Have your checked your business’s Knowledge Graph information lately? If you haven’t, you may be hearing from Google the next time you perform a search.
Recently, Dan Leveillediscovered that Google is proactively reaching out to searchers and urging them to keep their business listing up-to-date. If you haven’t checked on your listings recently, you may see a similar alert to the one below next time you sign in with a Google account associated with a Google My Business page.
Leveille notes:
“Other than asking developers to include social profile data, this seems like the first time Google is proactively asking business owners to directly suggest edits to their Knowledge Graph info.”
Leveille also uncovered a newly updated help document from Google detailing the criteria for being considered an “official representative of an entity in the Knowledge Graph.”
This is a significant move by Google to try to clean up out-of-date Knowledge Graph information and provide accurate listings. Both local businesses and major corporations can take advantage of the Knowledge Graph, so it is always a good idea to regularly check your listings and make sure they are current.
00Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2016-02-10 10:44:362016-02-10 10:44:36Google Is Urging Business Owners To Update Their Knowledge Graph Listings
With 2016 looming, it can be tempting to kick back and celebrate the New Year and successful holiday season. But, as any seasoned marketer can tell you, there is never any time for rest in the world of SEO.
The past year has seen huge changes in the world of SEO, with a newly emboldened emphasis on mobile optimization and responsive design, the change to 3-pack results in local search, and the expected new algorithms running over at Google.
With that in mind, it’s time to start looking forward and preparing for a booming 2016 by predicting the biggest trends likely to define the coming year. CJG Digital Marketing is doing just that with a new infographic detailing the hottest SEO trends in 2016.
00Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2015-12-30 16:00:502015-12-30 16:00:50Get Set For 2016 With The Hottest New Trends In SEO [Infographic]
With Halloween in the rear-view mirror we have officially entered the holiday season, and Google is rolling out new features to help businesses prepare. Google My Business announced it is launching a new feature that allows businesses to set their holiday hours in advance, so shoppers will always know when you are open.
In the past, businesses had to manually update their hours manually if they changed their hours for the holiday season, and when the season is over you had to go back in and change the hours back.
Now, if you know ahead of time when you will start running your holiday hours, you can schedule your Google My Business page to automatically update your opening hours when the time comes. Google will also tell shoppers if what they are seeing are special holiday hours.
If your closing hours are flexible, there is also a new option to have a message displayed saying “hours may differ.”
The feature will stick around, so if you have regular special hours for other events or holidays you can also set those up ahead of time.
How to Schedule Special Hours on Google My Business
Log in to your Google My Business account and select the location the hours will apply to.
On the “Location details” page, scroll down until you see the “Special hours section” and click the link.
Select the date when the hours will begin and enter the opening and closing times for that day.
Click the box next to “Closed” if your business will be closed on a specific day. You can also set your hours to 12:00am-12:00pm if you are open 24 hours.
Click “Add another” to add more special hours for the location.
For more information on the features or setting up your special holiday hours ahead of time, check out Google’s help center article.
00Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2015-11-03 14:07:522015-11-03 14:07:52Schedule Your Holiday Hours On Google My Business In Advance
Google made big news earlier this year when it declared it would favor sites that switch to HTTPS, and now Twitter is taking a similar path. A member of Twitter’s development team published a thread on the Twitter Community forum explaining the company’s future plans for HTTPS and setting a deadline for the company’s switch the HTTPS.
Starting October 1st, Twitter will begin utilizing HTTPS for all new outbound links, meaning any new link you share will be packed in “https://t.co”. This way Twitter can securely send users to their intended destination, even when the destination page is not an HTTPS link.
Similar changes have been made by popular sites such as Reddit and Wikipedia, however in those situations the sites began using HTTPS site-wide.
This will also have the added side effect of increasing URL lengths in the future, depriving you of one more character to write with when sharing a link.
This also causes issues with tracking referral traffic to non-HTTPS sites, as Twitter explains non-HTTPS sites may see an apparent decrease in referral numbers.
“Web browsers drop the Referer header from a request by default when downgrading from an HTTPS t.co link to an HTTP destination in compliance with the HTTP specification for the Referer header… Based on our estimates you may see a 10% drop in traffic attribution from Twitter as a result of this security change.”
The company also warns that sites will see a steady decrease in referral traffic recorded from Twitter in the future, as users update to the latest browsers that support this policy.
Any business owner who has ever received online reviews – whether they were negative or positive – can tell you the power online reviews have in influencing how others perceive your brand. All it can take is one glowing or irate review on a popular service such as Google or Yelp to make or break your business.
Most business owners will also tell you the most likely person to leave a review is an angry customer, but a new survey from Mike Blumenthal published on GetFiveStars suggests those business owners may be wrong.
While it is true that extreme reactions are the most likely to result in reviews for your business, the evidence suggests consumers are actually more likely to reward excellent service than they are to attack businesses which provided a bad experience.
Blumenthal surveyed over 600 consumers that self-reported being active online reviews, asking when and why do you typically leave a review for a local business, and the findings show that few reviewers see calling out exceptionally bad service as their primary motivation.
In actuality, most reviewers actually see their reviews as a means to help inform the community, the business, and other consumers.
For the survey, Blumenthal and colleagues allowed the respondents to answer in their own words, which were then categorized into the following categories:
When Experience was really Good or really Bad
Only When the Experience really Good
Only When the Experience was really Bad
To Help Other Consumers
To Help Business/Community
To Inform Business
Other
While the largest cohort of consumers was defined by extremes with a third of respondents only writing reviews based on really good or really bad experienced, the second largest group is entirely characterized by individuals who only use reviews to celebrate excellent service.
Importantly, this group was not much smaller than those who were motivated by extreme experiences on both ends of the spectrum, suggesting business owners are more likely to get positive reviews for good experiences than they are to receive poor reviews when they drop the ball.
To put this in context, 25% of active reviewers reported leaving reviews only when the experience was overwhelmingly positive, but 5% of reviews only leave reviews for truly poor experiences. That means the average reviewer isn’t the perpetually angry critic they are often portrayed as.
The truth is the vast amount of reviewers aren’t out to get anybody. They view themselves as integral parts to the current business ecosystem and an important part of society.
Ultimately, the reason online reviews may seem overwhelmingly negative is because it is simply much more difficult to provide exceptional service than it is to provide a terrible experience. That doesn’t mean it is impossible.
As a business owner, you should naturally be striving to provide the best service possible. If you are doing that, all you have to do to start drawing in scores of positive reviews is make it easy for your consumers to give you feedback and be sure to listen to their needs. If your customers feel like you are listening and responding to what they have to say, you should expect to see great reviews flooding in within no time.
Mobile search has gotten a lot of attention this year as it has overtaken desktop search in many metrics, but a new report from mobile loyalty company SessionM shows how ubiquitous the use of mobile devices to aid in the shopping experience has become.
SessionM surveyed 12,000 randomly selected US smartphone users on their mobile shopping behaviors and the findings highlight just how large a role mobile devices play in the shopping process.
The company said 85 percent of respondents reported their m-commerce buying was steady or had increased compared to a year ago while approximately 15 percent told the company mobile buying had increased “significantly.
Personal data security and/or poor user experiences (e.g., too small images or text) were cited as barriers preventing mobile e-commerce from more growth.
According to the findings, more than 90 percent of respondents had made a retail purchase within the past 90 days before the study. The majority (73 percent) of those purchases were made in traditional, brick-and-mortar stores, and approximately 53 percent said they found the in-store experience superior to online/mobile shopping.
However, the study also found mobile search plays a vital role in the in-store shopping process. The overwhelming majority of respondents (90 percent) said they use their smartphones in stores while shopping. The top activities on smartphones while in-stores breaks down as follows:
Price comparisons — 54 percent
Looking up product information — 48 percent
Checking reviews online — 42 percent
SessionM also had recommendations for valuable marketing opportunities for retailers from the data:
Opportunity surrounding in-store push notifications about deals/offers (57 percent were more likely to shop at a store if available)
Loyalty programs (76 percent would be more likely to shop at a store if available)
The data confirms what several other studies have found in the past. Shoppers are using their smartphones in stores to help them make informed purchases, but many retailers are failing to take advantage of any of the opportunities this presents.
00Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2015-07-21 16:30:022015-07-21 16:30:02Survey Finds 90 Percent of Shoppers Use Smartphones While In Stores
If you’re a business owner who has decided to get serious about your company’s online presence and marketing, you’ve almost certainly heard about search engine optimization. Unfortunately to the uninitiated, SEO can seem impenetrable with its endless technical jargon and conflicting opinions from experts about exactly how to get the best online visibility. It can feel a lot like jumping in the deep end without learning how to swim first.
Search Engine Optimization doesn’t have to seem so intimidating however. There may be a lot to learn before you are an expert, but with just a few basic ideas you can drastically improve your business’s online profile.
This infographic from SEOHalt will help guide you through the basics of SEO and give you the vocabulary you need to really get an understanding of what search engine optimization is and how it affects online marketing efforts. Once you’ve got these ideas under your wing, you’ll be ready to dive into the deeper waters of SEO without having to worry you’ll drown.
00Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2015-06-23 13:47:062015-06-23 13:47:06The Basics of SEO [Infographic]
Most reports have made Mobilegeddon out to be a farce with only a small effect on Google’s search results overall. New analysis from digital agency Koozai, however, suggests small and medium businesses (SMB) felt quite an impact when Google rolled out their mobile friendly algorithm.
According to Koozai’s May survey of 2,000 SMB’s with 50 or fewer employees, nearly half (46%) of all respondents reported experiencing changes in ranking. Of that group, 41 percent also saw a drop in rankings by at least three spots. This may not sound like much, but a drop in just one or two rankings can have huge impacts on traffic.
“The hype that the Google mobile update would cause carnage in the search engine rankings missed the larger picture,” says Ben Norman, chief executive (CEO) of Koozai. “Exaggerating the impact meant that businesses didn’t anticipate that even small changes in their ranking can have a big impact on their organic mobile search results.”
Norman says much of the confusion is due to the idea that a single algorithm is the deciding factor when determining ranking. Google uses over 200 different factors to rank pages on search results pages, but some were led to believe the mobile optimization would be the ultimate deciding factor. On the contrary, 27 percent of businesses in Koozai’s survey reported drops in rankings despite having optimized their sites for mobile.
This leads many business owners to feel like they are being punished after acting on Google’s warnings, which Norman says illustrates how frequently SMBs are poorly educated on SEO and fail to understand e-commerce analytics.
“Many consumers today will research on mobile and then purchase on desktop,” he says. “Many SMBs are missing out on these lead-creation opportunities if they don’t know if their e-commerce sites aren’t giving their potential customers a good experience on mobile.”
Of the businesses involved, 37 percent said they were worried the mobile friendly algorithm update would impact their sales while 44 percent said they were not concerned because the majority of their sales come from desktop shopping. Nearly half said they were unsure about the relationship between devices and could not say whether mobile influenced their desktop sales. In addition, 12 percent did not know whether their sites had been optimized for mobile at all.
There were predictions well before the release of the algorithm that small and medium businesses would be the most likely to be impacted by ‘Mobilegeddon’, but many reviews of the algorithm’s effects failed to consider the disparity in their post-Mobilegeddon analysis.
00Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2015-06-08 16:40:472015-06-08 16:40:47Mobilegeddon Had Greater Impact on Small and Medium Businesses
Over the past decade, website operators have relied on Google Webmaster Tools for ensuring their sites were being properly displayed and indexed across the search giant, but big changes are on the way. Google is rebranding one of its most popular services to Search Console and there a few new features coming with the new name.
According to Google, the shakeup is the result of user feedback, as only a small portion of users actually identify as “webmasters.” Google is hoping the new name will help bring the service to a wider user base.
“It turns out that the traditional idea of the “webmaster” reflects only some of you. We have all kinds of Webmaster Tools fans: hobbyists, small business owners, SEO experts, marketers, programmers, designers, app developers, and, of course, webmasters as well… So, to make sure that our product includes everyone who cares about Search, we’ve decided to rebrand Google Webmaster Tools as Google Search Console.
The rebranding is coming in the next few weeks, and Google has announced two new features that are expected to roll out about the same time.
With Search Console, users will have access to all the functionality they have come to expect of Webmaster Tools, as well as the ability to see how searchers are accessing your content via Android apps through Google Search within Search Analytics reports and the ability to see your app content through Google’s eyes with an alpha version of Fetch as Google for Apps.
00Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2015-05-22 13:47:452015-05-22 13:47:45Webmaster Tools Is Dead, Welcome to Google Search Console
Valentine’s Day is huge for online retailers, but some e-commerce sites are already wondering why they haven’t felt the love this year. If your e-commerce business isn’t seeing the traffic or conversions you think you deserve during this time of year, consider some of following tips and statistics about the big day tomorrow.
00Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2015-02-13 11:54:542015-02-13 11:54:54E-Commerce Tips To Help You This Valentine’s Day [Infographic]
Any business owner who has ever received online reviews – whether they were negative or positive – can tell you the power online reviews have in influencing how others perceive your brand. All it can take is one glowing or irate review on a popular service such as Google or Yelp to make or break your business.
