Developing Maturity in a Search Engine Optimization Campaign
Eric
Lander -- Senior SEO Project Manager
Top
Site Listings
July 7, 2003
In the past few years the search engine optimization
and search engine promotion industry has evolved
into a more common form of online marketing. In
fact, it seems to have the most appeal when we
speak of optimizing the websites for growing online
companies. Knowing that, I find it to be rather
surprising that while search engine optimization
is most suitable for growing businesses, the campaigns
that most SEO firms offer are very neutral and
static in nature.
For those of you with experience in working with
search engine optimization firms, you are likely
to have thought of them as "keyword hunters".
While going after and successfully ranking for
competitive keywords is a great way to boost levels
in your websites' traffic, it is not going to
help propel the growth of your online business.
In my opinion, as the market of search engine
optimization grows, it becomes important for any
business-minded SEO firm to retain clients in
order to
promote long term business relationships.
How can you find a suitable optimization firm
to handle your sites continuous growth? Look for
the firms that make an effort in the beginning
to learn your business, and make sure they are
comfortable in working with you on the following
techniques to helping take a normal and static
SEO campaign to the next level.
Refining a Website
In the development of a website, it seems nearly
impossible to strip out the unnecessary elements
and pages. While there are many instances that
I can recall where site elements exist for quite
literally no reason, website owners do take pride
in their work. Approaching them and telling them
that elements of the site they have likely worked
quite hard at are pointless, is a difficult position
to be in. Knowing that, it will take an SEO with
a lot of knowledge and experience to show exactly
why removing elements from a site can be beneficial.
In general, elements that should be carefully
reviewed would likely include dynamic navigational
elements, spacer images and nested formatted issues,
and irrelevant coding.
Reduce Bandwidth Usage
In order to be successful, a search engine optimization
firm can and should be driving large quantities
of traffic through the engines to your website.
While you can get excited about watching the visitor
sessions and page view numbers climb through the
roof - you'll likely start to see inflated numbers
on your hosting bill too! Website hosting packages
are often priced according to elements such as
amount of actual data you are transferring to
the end browsers.
So, how can this be improved? First of all, if
your site includes a number of files and folders
that no one should ever see - remove them. Archive
them on some CD's, and move on. That alone will
free up a lot of space.
Moving beyond that, search engine spiders will
try to gain access to anything that they possibly
can. In many instances, they don't need access
to the folders that will include your stats, images,
reports, or client data. So, perhaps you would
then want to disallow specific robots in your
robots.txt files whenever possible.
Lastly, take a step back alongside your SEO, and
remove the HTML elements that serve little to
no purpose. I have seen some previous SEO's work
where the targeted phrase was used as the ALT
tag on all images within one page. That may have
been useful a few years ago, but at this point
in time it could be of little or no value depending
upon the targeted engine.
Streamline Performance
Search engine optimization professionals should
have access to your website statistics. Typically
within any statistical package is a section devoted
to the "Errors" of your website. Scary
topic, right? Not at all! While looking through
the error types for any website, you will most
likely end up seeing a number of "404 Errors".
Essentially, these errors are created when a user
agent (human or engine spider) is trying to access
a page that is not on your server. (You have likely
seen this too someplace… The result is one
of those "Page Not Found" errors in
your
browser) When this type of error accumulates it
should be easy to find out where you are erroneously
pointing visitors. If you fix this, you'll help
to make sure the users and spiders are not "turned
off" because of your sites (lack of) performance.
If you're going this far… Be sure to pay
attention to other error codes that the server
is tracking for you!
Increase Conversions Rates
Increasing traffic to your website is a waste
of time and money if your visitors do not convert
into buyers. If thousands of people a day visit
your site, and do not buy anything or contact
you, it's of no value to you.
Every website has a specific purpose. That purpose
could be to make a sale, to initiate a phone call,
or to have the end user submit information. Since
most of those interested in SEO seem to be selling
through their site directly, I'll use a shopping
cart as an example.
In general, most online shopping carts are abandoned
for reasons other than poor design. What a good
SEO should help you to do is to maximize the selling
potential of your online customers. Sure, not
all customers will end up buying from you, but
there are numbers of items that can be researched
and revised for the sake of increasing overall
conversions. For example, merchants often configure
their carts in a way that they would want it to
work. They forget what it would be like for a
consumer, and they tend to think that the consumer
knows too much about what to do.
For optimal results, a good SEO should have the
experience available to them such that they can
improve conversions by nearly 20 percent or so.
Combine that with the traffic they've gained to
your site, and the bottom line begins to look
a lot better. Some other issues that could be
evaluated would include researching and reducing
cart abandonment, shipping options, transaction
requirements, and even browser compatibility.
Isolate Points of Conversion
Did you know that most keyword phrases that generate
a high amount of traffic do not generate sales
or leads on your site? While attending a conference
earlier this year, an Overture representative
shared some astonishing information; while completely
sensible, it served as an eye opener on many levels.
In a nutshell, the more refined a phrase becomes,
the more likely it is to convert.
Targeting the right phrases only works if you
have isolated, identified, and appropriately developed
your conversion points. For a seasoned SEO professional,
that is a relatively easy task to manage. You
simply view statistical data, find out the most
consistent terms driving traffic, and manage your
SEO work such that the conversion points are the
first things seen by such visitors.
By tracking the effectiveness of each keyword
(and often on an engine by engine basis) you assume
the luxury of being able to aggressively promote
towards those keyword phrases that actually generate
sales or leads on your website. Why should you
let your SEO provider only work on levels of rankings
and traffic? Force them to take a step further
and assist in producing a more goal-oriented website!
Develop Branding
While your SEO campaign should produce traffic,
rankings, and assist in developing other avenues
of your online business - you should always be
aware of your branding within your market. Is
your SEO provider consistently analyzing the competition?
Can your current SEO provider tell you when your
largest competitor releases a new product line
or perhaps an entirely new branding and business
image?
If they cannot inform you about your competition,
you should start looking for another SEO provider.
A well seasoned SEO takes the time to understand
the dynamics involved within your market. Failure
to do so on their behalf ends up causing them
to become too reactionary when they see your competitors
changing up pace. When that happens, they become
more likely to produce quick and unplanned shift
in your company's SEO campaign.
A seasoned SEO provider though has seen dozens
of business in your situation and can actually
begin to predict the intentions of your competitors.
If they're good, they can counter-act your competitors
moves before they even have time to develop them
(in terms of engine comprehension at least). How
better to remain on top of a market than to consistently
one-up your biggest and most powerful competitors?
In the end, an SEO provider is essentially allowing
your product or service to be branded consistently.
That consistency is something that your targeted
market sees, something your competitors see, and
in some cases, even what the media sees. Developing
that level of brand recognition is what steals
the spotlight and allows you as a business to
grow with the attention you deserve.
Continuously Develop Content
If nothing else, you should know that the search
engines are always in the mood to review and index
more content. While it may put a stress on your
internal resources at first, a consistent push
towards consistent content development is what
will allow your site to retain the engines' spiders
once they come in. Imagine them as wild animals…
If you leave food out for them every day, you
can rely on them beginning to come every day,
day after day. How can that help your business
grow? Well, in the case of Google (fresh listings)
it is not uncommon to upload a new page and see
it appearing prominently within the search results
in a matter of a day or two! With the assistance
of your SEO provider - - you can focus on your
other business tasks knowing that these new pages
will not only be seen by the engines, but also
by the market you intended them to be for.
Conclusions
Nowadays, nearly anyone understanding SEO can
produce moderately effective results in a few
months time. But as a client of an SEO provider,
what value is signing an annual contract? It takes
professionalism and dedication to effectively
mature an SEO campaign from a three-month-long
burst of traffic into an ongoing and mutually
beneficial relationship where you, as the recipient
of SEO services, have one less thing to worry
about.
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