SEO Archives - Marketing ideas

May 30

How to structure your knowledge

By Nigel Temple Internet marketing, Marketing strategy, SEO, Writing No Comments

If you are a subject expert, you may have written a single book, several books or a series of blogs. You may have slide decks, course handouts or articles that you have written. You have probably answered questions via email and during meetings.

The information surrounding any given subject is continually expanding and you may have considered creating a knowledgebase, wiki or encyclopedia.

For some time, I have been in this position and I have looked at a number of ways of achieving this. Finally, I opted for a premium WordPress plugin called Enclyopedia Pro.

Here is the project so far: The Marketing Compass Encyclopedia

There is a long way to go, as I have several thousand entries to add.

I am finding that this project is making me think about my subject area (marketing) in new ways and how everything fits together.

There is an SEO benefit from publishing your knowledge.

Personally, I do not have any problems with sharing my knowledge. I wonder whether you feel the same?

Mar 26

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Website link building: 10 ideas

By Nigel Temple Internet marketing, SEO No Comments

Google sees inbound links – AKA backlinks – to your website as votes of confidence. In general, the more inbound links you have, the better as long as they are of good quality.

An inbound link = a hyperlink which is pointing at your website.

Website link building should form part of your ongoing SEO strategy.

1. Gradually build inbound links to your website. Google doesn’t like sudden spikes.

2. Work manually i.e. don’t use bots / software programs / suspicious services from people you don’t know.

3. Include keywords within the anchor text*, where appropriate.

4. The links should come from relevant websites.

5. The links should come from sites with high authority i.e. credible websites.

6. Don’t use paid links.

7. Don’t use email spam to request links.

8. Don’t use link farms.

9. Do keep a meticulous record of your in-bound links.

10. Do check from time to time that the links still work.

*Anchor text: The text within a hyperlink,
i.e: www.nigeltemple.com or Digital marketing consultant

SEO Course – click here

Feb 19

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How to write a Description tag

By Nigel Temple Internet marketing, Promotional techniques, SEO No Comments

Within The Marketing Compass 2019 SEO Course (which NavigatorPlus members can access for free within the Resource Centre), we discuss Description tags. They provide a concise description of a web page, within a Search Engine Results Page (SERP). If a description tag is not there, the SERP result may show random wording, drawn from the web page.

On the one hand, since 2009, Description tags have not counted as Google ranking factors. However, because of the way in which they can make your search engine listing look better, they are important and well worth paying attention to. To put it another way, well-written Description tags will help you to get more visitors to your website.

Here is a screenshot of a Google search result. Notice that the Title tag (MailChimp training – Learn how to…) reads like a headline and that I have included a phone number. The Description tag text begins: ‘The training can be….’ These two elements in combination have always struck me as looking like an advert.

You can have up to 300 characters including spaces within a Description tag.

Write about the benefits that are to be found within the web page. For example, as opposed to writing: ‘Here is our widgets page. It lists all of the widgets that we sell.’

You could write this: ‘Find the right widget for your requirements. You can specify your widgets by size, material, colour and price. We’re the leading widget supplier and we are here to help. Our vast warehouse ensures that we’re always in stock. Order online or apply for an account. Questions? Call: 01234 56789.’

(292 characters including spaces between words; it is quite a lot of text, isn’t it?)

Use the words ‘you’ and ‘your’ within your Description tags, as this will feel more personal for the reader.

It is better to write in an upbeat, positive way.

Use short sentences and short words.

Where you are marketing a product or service, include a call to action.

If you are a WordPress user, Yoast is helpful.

You will find more detail and ideas within the SEO course – click here.

Nigel offers Google SEO training.

PS This article first appeared in my marketing tips email which you can subscribe to here.

Dec 20

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Choosing an internet marketing consultant

By Nigel Temple Internet marketing, Nigel Temple, Promotional techniques, SEO, Social media, Websites

Impartial, independent third party advice and feedback on your internet marketing activities can make all the difference. Here is a checklist for choosing an internet marketing consultant:

* Begin by deciding what you want the consultant to help you with, i.e. creating an internet marketing plan, increasing traffic, a website review, web copywriting review, an SEO audit and feedback, improving social media engagement, improving conversion rates, generating more enquiries / sales (or all of these).
* Look for someone with a wide range of experience in different industries
* Does their website give you confidence? Is it well designed, does it look professional and is it easy to navigate?
* Do they display testimonials within their website?
* Does the consultant also teach? Where have they taught internet marketing?
* Does the consultant understand web copywriting?
* Can they demonstrate a thorough understanding of SEO?
* Do they have professional marketing qualifications, for example a marketing degree?
* Has the consultant built any websites? How successful are these sites?
* How many clients has the consultant worked for?
* How quickly do they respond to your enquiry?

Choose three or four consultants and talk to them on the phone. Ask them to give you some initial feedback on your website. Request a written quotation for their services by email.

Read about Nigel’s digital marketing consultant services.

Here is some typical feedback:
“I revamped the site taking into your comments and the bookings have gone crazy. We’ve just had our best ever week! Thanks so much, your magic has worked!” ~ Neil Ross

Nigel Temple is an internet marketing consultant, author, speaker and trainer. He shows business owners, professionals and teams how to get better results from 21st century marketing – including online brand awareness, improved search engine rankings, social media effectiveness, website traffic and sales enquiries / sales.

Nigel has taught internet marketing since 2000. He served as a Faculty Member and Course Director at CIM (the Chartered Institute of Marketing) for 12 years. He led over 500 Business Link workshops, focusing on website effectiveness, SEO and social media. Today, he delivers internet marketing events for The Marketing Compass which provides impartial marketing advice for business owners. He has worked in dozens of countries around the world including the USA, Dubai and Japan.

To find out more about Nigel’s services email joanna@nigeltemple.com or call Joanna on +44 (0)1628 773128.

He welcomes media enquiries about 21st century marketing, social media and digital marketing. He has appeared within the national press and broadcast media.

Nigel is the founder of The Marketing Compass – join thousands of business owners, tell us about your business and ask some marketing questions,

Here is an online SEO course.

Follow Nigel on Twitter: http://twitter.com/nigeltemple

Nov 08

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What is a title tag?

By Nigel Temple Internet marketing, SEO, Websites No Comments

A title tag is part of the meta data within a web page. Title tags help search engines to understand what the page is about.

Why are title tags important?

Title tags are important because Google reads them. They are one of the 200 or so Google ranking factors. If you want your products or services to be found online, effective title tags will help you.

Title tag video

Here is a short video that includes some tips:

Another way to see a title tag

If you visit your website homepage, hover your mouse over a text area and right click with your mouse, a pop-up box should appear. One of the options should be: View page source

If you click on this option, a new browser window will appear. Use Control and ‘F’ (Command and F on an Apple Mac) and search for: title

….this should highlight the title tag.

Where do title tags appear?

Title tags appear within search engine results pages (SERPs). They look like headlines, which is one of the reasons that they are so important.

Within a SERP results page, title tags are clickable.

They also appear in web browsers (at the top) and social media networks.

How to write a title tag

Writing effective title tags is part art and part science. They have to work as headlines for human beings, which is where the art of copywriting comes in. In addition, they have to work for Google, Bing and the other search engines, which is where the science of SEO comes into play.

I recommend that you begin your title tags with the primary keyword, it possible. Then use a secondary keyword.

A ‘pipe’ symbol can be used to break the text up. They look like this: |

On a full size keyboard, the pipe symbol is in the lower left, near the shift key. To make it appear, press shift and |

…and Voila! there it is.

How long should a title tag be?

I am often asked about the optimum length for a title tag. Up to 60 characters including spaces is fine.

If the title tag is too long, it will be cut off and it will end in a series of dots; the technical name for these is an ellipsis.

I hope that this blog has helped to answer the question: What is a title tag?

My services include Google SEO training and I am a digital marketing consultant and trainer.

Here is an online SEO course that I have created.

Sep 17

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What to look for in Google Analytics

By Nigel Temple Google Analytics, Internet marketing, SEO, Websites

Here is a quick checklist of what to look for in Google Analytics. If you don’t use Google Analytics frequently, it can be confusing can’t it?

These are 3 key areas that I look at when I spend five minutes looking at Google Analytics for one of my websites or one of my clients. (Sometimes, I spend a lot longer).

Once you have logged in you will see a menu on the left hand side of the screen (if you are using a desktop / laptop). We are going to use:
Audience
Acquistion
Behaviour
….from this menu.

Audience / Overview – what are they doing when they visit?

Towards the top RHSide (Right Hand Side) of the screen, change the date range so that you are looking at three months. I have found that this is a reasonable time period, to measure changes.

If you have more than 5 minutes at your disposal, when you are working with Google Analytics, you can change the viewing period to see what difference it makes. However, for comparison purposes – it is important to stick to the same time period.

Within Audience / Overview you can see: Sessions. Users. Page views. Pages / Sessions. Bounce rate. Also, you can see a pie chart of new versus returning visitors. NB You can change the settings so that you can see different information.

Acquisition / Overview – where did the website visitors come from?

Within this view you can see:
Direct – i.e. visitors have typed your website address into a browser
Referral – they have found your website by clicking on a link in a website
Organic search – they found you via Google search
Social – they found you by clicking a link in Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter etc
Email – they clicked on a link from an email, i.e. your website address if you place this after your name, phone number etc

Behaviour / Overview

Shows a list of the most popular pages within your website.

If you see: /

….at top, or near the top of the list, this means ‘home page’. You can click any of the pages and drill down for more information.

Conclusion

It is a good idea to login to Google Analytics and make a note of some of the key stats, i.e. the ones that I have listed above, in a spreadsheet. Then login a week later and make a note of the new numbers within a separate row within the spreadsheet.

I always include Google Analytics when I build a website and I am always keen to show the website owner how to use the software in order to improve their website.

We have an SEO Group within The Marketing Compass website.

Sep 12

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What are SEO Citations and how can they help you?

By Nigel Temple Internet marketing, Local Search, SEO One Comment

You may have asked yourself: what are SEO Citations? If your enterprise is mentioned on the web, this is called a Citation. It comprises any combination of the following information: the name of your enterprise, telephone number, business address, postcode, website address. Citations are particularly important when it comes to improving local SEO search results.

If you haven’t focused on local SEO there are many reasons why you should do so, regardless of your business type and size. As smartphones become our ‘2nd brain’ we use them to search for all sorts of things – wherever we happen to be. Understanding Google Search is a crucial marketing skill (it is a big subject, isn’t it?)

Interestingly, a Citation doesn’t need to link back to your website. The value in a Citation is in the mention. The more mentions, the better, as this will boost your local rankings although relevancy is an important factor. Links are still helpful and Citations that include hyperlinks are better than Citations that have no links.

Local Citations include the following combinations: company name and phone number; company name, phone number and address; company name, phone number, address and website; company name and website.

Additional Citation information includes: business categories; hours of operation; driving directions; business description; images; videos; payment forms accepted; geo-coordinates; reviews; owner responses; social media links; email addresses; alternative phone numbers.

A complete local Citation would include your company name, address, and phone number. This is referred to as a NAP. In order to help with your local SEO page rankings, the NAP should match the information on your website exactly. In computer terminology, this is referred to as a ‘character string’. Once you have decided on a format, stick to it. For example Tel: 01628 773128 versus… Phone: +44(0)1628 773128 or some other variant of phone number formatting.

Include your NAP on your Homepage, About page and Contact page.

Here are some places to get Citations: directories, forums, blogs, social media, press mentions, image and video descriptions and profile pages.

Here is an online SEO course that I have created.

You can ask us about SEO within The Marketing Compass website where we have an SEO Group.

Jan 24

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Google Search Console

By Nigel Temple Google Analytics, Internet marketing, SEO No Comments

Google has launched a new version of Search Console that helps you to manage your presence on Google Search. Specifically, it shows you how people have found your website. The software is free to use.

You can now confirm which of your website pages are indexed and receive information on how to fix indexing errors. You can also monitor your performance on Google Search over the previous 16 months of data, to enable year-over-year comparisons.

Google recommends checking your current status using the new Search Console, as they will only notify you if your site data changes from the current state.

I found that it took a few attempts before Search Console would verify that I owned my website (!); however, if this happens to you, it is worth persisting and there are several ways in which you can verify your website.

You can login here: https://search.google.com/search-console

Jul 21

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Tubebuddy review – YouTube productivity

By Nigel Temple SEO, Videos, Websites No Comments

Are you using videos to market your business? If not, you should consider doing so.

Do you have a YouTube channel? Hopefully, you have answered ‘yes’ to this question as
there are over 400 hours of content uploaded to YouTube every minute of the day.
A billion hours of videos are watched on YouTube every single day.

Tubebuddy www.tubebuddy.com channel management browser plugin helps content creators,
brands and networks grow their brands directly from within YouTube.

Tubebuddy is a Chrome browser extension that integrates with your YouTube channel.

* Perform bulk updates to your videos, i.e. adding annotations or cards to all your videos with a few clicks.

* Create embed codes with the full list of options for adding videos or playlists to your website.

* Use Tubebuddy to perform Find/Replace routines on your videos.

* Generate professional custom thumbnails using screenshots and branding/text layers.

* Export your list of subscribers and their social profiles.

* Promote your new upload across all other videos.

* A series of End Screen Templates are available.

Tubebuddy is a paid for service and the pricing starts at US$9 per month.

If you are serious about your YouTube channel then Tubebuddy is worth looking at.

SEO

How to structure your knowledge

Website link building: 10 ideas

How to write a Description tag

What is a title tag?

Why are title tags important?

Title tag video

Another way to see a title tag

Where do title tags appear?

How to write a title tag

How long should a title tag be?

What to look for in Google Analytics

Audience / Overview – what are they doing when they visit?

Acquisition / Overview – where did the website visitors come from?

Behaviour / Overview

Conclusion

What are SEO Citations and how can they help you?

Google Search Console

Tubebuddy review – YouTube productivity

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