Top 10 SEO Key Points for Small Business Owners

Small business owners who have just begun their SEO campaign will find that there is no end to the depth and complexity inherent in search engine optimization. Many companies try to take a do-it-yourself mentality to SEO implementation that ends with them sloppily stringing together popular search terms or stuffing keywords on contextually irrelevant web pages. Some businesses implement SEO so poorly that, in some instances, Google may disregard their website as a spam site. The result is a significantly low ranking that will make the business show up in only the most specific term searches.

Starting or running a start up company presents many challenges for entrepreneurs no matter what the service or product.  The last thing CEO’s may consider is their Internet marketing strategies or Brand management.  In addition, most likely that is not their area of expertise nor do they have the time to implement the tasks required to gain the valuable exposure required.

Improperly-handled SEO campaigns are increasingly common these days, but it is not a fate that need befall all small businesses. It is always recommended that a company turns to a top SEO agency when approaching any search engine optimization project. Once a marketing firm has been selected, then the business will be able to run a successful SEO campaign. However, it’s important to bear in mind that there are several key points that should always be kept in mind when approaching SEO.

1) Identify your Intended Audience

The first step in any SEO campaign should always be determining who the intended audience of your good or service is. While it’s easy to simply focus on your business as the driving force behind your SEO operations, it always helps to be a more specific in your approach. By selecting a certain product as the core keyword of your campaign, you will be able to attract more traffic than otherwise.

2) Expand your Keyword Focus

Although your focused keyword may not have a hundred and one uses, you should always try to be as forward thinking as possible when considering other optional keywords. Sometimes the search term that Google looks for may not be the same one that you would have typed when looking for it yourself. You should always do research to find other ways that web surfers may try to look up your product or service.

3) Refine your Website’s Page-to-Page Connectivity

A well-designed website is one that funnels users from page to page effortlessly. By interlinking your site so that relevant pages connect to one another, you’ll find that even the less visited branches of your website will see more traffic. As a result, you can expect your website to have better domain authority and, as a result, a higher place among the search engine rankings.

4) Keep your Keywords Dynamic

Even if a particular keyword has generated a lot of traffic during the course of your SEO campaign, don’t let that prevent you from cycling your keyword focus. Search trends change as much as social ones do, so there’s never a guarantee that one term will consistently prove fruitful. Always be on the lookout for other applicable keywords that may bring traffic to your website.

5) Establish your Business on Social Media

Social media work has become an increasingly popular way to generate long term website traffic. These days, many SEO agencies focus a lot of their attention on establishing a follower base for their clients. As the number of people following your company continues to increase, so too will the potential customers that may frequent your business’ site. No matter how big or small your organization may be, you can never have enough Facebook or Google+ followers.

6) Go Where the Competition Isn’t

While it is important that your company builds a significant social presence on the more popular networks, it’s always a smart move to look for alternative sites on which to make your business known. As anyone in the SEO community can tell you, there are several up-and-coming social networks that have yet to be capitalized on. In addition to establishing yourself on Facebook or Twitter, consider also extending your social media campaign to sites like Pinterest as they become available.

7) Constantly Create Original Content

Increasing your company’s web traffic and domain authority is only the first step in your SEO campaign. While some SEO agencies may focus entirely on getting potential customers to your site, giving users a reason to stay on your website is going to be vitally important. Original content, such as a weekly blog or community activities, can go a long way towards capturing an audience and convincing them to continue interacting with your site until a sale is made.

8) Consider Pay-Per-Click as a Way to Create Site Traffic

While the service that PPC companies provide may not be as attractive as the long term solutions of most SEO practices, that doesn’t mean they aren’t useful. PPC advertisements have been a decent way to drive site traffic volume for over a decade. Should you feel your monthly analytics aren’t showing the numbers you want to see, consider supplementing them with PPC work.

9) Patience is Key

Even when employing the most methodical and well-run SEO or social media campaign, one has to keep expectations manageable. Yes, search engine optimization and other SEO practices can lead to dramatically improved site traffic and search engine rankings, but they do take time. After having built up momentum and established your company as a significant online presence, your website’s analytics will rise sharply. However, getting there may sometimes take a month or two. One should always keep this in mind throughout the duration of the campaign.

10) Always Stay in Contact with your SEO Firm

By keeping a close working relationship with your SEO agency, you and your business will be able to reap a number of benefits. Aside from having a greater degree of control over the details of your campaign, you will also be briefed on any setbacks or major developments as they occur. As a result, your optimization and social media work will go without a hitch, and you’ll be able to fine tune the particulars  of the campaign as you see fit.
Written By: Todd Bailey Source: SearchEngineJournal.com

Best SEO Link Building Practices You Really Want

Link building is the practice of having other websites direct traffic to your site. Good quality links help you get the right type of traffic and help you get good rankings on search engines. Link building is not something you do short-term. It takes quite a bit of time not only to research how and where to get good quality links but also takes constant attention and something that needs to be done consistently.

So where do you start and get good quality links from?

Business Contacts and Customers
Just finished a project for a client? Ask them to link their website to yours with their recommendation. This will get traffic to your site that are most likely to be a potential customer too.

Guest Posts and Content
Offer to write content on other people’s blogs that are related in the same industry you’re in. This is a great way to get great links and network at the same time.

High Quality Resource Links
These would be things like having a link in Better Business Bureau directory sites. Or even get some visibility in Wikipedia.

News Media & Blogs
Get on with the press. Have someone write an article about you on their blog and introduce your business.

Relevant Social Industry & App Account Links
If you contribute to someone in your related social sphere, have them link your website to their site.

Social Media Link Acquisition and Content Marketing
One of my favorites. Engaging and building relationships in social media is a sure way to get people to like you and your content. If they like you, they’ll visit your site. If you’re content is compelling, they’ll comment on it.

Hope you found some of these link building suggestions helpful. Good luck
By: Jocelyn Wilhelm Source: JWSocialMedia.com

Content Strategy for SEO and Social Media: Tips to Ensure Success

An effective SEO strategy involves much more than content strategy. However, the content strategy takes the center place of the overall SEO strategy and makes up the major factor of SEO success. In this article, you will find important tips to maximize the effectiveness of your content and to ensure the SEO success in return.

Realizing the Importance of Benchmarking

Before building your content strategy, you should be aware of what is happening in your niche especially on your competitors’ websites. You should not only follow their rankings but also know where they position themselves in the market. The benchmarking strategy is important to be relevant to your customers’ needs and expectations. Also, it allows you to assess the results of your marketing strategies including the content strategy.

Understanding the 5 W’s of the Content Strategy

Creating unique and fresh content based on a keyword strategy is a must have aspect of a successful content strategy. But before going that far, you should base your gatherings from benchmarking studies on the 5 W’s strategy. The 5 W’s strategy involves the questions of “why”, “who”, “what”, “when and how” and “where”. More clearly, you should find the best answers of why do you want to create content, who is your content for, what are you trying to achieve with your content, when and how are you going to create the content and where will your content be posted. The answers to these questions are extremely important to refine and build a successful content strategy.

Following Search Trends

A successful content strategy for SEO purposes requires you to follow the search trends to find current search terms relevant to your content. You can achieve this by using Google alerts, Google AdWords Keyword Tool or some social media monitoring tools. By using this strategy, you can create new content with current search terms and also update your existing content according to current search trends. Your efforts of updating your content will surely be rewarded by Google and other search engines and will help increase your search rankings.

Creating Keyword Focused Pages

It is imperative to focus on one keyword for each main page to get the best SEO results. For the best practices of keyword focused pages, you should divide up your content on the main product or service pages to cover a specific topic. For example, if you are selling discount kitchen cabinets online, you can divide your content up into custom kitchen cabinets, contemporary kitchen cabinets, wood kitchen cabinets, wall kitchen cabinets, base kitchen cabinets, etc. You should be as specific as you can in order to focus on more keywords which will increase the chance that your customers find what they are looking for.
Another important strategy is to use the keywords properly and in the right places. In fact, you should use the main keyword in your title, first 50 words of your article, last sentences and H1 tag. These are the most essential places, but you can surely use your keyword in other places too as long as you do it naturally and without overdoing it.

Using LSI (Latent Semantic Index) Keywords

While it is extremely important to focus on your main keyword during your content creation, using LSI keywords in your content shouldn’t be skipped either. This is a powerful strategy and can boost your page rank right away.
LSI keywords help search engines associate your main keyword with the actual topic your content is about. For example, if your keyword is “dinner plates”, you wouldn’t want search engines to relate your content to unrelated terms such as “license plates” or “collector plates”. With the LSI technology, search engines look at your content and try to find other terms to associate your main keyword with the appropriate topic of your content. Therefore, if you have food related terms in your content such as knives, steaks, recipes, etc., then the search engines will index your content for the term “dinner plates".

The important tip in this matter is to use your main keyword 1 to 4% of the time while using LSI keywords 1 to 2% of the time. Another tip is to use Google Keyword Tool to find LSI keywords. You should search for terms that are relevant to your main keyword. When you have a list of terms, sort them by their relevancy to your main keyword and choose the most relevant ones as your LSI keywords.

Creating Engaging and Likable Content

The readability of your content may not be assessed by the search engines but this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t pay attention to it for SEO purposes. Search engines measure visitors’ behaviors during their visits to websites. If you have unique, relevant and smooth flowing content, your visitors will spend more time on your pages and may possibly want to visit other pages linked to the page they have enjoyed reading. Even if your content is a technical or fact based topic, you should make your content engaging and likable to your readers.

Adding and Updating Content Continuously

There are great benefits to adding new and updating existing content. Top search engines including Google, Yahoo and Bing like fresh content. By adding new and updating existing content, you show search engines that you care about your readers. To achieve favorable SEO results, you should update at least a few times a week. Some of the effective ways of updating your content includes adding fresh blog posts and using Twitter syndication and Facebook integration. You can also update the existing content manually with current information.
Speaking of adding new and updating existing content continuously, you can use an editorial calendar for your updates or new content. More clearly, you can target new keywords related to specific events or certain times relevant to your product or service. For example, an outdoor gear seller can benefit from adding new or updating existing content just before winter regarding snowshoe models and prices.

Creating Successful Calls to Action

Many people would agree that having successful calls to action in your content is extremely important to achieve business objectives. However, some of those people overlook its importance for SEO purposes. Successful calls to action improve positive user experience and increase your customer base. All these help you reach your SEO objectives in return.
For successful calls to action, tell your visitors what action to take and direct them to the link they should click. Also, your calls to action should be simple, offer benefits and have a positive approach.
Building Internal and External Linking Structures
For the best SEO results, you should build internal and external linking structures as part of your content strategy. Your pages should have quality links from relevant sources to your homepage and also deep links to the other relevant pages. These links help search engines determine the relevance of your content and the rankings of your pages. On the other hand, internal linking emphasizes the important pages and help search engines determine what your website is about.
The important tip here is to use proper anchor texts for your links. In your anchor texts, you should use relevant keywords to the page you are linking to and avoid using invaluable terms like “click here” or “read more”.
To sum up, to ensure SEO success, you should have a carefully planned and well applied content strategy. Your strategy should include using benchmarking, answering 5 W’s, updating your content with current search terms, creating keyword focused pages, using LSI keywords, creating engaging and likable content, adding new and updating existing content continuously, creating successful calls to action and building internal and external.
By: Anthony Saladino Source: NoobPreneur.com

How to Make a Google+ Page for Your Businesses

Google+ has opened the doors for business and brand pages.
In this article I show you how to set up your Google+ page and provide examples.
If you haven’t already created a personal Google+ profile for yourself, you’ll need to do that first (you cannot simply sign up a business page from the main Google+ signup screen).
Check out the How to Get Started With Google+ for more on personal Google+ profiles.
If you do have a personal profile, here’s how to create a page for your business.
Visit Create a Page on Google+ to begin, and follow the steps below to get started with Google+ pages.

Pick a category

Pick a category for your Google+ page to fall under.

The first step in getting started creating your Google+ page is to choose from the following five main categories.
#1: Local Business or Place
Local Business or Place includes any local business—hotels, restaurants, places, stores or services. If you choose this category, you will be asked for the country in which your business is located and the primary phone number.
If Google finds a matching result in Google Places with your phone number, it will use this information for your Google+ profile. If not, you can add your business info to Google and continue.

Add your local business information to Google+.

#2: Product or Brand
Examples given by Google+ of pages that would fit under Product or Brand include apparel, cars, electronics and financial services.

Add your Product or Brand info and choose the most applicable category.

Here, you would enter your page name and website, and choose an applicable category which includes anything from Aerospace and Defense to a Website, or you can simply choose Brand, Other, Product or Service.
#3: Company, Institution or Organization
The next category, Company, Institution or Organization includes pages for companies, institutions, organizations and non-profits or similar entities. Here you also enter your page name and website, and choose an applicable category with the same options as a Product or Brand page, or you can simply choose Company, Institution, Organization or Other.
#4: Arts, Entertainment or Sports
Pages for movies, TV, music, books, sports and shows are considered a good fit for the Arts, Entertainment or Sports section. Again, you will enter your page name and website, and choose an applicable category—this time with options ranging from Album to Website, or you can simply choose Entertainment, Other or Sports.
#5: Other
If you don’t feel your page fits in any of the above-mentioned categories, you can simply select Other, where you can enter your page name and website without any additional narrowing of category selection.
For pages in any category, you must also choose whether your page’s content is suitable for any Google+ user, users 18 or older, users 21 or older or specifically note that the content will be alcohol-related. Then you will tick boxes to opt-in to updates for Google+ pages and agree to terms and conditions to continue.

Determine the appropriate age group for your page to be visible to based on content.

Be sure to actually check out the Google+ Additional Terms of Service to see their notes on Authority, Access, Content, Data, Contests and Suspension & Termination.

Customize Your Page’s Public Profile

Once you’ve selected your page’s category, you can start customizing your page’s public profile.
#1: Add Your Profile Photo and Tagline
First, you will be asked to add your tagline (the 10 words that best describe your page) and your page’s profile photo.

Add your Google+ page’s tagline and profile photo.

After you have added these items and clicked on Continue, you will be asked to spread the word about your new page through your personal Google+ profile. If you’re not ready yet (which you probably aren’t, since you haven’t completed your profile), click on Finish to be taken to your new page.
#2: Editing Your Page Information
Once you’ve perused your page’s welcome screen, you will want to edit your page’s information. Go to your page’s profile by clicking on the Profile icon at the top, left of the Search Google+ box. Then go to your About tab and Edit Profile.

Edit information for your profile’s About section.

Here you will be able to click on everything from your page name to your links to enter relevant information about your page within Introduction, Hours (for local businesses or places), Website and Contact Info (phone, email, Skype, etc.). Also be sure to enter additional links to your page in the Introduction section using the Link button and under Recommended Links to link to your other social profiles, blog, blog posts and so on. Keep in mind important keywords for your business – if you are a digital marketing agency, be sure to include digital marketing in your profile.
#3: Adding Your Photostrip
Last but not least when it comes to your Google+ page design is filling in your photostrip. These five photos will be displayed underneath your page’s name and tagline.

Add photos that best represent your page in your photostrip beneath your page name and tagline.

It’s similar to the five photos you can have on your Facebook page. While editing your profile, click on the photo area where it says “add photos here” and upload a photo in each of the five photo spots. You can use different photos that represent your business or creatively cut one photo into five pieces and spread it across the area.
Congratulations! Your Google+ Page Is Ready.
Once your profile is ready, you can start posting to your profile by adding status updates, links, photos and videos just like you do on your personal Google+ profile. I would suggest writing a post or two before you use the “Spread the word” option in your right sidebar to announce your page to your personal profile connections.

Following and Engaging With Your Fans

So what’s the difference between a Google+ page and a Facebook page? The big one I’ve noticed so far is the fact that you can follow your page’s fans back and add them to Circles.
To find out who has added your page to their Circle, you can check your Notifications under Stream in the left sidebar. You can also look under your Circles > People who’ve added you area by clicking on the Circles icon.

Follow your Google+ page’s fans by moving them into Circles.

In this screen, you can drag your fans into one or more of the four default circles.

• Team Members—The people you will share the inside scoop with. This could be a great way to share company news with only the people you want to see it.
• VIPs—Your most loyal customers and closest partners.
• Customers—All the people or organizations you want to build deeper relationships with. You could possibly use this Circle to send out special discounts and promotions!
• Following—People you don’t know personally but whose posts you find interesting.

Just as you can with your personal profile, you can also create new Circles.
There are a lot of ways you can successfully use your custom Circles for marketing and messaging, such as creating Circles of fans in a specific location and sharing updates with them about geo-specific offers.
Universities can create Circles for professors, alumni, undergraduate, graduate and prospective students and then share updates with them about news related to their current status with the university. The possibilities are endless.
This also means you can follow your fans’ updates, comment on your fans’ status messages, and +1 their updates as your page. The functionality for a Facebook fan page to interact with a personal profile on Facebook isn’t there, but it is in Google+. Your fans will even see your interaction with their updates in their notifications!

Google+ users will see your page’s interactions with their profiles in their notifications.

This, in my opinion, is going to be a very powerful way for businesses or brands to communicate with their audiences.
For example, if there is a complaint, the Google+ page can reply publicly on their page, and then privately to the Google+ user by sending a status update directly to them. With Facebook pages, the page can only reply on the wall update but not directly communicate with the Facebook user.

Connecting Your Google+ Page to Your Website

You can connect your website to your Google+ page using the Google+ badge configuration tool. Currently only the icons are available, but official badges are coming soon.

Connecting your Google+ page to your website.

Regardless of whether you want to add a badge to your website, you will want to connect your Google+ page to your website simply for the search benefits.
Google+ Direct Connect will allow visitors to find your Google+ page and add it to their Circles, directly from Google search results. To do this, simply add the following code between the <head> </head> tags on your website.
<link href="{plusPageUrl}" rel="publisher" />
Replace {plusPageUrl} with your Google+ page URL. Then visitors will be able to add your Google+ page to Circles simply through their search results.

7 Google+ Page Examples

If you’re in need of some creative inspiration, here are a few established Google+ pages for social media enthusiasts.
#1: Social Media Examiner

Social Media Examiner’s page gains instant popularity on Google+.

A list of great Google+ pages would be incomplete without Social Media Examiner!
#2: Social Media Explorer

Social Media Explorer’s Google+ page uses photostrip images to convey education.

Social Media Explorer‘s page marries its tagline of education and information perfectly with its photostrip images.
#3: Mashable

Mashable was one of the first brands to put its presence on Google+.

Mashable appeared, then shortly disappeared in the early days of Google+, but has once again emerged.
#4: Search Engine Land

Search Engine Land breaks the latest news about Google+.

Although its focus may be search marketing, Search Engine Land also offers extensive social media coverage, especially when Google+ is concerned.
#5: HootSuite

HootSuite uses its Google+ photostrip to represent a worldwide user base.

HootSuite displays its diversity through a variety of expressive icons in the photostrip.
#6: Google+

Google+ positions its page as an authority for its own network.

Another page that is a must-have for any list of Google+ pages is that of Google+ itself.
#7: Twitter

Twitter is just starting up its presence on Google+.

Although it isn’t active yet, Twitter is on the ball by creating a brand page on Google+.

What Are Your Thoughts on Google+ Pages?

Have you begun experimenting with Google+ pages for your website, brand or business? Please let us know your experience so far, additional tips you would like to share with those getting started and the best Google+ pages you’ve seen thus far!
By: Kristi Hines Source: SocialMediaExaminer.com

Why Big Marketers Are Moving Towards Google+

You have likely heard the buzz about Google+ for some time.

Perhaps you’re wondering why so many marketing professionals are focusing heavily on the new social network.

In this article, I sit down with Guy Kawasaki, the original Macintosh evangelist. You’ll discover why 99% of his efforts are now focused on Google+.

Guy reveals his Google+ strategy and talks about his new book, What the Plus! Google+ for the Rest of Us. And it’s very different than his other books. It revealsextensive details about how to benefit from Google+.

Mike: Guy, why should businesses consider Google+? What are the major advantages?

Guy: Businesses should jump on Google+ because it’s the Wild West, so you canstake your claim, as opposed to breaking through the noise on Twitter and Facebook.

Also, Google owns the river called search traffic. It can point this river any way that it wants.

When Google introduced the concept of “social search,” it turned SEO upside down.Now when people search on Google, they see the actions of their friends on Google+. That’s huge.

Here’s an example of social search (note the little avatar of a person’s head indicating a social search result)

It means 1) you want people to circle you so that when they search, they see your posts and 2) you should post about what you want your followers to know you for.

If I were running a business, I would be thinking, “Why wait until I have to buy real estate in Manhattan? I should get in now and grab all of the followers I can before Google+ hits the mainstream.”

Mike: You have been a huge proponent of Twitter for some time, and later Facebook. Where does Google+ fit in for you with the other social networks and why?

Guy: I fell in love with Google+ because of the ability to edit posts, the more elegant user interface and the quality of comments.

Today, 99% of my social media effort is on Google+.

Admittedly, this might not be rational or optimal, but when is love rational or optimal?

In many ways, Google+ was like the second coming of Macintosh for me. It was that profound a discovery for me.

I’ve only written two product-oriented books, 25 years apart: The Macintosh Way andWhat the Plus!  What does that tell you?

Mike: What the Plus! seems very different from your previous books. Can you explain why you wrote the book, who it is for and what makes it unique from the others that are out there?

Guy: I wrote What the Plus! Google+ for the Rest of Us because it pains me that people aren’t “getting” Google+.

I think it’s a better social networking platform than the competition—just like Macintosh was better than other operating systems.

I can’t stand it when people aren’t using the best tool, especially when they’re taking the advice of so-called experts. I fought the same kind of “expert” advice with Macintosh during the 80s.

I kind of enjoy this sort of fight. Actually, I’ve made a career of it. Google+ is my latest “cause.”

Mike: Have you self-published this book?

Guy: I did, working with the folks at Libboo, mostly Halley Suitt Tucker, and an independent consultant named Shawn Welch.

I self-published because I wanted to hit a low price point—”less than a Starbucks grande latte” to be exact—and I wanted total flexibility to do any kind of licensing, sponsoring and whatever-strikes-my-fancy deals.

For example, Samsung is sponsoring 6,000 copies. Can you imagine trying to get that through a traditional publisher? Tim Cook (current Apple CEO) will retire before that will happen.

Also, Google says that it introduces one new feature a day, so I have to be able to revise this book all the time.

Plus, do the math. I make 70% of $2.99 on an ebook, so about $2. I have to sell two copies of What the Plus! to make about the same amount on one copy ofEnchantment. I think it’s easier to sell two copies of What the Plus! than one copy ofEnchantment. And the time to market from the time I finished the book was less than a week.

Ebook self-publishing is very compelling if—and it’s a big if—the author can also market the book. I can let you know in a few months how this experiment has worked out, but it sure is fun.

Mike: What is your daily routine on Google+?

Guy: At night, I lay in bed with my Samsung Galaxy 7.7 and check several sites:autos.alltop.com, gadgets.alltop.com, NPR.alltop.com, tech.alltop.com andphotography.alltop.com.

Guy uses Alltop to help him discover interesting content to share on Google+

They help me find stories to post the next morning.

I’ve created a circle with only me in it.

Using Opera, I share these stories with my circle—this means no one sees it but me.

Then in the morning, I use these shares to post stories to Google+.

I also look at the posts shared by the members of #sciencesunday for stories.

Then I post throughout the day, and use the Gmail notifications of +mentionsto respond to people.

I try to respond to every comment that +mentions me. I also spend a fair amount of time “nuking” spam, etc., using the Chrome extension called Nuke Comments.

Nuke Comments helps block spammers from commenting on your Google+ page

Mike: Should businesses focus on their personal profile or company pages when it comes to Google+ and why?

Guy: This is a tough question.

The answer is clearest when the entity is a sole proprietorship or individual brand.

If the entity is likely to live longer than the person, then it should be a company page.

But a good company page should act like a living, breathing person, not some hoity-toity “brand.”

I have found it difficult to maintain more than one presence on Google+. It’s like trying to keep two Macintoshes current, happy and up to date… if you know what I mean.

Mike: Can you share some tips that businesses should consider when setting up a Google+ account?

Guy: Sure.

Tip #1 I just mentioned: Make sure that people feel like they’re interacting with a person, even if your Google+ page represents a company.

Imagine, for example, if when you called your friend on her cell phone, she had a voicemail tree that you had to step through: “For English, press 1. For Spanish, press 2. If this is a call about a date, press 3. If you are canceling a date, press 4.”

Tip #2 is to adopt what I call the NPR model. NPR provides great content 365 days a year. The content is so great that we tolerate the telethons and fundraisers.

The content you share on Google+ should provide value: information, analysis and assistance. Your content should be so great that you earn the right also to promote your product or service every once in a while, like 5% of the time.

For example, if I were running VirginAmerica’s Google+ page, I would be constantly posting pictures of the cities that we serve, food from those cities and celebrations from those cities.

I would link to Real Simple when I ran a story about how to pack properly. I would link to a Lonely Planet article about the ten best outdoor adventures in south Florida. I would link to Andrew Zimmern’s Bizarre Foods coverage of food in Texas. Maybe even when Mike Rowe has a “Dirty Job” in New York.

In other words, the content would be all about how to travel, whether for fun or business. Then because people circled our page to keep seeing all the good stuff, we would have earned the right to talk about our new routes and new fares.

If companies just do these two things, they’ll be fine.

Mike: Where can folks get a copy of your book?

Guy: The best place to start is WhatthePlus.com because this is where the special promotions and such will be provided.

But trust me when I tell you that my goal is to make bumping into What the Plus!unavoidable if you’re on Google+ in the next few weeks.

Mike: What’s next for Guy Kawasaki?

Guy: I have no idea. If I sell enough copies of What the Plus!, I’ll dedicate my life to my family and playing hockey. That’s all I really want to do.
Source: SocialMediaExaminer.com

32 things you ought to know about Pay Per Click

PPC can be a rather strange and potentially expensive world for newcomers if things go wrong, but with a bit of knowledge disasters can be averted and money saved.
Duncan Parry, Head of Paid Search at digital marketing agency STEAK Digital was on hand at SES London 2012 to run through the basics of PPC.

“PPC is like a cross between scrabble and Sudoku”
Duncan Parry

Google had a 93% share of the UK search engine market as of Jan 2012. The reality of the PPC landscape is that if you do paid search advertising, the majority of your time will be spent on Google's AdWords platform. Whilst there are other search engines that are worth considering, you need to set your expectations realistically.

How PPC works

1) According to Duncan, successful advertising is all about relevance. To ensure advertisers produce relevant content for users, Google doesn’t only rank adverts based on the amount of money someone is willing to pay. They also use a 'Quality Score', which takes into account the relevance of your ad to the searcher's keyword. Your quality score should be at the heart of your AdWords campaigns and a good one will help reduce your advertising costs.
2) Google wants to deliver relevant content to its searchers. In a nutshell, relevance creates clicks and clicks create profit. And, from Google's perspective, clicks to relevant useful sites create loyal search engine users who come back (and keep clicking).
3) Google’s system calculates quality score for each of your keywords. Over time, Google has refined how quality score is measured. Some of these changes are publicized on the Google AdWords blog

What influences Quality Score?

4) Your historical clickthrough rate (CTR) for the keyword and the related advert influences your quality score. The clickthrough rate of an advertisement is defined as the number of clicks on an ad divided by the number of times the ad is shown (impressions), expressed as a percentage. A high clickthrough rate will improve your quality score. (Find your quality score by adding the attribute Qual. score to a campaign as shown in the image below:)

5) The historical CTR of the display URL (the one you see on Google at the bottom of an advert) also influences quality score, as does your overall account history.

Live elements that affect quality score

6) The quality of your landing page and the relevance of the keyword to the advert it is associated with will affect your quality score. Your overall account history (the CTR of all ads and keywords in the account) also comes into play. If your account history is poor, don't worry. Improve things, get it right today and you'll be able to leave the past behind.

Keywords and AdWords functions

7) Negative keywords are words you don’t want your ads to appear for. You need to keep adding negative keywords, as you don’t want your ads to appear next to things that are negative to your brand. And you don’t want to pay for irrelevant clicks. Recently it has become easier to add negative keywords to an AdWords account and to control when your ad appears.

Google search query reports

8) You can use Google's search query reports to check for appropriateness. Your report will show the actual searches your ads appeared against next to the keyword you bid upon. You can use these reports to find negative keywords that aren't relevant to your business and identify new search terms with potential.

Match types

9) Google offers a variety of match types. Let's look at some examples, using the keyword formal shoes:

• Exact match If you chose to advertise against searches for formal shoes your ad would only appear for searches on this exact keyword. Nothing more, nothing less.
• Phrase match This matches phrases with the keyword in that order. So your advert would appear for black formal shoes.
• Modified broad match eg, formal + shoes. This also matches evening shoes, black dress shoes.
• Broad match - matches formal footwear, evening footwear and men's dress wingtips.

PPC adverts

10) Check the clickthrough rate and bounce rate for your ads. Check whether people are clicking on your ad, then bouncing off your site because the ad is misleading.
11) Also consider whether people clicking through are not buying because the product is not competitively priced.

Tips on writing ads

12) Put keywords in your title. Aim to convey your unique selling point (USP) and relevant features in your ad copy.
13) Remember consumers skim read so make it easy to read your ad quickly.
14) Put the primary keyword in your display URL if space permits.
This ad includes the searched keyword in both the title and the site URL.

Structure and organization

15) Your account structure is also important. You should aim to create a campaign structure that is easy to manage. This is how you can turn the theory of relevance and quality score into practice, and demonstrate to Google you understand how the system works. This is the account structure that Google recommends:

Definitions

16) Clickthrough rate (CTR) – this tells you how well consumers are reacting to your ads and keyword choices.
17) Max CPC – the maximum you specify you are prepared to pay per click.
18) Average CPC - the average amount you are actually paying.
19) Ad rank - this is a score based on your quality score and your bid, that determines your average position.
20) Quality score - this is measured out of 10.

Ad Extensions

21) Ad Extensions are free to set up and you are charged per click as usual. These include:
22) Social extensions such as showing the Google+1 button.
23) Call extensions for ‘click to call’ on mobile ads.
24) Sitelinks, which add additional links to the ads in the top positions. These can be good for directing consumers to the right page in one click, on brand and ambiguous terms. This can help boost CTR and conversion rates.
25) Location extensions add a map and address in a dropdown (eg, Pizza Hut can show local pizza places).
26) Product extensions and ratings show ratings stars from reviews gathered across the web. You have to be promoting a physical product to have those turned on.

Google Display Network

27) Google display advertising can be useful for brand awareness as well as for sales. It shows PPC ads on third party content sites including YouTube.

Re-marketing and re-targeting

28) Re-targeting can work really well. It is possible to re-target consumers who have visited your site but have not bought from you. Or you can cross-sell to those who have bought.

Tips on planning and launching a campaign

29) It’s important to know your numbers. Work out what you can afford to spend to acquire a customer. Educate the other people in your business and manage their expectations.
30) Try and learn as much from your competitors as you can. Look at their ad copy, their landing pages and keywords.
31) Think about what can be automated in your PPC campaigns. If it can be automated then do it, as PPC can eat up your time otherwise.
32) Check everything and never stop!

Wordtracker Strategizer

Wordtracker Strategizer is a great way of analyzing SEO keyword data that you are using in your PPC campaigns and getting to the real meat of what keywords you must protect and which you should expand or indeed drop entirely.
Source: WordTracker.com

21 Key Points Must Know Marketers - Facebook Timeline for Business Pages

If you have not yet converted your Facebook fan page over to the new Timeline design, your page will automatically convert on March 30th, 2012 which is coming up fast. This post covers the majority of basic settings and features you need to know. Even if you’ve upgraded, you’ll find some tips here!
First, review this marked up screenshot for a tour of most of the features — click the image to view full size (you may need to click again on the image on the next page):

Facebook Timeline for Pages - Guide (click to see full size)

Cover image replaces default landing tab

One of the biggest feature changes that many businesses are upset about is the removal of a default landing tab. That is, where you can create a custom landing page for non-fans using an iFrame app, and add rich media, an opt-in box and/or a compelling reason to join your fan page. In addition, many businesses made use of the “like-gating” or “fan-gating” feature on these default custom landing tabs where you could entice your fans to click the Like button and then reward them with a special benefit such as a coupon code, or unique content just for fans.
The good news is you can still have custom tabs, plus the like-gating element still functions. You just can’t set a default landing tab. However, each of your apps still has its own unique URL. That means you can drive traffic to any “landing” page you wish – from within Facebook via ads, your profile and other places as appropriate; and from outside Facebook on your website/blog, other social profiles, tweets, email campaigns, email signature files, and so forth.
With the new Timeline design, you’ll notice the generously large cover image at the top of your page. You may find that you care less and less about a default landing tab with this piece of prime real estate that is always visible to fans and non-fans as they land on your page. The dimensions are 851 pixels wide by 315 pixels high. It’s a wonderful place to showcase photographs and graphics pertaining to your brand/business. Personally, I’m very excited about the cover image! The possibilities are endless… even with the tight rules around what content cannot be placed on cover images (see key point #4 below).

21 Key Points To Know About Timeline for Pages

To keep you on track with the change, here’s a list of 21 key points about the new Timeline design:

1. Preview

You have a chance to preview your page(s) first, made all the edits you wish, get it just the way you want it, then publish. Look for the preview option at the top of your page in the old design. Or, see a list of your pages here and turn on page preview mode. Before you publish, at minimum just have an attractive cover image loaded.

2. March 30

Your page will automatically convert on March 30. My advise is don’t wait. There really is no strategic advantage to waiting … okay, maybe if you have a really hot custom landing tab with a like-gating campaign that’s going extremely well. Otherwise, go for the upgrade now and lead the way by educating your fans on all the new features.

3. Cover Image

Dimensions for the large cover image is 851 x 315 pixels.  If you upload an image that’s smaller than these dimensions, it will get stretched to this larger size. The image you upload must be at least 399 pixels wide. Facebook encourages you to change your cover image as often as you wish. Newsflash: each time you change your cover image, this posts on to your wall and goes out into the news feed of your fans. You may find the activity itself doesn’t get great Edgerank (visibility score in the news feed). So, what you can do is hide the activity on your wall, then share the new cover image with a call to action in the textual area, e.g. We’re celebrating 10,000 fans today and just changed our cover image in honor of all of You! Click like if you like! (To be clear, that message does *not* go ON your cover image itself. You’re posting your cover image on your wall with the message as a description.)

4. Image rules

Do not put contact info, calls to action, or arrows pointing to the Like or Share button on your cover image. See the Page Guidelines here. Contact info should go in your about section. The no calls to action rule is likely because Facebook has been very generous with this large piece of real estate … however, the company does not want us to run hogwild with all manner of promotions and campaigns… for free! Those come at a price and are called Facebook ads! And the new Premium Ads and Reach Generator. And, the one I’m most excited about: Offers (that one is actually free to set up, though currently only available to large brands).

5. Profile picture

Your profile picture is always a square and is displayed at 125 x 125 pixels or 150 x 150 pixels, depending on the size of someone’s screen. The photo you upload must be at least 180 x 180 pixels. Facebook discourage page owners from changing their profile picture that often. This is the primary, instantly-recognizable image that tracks you throughout Facebook wherever your posts go and wherever you comment as your Page.

6. Landing tab

You can no longer set a default landing tab. Make good use of the cover image, instead (see #3 above) and the three main apps (see #8 below). Plus, drive traffic to whichever tab you wish (see #7 below).

7. App URLs

Custom apps all still function, including the fan-gating feature. Each tab/app still has a unique URL so you can drive traffic from inside or outside Facebook to any ‘landing page’ you wish.

8. Showcase apps

Just below your cover image, your ‘tabs’ are now displayed as apps or views. You can have a max of 12, though only four are always on display. The first one is always Photos and cannot be moved. ‘Views’ are Facebook’s default apps or features such as Photos, Events, Likes, Notes, Map. Apps are all third party apps.

9. Custom thumbnail

You can add a custom thumbnail image to all your apps. The dimensions are 111 x 74 pixels. These are great areas to get creative and add seamless branding, calls to action, and specials. To add/change a custom thumbnail, first expand all apps by clicking the small down arrow to the right of the four app display. Then hover over any app > click the edit pencil > click Edit Settings > click Change next to Custom Tab Image (opens in a new window) > click Change > upload an image. Voila. The image loads and saves right away. (I have noticed bugs with this feature and have often seen other pages’ thumbnails appear… you may need to upload a couple times to get your image to stick!).
My Irish and Scottish friends across the pond have done a super job of their Timeline branding on Social Stars – the image below shows their creative use of the custom app thumbnails. But do check out their cover image, too. It’s one of my favorites!

Custom App Thumbnail Images on Social Stars UK Fan Page

10. Liked button

The like button now tuns to “liked” when clicked. Users can HOVER for options, including adding to an Interest List(s). The Liked button is a great new feature as it visually informs fans that they have already liked the page. However, the hover feature and ability to add pages to Interest Lists is very new and really not obvious at all. (See #11 and my next blog post!)

Facebook Liked Button - Options on Hover

11. Interest Lists

Encourage your fans and visitors to add you to an Interest List; let them know which topic is best, e.g. my Page would be best added to a list called Facebook Tips, or Facebook Marketing, or Social Media Marketing. (Interest Lists are brand new as of March 8th. More on the new Interest Lists in an upcoming post! Speaking of lists, please do subscribe to my popular Facebook Experts and Resources list, with 77 people and pages and currently over 800 subscribers.
Got Facebook questions? Come join my community of over 260,000 fans and subscribers! Just click the Subscribe and Like buttons below to connect with me on Facebook!

12. Milestones

You can go back in time to add business milestones on your Timeline. When you do, these will post at the right date, and go out into the news feed of your fans and create more visibility and engagement. The full extent of the actual timeline element of the Timeline design is geared toward what Facebook calls “Legacy Brands” – those brands with historical data spanning decades that they’d like to feature.

13. Wall Filters

Page walls now have four filters: Highlights, Posts by Page, Posts by Others, and Friend Activity. There is no way to set the wall to be posts by everyone. The default is always Highlights. In your page settings (Admin Panel > Manage > Edit Page > Manage Permissions), you can choose to not let anyone write on your wall, or to not display Posts by others. However, I recommend that you leave the settings on to allow everyone to write on your wall, everyone can add photos and videos, and show the box for Recent Posts by Others.

14. Pin posts

Any post made by the Page can be pinned the top of the wall for up to 7 days. I suggest rotating which posts are pinned and not letting any post sit there for longer than 1-2 days. You never know how many repeat visitors are coming to your Page and you want to keep it fresh for them.
Enjoying this post? Tweet to let me know – just click the button below (opens in a popup, you’ll have a chance to see and edit the tweet!):

15. Highlight posts

Page admins can choose to display any post made by the Page or by others as ‘double wide’ – meaning the post spreads across both columns of the Timeline. Hover over a post and click the star icon to highlight.

16. Posts by others

Posts made by others (fans and non-fans) are in a small box at the top right called Recent Posts by Others. You can scroll in this field without leaving your wall: first click ‘More Posts’ on the lower left of the box and use your mousewheel or the vertical scroll bar. Or click ‘See All’ for a popup box. For viewing and moderating, it’s easier to view these posts on the Posts by Others wall filter, though, as mentioned in #13 above.

17. Default wall

You cannot set a default wall view – it’s always Highlights. I’m seeing a few disappointed page owners talk about this. I tend to agree – the new Timeline for Pages design seems to really favor brands and businesses showcasing themselves vs. making it community-focused. However, with creative use of your cover image and changing it regularly, I believe you can build a wonderful culture of mutual respect between you and your fans. (I’m working on a strategy just now to change up my fan page cover image every 1-3 days; I’m experimenting with montages of featured fans which has been received very well by my Facebook community).

Mari Smith - Facebook Page - Montage of Fans

18. Personalization

Page Timelines are personalized for each person viewing: every page wall includes ‘friend activity’ at the top right where the person viewing will see one post from the past from a friend (or a Facebook user to whom the viewer has subscribed). Frankly, I think this is a complete waste of valuable real estate and I’m already tiring of seeing old (no-longer-relevant) posts repeatedly dredged up when viewing my own page and/or other pages while logged in as my profile. I hope, on the next feature overhaul, that Facebook removes this section and replaces with something more valuable – or enlarges the Posts by others area! That’s my $0.02!
In addition to the one post displayed at the top right of the wall, any Admin or visitor to your page can view your Timeline wall via the ‘Friend Activity’ filter mentioned in #13 above.

19. Adjust photos

You can now reposition photos shared by you or others on your page: hover and click the edit pencil, then click Reposition photo, then drag the image where you want it, and click Save.

20. Messages

Fans and visitors can now private Message fan admins – you can turn this feature off in your settings but it might be a good idea to leave it on to encourage connection from prospects! You cannot initiate messages as your page; you can only communicate via Messages when someone contacts you first. The one drawback of yet another method of communication is that you may need to add more community managers to deal with the increase in emails. You’d be surprised at how many people start to contact you via your page!

21. Admin Panel

It takes several more clicks to get to the various settings of your Page now. You may have to dig deep to find features that were once just one click away. For example, to view your Hidden Posts (posts flagged as spam by Facebook that are only visible to Page Admins, to the person/page who made the post, and to friends of that person) – previously it was ONE click on the Hidden Posts link under your Wall on the left. Now, it’s FIVE clicks to get to the same place! Click Admin Panel > Manage > Use Activity Log > All (upper right menu) > Spam. From there, hover over the spam icon to the right of any post that is not spam, and click Unmark as Spam.
So, those are 21 key points I’ve compiled. I’m sure there are many more to add – stay tuned for additional posts on the subject of the new Timeline for both Pages and personal Profiles. Meantime, here are even more tips and resources to help you on this journey of mastering the latest round of Facebook changes. (I hope your seatbelt is fastened; it’s been non-stop at Facebook HQ for some time now what with the IPO.)

Customize Your Facebook Page – video tutorial

If you’re brand new to the Timeline design for Pages, this handy video by the Facebook team is well worth the 3.5 minute watch:

Facebook’s Page Guidelines and New Timeline Page Tutorial

Unlike many of Facebook’s past product launches and feature upgrades, the company has outdone itself this time with the comprehensive range of guidance for the Timeline design for pages. The following resources are all from Facebook:

• Plus, for even more guidance, go to www.LearnFacebookPages.com for an interactive course – this is brought to you by Facebook and is very well done! You may need to temporarily disable popup blockers for the course to start.
• View more Facebook video guides here.
• Read the revised Page Guidelines here.
• Download Facebook’s PDF Pages Overview here.
• Want to read up on how other businesses are creating success with Facebook’s variety of products? Check out this nifty, interactive resource – Facebook Success Stories.

Recommended reading:

• Facebook Timeline for Pages – Frequently Asked Questions [hyperarts.com]
• 28 Things You Need To Know About The New Facebook Pages [by Kristi Hines on kissmetrics.com]
• 15 Creative Tips to Rock Your Timeline Cover Photo for Facebook Pages [wchingya.com]

You made it down here! Good news – when you convert your page to the new Timeline design, you won’t lose anything. Well, that is, unless you’re a local business with a Place Page, in which case you will lose your Recommendations, for now. I understand they are coming back in the next week or two. Last week I did see that anyone could still write a Recommendation for your business and post to their personal profile to share with their friends – the popup shows upon clicking the Like button. However, I’m not seeing that popup option any more. Plus, the new Timeline design of Place Pages currently has nowhere to display these Recommendations. At least not that I could find. So, it seems Facebook is working on this feature.
Phew, so there you have it!! This turned into a monster blog post, even though I kept saving more in-depth discussion for SO many of these new features – and new optimization strategies – for future posts. Let me know if you found this helpful in the comments below. Is there anything missing? Where are you feeling most stuck?

Facebook 2012 Fan Page Checklist

To download my 14-page Facebook 2012 Fan Page Checklist, just pop your name and email below and I’ll give you instant access to this popular document (over 17,900 downloads!). The checklist part is the first five pages; the rest is all endnotes explaining the elements of your page and how best to set up and optimize for marketing and engagement.

This version is hot off the presses, and includes all the latest Facebook Timeline features
Source: MariSmith.com