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Search Engine Marketing Checklist

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If you have a new website or even an old one that you haven’t looked at much in terms of how it performs on search engines, the following checklist will assist you in getting your website optimized for best performance in the free or organic listings on search engines and also what to look for and do if you are considering paid search.

Remember: If you are not on the first page of the search results, it is unlikely your listing will be clicked. People simply very seldom look further than the first page of search results.

Search Engine Marketing (SEO and SEM) Checklist

SEO

  1. Are your Title tags describing the content on each page of your site effectively?
  2. Do your Meta description and keyword tags accurately reflect the content on each page of your site?
  3. Do you have Alt tags on each image?
  4. Are you using real text for content (instead of graphics with text in them)?
  5. Are you including keywords and are the keywords relevant to the content on each page?
  6. Content: How good is it? If it’s not great, don’t expect a lot.
  7. Is your site and content shareable?
  8. Do you have an RSS feed set up?
  9. How many links are coming into your site?
  10. Can you think of people, site owners who would be willing to link to your site and content?
    Have you asked those people to link to you?
  11. Is your site link-worthy?
  12. Have you submitted your site to search engines?
  13. Have you started a blog and/or posted articles about your area of expertise or the product or service you are promoting with your site?
  14. Are you checking how you rank against competitors for particular keyword terms?
  15. Is your content fresh?
  16. Have you run your site through http://website.grader.com?

SEM (Paid Search)

  1. If you are unable to get a top page organic search result, have you considered paid search? Since Google has 84% market share, its AdWords Program is a good place to begin.
  2. Are you choosing your keyword terms effectively?
  3. Are you monitoring which ads are working better than others?
  4. Are you monitoring which keywords are your best performers?
  5. Do you have goals set up in your paid search tool? Is your site listed in as many places as possible?
  6. How focused is each page of your site around a particular keyword term?
  7. What are the top 5 keywords that people are finding you with on search engines?
  8. Do you have pages dedicated to those top 5 keywords?

Measure, Monitor, Monitise (MMM)

  1. Are you tracking your linkpopularity? http://www.linkpopularity.com is a good starting point.
  2. Have you started tracking and monitoring visits to your site with analytics tools?
  3. Do you have analytics on your site? Are you monitoring your statistics and making changes to the site according to what you notice from the statistics reports?
Marketing, Search, SEO , , ,

Google AdWords and Keyword Matching Tutorial

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If you are just starting out with an advertising account on Google, (aka a Google AdWords account), this quick keyword matching options tutorial will help you get the most from your campaign and maximize your return on investment.

Key points to remember:

  1. Targeting your keywords saves you money and increases ROI
  2. Use exact matches as much as possible
  3. Use phrase matches
  4. Use broad matches sparingly
  5. Use negative matches so that you are only getting clicks from people who are really interested in your product or service

Keyword Matching Options from Google

Keyword Matching Options from Google

Marketing, Search , ,

Claiming my Blog on Technorati

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If you have just started a blog it is a good idea to register with Technorati and claim your blog there. A link from Technorati is worth a lot in terms of search engine optimization and when your blog eventually becomes really popular you will show up highly ranked in Technorati’s most popular lists.

The code above is the way Technorati verifies that you own the blog you are claiming to author. They ask you to enter the code into a post so that they can verify it.

My blog is now claimed.

Blogging

An Introduction to Social Networking Presentation in Oakland

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Save the date:  September 25, 2009 11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.

I am honored to have been invited and excited to be giving a presentation titled “An Introduction to Social Networking:  Tools to Grow Your Business, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn…what works for you?” The presentation is to women entrepreneurs as part of  a joint effort by Honorable Jane Brunner, Oakland City Council President and the East Bay Community Foundation.  It is one of many presentations in Councilperson Jane Brunner’s “Women In Business” Brownbag Lunch Series – Informative workshops targeted at women entrepreneurs.

It should be a great way to personally network with some cool women in business as well.  Please share this flyer with your friends and colleagues.

To attend, please RSVP by September 21, 2009 to Luis Aguilar via email at laguilar@eastbaycf.org or phone at (510) 208-0845.

Marketing, Social Media, Uncategorized , , , , ,

The Most Environmentally Friendly Ferry in the World

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I’m working on a proposal for San Francisco Bay Area Water Emergency Transportation Authority and in reviewing their website, I noticed this inspiring little video about the world’s most environmentally friendly ferry that I hadn’t seen before. Yes, I get most of my news and information online, but I also listen to NPR and my ears are particularly interested in local green technology. I’m sorry I missed this video when it aired on CNN, because it is a great accomplishment for San Francisco and our beautiful bay.

Have you taken the ferry lately? What do you like about it? Did you know we have the most environmentally friendly ferry in the world?

Fun, Random

Pay Yourself First

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I just learned through Twitter than Jeremiah Owyang is leaving Forrester research. I have admired his tweets and posts over the past several months so I am very interested to learn what he will be up to next. More importantly though, Mr. Owyang is an valuable role model for building your own personal brand even while working at a very well known company in a high profile position.

My favorite quote from the article “Why Jeremiah Oywang Left Forrester Research” is his response about how he works, why he blogs and how he has built his online brand:

“My use of social media and my career advancement are intrinsically tied,” Owyang told us by phone today. “I started my blog as a practitioner at Hitachi. I budget time every morning to read and blog. I do that before I check my personal email or work email. I believe you have to pay yourself first. When you open your email you pay someone else, because it’s usually people reaching out to ask you for something. Taking the time to read blogs, synthesize and add value, that builds your community. That’s paying yourself first.”

Clearly, Jeremiah was making a conscious effort to build his own brand on Twitter and through his Web Strategist blog and Forrester is losing a superstar. He says he is excited to be practicing more about what he knows than analyzing it, so I’m particularly curious to see where he’s going.

The only constant (especially on the web,) is change. This one should be particularly interesting.

Social Media, Twitter , ,

Fortune 100 Companies Prefer Twitter Over Facebook

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In mid-July I did a series a posts on Facebook or Twitter?. According to yesterday’s eMarketer article: Marketers Embrace Twitter Over Facebook,

“Burson-Marsteller, in a July 2009 study of Fortune 100 companies, found that more companies had a presence on Twitter (54%) than on Facebook (29%). “

eMarketer Chart showing Fortune 100 Companies favoring Twitter

Furthermore when resources are limited in terms of time to spend on various social media channels, 21% of Fortune 100 companies use only one channel and 76% of those companies were likely to use Twitter, with only 14% choosing Facebook and 10 choosing blogging.

Why?

  1. Twitter means business, where Facebook is entertainment.
  2. Twitter is a place to connect around specific topics, where Facebook is a place to connect with friends and family.
  3. Twitter is about following people you respect and being followed by people who respect you. Facebook is about having friends, sharing photos, events and having fun.
  4. The twitter platform enables sharing of good links more freely and with a bigger reach than Facebook. Repeating on (and retweeting) on Twitter is perfectly acceptable and even encouraged, where repeating on Facebook makes your brand across as annoying.

    5. Picture 1

  5. Twitter is faster than blogging
  6. Tweets are more easily digestible than blog posts. Think “byte” sized chunks of valuable information.
  7. Tweeting a link to a blogpost is the norm
  8. Twitter combines the fun of Facebook with the information and knowledge value distributed in blogs.
  9. Twitter is more mobile and easier to do quickly than Facebook and blogging.
  10. Twitter requires more listening than Facebook and blogging and that means the people that embrace the medium are better conversationalists, because dialog means listening and responding.
  11. Twitter is real-time, blogging is as soon as I can get to it and Facebook is whenever.  Time means money and money means business.
Facebook, Social Media, Twitter , , ,

Twitter Tips: Why is Retweeting important?

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If you don’t know what retweeting is, it is simply repeating a tweet or post made through a Twitter account. Retweeting has many benefits including:

  1. Sharing content of value with your followers, i.e. friends, colleagues, student, clients and potential clients
  2. Saying thanks (aka giving kudos) to the author of the original post/tweet.
  3. Sharing links which is beneficial from a search engine optimization standpoint
  4. Since people are not on Twitter all day, they may have missed an important post. Retweeting helps spread the word, because the information is repeated and shared over a number of hours or days versus just appearing once in the Twitter timeline.

The presentation by Dan Zarella below details some key research findings.

The Science Of ReTweets

View more presentations from Dan Zarrella.
Social Media, Twitter ,

Virtual Goods, Virtual Connections, Real People, Real Connections

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According to E-Marketer spending on virtual goods is about to explode.  How can this be?  Why do people want to buy things that they can’t even touch, smell, taste or handle?

If you haven’t spent much time in virtual realities like Second Life, playing roler player games or sending virtual gifts on Facebook you may not be aware what these virtual goods are.   They are things like virtual flowers, virtual cupcakes or even virtual hugs.  Remember when you used to send someone a birthday card or present in the mail when you couldn’t see them in person?  Well in the digital age this process is being completed via emails, SMS messages and even more – virtual cards and even virtual gifts. 

It’s the thought that counts, right?  Well if it really is, then whether the gift is virtual or physical it shouldn’t matter. Could that be why virtual goods are a growing industry? Is everyone just being budget conscious or cheap by sending virtual gifts? I don’t think so. I think it’s all about connections.

Let’s face it, the world we live in today is much smaller than it was even twenty years ago, because there are many more opportunities to remain connected with people all over the world despite any physical distances. Virtual gifting is a way to let your friends and family know you care about them. My friend Helen sends her friends virtual flowers and gifts for birthdays. Because of that she is top of mind to me and likely most of her other friends when we think about a friend who knows how to play the piano or do administrative work at a law firm.

Showing you care is a way of building connections with people and virtual goods offer a way for you to do that. That’s one reason.

E-marketer Chart

The other reason is that your virtual presence is just as important as your physical presence. Think about it. How many people can you talk to or be in front of physically in one day unless you are at a conference or giving a presentation? In the virtual world there are endless opportunities to be on various networks connecting, sharing, listening and talking with people. Sometime you may not even be aware of the people who are following you.

Virtual goods enable people to improve their virtual presence (avatars) and profiles and since trends in the digital space change so rapidly, there is always an opportunity to purchase something more up-to-date. The good news here, except for the expense is that virtual goods are a zero waste product. That’s the joy of virtual – nothing to throw away, recycle or feel guilty about buying because you’re ultimately adding to the physical landfill. Virtual waste is far more easily erased.

I think we are just at the tip of the virtual ice berg, ha ha, but it’s something to be aware of at least for the near and virtual future.

Facebook, Social Media , ,

tr.im no more

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I just went to tr.im my favorite URL shortening tool to find the following message.  This is very sad news.  If you’re looking for a tr.im alternative, try http://bit.ly or http://ow.ly.
“tr.im is now in the process of discontinuing service, effective immediately.

Statistics can no longer be considered reliable, or reliably available going forward.
However, all tr.im links will continue to redirect, and will do so until at least December 31, 2009.
Your tweets with tr.im URLs in them will not be affected.

We regret that it came to this, but all of our efforts to avoid it failed.
No business we approached wanted to purchase tr.im for even a minor amount.

There is no way for us to monetize URL shortening — users won’t pay for it — and we just can’t justify further development since Twitter has all but annointed bit.ly the market winner.
There is simply no point for us to continue operating tr.im, and pay for its upkeep.

We apologize for the disruption and inconvenience this may cause you.”

Farewell and RIP, tr.im.

Social Media, Twitter ,
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