Good SEO vs Easy SEO

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I’ve been taking a look at some of my competition lately and seeing their bragging about achieving first page ranking for keywords, and in some cases top position ranking for keywords.  Well, for people who are looking to get SEO services from a company or an individual, be sure to keep some things in mind before being impressed by achievements such as these.

There’s a good list of things to double check (or to ask) when you see rankings like this in a portfolio:

  1. How many results do you get for that keyword in the search engine? If you do a search in Google and get under 200,000 listings, there’s a good chance it’s very easy to rank for that keyword.  There are exceptions to this rule, but for the most part, if no one’s competing for the keyword, it’s easy to rank for.  But again – if no one’s competing for the keyword, chances are it’s not worth ranking for.  We’ve got a few clients with keywords that are ranked on the first page that have search results numbering over 6,000,000.
  2. What kind of traffic does that keyword get? There are different ways to learn about this, but you should see if the keywords that are being ranked highly actually get good traffic.  You may have a number one position, but if it only gets two searches a month – is it really something that’s worth it?  As always, there are exceptions to this rule (if you can close on one of those two searches and it’s worth six figures, that’d be worth it), but usually getting no traffic means the keyword is not worth as much.
  3. What other keywords are ranked for that site? So they have shown a single keyword phrase for their SEO’d site.  Is it the only one that’s ranked?  A good SEO should be able to rank highly for multiple keywords.  Ideally, multiple targeted keywords.
  4. Is the SEO company’s site ranking for keywords? If the company claims to do SEO, it would make sense that they would rank for keywords themselves, correct?  If you ask and they can show no good results for their own site in the search engines, be very cautious about trusting them with your own site.

When you hire someone for SEO work, they should be able to provide information on what keywords they are targeting and show you the results that it’s bringing.  Having a particular ranking is worth nothing if you don’t see results from that position in the search engine listings.  Check this list to see what those results are really worth, and if it’s good SEO or just easy SEO to put something into a portfolio.

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Apple iAd May Compete With Google For Ad Revenue Levels

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Apple has recently revealed news on the iPhone OS 4 update.  The more interesting part of this news for marketers is the new development of iAd – an advertisement opportunity to allow ads to be created and used within apps on the iPhone. Read more

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Microsoft and Yahoo Join Forces for PPC Advertising

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I got an email from Microsoft adCenter promoting the new alliance between Yahoo and Microsoft.  They’re calling it “Search Alliance“.  The aim is to have their online paid advertising fully unified before the 2010 holiday season, although they did say that they’ll wait until 2011 if they “determine this will be more effective”.

Microsoft bought out Yahoo, so now the primary tool behind both search engines will be Bing, and behind the pay per click (and other paid online advertisements) will be adCenter.  The Search Alliance has stated that each company will “continue to have differentiated consumer search experiences”.  Not sure exactly how they’ll pull that off with the same search engine for both, but they may just mean the search interface.

The support will be broken apart, Yahoo supporting the bigger advertisers, and Microsoft will provide support to “self-service” advertisers.  They are combining their platforms for the advertising audience, so ads put together under this new alliance will reach consumers using either search engine.  The Search Alliance brags that advertisers of all sizes will now be able to have access to a combined audience of nearly 577 million worldwide searchers.

At any rate, this is pretty big news – Yahoo and MS pulling together to battle the mighty Google.  I expect this may be an epic battle.

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How Much Money Does Google Make? Billions.

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Google just upped their record from the 4th quarter of 2008 by 17%.  So how much is that, exactly?  Revenues in the 2008 4th quarter: $5.70 billion.  And they’re only improving.  Revenues in the 2009 4th quarter: $6.67 billion.

The fact that this is only for one fourth of the year blows my mind.  If that stays consistent, then that’s in the neighborhood of $25 billion a year.  They’re doing okay.

If you want to get more of the details on these numbers, check out this article from Greg Sterling at Search Engine Land.

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Put Business Phone Numbers on Cell Phone Ads

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Google’s made a little tweak to AdWords, so now you can put an ad that will show on cell phones that lists a business number.  If the owner of the phone calls that number, that counts as the click that is paid for.

The benefit of this is that it’s a very quick hot lead for anyone who advertises on the mobile network.  And it’s easy to do, since it defaults to all devices in AdWords, anyway.  To make sure you’re listed, check to see that mobile devices are checked in your settings in the campaign settings in AdWords.

Also, to have your phone number listed, you can either have the business information synched up with your business account or enter it manually, both done inside of the AdWords campaign settings.  Make sure whichever you do that you include your phone number.

Then to see the results, just choose the “Filters and Views” drop-down list and choose “Segment by”->”Click Type”.  This will show which clicks were URL clicks, and which were calls, from either the Ad Group or Keywords tabs.

It’s just an addition Google’s made to AdWords, and sent out an announcement through email to Google advertisers.  This could be a good change for people who use AdWords for markets that actively use their cell phones.

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SEO Jobs: Demand is Going Up For SEO Skills

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It looks like holiday shopping this year has moved even more heavily online.  As companies are realizing that more people are actively searching online for their commercial searches, they’re starting to see the value of search engine optimization.

Because of this, the IT industry is starting to anticipate a high demand for SEO skills in 2010.  (Yay for us professional SEOs!)  In Great Britain alone, demand for SEO and online marketing skills went up by 40% last year.

The skills of SEO, pay per click management, social media marketing and web design are all being looked for, ideally in a combined package.  SourceWire has all the details in an article based on this story in the UK.  (And I have to add a little something something here – Tulsa Marketing Online does in fact do SEO, PPC, social media and web design.  Wink, wink, nudge, nudge.)

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Google Hits Back Against Scammers

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Google’s changes lately have been quite thorough.  They’ve made changes for AdWords, they’re changing the way the search engine itself operates, and now they’re coming out to take a stand against online scams.

In particular, the schemes for how to “work-at-home” to use Google and make a ton of money are starting to get shut down by Google.  Google is starting to file lawsuits against these companies to bring them down.

For most people, these are familiar schemes – you see them in banner ads, with text like “Use Google to make 1000s of Dollars!”.  They generally operate by having a kit you send out for and then have you set up for automatic billing once a month (and many people don’t realize there’s automatic billing).

CNN has a bit more detail in this story.  I did find it rather amusing that under this story in their sponsored links, one of the ads said “I’m glad I lost my job! Jobless Dad makes $6493/month working online from home. Read how he…”

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Highest Traffic Keywords Do Not Always Bring Profit

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It seems like the focus for a lot of internet marketers is finding that top trafficked keyword.  However, this can be a mistake by not focusing on the true marketing involved.  In some cases, the top traffic keyword is not one that will bring conversions.

Putting focus purely on the traffic numbers for keyword research is the reason many internet marketers are not able to pull the profit numbers many others do.  Making sure you focus on the consumer and their intent more than the pure traffic size is key.

This can be done more quickly using PPC, but at a price.  And in SEO, solid keyword research must be done to target proper keywords – a mistake here will cost a lot of time and money.

Evan LaPointe goes into a bit more detail about all of these factors at Search Engine Land.  At any rate, it’s good to remember that the focus should be on the human experience, not just the analytics numbers.

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AdWords in Google Maps

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It looks like with the latest AdWords update, they’re starting to put any local advertisements in Google AdWords into Google Maps.  You can see images of some examples of that here, in Search Engine Land.

The ads appear almost the same as Google Local listings, only with blue numbered pushpins instead of red lettered pushpins.  I’ll most definitely have to look further into AdWords to see exactly how to take advantage of this new update.

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Smaller Cities Moving Business Online

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It looks like smaller cities are starting to see their businesses move more online with web sites, online marketing and social networking.  This would not surprise me too much to see, as the demand here for Tulsa SEO has increased, as well as for Tulsa website design.  I’m willing to bet it’s very similar in other cities.

In this case, it appears that Columbus is definitely on the list of cities rising in their online presence, and it’s showing for several different types of markets.

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