Archive for December, 2006
December 25th, 2006 - Australia Bound!
So this blog’s been quite neglected of late, mainly because I’ve been busy with some big plans. Bit of a spoiler post-title, but yes, I’ll be spending most of 2007 in the sunny land of Oz, near Brisbane on the Sunshine Coast. I’ll continue to provide some services to Quarry and am looking forward to providing some SEO services in Australia (let’s call that Australia SEO just for some added keyword relevance). I’m looking forward to making some new connections down under and helping to boost the online lead generation efforts for some Australian companies.
‘Course I’m also looking forward to some snorkeling, surfing and exploring 
December 25th, 2006 - Landing Page Optimization - Article on BizTech
I recently wrote an article for BizTech magazine on Landing Page Optimization. It walks through some of the basics for positioning a page well for search engine optimization. It includes some tips for keyword research and SEO copywriting. One could write a book on any of these topics so I needed to address them at a very high level in the article.
Here’s the lead:
Landing Page Optimization
Using SEO to Build Search Referrals
By Dan Skeen
So, the CEO thinks your company Web site is optimized to attract search engine traffic because when he types the company name into Google your home page is listed at the top of the search results.
Of course, that’s an important (if sometimes effortless) achievement. But unless you’re Home Depot or McDonalds, don’t count on your brand name as your main source of search engine traffic. Consider this: The term “office furniture” gets searched 15 times more often than “Herman Miller,” and “car insurance” gets queried 22 times for each “GEICO” search.
Read the full “Landing Page Optimization” article.
December 25th, 2006 - New article on SEO Best Practices
I’ve got a new article on SEO best practices that is availabe online. Thanks to the excellent editorial team over at BizTech magazine. BizTech is an online and offline publication distributed to small business IT managers throughout the US each month. This is the first article I’ve written for them, though more are in the works and we’ve discussed the possibility of my participation in an online webinar. Termed “Search Warrant” the article illustrates how, among other things a client of ours was able to improve online lead generation by 600% year over year. Catered to an audience that is fairly new to search engine optimization, the article includes a number of SEO best practices for site managers to consider. Here’s the opening paragraph… Search Warrant If you want would-be customers to find you on the Web, try these tips to make your site search-engine friendly. By Dan Skeen It’s the dreaded question that inevitably comes from a senior manager with some spare time and a Web browser: “Why aren’t we No. 1 in Google?” The landscape is competitive, but if the Web server falls into your area of responsibility, you’re most likely accountable for ensuring that your Web site shows up prominently when prospective customers or clients type keywords into the popular search sites, a pursuit known as search engine optimization, or SEO.
http://www.biztechmagazine.com/article.asp?item_id=160
December 25th, 2006 - Notes from the SES Toronto conference
I just wrapped up my speaking role in the “Organic Listings Forum” at SES Toronto. I was teamed up with an excellent panel that included Rank Fishkin of SEOmoz.org, Mikkel deMib Svendsen of RedZoneGlobal, and Todd Friesen - a fellow Canuck with Range Online Media. The session was moderated by Danny Sullivan of SearchEngineWatch.com . It was a good crowd with a great set of questions for us, and I had a great time. I’ve also attended some other sessions and met some old and new friends in the field.
December 25th, 2006 - Speaking at Search Engine Strategies Conference
I’ll be speaking at the Search Engine Strategies conference in Toronto on April 26th in a panel on organic search listings.
The session will be moderated by search veteran Danny Sullivan.
December 25th, 2006 - Article on SEO Copywriting at Marketingprofs.com
Thanks to the editorial team at www.marketingprofs.com I have a new article available online. If you’re unfamiliar with the site Marketingprofs is a subscription-based site devoted to a wide range of marketing issues. It has a loyal audience of marketing professionals.
My article on SEO copywriting deals with the sometimes-tough transition from non-SEO copywriting to SEO copywriting within a typical marketing department. It devotes some ink to pragmatic tips to help you walk the line between search-friendly and human-readable copy.
Here’s the first paragraph:
“The aggressive drive to be the number-one search result in Google continues to change the nature of communication. No one is feeling that more than today’s copywriters. In less than a decade, many copywriters have fundamentally changed, or felt pressured to change, their approach to the craft. They have learned that some traditional communications tactics don’t register well with a greasy machine named Googlebot.”
Read the full Dan Skeen SEO Copywriting article.
December 25th, 2006 - A Humbling Moment as a Guest Lecturer
I had the pleasure of being the guest lecturer for a Communications class at Waterloo’s Wilfred Laurier University this week. I enjoyed sharing some thoughts on the evolution of Internet communications, the state of online advertising today (including an overview of pay-per-click advertising), and a look at potential careers in the field.
It was my first time in a university classroom since graduating from the University of Western Ontario in 1996. Yikes! My humbling moment came when I showed logos of some of the big search engine players of the past (Hotbot, Northern Light, AltaVista, OpenText, etc.). When I asked who had used these at some point (of course I had used them all a fair amount), one person admitted she’d used Hotbot in the distant past. My brief history lesson on search was a set of memories to me, and ancient history to them.
As an aside, if you want testimony to Google’s dominance, look no further than the current crop of university students. Of the 40 in the class, all used Google as their only search engine.
December 25th, 2006 - Why SEO and Corporate Marketing (often) Don’t Mix
A lot of the marketing managers that I meet express a similar frustration: “I’ve got the most popular product in the marketplace, but I’m nowhere near the top of search listings.” Making matters worse, the top listings are filled by unprofessional web pages from obscure companies. When it comes to search, you’re being out-optimized by the small fries.
You only need to see one part-time webmaster achieving more online eyeballs than a Fortune 500 company to recognize the power of SEO. There’s no strange alchemy that enables a small outfit to out-rank a large company. In fact, some factors work in favor of the larger enterprise:
- An established corporation has more resources to get the job done
- Despite the autocratic nature of the Web, money does help buy search relevance, and larger companies have bigger online marketing budgets
- While it certainly doesn’t guarantee success, having a strong brand offline makes it much easier to build a strong brand online. Web searchers value brands they recognize.
- The large company has more opportunities to parley newsworthy items (new ad campaign, financial reports, etc.) into search-friendly content
- Large companies typically have a richer network of partner or affiliate sites that can be leveraged to generate more links to their site.
So how come some big company sites are buried in the search results? Most commonly, the barrier to search performance is internal, organizational challenges. SEO is a cross-functional activity that doesn’t work well with silo-like teams built on traditional marketing disciplines. Consider the various departments involved:
- Your designers must create a layout that is search friendly. Reliance on Flash or excessive use of graphics can limit your search saturation.
- Your developers must produce search-friendly code. A site with multiple session parameters may not get indexed.
- Your content contributors must include your target keywords with the right relevance and prominence.
- Your public relations efforts should extend to online link-building as well as offline awareness building.
- Your IT team will be required to provide timely web server statistics – vital to ensure that your SEO efforts are working.
For some organizations, that’s just the beginning of a long list that also includes corporate communications, change management, legal, and others.
It all points to one of those cross-functional projects that tend to get perpetually mired in bureaucracy, plagued by political motivations, or most commonly, classified as “low priority” due to lack of support, endorsement, or understanding. But it can be done. Some forethought, coupled with good planning and communication, can create a smooth process framework. A very small educational effort can yield a team of SEO-skilled contributors. When these things work together you’ll have the pleasure of watching your web pages climb in search rankings, leading to more business generated from your web channel.
Start with a Plan: Groups will feel less threatened by activities they can independently review and understand. Create a simple-yet-detailed plan that summarizes the need, the benefits, and the required activities. Spell out each group’s role and why they are critical to the overall effort. Set clear milestones and communications. Include estimated dates and resource requirements. Distribute the document, have a review meeting, and then plan for a follow-up discussion.
Sell the ROI: A compelling business case is tough to ignore. Think beyond “more traffic” to anticipated conversion rates. Calculate a target range for cost-per-conversion. How does the cost of that lead/sale/download compare to your other marketing methods? These comparisons can sometimes be staggering, but also be careful that your estimates are achievable. It’s better to consult an expert than to hazard a guess which you may be accountable for later on.
Focus on Process: If your website has never been optimized for search, or if you’re conducting a new site launch or a significant redesign, it warrants a significant SEO audit and likely quite a few changes to achieve the desired level of optimization. But for day-to-day content management, you want to ensure you have embedded SEO best practices into your core processes and workflows. Doing so ensures that your keyword strategy is applied consistently by those who create, review and produce online content, and that often overlooked components like metatags and alt text are fully optimized. Finally, this process should include feedback mechanisms to ensure the strategy is working. This means finding a way to get the right depth of information to the right team members on a consistent basis.
Find a Champion: I have yet to find a corporation that doesn’t have a C-level executive asking his marketing lead “why aren’t we number one in Google when you search on (insert category name)?” With a bit of education and expectation-setting, this person can help endorse your project and provide the official “buy-in” that’s often required to make any project successful.
Get Help: Sometimes those internal silos can be outright fortresses. In these circumstances, the impartial objectivity of an outsider can be a benefit. Free from political affiliations, a skilled agency or consultant can help bring each party to the table with a ruthless focus on getting the SEO results you need. In choosing the right partner, you’ll want to look for more than a list of the #1 rankings they’ve achieved. Your selection criteria should include:
- What methods or processes do they have to facilitate projects involving stakeholders from multiple business divisions?
- What unique tactics will they use to optimize your site? This is your chance to unearth any marginal tactics (cloaking, doorway pages, etc.) that could potentially get you in trouble with the search engines. While smaller companies may be willing to take some risks, you’ll want to ensure your SEO efforts are conducted with complete integrity.
With some time and patience, you’ll have created a multi-disciplinary SEO team that will put your company in a good position to rise in the search rankings. Also, you’ll have embedded some SEO best practices that will have lasting effects.
December 25th, 2006 - New Article on About.com
If you haven’t ever visited the Web Search and SEO channel of About.com, you should check it out. That’s only partly a shameless plug for my article on pay-per-click advertising strategies. They’ve also been kind enough to post a Dan Skeen bio page.
December 25th, 2006 - Flash to html – SEO Tips
There’s plenty of commentary out there about the drawbacks of Flash-based sites when it comes to search engine optimization. In a nutshell, search engine spiders cannot read most of the text, and cannot interpret the linking structure between individual pages. A typical Flash site shows up in Google as one page (the home page) that is nowhere near as high in search rankings as it would be if the same screen was built in html.
What’s the difference? Consider the results we achieved for a client recently. We were able to reduce their use of Flash without losing any graphic appeal. Most of their work in Flash could be replicated in search-friendly html. We used an html template to frame some of the Flash animations, and it looks great. In the meantime, here’s what the site achieved in one month:
- Whereas Google had previously only indexed (recognized) 4 pages from the site, Google now indexes 87 pages.
- There has been a significant boost in the site’s rankings for their target keyword searches. We saw huge improvements across the board, including one key search phrase that went from >100 to 4th overall.
- Between May and June 2005, traffic from organic searches rose 77%