Search Tip of the Week (8)

This week our tip is related to Paid Search.

For the SME running a Paid Search campaign on a limited budget there are various ways you can ensure you get maximum bang for your buck!

So here is a tip on how you can make sure you are not wasting money on clicks that are not likely to convert for you.

"Do not Broad Match" your terms. If you just type a list of terms into your ad groups on Google the automatic matching of your terms will be "Broad." This means that your ad will be shown for any search containing your search terms in any order.

E.g. If you sold cars and had the "broad" matched term "cars" in your ad. Your ad could potentially be shown for the following searches:

fluffy dice for cars
police cars
cars the movie

As you can see these will not be relevant to your car selling business and so could result in low click through rates or a large number of untargeted visitors to your site.

Sooooooo to drive more targeted visitors to your site and limit the amount you spend on wasted visitors, we recommend for those on a tight budget that you "phrase" or "exact" match your terms.

If you put "" around your search terms this means that your terms will be "phrase" matched. This means that your ad will only be shown for searches that contain the full search term in the right order.

E.g. If you have the phrase "used cars for sale" in your ad group your ad would only be shown for the following types of searches:

red used cars for sale
used cars for sale uk
ford used cars for sale

This would result in far more focused traffic to your site and you are likely to be paying a far lower cost per click.

If you "exact" match by placing [] around your terms they will only be shown for the exact terms with no other words on either side. This will give you even tighter control over the searches your ad is shown for, again reducing your spend and giving you more focused visitors. However, with exact matching you are limiting your exposure.

So if you are spending more than you want and finding your campaign is giving a low return on investment why not just try making all of your search terms "phrase" matched and seeing what happens!!!!

Strike A Balance!

In the rush to modify websites to comply with the latest Google webmaster guidelines it is often the case that other search engines namely Yahoo and MSN are overlooked.

Why?

As things stand, Google's reported UK market share is approximately 75% and rising, with Yahoo, MSN and the rest making up the difference. Therefore, logic dictates, that Google compliance must take precedence when it comes to optimising for search engines. I personally don't have an issue with this stance, however, please take into account the following if you are devising your own SEO strategy or taking advice from others;

• Google's market share may fall in the UK.



• Internationally, Google is not always the dominant force, for example, in Russia, the Yandex search engine is reported to be the market leader with 49%, similarly, in China, Baidu controls 62% of the market. In Italy, Google's market share is reported to be 53.5%.



• It is constantly rumoured in the press, forums and blogs that a search engine merger or acquisition is just around the corner, therefore, search engine market share today could radically alter tomorrow!



• Depending on your viewpoint, some observers have also pointed out that some Google webmaster guidelines will have no impact on SEO. For example, is the "If-Modified-Since HTTP header" inclusion which is recommended, merely an attempt by Google to reduce the work of its spiders?

Compared to other market places which have been around for hundreds of years, the internet industry is still in its infancy, therefore, as the title of this post says "strike a balance with your internet marketing strategy".

Search Marketing Word of the Week (9)

Firstly, the Frogg would like to apologise for his absence last week; he had already jumped ship and made his way to the far reaches of the pond for a weekend of rest and relaxation before I could catch him for the weeks letter!

Have no idea what I'm talking about? There is a purpose to this regular post.

Anyway, away with this weeks letter please...

F

OK, let's go with 'Feed'

This is content which is automatically delivered to a website via a particular piece of software or program.

A good example is a news feed; in fact, have a look on the Leapfrogg site for a new service we have recently introduced in partnership with The Press Association whereby bespoke news content can be delivered to a website every day. The advantage of such content is in keeping your target audience interested and therefore returning to your site over and over again. An element of trust is developed in the fact your site offers reliable, up to date information.

Have a good weekend!

Diary of a link builder: Love, links and preconceptions

This morning, during my continued quest for quality links I received an email from a prospective link partner, questioning, rather aggressively, exactly why he felt he should set up the link and in his words “advertise” another business for free on his website.

Before I sent my response, I wondered where the love had gone and why webmasters and their websites were becoming more like private residences and not the green open fields I once thought of.

Had the unforgiving and ever more complex spam attacks led webmaster to put up impenetrable barriers to genuine emails and communication from fellow web masters and marketers, who, unlike the spammers, wanted to recommend and raise the profile of established businesses?

I wondered if webmasters were now more concerned about recommending particular websites because of security, when referencing viruses and Trojans. Or was it the development of something a little closer to their chests?

Taylor, hailed as "The Father of Scientific Management" was perhaps right in his belief that it is money which motivates, and certainly with the development of affiliate marketing over the last ten year, Google’s Adsense and the popular Amazon Associates program many webmasters are recognising they can monetise their websites, including by selling links.

Whilst I am not opposed to webmasters selling space on their website, providing it is relevant and justified of course, I remain concerned as to how far the sale of links will go? Will a webmaster drop a good quality website in lure of a high paying poor quality link partner?

In casting my eyes back to the original email, I wondering why the sender had chosen to use the word ‘advertise’, particularly as I wished to gain a link on his resources page. I then questioned whether users would even navigate to this page, and if they did, why would they?

The answer was simply. Users would navigate to that page in order to find some more information on the subject, which the resources page currently did not offer.

Now I ask you to consider what you do if you are on a website which doesn’t fulfil your needs? I'm pretty confident you’ll leave it, right?

My belief with ethical link building sits firmly with the premise, not of optimisation and manipulation of the major search engine algorithms but of the optimisation of the user experience. If your website includes quality and useful content, in addition to, for example, a range of external websites where users can ‘find out more’ then you’ve adding value to your website and are acting as an authority as you clearly have an awareness of the key areas of your industry.

I count myself lucky that I get to relive my childhood whilst conducting my daily link research, viewing all sorts of circa 1994 (and near epileptic fit educing) animated gifs on rarely updated websites before finding a true diamond in the rough.


I only wish there was more of an understanding from webmasters of the true value of ‘sharing the love’ and adding reputable links to their websites. Ethical link builders, like me, are not second class citizens so why not join us. Let’s push things forward and make the web more useful for everyone!

6 Reasons why good link builders make great lovers:

1. A good link builder appreciated the necessity of sharing. With a good link builder, it’s not all about take take take, but he offers reciprocal links to quality and complimentary resources – he shares the love to enhance the experience for everyone.

2. A good link builder is personal in his emails, referring to webmasters by their first name and establishing an informal repour – call it foreplay if you will.

3. A good link builder will call back and follow up any communication between link partners. One night stands mean nothing to a good link builder, as a link partner can be called upon again in future.

4. A good link builder will incorporate methods they perhaps have never tried before including link baiting and the penetration of social media in order to spice up the campaign. A good link builder appreciates that monotony is not going to get anywhere, but by keeping the experience fresh and exciting he knows he will succeed.

5. A good link builder is honest, will not say “it’s not you, it’s me” and won’t string a webmaster along by dangling an offer of a reciprocal link in front of them, only to withdraw when their link is live. A good link builder either wants you, or he doesn’t.

6. Of course the matter of paid links might cause some critics to consider the notion of prostitution, however I consider paid links to be like massage oils, ‘toys’, and lingerie in that they serve – providing they are good quality – to enhance the campaign. A good link builder, and a lover, knows this.

Please note, that whilst I have used the term ‘He’, I refer to and include all link builders whether they be men or women and in addition, I feel I have to add that whilst at Leapfrogg, I go far in my quest for high quality links, there are some things that I just won’t do...

Who's responsibility is it anyway?

Over at Search Engine Guide, Stoney deGeyter recently wrote an excellent article entitled 'Where does the Responsibility of the SEO End and the Client's Begin? Stoney discussed a number of the issues that both the SEO and the client should consider before grabbing one another by the hand and walking the (often unpredictable) walk of client/SEO partnerships.

Stoney focused mainly on top level issues, such as whether the client has a solid business plan, whether the SEO understands the clients objectives and where responsibility lies for tasks such as copy writing. By focusing on such issues before the contract is even signed, the hope is that there will be fewer surprises further down the line.

I want to look at the title of his article from a slightly different angle by focusing on the day to day responsibilities, especially those that also involve the web developer?

For example, I have no doubt that if a typical SEO spotted that one of their clients sites was down, the first thing that they would do is to call the client and let them know. However, is this ultimately the responsible of the SEO? What about if you spot a broken link or two on the clients site? When you initially optimised the website a couple of months back, all the links were present and correct. Shortly after, the site is littered with broken links perhaps as a result of a technical error (the fault of the web developer?) or a human error (the fault of the client if they have made changes using a CMS?). In this instance, and presuming I spot this first, is it my responsibility to fix somebody else's error?

These kinds of situations arise every day for us and it's difficult knowing whether to have your staff spend their valuable time trying to fix problems of which they had not part in creating. At the same time though, they are a caring bunch and are dedicated to seeing their clients campaigns succeed; they will therefore jump all over anything that may stand in the way of this success.

Strictly speaking a web developer should have tools and alerts in place in case anything goes wrong but often they don't. The client should be aware of making changes to their site and the implications this may have on their SEO campaign but often they don't.

I therefore ask you, who's responsibility is it anyway?

Until next time, enjoy your weekend!

Roll up Roll up you search marketing enthusiasts!!

We are currently recruiting for 2 SEM Trainees and a SEM Account Manager with or without industry experience to join our wonderful team here at Leapfrogg. If you think you have what it takes to make it in the world of Internet Marketing, we would love to hear from you, or if you know anyone who would be interested in working for us please point them in our direction. You can find full job specs and information on how to apply on the Jobs page of our website.

For those of you that apply or make it to interview stage, here are our top 5 tips for impressing us to help you on your way:

Spell Check your CV! – You would be amazed at how many CVs we get sent with grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. This is a BIG NO for us; you won’t even be considered for interview. (Well, maybe one or two mistakes might get through, but some CVs are horrendous!) Come on guys, use the Spell Check!!!

Research – Make sure you have a good read of our website; we want you to be interested in working for Leapfrogg because you think we are a great company you can grow with. Coming to an interview unprepared and expecting us to tell you what we do is not cool!

Dress to impress - As with most new media companies our dress code is informal, but we want to see you make an effort. First impressions count!!

Be confident – Interviews are scary for all of us but if you come prepared and just be yourself it will go along way with us. Personality fit is just as important as your skills!

Time Keeping – Don’t be too early or too late. Arriving about 10 minutes before the interview is good for us.

Good luck with your application

Does Scrolling really harm your website?

(Example: 800x600) smallest



(Example: 1280x1024) High Resolution
OK, so you have a great site, have lots to say, are an expert in your field and your site also looks great in 1280x1024. But, you have just found out that people are still using 800x600 and these people can only view 419px area above scroll, so are seeing barely half of your fantastic new site. What do you do?...........

Well Jakob Nielson has been debating this very issue since 1994 and in Neilsons words “most findings about Web usability are the same now as they were in 1994.This may be surprising, but usability is about basic human capabilities and users' needs which do not change nearly as rapidly as technology.”

Scrolling: it seems everyone has an opinion on it:

“Re-design for 800x600, you’ll regret it if you don’t!”

“Don’t worry about it; most people are on 1280x1024”

“Make sure that your calls to action are above the fold”

“What’s the fold?”

In my opinion, designing for 800x600 would not be designing for the majority of users. I don’t for one minute consider that those using 800x600 are inconsequential, I just believe that a compromise is probably better in this case. The percentages of those on high and low resolution is still in some contest, some will argue that its 7% on 800x600 others 14% leaving the majority with a fairly significant share, but it is something that should be factored in when considering copy placement and positioning of a companies USP at the very least.

According to the research by Click Tale total page length is not a strong factor in terms of how many people will scroll below the fold or reach the bottom of page. Their analysis has shown that:

* The average location for the fold is between 430 and 860 pixels down on the page.
* 76% of people will scroll below the fold.
* 91% of pages are long enough to require scrolling.

You have to keep in mind that behind these percentages lie actual individuals, and user behavior is split between certain groups of individuals that make up the Web Population i.e.: Methodicals and Humanistics these are users driven by information gathering and will most likely scroll in order to find what they need, their opposites are the Spontaneous and Competitive types who make up, probably the majority of site bounce ratios, these users are far more fickle and indecisive, and therefore need to access information easily and quickly. Considering the brain can absorb thousands upon thousands bits of information per second...10 seconds is long enough to get your message across.

So basically to round up, here’s a short checklist of things that might help to avoid bounce rates due to scrolling:

1. Communicate your USP, biggest benefits in headlines and calls to action above the fold (Users often decide whether to stay or leave based on what they can see without scrolling)
2. Include well-formatted web copy to aid scrolling
3. Don’t sacrifice clear page design to shave a few pixels off the page length
4. Don’t even consider horizontal scrolling
5. Remember the 10 second rule
6. Add a bookmark button at the top of the page (to encourage them to return)

Of course for more information on usability visit the Jakob Nielson site.

Search Tip of the Week (7)

This week we thought we would give you a list of blog search engines and directories we have come across on our travels. Its a long hard slog getting the word out about a new blog (oooh that rhymes!!) So submitting your blog to a few of these could certainly help it along the way.

Blogorama
Blog Universe
I blog business
Bloghop
Eaton Web
Britblog
BlogPulse
Blog Catalog
Blog Hub
Top Blog Area
Best Blogs
Blog Search Engine
Blogdigger

Have fun!!

Search Marketing Word of the Week (8)

I know our regular readers are on the edge of their seats waiting for this weeks search marketing word (or phrase) so I will keep you waiting no longer.

Despite my jovial tone there is a good reason for this regular post.

But if you are already an avid fan of this regular Friday afternoon slot, your wait is over.

Frogg, a letter please...

W...H

OK, one of our favourite phrases here at Leapfrogg...

'White Hat'

So what the devil does a hat have to do with search marketing. Let me explain.

'White hat'optimisers follow published search engine guidelines and do not attempt to game the system by adopting techniques which work against these guidelines. Such techniques, labelled 'black hat', are used as a means to try and manipulate search engine results.

With 'white hat' SEO there is also a conscious effort to adopt a content-based approach designed to improve the value of the site to its target audience, not just the search engine.

Search Tip of the Week (6)

This week we have put together a handy little crib sheet for all those acronyms that are used in our industry.

There are a hell of a lot of them out there and if you want to know your CPC's from your CPS's and your SEM's from your SERPS you might just find the tables below helpful.

MSN Ranking Update

After checking clients’ rankings yesterday, I noticed significant drops in rankings on MSN Live Search. After investigating this further, it appears that MSN Live Search has had a major update in the last week or two which it describes as the “biggest update since our debut in January 2005”

The features of this update include enhanced speed, word handling, auto spell correction, layout and usability of the interface and yes… enhanced ranking algorithms

In fact the Live Search update has seen their index quadruple to 4 times the size it previously was. This has no doubt impacted search engine rankings and will introduce new competition to climb up MSN’s search results.

I would be interested to see if anyone has seen a similar drop in rankings on MSN Live Search?

Lewis Hamilton & You Tube

Sadly, it wasnt to be for Lewis Hamilton to be crowned world champion this weekend. We will never know whether the You Tube video evidence filmed by a fan at the Japanese Grand Prix added that extra bit of pressure.


Source:Flickr

What this does show however, is the power of social networking sites such as You Tube and their increasing ability to influence world events be it sporting or otherwise.


Source:Flickr

Imagine the same scenario occurring 5 or 10 years ago and it would have been unthinkable to envisage a spectator's video coverage having the effect without the free outlet of a social networking site. Of course there could have been the possibility of the video coverage being made available to various news sources, however, the ease in which it was simply uploaded to YouTube with the minimum of fuss is there for all to see. It is clear that user generated content is here to stay, however, it is sure to evolve in line with the advance of technology.

The introduction of Google's Universal search will mean its more important than ever to optimise video and images. For more information on how to optimise video for search marketing purposes the following article from SEO space includes some useful hints and tips.

Good luck Lewis in the final race, we are all routing for you!

Cut out the middle man - optimising for Google News

Optimising and submitting press releases online is widely acknowledged as an essential tool in the search marketer's armoury. When distributed through the right channels, a press release can have you featuring in Google News (for related searches) in a matter of hours, thereby raising profile and brand awareness.

And of course, one of the key reasons why many search marketers optimise and submit press releases online is down to the fact text links can be incorporated into the release, thereby aiding 'link popularity' (however, the true value of these links is questionable...see below for further comment).

But for every submission of a press release online there is usually a charge (presuming you want it to appear on Google News and similar sites - there are free submission tools available but we have not found these to provide the exposure we are looking for). Depending on the company you use charges on a per-release basis can range from around £40 to £150 depending on the level of personalisation in the releases' targeting.

For many of us SME's this is an additional cost we could do without so what can we do? Well, a good start is to optimise the news pages on your site specifically for Google News. By following a few simple rules, the opportunity exists to cut out the middle man and have your own site pages ranking in Google News for FREE! The only drawback to this is that a press release distributed through a submission site will usually allow links to be added to the release. These releases are then archived online thereby adding to the number of incoming links to a website. However, the actual value of these links has to be questioned in light of the fact that the releases might well be archived but they are no doubt buried under a mass of new content submitted through the site each and everyday.

So if we ignore submitting press releases for the goal of improving 'link popularity' and instead focus on the real goals of a press release; exposure, brand awareness and so on, follow these simple steps and you might well save yourself a few pounds on regular submission fees...

1) First and foremost make sure you have something interesting and useful to say. Too many companies are submitting press releases online and adding news to their sites, which to be quite frank, nobody gives a hoot about! Consider what your target market and the wider community are going to find of interest and what is better kept amongst staff.

2) When writing a press release or news based article, carefully consider the headline; it needs to be between 2 and 22 words and attention grabbing. Also, think about keywords related to the piece. Optimise the copy as you would a product or service page on your website; for the user first and search engine second. Your news item will not stand a chance if it is 'spammy'.

In addition follow these rules when writing your press release or news based article (amended from Google's own guidelines)...

* If the article body appears to be too long to be a news article, Google's crawler may not recognise it as an article

* Format your articles into text paragraphs of a few sentences each and don't use frequent tags

* Ideally eliminate or certainly minimise the amount of text surrounding the article. Google may ignore the article if it makes up a relatively small fraction of the text on the overall page

* Make sure that the full text of each of your articles is available in the source code of your article pages (and not embedded in a JavaScript file, for example)

3) Each article must have a unique URL and this URL must contain at least a 3 digit number. If you have 4 digits in your URL make sure they do not resemble a year. In an ideal world, your URLs should be static as Google still has a habit of tripping over dynamic URLs.

4) The article must be linked to from a main page on your site via a textual html link.

5) Google must be able to determine the publication date of the article. Therefore, place a clear date and time for each of your articles in between the title and main body text in a separate line of HTML. You might want to consider removing any other dates from the HTML of the article page so that Google's crawler isn't confused by another date on the page.

6) Once you've got your formatting and URLs nailed, go to http://www.google.com/support/news_pub/bin/request.py and complete the form ('Suggest my site to Google News'). This is because to gain exposure in Google News, your site has to be included as a trusted source of information. You can check whether you're in by using the "site" function. Do not submit page URLs’s to be spidered that change daily, weekly or monthly. In fact it is best to make sure that the URL remains the same as Google simply won't be able to spider the new URL if it does.

And there you have it. Whilst we are in no way dismissing the value of the submission tools and personalised targeting offered by our good friends over at DW Publishing and The Press Dispensary, it is not always feasible for the typical SME to spend money on distributing news related content. Of course, when you really have something to say, there is no doubting the value in utilising a distribution service but if you are simply looking to drip feed information into Google News, follow the simple steps above.

Until next time...

Search Marketing Word of the Week (7)

If you are looking for a straightforward explanation of the many terms and phrases banded about in the wonderful world of search marketing, this is the regular blog post for you. Every Friday our wonderful frogg provides us with a letter. We then pick a word or phrase and spell out what it means...in plain English!

So without further ado, a letter, or maybe even letters please...

B

...and R

OK, I give you 'Bounce Rate'

Any half decent web analytics package will provide bounce rate data. The bounce rate measures, as a percentage, the number of visitors who enter a webpage but then leave without viewing any further pages.

In theory, having a high bounce rate is not a good thing. It means there is undoubtedly something wrong with the page itself if it fails to encourage the visitor to navigate further through the site.

However, it cannot account for certain instances, such as the visitor who finds the content of a page appealing, and because your contact details are visible on the page, they simply do not need to navigate any further. You've sold them on the content and they've picked up the phone!

Therefore, be careful in making assumptions based purely on bounce rate data.

Google Adwords Representatives...friends or foe?

In the last couple of months our Google reps have been offering us far more help and advice with our client's various campaigns. This proposed help and advice ranges from account optimisations to new account set ups.

Whilst it is always handy having them at the end of the phone (if I can't get through to them directly, they will call me back within about 2 mins!) I am slightly concerned that they are moving ever closer toward becoming an in-house SEO agency. This poses all kinds of conflict of interest issues in my mind, as well as the fact that they may be trying to steal my job!

If we do choose to accept any of the services that Google are currently offering us, it will be interesting to note whether they apply their "best practise guidelines". At my previous agency, I often found that account optimisations performed by Google actually went against the guidelines.

Whilst remaining greatful of their very "hands-on" approach, I will most definately be keeping them at arm's length. Over the next couple of months I will be reporting on our Google reps' level of engagement with our client's campaign. I am interested in:

1. How far can they "help" our campaigns without "helping" themselves - at what point do their recommendations become detrimental to the workings of an optimal ROI campaign. Increased expenditure and visibility will very rarely increase the ROI of a campaign.
2. How far do their recommendations fall in line with their recommended best practises.

Tune in soon for futher musings on this very topical subject!

Googles Guidelines on the Meta Description Tag

Following our search tip this week on Meta Tags. We wanted to share with you a very useful entry from the Official Google Webmaster Central Blog on how it thinks Meta Description tags should be written.

Its all common marketing sense really!

Search Tip of the Week (6)

Meta tags...the debate rages on - are they essential to SEO or just another dated 'on the page' factor we can now ignore?

We say, 'ignore Meta tags at your peril'.

The adding of Meta tags is one of the most well-known page optimisation techniques. In the past these Meta Tags played a more significant role in achieving rankings. This was until they were abused by 'spammers' stuffing irrelevant, but hugely popular, search terms into their tags (think 'naked britney spears'...in her better days of course!). For a while, stuffing a term like this into your keyword tag could have you ranking for a term completely irrelevant to the actual content of the page.

Meta tags are no longer so instrumental to rankings (and therefore not open to so much blatant abuse) but do continue to provide useful guidance to the search engines as to the content of your site pages. This relates to the Title tag in particular, which is one of the first ports of call for a search engine in understanding a pages content (you can see the Title tag at the top of your browser in the blue bar). Therefore, write a short summary of the page, ideally containing a relevant search term. For example, on our homepage, the Title tag is 'search marketing solutions'.

The Description tag is not quite so important purely from a rankings perspective but does often accompany your listing on the search engine results page (SERP). Therefore, write your Description tag to be relevant to the page and importantly enticing; remember you are competing on the page with at least 9 other 'natural' results and plenty of paid ads too - therefore you need to try and encourage the searcher to click on your website listing over and above others that are on the page, for example...

"Experts in improving your Internet presence through a range of best practice search marketing solutions. Find out more."

Finally, the keyword tag. Don't worry too much about this one. Traditionally, it is where you would list the keywords the specific page has been optimised for. However, these days it is widely acknowledged that most search engines now ignore this tag. In fact, Rand Fishkin over at SEOmoz made a good point in a recent interview that populating the keyword tag does nothing more than give away marketing intelligence.

Until next week...