BarnRaisers

80% of visitors find a website through a query to a search engine. 80% of those clicks are on natural or organic listings.

If you want your website to be found on the internet, an effective SEO (Search Engine Optimization) program is a requirement. SEO is a precise marketing science; one that takes a strategy, diligent effort and generally 2 to 6 months to get to a top rank.

The results are substantial and lasting. Good SEO professionals, for online businesses, are one of their most valuable assets.

But we all should be able to learn. Here are the best 12 Free SEO tools everyone should know and the ways in which they help your business:

1. ROI: Even if you get to a top rank, it doesn’t do much good if you don’t establish the action you want  people to take once they get there. Google Analytics is an essential guide. It’s the GPS system for a website. Before you begin your SEO program, you should benchmark key measures like Unique Visitors, Bounce Rate, Keywords, Content, Traffic Sources and, if you sell online, Sales, Conversion, and Average Order Value.
2. KEYWORDS: The currency of an SEO  program is keywords. Everyone should allocate time for research and discovery. The best tool to spot opportunities is Google Trends. It’s the Library of Congress for keywords because it’s Google entire catalogue. Once you identified keywords, the best tools for substantiating them is the Google Adwords Keyword Tool. Look at monthly searches, competitiveness and CPC (Cost Per Click). It’s good to know what others pay for a word that you achieve a natural listing. The Trellian Keyword Discovery Tool is also excellent.
3. LINKS: The two factors that drive search rank are relevance and authority. Keywords establish relevance but links establish authority. Because spammers took advantage of this area through inauthentic backlinks, the search engines, particularly Google, are cracking down on links that aren’t  trusted. Google has updated their algorithm through updates called Panda and Penguin to reward authentic content and links and penalize Black Hat tactics. The best tools for identifying links and identifying trusted links are Majestic SEO, and Alexa.
4. INDEXED: With the right keywords and links, your business starts to appear or is “indexed” on more search engine pages. You’ll want to report and track progress with a tool like Marketing Grader from HubSpot.
5. TECHNICAL ISSUES: When links lead to pages that don’t exist or a website url doesn’t redirect properly, it can create a major setback in SEO progress. That’s why there is Google Webmaster Tools. They bring these issues to your attention immediately and should be installed on every website.
6. SERP (SEARCH ENGINE RANK PAGES): To report and track progress as search rank improves, you’ll need a good tool to check your search rank. SEO Book is a great SEO resource and their SEO Rank Checker, with the Firefox Extension, is the tool to install.
7. SITE SPEED: The speed in which your site loads influences SEO rank. Most people are not willing to wait long for what they are searching for. Pingdom and YSlow are two tools that tell you how long it takes for your site to load; how that compares to other sites and what is influencing site speed or slowness.
8. GENERAL SITE AUDIT: If you want a good diagnosis of see progress in the steps you are taking above as well as steps you could be taking in the areas of blogging, social media outreach, tagging images and mobile search optimization, Marketing Grader is a helpful guide for evaluation and setting up a course of action.

SEO can get technical but it doesn’t have to be rocket science. Everyone can learn because great tools are very accessible.

There are very possibly others that should be include so please let us know. If you would like to learn more about SEO, let us know too. You may also find it helpful to know about key SEO measurements.

Do you think these are tools for SEO everyone should know?

• 80% of people find a website by typing keywords into the query box of a search engine
• 42% click on the website in the #1 organic search position
• 90% click on a website on the 1st page (Source: SEO Book)

These facts show, for any company doing business on the internet, search engine optimization (SEO) is a requirement.

But search engines don’t buy, don’t download and don’t fill out requests for more information. People do. That’s why, although search rank is important, a top rank is only as good as the content on the website at getting visitors to take the action you want.

How do you accomplish both? Here are 12 tips on how to write for your audience and search engines.

KEYWORDS

• DO KEYWORD RESEARCH: Keywords are the currency of the internet. They establish relevance to both your audience and the search engines. So look for the words consumers use to express their unmet need; how many express it and how often. Two tools that are a valuable guide in this discovery are Google Trends and Google Adwords Keyword Tool.
• CREATE SITE ARCHITECTURE: When search engines crawl your site, they are trying to give your audience the best match for the words that express their unmet need. So give both your audience and the search engines something to work with and make it easy on them. Organize your keywords and content to create a more complete picture.

• DIFFERENTIATE BY BEING SPECIFIC: The people who are most ready to take action are most likely going to be more specifics about what they need and less willing to wade through a lot of information. So help them on their journey with content that includes “long-tail” phrases, not just “short tail” keywords. If you were in the market for a digital camera and ready to buy, wouldn’t you be looking for the brand and model, not just the category?

LINKS

• IDENTIFY AUTHORITIES: “It”s not what you know, it’s who you know.” This truth applies to life and doing business on the internet. That’s why hyperlinks (the blue text that goes to other websites) play a pivotal role. They connect you with authorities on your topic. If  the search engines determine, through links, you are connected to authorities, they raise your rank. There are many link tracking services. Options range from free to subscription services. A few to consider are: Alexa, ClixTrack and Linktrack and Linktrackr and options from free to subscription.
• WRITE HYPERLINKS INTO SITE CONTENT: The search engine are cracking down on websites that load backlinks into the back end of their websites but they are rewarding websites that do it, authentically, by featuring relevant links in content like suggested above. Also, consider social network pages as links and build your “social authority.” This is increasing greatly in importance.
• USE INTERNAL LINKS THROUGHOUT YOUR SITE:  Hyperlinks are also good for connecting pages within your site. This give both your audience and the search engine the opportunity to spend more time with your business and get to know you better. And that’s always a good thing.
• CHECK FOR BROKEN LINKS: Make sure everything is working as it should. A website analytics tool, like Google Analytics  is your GPS system. Google offers Google Webmaster Tools for spotting any critical issues.

WRITING CONTENT

• TITLE YOUR KEYWORDS IN THE URL, TITLES AND HEADERS: The reason for being for each page is a key consideration for you, for your audience and the search engines. Put your keywords in url’s, and titles. Here is where you need to include them.

• WRITE MORE THAN 200 WORDS ON EVERY PAGE: Your audience and the search engines want to get to know you. Although there are  a number of opinions, at least 200 words per page is a good rule of thumb.
• WRITE FOR 3 TYPES OF VISITORS: Regardless of the website, there will always be 3 types of visitors. “Researchers,” who expect to be educated and want lots of information. Reviews and testimonials are important. “Shoppers” look for comparisons. They want to know the facts, but they want the Cliff Notes version. “Buyers” are ready to take action but they want the specifics, as clearly called out as possible. All are important. They also are not mutually exclusive either. One can move  from one stage to another.

TRACKING

• KEYWORDS: Now that you have your plan in place, track your progress is raising your rank every month. A good tool to track your progress is SEO Book Rank Checker (Firefox Extension).  
• INDEXING: The more search pages your are on, the better so know how many search pages you are “indexed” and work to increase the number. Marketing Grader from HubSpot lets you see how your doing.

To write for your audience is as important, if not more, as writing for the search engines. Do these 12 tips help teach you how to do it?

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of pursuing a top rank for a website around specific keywords  in a search engine’s unpaid or “organic” search results. Search Engine Marketing (SEM) focuses on purchasing ads that rank high and appear above or to the right.

The point with both is to get to a top rank. That’s what this 30-second video shows. It’s called a “Heat Map.” It’s is a controlled experiment that shows how we search for what we need.

When most of us search, we chose a website in a top position of the unpaid or SEO portion. However, as the video also shows, we are more likely to go to a website in a top position of the paid or SEM portion before we venture further down the page on the SEO portion.

SEO and SEM experts says, with confidence, both are proven performers that get results. Getting the experts to agree on when it produces results and how much it costs, that’s another story.

Here are 21 experts that take a position on SEO vs. SEM.

SEO

1. SEO takes a lot of time and tweaking to get it right. Positive ROI generally doesn’t yield for at least 6 months. – Jayson DeMers, Business 2 Community
   
2. 86% of web searchers trust organic SEO listings more than sponsored/paid PPC listing. – Oli Gartner, Unbounce
3. SEO is more authorative in the end-user’s eyes and the clicks are “free.” – Geoff Grigsby, Maine Today Digital
4. In SEO, your goal should be to understand the keyword landscape of a topic. What keywords do people search for, and what does this tell us about their intent? What can we learn from looking at keywords in a broader context? – Jenny Halasz, Search Engine Land
5. Typically with organic SEO the work will continue to increase rankings for months or even years after the campaign is ended. Meaning you will have a long term ROI. – Chris Hornak, Eye Flow
6. 80% of the traffic that can be generated for any website will come from the search engines. – Larry Kim, Wordstream
7. If you’re operating on a shoestring budget, it may make more sense to invest time in chasing high search rankings through SEO. – AJ Kumar, Entrepreneur
   
8. SEO takes longer (usually up to 3 months before you’ll see a result) yet these listings are more permanent. – Online Specialists
9. SEO  is a longer term approach. Good original content, well implemented on page optimization and a solid link building campaign is usually more than sufficient for SEO – Tetsu Liew, Visualscope.
10.  According to the Search Engine Journal compilation, 70-80% of users ignore paid ads and focus on organic search results. Leads that come from organic SEO have a 14.6% conversion rate. – Clayton Wood, seoreseller.com
11. SEO can be a part of SEM but, unto itself, is more of an art. This involves crafting a web page to try and attract as many search engine hits as possible, addressing such elements as content, keywords, and other factors to boost your site’s ranking in search engine results. You don’t buy anything as you do with SEM, but the results can be more dicey – YP – Advertising Solutions

SEM

1. The time frame can be tailored right down to the day and time of day in which ads are displayed. This kind of control is invaluable for any business. – James Broadfoot, Rank High Media
2. SEM uses paid tools like Google ADWords and Pay-Per-Click advertising. For companies looking to use part of their marketing budget online, it is a great opportunity to gain traffic to websites including social media or e-commerce sites. – Davanti Digital
3. SEM requires sustained amounts of money, and traffic stops when the money does - Brandon Dennis, Buuteq
4. 50% of people arriving at a retailers site from paid ads are more likely to buy than those who came from an organic link. – Oli Gartner, Unbounce
5. SEM practices offer the advantage of immediacy. If you need to increase your traffic and your visibility right away, and you don’t have a problem with spending a lot of money, this may be the way to go. – Bob Gladstein, Raise My Rank
6. You should focus on keywords that suggest a purchase (or goal completion), that represent a category area that is profitable for you, and that you can’t easily get ranked for in organic (most of the time – there are exceptions to this). - Jenny Halasz, Search Engine Land
7. According to WordStream, if an advertiser buys ads for keywords they currently rank organically for, 89% of the traffic from paid ads will be new traffic. – Jeff Kershner, Dealer Refresh
8.  PPC marketing will allow you to narrow down your prospects based on their demographic data. Many PPC platforms, like social media sites, allow you to promote to the age range, gender, income bracket, education level, and even marital status of the people who will be able to view your ad. – Larry Kim, Wordstream
9. SEM usually places you in a top position instantly (based on your budget limitations). can be targeted to specific geographic areas ranging from Suburbs, Cities, States, National or Worldwide, whereas SEO covers a specific country or state – Online Specialist
10. Paid ads are gaining traction, and more often not, getting more clicks than organic listing. Not all keywords are created equal and PPC can’t replace SEO – Jessica Ruth, Brand Manager in automotive business

Did these positions teach you something new about SEO and SEM? How you would use them for your business? Do you have a position on SEO vs. SEM?

• 80% of visitors to a website begin by typing keywords in the query box of a search engine
• 42% click on the website in the #1 position on the search page
• 90% click a website on the first page

These facts underscore the reality, if your brand is on the internet, a high rank on the search engines is a requirement for business.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of maximizing the number of visitors to a website by remaining high on the list of results returned by a search engine. It is the single, most measurable, profitable and predictable activity a business can pursue in digital marketing.

Many are fooled because they believe, to get to a top rank, you need to know the right tools, tricks and people. So you don’t get fooled, here are 12 myths vs. reality about  Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

1. A GOOD WEB DESIGN FIRM IS ALSO AN SEO EXPERT: That’s usually not true because SEO begins with keyword discovery. This involves numerical analysis of keyword search volume, competitiveness and input from you about your expertise to compare to what consumers want. As it turns out, building a beautiful website and getting your site to a top rank with the search engines are two very different skills.
2. SEO IS ABOUT META TAGS , META DATA AND WRITING CODE: Once upon a time, the meta tag, an HTML tag that provides keyword information about a web page, was an important part of the SEO process. This process was quickly spammed to death. As a result, its importance has decreased. Today, it is of relatively low importance for effective SEO
3. SEO DEALS MOSTLY WITH ON-SITE MODIFICATIONS: Content from keywords plays a big roles in determining relevance, but off-site factors such as how many high quality or authoritative websites link to you is equally important. Relevance and authority are the two factors that drive search rank.
4. SEO INVOLVES TRICKING THE SEARCH ENGINE: The opposite is true. SEO is about creating web pages and writing copy that is intelligible to search engines and also creates an experience for visitors that makes them want to come and come back again to your site.
5. GOOGLE IS THE ONLY SEARCH ENGINE THAT MATTERS: It’s true that Google represent 70% of all searches and the percentage is growing. But, last year, Bing had a record year at 16% and is growing too. To focus only on 70% and ignore 30% leaves a lot of potential business on the table.
6. DUPLICATE CONTENT GETS YOUR SITE DE-LISTED: There is no duplicate content penalty. Duplicate content is substantive blocks of content within or across domains that either completely match other content or are appreciably similar. “There is no such thing as a duplicate content penalty” says Google in their webmaster blog. Bing and Yahoo say the same thing too.
   
7. PAID SEARCH HELPS ORGANIC SEARCH: In all of the experiences ever witnessed or heard about, it has never been proven spending on search engine advertising (PPC) improves your organic SEO rankings.
8. SEO HAPPENS QUICKLY: Nothing that is worth doing well happens overnight. With SEO, you are building equity in your brand. You should estimate 4 to 6 month for results behind keywords that matter for your business. A good tracking system shows progress and helps results occur in the most effective manner.
9. ONCE A SITE IS OPTIMIZED, YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO ANYTHING ELSE: While the effects of a good SEO campaign last, rankings may begin to drop if you don’t update content and there are no new inbound links generated. However, if you continue to create good content, the site will stay “fresh” and hopefully you will continue to get real “organic” links from people who find your website useful.
10. SEO SOFTWARE AUTOMATES IT ALL: No, it doesn’t.  There are plenty of apps and websites to help do keyword research, find possible link opportunities and analyze your competition. There are some really good tools and plugins that can help you do your on-site optimization. But none of them does the thinking for you. None of them is able to understand the subtle nuances of language, your customers and your business. No one of them gets results on their own.
11. SOCIAL MEDIA DOESN’T IMPACT SEO (AND VISA-VERSA): Social media has everything to do with impacting SEO and visa-versa. It is a source for content, keywords and links that drive authority. It not only helps your business get to a top rank, it helps your business get multiple rankings on a search page and it builds 1-to-1 relationships.
12. ONCE YOU HAVE A TOP SEARCH RANK, BUSINESS ROLLS IN: A top rank behind keywords that matter drives visitors to a website. The action they take, once they get there, depends on the how you guide them and create a good experience. For example of brands that do this well, here are 10 case studies that prove the ROI of SEO.

This clarification of myth from reality is to point you in the right direction so you pursue the right path for your brand. SEO is a marketing science. Although there are those who claim to know the “special sauce,” check first if their implementation of SEO relies on myths or reality.

SEO is something BarnRaisers does and I teach as part of the MBA faculty at Rutgers CMD. With colleagues Mike Moran and Tim Peter, we have a unique offering for companies with on-site training called JumpStart Workshops where we come to you and to “hand-on” training to deliver an effective SEO strategy and plan for your business.

Did these 12 steps clear up the myth versus reality about Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for you?

“If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll probably end up someplace else,” said Laurence Peter. For any brand doing business on the internet, to get where you want to go, an understanding of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is required. The reasons why are simple.

• 80% of people who visit a website start by typing a keyword in the query box of a search engine
• 46% click on the website in the first position on first page
• 90% click on websites on the first page

(Source: SEOBook)

SEO is about measuring website and marketing effectiveness and, from the learning, making adjustments to attract more people like the ones you want.

What are the measurements that matter? Here are 10 SEO measurements every marketer should know.

1. Return on Investment (ROI): It’s the final word on the success of any marketing campaign. This is no different for search marketing, It’s an objective measure of performance based on the buying cycle for your brand (e.g. 30 days, 60 days, 90 days). A calculation from Klipfolio is: (Attributable Revenue – Campaign Investment) / (Campaign Investment) = ROI (over X time period) and an example: ($1.0 M Revenue – $0.5 M Invest) / ( $0.5 M Invest) = $0.5 M ROI over past 90 days.

2. Visitors from Search: Every website should install an analytic tool, like Google Analytics. In the Traffic Sources section, look for the percent of people who come to your website from search, referrals (e.g. social networks, other websites, email marketing) and direct. It’s displayed as a pie chart like the one below. For most websites, search comprises a large percentage so monitoring the number of visitors make sense.

3. Number of Keywords Driving Traffic: What drove them to your site? A measure of a site’s effectiveness is the number of keywords drawing traffic. A site growing in content and popularity should draw traffic from more search queries. These keywords are also found in the Traffic Sources of Google Analytics. If you are publishing new content but the number of keywords drawing traffic is not increasing accordingly, you should examine the keywords.

4. Keyword Rank: 90% of consumers go to a website on the first page of their search query and 46% click on the website in the #1 position. It’s important to choose keywords where you achieve a high rank. Beyond the first page of results, your hopes for generating traffic drop significantly. Rank Checker is a good tool to consider for measuring keywords rank.

5. Keyword Search Volume: The keywords chosen require good search volume. A good tools to measure search volume is the Keyword Tool in Google Adwords. If a keyword has 30,000 or more searches a month, it is a major keyword so choose keywords based on the unmet need your brand fills and where you chances of a top rank are best. This is the principle of “Short vs. Long Tail Keywords.”

6. Keyword Value (CPC). Although you don’t buy keywords with an SEO campaign, it’s still good to know what people pay for them. This gives the value of keywords is measured on a CPC (Cost Per Click) basis. CPC’s can also be found with Google Adwords’ Keywords Tool. Keywords run a wide range but many fall in the range of $1.00 to $5.00 per click.

7. Number of website pages receiving at least one visit from search engines: Publishing fresh and high quality content is key to drawing more traffic from search engines. Why? The more content a site has, the greater is its relevant to consumers and the search engines, and the more search impressions and clicks it will get. If you are publishing new content you should see more and more pages on the site drawing traffic.

8. Number of pages “indexed” by search engines: Search engines look for fresh content so they can serve it up in search results. If they don’t index it, results won’t show it. The more fresh content you create, the more often search engines come back looking for more.

9. Links: Every link to your site is another vote in the site’s popularity and add to your recognition as an authority with the search engine value, highly. The more sites that link to you, the higher your rank. Keep on creating and sharing valuable content, and you raise your relevance, authority and rank.

10. Conversion: The #1 business requirement of your search campaign is to get customers to take the action you want. Every site has its goal(s), whether it’s a sale, signup, a particular page view, an inquiry form, or a video view. Whatever your goal is, track it. If you can attach a dollar amount to each completed goal, even better. With effective SEO work, the number of completed goals (and revenue, if applicable) should increase over time.

For those looking for in-depth “hands-on” training  in SEO,  Rutgers CMD is conducting MIni-MBA in Search Marketing and Web Analytics from December 10-14. I’ll be teaching with colleagues, Mike Moran and Tim Peter.

Do these 10 measurements help you see how SEO works to get your business where it need to go online?