By Brant Skogrand, APR, MBC
Last week I was a guest on the Twitter talk show #SmallBizChat with
Melinda Emerson, the "SmallBizLady." I answered questions about the basics of search engine optimization.
Here's the transcript.
SmallBizLady: Many people have heard of search engine optimization (SEO). How would you define SEO?
Brant Skogrand: According to
Search Engine College,
where I became a Certified Search Engine Marketer, SEO is “the use of
search engines to draw traffic to a website. It’s the technique of
attaining a higher ranking in search engines and directories via
alteration of website code and copy to make it more search engine
compatible.”
SEO is divided into two categories: organic and paid. The Search Engine College definition mainly refers to organic SEO.
Paid (or pay-per-click) SEO also is important, because it can provide
instantaneous visibility and be very useful for online marketing
campaigns of a specific timeframe. Examples of pay-per-click SEO
programs include Google AdWords and Bing Ads.
SmallBizLady: Why is SEO important?
Brant Skogrand: Think about your own web search
habits. I know that even if I’m really searching for something, I don’t
usually go past the fourth page of Google. I’m the exception, however.
According to HubSpot, 75 percent of users never scroll past the first
page of search results.
Getting onto the first or second page of search results for keywords
that are relevant to your organization can make a big difference in
visits to your website – and very likely in your business results.
There are approximately 200 ranking factors that go into Google’s
algorithm, ranging from keywords to social signals to tags and beyond.
Having an understanding of those ranking factors can help your website
rise in the search results. It does take time as well as a fine balance
between optimizing your website and over-optimizing your website, which
the search engines frown upon.
SmallBizLady: Why are keywords important to SEO?
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| “Key With Keywords Text” courtesy of Stuart Miles / www.freedigitalphotos.net |
Brant Skogrand: Keyword research is probably the
most crucial element to SEO. The search engines are looking to connect
users with the most relevant sites. Keywords are more than just single
words; they are the terms that potential site visitors would use in
search engines to find your product or service.
Hopefully you already know who your target customer is. If not, start
thinking about your target customer to move forward with your keyword
research. Where do they live? What is their age range? What is your
target customer’s gender?
Start writing down a “seed list” of keywords to choose from. For
instance, a Minneapolis-based florist might start out with phrases that
include the words “flowers,” “florists,” or “gifts.”
Those are pretty general terms though. Continuing on with the example
of the Minneapolis-based florist, qualifying the terms will help you
get closer to the phrases that visitors might actually use, such as
“send flowers Minneapolis,” “florists Minneapolis,” “wedding bouquets
Minneapolis,” “Valentine’s Day gifts Minneapolis,” etc.
This final list of keywords is important, because you will want to
use them throughout your website: in the text, in headers, in the title
of your website, and more. Most webpages can only be optimized for a
maximum of two to three keywords or phrases. So, if you have a 10-page
website to optimize, you’ll need approximately 30 keywords of phrases to
target. You probably would want to come up with more words than that,
though. It’s always good to have more keywords to choose from.
Some of the best resources that I have found to determine the actual
traffic for various keywords include the Keyword Planner tool on the
Google AdWords website,
SEMrush and
Raven Tools.
SmallBizLady: What role do tags have in SEO?
Brant Skogrand: The title tag in particular is very
important. Search Engine College defines the title tag as “a
descriptive name of a page that is shown by browsers as the page name in
the browser window.”
After the overall content of a webpage, the title tag is considered the single most important on-page SEO element.
Search engines prefer when your website has a unique title for each page, and may even ignore pages that have the same titles.
Search results limit the number of characters that they show for page
titles. The best practice is to keep page titles to a length between 10
and 70 characters.
Use your keywords in your title tag. Put the most important keywords first, as search engines read from left to right.
The meta description tag also is important, as search engines often
display this short, helpful summary of your page’s content. Searchers
also use the meta description tag to decide which result to click on. A
general best practice is to keep the meta description tag to a minimum
of 50 characters and a maximum of 156 characters.
SmallBizLady: How can photos be optimized for SEO?
Brant Skogrand: Since search engines are visually
impaired, flashy webpages aren’t as useful as ones that have an
appropriate level of text to help the search engines with appropriate
context to understand the content and its quality.
Best practices recommend at least 250 words of text on each webpage.
I like to take advantage of any optimization possibility, however,
and each photo has the opportunity for associated text. Both ALT text
and title text for a photo provide search engines with useful
information about the subject matter of an image. The search engines in
turn use this information to determine the best image to return for a
searcher’s query.
SmallBizLady: SEO is constantly changing. How can people keep up?
Brant Skogrand: Several websites are very useful
that track search engine updates, including: Search Engine Journal,
Search Engine Watch, Moz and Search Engine Land.
Matt Cutts, the head of Google’s Webspam team, also has a blog with very useful information.
Many search engine updates, such as Google’s recent announcement that
websites that automatically encrypt their services will be boosted in
Google’s ranking formula, are covered in the mainstream media.
SmallBizLady: What were the effects of the most recent Google updates?
Brant Skogrand: Google changes its search algorithm
around 500 to 600 times each year. Most of the changes are minor, but
sometimes there’s a major algorithmic update – such as Google Panda or
Google Penguin.
Recent updates include Pigeon (updates to local search algorithms),
Panda 4.0 (part of an update to prevent sites with poor quality content
to get into the top search results), changes to Google Authorship, and
Payday Loan (an anti-spam update).
SmallBizLady: How can SEO be measured?
Brant Skogrand: Hopefully it ties to business results.
While you can look at where your website ranks in the search results,
there are more measures to look at by having Google Analytics installed
on your website, which can track site usage and visitor behavior.
With Google Analytics, you can set a goal conversion – meaning that
if people visit a certain page, request an appointment, buy an item,
etc., you are meeting specific goals for your website.
Other measurements in Google Analytics range from bounce rate (the
percentage of visitors who enter the site and “bounce” (leave the site)
rather than continue viewing other pages within the same site) to the
geographic location of site visitors to the most popular content and
more.
SmallBizLady: What role does social media and public relations have in relation to SEO?
Brant Skogrand: Earlier this year, Google’s Matt
Cutts said, “But as far as doing special specific work to sort of say
‘you have this many followers on Twitter or this many likes on
Facebook,’ to the best of my knowledge we don’t currently have any
signals like that in our web search ranking algorithms.”
There’s value in having an active presence on Twitter, Facebook and
other social networks (like Google+), however, because it can be a way
to drive traffic and visitors to your website.
Having a blog on your website also can be valuable as a way to
demonstrate thought leadership.
Search engines also reward sites that
frequently refresh content, which generally can be accomplished by
having a blog.
There’s also value in obtaining media coverage through public
relations outreach. The resulting articles could drive traffic to your
website and increase the popularity of your organization. In addition,
media websites often link to the websites of companies that they cover,
which can be a boost to your organization’s SEO efforts.
SmallBizLady: How can entrepreneurs learn more about SEO?
Brant Skogrand: I found the Search Engine College
program very helpful. Their curriculum covers topics ranging from
organic SEO to pay-per-click to copywriting and beyond. It’s on online
program, and tutors grade your assignments.
Google also offers free online courses through
Google Analytics Academy to help people improve their Analytics skills. There also are
Google Partners certifications, including the AdWords certification, to
demonstrate proficiency.
SmallBizLady: Why did you decide to write the 19 Tips for Successful Public Relations book?
Brant Skogrand: Many organizations struggle with how to successfully integrate public relations into their marketing mix.
Because of the numerous demands on entrepreneurs’ time and money,
many small business owners neither are able to learn public relations on
their own nor hire an outside public relations firm.
My goal with the book is to help entrepreneurs learn small business
public relations through straightforward tips and by analysis of
real-life examples – and then be able to apply public relations
strategies and tactics to help achieve their business goals.
SmallBizLady: Are there any other tips for SEO that you can give to startups and developing businesses?
Brant Skogrand: As you probably have noticed, there are a lot of factors that go into SEO and it can be tough to keep up with the changes.
Even though you can do it on your own, the results generally are better when you hire an outside professional.
Be wary of people who guarantee results. Since we don’t run Google or
Bing, we can’t guarantee that your website will rank at the top of the
search results for specific terms. By using our knowledge and
experience, however, your site should see optimization improvements.
For a collection of more public relations tips, insights and reflections, buy the book "19 Tips for Successful Public Relations: Insights on Media Relations and Reputation Management" from amazon.com!
