Sunday Funny

From Charlos Gary via the Denver Post via Seth Godin:

If I Only Had $30 to Spend on SEO...

Well that changes things entirely. In that case I'd borrow $10 and spend it all on Ninja SEO School!

(seriously)

What would you spend it on?


Jeff

If I Only Had $15 to Spend on SEO...

I'd borrow $5 and spend the entire $20 on SEO for Dummies by Peter Kent!
(Actual advice I shared with a potential client via email today)

What would you spend it on?

Jeff

The Power of the Dare

I dare you to click on this link:

Link to mysterious undisclosed web page which you now can't resist clicking on because I dared you to.

I double-dog dare you with a cherry on top. Go on, do it. What are you waiting for? I dare you.


For those of you who clicked the link and checked out Naomi's blog (and don't think you can just lie about it, I have analytics and heatmap tracking!), welcome back. As you noticed, her post was about the power of what she calls brand conscious words. I found it interesting, and I thought you might too.

(I also know that Naomi watches her analytics data like Rain Man watches Wapner, so I'm hoping when she sees a few click-throughs, she'll check out my blog and maybe give me a link or a mention or a tweet or a thank you card, any of which would be a big deal to my infantile blog!)

But I digress...back to the matter at hand:

1. Did you click on the link? If so, why? If not, why not? (leave your answer in a comment)
2. What could you dare/challenge/battle/duel your customers, or better yet your employees, to do that might help your small business grow?

What the Heck is SEO? Series Post 2: Title Tags

Welcome to the second post in my What the Heck is SEO? series on Search Engine Optimization for small businesses. You’ve probably never asked anyone “How’s your meta data?”, but I assure you that you will after reading these next few posts!

In my kick-off post titled “What the Heck is SEO?”, we talked about the definition of Search Engine Optimization, search engine market share, the difference between Push and Pull Marketing, and the critical importance of ranking well in the search results on Google and Bing.

This week, we’re going to roll up our sleeves, pop the hood, and start tuning up your website!

Search engines like Google and Bing work by “crawling” the internet with programs called bots or spiders that read the content of a website, taking a snapshot of each page of the site (called indexing or caching), and saving it in an index (a giant database of websites) each time the site changes. Then when you search for something, the search engine compares your search term to the sites in its index, decides which web pages are the best match, and ranks them in its search results.

The actual algorithms used by search engines to make these decisions are closely guarded trade secrets. But search engines publish their standards and guidelines, and search engine optimization professionals are able to make judgments and infer certain factors using these guidelines and good old-fashioned trial and error.

The purpose of this series isn’t to get into the nuts and bolts of how search engines work; it’s to help you improve your website using language and concepts that are easy to understand. So, close your eyes and imagine for a second that you’re going on a business trip...

You’re in the airport waiting to board your flight, and you just realized you didn’t bring anything to read! You wander into the airport bookstore and start browsing for a book to read. You find the section you want, cock your head to the side, and do what?

You read the titles, of course!

Guess what? Google and Bing do the exact same thing! The first place Google and Bing look when trying to determine what a page on your website is about is the Title Tag! The title tag is a snippet of HTML code in each page of your website that looks like this: <title>Title of This Web Page</title>

The title tag is only visible in the header of your browser when you are viewing a particular page, so it is often overlooked by small business owners and web developers when designing their site.

"The first place Google and Bing look when trying to determine what a page on your website is about is the Title Tag!"

The other place your title tag is visible is in search engine results - it becomes the blue hyperlinked text for each search result listed.

So now that you understand the importance of your title tags, what do yours say? If you have never given them any thought or you use a template based website, chances are they say “Home” or “Welcome”, or some other generic term. Obviously, your website has absolutely nothing to do with “Home” or “Welcome”, yet this is the number one mistake that small business owners make when designing their own websites! These generic title tags are just wasted space.

"Generic title tags are the number one mistake small business owners make when designing their own websites!"

Good title tags should reflect two things: 1) What your business does, and 2) Where you are located. They should be concise (no more than 60 characters) and get straight to the point. Here are a few good examples:

• Tampa Wedding Photography by Suzy Brown
• Wedding Cakes in St Petersburg, Florida
• Joe's Plumbing in Clearwater, FL

And keep in mind that each page of your site has its own title tag, so if you have one page about wedding cakes, and another page on your website about cake toppers, make sure the titles reflect this!

"Remember each page of your site has its own title tag!"

So, now that you’re armed with this knowledge of the force, get to work on those title tags (and keep in mind it can take Google and Bing anywhere from a few days to a few weeks to update your site in their index).

Now back to our story in the airport bookstore. You’ve narrowed it down to two books that look promising based on their titles. How do you decide which one to buy and which one goes back on the shelf?

Find out in my next post in this series post on Description Meta Tags, and subscribe to my blog to make sure you don't miss any of the awesomeness!

What the Heck is SEO?

Welcome to my first post in a series on Search Engine Optimization for small business owners.

There is a lot of confusion over Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, and there are a lot of shady characters, spammers, and telemarketers in the SEO business. Unfortunately, this has resulted in many small business owners being skeptical and tuning out as soon as they hear the term “SEO”. This is a shame, and a crucial mistake from a business and marketing standpoint.

Think about it – Who are today’s consumers? Baby Boomers have completely embraced the internet and email, and are heavy users of search engines, and many younger consumers have never walked across the living room to turn the “knob” on a television set, have had a computer with internet access in their household for as long and they can remember, and have never touched the Yellow Pages. Thus, the first place today’s (and increasingly, tomorrow’s) consumers go when shopping around for a small business is an internet search engine.

Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is the process of planning (for a new website) or revising (for an existing website), a website’s structure and content so that it adheres to the guidelines expected of the major search engines and ranks well in their search results for a particular set of search queries or “keyword phrases”. Nothing more, nothing less.

Now that we’ve clarified that, it bears mentioning just who the major search engines are. In a word, Google! Google currently enjoys about a 70% market share of online searches in the United States. Google’s only real competition is Microsoft, who recently acquired the Yahoo! search engine and is in the process of merging Yahoo! with its own search engine, known as Bing (formerly MSN Live Search). Bing (when combined with Yahoo!) now boasts a 25% market share. All other search portals (AOL, Lycos, Ask.com, etc.) have a market share in the single digits, and many serve search results that are actually from Google or Bing. Thus they really aren’t a factor when it comes to SEO.

“You really only have to worry about Google and Bing!”

So the good news is you really only have to worry about Google and Bing! Furthermore, Google and Bing tend to serve fairly similar search results, so if your site is well optimized for Google, chances are it will also rank well in Bing, and vice versa.

Being ranked highly in the search results on Google and/or Bing is one of the most powerful marketing tools available to today’s small business owners. And here’s why: Almost every other form of advertising in the world is based on what I call “Push Marketing”. In other words, you “push” your message in front of a potential customer’s eyes. Whether it’s an ad in a magazine or newspaper, a brochure or business card, or a billboard or sign, the effect is the same; The customer is usually not seeking your product or services at that
particular moment, so they are much less receptive to your message and subconsciously resent having it “pushed” on them.

"Being ranked highly in the search results on Google or Bing is one of the most powerful marketing tools available to today’s small business owners."

Search engines turn this process around 180 degrees, and use what I call “Pull Marketing” – the customer is actively searching for your product or service and is trying to “pull” your message in front of their eyes. And once they find what they’re looking for, they usually stop searching and contact the business that seems like the best fit. At that point, all of the more traditional marketing techniques apply. You have to answer the phone when it rings and be responsive and professional in e-mail messages, and you have to have a high quality product or service in order to complete the sale. But the search engine did its job and delivered the customer to your door, telephone, or inbox!

But how do you make sure your message is the one that the customer pulls?

Most people are surprised when I explain to them that Google and Bing want your site to be on the first page of their search results. Why is that? Because Google and Bing must return relevant search results in order to keep users coming back to their search engines.

"Google and Bing want your site to be on the first page of their search results!"

Let’s say your website is about Tampa Wedding Photography (and you are in fact a wedding photographer in Tampa). If I go to Google or Bing and search for “Tampa Wedding Photographer” and your site is not there, then Google and Bing have failed!

However, if I search for “Tampa Wedding Photographer” and your site is one of the top results, and I click through to your site and find exactly what I was looking for, we all win! I’m happy because I found what I needed, you’re happy because a potential new customer found your website, and Google and Bing are happy because next time I need to search for something online, I’m more likely to return to their search engine. That’s how it’s supposed to work.

But how do you let Google and Bing know that your site is about Wedding Photography in Tampa or Plumbers in Clearwater? That is exactly what this series of blog posts will teach you!

The remainder of this series will focus on teaching you what the search engines are looking for and how to optimize your website to rank on the first page of Google and Bing. Subscribe to my blog to make sure you don’t miss my next post about Title Tags!

How to Grow Your Blog by by Guest Posting

You might have heard of blogging guru and consultant Chris Garrett. He wrote the Problogger book with Darren Rowse.

Well he has a new ebook out that tells you everything you need to know to get quality authority links and a boost in traffic, all through a quick and easy approach to guest blogging. I highly recommend both the practice of guest blogging and the ebook (which I paid $17 for and thought was worth every penny). It details the process and reasons for guest blogging in step by step, easy-to-read language.

Right now he is offering it for a low introductory price of only $17. The price has already increased twice, and is sure to go up again as the content increases and reviews and testimonials start to pour in, so make sure you grab your copy and check out all the bonuses fast!

Check it out here.