New search algorithms, re-indexing of websites, massive changes in website traffic and search rankings and now…

The new look Google

is upon us!

There are literally thousands of posts on SEO forums across the internet all talking about massive drops in traffic, loss of pages indexed by Google, affected search rankings, the list goes on.

What is of concern is that the sites suffering are the older, more established sites that Google has always held in high regard, sites with good PageRank, lots of indexed pages, good quality inbound links, the list goes on.

When Google makes changes it tends to affect less-established sites more but this time round it is the bigger, more established sites that are suffering.

We are not just talking about short-term losses in small percentages of traffic either, we are talking up to 90% losses for weeks and months, affecting some of the biggest online businesses in the World.

Example 1: A 13 year old website with a PageRank of 7 and 400,000 (yes 400 thousand) inbound links, has suffered a massive loss in traffic

Example 2: A website with a PageRank of 6 and over 1 million pages indexed in Google loses 900,000 indexed pages in a DAY!!!

I could write a long list, but what is Google saying on the situation…

NOTHING

Talk on the SEO forums is that Google are staying tight-lipped because Google is ‘broken’ and they are rapidly trying to fix the new algorithm, there have been reports of Australia searches showing Scandinavian results, Adwords ads in the organic results, spam sites ranking higher than Wikipedia…

AND STILL GOOGLE SAY NOTHING

The general consensus is they are saying nothing because they don’t know what to say, they have rolled out these changes and in a ‘live’ environment they just aren’t working!!!

AND THEY ARE AFFECTING MANY PEOPLES BUSINESSES

But what can you do?

The advice is to keep doing what has worked in the past (as long as it doesn’t involve ‘black hat’ SEO), do not make any drastic changes to your site until Google has settled down and got back to normal, then assess things before doing anything drastic.

What is the talk of ‘long-tail’ keywords

Long-tail keywords are search terms that consist of 3 or more words and are what the larger sites with lots of content rely on for much of their traffic, these search terms are very specific, e.g.

Searching for a short-tail search term like

Books

Returns the home page of Amazon at the top of the search results

http://www.amazon.co.uk

Whereas searching for a long-tail search term like

Search engine optimisation books

Returns an Amazon page at the top of the search results that advertises specific books:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Search-Engine-Optimization-Hour-Day/dp/0471787531

Long-tail keywords give websites much more targetted traffic and increase the chance of user interaction with the site (e.g. making a purchase).

It is being said on many SEO forums that Google is changing the way it ranks sites for long-tail keywords, hopefully when an announcement is eventually made by Google on their new algorithm all will become clear on how to continue to optimise sites for ‘long-tail’ traffic.

There is already talk that to drive traffic through ‘long-tail’ searches you now need the search term in the specific order, e.g.

Lawyer London Injury

appearing on the page will drive less traffic now than

London Injury Lawyer

For the search term ‘London Injury Lawyer’ whereas this was not always the case before.

Only time will tell, in my opinion, keep doing what has worked for you in the past, keep an eye on how your site is performing and don’t do anything drastic YET!!!

To quote Google’s Maile Ohye

“…I think having a solid site: great content, good experience for users, descriptive page titles, standardized URL structure, etc., is of primary importance. A strong site is the foundation where you’ll likely make your online conversions…”

The use of a video online can bring many advantages. It’s a great marketing tool and can have a real impact on the viewer. It combines the advantages of the “classic” TV commercial with the web’s most important characteristic: Interactivity.

An online video advertisement can result in a viewer becoming much more receptive to what you have to offer. It goes without saying then, that online marketing is much more cost effective than a regular TV ad would be, simply because it’s much less expensive to produce in the first place and it makes targeting the customer a lot easier too.

Benefits of Online Video Marketing

It’s a well known fact that these days people enjoy watching a screen (whether it be a TV or a PC) rather than reading. Information can be delivered at a quicker rate via images than through text alone.

One advantage that these online marketing videos have over other more traditional ways, is that videos can “get to the point” much quicker and therefore waste less of the prospective customers valuable time. Rather than a web surfer, who may be in a hurry, search over pages and pages of text to figure out the message you’re trying to convey, you can deliver that same message in a more attractive, effective manner and in far less time.

Online marketing videos can be used when a local business wants to promote one or more of its products or services. They reach the prospects in a visual way and because more and more people now turn to Internet to search for information, served up quick and fresh , online marketing videos are a natural next step to feeding the Web surfers need for information.

In Conclusion

Online marketing videos will give you the opportunity to convey your business message to people more effectively and efficiently than ever before. Use videos to let folks know how you differ from your competitors and to make yourself known and stand out from the crowd.

Upon deciding to use video as part of your marketing campaigns, you’ll soon discover it’s much more interactive and compelling than some other types of advertising. It grabs the viewers attention easier and relays your message to potential clients in a much faster way than simple text alone.

Finally, ensure your online marketing video is fairly short in length, no more than a minute long. Web surfers can easily become bored and a long, drawn out video can drive them away from your site. These days people lead busy lives and don’t like to waste time. Also, don’t sell… inform, educate, enlighten!

SEO is basically making sure that your website ranks higher up in search engines such as Google. The higher your page rank = the more likely you are to get seen. So why is this important? I can honestly say I have met companies that have great products/ services that are genuinely needed by their target markets so why weren’t their phones ringing off the hook?

Simple – they have the product, the marketing, the potential – but the customer cannot see it! You can create a great website but if you cannot be found in a search engine and are not on the first 3 pages then chances are that you will not get a visitor to your website.

See for yourself – Are you a hairdresser in Birmingham? – go to Google and type in Hairdresser in Birmingham. If your on the first page of Google great, Number 1 position – fantastic, if your on page 55 – forget about it.

SEM is different to SEO. SEM is also known as Search Engine Marketing – these are the sponsored results in Google stretching from the top down to the right hand side of the page. These results are Google adverts which are paid for by advertisers on a Pay Per Click basis.

The organic search is the body of the Google search i.e all the results which have not been paid for. It is these search results which create the market for website optimisation.

It has been said that paid search gets around 30% of the clicks in comparison to organic search which gets 70%. Organic search results are credible as Google shows these results in order of relevancy. In order to do this Google has to analyse your website using Googlebots (small internet spiders that crawl over your web pages and collect information).

So what does Google look for?

There are two things, firstly, on page content.

Keywords are ..wait for it -> KEY! It is important to choose keywords that are commonly searched for and relevant to your product/service AND are not being used by your competitors that much. So remember, high volume, high relevancy and low competition.

Do keyword research – do you know what customers type in to Google when they are looking for your service?

You can conduct in-house research so for example when somebody puts ‘internet’ into the ‘where did you hear about us section’ ask them to recall what they typed in.

You can also use the Google Adwords Keyword Tool which is a free service that shows you all the related terms to your search term and also shows you the search volume (the number of people that have used this term)

Secondly Google looks for off page content. Google will rank your website from 1-10 to determine how important your website is. You can improve your page rank through two things:

Inbound links – web pages that link to your website i.e. direct traffic to your content. You can do this by asking a partnering organisation to post a link on their website which directs people to yours. This is a credible form of referral.

Link Anchor Text – this is text that links people back to your website so for example – if you are looking for a professional and affordable web design – look no further!

Links are very important – they are online recommendations and are great at creating online word of mouth.

Both Keywords and Links are the building blocks of SEO. Once you know how to do it you can make a start and aim to be Number 1 in Google.

SEO is great for putting you in front of your customers – and at a time when they need you most!

The great thing is – IT’S FREE!.