The 8 Most Important Things I have Learned About Interactive Marketing

From: Search Engine Lowdown

It’s been my honor to follow Andy’s and Garrett’s lead for the last year. These were incredibly large shoes to fill, and moderating this blog is not something that I have taken lightly. My hope was that I’ve done it justice. And unless THK decides to generously give this blog to me, this will be my last post as I leave MSA today.

In the meanwhile, below are what I think are the most important tidbits of information that I’ve picked up about interactive marketing over the years. Some of them are pretty obvious, but then again:

1. Never forget that it is interactive. There is nothing more essential for conversion than a site that responds to the needs of the target market.

2. SEO never ends because it is a mindset, not a project.

3. The best way to have a search engine friendly site is to have clear and concise performance goals before the first line is coded. Your goals should affect the brand, the tone, the products, the pricing and the overall architecture. Retrofitting a site for SEO is almost always second best.

4. If you are not committing yourself to understanding and immersing yourself in your Web site’s analytics, you are in the wrong business.

5. PPC will never get less expensive. Success should be determined by overall conversions and trended conversion rates. Expect CPC to go up every year, because it’s going to.

6. The best Web sites diversify their traffic drivers between organic and paid search, email marketing, affiliate marketing, social media and when appropriate online and offline media. Those who rely solely on one of these tactics won’t last.

7. There is no more crucial Analytics metrics than bounce rates and conversion rates. Everything else comes second.

8. The term “linkbait” is given a bad name, because if you have good intentions the premise is very sound. It’s not about scheming to get links. It’s about creating something that is so good, your interactive neighbors can’t help but link to you.

continue reading……

Five Ways to Get Your Boss to Stop Talking About Alexa

searchenginelowdown.com

Every time I hear some new stat about Alexa, it makes me want to stab myself in the eye. The only thing worse is to hear a client confidently quote their statistics.

IMO, if enough of us stop acknowledging Alexa, maybe it will go away.

First of all, I’m telling Noah about the flood when I say that the data is skewed beyond recognition. If one portion of the target market is using Alexa’s toolbar, then their data completely alienates the other 99.9999999999% of the population who realize that the toolbar has little to no value to the user as compared to other browser companion applications. Okay, maybe now I’M exaggerating numbers a bit, but no credible statistician would risk his/her reputation on Alexa figures. So why does Alexa continue to get any traction?

Simple. Because every once in a while, a CEO, CMO or VP of Marketing learns about Alexa and turns to their Online Marketing Manager to ask, “Why is [insert competitor Web site here] above us in Alexa’s rank?”
Continue Reading….

Google Rankings Drive Sales - SEO Expectations

By: Barry Welford

searchnewz.com

Google Rankings Drive Sales. Thats what a caller told me this morning. Lets call him Chuck, from Massachusetts, to preserve his anonymity.

A year ago his website was at #1 in Google for an important keyword in a somewhat competitive consumer market and now its dropped to #3. His sales during the same period had seen a 20% decline. He asked me whether I could help to correct this situation.

By coincidence, Sandra Niehaus has just published a related post entitled, Why Isnt EVERYONE #1 on Google? She wrote it for all those SEO professionals who have been asked whether they can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google. Theres some excellent advice there. It all relates to Setting Client Expectations for SEO and what it can achieve. Part of that included what might be called Reasonable Expectations

Continue Reading….