The key to better search rankings is content. "True success comes from driving buyers directly to the actual content they are looking for" (Scott, p. 399). Let's say you have a lifestyle and recipes blog and you want to drive traffic to your perfect margarita recipe because your are endorsing a new brand of tequila. If users are looking for the best place in their city to get a margarita, your blog is not the place they want to be. If they are looking for a margherita pizza recipe, your blog won't be of much help either. Attracting this type of traffic will only increase your bounce rate and won't sell any of that tequila either.To attract the right visitors, you need to be strategic in your choice of keywords. "Keyword phrases should be as specific to your company as possible and have an easy, conversational sound not a marketing vibe. Just consider how you search for things online" (Demers, 2014). You should strategically sprinkle keywords throughout your site and the landing page you are attempting to direct traffic to. If paying for optimization through Google Adwords, be careful in your choices. In the case of your margarita recipe, when trying to optimize your landing page, you might want to avoid general search terms such as "best margarita" or "perfect margarita," and consider more specific search terms, such as:
- homemade margarita recipe
- best margarita recipe
- make your own margarita
Do your research. What is already coming up in these searches? How can you do better? Using a long-tailed, specific approach will attract the right visitors to your site and lead to conversions, rather than bounces. "You don’t have to spend money on an SEO expert to dramatically improve your search visibility. Simple steps can achieve major SEO boosts. In the end, SEO is all about improving the usability and user experience of your website" (Demers, 2014).Also, be sure to make sure your landing page is inviting and ready for conversions, as Meredith highlighted in her recent blog post.
References
Demers, J. (2014, Sept 29). 7 Advanced Ways to Improve Your Site's SEO. Entrepreneur. Retrieved from https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/237819
Scott, D. M. (2015). The New Rules of Marketing and PR (5th ed.). New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons.
Hi Aimee,
ReplyDeleteI loved that you used "margarita recipe" as your example as spring break is near!
I enjoyed learning about SEO and also took some great points away from Demers that I was not aware of before. The major point that I noted is content. Every topic we've discussed throughout class, content has been a consistent component in success.
Beyond keyword phrases, the quality of content should be unique and useful to viewers. The content should involve the key phrases that would be used to enhance SEO.
“Think of SEO this way: If a customer-focused
content marketing program is the sandwich, then
SEO is the mayonnaise. It touches nearly
everything and enhances the overall flavor
of the sandwich, but on its own, it’s not
very appetizing” (Linn, 2014).
While it is important to make sure users have quality content and content of substance to capture interest. It is just as important to make sure search engines are properly indexing that content as they increasingly attempt to give direct answers to searches (Linn, 2014).
Resource:
Linn, M. (2014, June 27). The Basics of SEO for Successful Content Marketing. Retrieved from contentmarketinginstitute.com: http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2014/06/seo-successful-content-marketing-basics/
Hi Aimee,
ReplyDeleteI think that you made a good point in saying that you need to be strategic in what key words you select and how you implement them.
By understanding your target audience, it gives the company a leg up on being strategic and effective in their SEO strategies. As Demers (2014) states, it "helps you answer vital questions such as: who are your customers? What are their most urgent and pressing concerns? What factors are they focused on in terms of making a buying decision?"
Researching your target audience and determining how they utilize search engines to to find your website is vital knowledge. DeMers (2013) explains seven different ways that you can research the search patterns of your target audience in order to more effectively reach them.
#1: Competitors’ forums
#2: Comments
#3: Surveys (online and offline)
#4: Keyword Research – Trends, Related & AdWords tools
#5: The social networks
#6. Product forums, a.k.a. support
#7: eCommerce
In addition, you can also use the following techniques to find how businesses gather information;
Keyword Research
Website Analytics
PCC-based Research
Auditing Existing Buyer Data
A/B Testing
The only true way to make sure that you are utilizing effective SEO strategies is to ensure that you understand the buying and searching habits of your target audience.
References
DeMers, Jayson. (2014, Sept. 3). Why Knowing Your Audience Is The Key To Success. Forbes. Retrieved: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jaysondemers/2014/09/03/why-knowing-your-audience-is-the-key-to-success/#2317cecc3fb7
DeMers, Jayson. (2013, May 21). 7 Ways to Find What Your Target Audience Wants and Create Epic Content. Social Engine Journal. Retrieved: https://www.searchenginejournal.com/7-ways-to-find-what-your-target-audience-wants-and-create-epic-content/63798/
Hi Melissa,
DeleteGreat add to the conversation! It is key to understand your buyer personas to truly build your content strategy. As Scott states “well organized web content will lead your visitors through the sales cycle all the way to the point when they are ready to buy from or otherwise commit to your organization” (Scott, 2015).
References
Scott, D. (2015). The new rules of marketing & PR (5th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.
Hi Aimee,
ReplyDeleteI loved your blog post this week. The margarita recipe example was a great idea :)
You are spot on when you said, "To attract the right visitors, you need to be strategic in your choice of keywords." I found a blog called Get Response, which talks about how to optimize your landing page for SEO and the first tip was to gather a bunch of keywords and then put those words into search engines. The blog gives great advice that you also touched upon: "What do they show you? Are there any websites similar to your landing theme? Take their keywords and put them on the list. If there is no relevant pages, maybe you should rethink your keywords" (Szyler, 2014).
It is really interesting coming up with keywords. I did some work with SEO when I had a small private school as a client. The school wanted to target families with in 10 mile radius and the list of keywords we came up with was very extensive. We wanted to target people who were looking at schools in the area but didn't know about this specific school. We also used keywords from the website.
Szyler, P. 2014. 7 Tips to Optimize Your Landing Page for Search Engines #SEO. Get Response. http://blog.getresponse.com/7-tips-optimize-landing-page-search-engines-seo.html
Thanks for the feedback! It all comes back to the importance of listening, as Scott mentioned in chapter one! We need to listen to our target audience, understand what they are searching for, and monitor their search patterns.
ReplyDelete