Active online coupon users are almost 1.5 times more likely than light coupon users to try a new brand and/or switch brands — 74% to 54% and 61% to 43%, respectively. This implies that the more shoppers use coupons, the more open they are to trial.

In addition, within the total U.S. online population, 80% of respondents indicated that a company that offers online coupons improves its brand image. In addition, 88% of all respondents said that they had “positive feelings” toward a brand that offers coupons.

While this research bolsters the argument that online coupons and promotion codes in general help, rather than hurt, a company’s brand image, Forrester cautions that research also shows that over-couponing and/or stale promotions can have the effect of tarnishing a company’s brand image..

Online Coupon Use Rises

The usage of online coupons by US consumers is increasing, according to other survey results which indicate 66% of consumers will use online coupons for at least 25% of their purchases in the next 12 months, a 20% increase from 55% who used online coupons for at least 25% of their purchases in the last 12 months. This includes a 19% jump in consumers who will use online coupons for 25-50% of their purchases in the next 12 months (26% to 31%) and a 21% increase in consumers who will use online coupons for 50% or more of their purchases in the next 12 months (29% to 35%).

About the Data: In this study, Forrester surveyed 504 US-based coupon users and interviewed five e-commerce executives from large companies across various industries (clothing and apparel, home and garden, food and entertainment, and travel) who are currently responsible for online couponing to evaluate their perceptions and understanding of the online coupon market. The study began in July 2011 and was completed in August 2011.

The report focuses on failed social media promotional efforts of three brands: EasyJet, Microsoft and American Express. A brief summary of each effort follows.

EasyJet Parody Ad Fails to Take Off

UK airline EasyJet released a poster on its Facebook page in September 2011 in response to a British Airways marketing campaign. The poster featured a “To Fly. To Save” slogan, mimicking British Airways’ “To Fly. To Serve” motto featured in its campaign. The page’s community manager asked users to let them know what you think and reaction has been very mixed.

As with other social media parody/satire campaigns analyzed by WaveMetrix, EasyJet’s post seems to have backfired, as consumers jumped to the defense of British Airways. More than half of comments about EasyJet were negative, as consumers criticized the “bitchy” poster. In contrast, more than three-quarters of comments about British Airways were positive, as consumers defended its “great ad.” WaveMetrix says this suggests that brands should refrain from using social media campaigns which attempt to tarnish a competitor’s reputation, in order to avoid the risk of a negative backlash.

Reaction to Microsoft Ad Not Petty

A viral online attack ad released in summer 2011 that was intended to promote Microsoft’s Office 365 email service and reveal the weaknesses of Gmail instead resulted in consumers branding Microsoft as “petty” and largely ignoring the merits of Office 365, which WaveMetrix says demonstrates the drawbacks of negative campaigns to marketers.

Negative comments on the Microsoft brand made up 40% of consumer discussion about the ad. In contrast, only 6% of discussion focused on Office365.

Amex Seen as Self-serving Instead of Charitable

In September 2011, American Express invited UK Twitter users to share the things that inspire them and has promised to donate to the Prince’s Trust charity for every tweet or retweet containing the hashtag #AmexBeInspired. WaveMetrix analysis reveals that almost half of all posts generated by the “Be Inspired” charity campaign are about the American Express brand itself, and the majority of these posts are negative.

While many tweeters used the #AmexBeInspired hashtag for its intended purpose, a large number of others posted sarcastic, angry comments about the American Express brand and their scepticism surrounding the charity campaign. WaveMetrix analysis indicates this suggests that brands that pledge to make a donation for every retweet, tag or Facebook like they receive risk angering consumers, who sometimes feel the donation should be made regardless.

Fan Involvement Aids SocNet Rebranding

Brands should consider their existing fan base when rebranding or launching new goods via social media, according to other results from “Q3 2011 Benefits and Limits of a Social Media Fanbase” which indicate successful brands involve fans in social media rebranding efforts rather than trying to force a positive response.

Search engines have two types of listings: those that are paid for, which are usually distinguished as “sponsored links” and those that are organic.

To the right is a screen shot of a Google® search results page. The listings in red are paid ads, and the listings in the green area are organic results.

Organic Listings
Organic search engine listings are those that appear down the middle of the page. Search engine optimization services are devoted to optimizing sites to appear in the organic listings space. See the diagram above to see where organic listings and paid listings appear in the Google search engine results page.

Spider-driven search engines such as Google®, Yahoo!® and MSN® use “robots” or “crawlers” to score websites across the Internet. Robots “spider/crawl” each site and “score” pages based on how relevant they are. A website’s score or placement within a spider driven search engine is derived from hundreds of variables such as link popularity, density and frequency of keywords in page content, HTML code, site themes and more. You will want to focus many criteria in your SEO strategy to position yourself well among the major search engines. Here are two of the most influential factors:

1. Link Popularity
   Spider-driven search engines use robots to spider websites across the Internet by traveling through links from web page to web page. A website’s score or placement within a spider driven search engine is derived from hundreds of variables such as, link popularity, click popularity, keyword density, website themes and more.

   Google is the most popular spider-driven search engine. Its database currently has about 4 billion pages indexed and is known for finding the most relevant information. When Google spiders the Web, it finds sites by traveling through links. The more sites that link to you, the more important the engines believe your content to be. You should focus on getting many important sites to link to your site. You can do this in many ways: submit to online directories, exchange links with business partners and industry-related sites, or participate in Link Building.

2. Page Content
   Search engine spiders can only spider through text. They will use the content on your site to determine what your site is about, which in turn will help to decide how highly your site will be ranked for specific keyword phrases when visitors type them into the search engines. For this reason, keyword research is critical to obtaining natural search engine placement and should be at the top of your list when mapping out your SEO strategy.

   You will need to know how many people are searching for your keyword phrases and what kind of competition you are facing when attempting to obtain a top spot in the search results. Keyword research, text writing, submissions and site analysis are all included with our search engine optimization packages.

Why Search Engine Optimization?
Studies have proven that top placement in search engines generally provide a more favorable return on investment compared to traditional forms of advertising such as, snail mail, radio commercials and television. Search engine optimization is the primary method to earning top 10 search engine placement. Learn more about the search engine optimization process and discuss an SEO strategy for your site when you contact a search engine specialist today.

Paid Listings
Yahoo!’s Pay-Per-Plick (PPC) Program shows paid ads at the top and right of the results pages. websites that show up here bid on keyword phrases and pay Yahoo!® a small fee each time the ad is clicked on. The more you bid per phrase the higher your ad will appear on the results page. Yahoo! PPC is a great way to help drive traffic quickly to your website. You can set a daily budget. When you max out your budget, Yahoo! will pull your ad for the remainder of the day.

A comprehensive search engine marketing campaign may encompass both organic optimization for long-term success and a pay per click campaign for immediate results. Feel free to contact a search engine marketing consultant at 1-877-438-8599. We can help put together a marketing strategy for your site’s needs.

Each organic search engine ranking places emphasis on variable factors such as the design and layout, keyword density and the number of relevant sites linking to it. Search engines constantly update and refine their ranking algorithms in order to index the most relevant sites. Other variables that have an impact on search engine placement include the following:

SEO Keyword Research: Choosing the right keywords is critical to SEO success.
301 Redirect: The primary search engine friendly way to redirect your domain name.
Link Popularity: Work to increase traffic by exchanging or achieving links from many high-ranking sites.

Many companies wrap paid search into their behavioral targeting programs due to the ease of directing traffic to targeted landing pages built specifically for the goals of those campaigns. Needless to say, many large organizations get lost in a sea of customized landing pages or microsites that are completely separate from the main architecture of their website, which are often left un-optimized and blocked from displaying in organic search. By having a dynamic UI on your main website, you are able to deliver the same personalized content that would appear on those microsites, regardless if they’re arriving from paid or organic search, while gaining better insight into the conversion path of your consumers.

A few primary areas of alignment are critical to ensure effective connections between your SEO and behavioral marketing program.

Syncing SEO Keywords With User Segmentation

In the early phases of an SEO initiative, keyword research is conducted, pulling insight from your analytics and paid search campaigns, competitive research in the industry your products and services are categorized in, as well as factoring in that industry’s “breakouts” and trends. These keywords are taken and applied throughout your website, optimizing the metadata, on-page copy, and navigation, in a holistic attempt to drive users from search to the most relevant page on your website. We look at optimizing for unbranded general terms such as “cruises” that are a bit more broad but have a higher search volume, as well as more specific long-tail terms such as “How do you choose which cruise line is right for me?” that drive less traffic but have a higher conversion rate. Similarly, looking at branded keywords driving traffic to your site is a good indication into the segments you’re targeting. Terms such as “Company Name Cruises” versus “Company Name Deals” are two very different groups of people. An effective keyword strategy takes into account the context of search terms such as these when optimizing on-site features of the website.

Simultaneously, when setting up a behavioral marketing program, you first have to identify the various segments of users that you are trying to reach. On top of the specific messaging you want to present them with, and the calls-to-action that you would like them to take, you need to ensure that the page is displaying that content effectively enough to capture the user’s attention. Both of these programs are based on delivering users to the most suitable page that has relevant content that will lead them through to conversion. Your SEO keyword strategy should be tied closely to the user segments you are targeting on your website. The terms outlined above should be mapped directly to specific pieces of content and calls-to-action on your optimized landing page. Search can drive users to a page, but after that, it is the website’s job to drive conversions. By having a seamless experience from the search engines through to the landing page, you are reassuring users that your website is right for them.

Delivering a Message Catered to Users

Your website should be constructed in a way that allows individual pages to be optimized, whether it’s your home page or top-level products or services, and that the page can be personalized to drive user engagement.

People are driven to search by a multitude of factors that are heavily influenced by their past experiences, many of which stem from being exposed to a brand message, conducting product comparisons, or even receiving a recommendation from a peer. From the most general keywords to more long-tail terms, we are able to identify what users are looking for and then the actions we know they will take. When all of this is synced closely to a retargeting program, we’re able to serve users the most relevant information based on their last interaction – no matter through what channel we are reaching them. It’s best to keep in mind that these individuals are in various stages of the buying cycle and are coming in with different states-of-mind. One static message may be relevant to users who saw your latest TV commercial, but it may be irrelevant to somebody who has been browsing through completely different products and services in the past.

The majority of your target consumers should be able to find the keywords that they searched for, as well as relevant content and messaging, based on the page they land on.

Through it all, if a user enters a website and is looking for specific information, they’ll either find what they’re looking for and dig a bit deeper or just drop off. We’re always looking for ways to attract users to a website, increase on-site engagement once they’re there, and then lead them down the path to a conversion. Search is just one portion of your overall behavioral targeting program, but keyword strategy is a component that should be incorporated into the messaging of all your online campaigns in order to influence users in each channel while maintaining a consistent message. Though you can’t directly tie revenue to SEO initiatives, this is a way for companies to tie their SEO programs closer to the aspects of online marketing directly tied into sales.