I Do Web Marketing

Integrating Video on Your Company Website

“Video on my website? Isn’t that just one of those fancy gadgets that increases my load time, costs a lot of money, and wastes time?” Before you follow that line of thinking any further, let’s think about the ways people interact online these days. Most people go online for news and information before going anywhere else. The majority of those people also watch videos online, some every day. And the videos they’re watching aren’t just funny YouTube videos. Your customers are looking for informational videos that share news, demonstrate products, and explain company initiatives.

With these facts in mind, let’s take a look at some common concerns expressed by small business owners about incorporating videos on their websites.

●      Will videos increase my load time?

Better internet connections and cheap bandwidth have made it possible for videos to be integrated into your site without placing much strain on your load time. It’s important to make sure your videos load quickly, but the tools available to make that happen can be accessed easily and cheaply, so don’t let fears of long load times scare you away.

●      What will adding videos to my site cost me?

The ability to use free third-party hosting makes posting videos cheaper and easier than ever before. In addition, these hosting services also help boost your search rankings and enable bloggers to help broadcast your message. It’s like getting a built-in advertising package for free.

●      How will video integration benefit me?

Videos can communicate your message in a way words can’t. The old adage “Show, don’t tell” holds true for online communication as well. You can strengthen your marketing messages as well as generate conversations about your brand by posting a video and encouraging people to comment. Those comments will provide you with valuable feedback from your target audience, enabling you to improve your online presence.

Multimedia integration has become a source of vast marketing potential that many businesses have yet to tap. The new SEORCHERS website, set to launch in a few months at www.seorchers.com, will showcase video integration, giving clients a new way to learn about their services as well as showing how video can help communicate your company message in an innovative way. As you consider the benefits of integrating video into your site, don’t be afraid to see what your competitors are doing. It can help you visualize the potential that multimedia integration has to revolutionize your online marketing.

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Justin McGill is a web marketing professional and runs a successful Small Business SEO Firm. He is the founder and CEO of SEORCHERS (read: [surch-ers]) - a local web marketing firm specializing in organic search engine optimization (SEO) with a focus on converting visitors into clients. He is available for SEO Consulting and now you can connect with him on Google+!.

This was a piece I originally wrote for AgencySide, and am reposting here as I felt it would provide additional exposure to the idea of PR agencies being backed by SEO support.

When a company hires a Public Relations agency, the expected outcome is more business and an improved image. One of the most important ways to accomplish this is by utilizing the internet for global public relations. However, no matter how well-written and thorough the website content is, without Search Engine Optimization (SEO), very few will ever read it.

Heighten Online Exposure

Public Relations agencies invariably work with a company’s online presence to create better exposure. They will write web content, interact with interested parties on social media sites, and enhance web design. As the agency seeks to promote their client’s internet presence, they have the ideal opportunity to incorporate SEO terminology, keywords, and backlinks that will elevate search engine status and create greater traffic. This is simple to accomplish for someone who knows even the basics of SEO techniques, and since the agency will be writing the content anyway, it takes very little additional time.

Promote Credibility

When using a search engine, most people seldom look beyond the first few provided links. At the most, they may venture onto the second available page, but rarely beyond that. In fact, 99% of searchers do not go beyond page three. Whether they realize it or not, readers associate credibility with search engine status. If a website appears at the top of the list, it is perceived as credible, regardless of the content of the page. Utilizing SEO thus gives a website an opportunity for instantaneous credibility. It is an easy way for agencies to achieve an otherwise challenging task.

Achieve Traffic Flow

Once a website begins to appear at the top of the Google food chain, traffic flow will rise dramatically. And that traffic can turn into valuable revenue for the company. Statistics clearly indicate that there is an inseparable link between website traffic and increased sales. According to Web SEO Analytics, around 3.5% of this traffic turns into sales. SEO is thus essential to achieving heightened traffic flow, and subsequently greater revenue.

Exceed Client Expectations

These days, clients expect their PR specialists to understand all of the available venues for elevating their business. And since the internet is the fastest growing marketing location, it is absolutely essential that agencies utilize this all-important venue. By employing SEO, agencies can quickly elevate their clients’ web exposure, promote their credibility, and achieve revenue-generating traffic flow. The client will be thrilled and will be more likely to promote their over-achieving agency!

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Justin McGill is a web marketing professional and runs a successful Small Business SEO Firm. He is the founder and CEO of SEORCHERS (read: [surch-ers]) - a local web marketing firm specializing in organic search engine optimization (SEO) with a focus on converting visitors into clients. He is available for SEO Consulting and now you can connect with him on Google+!.

An appalling article in the New York Times just after Thanksgiving has led Google to make some significant changes to their ranking algorithms. The article highlighted a serious flaw in the ranking process which allowed businesses to leverage bad business practices, negative customer reviews and even disclosure of those bad practices by reputable sources such as the New York Times to earn greater exposure and consequently higher search rankings.  After the article blew the whistle on the problem, Google responded with characteristic promptness and a few days later released a statement that they were working toward a solution.

Speculation has since cropped up all over the web as to what exactly Google’s solution will entail for business owners. While Google representatives remained vague in the announcement on their official blog, observations have led to the conclusion that the new algorithm will incorporate positive and negative reviews posted on Google Places. While Google denounced the idea that they will rely entirely on sentiment analysis (directly correlating positive reviews with high search rankings and negative reviews with low rankings), businesses still seem to be affected by the number and type of reviews posted on Google’s Place pages.

Direct correlation between customer reviews and search ranking could lead to significant problems, as Google effectively pointed out in their response to the New York Times article. Controversial issues such as political campaigns that engender strong feelings either positive or negative could skew search results, making it difficult for web users to find information on those topics. Although Google strongly asserted that they will diligently work to find an effective solution to the problem at hand, they refused to provide details, citing concerns that knowledge of specific means and methods could lead to increased efforts to game the system.

Whatever the specific algorithmic answer turns out to be, it’s clear that businesses will no longer get away with using bad business practices to increase search rankings. Google strongly asserted that, moving forward, bad practice will be bad for business not only in the real world, but in the online business realm as well. Just as employees in brick and mortar stores must put the customer first in order to keep business booming, online stores will now have to pay attention to their customer relationships as well. If they don’t, the bad reviews they get could be the means of sinking their business. And that’s the way it should be.

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Justin McGill is a web marketing professional and runs a successful Small Business SEO Firm. He is the founder and CEO of SEORCHERS (read: [surch-ers]) - a local web marketing firm specializing in organic search engine optimization (SEO) with a focus on converting visitors into clients. He is available for SEO Consulting and now you can connect with him on Google+!.

For quite some time now, search engine optimization gurus have postulated that Facebook and Twitter popularity directly affects search engine rankings, and now an announcement from both Google and Bing confirms those suspicions. Just what factors figure into the specific algorithms for each of the popular search engines remains under wraps, but the news holds significance both for search engine optimization and for web marketing. With concrete evidence to support the long-held theory that Facebook likes and Twitter followings will boost search engine rankings, marketers can now place a little more confidence in the fact that their social media efforts will produce tangible ROI sooner rather than later.

The announcement sparked a flurry of additional speculation regarding exactly how the popular social media sites play into search engine rankings and while much of that speculation remains unsubstantiated, both Google and Bing did confirm the following points.

●      User credibility carries weight in the algorithm.

In other words, the more authoritative a source is, the more weight its re-tweets and links carry. People who are recognized experts in their fields will affect the ranking of links they post or tweet more significantly than other users will.

●      The quality of the author can be determined by the algorithm.

This point gains significance when viewed in light of the previous point. Both Google and Bing denied knowing the identity of individuals, but Bing did confirm that public figures and companies could be identified as authoritative sources.

●      The number of people who re-tweet a particular source will influence ranking.

Referred to by Bing as “social authority,” popularity on both Facebook and Twitter can increase the importance of the links and tweets shared by individuals. In other words, the more people who share a particular link or post, the more important it becomes in the eyes of the algorithm.

While neither search engine revealed additional factors that play into the determination of which Facebook and Twitter posts receive greater weight in the ranking process, many acknowledged SEO experts have speculated about various possibilities. Some of these include source diversity, clicks and re-tweets, authority of friends and followers, and surrounding content. Just as a website is more than the sum of the keywords it includes, Facebook and Twitter are more than the sum of friend and follower quantity or even quality. In addition, search engines will now be able to more easily detect spammy Twitter and Facebook accounts just as they can detect keyword-stuffed web pages. Popularity on Facebook or Twitter typically indicates substantive content, allowing the best pages to be acknowledged for their quality by the number of followers they gain.

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Justin McGill is a web marketing professional and runs a successful Small Business SEO Firm. He is the founder and CEO of SEORCHERS (read: [surch-ers]) - a local web marketing firm specializing in organic search engine optimization (SEO) with a focus on converting visitors into clients. He is available for SEO Consulting and now you can connect with him on Google+!.

Business-to-business marketing requires a greater level of attention to detail and quality content than business-to-consumer marketing. B2B sales will require more time between initial contact and sale and must also incorporate content that brings genuine value to the table for your target market. To accomplish this, you’ll need to allocate your SEO resources strategically, placing greater emphasis on tactics that deliver high performance value. You can further prioritize your techniques based on required effort levels, realizing that high-effort, high-performance strategies will be worth extra exertion as compared to low-effort, high-performance strategies based on where they fall in terms of delivering results. With this in mind, let’s take a look at some of the top SEO tactics utilized by successful B2B marketing campaigns.

●      Keyword Research

Keyword research is the number one strategy businesses should be focusing on as they seek to improve the effectiveness of SEO marketing campaigns. Without the right keywords, you’ll fail to attract the appropriate market to your website or you’ll attract no traffic at all, meaning low conversions and devastating lack of exposure.

●      On-page Content Optimization

Quality content will keep viewers on the page once they’ve been enticed to click by your keywords. For B2B marketing, this means providing information depth and dynamic content that seeks to cultivate and develop leads until they convert. This is a high effort approach, but it also delivers excellent results.

●      Title Tag Optimization

The title tag is important because it communicates the theme and purpose of your web page to the search engine crawler. An ineffective title tag will fail to attract your target buyers, resulting in a poorly converting page. This tactic requires lower effort than the keyword research, but still should receive careful attention for greatest effectiveness.

●      New Content Development

Developing new content ranks high in terms of importance because it is what will keep your target audience coming back. While it does require high levels of effort, it should not be overlooked as a vital SEO technique for B2B marketers.

●      Meta Data Optimization

Meta data gives both search engines and users a brief summary of your page content. Extremely important on the search engine results page, your meta data will determine whether or not a user believes you can deliver the information he is looking for.

While all of these tactics can and should be part of any SEO campaign, they take on greater significance for B2B marketers because your buyers will be harder to sell to than an average consumer. Minute attention to detail and high-value information in these areas will help you create an SEO campaign that increasingly converts leads to sales.

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Justin McGill is a web marketing professional and runs a successful Small Business SEO Firm. He is the founder and CEO of SEORCHERS (read: [surch-ers]) - a local web marketing firm specializing in organic search engine optimization (SEO) with a focus on converting visitors into clients. He is available for SEO Consulting and now you can connect with him on Google+!.

Google’s latest search engine gadget has created major problems for some webmasters. Google Instant Preview, a feature which allows users to preview a web page before clicking, holds both promise and pitfalls for web users. While the idea behind the new tool is to create a more user-friendly search process, it has also created havoc with many analytics programs. Because the preview feature occasionally fetches real-time previews rather than displaying the more typical pre-cached screen shots, analytics programs including Google Analytics have recorded increased page views, a problem which also skews other results including bounce rates and conversion rates.

Google Instant Preview works by allowing a user to click on or mouse over the newly added magnifying glass icon next to each search result and then view a miniature version of the web page in question on the right-hand side of the screen. Instant Preview also highlights the portion of the web page where the search term appears, making it easier to find information on the page, especially when looking for a specific chart, image, or name in a list of similar items. Google hopes to give users the ability to increase search speed by increasing their likelihood of clicking on relevant results early in the search process. The previews should enable users to screen out irrelevant web pages without ever having to leave the Google search results page.

Most of the web page images utilized by Google Instant Preview are screen shots cached by Google in advance. If Google does not have a cached image available, however, it will fetch a new image in real time. Because these fetches are counted as actual visits by many analytics programs, Instant Preview has created analytics problems for webmasters. Google has already issued a statement saying that the bot visits will no longer count in the Google Analytics program as actual site visits. However, previous data from before the fix will remain unchanged. Those using other analytics programs should be able to filter out the Google user agent using the same methodology that filters out regular Google crawls.

While the analytics issues appear to be a fixable hiccup for Google Instant Previews, the jury is still out on whether the feature will actually speed up user search time or whether it will make a formerly simple process increasingly complicated. Initial data seems to indicate a slight increase in user satisfaction, but time will tell whether users find the ability to preview web pages helpful or distracting.

Be sure and subscribe for the latest web marketing strategies and updates!

Justin McGill is a web marketing professional and runs a successful Small Business SEO Firm. He is the founder and CEO of SEORCHERS (read: [surch-ers]) - a local web marketing firm specializing in organic search engine optimization (SEO) with a focus on converting visitors into clients. He is available for SEO Consulting and now you can connect with him on Google+!.

Everything on the internet revolves around traffic generation and conversion. It does not matter what type of site you have, from a personal blog to a website selling tractor parts. You need visitors to come to your site, and then take some sort of action which is desirable, which is considered a conversion. Conversion may mean a purchase transaction, it might mean downloading a report, or it might mean reading the latest article that has just been posted.

One of the often overlooked metrics is the time spent on a site. This is generally broken down into two broad categories, time spent by new visitors, and time spent by repeat visitors. But why do we actually care about time? It is actually one of the most important metrics we have to measure the effectiveness of both the presentation (how the site looks and is laid out) and the content it contains.

When a website is new, almost all visitors will be new visitors. If you noticed that the average visit was 3 seconds, what does that tell you? It tells you someone sees the site and immediately leaves. This means you need to make some changes ASAP. It might be your layout, or it might be your content. If you are using advertising dollars to drive traffic, every time someone comes to your site and immediately leaves, that is money wasted. This would additionally tell you to check the wording of your advertising banners to make sure the message you are broadcasting lines up with the message your site is portraying to the public.

The time on site measurement gets even better when it comes to repeat visitors and measuring conversions. Repeat visitors are great for any site, especially if you are an ecommerce site. It means that buyers like your products and design and are coming back for more. Watching the time spent on site by repeat visitors helps you tailor new content, and see what areas are attracting them to come back. Time to conversion is another metric which is important. This is the average amount of time spent on the website by anyone who then converts, or performs a desired action. Watching this over time helps you improve your branding image. The better your design, and the better your brand image, the lower this number goes. For an ecommerce site, this means vistors come to the site specifically to buy your products. They do not spend much time browsing around and needing to be convinced to buy. This is the holy grail in internet marketing.

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Justin McGill is a web marketing professional and runs a successful Small Business SEO Firm. He is the founder and CEO of SEORCHERS (read: [surch-ers]) - a local web marketing firm specializing in organic search engine optimization (SEO) with a focus on converting visitors into clients. He is available for SEO Consulting and now you can connect with him on Google+!.

Social media has taught us to be frugal with our status updates due to character limits. Twitter offers only 140 characters, so posting a link can take up all of your alloted character space. To get around this, several link shortening services have been introduced.

Link shortening services let the user input a very long URL and it shortens in to a lot less characters. By truncating a long URL, the user is left with more space for their message. Google has introduced its own URL shortening service called Goo.gl.

The main problem with URL shortening is that there isn’t always a way to know what it really links to. It could be spam or, worse, a site with known malware. You must trust who sent you the link and be sure their account didn’t get hacked. Goo.gl promises to be different by offer spam protection. Since Google already scans the Internet for spam and malware sites, integrating this data into Goo.gl will be relatively easy for the search giant. Goo.gl also promises speed and stability. In keeping with Google’s analytics service, Goo.gl will offer analytics with data on demographics and traffic sources.

Google is the top search engine and doesn’t show signs of losing popularity. With the introduction of Goo.gl, this means that Google knows that social media is important for search and search engine optimization (SEO). Social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and FourSquare are not simply different sites available for search; they are a completely different type of search.

This can mean a whole new ranking algorithm for Google and searches. Static pages may no long rank as high as social media sites. Social media sites offer real-time content and that may push static blogs and websites further down the search list. This can have a severe impact on your rankings if you are not using social media.

Google isn’t offering Goo.gl out of the kindness of their hearts. They want to use the data and statistics to see how links are shared on social media sites and who clicks on them. It will use this data to change the search algorithm and determine how important social media sites really are. If they are truly as important as we think they are, this can have a big impact on SEO as we know it.

Be sure and subscribe for the latest web marketing strategies and updates!

Justin McGill is a web marketing professional and runs a successful Small Business SEO Firm. He is the founder and CEO of SEORCHERS (read: [surch-ers]) - a local web marketing firm specializing in organic search engine optimization (SEO) with a focus on converting visitors into clients. He is available for SEO Consulting and now you can connect with him on Google+!.

With the release of Google.tv, small business owners and internet marketers are starting to wonder what this means for their websites. This leads many people to ask, “What SEO techniques are used for Google.tv?”. The truth is that normal SEO techniques will hardly change from things website owners had to do before.

Some initial effects people might see from new Google.tv users is traffic. Google has yet to really launch its name as a household brand, even with the release of Google.tv. However, if it becomes increasingly popular, this will allow people to comfortably search from their sofas instead of their computer chairs. What this could mean is an increase in search engine traffic over the next few years as Google.tv becomes more popular or competing products are made. Unfortunately, this could give false traffic impressions, as these people could easily be surfing instead of generally looking for something specific.

The biggest effect Google.tv will have on website owners is site optimization itself. Website owners will have to focus on the user experience while also making sure the Google search engine likes their website. This will mean that the site owners will most likely have to change the look of their website while maintaining normal site optimization such as the use of headers, keywords in bold, and using other keywords or LSI.

However, there are some extra things website owners will have to do now outside of changing their website to get traffic from Google.tv users who are not using Google’s search engine. Most people using Google.tv will be using apps. These apps will allow people to use social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook on their television. So for anyone who is not currently using social networking to get more traffic to their website, now is the time.

Website owners should consider making pages dedicated to videos. Google.tv will be able to show high quality flash videos. Videos are often on top of the search engine results as well for the majority of keywords. Optimize a page for Google and users and imbed one Youtube video on the page. Using normal SEO techniques to these pages will allow your video webpage to be featured at the top of Google results. This is important because people will be more inclined to watch videos than read text while using their Google.tv.

It is wise to offer users a version of your website that is Google.tv friendly. The website will have to be able to be seen from a distance. Easy navigation along with images and big headers are a must. Also remember that light or white font on a dark background is more visible on the tv than its counterpart on the computer. Make use of HTML5 and Flash, increase font sizes, and shorten paragraphs. The Google.tv website has examples of company sites who are optimizing for Google.tv.

So as far as SEO techniques to use for Google.tv, standard SEO techniques apply. But remember to enhance the user’s experience of your website. People won’t stay on your website for long if you have it optimized for computer visualization. Remember to also establish your presence on social media networking sites.

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Justin McGill is a web marketing professional and runs a successful Small Business SEO Firm. He is the founder and CEO of SEORCHERS (read: [surch-ers]) - a local web marketing firm specializing in organic search engine optimization (SEO) with a focus on converting visitors into clients. He is available for SEO Consulting and now you can connect with him on Google+!.