Entries Tagged 'search engine optimisation' ↓

I have been a copywriter for a while now and many of the projects I am commission to carry out involve search engine optimisation.

That’s hardly surprising considering the importance of online marketing to today’s businesses.

People’s attitudes to online search are changing. Companies are now recognising that if they want to open up their businesses to new markets they have got to get to grips with SEO and keyword identification.

Keyword research

Most people ‘get’ keyword research these days.

They understand that the words they have to target are the ones their customers are searching for. That list might include the particular product that they sell or their geographical location etc.

Usually the list of keywords I am given are pretty relevant – they cover the products/services and will drive targeted traffic to their website.

But the problems start when it comes to allotting keywords to the copy – how many should each web page target?

Common misconceptions

When investing in SEO most people want to maximise their ROI and use SEO to get found for every keyword or phrase they can think of.

For a start, initially, that’s not practical. Over time as they build links and relevant content, they will see rankings for most of their keywords (the level of their ranking will depend on the competitiveness of the term they are targeting). But from the outset, SEO takes time and the early results will be found with the least competitive words.

The second problem is that many people view their website as their Home Page. By that I mean they want to load their Home Page with all their keywords.

So, for example, if they sell silver jewellery, their keyword list may look something like:

• Silver jewellery
• Silver jewellery suppliers Suffolk
• Silver jewellery gifts
• Gifts in silver
• Silver necklace
• Silver bracelet

You get the idea.

Now, to try and include all of those words on one page is complete madness because the resultant text won’t encourage anyone to buy.

Using keywords the right way

For starters you must remember there is more than one page to your website. Plus, Google and the other search engines also recognise this as each page is indexed individually. Therefore you should be targeting different keywords on different pages. The keywords should also be reflected in your navigation and page titles.

With regards to the number of keywords per page, you should only look to target 2 (3 max) primary keywords. You can of course incorporate long tail keywords (i.e. your primary keywords plus modifiers) but trying to target more than 2 can create unwieldy text.

The main point of your website copy is that it should be relevant, interesting and compelling. The traffic your keywords attract must be drawn in by your text and encouraged to buy – otherwise what’s the point?

By researching your keywords, using them to structure your website and then target each page for different keywords will maximise your chances of SEO success.

Can Twitter really help with your SEO?

That’s the question answered by Wasim Ismail on searchenginejournal.com.

The web is becoming more and more social. Social media is becoming a major part of business marketing strategies and is not just the latest ‘thing’ for teenagers. The search engines recognise their importance and are constantly finding ways to integrate social and search results.

Why?

Because social media is the voice of internet users and can no longer be ignored.

Of all the social media platforms out there, Twitter is probably the most popular micro blogging platform (that is until the next big thing comes along).

Due to its vast size, Twitter really does have the potential to help your SEO activities as your tweets can help build your online brand and reputation.

In his post, 10 Tips to Improve Your SEO Using Twitter, Wasim shows how you can utilise your Twitter account and tweets to enhance your SEO activities on line. This is a must for any Twitters out there looking to make the most of their social media activities.

So grab a coffee and have a read – it could be the most productive 10 minutes of your day.

You may have been trying to ignore social media but whether you think it’s for you or not, it’s here to stay.

Leveraging the social power of the internet is vital for any business today regardless of industry. Understanding how to use it correctly is the key to success so you must come up with a strategy before you dive in.

The most important aspect of any social interation is listening. Without listening you won’t know what your customers are talking about, what’s important to them, or where they’re hanging out. After all, what’s the point in using visual channels such as YouTube and investing a shed load of cash in video marketing if your audience use Twitter and Facebook?

Listen – Content – Socialise – Measure

Those four words are the key stages of any successful social media strategy as identified by Lee Oden in his post 4 Steps to Social Media Success on toprankblog.com.

If you want to develop a great strategy that works it’s well worth a read. Lee helps you understand the importance of listening to identify where your market hangs out, the importance and types of content you can generate, how to socialise effectively and, most importantly, how to measure your effectiveness.

This basic structure will help you develop a strategy that will promote your brand, develop relationships with customers and potential business partners and generate content that will also help make you stand out in the search engine rankings.

Social media is here to stay. It will constantly evolve so now’s the time to get on board.

Keyword research (as opposed to keyword guessing) is vital if you want your search engine optimisation activities to bear fruit.

The words or phrases you decide to target will have a big effect on your website and its contents which is why it should be done before you begin the design process.

How can a few keywords affect your site?

Well quite easily. After all it’s not until you know what you’ll be targeting that you can:

• Create your on page text (SEO copywriting)
• Decide on your link building anchor text
• Work out your internet linking structure
• Decide on your site navigation
• Produce your page titles (title tags)
• Decide on your URLs
• Write your META tags

So as you can see it’s quite important that your keyword research comes first.

How to decide on your keywords

That’s all well and good but how do you begin the process of deciding on which words and phrases to target?

Here are 3 steps you can take to ensure you get the best possible match between your keywords and your target audience.

1. Be open to new ideas

Don’t go into the research blinkered to the ideas of others. You must remember that you are trying to find the words that other people search for to find your products and services, not necessarily the terms you would use.

The main thing is that the words you decide on must be relevant to your product or service. There’s no point in using a keyword that generates lots of traffic if it’s not pertinent to what you do. You’ll just end up with a lot of frustrated people.

2. Create word groups

Your starting point will be to generate a list of words that relate to your product/service.

Then, expand that list to incorporate names used in your industry for what you do. Expand this again with words used within the media for your product/service. Then, if you work in a specific locality, add in relevant geographical modifiers.

Then it’s time to use keyword research tools such as Google’s to further refine and expand your list.

3. Check competition and relevancy

The final step is to work out which are the best terms to go for.

Although you want to target terms that generate a lot of search traffic, you don’t want to pick something so competitive you won’t stand a chance of ranking for it.

This table below will help you determine which the best terms to try are:

That’s why keyword research is so important. Make sure it’s the first think you do before starting your web design process.

Search engine optimisation is vital for today’s online businesses.

If you want to be found you have to make your website as visible as possible and the only way to do that is through a strong SEO strategy.

More and more companies are realising that PPC is find for short a term push (if you have the budget for it) but unless you have seriously deep pockets, it’s not a long term solution.

A winning SEO strategy

If you want to be an SEO winner you’ll need the following:

• A well-researched list of keywords
• A well designed website structured inline with your identified keywords
• A professional SEO copywriter on board who really knows what they are doing
• An ongoing link building strategy

But whatever you do don’t try and go for fast results. SEO is a slow burning entity. You won’t get overnight results but if you work at it constantly you will be rewarded by lasting high rankings that will bring a continuous stream of targeted traffic to your website.

What to avoid in your SEO strategy

I came across a post on Seomoz the other day entitled “32 SEO Tactics to Avoid in 2011” which gives you a run down of ‘black hat’ techniques that should be avoided at all costs.

Have a read through and make sure you’re strategy is above board. Also take a look at some of the comments—it is a post that generated a lot of debate about SEO.