Google Plus Setup For Businesses, Franchises & Brands

Derek Clark — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 20:17:47 +0000

Clients often ask us, “What should we be doing with Google+?” Usually it’s already understood that it’s a social offshoot of Google that fits somewhere into the scheme of online marketing, but the details of how to get started can often get confusing.

Changes are happening fast – check for timestamps on articles online (this one, too).
As Google continues to integrate Google+ with existing assets, bloggers from a variety of industry segments are racing to declare the latest implications. The most dramatic pronouncements tend to gain inflated visibility because of their share/click appeal.

ISM set out to take a closer look at Google’s latest offering, crossed that with some quality investigative blog posts, and boiled the results down to a roadmap for businesses. Many thanks to gurus Danny Sullivan, A.J. Kohn, and many others whose research efforts were included this article.

Google Plus Background

Overview

Summary of Google Plus

Google+ is a social network created by Google, integrated with existing Google user accounts, the “+1” sharing system, and other existing Google assets. Google+ users can “follow” or “friend” other Google+ users or pages by adding them to their “Circles”. Google+ Circles provide a way for users to organize their contacts and interests.

Google+ Business/Local Pages

Google+ Pages are social profile pages that users create on Google. Recently Google started allowing business pages.
As in other forms of social media, increasing the number of users who include you in their Circles is the key to expanding your visibility and influence on the network.

How Google Plus Affects SEO

Recent History (2012)

Google has started including Google+ content on regular search results. These results are usually contextual to logged-in users, showing content from people and pages in their Circles. Content published publicly via the Google+ platform may also appear as part of normal search results (non-logged in users will see it). This is one area where Google+ differentiates itself from Facebook.
Both scenarios – logged in and non-logged in – should be considered when building a strategy to increase organic visibility using Google+ business pages.

Benefit 1: Boost Brand Visibility

The most immediate influence of Google+ pages for business is allowing business to claim more SERP real estate for branded searches.
For example, a search for “at&t”:

Not every business can expect this kind of result, but it demonstrates how Google+ profiles are becoming another asset for controlling SERP visibility for your brand term. In this example, Google has pulled in posts from AT&T’s Google+ page (comparable to tweets or Facebook status updates).

Results like the example above are much more likely to be generated if the logged-in user has the Google+ page in their circle. Expanding the number of followers on Google+ is a critical ingredient to any Google+ marketing strategy.

Benefit 2: Increase Non-Brand Visibility

Content posted via Google+ represents a new medium that is governed by a separate ranking algorithm, opening up new avenues for content visibility.

Creating Google Plus Pages for Business

Signing Up to Google Plus

Log in to Google

Start by logging into a Google account and going to https://plus.google.com. We recommend the creation of a corporate Google+ page as well as local pages for each franchise.

Create a Product or Brand Page

On https://plus.google.com, look for “Create a Google+ page” in the right column. Choose “Product or Brand” as the category:

Provide the company name, website, and the most relevant category to complete the initial setup.

Creating Local Business Google+ Pages

To extend the benefits of Google+ into geo keyword verticals, we recommend creating (or coordinating the creation of) Google+ pages for each franchise. Use the same instructions as above, except choose “Local Business or Place” instead of “Product or Brand”

Increasing Traffic via Google+ Pages

1. Optimize Google+ Page

Like other content on the web, SEO strategies can help influence the visibility of Google+ Pages in organic search results. Early industry studies have led to the following SEO best practices for Google+ pages.

Content Optimization

Include target keywords within the “Introduction” section of the “About” page:

Keywords That Surface Google Plus Pages (on Google)

Google looks for the following qualities in keywords when deciding whether to pull in Google+ pages on regular SERPs:

Is typically used in social contexts (e.g. topical keywords related to recent events)
Is a close match to a Google+ page in the user’s Circle (if they are logged in)
Is a close match to a Google+ page that has received a high volume of +1′s

Link To Your Business’s Google+ Page

Help both new and existing customers find your Google+ pages by adding links to them on the web site. Eye-catching widgets are available to help attract clicks: https://developers.google.com/+/plugins/badge/config

Verifying Your Business On Google Plus

Google looks to form links between Google+ pages and websites as a measure to improve search results. To help accomplish this, Google provides steps to get a Google+ page verified as an official business page. Follow these steps to get verified:

1. Link to Your Website From Google

2. Link to Google+ From Your Website

Link to your Google+ page and include a rel=”publisher” directive in the HTML that specifies the correct URL for your Google+ page. This will take the format https://plus.google.com/(10+ numbers here)

3. Submit verification requests

Websites can request a “manual” verification from Google if the Google+ page exceeds 1,000 followers (in addition to the interlinking described above):

http://support.google.com/plus/bin/request.py?contact_type=extended_verification

Publishing Strategy for Businesses on Google+

The following strategies are recommended as part of an active social media campaign. The benefit with Google+ is that each post—especially public posts—double as possible entry points via new keyword searches on Google.

Post to Public

Make sure posts are public so that Google may include them in regular results. This also makes your content to visible to other users within the Google+ network that aren’t in your Circles (or vice versa).

Post Frequently

Signal freshness and attract followers by regularly posting

Lure +1’s (up-votes)

User up-votes (+1’s) are a powerful signal in Google’s real-time system, so posting items users are more likely to share will help get your content—and your brand—onto more search result pages and in front of more users.

Flag Other Users with “@”

Use the @name function to create visibility for posts on other pages and also engage new groups of users (just like Twitter and Facebook).

Respond to Engagement

When users +1 content, circle them or otherwise engage them. Use the @name function in replies when applicable.

“Circle” People

Add team members, business partners and industry experts. Search Google+ users who match terms that suggest interest in your business’s product and services and circle them, too.

Monitor real-time searches

From within Google+’s search (not public search), keep an eye on brand results and keyword results related to recent posts. This will help your business become actively engaged with the most influential Google+ users and pages in your space.

References

iSM announces support for ClearWater

Brian — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 22:04:12 +0000

ISM is pleased to announce its support for the ClearWater project, which aims to provide sustainable clean water to thousands of indigenous families spread across 20 villages and hamlets in the oil-ravaged areas of northeastern Ecuador.

ClearWater is a collaboration between local communities in the northeastern Ecuadorian Amazon, the grassroots organization Amazon Defense Coalition, Berlin-based child welfare charity Saving an Angel Foundation, San Francisco-based charity GroundWork Opportunites, and the international environmental and human rights organization Amazon Watch.

ISM is proud to offer SEO and social media consulting services to the project owners in an effort to maximize search engine visibility and encourage the virality of the ClearWater vision.

Please take a few minutes to watch the video below, and if you are so inclined, donate to this important cause.

iSM hosts first-ever cookie bake-off

Caitlin Halpert — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 01:16:34 +0000

A selection of the cookie contest entries

After many controversial company competitions, including guacamole & salsa-offs, the company was finally able to settle on the ultimate food competition this quarter: a cookie bake off.

The competition was tight with 7 entries ranging from chewy to crunchy and chocolaty to nutty. After we were given very specific scoring instructions (1 means best, not worst!) the tastings began aided by flowing cups of milk, soy milk and champagne (good combo, right?). From chocolate chip cookies, to nutella to raspeberry thumbprints, we had quite an array to test. Let me take a moment for a PSA (for the uninitiated into cookie bake-offs): do not eat 7 cookies in a 10 minute time frame…you might not feel so good afterwards!

For proper testing purposes, a few bites of each cookie were necessary!

We all handed in our ballot and waited anxiously for the results to be tabulated. It seemed to take hours as we contestants chewed our finger nails in anxiety hoping to win the grand prize: a $100 gift card! Though I hoped desperately that I could edge out a win, it was no surprise that Annie Meurs, with her delicious soft and goey creation: salted caramel stuffed chocolate truffle cookies, was the illustrious victor. You know if a cookie has that many words in its name it has to be good!

Our President & CTO, Charles Hentrich, came in 2^nd, and sadly, I came in third. I should have known better, my “cookies” were hardly cookies at all (I made matzah candy).

Now all that remains is the decision for our next competition. Will it be dips? Or pies? Stay tuned!

Annie Meurs: Cookie Baking Champion Extraordinaire

Google Adwords 101: The basics of quality score

Caitlin Halpert — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 19:06:10 +0000

You may or may not know that competition is not the only determining factor in AdWords click cost. Quality score (QS) has a huge impact on how much you pay per click, and can even impact how often an ad is displayed. Here are some basics to help any advertiser better understand quality score and its implications.

The Basics:

Quality Score is a number between 1 and 10 that Google assigns to each keyword in an account. This number is dynamic so it can and will change over time as Google reassesses performance. This number is Google’s interpretation of your ad & product relevance to the targeted keyword. The reason for this is twofold; the consumer gets a better online “shopping” experience if an advertiser can provide them with highly targeted, relevant ads, and Google profits from every click. The more relevant the ad, the more likely users are to click on that ad, and the more likely Google will make money.

Where is QS Reported:

Quality scores are found in the Keywords tab of the AdWords interface. If it is not displayed, click Columns -> Customize columns and add Qual. Score (under Attributes) to the view.

Distribution:

Quality scores are not evenly distributed; a disproportionate percentage of scores are 7 or in the 3-5 range. The quality score algorithm appears to grant a score of 10 more often than a score of 9.

Ingredients:

Google uses many factors to calculate each keyword’s score:

Ad copy relevance to the keyword
Click through rate (CTR)
Landing page relevance to the keyword
Landing page load time
Historical performance of that keyword on Google.com and in your account
Overall account, campaign & ad group quality score.

Why it matters:

An increase in quality score can save advertisers money because CPCs (cost per click) will go down and average position will go up because Ad Rank (Max CPC x QS) improves. Lower CPCs mean increased ROI!

Adding a new keyword? Keep in mind that a new keyword in a new account has a quality score that is primarily based on its historical performance on Google.com. Some keywords, especially those with vague user intent tend to have naturally low quality scores, which will be difficult to improve upon, especially since achieving a higher than average CTR is unlikely. If an account has been running for some time, then account performance as a whole is taken into account. Over time, this score will change as Google learns how relevant a specific ad is to the user. Google monitors this change primarily through ad CTR.

How to increase relevancy and thus quality score:

Optimize ad copy

Include the keyword in the ad. This change has two important benefits: quality score will get a bump because Google sees the relationship between the query and the ad, and search terms in the ad copy will be shown in bold, drawing more user attention.
Use enticing ad copy with a strong call to action to further incentivize clicks.

Optimize landing pages

Create a landing page that is specific and relevant to the keyword and ad copy.
Shorten landing page load time by minimizing unneeded page elements.

How long will it take for quality score to change?

It depends. If you are bidding on low-volume keywords, you may have little to no ability to improve your quality score if it doesn’t surpass Google’s impression threshold, which is usually in the thousands. Think of this as the sample size in a scientific study: there must be significant data to prove to Google that you are better than the average advertiser on that keyword. Bottom line: if spend is restricted, or on the account depends on long-tail (low-volume) terms, keyword or budget changes are necessary to avoid being trapped with chronically low quality scores.

Now that the basics have been covered, making an informed decision around improving quality score should be a breeze—and if you’re a client, hopefully this gives you some insight into the steps we take on an ongoing basis to make sure your campaigns are as efficient as possible!

Mobile SEO: Tips for optimizing your site for mobile search

Leslie To — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 17:52:23 +0000

Recent research estimates that among the 83% of American adults who have a mobile phone, 42% of those have a smartphone; this translates to roughly about 35% (or approximately 100 million) of all US adults. With 25% of mobile users claiming that their mobile device is their primary connection to the Internet, it’s becoming increasingly important for companies to optimize their sites for mobile search. If the sheer number of mobile users doesn’t convince you, then consider divergent search habits and trends of mobile vs. desktop.

Search on mobile devices tend to focus more on generic, non-branded keywords rather than brand-based keywords. For example, users will search “women’s shoes” instead of Nine West (with the end goal of looking for a non-specific women’s shoes retailer close by), unless they are actually looking for a Nine West store.

There is also more emphasis on proximity and local terms in mobile search. For that reason, Google Places listings and businesses with a local intent sometimes will appear higher in mobile search results. This makes optimizing and claiming your Google Places listings essential.

Depending on the location of the searcher, different search results will appear, especially if those queries are location specific. So if you’re a brick and mortar type of business, having semantic HTML (using microformats and location tagging, for example) could be the difference between a convertible lead and a non-converting visitor.

Due to the nature of touchscreen smartphones, typos tend to appear more often. So for many mobile devices, autocomplete/autocorrect results can act as search results themselves. Optimizing for mobile suggest can help divert users to high quality content they would have otherwise never found.
While Local/Places have a strong impact on desktop searches (drawing the most eyeballs even if they’re on the middle of the page), reviews and social signals tend to grab the most attention on mobile search. A recent Mediative study revealed that businesses, even if they’re in the top 3 positions, will be relatively ignored if they lack reviews and social signals, especially if their competitors have reviews.

Not only is user intent different between mobile and desktop search, but Google announced a smartphone Googlebot in December that is meant to refine searches for mobile devices, placing a preference on serving up content that is fast, simple and relevant to mobile devices. This means that user experience will differ based on the search device.

In the end, what does all this mean? As we begin to move forward with new SEO strategies for 2012, a mobile-specific SEO strategy should be in your project plans for the upcoming year. A one size fits all type of SEO strategy will become obsolete as Google continues to refine search algorithms to reflect the diverging search intent and habits on different devices.

Sources:

1. Pew Internet

2. Mashable

3. Search Engine Land

Staggering usage data from facebook

Derek Clark — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 23:46:17 +0000

Last year Google confirmed something that many of us already suspected: Facebook is the most visited site on the web. We’re big analytics geeks around here, so we started wondering just how much people are using Facebook, in terms of web analytics. We know that a site like Facebook has high engagement, so couple that with huge volume (and a market that’s collectively expanding thanks to the boom in internet connected devices) and you have a website that’s entering completely new territory for usage and overall engagement. But could we find data?

After sniffing around the web we found pieces of information published by various research agencies, blogs, and, in some cases, Facebook directly. We played with the numbers a bit to tease out some interesting facts that really drive home the scale of Facebook’s power:

Facebook.com is likely receiving over 1 trillion pageviews a month as of July 2011.
There are more active Facebook users than 1) dogs in the world, 2) people alive over 65
Most users visit the site more than once a day.
Users spend an average of 23 minutes per visit (normal site average = 2 min).
2 out of 3 Americans between the age of 18 and 35 use Facebook
30 billion links, images, or updates are shared a day
10,000 comments are posted every second; many are identical
More than half of Internet users visited Facebook at least once in 2011.
750 million pictures were uploaded in a single night in early 2011
The typo “fecebook” is Googled more frequently than “myspace”…
At an average of 31 minutes a day, Americans spend more time on Facebook than they do participating in sports, recreation, or exercising.

These numbers are only as good as our sources and for some of our facts we inferred from partial data. But even the erroneous data probably isn’t too far off the mark and, at the least, food for thought. Or, kindling for some sort of Orwellian panic attack.

Bonus: There’s a 20% chance you’re already logged in, so….

Sources:
http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics
http://www.kenburbary.com/2011/03/facebook-demographics-revisited-2011-statistics-2/
http://www.avma.org/reference/marketstats/sourcebook.asp
http://www.onlineschools.org/blog/facebook-obsession/
http://www.google.com/adplanner/static/top1000/
https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/atus.t01.htm

Improving organic CTR with semantic HTML

Derek Clark — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 07:20:23 +0000

A visually compelling search result can influence click-through rate (CTR) by 10-30%. ISM decided to investigate exactly which types of structured markup Google looks for when generating CTR-friendly “rich snippets”

Not all search results are created equal. By now most of us are familiar with presence of rich snippets on Google search results:

Paradox: Five Star = Four Stars

Google relies on the usage of Semantic HTML to generate results like the one above. Generally speaking, semantic HTML is any markup that is written in a way that indicates the meanings of–and relationships between–elements on a web page. There is no absolute standard for semantic HTML, but various online groups have worked together to establish markup standards that define HTML patterns and element properties for common types of content on the web.

Semantic HTML & Search Marketing

Semantic HTML helps search engines identify objects within a web page, a pivotal aspect of deciding when and how to render dynamic, query-driven snippets. In the example above, Google correctly deduced that my search, “five star pizza”, was submitted in the pursuit of ordering a pizza (and not simply looking up information about Five Star Pizza, the pizza chain). Having made this deduction, Google generated a snippet that used customer-friendly Microdata it discovered on the source site, Yelp.com.

In fact, Google used multiple structured markup standards to generate the rich snippet from our example:

Reviews (data source: “hReview” microformat)

The hReview microformat is the most commonly used format for reviews. In the example above, Google determined the 4-star rating from Yelp’s usage of hReview-aggregate, a broader version of hReview.

Breadcrumbs (data source: Microdata markup)

Yelp copied Google’s example of breadcrumb Microdata character for character, choosing to hide the breadcrumb text per their design preference:

Rich Snippets and Higher CTR

On a less sophisticated level, rich snippets help click-through simply by decorating search results with more attention-grabbing visual components. More importantly, however, they provide pieces of information that are relevant to potential actions underlying the user’s query, establishing a critical competitive advantage over generic results.

Conservative estimates suggest that users click on results with rich snippets 10% more frequently than generic results. Search marketer Paul Bruemmer recently reported that he witnessed 30% increases over a handful of large retail websites.

Which Markup Standards Does Google Recognize?

There is no official standardization for semantic markup on the web (as declared by the W3C), nor are there official statements from Google about which standards it interprets. However, some standards are more popular than others, most notably the following (each of which is known to be interpreted by Google):

Each of the preceding sets forth standards for integrating semantics into HTML. We should note, however, that microformats define precise markup patterns while Microdata and RDFa more loosely define data schemas, properties, and naming conventions (for context, a microformat could contain Microdata, but not vice versa).

Future of Structured Markup

Google continues to openly recommend the usage of structured, semantic HTML to help them better understand content and generate more engaging snippets for search results. In a post from Google’s official blog last week, an update to rich snippets was announced:

“We improved our process for detecting sites that qualify for shopping, recipe and review rich snippets. As a result, you should start seeing more sites with rich snippets in search results.”

Additionally, the emergence and adoption of HTML5 (which introduces a variety of new tags that help standardize the markup of common types of content) will increase the competitive importance of using structured, semantic HTML in non-HTML5 markup.

Advertising on corporate blogs: good or bad Idea?

Maya Joshi — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 15:00:34 +0000

A client of ours recently asked, “Should we put ads on our corporate blog?”

If I could sum up my answer in one sentence, it would be something along these lines: If the revenue from ads on your blog or site are essential to your success as a company, keep them—but if you’re a major brand (vs. an individual) and your blog doesn’t get that much traction, it’s probably not worth doing.

Now, I realize this might seem like a simplistic answer to a question that merits a more thought out, scenario-specific response. But (full disclosure here if it’s not already obvious) coming from an agency perspective rather than a business perspective means user experience and brand credibility will almost always win this battle.

Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I’m going to try to be as objective as possible. Technically, there aren’t any “wrong” or “right” answers to this question, but there are a lot of grey areas and this is definitely not a decision that should be made based on a whim. Thinking about how ads might affect some of the components outlined below is a good place to start:

1. Usability

There’s nothing more annoying than a pop-up, splash page or any additional barrier/obstacle in the way when all you want to do is read a blog post. Overly-animated, fancy flash banners may either piss off readers OR cause them to leave your site as a whole.

How to do it right:

Chose ads that aren’t too obtrusive or distracting. Additionally, try to ensure ads somewhat mimic the look and feel of the site…but be careful. There’s a fine line between ads blending into the site/blog and ads deceiving users into thinking it’s actually a natural part of your site. Users won’t be particularly thrilled when they learn they’ve clicked on an ad when thought they were answering a poll about puppies (because who doesn’t love puppies?).

It might be difficult to do a perfect test given the sheer number of variables involved, but try capturing engagement stats before and after putting ads on your site. If you notice a higher bounce rate, decreased time on site, or fewer pages/visit it could be an indicator that the ads are hurting the user experience.

2. Credibility

You have to consider the fact that people visit your blog because they want to see what your brand is up to (usually highly engaged/frequent visitors), they found your blog through an organic search (demonstrates intent and contextual relevancy) or they got referred to your site through another source.

How to do it right:

Hand select ads that complement your blog content and fit your audience. I wouldn’t rely on Google or any other ad network to pick ads based on what they consider to be “contextual relevancy.” Their methods don’t understand tone (sarcasm) or intent like humans do. The last thing you want is a questionable ad that’s not related to your content or demographic. In other words, opt out of Google’s (or any other) content network if you’re the publisher, especially when automatic placements are involved.

3. History

Some people don’t like change. Similarly, your subscribers might freak out if there’s too much change. If your blog never had advertising on it and suddenly the look and feel has changed to accommodate ads, they may not like it. It’s probably unlikely that you’ll lose them as a whole, but it’s possible that some followers will become slightly disgruntled or disengaged. If you start a brand new corporate blog with advertising, users will feel “less shocked,” but the other two factors above will still need to be considered.

Other Tips if you do decide to advertise:

Be Picky

It’s your blog and your brand/reputation at stake. You have the right to be picky about what ads go on your site. To minimize impacts stated above, consider only accepting “branding” ads, or ads that have the ability to effectively serve their purpose based on impressions—in other words, they don’t require a user to “engage” or click on the ad. This setup also allows you to charge on an impression basis or flat fee.

Hold on to Your Link Juice

This one is especially important for SEO: Make sure you add “nofollows” (rel=”nofollow”) to all advertising links. This rule goes beyond advertising. If there’s anything on your site that you don’t want to “vouch” for, why pass link juice to it at the expense/loss of your own domain strength? Beyond that, if it’s not a “natural” part of your site, it’s the best way to let search engine know.

Get creative!

Try getting your advertisers to come up with a “giveaway” instead of a standard ad. This is really a win-win-win (yes, triple win!):

• If the product complements your brand, users will feel like you’re doing them a favor by giving them a chance to “win” something.

• You get the gratification of making them feel that way

• The advertiser gets a lot of brand recognition (or even traffic depending on the type of ad).

Although the example on the left from I Heart Organizing’s blog, isn’t an ad, the customization and relevance of the approach should be noted. Also note that her ads are clearly labeled under “my sponsors,” yet the ads match the look and feel of the site. Check out the clever Amazon advertisement at the top as well. All the products she mentions can be bought there, making the ad actually useful to her readers. Such an approach makes the advertising much more “natural,” if there’s even such a thing.

Develop Partnerships

“Upsell” your advertisers with the prospect of more formal relationships if they’re companies that you could potentially form long term partnerships with. Think of this as a PR opportunity. Maybe you can work together on a new charity event? Or exchange product/service giveaways across user bases? With a little imagination, the sky’s the limit!

Photo Credit: Courtesy of Jolante

Integration 101: the fundamentals of SEO, PPC + social synergy

Leslie To — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 01:50:25 +0000

You’ve probably already heard that SEO and SEM efforts should be integrated. But why should they be integrated? And what are the benefits of synergy between them? And with social now becoming a larger part of the picture, where does that fit in? I was recently at the BrightEdge Share11 conference and there was a big emphasis on campaign integration. Their stance was pretty much the same as ours, plain and simple: PPC, SEO, and social campaigns should not be divvied up into three separate campaigns, run by three separate non-communicating departments. Now before you write this off and say to yourself your search campaigns function fine as separate efforts, there is credence to this claim. Here’s why.

Understanding the dynamics, strategy, and pace behind both SEO and PPC, it’s understandable why many businesses choose to separate them. But if your teams aren’t communicating, they’re missing out on some key opportunities to improve online marketing performance as a whole.

For example, from an SEO perspective, using the right keywords is the foundation to strategy and ongoing implementation (everything from meta descriptions to link building efforts center on a cohesive and comprehensive keyword approach). This is where paid search becomes crucial—generating some of these keywords. Using paid search data, you can better understand user search trends and use the data to produce a much more concentrated keyword strategy that targets the right audience. Asking these three questions can be a good place to start:

1. What keywords lead to a high bounce rate?

These keywords may not be right for the SEO strategy. Maybe they’re not considering the intent of the user. Maybe your business should create content that more closely matches the relevance of the keyword and the intent of the user. For any content that needs to be added or modified, you’ll inevitably need to go back to the SEO roundtable. You may come up with more questions than answers initially, but it will get your mind going in the right direction—and the answers you might have to dig up are likely going to be illuminating.

2. What keywords had high engagement?

Those keywords could be incorporated into your social media profiles and posts.

3.What keywords lead to high conversions?

These are keywords that should be dominant players in your SEO strategy, especially for sites where leads or conversions are essential. Keywords with high engagement are worth considering for brand SEO campaigns as well.

Using paid search to your advantage when you’re improving your site for SEO purposes can be the difference between a conversion and a bounce.

Now on to social. Although advertising in social media is a relatively new initiative for most brands, it is nonetheless an ever growing and evolving practice in search marketing. If you liken a company’s social campaign to their digital presence and overall reputation on the web, then you can see why it is often in the hands of PR agencies (larger companies) or CMOs (smaller companies). But what gives agencies like us an edge, is a clearer understanding of how to optimize these assets based on algorithmic trends. More importantly, as Google and Bing continue to catch on to this trend and really understand the role it plays in digital branding, social influence itself will continue to become a larger part of their overall search ranking algorithms—especially with the advent of Google+ pages for businesses (not to mention Microsoft’s relationship with Facebook).

Less than a year ago, SEOmoz did a test to see whether backlinks (SEO strategy) or numerous tweets (social strategy) to promote a given page would rank better in search engine results. With both pages being nearly identical, Page “A” had 646 links from 36 root domains and was tweeted twice. Page B had one link from one root domain and was tweeted 522 times. Page “B” ranked in position 4, while Page “A” wasn’t even on the first page of results. Surprised? Although this wasn’t a scientific test by any means, it adds credence to the theory that sites like Twitter and Facebook can be a valuable part of your SEO/social/brand strategy—and it also makes the need to post better quality social content more apparent (better posts/tweets = more likely to be shared, re-tweeted/re-posted = more likely to rank in organic search results).

Instead of having competitors dominate important search real estate, why not maximize your brand presence by optimizing the brand site and social profiles through SEO and promote any contest or promotions through social networks simultaneously? It’s a two birds with one stone thing. Add paid search into the mix and it’s three birds.

Your key takeaway should be this: the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Using a synergistic strategy can help enhance your marketing campaigns in ways that you wouldn’t expect; and definitely in ways that each campaign couldn’t do for your brand independently.

The 15 best WordPress plugins for SEO, social media & site speed (2011)

Derek Clark — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 03:57:25 +0000

We install and manage a LOT of WordPress sites around here, and knowing about the best plugins is a necessary part of what we do. Our recommendations should help make your blog or WordPress site faster, more SEO/social-media friendly, and help enhance the overall user experience. So without further adieu, here is our up-to-date list of must-have plugins for 2011.

In no particular order:

1. W3 Total Cache

This plugin is the unrivaled solution for improving the performance and security of your WordPress blog. When installed, the plugin automatically adds a variety of performance features caching, content delivery network integration and “minifying”—consolidating scripts and stylesheets to eliminate redundancy and reduce the total # of HTTP requests sent by each page. Unbiased tests online have shown the W3 lives up to claims of 10X gains in load time when fully configured. At minimum, we advise installing it and enabling (server) caching.

2. WordPress SEO by Yoast

We recommend this in favor of the more “popular” All-in-one-SEO plugin because it’s loaded with features and maintained by one of the most respected/supported web experts, Joost de Valk. Too many features to list, but serious SEOs will prefer this plugin over alternatives (from which you can import SEO meta data into this plugin, if you’re considering switching). Among its many features and utilities, WordPress SEO handles XML sitemap generation—one less plugin you’ll need.

3. Google Analytics for WordPress

Here’s another one from Yoast. Savvy readers may be thinking, “Why do I need a plugin for this? Can’t I simply paste my tracking code in my template and be done?” Sure. But in addition to handling this for you, this plugin automatically tracks a variety of other data (such as custom variables for post author, category, and also tracking where visitors exit as Events in Google Analytics) and provides simple interfaces for adding advanced tracking features, such as custom variables, cross-domain tracking, e-commerce, etc. If you can do it in Google Analytics, this plugin probably has an interface layer for it, insulating developers from tracking problems caused by syntax error.

4. Add Link to Facebook

Let it be known that there are hundreds of Facebook integration plugins competing to serve the same purposes; discerning the best one isn’t always easy. This plugin simply cross-posts to the Facebook page of your choice (profile, group, fan page—whichever) when you post something new. It also provides options to control what data gets sent, which likely influences how the snippet will look (which thumbnail, the link title, snippet text, etc).

5. WP Smush.it

Images are usually the most resource-intensive objects on a web page, so if you’re looking for faster load times, optimizing images is a good place to start. Smush.it, a well-maintained and well-reviewed plugin (that connects with the Smush.it API), automatically optimizes image compression when images are uploaded to your media library, and provides a simple interface where you can decide exactly how big or small (file size) you want your image to be. If your website uses a content delivery network (CDN), your image will be automatically uploaded to it.

6. WPtouch

WPtouch detects requests from smartphones and loads an alternate theme for your website that’s dramatically altered to suit small touch screens. The styling mimics that of iPhone applications, so the interface will look and feel intuitive to many mobile visitors. There are other plugins like it, but this one is exceptionally popular among them. It’s maintained by an agency which bodes well for the plugin staying up to date. There’s also a paid version with a bonanza of features, including iPad support.

7. Simple Facebook Connect

This is the most popular solution for integrating your site with Facebook Connect, the API that allows users to sign up, sign in, or post on your site using their FB credentials. Simple Facebook Connect automatically adds Facebook’s OpenGraph tags (standardized markup that FB looks for to interpret and categorize the nature of “likes” – influences how previews are generated when people share your page on their Facebook profile). Otto, the developer, is also one of the most visible and prolific WordPress plugin developers. Naturally, his expertise adds a lot of credibility to this plugin.

8. Simple Twitter Connect

Yet another plugin from Otto that allows a variety of Twitter integration features, including auto-tweeting when you post new articles.

9. PHP Code Widget

For users who like to get hands-on with their blogs, this is a tremendously handy plugin for managing widgets. Typically, if you want to add a custom piece of text as a sidebar widget, you would use the default “Text” widget which let’s your provide some text for it. This can include markup—HTML and CSS—but no PHP. As developers here, we frequently encounter situations where we want to apply conditions to what renders in a simple text widget. This plugin allows you to do that, presenting itself as a clone of the Text widget that can accept PHP code to allow pre-render conditional logic for what your widget will display (common conditions may be whether it’s the home page, or if the user is logged in, etc).

10. WP PageNavi

WP PageNavi is the go-to plugin for controlling pagination on your WordPress site. It’s well-supported and has been around for a while. Most any sort of customization you may have in mind, whether cosmetic or SEO-minded, can be made in the PageNavi settings menu.

11. WP No Category Base

By default, WordPress automatically includes “/category/” in the URL of category URLs, preceding the category slug. SEOs (and other types of neurotic people) are bugged by this, and would rather snip that out for a shorter, more keyword-rich URL. This plugin accomplishes what is otherwise a complicated problem – just install, enable, and “/category/” will disappear. Requests to the old URL format are 301 redirected and sitemap functionality correctly records the new URLs. Works with subcategories and multi-sites.

12. Slick Social Share Buttons

We’ve noticed this plugin gaining a lot of popularity among social bookmarking plugins. We recommend it as a one-stop solution for adding those share buttons for everyone’s favorite social websites (Facebook, Twitter, Google, LinkedIn, etc). What distinguishes this plugin is the “sliding” display type, which slides along the left margin of your blog as users scroll up and down, keeping it visible. No complaints about compatibility or operability issues from the WP community (so far). Lots of customization features.

13. Social Metrics

This one pairs nicely with Slick Social. Provides a simple dashboard where you can view the share totals across each social bookmark across each of your posts. Spot visitor engagement trends quickly by viewing all these metrics in one place. This particular plugin appears to be well-supported, up-to-date and well rated by its users.

14. Yet Another Related Posts Plugin

This plugin received the endorsement of Google SEO spokesperson Matt Cutts, which carries more weight than our arguments for it here. Related posts plugins rely on internal algorithms for calculating the relationships between posts, so in this respect there can be a huge difference between one plugin and the next. This plugin has been receiving updates for years, which adds to our confidence level in its algorithmic intelligence. It comes with a nice suite of features, including templating, caching and options to include related posts as part of your RSS broadcast.

15. Google XML Sitemaps

If you don’t want to use Yoast’s SEO plugin, which handles XML sitemap generation, this plugin is by far the most popular choice for the job. Install it and you’re done; as new posts are added, the plugin updates the XML sitemap and pings major search engines to let them know there is new content (which may influence search engines to return for another crawl sooner).

So there you have it. Did we miss any that you just can’t live without? Feedback is always welcome. Happy Friday!