B2B marketers tend to be excluded from most articles, case studies and examples. Even when we get mentioned, our marketing efforts are bucketed as “B2B” and not industry-specific. However, there are many sub-categories of B2B marketing (e.g., SaaS, ecommerce, education, healthcare). After working with hundreds of B2B accounts, I’ve found there are multiple factors that people tend to overlook or don’t even consider using because it is not “B2B” specific. That’s a costly mistake. This article will cover basic challenges when using Google Ads for B2B marketing, as well as more advanced obstacles. The advanced challenges are not necessarily difficult, but they will require time and some planning to overcome. Basic errors and platform limitationsNo ad scheduleBusinesses won’t search for your website on just any day or at any time. If you are helping a business that has never used Google Ads before, you should turn to Google Analytics. Within Google Analytics, you can understand exactly when prospects are engaging with your business, and get clarity into whether those prospects are passively researching your business or actively filling out forms. A key part of creating an ad schedule is also considering what you want to promote during a given timeframe. If your landing page tells visitors they can request live customer support but your team is not able to help at 3 a.m., you shouldn’t be advertising that specific page during that time frame. Common sense is also beneficial when setting your ad schedule. For example, if you repair kitchen equipment for restaurants, you need to consider your customer’s schedules. Their busiest times (and when they will need an urgent response) will depend on their restaurant type. High-end dining will need help at night and over the weekend, and the busiest time for a cafe will be in the morning. Thinking about small, yet critical insights like this can also open a window for ad scheduling testing and for bid adjustments Losing control of where your ads are showingPlenty of B2B companies operate in sensitive or highly regulated verticals. Hence, keeping tabs on where your ad is showing is critical for any marketer that works in these verticals. Showing your search ads on the display network or in the search partner network are two things you don’t want to do if you would like to protect your brand and avoid wasting valuable ad dollars. With search ads, you can use keywords to predict a user’s search intent. But display ads use audience targeting for increased awareness. Therefore, creating search campaigns with “display select” turned on is a quick way to lose visibility into where your ads are showing. On the other hand, we have search partners. Your ad is shown on pages you can’t track, you can’t adjust bids and you can’t pause placements you don’t like. So, why use them? For B2B specifically, you might get a few leads here and there, yet close to zero of those leads will become MQLs or SQLs. Intermediate challenges and platform limitationsStill using Single Keyword Ad Groups (SKAGs)SKAGs were probably one of the most amazing tactics B2B marketers had 10 years ago. However, they are no longer a tactic worth implementing. Let’s do a quick recap of what they are and why they were so popular. Back in the day, you would create an ad group with one keyword, and that keyword had to be present on your ad copy and your landing page. This meant that all messaging was exactly the same between your keywords, ad and landing page. Keeping that messaging consistent meant your quality score would be higher as well. When Google Ads expanded match types to include close variants, keywords with the same meaning, the whole shebang, this tactic lost a lot of power. Now, there’s no way to guarantee that all your messaging will align, you will end up competing with yourself. Not only that, but as marketers, we have evolved to understand we need to focus on intent and quality of the overall experience instead of just trying to match keywords to landing pages. Ad group managementWhen looking at Google’s definition of an ad group, they state “use ad groups to organize your ads by a common theme.” An extremely common B2B challenge is that marketers struggle to choose which landing page is best for a given keyword. So, they try to match existing landing pages to a group of keywords that seem similar! What they end up with are ad groups that have a demo, a trial, a whitepaper download and a blog post. That’s not ideal. Instead, they need to separate keywords (and landing pages) based on a searcher’s intent, journey phase, etc. Going back to PPC 101, Google tends to show ads with the most engagement. Now, naturally fewer people are willing to click an ad that says “contact us for a demo,” and more people will be willing to click an ad that says “read our latest blog post.” By default, you are burying your bottom-of-the-funnel pages. In today’s world, if the intent of two keywords is different, you will need two different landing pages. And since these two keywords don’t share a common theme, you will also need two ad groups. Lack of B2B built-in platform audiencesIf you have ever tried to find a built-in audience segment for your B2B business, you know that odd stuff comes up. For example: When I worked with an advocacy software company, Google said their top in-market audience was “High Performance and Aftermarket Auto Parts.” Say what?! Thankfully, you don’t need to rely on built-in segments. If you have access to Google Analytics, navigate to the demographic and interests report. From there you can see the in-market and affiliate segments associated with the traffic from all channels that are currently landing on your website. By using segments and filters, you can identify audiences that are high-performing or low-performing statistically speaking. While I don’t recommend you only target or exclude these audiences, this analysis can help you make positive or negative bid adjustments based on performance! The other great thing about these audiences is that you can (and you should) layer them into your search and display efforts. And remember, you can adjust your bids based on how well these audiences perform. Don’t get rid of a low-performing audience entirely – just bid lower until you reach a happy equilibrium. At the same time, don’t be afraid to bid up on audiences that drive more than their fair share of high-quality traffic. Complex B2B platform limitationsOnly looking at conversions on Google Ads: Connect your account to your marketing automation platformThe typical B2B buyers’ journey includes multiple touch points and stakeholders before they make a decision. That means it isn’t enough to know how many clicks and leads you are getting in a month. You need to know who is interacting with certain touchpoints. All major marketing automation platforms (e.g., Marketo, Pardot, HubSpot) have direct integrations with Google Ads. The integration process for each platform is different, but generally speaking, you’ll be able to make this connection by going into the platform’s settings. In Marketo, it is under LaunchPoint. In HubSpot, it is under Marketing and then Ads, and in Pardot, it is under “connector.” Once you have found those areas, you will need to click create a new connection with Google Ads, then log in to your Google Ads account. Boom! Those platforms will be connected. Going through this easy process will allow you to have better attribution on your marketing platform and see which specific ads, keywords and so on, are driving qualified leads. You can also create audiences and exclusions. The sky’s the limit! Enhanced Conversions for increased visibilityGoogle Ads introduced enhanced conversions in May 2021. This is a fantastic tool for B2B marketers. It starts with Google collecting key information about a user who submits a form on your website. Then, after they become a customer, you can upload this data into your Google Ads account and obtain insights into which ad they clicked before becoming a customer. The downside of using enhanced conversions is that you need to have your conversions set up using Google Ads conversion tracking. If you are importing leads from Google Analytics to Google Ads, you won’t be able to use this feature. Setting up enhanced conversions can be complicated, however. Here’s a great video guide about enhanced conversions from the Paid Media Pros. A lot of B2B marketers don’t even know about this awesome, recently launched feature. You should definitely give it a shot, especially if you don’t have access to a marketing automation platform or CRM. Your ads look boring: Ad customizers are here to help!If you are a B2C or DTC marketer, you are familiar with the ins and outs of ad customizers. However, the amount of B2B marketers using them is super tiny. This is a shame – they are incredibly helpful and so easy to set up. Ad customizers allow you to personalize your ad copy based on a user’s location, the product they are searching for, and so much more. To get started, simply upload a data file with all your customizers. If you don’t know how to do that, Google Ads has a downloadable template in the UI platform you can use. From there, create your ads and let Google do its magic. It’s no surprise B2B marketers don’t gravitate toward ad customizers. If you look at the examples on the Google Ads support page, you will see those are all B2C products. That doesn’t mean B2B marketers shouldn’t use them, however. For example, if you have cities or states where your business has a local presence, make sure to incorporate that into your ad customizer. If you don’t have a local presence in a given area, just use your default message. Here’s another example of how B2B marketers can use ad customizers: Discounts! If you have a discount that changes depending on your product and you don’t want to create multiple ad groups and ads to promote the correct discount, ad customizers can totally help you scale these campaigns while ensuring your account is easy to manage. Improve your B2B performanceIt’s sad but true: Many ad platforms were not made with the challenges of B2B top of mind. However, that doesn’t mean that B2B marketers can’t be just as successful as B2C marketers on platforms like Google Ads. You just need to be creative and think outside the box. Watch: Google Ads for B2B – Avoiding common mistakes and overcoming platform limitationsBelow is the complete video of my SMX Advanced presentation. The post Google Ads for B2B: How to overcome challenges, platform limitations appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/rh3Qnu6
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Yesterday Google sent an email letting advertisers know that their ad accounts would be switched to data-driven attribution. Google’s message to advertisers. The email tells the advertiser which account(s) qualify for the switch and gives them until August 4 to cancel the auto-switch. What is data-driven attribution. Google announced in September that data-driven attribution would become the default model, but advertisers would still have access to the five other rule-based models. Data-driven attribution uses advanced machine learning techniques to more accurately understand how each marketing touchpoint contributed to a conversion. According to Google, data-driven attribution takes multiple signals into account including ad format and time between the ad and interaction and conversion. Turn it off. If you don’t want Google making the switch you can turn it off here. Why we care. I would understand Google making the switch automatically if they were removing the other five rule-based models and this was the only option (Smart Shopping and Performance Max enter the chat), but just to blatantly switch seems a little extreme, even for Google. Nevertheless, I’m not surprised and it seems like they’re going to keep pushing automatic “upgrades” like this to see how much they can get away with – especially knowing they have market share and advertisers aren’t likely to leave the platform altogether. Analyze your affected accounts and look into how switching to data-driven attribution would change reporting and conversions. If you want to try data-driven attribution, then you don’t have to make any changes. If you don’t want Google making the switch, be sure to turn it off asap. The post Google will automatically switch some advertisers’ attribution models appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/0W3qoXn Google is now displaying the number of days you can return a specific product at a merchant directly in the search results snippet. Google shows a short section right under the main snippet for some search results that says “30-day returns” or “15-day returns” and so on. What it looks like. Here is a screenshot that I was able to grab of this in action: How does it work. It is unclear exactly how to show this return attribute in Google Search but I suspect it is from the Google Merchant Center data feed you submit to Google as part of the newish Google Shopping experience card. Google may also pull this information from structured data on the page or just from the page text itself. Again, it is not clear, as Google has not commented yet on this feature. Why we care. Displaying the return policy and length in the search results may drive more clicks to your site over your competitor that does not show the return policy. Also, if you have a shorter return policy than the competitor’s snippet below yours, it may lead to fewer clicks on your snippet. This is something to track and be aware of as more and more merchants show this attribute in Google Search. The post Google showing return grace period within some product search results appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/TdX7q9V If you’re in the U.S. and haven’t been living under a rock, then you’re probably aware that the economy isn’t in the best shape (I blame it on abandoning the Gold Standard in 1933, but I’m not an economist). So between increasing inflation and a looming recession, advertisers are saying to themselves: “How do I afford to stay online with search?” Two scenarios with two impactsWhile there is a district correlation between inflation and a recession, you can only do so much, and the solutions aren’t the same. First, let’s break it out, and how it relates to search marketing: InflationIn PPC, most commonly, this is referring to a noticeable uptick in costs (CPCs), whose growth, grossly outpaces that of traffic demand. The impact will be directly on front-end metrics, but can directly lead to declines in back-end efficiency (An informal analysis of my current client’s data, showed 75% saw YoY CPC increases, and 50% saw CPC increases of 20% or more.) In conjunction with this, you may also see:
RecessionFor PPC, this typically impacts demand. As searchers stop to review their own personal finances, leading to a decline in search volume for “non necessities” (think: luxury goods, new cars, international vacations, etc.). A decline in search volume often leads to declining search volume, which means proactively or reactively, PPC budgets will decline. When this is observed, expect the following:
Historically during financial crisis in the past, we’ve seen demand increase and decrease, with a direct correlation to unemployment rates. The higher the unemployment, the higher likelihood ad budget is pulled back and/or decline in demand for your keywords. In my 17 year career, I’ve seen one or the other hit advertisers, now we’re in a perfect storm, where a number of brands will feel the pinch of both, at the same time. What should you doConcerned? Good, this impacts almost every advertiser under the sun in a negative way. But being concerned doesn’t mean you need to panic. There are many other things you need to get worked up over, such as but not limited to:
Now that I have that soap box rant off my chest, let’s talk about how to deal with rising CPCs and declining demand. Approach to inflating CPCsThere are various theories as to why they are going up (especially brand keywords), ranging from big G and M/B messing with algorithms around RSAs, to more aggressive competition. Which is true? Not for me to say. But we have found ways to combat these upticks in costs: Brand keywordsUnless you share a name with a popular brand in a completely unrelated category, we have found the solution is a bit on the simplistic side (and honestly a lot of folks may already be doing it): Migration of strategy from [current bid strategy x]-> manual with first page bids->max clicks with an uncapped CPC->max clicks with a capped CPC (last phase is optional)
Non-Brand keywordsThis gets dicey and incredibly nerve racking fast. Yes, a max click may help reduce your CPC’s, but depending where in the funnel/the niche level of the keywords sit in the sales funnel, you may be forced to do a few different approaches. So I like to break them into standard marketing 101 categories: Bottom of the funnel/long tail Call these “brand junior”. They are high intent, just not as cheap. I recommend going the brand route on these as noted above. However, the capping of the CPC is mandatory here. Mid-funnel We do a cyclical strategy here, kind of a “reset.” Odds are, you’re doing a max conversion or TCPA strategy, and that isn’t wrong. But if you look over time, you may see CPCs rise considerably (if they aren’t then keep on keeping on). If they are, and you are in a max conversion or TCPA strategy, then make a circling approach. Migrate from current strategy to manual with enhanced CPC for 7 days (no more/no less). Then 2 weeks at max clicks. Check week two CPCs vs pre-rule changes (if they aren’t lower, give it another week, if they are, then progress to the next step). After max clicks, return to max conversions for 2-3 weeks. After max conversions go to TCPA, with a CPA cap 20% higher than you started, and walk it down by 5% points every 2 weeks. Why do all this to end with the same rule as you started? Simple, CPCs rise when competition increases and/or volume decreases. TCPA rules can stifle volume. So here, you are able to reset, throw more volume on it, and get more conversions (yes, you will take an “L” on their efficiency for a bit), and this allows the conversion and TCPA rules, to start operating off the higher volume, making them learn faster, and become wiser. High funnel The reality is, that you likely don’t convert all that well on the high funnel, but you can. So the key here is to split the high funnel into 2 groups:
Approach to the impact of recessive behaviorFor brands that plan on “staying in the game,” there are typically two approaches you can take. First though, you need to have a direct and honest conversation with the leaders with the brand on what could happen and decide if you want to stay in or not. There are no trademarked names for these approaches, so I am literally going to call them “Cash in the Bank” or “Profit”. Interestingly, the two approaches go in opposite directions, but do make a horseshoe and will intercede down the road. Cash in the bankFairly straightforward method, ignore declining demand, and press on. If anything you take on more funds that are being reallocated (if not from offline, then from the display, or social). With searches slowing, your new focus is to be front and center for all possible searches and get that revenue. Yes, the CPCs will go through the roof, and ROI will likely turn negative. That is fine, get that money to pay the bills first. Plan to do this for at least two fiscal quarters, but potentially three. Then, slow everything down, and focus less on the revenue (by now the bills are paid). Become less aggressive on the bidding, CPC’s to come down and then focus on your ROI. Expect to reduce, if not cut outright non-brand and/or high funnel keywords, to help make up the ROI. ProfitFairly straightforward, make yourself as profitable as possible. This does not necessarily mean more revenue, but just higher ROI. Here is where you expect to cut everything but the bottom of the funnel non-brand (even that should be reviewed) and brand keywords. Stop spending in auctions that are competitive, and costs are rising. Just wait it out, and be quiet. Capture the bottom of the funnel/brand-aware audience, and make a little money as well. But essentially, hold out until everyone else in the category has spent it out trying to get a tiny bit of traffic. Then, in two quarters, open up and return to normalcy. By then, you have a high enough ROI (hopefully), that you can focus on maximizing revenue at think profitability (or even break even), to get you back to what you consider solid footing. Only do this, if you have enough revenue on hand for normal business operations for two to three quarters. There are some that will have a good timeI should note, based on history and common sense, that this is always true. Financial issues cause stress. Consumers turn to what will make them feel better/less stressed. This is why I say it impacts almost every advertiser. A small number of verticals will avoid suffering in this scenario and actually thrive. We put this into an umbrella category of “vices”. Not to sound morbid or predatory, but if you run pharmaceuticals, QSR/fast food, alcohol and/or gambling brands, you might see an uptick in CPCs, but for the most part, you will be fine. In the endYou know your business the best (or so I hope). You need to decide with your operation the best approaches to dealing with all this. Yes, rising costs and dwindling demand are scary, but they aren’t insurmountable. You just need to make sure you plan out in advance, which issue you want to tackle, do you have a contingency plan in place, and what you can truly afford to pull off. The post PPC survival: Handling inflation and being ready for a recession appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/oOmVeMv Today, we are living in the era of the Fake Web, where a large portion of the internet is made up of malicious scrapers, spam bots, suspicious human users and other bad actors. It seems like every day there is a “breaking news” story about another company falling victim to a data breach, customer information being leaked or servers being hacked. Historically, these cyber threats were handled exclusively by the chief information security officer or the IT department. However, in recent years search marketers have begun to notice how bots and fake users harm their efforts. When fake traffic makes its way to a company’s website, it can damage a brand’s online reputation and ultimately hinder the effectiveness of paid and non-paid marketing campaigns. Throughout this article, we will cover three specific ways search marketers are impacted. 1. Page rank is penalized.Malicious scrapers frequently arrive on websites to scan for information and extract data or content to use elsewhere. Because of this, the way they navigate throughout a website appears more erratic than typical human behavior. Bots tend to jump from page to page, rapidly click on various modules, and exit quickly once they have stolen the information they were looking for. Because of the nature of these actions, these harmful automation tools can have much higher bounce rates and shorter time on each page than a standard user. Furthermore, because the end-game of a scraper is often to duplicate content or data somewhere else on the internet, they can also lead search engines to believe that the original content is actually duplicate content. When this type of activity is factored into the overall user behavior on a given website, it can reduce page rank and leave search marketers frustrated and confused. 2. Site speed slows down.Site speed is also largely impacted by various types of bots and fake users. When malicious bots arrive on a website, they often preoccupy servers with high volumes of requests within short periods. This can overwhelm a website and make the experience slower and more difficult for legitimate human users. Slow website speeds then also harm the website’s ability to rank highly on SERPs, which can be devastating for search marketing key metrics. Additionally, when search rankings drop, the website becomes more difficult for potential customers to find and businesses may begin to lose those customers to competitors and alternative solutions. 3. Keyword strategy is misinformed.Both SEO and PPC marketers habitually perform keyword research before launching a new initiative or campaign. However, since bots and malicious human users frequently click on both paid and organic links at a large scale, marketers might misunderstand which keywords are actually the best performing. For example, high click-through rates on a given keyword are typically seen as a positive indicator – but if a high percentage of those clicks came from bad actors, the marketer should probably avoid that keyword. The presence of malicious traffic can cause implementation of misguided strategies, which will continue to harm the business’s overall ability to drive quality traffic to the site. Trying to run an effective marketing operation in the era of the Fake Web can be intimidating at times. Still, the good news is that many organizations are beginning to fight back against malicious traffic. Today, more businesses are starting to implement go-to-market Security technology which can help mitigate these risks and allow marketers to focus on what they do best. The post 3 ways bots and fake users are killing your search efforts appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/19vo60Q Are you able to develop a relationship with your current clients and make your future prospects like you? The best way to do this is to understand the personality of your customers. This can help you predict their motives. Approach content by developing it for the psychology of the user, rather than the psychology of the writer. For example, for me (who has the attention span of a gnat), what if a content writer knew that she only had 30 seconds to answer “what are the best running shoes I can wear as a beginner?” Or what if she knew that for my friend (who can overthink how a garage door opener works for hours), she had a good 30 minutes to inundate him with as much information about “what are the best running shoes?” Dr. Taylor Hartman wrote the book on understanding motives in psychology. I was fortunate to have met him and to learn about how “The People Code” could be transformed into developing deep psychological trait-based content for better performance. I’ve taken these ideas and tested them. Not only the behaviors of individuals, but all the way up to entire countries and cultures. I was astonished by what I found, from the improved ROI to the more efficient buyer journeys. Who are you?The best way to start writing ads or content based on psychological behaviors is to first understand yourself. There are many different systems and tools you can use for personality assessments. However, for this article, I’m going to use Hartman’s tests and methodology. It starts with an honest quiz you give yourself of about 50 questions. For example: What ONE word of Phrase describes what you are like most of the time? As a child, I was: When you are done with the self-assessment questions in the book, you tally up your answers on how many As, Bs, Cs, and Ds to determine where you stand on the psychological trait spectrum, with:
What Am I?All of our behaviors will fall into a personality classification on this spectrum. Sometimes they will fall in between two color behaviors as well. For example, you can be evenly split between a Red Dominant and Blue Compliant or a Steady Green and an Influential Yellow. Dominant RedsMost of these traits are people who have type-A personalities. Direct, decisive, doers and workaholics. They may come across as too confident, demanding and domineering. Often they thrive and appreciate admiration, they have a specific need to look good to others and can also be a bit on the selfish side. The patience of this trait is usually at a minimum, which means content absorption is also at a minimum. Compliant BluesVery much the intimate ones. Usually cautious about how they go about things and as a consequence, they tend to have anxiety and be very worry-prone. There is a need to connect with others and to be understood and appreciated. They are dependable, loyal and expect honesty from others. They can also come across as moody, self-righteous, condescending and sometimes even a little too empathetic. Most Compliant Blues love other Compliant Blues. They tend to get each other so very well. That being said, content absorption is usually done when you can touch their heart and their soul. Steady GreensThese are the slow, peaceful yet independent people. Typically quiet by nature, they resist and hate confrontation. They are great listeners yet they thrive and need their alone time. Even-tempered and supportive, but also silently stubborn and over-sensitive. Sometimes it’s harder for this group to embrace or even understand empathy, yet they are diplomatic. T hey are the polar opposites of dominant reds and tend to do a lot of research and take their time making decisions. The more content, the better. Influential YellowsThese are the fun-loving, extremely social, playful influencers. The ones that are likely to be interesting, interactive, happy and spontaneous. They thrive on adventure and need to be adored and praised. Friendships are the highest priority for them yet they can turn off others easily by their impulsive and sometimes irritating loud nature. Always need to look good socially and it seems like nothing can go wrong, except for their attention span. Your content better not be boring or this group will be off with their mind wandering around the next palm tree vacation. How to create content around these psychological traitsAs you can see from the four different personality types, we are all pretty different and what we absorb in terms of content and creative is also different. What may resonate well with one group, may fall short with another. Using the “Running Shoes” topic, take a look at how each content reverberates with each group differently. Dominant Red contentThis group is the dominant power type-A personalities. They will make quick decisions if you can feed their ego and not bury them with too much information. Here are some examples that this group would enjoy:
Compliance Blue contentThis group (of which I consider myself a member) is motivated by the heart and feelings. Considering they are so trusting, they can easily be taken advantage of. This group does have an analytical side and can be brutally honest if need be. They tend to over-read into everything. But throw in a horse with a hurt leg that’s been patched up and is walking again, you’ll have already won them over. Here are some examples that this group would enjoy:
Steady Green contentThis group is the peace-lovers. The ones who take life in the slow lane. This group is often what we all need in order to slow down, take a deep breath, pretend we do Tai Chi and then go with them on their journey of never-ending research. Stretching the period of decisiveness from what you thought would be two hours to three weeks.
Influential Yellow contentThis group is made up of little rays of sunshine – the influencers who not only make me smile but make me want to pick up a good self-help book so I can be just like them. Content-wise, you’ve got to make sure you style your content as much as possible. Just about anything colorful and fun can get them going. Because they lack the patience for deep research, I will need to write content that’s fun, useful and clear. Frustrating an influencer is like death. They can go from the funniest clown to the meanest Karen in a heartbeat. More to comeIn my next article, I plan to do a deeper dive into other forms of psychological profiling, how to tag classifications to personas, how culture, country and language also have their own psychological traits, and how to survey your customers to get insight into what types are attracted to your brand. Because, finally, you understand them and they get you. The post Content creation: A psychological approach appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/iX2kn35 Want to know an easy way to speed up and improve the overall performance of your website? Invest in good hosting. Ignorance is no longer an excuse for any company to use a cheap web host. Website performance is a critical element that can help improve your rankings, traffic and conversions. This guide will cover everything you need to understand about why web hosting is important for SEO. What is website hostingA website hosting service provider, or web host, is a service that offers the technology required for a website to be viewed online. Think of a web host as the home base of your website. Websites or webpages are stored on special computers called servers, and through the server your webpages get connected and delivered to internet browsers. So, when users want to view your website, all they have to do is type your website address or domain into their browser. When building a website, companies typically invest a lot of time and resources on design, development, digital marketing and SEO. But web hosting is one area that tends to be an afterthought. If you are willing to invest in making sure the website looks good and driving traffic to it, why not also ensure that the actual website is fast, functional and flexible? Using a high-quality web host can maximize your conversion rates, along with other helpful benefits. How web hosting benefits businessesIf you want a website for your business, then you will need a web host. Although web hosting is usually left at the back of a business’ mindset, it is crucial for your online presence. A reliable web host can give your company a variety of benefits, such as:
In short, investing in a reliable web host is wise – and should help grow your business. Expected features from hosting providersWeb hosts offer more than just web hosting services for businesses. Web host firms offer multiple services that ensure a hassle-free experience for business owners and to make sure their only focus is the time and energy spent on their business. Here are some features you should expect from a good web hosting provider:
Most popular web hostsPopular web hosting companies include:
Why web hosting is important for SEOWhen it comes to SEO, Google strives to deliver the best possible results for its users. This means that a strong and reliable web host will lay the foundation for your SEO efforts. Google looks at several factors to ensure the user has a positive experience after using their search engine. Websites that work faster with improved UX can get a rankings boost. SEO is a huge focus for nearly all businesses and brands today. Everyone wants their site listed on the first page of Google for relevant search queries. Websites that fail to rank on Page 1 of Google likely won’t be found. As the saying goes, “the best place to hide a website is the second page of Google.” There are three main reasons why web hosting is important for SEO: speed, security and location. SpeedLooking at it from a practical standpoint, speed is an extremely important factor for SEO. A slow and cheap web host will result in a slow website. The domino effect is that it would result in poor rankings, low organic traffic, and minimal leads. What’s the solution? A good web host will have high speeds, which will decrease the load time of your pages. When determining how fast a website should load in 2022, it should always be as fast as possible. Google’s benchmark for the ideal time for mobile speed is two seconds or less. A 2022 study showed average loading time for mobile-sites was around 4.5 seconds. For 20% of the analyzed mobile landing pages, the visual content took longer than 6.6 seconds to load. Considering that speed equals revenue, this is still far too slow. Tools for Measuring Page Speed Need to measure your page speeds? Use these helpful tools:
Target Metrics for Websites The Core Web Vitals report is what shows how your webpages perform based on real world usage data, which is also referred to as “field data.” With the Core Web Vitals, the URL performance is shown by status, metric type, and URL group. Core Web Vitals are based on three metrics:
SecurityWithout a strong security system for your website, it can suffer from detrimental issues such as hackers, spam pages, and fake backlinks. All of these things can harm your Google rankings – and potentially result in a manual action. There is also the risk of your site getting infected with malware, which could potentially result in your site getting blacklisted by search engines or showing a security warning in the search results. If you don’t use a web host with a strong security system, it could negatively impact your SEO efforts. One feature that web host providers may offer is a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL). This is a security certificate that is the standard technology for keeping the internet connection secure. Another plus side of strong security comes from reliable tech support and customer service. As a company, you want to ensure that the web host you’re using has top quality tech support and customer service. If something is too slow or the site crashes, you can get it solved quick and efficiently. A strong tech and customer support team will ease any worries or panic if your site ever goes down. LocationLocation is an important factor in the SEO of your website. Search engines will look at location-based signals into consideration when searching for optimal results. Some questions to consider:
All of these are practical reasons for where your website will be hosted. It plays a role in determining how far the data must travel, and its speed. For example, if your business is located within the United States, you want your website to be located in the U.S. data center. If your company is in the United Kingdom, then you would want the site to be in a UK data center. If your business operates globally, you will want a Content Delivery Network (CDN) that offers hubs around the world, so the hosting is fast regardless of the user’s location. Using a cheap web host can result in not being placed in a local data center. This can potentially negative impact your website, including how the site performs for your users and your organic search rankings. Which web hosting service should you use?All hosting platforms have their benefits – but to be blunt, some really stink. So how exactly should you choose a reliable service? You can look for the following factors:
Why WP Engine is (almost always) my recommendationWe have worked with (and still work with) clients on a variety of hosting platforms. But when it comes down to which is the best, I almost always suggest WP Engine. In my experience with WP Engine:
The cost of WP Engine is extremely reasonable. The beginner package (which is great for most website) at only $23/month. The speed and performance of this hosting platform is tremendous and really aids your efforts as you optimize the site for mobile-speed and core web vitals. Furthermore, WP Engine also provides a free SSL certificate to their members, even further beefing up the website’s security and meeting Google’s known-standards. Working with WP Engine has allowed me to focus on my SEO work and less on server and performance issues that may be associated with a weaker hosting service. Educating your clients/stakeholders on the value of good hostingYour clients or stakeholders are already investing so much into creating a successful website (content, SEO, etc.) Picking the wrong web host could undermine all of those other investments. Picking the right web host can almost instantly improve your speed, Core Web Vitals and standing. If your website has poor web hosting, it runs the risk of negatively affecting your SEO. Your site could suffer from downtime, which is about as bad of a user experience as someone could have. If the web host is slow, it is more likely that the user will leave your page and switch to another option. Load time equates to reputation. And any website that takes longer than a few seconds to load will lose users (which means fewer conversions and less revenue). Think of it like this: if you purchased a new Bentley (new website), you wouldn’t want it to have the engine of a Kia Soul (slow web host/server). (I drive a Kia Soul, so certainly not a dig!) The post Web hosting for SEO: Why it’s important appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/XLUMI42 Link building isn’t easy, especially if you want it to be done right (i.e., stay compliant with Google’s Webmaster Guidelines). Nevertheless, if your goal is to siphon more organic traffic through high search engine rankings, it is vital to study the intricacies of modern white hat SEO. However, like with any other industry, you also have experts for hire within link building space. This article will cover some of the best link-building service providers. If you need professional help, especially in competitive niches where organic traffic could be highly lucrative, you might as well give these link-building services a try. To kick things off, let us introduce you to some of the best link-building services, followed by which we have some of the best link-building strategies if you want to do it yourself as well. 10 best link-building services1. OutreachZ.comOutreachZ.com is a self-service platform that acts as a middleman between backlink seekers and webmasters willing to publish your content on their blog. The marketplace is enormous and constantly growing. This is an excellent solution for SEO professionals who prefer to have more autonomy by taking matters into their own hands. It lets you choose the blogs you want to publish your content on (based on industry metrics such as DA and DR). We picked the platform because it effectively solves your blogger outreach problems through a user-friendly interface. Because every blogger listed on the marketplace has been pre-vetted, you’ll save a ton of time contacting them and negotiating the terms of the deal. As long as you can provide well-written content that’s relevant to their niche, it’s almost impossible not to strike a deal – this is a win-win relationship between you and the blogger who has already expressed their interest! 2. RankZ.coRankZ.co is a managed guest posting platform and one of the best link-building services to source highly relevant editorial links. Even if you know nothing about SEO, their friendly team of experts will take you by the hand and devise a custom-tailored SEO strategy just for you. Just like OutreachZ.com, RankZ has a broad database of bloggers from every niche who are willing to link back to you in exchange for quality content. We picked it because it can help any website gain higher search engine rankings at very reasonable prices. Unlike some of its competitors, the managed SEO service provider chooses to take a personalized approach for every one of its customers. Before proceeding with the custom-tailored action plan, one of their experts will thoroughly analyze your website and make recommendations based on their findings. Thanks to their in-depth reporting, you’ll always know where you stand in Google, and every backlink they create will be listed there, right along with the relevant metric (DA, DR and similar). 3. Page One PowerThis link-building services provider focuses on giving you a personalized experience, meaning they will sit down with you to discuss your individual needs, analyze your existing SEO work and backlink profile, and give you a personalized SEO package. The great thing about this link-building company is the fact they are willing to do a lot of research and heavy lifting for you, thus giving you the extra breathing room to focus on other aspects of your business. Once you start working with them, they will assign a dedicated project manager to oversee your SEO campaign who also serves as your go-to customer support agent. 4. uSERPIf you’re looking for a tried and true SEO and link-building agency that works with high-profile industry names like Robinhood, Monday, Freshworks, Hotjar and others, you’ve come to the right address. Working with small businesses and large enterprises alike, they will craft and initiate an SEO campaign that’s based on quality rather than quantity, so you can count on a fully white-hat and content-based approach to link building. They promise visible results in as little as three months. 5. NewswireAdding a little bit of diversity to your link-building campaigns can only do wonders for your SEO. This is exactly what Newswire was built on – distributing well-written press releases to authoritative media outlets. In essence, this lets you snag some high-quality backlinks all while increasing your brand’s reputation by bringing it in front of potential clients. According to their website, they can do either local or international coverage. The transparency of their business model ensures that you will always know what you’re paying for. 6. From The FutureFrom The Future is one of the link-building providers that emphasize the importance of a personalized approach. In practice, this means a high degree of customizability. Before they start working on your project, an SEO expert will analyze your existing backlink profile and do research on where to look for the most relevant backlinks from the top-quality sources in your industry. And this is not a one-off deal either: they promise to be on the lookout for new backlink opportunities on a monthly basis. And once one has been identified, they will message the website owner on your behalf, so you won’t have to. 7. Siege MediaSiege Media believes in the power of content-based link building, and this is the approach they choose to take when working with your brand. To save you time, they will research the most relevant high-authority websites on your behalf and pitch them your outreach offer. Since they create all their content manually, you can count on a high acceptance rate – the bloggers won’t be able to say no! Although this specific link-building services provider won’t give you an exact number of links they can expect to build, they will give you a ballpark figure instead, which is more than enough. 8. WhitesparkWhitespark is one of the better choices for every small business owner – that’s the client base they specialize to serve. Their methodology of choice is helping you build local citations. Before starting to work on your SEO campaign, they will ask you some detailed questions about your business so they can tweak it and custom-tailor it as per your exact needs. Their pricing is transparent – a single citation will cost you $4-$5, depending on its type. If you’re looking to get a citation from specific places, you can even send them a list of pre-approved websites, and they’ll see if they can accommodate your request. 9. The Upper RanksBeginning its operations in 2011, this link-building company has been around for quite a while and is a trusted business partner of some of the largest brands in existence, including some established names from the Fortune 500 list. Due to the high standards of their clients, you will never get a subpar backlink – each one they build is a direct result of hours of hard work, blood, and sweat they pour into it. The philosophy of their approach to SEO is to build the kind of backlinks that are relevant to their clients’ industry, thereby having the best chance of standing the test of time and delivering long-term results. 10. FATJOETo help you overcome any technical hurdles and get started as quickly as possible, FATJOE features an intuitive dashboard from which you can see your active orders and manage them. Their Blogger Outreach service makes it easy to get in touch with webmasters and bloggers who wish to publish your content on their website in exchange for a link back to you. To keep your backlink portfolio as diverse as possible, this link-building services provider will also toss in some press releases. With fast turnaround times and low prices, FATJOE is hardly a miss. Bonus Service: While inconsistent and hard to scale, HARO, short for Help a reporter out, can get you some of the best links you can proactively build. However, it can be time-consuming and not consistently successful as it requires you to organically contribute to journalists in their active research. Now, if you do not want to hire a link-building service provider for any reason, you can always do it yourself. Though time-consuming and mundane, link building can be the most rewarding and game-changing of all marketing activities you might have worked on your business. The strategies we’ll be covering are not only proven to work today but also lay a solid foundation for what’s to come in the SEO landscape in the years to come. And the best part? In our ultimate white hat backlinking guide, you’ll learn all you need to know to reach your organic traffic goals now and in the future, as well as get educated about some of the common traps and pitfalls to avoid. Right now, only thematically relevant backlinks are good enough to move the needle.Fast page load times and mobile-optimized websites are the essential cornerstones of modern on-site SEO, but for Google to rank you alongside the most trusted authorities in your niche, you will need to back it up with strong off-site SEO. Indeed, this means obtaining backlinks from thematically-relevant sources – Google sees this as a vote of trust. Think of it as “street cred” in your chosen niche. In the past, the primary focus was convincing high-authority websites to link back to you. But nowadays, the topical relevance of the backlinks you build is arguably even more important than the raw authority of the website. Ideally, you would have a backlink cover both of these categories, but in practice, backlinking opportunities like this are hard to find. Therefore, your primary focus when building links should be on relevance – authority, while still important, comes second. Best White Hat SEO link-building strategies1. Resource pagesMAIN IDEA: Writing in-depth resources on trending or niche topics that save time and are helpful will earn you the highest quality links for free. Link type: Follow When writing content, you should be willing to go above and beyond to help your audience in any way you can. If you take the concept of writing helpful resource pages and combine it with laser-focusing on trending topics that people are searching for, it won’t take much convincing for other people to link to you. Moreover, since you’ll be utilizing the power of hashtags that are trending when sharing your content on social media, people will organically flock to your website even before it starts ranking on Google. This can create a snowball effect as people are actively searching for the topics you’ll be covering. It’s like riding a traffic tornado – you’ll be giving them exactly the kind of content they’re starving for. So, what is a resource page? In essence, it’s a comprehensive guide featuring helpful guidance on pressing matters (examples include COVID-19, the Ukraine crisis and similar). Let’s say you decided to create a resource page on COVID-19 where you list a recap of the most important things the reader should know. You will be covering topics such as:
Other ideas:
Finally, to make this concept truly work wonders for your SEO, you should start searching for other people’s posts on the topic and find out who’s linking back to them. You can use any suitable SEO tool of your choice for this task (Ahrefs is a great choice). Then, reach out to these webmasters and say something along the lines of: “Hey, I noticed you linked to this post; we created a well-researched article that is even better, more in-depth, and covers more sub-topics. We spent a ton of time making the definitive and most comprehensive resource out there. Would you be willing to link to us instead?” Even if you only get one out of 20 to respond, make no mistake – it’s well worth your time and effort. Keep in mind the backlinks you’ll get will be of the highest editorial quality. In fact, this is one of the top white-hat SEO strategies out there, and it’s not going against the will of Google but giving it exactly the kind of thing it wants to see instead. By following the strategy explained above, everybody wins you, the webmaster, Google, and the readers.
Link baiting is a strategy you should use sparingly. But when executed correctly, it can bring you outstanding results. The premise is this: write something provocative or touch upon a sensitive topic and publish it on your website. Be respectful and stay within the boundaries of the law, but other than that, say it as you mean it, and don’t pull your punches! This way, people will be compelled to reference your post to chime in, and the discussion can heat up well beyond the comment section of your blog. This won’t always work, but when it does, your article or blog post can truly go viral. Plus, you can get a boatload of backlinks and traffic. A softer version of the same strategy is to post a discount on your products or services, which is also likely to attract links. Get your creative juices flowing and think of other ways you could bait people into linking to your content. Anything related to politics, football, dating, and celebrity gossip is a good start. In the beginning, however, your primary focus should be on getting traffic in the first place. This is the toughest part. Once your website starts getting the initial bout of traffic, the link baiting strategy can be a good way to expand upon the idea of “resource pages” and take it even further. 2. Guest postingMAIN IDEA: Gain powerful editorial backlinks in exchange for content. Link type: Follow Guest posting simply works. It’s one of the most efficient ways to secure high-quality backlinks from virtually any niche of your choosing. If the webmaster takes you up on your offer, this effectively grants you access to high-quality editorial backlinks, which are some of the most powerful ones you can get. This is due to the following: Firstly, these are content-based links. Google looks upon them much more favorably compared to, for example, backlinks that are placed in the footer or the sidebar. The reason being is that backlinks in those side areas are often not human-generated, whereas the ones placed in the middle of the content most likely are. Secondly, content-based links imply a healthy amount of editorial pressure. In other words, it’s up to the webmaster to either approve your guest post or reject it, meaning it has to offer something valuable to the reader – otherwise, there would be nothing in it for the webmaster to publish it. By favoring editorial backlinks, Google promotes the distribution of helpful and well-written content. It’s a win-win arrangement for everyone involved! The webmaster gets amazing content for free for their readers to enjoy, and you get a powerful backlink. Best of all, any blog in your niche could potentially be willing to link back to you in exchange for quality content. At this point, you’re presented with two options: – You can start contacting bloggers on your own. However, bear in mind it’s a labor-intensive process, and it’s quite typical for the majority of your emails to go unanswered. Furthermore, although still effective, the strategy has been chewed to the bone as you’re not the first one to think of utilizing it. Bloggers these days can be very picky with regard to what they’re willing to publish, so you’re going to have to come up with the very best content to stand a chance and pass through their filters. And that’s not even mentioning the time it takes to compile a list of bloggers and email them one by one. – In case writing and emailing people is not your cup of tea, you’re better off outsourcing it to a professional or finding the best link-building service with native writers on board (like the ones we mentioned above). But be very careful who you entrust this task! A no-name blogger outreach services provider could end up promising the sky and under-delivering, or worse yet, providing the wrong type of links that could harm your entire SEO campaign. Long story short: in the SEO sphere of today, guest posting remains the holy grail of white-hat link building. At the same time, it also helps position you as the authority in your niche and grow your brand. Once your posts get published, don’t forget to count the highly targeted traffic your website will receive directly from the webmaster’s blog when people start clicking through your link. This can drive highly qualified leads immediately, even before SEO benefits start taking place. 3. “Parasite” websites (with high Domain Authority)MAIN IDEA: Utilize high DA websites that can rank for low-to-medium competition keywords on their own. Link type: Nofollow How would you like to ride the waves of another website’s authority and capitalize on its high search engine rankings? With the so-called “parasite” SEO strategy, you can quickly claim the top spots in Google for low-to-medium competition keywords. There are numerous websites you can use for this purpose, with some of the best being: – Medium – LinkedIn Pulse After registering, simply publish an article there, and the platform will let you insert a backlink. Granted, it will have the “nofollow” attribute, but the strategy is worth pursuing for the direct clicks your website will receive alone. For example, let’s imagine you’ve written an article about “blue widgets” and published it on your main website. Do some keyword research and identify some related LSI keywords (typically, these will have a low difficulty). All of these long-tail keywords are perfect to write a supporting article for – inside, you will mention your website as a reference where they can learn more about the topic. You could, of course, use the long-tail keyword strategy on your main website as well, but don’t expect a miracle in terms of search engine rankings if it’s new. Although you will eventually rank for your chosen keywords, either way, know that “parasite” websites already have a high domain authority in Google and are thus much better suited for ranking quickly. Yes, even without building any additional backlinks to them at all! 4. InfographicsMAIN IDEA: Create eye-catching materials that people distribute without you even asking Link type: Varies Infographics have long been a closely guarded secret and a potent link-building weapon in the hands of the best link-building services and their clients. Much like press releases, once created, infographics are the kind of content people will happily distribute on their own without you having to lift a finger, provided the content (and its presentation) is truly something remarkable. Granted, not every topic will perform equally well, so you have to do your due diligence. In general, info-based topics that are packed with stats tend to perform well (hence the name “info”-graphics). When brainstorming ideas, make sure to think about what kind of statistics or facts would invoke the “WOW, I didn’t know that!” response in your readers. Because let’s face it – some statistics are just plain boring. And content that makes people yawn won’t get shared. Last but not least, consider hiring a graphic designer for the job. Even though you could technically get away with doing it for free using Canva or similar template-based tools, it’s essential to create something eye-catching. Note: In case you catch someone publishing your infographic without linking back to your site, kindly reach out to them and ask for a backlink. Most will be happy to oblige. But just in case, don’t forget to also include your logo and your main website URL in graphical form. 5. Broken link buildingMAIN IDEA: Get a free backlink in exchange for fixing other people’s broken links. Link type: Follow This backlinking strategy is severely underutilized, but if executed correctly, it could net you some high-quality editorial backlinks. In essence, it works like this: First, do some thorough research and web crawling to discover whether any bloggers in your niche have published any articles with broken links in them. These can be broken due to typos, but sometimes, the domain they were linking to could have expired or is simply no longer hosting that content. Then, get in touch with them, notify them about the issue, and offer your website’s URL as a replacement (ideally, you’ve already published an article that covers this topic). As you might have guessed, the hard part is locating these broken backlink opportunities, and if you were to do it by hand, you’d probably go crazy. The good news is that there’s a myriad of SEO tools you can use for this purpose, so this aspect of the equation is semi-automated and practically done for you. If you’re planning to use this strategy, there’s something very important to keep in mind: don’t try to hide your intentions. Be transparent. Say that “yes, my goal is to get a backlink from you, but if you help me out, we both gain something from it.” The reason being is that you’re solving a problem they’re having, but for this to work best, the replacement URL you’ll provide truly has to contain the kind of content that will leave them breathless. Ideally, it should be better to cover the topic more in-depth than the original. To check out the old article that is no longer reachable or someone has taken it down, you can use a free tool like Archive.org. 6. Email those who scrape your content and request they link back to youMAIN IDEA: Instead of going after copyright violation, turn it into your favor and get a backlink. Link type: Varies Stealing other people’s content is not only a copyright violation, but it’s also not recommended for SEO (duplicate content issues). Nevertheless, the internet is full of individuals who are utterly unaware of the fact, so expect them to do it regardless. Even though you’d be 100% in the right to request they take down the content that legally belongs to you, might we suggest a better strategy? Instead of going at them hard, kindly ask them to link back to you as a way to say “thanks.” This way, they can continue using the content, but you’ll get something out of it as they’ll list your website as the source. Don’t worry about their stolen article potentially harming yours. If you published the article before they did and Google crawled your website before crawling theirs, your version will be recognized as the original. 7. Press releasesMAIN IDEA: Raise brand awareness with PR articles that get picked up automatically. Link type: Varies (mostly nofollow) Although Google claims to be ignoring links obtained by distributing press releases (after all, most of them will have the “nofollow” attribute), it’s unlikely these backlinks will hurt you. In fact, they are not only great for diversifying your backlink profile but also for the purpose of growing brand awareness. If you get lucky and your PR articles get picked up by the right news outlets, you can even score some high authority “follow” backlinks along the way. So how do you write an amazing PR article that has the best chance of getting picked up by the media? In essence, structure your content in such a way that it addresses the following 5 big questions: – What message are we conveying/what is our announcement? – Who are we trying to reach? – What’s in store for our target audience? – When will it be launched? – Who will be the one to deliver the message? Of course, the exact questions can vary from niche to niche, but you get the idea. As long as you cover the “who,” the “what,” the “when,” the “where,” and the “why,” you should be in good shape. 8. Q&A websitesMAIN IDEA: Get direct traffic by sharing your expertise. Link type: Nofollow Q&A websites are an under-utilized yet powerful tool to grow your online presence. Not only do they let you leave a link back to you inside your profile and answers, but they also help you establish yourself as an authority in your niche – provided that your answers are genuinely helpful. In other words, you’ll be placing your business directly in front of a highly targeted audience who’s looking for a solution, which is exactly what you need. The leading Q&A websites in today’s web space are: – Quora – LinkedIn Answers However, you need to approach them with the right strategy in mind – mindlessly throwing your website’s URL around won’t get you anywhere (and it may even get you banned from the platform). In fact, even directly linking to your products or sales pages is NOT recommended most of the time. What you need to do is research the most common questions people are asking, categorize them, if need be, and write a blog post on your website that addresses them from various different angles. Now, you have a powerful free resource you can share with them if they want to learn more. So, let’s say you come across a question that asks about X. In your answer, you would do your best to answer that question to give the reader a good basic idea of what they need to do (but don’t go into the details too much). Then, at the end of your answer, you can say something to the extent of “if you’d like to learn how you can solve X, check out the detailed guide I’ve posted on my blog that answers your question even more specifically.” And inside that blog post (and NOT on the Q&A website directly), you subtly promote whatever products or services you’re offering. Do you see the difference? By doing it this way, no one will ever flag your answers as spam – in fact, the readers will thank you for it. Moreover, these Q&A websites often rank very highly on Google, meaning you can legitimately piggyback off of their search engine authority and funnel a healthy portion of their traffic your way. Although things may change over time, these will always be worth it for marketing purposes in one way or another. Even if they suddenly decide to make all of your links “nofollow” (or even prohibit you to insert links in the first place), it’s well worth it to participate as these may net you a handsome chunk of direct traffic. 9. YouTubeMAIN IDEA: Repurpose your content by turning it into videos that generate traffic. Link type: Nofollow Video distribution sites like YouTube and Vimeo are fantastic for getting your content out there and generating some thematically relevant backlinks while you’re at it. Did you know YouTube is the world’s second-largest search engine? It functions exactly like Google in many ways, with the main difference being its focus on video rather than written content. By uploading to YouTube, not only can you leave a link under every video you post, but you will also get direct traffic to your website from targeted visitors. If you’ve ever published an article, you can repurpose it for all sorts of things, including turning it into a video. Feel free to use the content you’ve already written as a manuscript for your video or amend it slightly if you wish. At any rate, most of the hard work will have already been done at this point – now, you only need to figure out what video production/editing approach would work best. If you’re camera-shy, there’s no need to put your face on the screen if you’re not comfortable with doing so for any reason. You can make a captivating video by using nothing more than a couple of PowerPoint slides or it can simply be you talking over an image background. As long as you’ve got a decent microphone at hand, you should be able to produce something in a matter of minutes. Alternatively, you could also outsource any part of the video creation process to a freelancer. 10. Blog commentingMAIN IDEA: Get direct traffic by adding value to the discussion. Link type: Nofollow Although blog commenting shouldn’t be your primary link-building strategy due to it yielding nothing more than “nofollow” links that don’t count for much, the best link-building services still recommend using it in modesty. The reasons are twofold: – It makes your backlink profile more diverse – It helps you establish a brand in your niche Keep in mind that the vast majority of these links will be “nofollow.” In most cases, your author’s name will appear as a clickable link you can use to link back to your website, but don’t try to shove your links inside the body of the comment (this will most likely cause the webmaster to delete your comment straight away). To be successful with blog commenting, the trick is to find relevant blogs in your niche and, ideally, be the first to leave a comment. This way, you’re almost guaranteed to be noticed and may receive some direct clicks to your website, provided the comment you leave contributes something valuable to the discussion. In other words, don’t just leave a comment for the sake of doing it. Comments like “hey there, great blog post” are not enough to get your comment approved – you have to do better! The goal is to invoke curiosity in the reader. If possible, try to use your real name with an avatar for your posts to have an added bit of legitimacy and to stand out more.
How many times has it happened to you that someone mentioned your name or brand, but it’s in plain text form rather than it being a clickable link? A pity you can’t do anything about it being hyperlinked… or can you? Listen: if someone decided to mention you in a positive context, chances are they will be more than willing to link back to one of your websites when asked nicely. And if not, try your luck with another person who mentioned you somewhere. With SEO tools (or Google directly), you’ll discover more of these unlinked mentions than you can chew on, especially if your brand is popular.
Not every backlink you’ve created will last for a lifetime. Sometimes, sites get taken down for a myriad of reasons, domains expire without being renewed, etc. But in other cases, they get removed deliberately by the webmasters. Chances are, at least one of the websites that used to be linking to you no longer does, and several SEO tools can help you pinpoint precisely what those are. Then reach out to those people and ask if they could add it back. Be polite. Sometimes it’s a mistake on their end, or perhaps they decided to rewrite the entire article. Either way, it doesn’t hurt to try.
Have you ever stumbled upon a low-quality piece of content that had a ton of backlinks and couldn’t help but wonder how it got them in the first place? If you’re a part of the SEO industry, you’ll come across one of these sooner or later. Then, write an article on the same topic, but make it bigger and make it better. It has to be superior to the original in every way you can imagine. After it gets published, convince the webmaster to link to your article instead. If you’ve done your homework, this should be an easy win.
Obtaining backlinks from directories is an old-school SEO strategy, and most of them will be “nofollow.” While this is unlikely to give you a substantial boost in your search engine rankings, it does serve an essential purpose – diversifying your backlink profile. Do you think it’s natural to have only the highest quality editorial backlinks pointing to your site and nothing more? Of course not. So go out there and claim these surefire victories, as small as they may be.
Is your website powered by WordPress? Then you probably have an RSS feed already. In essence, this is a mechanism that broadcasts your newly published content to the world. Unfortunately, some will blatantly steal your content and republish it on their blog. But often, they’ll employ some sort of automation to do it, meaning they won’t bother stripping out any internal links you’ve left in there. So, make sure to insert them in your articles and mention other related content you’ve published on your website – it’s a good on-site SEO strategy you should consider utilizing either way.
A wide range of SEO tools allow you to check the backlink profile of any page you’re interested in, including your competitors’. Why would you want to do that? The reason is simple: to see where they’re getting their backlinks from. If they’re willing to link to your competitors, they’re likely ready to link to you as well, especially if your content is far superior. The next step is to identify backlinking opportunities – which webmasters should you reach out to first? Go through them one by one and you should be able to get a response eventually.
Although any backlinks obtained from social media tend to be “nofollow” (Facebook, in particular, is set to “noindex”) and thus not likely to have a significant impact, it’s still a good idea to have them for multiple reasons. First of all, your backlink profile should be natural, varied, and diverse. By sharing valuable content on social media, not only do you get your brand in front of people’s eyes, but also foster healthy relationships with those who could end up becoming your loyal customers. You need to show them that you’re not just another faceless corporate entity; that there’s a real human face behind all of this, someone whose vision is to help others achieve their dreams and solve their problems. As a result, most will feel indebted to you and be more willing to do business with you – that’s the power of reciprocity.
This method only applies if you’re running some sort of retail or eCommerce store. Simply make a list of the products you carry in your inventory and jot down your manufacturers and suppliers. Then, write them an email and inquire whether they have some sort of “our retailers” page. Ask if they could link to your e-store. Most will be willing to oblige.
In case you’ve restructured your website, it’s important to have 301 redirects pointing from the old URL structure to the new one. Without it, you’d be losing out on link juice from anyone who’s linking out to you. Of course, newly launched websites won’t have to worry about this problem, but if yours has been around for a couple of years, it’s good to have this in mind – a little tweak like this could do wonders for preserving your existing rankings.
Bought any products recently that you’d have zero second thoughts about endorsing? Send an email to their creators, share your love and enthusiasm for the product, and ask if you could write a testimonial for them. In most cases, you’ll also be able to provide a link to your website. This works two ways: their sales pages get more credibility and you’ve just scored a powerful backlink to your site. Nice!
If you have a decent knowledge of coding, you could come up with a free tool and host it on your website. It could be something as simple as a calculator or as complex as an online scraper or SEO tool. These tend to attract quite a bit of organic backlinks. Alternatively, you could also hire a developer to do this for you, but bear in mind that, depending on the length and complexity of the project, it could end up costing you a pretty penny. Alternatively, it can be something creative: maps, tests, quizzes… you get the idea.
If you have a product to give away, see if they would like to receive a free copy in exchange for a review. It’s quite easy to score some high-quality editorial links this way. However, be careful how you present the offer – it’s against Google’s Webmaster Guidelines to give out a product in exchange for a backlink directly.
Are you an established name in your niche? Perhaps you’re holding a Ph.D. or you’re a well-known athlete? Capitalize on your accomplishments by letting other people interview you. You can bet they’ll be happy to leave a link as well. And in case you’ve been interviewed before and haven’t had a website at the time, reach out to them and ask them to insert your link next to the podcast or interview.
Is your niche about a passionate subject, something to do with human rights, perhaps? If there are people who believe in the same cause as you, they will do anything in their power to support it, including linking to it. You might even get featured in the media.
There are many podcasts and videos online whose creators simply don’t have the time or resources to generate a transcription or provide subtitles. Offer to do it for them in exchange for a backlink. 11. The dos and don’ts of white hat SEOBefore we conclude our guide, here are some of the key points you should apply to your SEO strategy:
Editorial backlinks are placed somewhere in the body (as opposed to the sidebar or footer). For Google, this indicates that someone has placed the link there intentionally (as opposed to the link being auto-generated by some plugin or a script). Therefore, it acts as a vote of confidence and thus carries more weight.
In the past, overusing “exact match” anchors worked tremendously well and was used by many SEO experts as a shortcut to attain high search engine rankings in a relatively short period of time. However, ever since Google introduced its infamous Penguin algorithm update in 2012, this is a surefire way to shoot yourself in the foot and get penalized by the search engines. In other words, you’re 10 years late to the party!
In SEO, quality goes a long way. Anyone can build thousands of spammy backlinks using automated tools, but nowadays, this will kill your rankings faster than you can say “cheese.” The ones you want to shoot for are usually the kind that is the hardest to get.
Keyword density is another SEO metric that used to be relevant back in the day, but nowadays, its relevance is minimal at best. Yes, it’s important to mention your main keyword at least a couple of times, but going above 2% in terms of keyword density could get your content flagged for “keyword stuffing.” Just don’t do it – Google is now smart enough to know what your content is about because it can understand its intent (read about the Hummingbird algorithm update if you’d like to know more).
As a general rule of thumb, it’s much better to spread out your backlinks over a long period of time than trying to get it all out there in a single day. Also, it’s normal for your search engine rankings to fluctuate as you do this, so there’s no reason to panic. The odds of witnessing this phenomenon are even greater if your website is new.
You may be compelled to link back to someone in case they linked back to you due to common courtesy. But in reality, this could harm your SEO efforts. Google isn’t the biggest fan of link exchanges; it wants to see people linking to you naturally. 12. ConclusionOff-site SEO is a marathon, not a sprint. As long as you focus on acquiring backlinks slowly and steadily, your search engine rankings will gradually improve. Consider working with the best link-building services to take some of the burden off your shoulders – building quality backlinks is hard work, after all. In fact, it’s one of the most challenging aspects of SEO, and it’s easy to mess up if you’re not 100% sure what you’re doing. Best of luck on your journey, and may you get the search engine traffic your awesome products and services deserve! The post Link-building services: 10 best companies to improve your SEO appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/83JZwYo Every week, we feature fresh job listings for search marketers. Make sure to bookmark this page and check back every Friday. Are you looking to hire? You can submit your listing here for free. Please note that we do not include listings without a salary range. July 22Paid Media (PPC) Specialist, Outpace SEO (Remote)
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Want a chance to include your job listing on Search Engine Land? Submit your details here. The post The latest jobs in search marketing appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/qgbLPl3 My team has been testing Google Ads Performance Max campaigns since it was released in beta. Here’s what you need to know to set up Performance Max campaigns the right way. What is Performance Max?PMax is an all-in-one campaign type that displays ads across all of Google’s channels:
Note: Smart Shopping and Local campaigns will be depreciated and rolled into PMax shortly. What is different about PMax?There are differences in campaign structure. Most notably in terms of Structure:
Note: Unlike Smart Shopping, Performance Max can be used for ecommerce and lead generation. Why use Performance Max campaigns?For ecommerce retailers who’ve seen success with Smart Shopping, PMax takes it to the next level by adding additional placements and reach – acting as a Smart Shopping campaign with retargeting and prospecting display ads layered on top of it. For lead generation, Performance Max can deliver scale and efficiency that may be hard to achieve through Search and Display alone. At the same time, it’ll be important to feed the system the correct signals so you don’t end up with poor-quality leads. Now that we’ve established the what and why, let’s get into the how Upgrading from Smart Shopping CampaignsIf you’ve been using Smart Shopping Campaigns, it’s recommended to use the one-click upgrade tool in the Recommendations tab. Using this tool will sync the campaign’s historical performance in the back-end which enables PMax to hit the ground running. You’ll want to check all settings: Locations, Asset Groups, Listing Groups. Since SSC is much more limited in terms of display ads, you’ll want to add additional creative/copy to the Asset Groups. It’s a good idea to add Audience Signals too. Campaign StructureWhat’s the best way to structure PMax? Unless you need to split into multiple campaigns for location targeting or budget allocation, it’s best to condense as much as possible. This allows the system more data signals to reach optimal performance. Since there is no reporting on the Asset Group level, you might want to break out different products/services into separate campaigns for reporting purposes. For stores with few products, we try to condense as much as possible. Simplicity over complexity, always. We typically segment into themes of product/service so the creative and copy will match the underlying products or services. Below is a great chart from Mike Ryan illustrating campaign structure ideas: Conversion GoalsChoose the conversion actions that make send for your business.
Hot tip: To improve lead quality, focus on calls over forms/chats. Location TargetingWhen setting up your campaign, after choosing your targeted locations, make sure to select Presence: People in or regularly in your targeted locations Asset GroupsYour messaging and creative assets should be tightly themed to the product or service within the group. If you don’t provide a video, Google will make a horrible one for you. Highly recommend creating something basic using Canva or a similar tool. For ecommerce, something worth testing for Google Shopping, especially if you’ve seen success with Smart Shopping historically, is to launch a PMax campaign with no assets aside from the data feed. Note: You’ll likely need to create a new Asset Group. Exclusions
Audience SignalsAudience signals are different from Audience targeting. The system uses this as a signal to find your ideal prospective customer. We’ve seen success with the following:
Data feedFor ecommerce, the most important piece of the puzzle is the product information. While everything else helps, the data feed submitted to Google Merchant Center can have the largest impact on your Performance Max campaign performance Make sure you’re submitting as much info as possible:
Bid strategiesPerformance Max has the following two options available:
If your account already has lots of historical data, you can jump right into target CPA/ROAS. With a new account, start with Maximize Conversions so the system can gather data. Later on, once you’re seeing steady conversions, switch to tCPA or tROAS to hit your goals. The post How to set up Performance Max campaigns the right way appeared first on Search Engine Land. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/1GoxF7e |
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