Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Articles
On Page SEO Is More Complex Than You Think
There is a lot that goes into an effective full service SEO campaign. You need to produce great content on a regular basis, earn quality links, and your on page SEO needs to be as effective as possible. In the past, it was enough to come up with a bullet list of things that need to be addressed as p...
How to Maintain Your SEO Rankings
After continually working your SEO program for at least the past six months, you're now starting to see how much the program is paying off. You've been regularly publishing new content, sharing posts on social media, and earning valuable links in the process. As you continue to do these activities,...
The Argument Against Specialized SEO Services
Many companies understand the importance of SEO, but just don’t have the time or resources to do it themselves. So, they make the smart decision to start looking for an SEO company or consultant to assist them. When researching SEO options you may come across companies that specialize in SEO withi...
Local Search: Optimizing for “Near Me” Searches
There’s no question that search behavior has changed drastically since the advent of mobile search. People can now search whenever and wherever they might be. On the go searches have resulted in the “near me” search phenomenon and Google launching mobile-first indexing. For local businesses, i...
Moving from Local SEO to National SEO
Generally speaking, there are two different types of SEO campaigns, local SEO and national SEO. With all of our b2b full service SEO clients, we carefully consider whether it’s best to focus on local SEO or national SEO when developing our strategy. In most cases, we incorporate a combination ...
Scam Alert: Negative SEO Extortion Emails
Spammy SEO firm emails are certainly nothing new and we’ve covered this topic before in the blog. Still, these emails are still prevalent as poorly run and spammy firms try to suck unknowing potential clients in by using negative, fear based tactics. Here's a look at what these emails look like an...
Find a Balanced Working Relationship with Your SEO Firm
Signing on to work with an SEO firm is a big step for any company. It’s an attractive option for SMBs that don’t necessarily have the budget to hire an SEO professional to work in-house, but understand how critical the work is. Outsourcing to a trusted firm is the next best option. Yet, the clie...
4 Ways to Supplement an SEO Campaign
Probably the most frustrating thing about SEO is that it takes time for a campaign to have a positive impact. It can take months, or in some cases, years, for a website to be rewarded with a ranking boost in the search engines after on-site optimization, posting great content, and building high-qual...
Do These Things Regularly for SEO Success
The key to achieving SEO success and maintaining SEO success is to keep at it regularly. It’s not the sort of campaign that you can turn off and turn back on, expecting to be right where you left off. If you take any time off from SEO work it will likely coincide with a gradual dip in organic traf...
3 Ways to Make Your Website Conversion-Friendly
SEO works to increase organic search engine traffic from target audience members over time. It’s a necessary part of a marketing campaign today, since pretty much everything is web-based. But we understand that website traffic isn’t the ultimate goal. What you really want is for website visitors...
The Various Types of Searches
When a user plugs their query into a search engine, they usually have a certain motive driving the search. Their reason for searching ties in with the actions they take once they get to your site. In some cases, as is the case with "questions" searches, it can even impact how google displays the sea...
5 Things to Do as You Start an SEO Campaign
The most important thing to understand about SEO is that it is a long-term online marketing tactic. It can take months or even years to begin to see traction and even longer in very competitive niches. That’s why it’s in your best interest to lay the best possible foundation for the campaign to ...
SEO Data to Look at Regularly
When it comes to SEO reporting, the most obvious data point to report on is organic traffic growth. Unfortunately, as we know, this can be slow to build. It’s easy to get frustrated after a few months if it doesn’t seem to be increasing. This is when some website owners scale back on their SEO e...
How Bounce Rate Relates to SEO
Bounce rate is defined as the percentage of visitors that enter a site and leave without viewing other pages on the site. It is thought that when the bounce rate improves, this could also improve search engine rankings. In this article, we'll examine how bounce rate relates to SEO and also what to d...
SEO: A 5 Step Program
Sometimes it seems like almost anything can be done in “5 easy steps” these days. Losing weight, building a business, earning extra income, getting over an ex, and the list goes on and on. SEO can also be categorized as a 5 step program, but it certainly isn’t easy. In order to find SEO succes...
The Pros and Cons of an In House SEO Expert
While most small businesses can’t afford to hire an in-house SEO expert, for some larger brands it might actually make more sense than hiring an SEO company. It might sound strange hearing that from an SEO provider but I’ve always believed in working with clients that we’re a good fit for and ...
Website Mistakes that Harm SEO
We might not know everything about Google’s search algorithm that determines where websites should rank for keyword searches, but Google has given us enough hints over the years about what’s important. At the top of the list: quality. Google wants to rank sites that fulfill the needs of searcher...
Top Reasons Why SEO is Slow
One of the most important points that we try to make to prospective full service SEO clients is that SEO is a slow and sometime very long process. It’s not the kind of marketing tactic that’s going to have immediate results or a quick ROI. The complete opposite is true. In fact, it can take ma...
Brand Strength Correlates with SEO Results
It's true that brand strength correlates with SEO results. You’ll often hear SEO professionals talk about branded keywords vs. non-branded keywords. It’s all fairly straightforward. Branded keywords include the brand, company name, branded products or services, etc. as part of the search term. ...
The Importance of Informational and Transactional Keyword Targeting
The first step of a thorough SEO campaign is to conduct keyword research to determine how target audience members are searching. When selecting which keywords to target on existing pages and within new content that will be created going forward, it’s important to keep in mind that not all target a...
Voice Search SEO Best Practices
As voice search increases in popularity – is it on your radar when it comes to your SEO campaign? If not, it should be. People are searching for pretty much anything using voice search, it’s not just for traffic information or recipes anymore. Why? Because it’s so easy to use. It takes less ti...
How Your Competitors Can Help Your SEO Campaign
The best SEO campaigns are the ones built on research. The first step is to thoroughly research SEO best practice. You want to know what you should and shouldn’t be doing before embarking on a campaign. Once you have a handle on this, it’s a good idea to see what your competitors are doing. Not ...
Are You Building an SEO Pyramid or House of Cards?
There is a difference between SEO best practices today and the SEO best practices of the past. Google is constantly changing its algorithm, and when it does that means there is the possibility that the methods could change slightly. Back in the early days of SEO the SEO hierarchy of needs (based on...
Using SEO to Improve Branded Search
While it is true that the primary goal of an SEO campaign is to improve traffic from the search engines from visitors using non branded keywords that are targeted in the SEO campaign, you can’t discount the importance of branded keyword search terms and how SEO affects these kinds of searches, as ...
Don’t Make These Costly SEO Mistakes
Search engine optimization is an essential component of online marketing since an organic search presence for targeted keywords will result in website visitors which can lead to sales and conversions. Most website owners know this today and understand that they need to get involved in this “SEO th...
SEO Software Won’t Do the Work for You
SEO isn’t just something that’s needed for big websites or large corporations. Every website that exists needs to be optimized in order to increase its online visibility and build brand awareness. Think about how many websites there are out there. Without an optimized site, it’s easy to get lo...
Where Do SEO Keywords Go?
While it’s true that SEO has evolved over the years, there remains one constant: keywords. Search behavior has changed and the search algorithms have gotten better at understanding the context of a search query, but keywords remain important. They are still what tell the search spiders what a web ...
URL Writing Best Practice for SEO
Is your URL structure SEO-friendly? On the surface, it may not seem as if such a small detail would matter. However, an effective URL structure helps increase usability to your website, which could increase traffic and also give you an advantage over your competition. When creating your website, it ...
Analyze Page Load Time As Part of Your SEO Audit
Like any service provider, the search engines want to create a service that will keep customers happy. This means that they want to rank the best possible pages that are relevant to keyword search terms. If the websites that the search engines suggest to users aren’t relevant or are poorly develo...
Top Local SEO Priorities
While there might be a few people out there who still use the Yellow Pages to find a local business, these thick booklets are more likely to be used as a doorstop, or tossed in the recycling bin. That’s because the majority of people looking for a local business are turning to their computers, tab...
It’s Impossible to Put a Timeline on SEO Success
When a potential client is interested in getting started with an SEO campaign one of the first questions that they ask is, “how long will it take for this to work?” Unfortunately, it’s a question that’s nearly impossible to answer, especially since a successful SEO campaign looks different t...
Tips for Hiring an SEO Consultant
If you own a small business, it probably doesn’t make financial sense to hire someone to do your SEO in house. Small to medium sized businesses can benefit from outsourcing the work to an SEO firm, but we understand that sometimes that isn’t financially possible either. The next best thing is to...
Understanding User Search Patterns for Effective SEO
Every SEO strategy begins with keyword research and in many ways, information gathered during the research phase will set the tone for the entire campaign. Every good keyword list will incorporate hard data gathered from keyword and analytical tools with manual tactics, such as creating lists of rel...
How to Set Yourself Up for SEO Success
How do you know if your SEO program is up to par? How effective your SEO program is depends largely on how you prepare. In other words, there is a right way to do things and then there's a wrong way. There is also a bit of an in-between where your actions could be effective, but your SEO program cou...
Make Sure Your SEO Strategy Helps with Branding
Over the years, it has become clear that Google favors business websites that show a strong brand presence in addition to creating a website that users will find valuable. Back in 2008, Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Google, said that, "Brands are the solution, not the problem," and that they give us ...
Local Business SEO Tips to Follow
If you operate a local business, you might not think that SEO is all that important, especially if you’re successful and already have a steady stream of business coming in. You might think that the advertising channels you’re already using are working just fine. However, even with a basic SEO pl...
Pros and Cons of Hiring Different SEO Service Providers
You know that you need some with your SEO and for this, you have a few options. You can hire various SEO service providers to improve your SEO program, including: SEO consultants, SEO firms or agency, or you can do the ongoing SEO work in-house. How do you know which choice is the best? Well, there ...
A Guide to SEO Hats
In the SEO world, there’s a lot of talk about white hats, black hats, and gray hats. When talking amongst fellow SEO co-workers or others in the industry, we know what’s being discussed when one of these terms pops up. But what if you’re somewhat new to SEO? Do you have any idea what these SEO...
Pre-SEO Campaign Launch Checklist
Like any other marketing initiative, taking the time to plan ahead and get all of your “ducks in a row” before launching an SEO campaign helps to set it up for success long-term. SEO work takes time and results can be slow to build, which is why taking a few extra weeks or months to set the camp...
Technical SEO: How Is Your Website Performing?
There are so many things that go into a successful SEO campaign. And that’s because there are so many search engine ranking factors. The search engines are looking at what visitors are seeing on your website to determine rank, but they’re also looking at what visitors aren’t seeing; the back-e...
How to Measure Organic SEO Traffic
In my opinion, one of the best ways to measure to overall success of your SEO campaign is to look at your organic SEO traffic. Rank just isn’t a good SEO metric for a variety of reasons including the increased personalization of search, the impact of social signals on the search results, the effec...
Can You Trust Your SEO Firm?
As the Google search algorithms have gotten smarter and stricter over the years, lots of the phony SEO firms out there got filtered out of business. However, every time we think we’ve seen the last of the outdated, spammy, black-hat SEO practices, we have a conversation with a potential client and...
Have Realistic Expectations for SEO Success
It's true that when you're involved with SEO, you need to make sure that the expectations are realistic. Part of being an SEO agency means educating our clients and making sure that they understand the rules of SEO, see the big picture of what SEO actually entails AND ensure they understand that SEO...
Why You Still Can’t Beat Your Search Competition
SEO is a long term process. You aren’t going to see results quickly, but within six months to a year of an SEO campaign you should start to see some improvement in your search ranking. What if you’ve been working at it for a year and don’t see any significant change? What if you just can’t s...
Yes, Branded Pages Should be Optimized Too
SEO best practice is to optimize every page of a website by writing unique titles and descriptions for each page and optimizing on page content where applicable. A common mistake that we see some website owners make is to only optimize their “priority pages” which are typically their primary ser...
Make Sure You Have Time to Work With Your SEO Firm
When you hire an SEO firm, it's important to make sure you have enough time to work with them. Sure, you trust their expertise. You have complete confidence that they'll deliver great results. However, if you don't have enough time to work with them, it will make it harder on them to execute the ...
Online Advertising Tactics to Consider With SEO
If your goal is to drive targeted traffic to your website in order to increase leads and sales, SEO is an absolute must. An SEO campaign will improve a website’s organic search presence, ranking, and traffic over time. However, it’s that “over time” part that leaves some website owners wary....
Match SEO Keywords to User Intent
When doing the keyword research for your site, it’s tempting to simply choose the ones that get the most searches and leave out the rest. Though this is the general idea, there has to be a little more thought that goes into it. Factoring in user intent while assembling your keyword list will not o...
Your SEO Firm is Your Partner
There's an art to choosing the best SEO firm for your business but once you do, it's important to make the most of it. What you really need, though, is a firm that treats you like a partner and not just a client. However, it does work both ways. If you treat them as "hired help" and not like a true...
The Two Parts of an SEO Campaign
No two SEO campaigns are going to be exactly the same, because no two websites are exactly the same. The details of an SEO campaign for the website of a small, local business are going to be different than those for the website of a large, international corporation. However, at a high-level, all SEO...