Many people do not realize it, but search engine optimization is actually an incredibly influential branding tool. Between all of the content out there, social media and bloggers, and different news organizations, those who have gotten to the top of the SERPs have also enjoyed a greater level of exposure. When more people catch wind of a concept, idea, service or product, you then have a higher level of brand recognition and this also brings about a greater level of trust. While many would argue that all branding is, is broad strokes marketing- I tend to disagree with that thought. I believe that you can integrate branding and search engine optimization together in a better way. The two camps are interesting to watch play out this sort of quarrel. If you look it up, you’ll find that some people favor SEO, others favor branding and each one will go to great lengths to explain why one is more impacting than the other- and I have to question why that is so.

Those who decry branding in favor of SEO will tell you that branding is expensive. It’s costly and you have to buy up ads all over the place, billboards, television, radio, movies and newspapers. They tend to focus on the fact that branding as it has been traditionally known, has been geared towards those with deep wallets and big advertising and marketing budgets. But here’s the thing- to give you a small slice of the way that things are tilting- two months after Hulu, an online television site launched, they released their statistics. At that time, Hulu users were streaming well over sixty three million videos.
This is just one website. Never mind the fact that there are many different music sites, online streaming live sites for news, radio, and yes, even television and movies. Then, you get into the blogs, the news sites, all the many different facets of the internet- ready at your disposal.

Seems to me that differentiating branding and search engine optimization is a bit nitpicky, don’t you think? Because if you look at exactly what SEO can do, it can hit every single aspect- apart from perhaps billboards, that the common conception of branding does. So, to me- it doesn’t mean that one is superior to the other, at all- it means that SEO is a newer way of branding on another level. To me, those who promote it in terms of “branding versus SEO” aren’t being entirely truthful and on the level. Consider one of the big arguments that is given for this argument is that “branding is just SO expensive”, but then you consider the time and effort spent working on a properly organized search engine optimization plan- it just does not make sense to me to quibble over the terminology, unless you were perhaps, not producing the search engine results that were actually worth the time you spent.

In short, return on investments. However, most people know that, already. What it is in regards to online marketing, however, sort of hones it, shaves it back into something a bit more specific.
This is actually a key component of online marketing, particularly as it pertains to the time used in setting up social media marketing- many people don’t address that issue. When you’re talking about ROI in regards to the use of free sites like Facebook and Twitter- how do you measure the actual investment that you’re giving? How much time will you be spending on these sites to market your business? If you’re not spending a daily amount of time- you may not be utilizing them to their fullest potential, but how much is too much?

The choice to go with social media marketing as a means of improving ROI, it’s not one that is an instant no brainer. It may seem like it, with how excitedly some of us talk about how beneficial it can be, but remember, your time is also money. The best way to make the most of that time is going to be in making sure that you’re not only doing things the right way, but that you are committed to it as much as you should be. The truth of the matter is, nothing in life is free- and social media networking is no different. Yes, social media marketing is a powerful tool in the online marketing game, but it’s not one that you can just pick up, use, and sort of allow to run itself. It is defined in cost, but time and effort- and those two things have to be in place, for a longer term, better result. Once you have your social media marketing rolling, then, you have to be able to track statistics and trends, and bring them all together to figure out what you’re Social Media ROI really is.

If you have not seen Oliver Blanchard’s Basics of Social Media ROI, you should. Not only is it pretty entertaining, it brings some very good points to the table, as well.

I’ve mentioned how you measure the impact of your social media marketing, before, but the way that Oliver Blanchard broke this down was excellent. While it may seem like an impossible thing to measure- it is not. There are tons of programs out there now with many options that will help you along, and once you have that information- you combine it with your sales, and you’ve got a reasonably good idea of what is working for you, what gets a “needs improvement” grade, and what you need to just scrap all together.

On February 10th, Facebook’s vice president of user growth, mobile and international, Chamath Palihapitiya made an announcement that Facebook has surpasses 100 million active mobile users worldwide.  This milestone is impressive considering just six months ago the social networked announced it had reached 65 million users on Facebook Mobile.

Palihapitiya stated, “Through this growth, we have continued to try to improve the experience of these mobile products.  We work with every major device manufacturer and many operators to ensure we provide the best possible mobile experience across thousands of different devices, mobile operating systems and carriers you rely on.”

The announcement continued and highlighted some of the recent mobile products Facebook has launched, citing the goal of offering value and user experience.  Below are the specific products mentioned:

Mobile Websites (m.facebook.com and touch.facebook.com) allow users to access Facebook from any mobile browser and in over seventy different languages.  Facebook claims that they want to be certain people have a great Facebook experience regardless of what mobile device they use and they acknowledge the necessity of keeping up with new devices so that Facebook scales to the different devices without issues.

Text messaging has also been a priority for Facebook.  They want users to be able to update and stay connected using SMS text messaging.  They launched a URL shortening service called FB.ME that makes it easier for people to share content.  This is especially useful for people using text messaging that have a limited number of characters you can use per message.

Applications are a top priority, as Facebook is already one of the most requested services on mobile devices.  Facebook currently works with every major device maker and mobile operating systems to bring applications and integrations that will ensure Facebook works with each platform.  Updates have been released recently for applications for Android, Blackberry, iPhone, Nokia and Samsung.  Aside from these particular devices, Facebook also supports devices from HTC, INQ, LG Electronics, Palm, Sony Ericsson and Microsoft’s Windows Mobile.

According to the report, “Facebook has already become a primary way for millions of people to stay connected and Facebook’s lead is likely to be extended as more consumers use increasingly powerful mobile devices (with photo/video plus high speed access) and the communications options on Facebook (like voice/video chat and other services) continue to rise.”

comSource data shows that the usage of social networking via cell phones is small, but growing.  In December 16% of mobile device users over the age of 13 had accessed a social network or blog.  In September that number was only 13%.

Despite the positive changes Facebook has made in regards to mobile applications, a quick look through the over 800 user comments to this article will show that while Facebook may be making huge strides in mobile user satisfaction, there is much left to be done.  Frequent layout changes have left users both confused and frustrated.  Despite this, Facebooks user numbers continue to soar both on mobile and non-mobile devices.

It sounds like such a beneficial thing, a web site where you can go to report those corporations, businesses and companies that have not been on the level, or in some cases, were just dishonest and did not deliver on anything they’d promised. It’s a very noble idea, the thought that you could give people a voice and they could then make sure that nobody ever lost a dime to unscrupulous sorts of people. To me, empowering people in this way is a really great thing- and people deserve to get the kind of services and products that they pay for. I believe in that strongly.

The problem is, that not all consumers are exactly scrupulous themselves and so, when you have a web site that is nearly a Wiki for all it can be edited by anyone- you have a problem. I’m not afraid to say that it also seems of interest that such a noble cause would actually be a “for profit” private entity.

If you don’t know what this site is, it is a customer complaint site- however, unlike the Better Business Bureau or similar things- from what I can see, very little is done in the way of regulating this site to ensure the accuracy of the statements given. There’s a “rebuttal” form you can fill out- and end up in the middle of a flame war, or internet cat fight. Of all of these reports that I have read- and I’ve seen quite a few, it seems to me as though this is troll baiting where real lives, real businesses and real money are concerned, accusations of extortion and lawsuits against this site aside.

As far as what honest businesses that have been the target of people who use this site dishonestly, it’s hard. There have been whispers as to just how this site seems to manage to cling to the top of the rankings for anyone who has been named in it- and the resultant bad reputation that can come of that, but the truth is- theories true or not, it does seem to linger there on that first page, more often than not. Even when presented with evidence that a report is untrue, the site will not take it down. This is very problematic for businesses who have been the target of people, and something that quite a number of seos and reputation management companies deal with on a regular basis. The site was created ten years ago- has had more time to gain a longstanding following, and with all of the media mentions, the complaints are considered user generated- which is something Google also favors in the ranking algorithm, and it’s got so much content on it that it does in fact, get grabbed up as really relevant by the search engines. With that much content, updated that frequently and that big of a following, to beat it’s ranking, you’ve got to have a powerful combination of reputation boosting tools at your disposal.

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Econsultancy and their partner ExactTarget, which is a global digital marketing provider, recently released their findings in a recent study that detail exactly how companies are dividing up their marketing budgets both online and offline in 2010.  Over 1,000 companies from the United States and the United Kingdom participated in the study in the form of an online survey taken in December of 2009 and January of 2010.  The report is said to compare spending trends across different traditional and digital marketing channels.

Some of the highlights from the marketing budgets report include:

1. 46% of companies say they are planning to increase their overall marketing budget for 2010.
2. 40% of companies have acknowledged they have restricted budgets for 2010 due to the economy.
3. A surprising 48% of companies admit to having a lack of understanding of digital marketing as their biggest barrier.
4. More than 50% of companies are planning to increase budgeting for mobile marketing.
5. 28% of marketers are shifting some of their budgets from traditional to digital medias.
6. Only a small 17% of companies have any plans to enlarge their budget for print media, 15% will increase amount of spending on radio advertising.
7. Print media is losing momentum, as most companies are planning on significantly decreasing print media such as newspapers and magazines, as well as radio advertising in favor of digital medias.
8. Companies concerned with brand reputation are the companies most likely to shifting budgets from traditional to digital channels.
9. An overwhelming 70% of the companies surveyed have plans in place to increase their budgets for social-media such as Facebook and Twitter.
10. Most marketers are unsure how to measure the return on investment (ROI) for funds spent on social media marketing.
11. Search engine optimization (SEO) is still important to most marketers, and 64% have plans to increase their SEO budgets in 2010 compared to 54% who plan to increase funding for retention email marketing budgets.
12. Paid search is still a high priority for many companies, as 51% had plans to increase their pay per click budget.

One of the reasons marketers are leaning toward shifting to digital marketing is that it is far easier to track how the budget directly impacts the bottom line.  Traditional advertising was at best a guess, as there was no concrete way to measure where customers originated.  While social media networking is a confusing prospect to many of the companies surveyed, it is too powerful of a tool to be ignored.  Overall, companies seem to lack t he training or staff to handle much of the digital marketing they want to accomplish, so this may be good news for consultants to step in and manage these aspects of advertising for the companies.

Any time Apple releases a new product the media goes wild. And it is with good reason, considering that some of the most successful techy gadgets out there today have come from Apple.  Many believe Apple has single handedly revolutionized how the average person listens to music, handles a cell phone, and now it is about to affect how one reads that very same media hype.

Apples latest innovation is the iPad. If you read any tech oriented news blog you have heard the hype. For those not overly familiar with what the iPad does, you may be wondering if you need to consider this top selling device in your marketing plans.  Here is the great news… absolutely not.

While the iPad can help people find you, the best thing about it from a small business owners prospective is it works to your advantage using channels you already should have in place.  Below are ways that you can be discovered by someone using their iPad.

iPhone apps are small programs that users download to do different things. A quick browse of the app store Apple offers will show you there are thousands upon thousands of apps. If your company has already developed an app for the iPhone, the iPad will also run this app, which will likely bring more traffic your way.

Local search is a big deal if you have a physical location you want people to be able to find.  While the basic iPad does not have a GPS chip like an iPhone, it will still show local results based on the origin of the internet connection.  The iPad with 3G capabilities does have the ability for the user to search for local business based on their specific location and get detailed directions to your front door. If you have put any effort into local search marketing, then you are all set on this aspect.  If you have a physical location and you have not worked on this, doing so should be a top priority.

Lastly, old-fashioned web browsing is done on an iPad just like it is on any computer. The same search engines one would use on their laptop or home computer will pull up results for search strings, allowing iPad users to search on the go.

So in regards to the impact the iPad will have on your digital marketing campaigns, it is only good news.  You may see more results from your efforts, without having to add any extra effort at all to what you are doing right now.

The only way the iPad might affect you is if you do not have local search as a priority in your marketing efforts.  If that is the case, it would be best to get ahead of the game and get that aspect of your plan up to speed so you do not get left behind when the droves of people go clamoring to purchase the iPad if need be.

As you well know by now, there are all types of content out there. You also know that content is king- if you glance around any SEO forum or blog, that’s the thing you’ll see repeated over and over. And, I just repeated it here. It’s vital to the success of your web site that you continually update with regular, fresh content. It’s not only for the search engines- but for your users also. As far as it goes, though, writing out content takes time. Many people may be great salespeople, lawyers, doctors, you name it- but they may just not be inclined towards writing. That’s pretty normal in and of itself. It’s usually not all that hard to optimize things, but wow. Three articles every other day, or a few blogs every day, and you begin to sort of go cross eyed whenever whatever program you use to begin text based content comes up. Even those of us who do write quite a bit, are sometimes stuck for what to write about, but, there’s a way around this and that way is user generated content. This is beneficial for a few reasons.

Think about it. You’re trying to build fruitful and profitable relationships with a target audience. The internet has shown us time and time again, that people want to be heard. Giving your web site visitors a chance to do that is great. It makes them feel as though you value their opinions in an even bigger way. It also generates content for you so that you can be doing other things. Granted, you cannot depend on user generated content for all of your needs, it can definitely help. It’s especially a good idea because whenever someone does something like this, they want to show it off. Instant back links. It’s a different sort of approach that has worked well for a number of people and businesses.

Many businesses have things like polls on their sites, or question and answer sections- these are all incredibly intelligent choices as they encourage the user to participate while at the same time, can display your know how and understanding of your niche. This also answers questions and, if when you’re putting it together for the site, you happen to frame those questions perhaps a bit long tail- you’ve got a winner.

You might be sitting there asking, “Well, what would my web site visitors possibly be able to say about my business/industry/etc?” You’d be pretty amazed, and you’d also be interested to know, if your business participates in anything charitable, you’ve got a shot right there for a marketing campaign that really pops. For instance, say your business is a regular supporter of Habitat For Humanity. Your employees or partners are often on site helping out, you even just donate a bit of money- however you handle it. If there were an incentive to participate, say, by a contest on your blog- there you go. Not only do you get to help out your great cause in a powerful way by raising funds and awareness, you will have people participating on your site.

Search engines usually only have a small bit of criteria that they use to give the most relevant search results to those who are keying in searches. When someone searches for a particular bit of information, Google, or any other search will get any documents that answer- it pulls this from a vast index. If you were to search for something like “cats and kittens”, Google will retrieve roughly 1,850,000 pages and images. How Google works this is, it returns the documents that have cat or kitten in the term- but not and. Along those same lines, Google chose for my search which results were the match for it, but then, took it a step further. Using its own particular algorithm, it then figured out which would be the most relevant to my interest. In the case of a search for “cats and kittens”, it shows “All About Cats”- an About.com site, followed by a link about Cats and Kittens Magazine, a site about cute little kitten pictures, and then a site called “I Love Cats”.

But the question is how? If you read through the explanation as to how the algorithm itself works, it gets a little murky and it’s a very long document. For me, that was an interesting read- but search engine optimization is my passion, for you, it may be something else and most likely is. So, to sort of explain exactly what happens when you key in a search, or conversely, when users key in searched for your business, we break it down a little bit to the basics.

Google and other searches use something called a bot or a spider. Why? Because spiders crawl on webs, and World Wide Web- you get the idea. But the truth of the matter is, if you consider your web site in terms of a web that a physical spider would be crawling on- it makes sense. If you’ve got broken links, the spider can’t go any further, if you’re web’s not branched out and strong- where’s it going to go? It won’t. A search engine spider works best when it’s got clear paths to crawl through, beginning with a very simple and clean site design, a great site map with one link on each page right back to it, you’ve got the best start. If you have loads of URLs that have far too many variable strings- the spider sort of gets stuck there and that’s it. So, building an awesome site is priority one, because this makes it easy for a search engine spider to work its way through ALL of your site, indexing relevant content and giving you a little bit of a boost. Frames, session Ids, submits that are too deep, these are other possible hindrances, but also, pages with drop down menus to access other pages of the site, purposefully blocked content, pages you have to log into, are also problematic. If you’ve got something that re-directs before the content is displayed, you may even get banned.

eMarketer recently released a survey that showed that fifty eight of the United States internet users would be reading blogs on a regular basis within three years, which is a twenty percent jump over the current total. By that same time frame, there is an estimated thirty percent increase in users that will be blogging- which means people will be talking. Think about it, they are out there. Your target audience. Talking about, discussing, and waiting to hear input- possibly already hearing input from the competition. It’s important to get your head in the game when it comes to the blogosphere. These are people that talk about the things important to them, and if they are talking about issues with, or benefits of your industry, it seems intelligent to pay attention.

The first step in any blog related marketing strategy is to find out if and where your business is being discussed. There are a few ways to do this, and if you use the methods that I’ve discussed before to measure social networking analytic, you can use the same to find out if your company already has a reputation brewing online. If you do find that there are some bloggers discussing your company in a favorable light, those are the ones that you want to focus on, not the negative ones. Curry favor with those who already seem to appreciate your business, and you will have much of the battle against those who don’t already won.

Be sure to pay attention to the posts where your company’s been mentioned and respond politely, but there’s a right way to go about this, as well. You need to identify yourself and explain a little bit about who you are within the business and why you’re reading the post. Go through the post, addressing things as you see them written, but leave out anything extra- stay on topic. Thank the blogger for their post, and then, offer to answer any questions, answering those promptly. If you are keeping a list, subscribe, keep aware of what is going on and be very open to talking to bloggers.

You’ll find that the more receptive you are, offering interviews, announcements and the like- the more exposure you gain. This is one very powerful yet free means of taking advantage of the free flow of information that the internet has supplied. The very last and most important aspect of engaging the bloggers is this: don’t only do it once. Make sure that you are open to questions, comments and continually on top of things.

Give them something to talk about and they will, it’s obvious to any one who has ever either had a blogger unhappy with their service or exceptionally happy- word travels fast, particularly if you’ve engaged an already popular blogger with a big following. The two options for doing this are mass emails which nine times out of ten just annoy the bloggers, or, you can do this the right way and enjoy the benefits of a well played blog move.

There is a big reason apart from just getting yourself proactive that you really want to be sure that your web site has a clear goal in mind- you have to be able to measure the success of the campaign. If you don’t have a goal, how do you know if you’re really succeeding? Assuming you’re just starting out, or perhaps you’re just unhappy with the lack of customers from your website, there are a number of reasons to take a more goal-oriented approach to your web site.

For some businesses, being able to figure out how successful the web site is, is pretty clean cut and straight forward. If you know how many sales you pick up from it, then you probably have a good idea about what your conversions are. However, if your business generates leads or other things from that web site, it may be a little bit more difficult. If you’re picking up clients based on your web site, it’s the same thing. For those of you who aren’t selling products online, this is a vital bit of information- you have to know about your web conversions. This means, deciding on what factors mean success for your website. If you’re an attorney, it may be something like how many “request information” hits you get, how many people call your service and mention the web site, or how many people email through the web site. Anything that you can look at as proof that your web site, is in fact working for you will do.

Monetizing this becomes just a bit more tricky, and in some cases, it’s easier said than done, but in all cases, possible. Ways that you can do this are fairly easy- offer something that will save your target audience time or money. For instance, you can use web coupons, printed from the web site itself, you can offer information on the web site, and instruct them to print said information to bring with them- a time saver in cases where filling out an intake form and the like is needed. I have actually seen many doctors offices using this and it is convenient. No more sitting in the waiting room for what seems like an eternity! It’s brilliant for that.

One of the single best uses that I have seen on web sites insofar as conversion happens to be that form. In this way, physicians know that their site is getting traffic. I have seen some take it so far as offering submission of those forms via email, and then simply signed at the office, as well as other variants. It’s a clever thing for a few reasons- it makes the patients feel taken care of, and saves them time and effort, it enables the doctors to have the information at the tips of their fingers, and in legible, typed format, no less. But, the other factor is, it proves without a doubt that their web site is actually helping their marketing efforts. That’s conversion done well.

I have talked before about not only the impact that social media marketing has on businesses, but why those with Facebook pages are on the fast track to making the best of it. I was on the phone with someone the other day and he had mentioned that he attempted to set up his business Facebook page- but failed. He was asking my advice because apparently, Facebook page creation is remarkably difficult . It’s easy to set up a personal page, but not so clear on how to set up a business page, so I decided to give a basic run down of the mechanics of setting one up for your business.

The reason it can be a bit tricky to find is that most of us have personal Facebook pages, and if you do- your cookies may have you auto signed in before you see that on the Facebook homepage, there’s a link that reads: “Create a Page”- it’s down there under the green “sign up” button. The alternative way is to scroll all the way to the bottom of the Facebook page, even when signed in, find the ‘advertising’ link, click on it and from there, at the top- there’s an option that reads, “Pages”. You can then either read on, or click the “Create a Page” button to get started. Option three, is from any Facebook page, if you scroll to the bottom left, there you’ll find a link that reads, again- “Create a Page”.

Going from there, the instructions walk you through the rest, but don’t skip or scrimp on any of it. Make your Facebook page just as detailed as you can. Let’s talk about profile pictures, first. Make sure that your profile photo, the default that everyone sees is optimized. Yes, you can do it. Believe me, if it can be optimized, I’ve found the way to do it. If you’re using a logo with key information, keep said information within the bounds of a 12 pixel border around all sides. This way, nothing is lost in the thumbnail.

I’ve mentioned before, be sure that your information is clear, clean, offers links to your domain and then some, but, also, it’s important to make sure it is all current. Contact information needs to be easy to find and access- better still if you have a staff member who is willing to be contacted via their Facebook page. There’s a reason for that- this is social media marketing, and if you try to take the “social” out of it, you’re going to waste your time. Ask questions, start conversations, become a fan of multiple pages and then some. If you’ve got Facebook friends who are within your business who are also fans of your page- whenever you upload photos of them, make sure you’re tagging them appropriately.

One last thing- don’t update that status message every five seconds. This is a fast track to the “ignore” button, again wasting your time. However, make use of an RSS feed for your blog. Doing this, every time you do update that off Facebook blog, your Facebook page will display it, linking back and forth.

Many wonder at the feasibility of users paying for content online. However, according to Nielsen, it becomes very obvious that consumers around the world are more than willing to pay for a few key things. The recent studies have shown, in fact that consumers are much more likely to pay for online music, but less likely to pay for a blog. The number of consumers that would pay for online music was over three times as high. The recent Nielsen statistics show that of over twenty seven thousand consumers in fifty four countries, attitudes about online content varied a great deal. However, it’s interesting to note that many who were willing to purchase online content were more likely to do so for a few things, though this varied quite a bit by demographics, geography and the types of content they’d go for.

On the whole, it was pretty clear from Nielsen that consumers would pay for music, games and movies, or a professionally produced video before they’d shell out for a blog, podcast or consumer related video- which is great news for businesses. These same studies showed that the consumers were also pretty willing to deal with increased ads to offset the cost. According to Nielsen: “This validates the notion that consumers globally still place more value on content produced by “professionals” than by other consumers.” The exact numbers, as expressed by the Fall 2009 Study were:

Music 57%
Theatrical movies 57%
Games 51%
Professional produced video (including current television shows) 50%
Magazines 49%
Newspapers 42%
Internet-only news sources 36%
Radio (Music) 32%
Podcasts 28%
Social Communities 28%
Radio (News/Talk) 26%
Consumer-generated video 24%
Blogs 20%

The fact that most were willing to pay for the online content was a bit stunning for most. However, the thing that really raised some eyebrows about these studies was just how open the same consumers were to advertising. Half of all global respondents expressed a willingness to view ads- so long as the content was free. According to the results of these studies, monetization is an important thing- however, they are going to have to be very flexible so that users feel given a choice.

On the whole, this study really speaks to marketing globally, rather than locally. However, if your business does in fact run online- say, products, rather than services, it is a good idea to consider the implications of this study. Those are, that globally, people have different ideas about what they are willing to pay for, and how they feel about advertising. According to Nielsen, again, though half of all the global respondents were open to it- some were more so than others.

“While 57% of respondents in the Middle East, Africa and Pakistan are open to the more advertising – as are 55% of those in Asia Pacific – just 40% of North America respondents and 39% of European respondents agree.”

This is definitely something to consider, because the implications of your business on the global market, and what target markets you may have in that- it’s important to tailor your ad and marketing campaigns accordingly.

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• Buddha 9

Let’s have a little talk about keywords, their use and a basic run down of what anyone who is working on search engine optimization needs to know about them. One of the best things to understand is that you can have all the great content on your site, you can have it jazzed up with graphics and then some- but if you are not aware of your keyword use, the “keyword percentage”, you aren’t giving it everything you have got when it comes to search engine optimization.

This is not to say that you have to optimize in a way that makes your every paragraph look ridiculous. For instance, everyone has seen the sites where every sentence has a keyword- and you know that’s what they are doing because they repeat themselves. This isn’t beneficial, nor does it achieve the objective in the search engine’s eyes- use a phrase too much and it will lose relevance. If you use your keywords, but you’re only using them in your titles, and in your meta tags- again, this is not going to give you the full benefit of what that content could be. Think about it like this, would you rather drive a Porsche or a bicycle on the Autobahn? If you are not optimizing your content to its fullest potential, you may want to peddle faster.

If you have a look around there are many, many different things you can do to optimize your content to its fullest potential- so much so that there are books on this topic in and of itself. So, to break it down to a few really good tips in a blog, it’s a bit of a challenge. First, as I’ve talked about before, make sure that you have researched those keywords and researched them well. Get into the heads of your target audience and think about what they are going to key into that search bar- those are the phrases you want to look into more deeply.

When it comes to density though, this is where some people have a bit of a problem. It’s generally best if your pages each contain at the very least, 250 text based words. Most schools of thought say that you need to make sure that your keyword density is roughly anywhere from five to fifteen percent. So, if you have several phrases that you’ve chosen for keywords, or even your long tail keywords- space them out a bit within the pages. The best place to put the highest density is in fact near the top, but be careful to keep it at not targeting too many of these phrases, or you will end up having to write more. If you’re writing blogs or articles, this can be a great thing, but if it’s just your web pages, you want to be a bit more brief than that. Also, making use of links for this is a smart thing. For instance, use one of your keyword occurrences to link to a relevant page on your site, about that topic.

As I was going through my emails this morning, I received the usual fare. Find my soul mate? Delete. Free laptops? Delete. Cheap pharmaceuticals with rather insulting suggestions? Delete. Did I open a single one of these? No, I did not. And most people don’t. I’m sure that most have seen this- you may receive an email that actually makes sense, you might not. I do not even know where half of these emails are coming from- because I certainly did not opt into anything that would mandate my getting well over twenty five emails a month about various sites I’d never use, medications I don’t need, and deals I just can’t live without but have some how managed to all this time. Unfortunately, this is an all too common occurrence, but it does not have to be that way for your business. You also do not have to shy away from email marketing, either. There are ways to do it, and ways to not do it- and you honestly only have to look as far as your junk email folder or those emails you delete without even having a look at to know the “What not to do”.

First and foremost, it is generally not a good idea to buy lists of email addresses. I’m probably going to get some flack for this, but the truth is, keep your email marketing permission based. You’ll find that the time you invest is much more worth it when you’re targeting an audience that actually wants to read what you have to say. The very best way of doing this is by having a form, somewhere on your website where users can opt in, and have it done the right way. A good way to do this is to set it up so that users can specify their preferences in not only what they are sent, but how often- for instance, if you have a stand alone newsletter without any sort of advertisement, or if you do have special offers and the like.

A note about newsletters, they can be very effective advertisements if you know what you are doing. Generally speaking, a well written newsletter that announces a sale or offer without coming across as “ad based” is a wonderful tool as it doesn’t seem as though all the company is trying to do is push a product or a service. For instance, a small piece about what those at your office are doing to gear up for such and such sale, or how excited everyone is to be working on this offer or that deal. For the most part, though, keep the newsletters almost solely informative, because it still gets your name out, and people do remember- especially if that newsletter is sort of press release style, revealing charitable contributions, drives and the like that further personalize your business and endear it to the public.

If you are going to put a form on your website for users to opt in to your newsletter, or your email ads, also make sure you have a well written, clear privacy policy. This makes people feel much more comfortable about giving their information. If a user does opt out, always make sure that you do remove them from the list, and make it fairly easy for them to do this- there is really no point in annoying some one repeatedly, think about how effective this tactic has been with you. Has it ever been?

Everywhere you look on the internet, it seems like someone has a blog. There are a variety of them for almost any niche you can think of. Did you know that blog is actually just a shortened way of saying weblog? And the concept of blogging isn’t new. They’ve been around for quite some time and they are a tremendously valuable source of not only information, but cost effective marketing gold. With so many people out there having blogs, generally, if a website doesn’t have one, people wonder why. There are many reasons that any industry can utilize a blog, and not all of them just relate to search engine optimization. This has in fact become so important that there are even blogging consultants out there to help businesses set up, maintain and continue to publish blogs on their websites and off site.

One of the key benefits to having a blog is because this makes for another thing for search engines to pick up on- but not only that, this puts your site in different directories, as well throughout the blogosphere. You end up with a great deal of extended reach, and furthers your own sort of voice, helps your business to connect with clients, customers and potential clients and customers in a much more beneficial way than before. As to optimization, you have to look at a couple of benefits here- for one thing, almost every blog interface is its own content management system, so first off, blogging is easy. It may look a little daunting at first, but set up is generally minimal and can be done without the aid of a web guru. Going from that, then you realize as you look at the newly set up blog- the URL structure is remarkably simple. This makes it easier for search engines to index them. Again, the fresh content issue is resolved here because if your site’s got a blog, and you update it regularly, the search engines really like that, but also, so do your readers- this results in repeated hits. Consider also what happens when you have written a blog that makes people think, or even something that just gets people talking. Blogs are conversational in tone, so this is much more likely to happen- and that is when you get viral marketing help, inbound links and the like.

For business that have a very specific niche, or perhaps a specific service or product, blogs are a competitive way of connecting with that audience that not many seem to understand or grasp yet. When you consider your business, think about the sorts of questions that your clients have- and then consider how many people all over actually have those same basic questions. These things, when answered in informative blogs, really show integrity and a know how of your given field. This isn’t to say that you should not be careful, after all, this is still something connected to your business, and more casual or not, you have to maintain your professionalism- depending on what you do this may be more important in some instances. But if you have a business, and your web site does not yet have a blog, you may really be missing out on some very important search engine marketing options that you could easily update on your own, at any time.