Top 10 Tips For Local Search Success by Wesley Young

Many local businesses today are overwhelmed by the variety of local marketing choices available. Unlike the old days when a small handful of advertising outlets would cover the majority of your audience, the sheer volume of marketing options has seemingly flattened the reach of each advertising channel.

Business owners see all the different ways that consumers are seeking out, discovering and considering local businesses, and they don’t know where to start.

The key to getting started is building a strong foundation for local search success by checking off the basics. From there, you can take advantage of other opportunities, including paid media, to generate even greater visibility for your brand.

Here are my top 10 tips for best positioning your business in local search:

Source: YP.com

1. Ensure Key Information About Your Business Is Accurate & Accessible

One of the most important aspects of local search is ensuring that your business’ information is consistent, accurate and accessible throughout the web. Yet 50% of small businesses have inaccurate online listings, according to a survey by ConstantContact. If your business information is outdated or appears in different ways in different places, it will not only lower your visibility in search — it will make it difficult or even impossible for potential customers to find you.

A good approach to tackling this issue is to take advantage of local listings services, including Localeze, Axiom, SinglePlatform, Yext and Universal Business Listing to actively manage your business information across local search platforms.

For the most popular sites such as Yelp, Google, YP.com, Yellowbook.com and Dexknows, be sure to manually claim your listings and make any necessary edits directly right away.

2. Populate Your Top Local Business Listings

Once your basic information on local search platforms is accurate, build out your listings on the most popular sites to include additional information that potential customers are looking for.

The 2013 results from our forthcoming Local Search Association/Burke Inc.’s “Local Media Tracking Study” show there is a variety of information beyond business name, address and phone number that consumers are looking for when reviewing a local listing.

Source: Local Search Association & Burke, Inc., “Local Media Tracking Study,” June 2014

Over half of consumers are interested in hours of operation, website address, and pricing information. Additionally, more than one in three consumers (38%) are looking for online reviews (more on that later). It’s also valuable to add business photos, menus and service offerings and other relevant information to fill out your local business listings.

Building out your listing is easy, so set aside time to do it and do it right. And if anything with your business changes — e.g., you go from limited hours on Sundays to none at all — be sure to update that on your local listings quickly so that customers don’t show up to your empty business.

3. Build A Website With The User Experience As The Key priority

A business website is the leading component of any business’ local marketing strategy – it’s essentially the “home base” from which digital interaction with your business begins and ends. The website is the most important place for existing and potential customers to learn about your company before deciding on whether to move forward with a purchase.

Local businesses benefit when they invest in developing a contemporary, appealing, easy-to-use website. This includes using a visually appealing color scheme and attractive visual content (more on that below), as well as incorporating straightforward navigation.

A user’s experience on your business website should mirror the experience you want customers to have with your business overall. Outdated information, dead links and long page load times should never be considered acceptable. Additionally, avoid using Flash media on your business website since it may negatively impact your site’s search ranking potential and not load on some browsers and smartphones.

4. Optimize Your Website For Search

When building a great business website, keep in mind that many potential customers won’t see your work if they can’t find it. Optimizing your website for search should go hand-in-hand with building an effective website.
Basics for boosting business website SEO include:

• Ensure your website title goes beyond your business name to also include what it is and where it’s located. For example, if your business is called “Wesley’s Oasis,” it will be difficult for search engines to pick up on the fact that it’s a spa located in Austin if that’s all you include in your title tag. Make sure that potential customers can find your business in search by listing all relevant information in the website title: “Wesley’s Oasis – Full-Service Spa – Austin, Texas.”
• Create individual pages for each business location as well as each product or service your business offers. This will raise the visibility of each in search, making it easier for potential customers to find exactly what they’re looking for.
• Use keywords and phrasing that potential customers are most likely to use. Don’t go overboard trying to “keyword-stuff” every page, but don’t use industry lingo to explain an offering that the average Joe would describe — and therefore search — differently.
• Don’t leave contact information just for the Contact page. Include basic business name, address and phone number information on every page of your website. This not only boosts SEO, but also makes it easier for a potential customer to contact or visit your business.

5. Start A Blog To Provide A Steady Stream Of Content

An easy way to build your website’s local search visibility is to start a blog, which will provide a steady stream of new and relevant content for your site. A blog — which can be featured prominently on your website homepage as well as promoted in your business’ social media channels — is a great opportunity to provide thought leadership on your industry and highlight new business offerings.
This additional fresh content will raise your site’s SEO results and provide an ongoing mechanism to drive traffic from the social web to your site.

6. Leverage Visual Content, Including Photos & Videos

In this age of Instagram and Pinterest, visual content plays an important role in appealing to potential customers. Consumers today are attracted to large photos and engaging videos that demonstrate a brand’s authenticity and value. Both photos and videos also help to boost website SEO and improve visibility for local listings.

Basics for integrating photos and videos include:

• Add large, compelling photos to your website homepage that illustrate the character of your brand and the diversity of your offerings.
• On the homepage or the About Us section of your website, add a short “Welcome” video introducing the visitor to your business so they can see who you are and develop a level of trust with your business.
• Incorporate photos and videos into products and offering pages on your website. Consider short how-to videos and the like to demonstrate how useful the product is, or how easy it is to put together, etc.
• Add photo albums and videos to your social media pages (more on social media later). This will boost visibility for your updates and provide followers with rich content about your business.

If your business hosts photos on Flickr or videos on YouTube, you will also benefit from the opportunity to include a variety of keywords that link your content back to your business.

7. Ensure Your Business Website Is Mobile-Friendly

One of the biggest missteps your business can make is not optimizing its website for mobile. Local mobile searches are not only on the rise – the majority end in a purchase. If a potential customer attempts to access your website via mobile but is tripped up by pages not loading, sizing issues or the inability to find basic information, they are more likely to go back into search until they find one of your competitors who has a better mobile interface.

Start by conducting a mobile audit of your current website to determine the types of mobile consumers that are visiting your website, and what they’re looking for when they access your site. Then work with a mobile website developer to create a slimmed down version of your desktop website that highlights the most important information potential customers are looking for, delivered in a format that is easily viewable across smartphone devices.

Additionally, use call-to-action messaging throughout the mobile site to make clear what consumers can accomplish via your mobile website, such as schedule appointments or purchase products. Use large, bold text that is easily viewable on a mobile screen.

8. Engage On Social Media Channels Used By Your Target Customers

Social media provides a way to keep in direct, ongoing contact with your business’ most loyal customers about new offerings, promotions and the like. Profiles on Facebook, Twitter, etc. also rank high in online search and create backlinks to your website, boosting your website’s visibility. These benefits come at no added cost to your business.

Begin by determining which social media channels make the most sense for your business, based on the types of content you will be able to share and the channels your potential customers are most likely to be using.

Then create an editorial calendar for what content you’ll post and when, such as promotions, giveaways, photo round-ups, new offering announcements and blog updates. Use posts to link to your business website to drive traffic. And always engage with users directly about their questions or concerns.

9. Encourage Reviews To Add Credibility To Your Business

Online reviews are playing an increasingly critical role in driving consumers’ purchasing decisions. The quantity and quality of reviews also strongly influences how your business appears in local business listing results.

But while you want to encourage customers who have a positive experience with your business to leave reviews, you don’t want to improperly incentivize them or even bully them to do so.
Instead, use a soft approach by featuring a list of top review sites on your website and asking customers to share their feedback with you. Print phrases such as “Let us know how we’re doing” or “Please leave your feedback” on your receipts or invoices. Even consider adding a review button in your business email signature.

10. Pay Attention To Your Success – And Adjust Your Approach As Necessary

Once you begin implementing these tips, keep close track of your progress. Create a regular and ongoing reporting method so you can see what’s working, and what needs to improve.
By building this framework, you’ll be in greater control — and achieve peace of mind about your local marketing strategy.

Opinions expressed in the article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land.

The 10 Worst Link Building Assumptions by Julie Joyce

Over the past few years, one of the biggest problems I’ve faced is educating clients about search marketing — about what’s reasonable to expect and what isn’t in the world of link building.

It can be difficult, especially in the winning-the-business stage, to admit that you can’t turn lead into gold, but being honest and clear with clients to set appropriate expectations can set you up for success in the longer term. If they’re the right client, they’ll be smart enough to understand.

When we started the company, we stayed quiet and let the clients dictate what we did for the most part, mainly because we didn’t yet have our footing. We’ve always discussed risk with our clients, but we didn’t advocate for all the things that make our jobs easier and make links work better for them.

Since then, we’ve gotten better about speaking up and advocating for everything from technical changes to better content. However, we still have a way to go, as we’re still facing some severely problematic assumptions about link building.

I’ll list them for you here, and you can share this list with your co-workers, bosses or clients. If you, or anyone you know, is operating under one of these dangerous assumptions, it’s past time to get educated.

1. I Can Tell You How Many Links It Will Take To Rank.

I can certainly guess (42, always), but that’s only after spending a lot of time doing analysis and research.

My problem with this assumption is that it sets the whole relationship up for failure from the beginning. I can’t predict algorithmic shifts or what your competitors are doing (or what you’re doing without telling me), so it’s irresponsible for me to pretend that I can, just to get your business.

2. I Can Tell You How Long It Will Take To Make You Rank.

I’ve seen some sites rank for whatever terms they want after we’ve been building links for a few weeks, and I’ve seen some that take months. That depends on a variety of factors so, again, it’s irresponsible to guess.

3. I Can Guarantee What Position You’ll Hit.

At least a dozen times over the years, potential clients have tried to figure out why I won’t guarantee certain rankings — because they’re spoken to several SEOs who will. (A guarantee like this is a warning sign of a questionable SEO.)

Perhaps I’d be more likely to consider this if I had full control of the online market environment; but even then, I think it’s crazy to guarantee a specific spot.

4. If Something Makes Me Rank In The Short Term But Is Risky, It’s Still Worth The Risk.

I guess that’s true if you like to churn and burn sites or rely on PPC. However, the many ways to rank quickly are the kind of methods that can easily come back to haunt you.

Obviously, my idea of risk and your idea of risk may be very different, but throwing 30 exact match anchor text links at a page just because you say that moved the page up three positions in the SERPs is just a bad idea.

5. Once We Get To Where We Want To Be, We Can Stop Doing Everything We’ve Been Doing And Let It Ride.

We’ve dealt with a few clients that stopped using our services when they were doing well. Then, when things started to go south again, they wanted to start back up again.

Even if you feel like resting, your competitors are probably still moving forward so, at some point, you’ll start to fall behind.

6. I Don’t Have The Knowledge To Be Able To Look At Your Backlinks And Figure Out All The Bad Things You’ve Done And Are Still Doing.

This isn’t usually a big problem with my contract clients, but it’s been an issue with some short-term consulting gigs.

It makes me feel like anything good that we do will get cancelled out by all the spam links that keep being built intentionally in an effort to rank well quickly.

7. You Won’t Have Problems If You Follow Google’s (Current) Guidelines.

Just because you follow their guidelines doesn’t mean that you won’t become a casualty of an algorithmic update, an accident, or simple poor rankings.

There are loads of people doing things the right way and their rankings are abysmal. That’s one reason that sites are so driven to take on massive risks. Following Google’s guidelines doesn’t guarantee online success, ever.

8. You Can’t Be Penalized (Whether Manually Or By An Algorithm Update) For All The Bad Stuff In Your Profile Even If It Was Done A Decade ago Or You Didn’t Know About It.

You don’t just get grandfathered into Google’s good graces because you’re an innocent or uneducated victim. They really don’t care.

Matt Cutts, Google’s Head of Webspam, Explains

9. Any Free Link Is A Good Link.

I used to believe this, wholeheartedly. Now? I’ve seen some vicious penalties on sites that never bought a single link, never did outreach to get links, and basically just got screwed by having linkable sites.

10. I Can Do This Well Without Your Input.

I can do it, yes, but I don’t know your product or service like you do, and having an inside perspective means that the work I do is much better.

Having you paying attention and catching my mistakes is particularly awesome because, again, I don’t know your business like you do and I might make an incorrect assumption.
What’s the solution to this? Continued advocacy and education, or is there something more? I’d love to hear what client assumptions you face, as well as how you handle them.

Opinions expressed in the article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land.

A Step-By-Step Guide To Link Building For Boring Industries Or Products by Matthew Barby

Within the current search landscape, most search engine optimisation campaigns have become increasingly content-led. The majority of the campaigns that I work on revolve largely around the production and placement of high quality content on top-tier sites.
This approach to search engine optimisation is more akin to a typical PR campaign than a traditional SEO campaign — and the former, in my opinion, is the way that most digital agencies should be positioning themselves.

Yes, I’m gonna say it: content marketing is the way forward.

Now that I’ve got that buzzword out of my system, we can move on.

Creating truly engaging, fun, linkable content may not seem that daunting when you’re an exciting B2C company that has a quirky product behind it. Just look at the likes of Red Bull and their Stratos project or Oreo’s Daily Twist campaign. These were genius ideas that have already become iconic content marketing examples.

But it’s not always easy when you don’t have the kind of brand value or creative positioning that those companies have.

Around 90% of the companies that I work with operate within what you would typically classify as “boring” industries — I’m talking businesses that manufacture special valves to go within specific types of machinery.

There’s not the same kind of scope to do some of the more exciting product-related marketing activities, and these businesses are often incredibly brand-conscious. Plus, proposing to drop a bloke from space doesn’t always fill my clients with confidence in our work, let alone our sanity!
There is a solution, though — and it’s something that we’ve been executing to great effect for a number of our clients.

Positioning Your Clients As Thought Leaders

One of the approaches from which we’ve seen fantastic results involves positioning our clients as thought leaders within their fields. This works really well within B2B industries, especially when their product/service is very niche.

The idea behind the thought leadership is to develop some key members of staff within the organisation as experts within their field and have them featured across a number of top-tier publications (both online and offline), then use the reputation that we’ve built to bring in leads. This could be through search, social, offline or a number of other channels, but it all stems around the content we create.

Here’s a typical approach:

1. Identify key members within the organisation that we can run some thought leadership pieces around.
2. Develop the message and story that we’re looking to position around the individual that falls in line with the values of the brand.
3. Optimise their online presence to reflect the image that we’re trying to convey. This includes scripting their LinkedIn profiles, Twitter bios, etc. and ensuring that all of their online and offline presence falls in line with the message we’re conveying. In some cases there has been a personal blog set up for the individual to further amplify their image.
4. Identify the top-tier publications that we’re going to target in order to get some coverage for the individual and wider brand.
5. Develop a content roadmap that covers the major topics that we’re going to focus on and collate this against major industry topics, events and wider company news/campaigns.
6. Work on a reputation catalyst to give us some credibility when pitching to the top-tier publications. What I mean by this is that we look to get a profile piece on a respected industry publication so that we can use this as a catalyst for further placements in the future.
7. Identify industry influencers, journalists and major content producers so that we can work on building relationships with them.
8. Get to work!

As I mentioned, content is at the heart of all this. This is where we will develop in-depth white papers surrounding the latest topics within the industry and work on some more visually appealing content that will appeal to some of the publications we’re targeting.

(Click to enlarge.)

The above diagram is the general framework that we look at when generating new content to plug into any digital campaign. This could be something as simple as a text-based article, or something as complex as an interactive microsite with multimedia-rich content. The same principles apply.
So, let’s delve a bit deeper into each of the steps for building out a thought leadership campaign that delivers SEO results…

Step 1: Identifying The Thought Leaders

It doesn’t matter how big or how small your company is — thought leadership is about positioning your business in a way that allows you to be perceived exactly how you wish to be. With this in mind, it’s really important that the people within the business are brought to the front of the campaign.

When the emphasis is more product-focused, we’ll usually look to position one of the technical staff as a thought leader. This allows them, as the product specialist, to talk about the science behind the product (particularly relevant in more technical niches).
Alternatively, senior executives or directors are prime targets to position as thought leaders, and they’ll come with a fair amount of credibility when you’re approaching publications — even if they’re not known at all.

I’ve found that the best way to identify your thought leaders is to outline the key objectives for the campaign and align the skill-sets of each key stakeholder against them. For example, the objective could be to generate awareness for the technical superiority of a product, it could be to establish the brand’s CSR credentials, or it could be that the business needs a wider international feel. Each of these objectives could be aligned to a different person.

Step 2: Developing A Story

Strategic storytelling plays a huge part in the branding of most major companies. The majority of the well-recognised brands on the planet have clear messages and stories that run deep through the heart of their companies.

Look at Aston Martin, a heritage UK car manufacturer. Many people dream of one day owning an Aston Martin, and their brand always has classy, professional and suave content campaigns, playing on the link with the likes of James Bond to create this overwhelming sense of luxury.
Innocent Drinks are another of my personal favourites. The business entered a hugely competitive marketplace in which everyone said they would fail. The result was quite the opposite, and that was primarily due to the story that they had intertwined with their products.

It has become cool to drink Innocent Smoothies. They place a huge focus on environmental sustainability and go against the processes of many major corporations.
They talk in detail about their humble beginnings of selling their drinks at a music festival, asking people to let them know if they should continue the business by placing the empty bottle in either a bin labelled yes or a bin labelled no.

Every part of their marketing reflects their story in one way or another, appealing to the younger alternative market, and they do a huge amount of work with other companies targeting the same people.

The funny thing is that a lot of the anti-corporate crowd buying Innocent’s products don’t realise that they are actually owned by Coca Cola – this shows the power that their brand story has!
With this in mind, it’s important that you consider the story that you will be telling within your thought leadership content. Consistency is key, and it helps to drive everything forward as one if you have a clearly defined, over-arching message.

Step 3: Optimisation Of Their Online Presence

This is one of the most overlooked and important stages of campaigns like this.
If you’re going to be positioning someone as an expert in their field, the rest of their online presence needs to reflect this. The amount of work required will depend on the scale of the project, but we will usually do the following:

• Full optimisation of LinkedIn account, including photo, copywriting across profile information, updating of job title, seeding of recommendations and endorsements and updating of experience.
• Updating of Google+ account and setting up authorship across any existing content.
• Updating of Twitter profile, including profile image (must be consistent with other platforms), bio information and full analysis of existing content that’s been published. This way, we can delete any posts that may not convey the right message.
• Creation of a personal blog (we don’t always do this, but it’s a really great way to build authority around the individual that can turn into a valuable link building asset).

Step 4: Identification Of Top-Tier Publications

At the start of each campaign, we spend significant time analysing the content landscape within the client’s industry in order to highlight the top-tier placement locations that we’d love to secure. These should be niche-specific and don’t always need to just be online. Offline placements can help to build credibility around the brand and can often lead to further online opportunities — don’t think with a one-track mind around links here.

Alongside this, we’ll research into some of the key journalists covering topics within the niche and build profiles around them. This can include their social footprint, their contact information, who they write for and what types of content they tend to post. Using this information we can tailor content to align with them and dramatically increase placement rates.

This analysis will also look at coverage for the wider brand as well. If you want a more detailed analysis into how I identify top-tier targets and get content placed within them, check this post out.

Step 5: Develop A Content Roadmap

The development of the content roadmap is probably the most important stage of the campaign. This is where you need to identify content gaps within the niche and focus big pieces of content to surround them.
My latest post on Moz looks at how I use data scraping to analyse leading websites within the niche I’m working in to gather insights into the key components of successful content. Using this information, I’m able to get far greater return on investment.

My preference here is to develop a number of big ideas that can then have smaller pieces of content wrapped around them. For example, we could develop a new technical white paper and then create a number of articles off the back of it, published under the name of our expert to capitalise on the rush of content.

White papers are just one example, and probably a bad one. Just because your company operates within a technical niche, it doesn’t mean that your content has to conform to a certain format. Find an aspect of the story behind your brand that will allow you to open your content up to a wider audience but still remain consistent with the image you’re trying to achieve. This is a killer combination for links.

One of my favourite examples to show this in action is from TruckerClassifieds.com, a site devoted to truck driving jobs across the US. They found an angle when they created their Truckpocalypse infographic that has returned over 3,000 shares across social media and just over 700 links – not bad. If you’ve not seen this before then check it out because it’s great.

Another fantastic example is this infographic from TownCentreCarParks.com that centers on drunk driving. This is great for the brand and has also delivered some great results from a links/social share point of view, not to mention all the relevant traffic firing through to the site.

I’m not going to go into too much detail around the content creation process right now because that’s an article in itself, but one thing I would say here is to experiment with different formats, topics and approaches.

Here’s a great Excel template (.zip file) that you can download for documenting your content roadmap – I’m sure this will come in handy for a number of you (thanks to Pam Dyer for this one).
Another thing to remember with the content creation side of things, and this will really help when it comes to getting buy-in, is that a piece of content developed for online can actually be developed and used offline as a sales/marketing tool. A good example of this is with these interactive infographics from Animagraffs.

Step 6: Work On A Reputation Catalyst

A reputation catalyst is a term that I use for securing the placement of a piece of content that has the sole focus of boosting the credibility of the author. These reputation catalysts are essential for thought leadership campaigns.

There are a number of ways to go about securing a reputation catalyst, each with their own advantages and disadvantages. Here are the usual routes that I explore:

Sponsored Post: A sponsored post is simply a paid-for piece of editorial. Any links within the post will be nofollow links, but that doesn’t matter. The core objective of having a piece placed under our expert’s name is so that we can use this as ammunition when contacting journalists in the future. This is what I was referring to when I was saying that you can’t approach these campaigns with a one-track mind focused on links.

Many top-tier publications will offer sponsored posts, but it will depend on the budget you have at your disposal as to which you can go with. Having a couple of placements can help out a lot at this stage.
The obvious advantage to this approach is that it can be done immediately, so you can crack on with the rest of the campaign.

Work With Top Authors: I wrote a post earlier this year that talked about identifying writers of top publications, building relationships with them and commissioning them to place content on top sites for you. This is a strategy that I’ve executed on a number of occasions with great success, and it can work well for acquiring a reputation catalyst.

The advantage here is that you’ll have built a relationship that you can utilise on an on-going basis, plus you’ll likely get some links out of it as well. The downside is that it takes a lot longer than something like a sponsored post.

Utilise Reactive PR Requests: Services like HARO and ResponseSource can be goldmines for PR opportunities. Journalists are always looking for input from experts so this can be a quick win for establishing a nice feature.

I talk about this process in a little more detail within my post surrounding link building in 2014 (about halfway through) so make sure you give it a read.

Step 7: Relationship Building

Now that the content production has begun, your expert’s online presence has been optimised and you’ve acquired an initial placement (reputation catalyst), it’s time to start building relationships that can help deliver links in the long term.

Within industries where social media is less widely adopted, relationship building can seem like it’s much more difficult. The reality is that there’s just less noise to compete against.

The main focus for me within campaigns like this is to develop relationships with three types of people: journalists (preferably freelance because they write for a number of publications, giving you more bang for your buck!), editors of niche-relevant publications and industry influencers. I’d strongly recommend using a PR database to help with this, especially when it comes to the more technical industries because it will save you a ton of time and money.

One thing to remember when you’re reaching out to journalists and editors is that you’ll often only have once chance to make an impression with them. Forget batch sending the same message to a database of contacts, as it’s not an effective strategy. The more refined and personalised you can be, the better. I’ve also found that it’s much more effective to create the content in advance and then pitch it to a journalist/editor rather than speculatively emailing to see if they’d like a guest post from you (…sigh).

You might find this guide on writing the perfect email pitch pretty useful when it comes to this.

Bringing It All Together

Thought leadership is a powerful way to deliver campaigns within industries that a lot of people will write-off as being boring or too technical. We’ve run SEO projects that have been delivered solely through this approach, but from my experience, this should be just one component of your overall approach.

The relationships that get built through developing really specific pieces of content and through establishing key members of an organisation as an expert within their field will help to produce organic mentions over time. These things don’t happen overnight, but if you’re looking for a link building strategy that focuses on building awareness for your brand, developing flagship content pieces that can also be used as sales tools, increasing the reputation of key members within your organisation, and driving the rest of your online and offline presence forward as one, then thought leadership may be for you.

TL;DR

• Just because an industry is deemed as boring by a lot of people doesn’t mean that everyone feels this way. This is an opportunity more than anything.
• Thought leadership is more than just guest blogging!
• Don’t approach campaigns like this with a one-track mind focused on links.
• Obtain a link catalyst to increase the effectiveness of your outreach campaigns going forward.

Opinions expressed in the article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land.

Using Schema Markup to Boost Your Google Rankings by Adrienne Erin

As a marketer or someone involved in SEO, you’ve probably heard of Schema markup, but if you haven’t, it’s okay. While frequently viewed as a relatively new technology to increase search engine rankings and the accessibility and usability of your pages, the markup has actually been around for years. If it’s not currently part of your SEO strategy, now is the time to make a change.

Keep reading to learn more about the basics of schema markup, along with 3 compelling reasons to start using it on your website today.

What is it and How Does it Work?
According to Dan Shewan at WordStream, schema is “a type of microdata that makes it easier for search engines to parse and interpret the information on your webpages more effectively so they can serve relevant results to users based on search queries.”

To make that even simpler, schema markup takes the information that matters most for search engines to find your information, puts it front and center as far as the backend of a website is concerned and serves it up to increase the odds of a website using the markup standing out above a website that does not. It’s wholly designed to increase the ease and effectiveness of search engine crawlers.

Additional information is available on Schema.org, launched in 2011 as a result of the Schema project – a collaboration between multiple large search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo!. The site brings Schema markup to the forefront of website design by providing a large collection of schemas – largely viewed as html tags – that can be used by web designers, developers and average users to improve search engine placement.

Because the project is a result of major search engines, it is not specific to just one and is, therefore, an excellent use of time and energy.

Schema works similarly to other markup formats by applying microdata to page content by easily defining – in html terms – exactly what a webpage contains and how it should be treated. It presents data in an easy-to-read format for search engine crawlers and makes it more likely that relevant information will be presented to searchers. It makes the crawlers’ jobs easier and is therefore generally rewarded.

This description alone makes it clear that schema markup is an important aspect of SEO success.

However, if you’re still not convinced, check out these 3 compelling reasons to incorporate it into your strategy.

1. Matt Cutts has Been Recommending it For Years.
Matt Cutts – head of Google’s Webspam team, single-handedly responsible for shutting down multiple websites utilizing questionable SEO strategies and other actions – has been recommending schema markup for years. This is big – as someone who has helped to write the technology behind the largest search engine in the world, his words carry weight.

Back in 2012, in a webmaster help video, Cutts shared the following information about schema markup.

“Just because you implement schema.org doesn’t mean you necessarily rank higher. But, there are some corner cases, like if you were to type in ‘lasagna,’ and then click over on the left hand side and click on ‘recipes,’ that’s the sort of thing where using schema.org markup might help, because then you’re more likely to be showing up in that at all.”

While he was reluctant to outright say that it would help rankings, he made it clear that it definitely wouldn’t hurt anything. Coming from one of the top names in Google, this matters.

2. Rich Snippets, Like Those Featured in Google SERPs, Result in Higher CTRs.
Schema markup leads to tangible benefits, including enhanced search engine results pages – SERPs – that stand out among the competition. While these results generally include items like titles and snippets of a full webpage, targeted schema markup can be created to include customer rankings, photos and more.

Yes, visually it’s more appealing, but, it’s also more effective. Information shared by Search Engine Land indicates that rich snippets, listings that include more information than standard search engine listings, can increase click-through rates by 30%. Thirty percent more web traffic can do a lot to take a company to the next level, while looping back and increasing search engine visibility even more. Schema markup allows for this circle and as such, should be a serious consideration for increasing rankings and website effectiveness.

3. Pages with Schema Markup Rank an Average of 4 Positions Higher on Google
A recent study by Searchmetrics revealed that while less than 1 percent of sites on the Internet have implemented Schema markup, those who have done so rank an average of 4 positions higher on Google. That can mean the difference between page 1 and page 2, or being displayed in the top results or being buried, never to be found by searchers and prospective clients.

The study goes on to explain that Google shows results for sites with Schema markup – like those mentioned in reason number 2 – for over 36% of keyword queries, while keywords without markups are shown less frequently.

The bottom line is simple. Schema has been recommended by individuals behind the top search engines in the world and cannot hurt anything, the rich snippets that the practice enables lead to higher click-through rates and those with the markup rank higher in search engine results than sites that do not. Not using the markup – based on these reasons alone – just doesn’t make sense.

If you’re ready to put schema markup to work for your site, or are interested in learning more, check out Schema.org’s getting started guide. The time to start is now.

Courtesy of Site Pro News-Jayde Online, Inc.

How to Get Bloggers to Answer your Email Every Time by Salma Jafri

I typically don't answer 98% of the cold emails I receive. I might have made up that statistic but there’s no denying the fact that I hit delete, spam or simply choose to ignore the vast majority of emails that I receive. Why is that?

Could it be because:

• I think I’m too important to read your mail?
• I don’t have time?
• I don’t want to make time?
• I’m lazy?
• I couldn't be bothered?
• I’m not interested?

Frankly, it’s none of the above.

Have you ever emailed someone important and never received an answer back? I’ll admit I have. I’ve emailed plenty of people never to hear from them again. So why is it that most people won’t answer emails from an unknown person?

The answer is actually easier than any of the reasons listed above. The reason most people ignore your emails is because your mails are too vague. I never really understand just what it is you need from me.

So the real reason I haven’t answered your email is because there was really nothing to answer. You touted your horn, told me in lengthy paragraphs about your achievements and then ended your email hoping I’d help you out with some vague idea of how to earn online and market your business.
Big fat #FAIL.

Most public email I receive can be categorized into the following:

• vague pleas from people wanting to set up an online business
• more vague pleas from people looking to get more customers/traffic and do better marketing
• requests for me to speak/present at your event
• specific questions related to my area of expertise – marketing and working online

Guess which type from the above gets answered the most?

If you guessed the last one, you’d be correct.

The easiest and fastest emails to reply to immediately are ones where the emailer does not waste my time or his telling me about his million and one qualifications, gets right down to why he’s contacting me and what information he needs from me. The more specific the request is, the faster I can respond to it.

Let me repeat that:

The more specific the request is, the faster I can respond to it.

And not just faster but more accurately too. Win-win for everybody! I like helping out people but I don’t like it when I feel my time is being wasted or when someone can simply Google the answer for themselves.

This principle of being as specific as possible generally holds true for all communication – whether it be via email or some other medium.

So the next time you’re about to email someone for a request of help, consider wording your email to help them take immediate action.

Here are some examples to help you get started:

Vague request	Specific request
please help me earn more online	Which top 3 sites would you recommend for getting started with online writing jobs?
how can I get more traffic to my website?	Can you tell me some specific social media strategies I can use to get 50 views on my post everyday?
can you tell me how to use elance?	I’ve signed up and made my web designer profile on elance but am confused about pricing my services – should I price low initially or charge what I feel I’m worth?
how can I market my services with a zero budget?	What are some ways I can get more Twitter followers for free?

Of course you can only be specific in your requests if you are very clear about your goals.
So please get some clarity on your goals and know exactly what you need to ask before you hit send on a poorly composed vague email. Chances are that you wont get a second chance. I typically delete or mark such vague requests as spam and then my mail server filters all messages from the sender as spam from that point onwards. So your first impression is truly your last impression.

Make sure you are as specific as possible – don’t waste your time or the time of the person you’re emailing.

Courtesy of Social Media Today LLC

These Sites Tell Which Of Your Accounts Have Been Hacked by Adam Tanner

Heartbleed, the massive flaw in web encryption recently made public, is just one of the unending stream of vulnerabilities that enables hackers to steal personal details and passwords from companies with which you do business.

Of recent, a number of websites have opened up shop to alert users when such attacks happen.

 

For example, haveibeenpwned.com allows you to enter in an email address to see if hackers have compromised it. For example, a check of one email address I use only with companies showed that it had been breached in October – along with 153 million others — when Adobe’s accounts were hacked.

A check of an email address I use just for Forbes.com (and one I knew had an issue earlier this year) also showed it had been breached, with a useful explanation below. “In February 2014, the Forbes website succumbed to an attack that leaked over 1 million user accounts,” the site said. “The attack was attributed to the Syrian Electronic Army, allegedly as retribution for a perceived ‘Hate of Syria.’

Another site, PwnedList, found those where both email addresses had been hacked and gave a date of the hack, but did not say where the issues occurred. Shouldichangemypassword.com offers a similar service. All are free and offer to notify users in the future if an email address is compromised.

Screens shot of PwnedList.

These sites may see more traffic in coming weeks if the Heartbleed security flaw leads to a whole new series of hacked sites, as many experts forecast.

“If this issue isn’t fixed immediately at all companies (which it won’t be), then we can expect to see a large number of breaches and leaks enabled by this vulnerability,” said Steve Thomas, the co-founder of PwnedList. “We are preparing our database for a rapid increase in the number of compromised credentials, which Heartbleed will certainly contribute to.”

PwnedList makes its money by alerting corporate clients to hacking attacks, which in many cases affect not the firms themselves but their outside vendors. It says its clients include publisher Reed Elsevier RUK +1.5%, password service LastPass, one of world’s largest social networks, and one of largest aeronautics  and personal appliance firms.

It catches wind of new breaches by hanging around Internet hacker sites. “Once we join those we get access to everything that is getting passed around,” says Thomas. “Primary hackers will say ‘I just broke into XYZ company, here is their user list.’” Sometimes hackers broadcast their accomplishments on Twitter, but some boasts have not actually occurred.

He estimates that PwnedList learns of about a dozen different data leaks every day, with 100,000 to 500,000 compromised credentials.

Alen Puzic (seated) and Steve Thomas, co-founders of PwnedList (Photo courtesy of PwnedList)

The site haveibeenpwned.com, set up late in 2013, is the pet project of Troy Hunt, an Australian who works as an architect at a large company by day.  He concentrates on the larger data breaches, and adds one to two different data sets a week to his site. “It is a bit of a laborious process,” he said. “It doesn’t make any money. I guess it is a hobby and public service.”

Hunt would like to see companies whose systems are breached be more responsive in reaching out to their affected customers. Often, he said, there is a long lag time before they own up to what has happened.

“People, sort of rightly say, ‘Wait, hang on a second, why didn’t these guys tell me?’” he said. “What surprises me a little about it is when there is a compromise, the company that is being compromised is in the best position of all to say whether it is legitimate or not. The vacuum of information from companies that are alleged to have been compromised is not a healthy thing.”

“One thing we have got to be cautious about is there is a lot of people go out and beat the drums and say we’ve just compromised the NSA, for example, here’s all their passwords, and it’s just fraudulent.”

After processing so many breaches through his site, Hunt has strengthened his own personal security drill and recommends the same for others: he uses only strong, unmemorable passwords for each account, and turns to a secure password manager to keep track of all that information.

Courtesy of Forbes

Report: Google+ Brand Posts Get Twice the Engagement of Tweets by Todd Wasserman

We've all heard the claims that Google+ is a ghost town and that the network's population is artificially inflated, but a Forrester Research analyst says marketers are crazy to ignore it.

 

The analyst, Nate Elliott, based his assertion on a study of 60,000 online adults in the United States. The report found that 22% of those adults had visited Google+ within the last month.

See also: Sorry, Google+, We Still Won't Come to Your Party
 

"That’s the same number who told us they use Twitter, and more than told us they use LinkedIn, Pinterest, or Instagram," Elliott wrote. "That means you can build a real follower base on Google Plus: On average, top brands have collected 90% as many fans on Plus as on Twitter. (In fact, the brands we studied have more followers on Google Plus than on YouTube, Pinterest and Instagram combined.)"

Forrester also studied more than 3 million user interactions with more than 2,500 brand posts, and found the Google+ posts scored almost as high as those on Facebook and received almost twice as much engagement per follower as tweets from those brands:

"The bottom line? If you’re not actively marketing on Google Plus, it’s time to start," Elliott writes.

Long-Term SEO: Sustainable Tactics, Strategies & Solutions by Shari Thurow

Last month, I attended the Long-Term SEO: How To Win For Years, Not Days session at SMX West. I have worked in the search industry since 1995. I have seen search engine optimization (SEO) trends and tactics come and go… and I’ve also seen fundamental, universal concepts get stronger and stronger over time.

So what I wanted to learn was: what are flavor-of-the-month strategies, and what strategies are going to stand the test of time? Would I hear anything about information scent and the aboutness of digital documents? Should you invest in link development, a sustainable SEO strategy, or has it been relegated to SEO history?

And, as search engine guru Danny Sullivan so aptly put it, “Am I constantly trying to make the algorithm happy?”

What follows are the panelists’ perspective on sustainable SEO.

Sustainable SEO consists of search engine optimization concepts, strategies, tactics, and implementation that stand the test of time.

Rhea Drysdale, CEO of Outspoken Media, opened with, “It is up to you to manage the site from beginning to end. The strategies that you choose and tactics… all of that ultimately falls onto you.”
Drysdale said that website owners should focus on the big picture rather than short-term “vanity goals” (I like that phrase) or choosing shortcuts without weighing the risks. “Do no harm to the brand and let people know the risks,” she said.

She also pointed out that “human behavior forces algorithm updates.” The example she gave to support her statement was The Decay and Fall of Guest Blogging for SEO in Matt Cutts’ blog.
I could not help but be reminded of my warning about PageRank sculpting years ago. Many overzealous SEO professionals and website owners will go to great lengths to achieve search engine visibility. In the long run? These short-term tactics can actually do more harm than good.

Mark Munroe, Director of SEO at Trulia, takes a more holistic approach to long-term SEO: focus embedded SEO intelligence throughout your organization and build your brand’s reputation. “Links might go away,” he said, “but your reputation never will.”

Some ways of building reputation to your brand (past and present) include:

• Link swapping and link networks
• Web and niche directories
• Link buying
• Press releases
• Article directories
• Infographics
• Social
• Content marketing

Even though some of these tactics seem outdated, when implemented properly, they are a legitimate and trustworthy way of getting search engine traffic and credibility. For example, link exchanges might seem to be an ancient SEO tactic — one that can get your site penalized or banned for search engine spam. But what if the domestic violence shelters from each state in the United States linked to each other? If that happened, maybe victims of domestic violence could more easily find the closest shelter online.

Additionally, both Drysdale and Munroe do not believe that press releases are a dead form of PR (public relations). Press releases are a means of distribution that can support your optimization’s goals. The point is to keep all of these alleged SEO shortcuts in the right perspective.

“The best links are not asked for,” Munroe said. “Create a reason to be linked to.”  That does not mean that SEO professionals should not ask for links. If you have great content that you believe is link worthy, reach out to the right people and ask for the  link. “Maintain your outreach initiatives,” he said, ” and leave the anchor text up to the person/site linking to your site.”

Next up to speak was Eric Enge, CEO of Stone Temple Consulting. “Of course, building your reputation with your target audience means understanding that audience, their needs, how they think, and how they might engage with your site,” he said.

“As Amit Singhal noted during his keynote here at SMX West, Google is very focused on the user, and publishers need to be, too. It is hard to predict how the changes will unfold during the next few years, but we know they are coming. For that reason, publishers must also focus on the users because ‘those are the signals that we (Google) want to find and value the most anyway.’ Now that’s a rock solid approach to SEO.”

Here is a list of Eric’s one-liner takeaways about long-term SEO:

1. Be an expert or go home. You can’t build trust with random writers.
2. Authenticity is hard to fake.
3. Pursue extreme differentiation. The same old content isn’t going to cut it.
4. Realize that links are the result, not the goal.
5. Focus on reputation and brand (as your top priorities). You can’t vote for yourself.
6. True value of press releases: generate interest from the media.
7. Don’t look natural, BE natural.
8. Strong social media presences are like a built-in PR channel.
9. Influencers are the accelerant.
10. Solving problems for others is engagement that is memorable.
11. If you have to argue that it’s a good link, it’s not.
12. The company you keep defines you.

Eric had a great diagram that illustrated how all of these long-term strategies should work together (see slide #30 in the SlideShare presentation below).

“SEO has changed dramatically in the past several years, and with increasing emphasis by Google in search quality, the Knowledge Graph and improving search quality, these changes are only likely to accelerate,” said Enge. “What it means for publishers is that they need to focus their SEO strategies on where Google is going, not on ‘what works now.’ The best way to do that is to build your reputation online with your target audience.”

Along those lines, Eric has a great interview with Matt Cutts on What Makes a Quality Site. In the interview, Matt said:

By doing things that help build your own reputation, you are focusing on the right types of activity. Those are the signals we want to find and value the most anyway.

Mark Munroe, I think, summarized it best when he said, “The objective is to embed SEO intelligence… become an SEO team. Get teams to communicate with each other. Get executive buy in. Look for synergies among groups: user experience (UX), information architecture (IA), content optimization, technical, and so forth.”
“We need a world where everything is working together – SEO is coordinating and benefitting from all of this,” Enge concluded.

So, if you want long-term SEO traffic? We all must work together to attain the same goals so that everyone benefits: your company, your brand, your users… and the search engines.

Opinions expressed in the article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land.

LinkedIn Launches New Tool to Measure Content Effectiveness by Jose Capelo

From now on, companies can measure the effectiveness and reach of their content strategy on LinkedIn. The social network has unveiled its Content Marketing Score, directed exclusively to businesses with the aim to help brands become better publishers.

Marketers need to assess the impact of their actions on social media. To do this, any tool or application metric is welcome. To facilitate the task, LinkedIn has introduced its own measurement tool available to businesses only. This tool is not limited solely to paying stocks, but also lets you know what unique users have interacted in their company pages, groups, updates or employees posts by influencers. Thus, the brand may know the percentage of people that somehow interacted with your content, recommended the content through word of mouth marketing, began to follow the business, or shared recommendations.

Furthermore, based on these results a ranking, in which results of the competition will be included, will be formed in order to help business asses the real impact of their strategy. Yes, all privately and anonymously, but using this data, companies can assess the effectiveness of their content strategy on this platform, find out what kind of publications were recorded, and overall offering a greater range to optimize their long-term strategy.

Similar to Google’s search algorithm that ranks organic content in results from search engine queries, LinkedIn will calculate metrics from the content’s performance to determine the score. Activity on a brand’s page, sponsoring a piece of content or paying to have a piece reach a target audience, employee posts in aggregate, group activity, and posts from any of the 500 people in the site’s influencer program all contribute to the score.

In addition to this classification and valuation of companies engagement generated by each organization, LinkedIn also let you know what the current issues related to the target audience of the company are. Definitely useful in guiding, and planning publications with related information.

LinkedIn is the meeting point for professionals in the online medium. This is ideal for networking and generating business opportunities, especially in the case of the B2B scenario. A platform with over 225 million users and which meets 81% of Inc. 500 companies. A broadcasting platform for generating content with indicated confidence, attract the target audience and loyal customers. Those advantages make LinkedIn to position itself over Facebook even in the case of small and medium enterprises (83 % vs. 80%).

LinkedIn has positioned itself as a leader platform in business, and works to provide more features and benefits that encourage the use of its services, and its importance as a social network.

How to Craft the Perfect Email Subject Line by Dmitri Leonov

According to some estimates, more than 144 billion emails are sent every day—and, sometimes, it seems like every one of them lands in your inbox.

Even those of us who are tasked with creating email marketing campaigns aren't immune to information overload: We all know what it's like to be bombarded with email messages—all competing for a share of our attention during a busy day.

If it's your job to come up with a subject line that is compelling enough to cut through all that clutter, it's a good idea to apply your experience as an email recipient to help you craft the perfect subject line. What gets your attention? How do you decide which emails to trash unopened and which to read?

Scores of scientific studies can tell you which words appear with the most frequency in successful email campaigns. And that is useful information. But in creating a compelling subject line, sometimes a simple strategy works best.

Here are some tips that can help you improve open rates.

Keep it brief. When prospects are scanning their inboxes, a short, snappy subject is more likely to catch their eye than a lengthier line. If possible, it's best to keep the subject line short enough to appear as one line on a smaller device screen, such as a smartphone or tablet. Keep it short and sweet to improve your open and rates.

Don't waste valuable real estate. A subject line doesn't provide much space, so make every word count. Don't waste space with words (such as "hello") that don't add much value to your message. When crafting your subject line, evaluate each word and make sure it adds value—from the standpoint of providing information or encouraging readers to open the email.

Be specific. When readers are scanning new messages in their inbox, they're generally in a hurry to respond to urgent messages or tackle the next task in their busy day. In such a state of mind, they won't have much patience for mystery. Cut to the chase by using the subject line to tell them what the message is about.

Make it searchable. There's a good chance your reader won't have time to focus on your message when they first see it, so it's wise to give them an easy way to return to the message when they have more time. If you make the subject line searchable so readers can easily find it later, there's a better chance that they'll revisit your email, even if they don't have time at first.

Include a call to action. Make sure your subject line tells the reader what he or she can do to benefit from the message—whether that's to visit a site, make a call, or just read the message. A brief line that summarizes the value can be highly effective, so think about what's in it for the reader and try to convey that in the subject line.

Don't create anxiety. Although you want your readers to take action, it's important to balance a call to action with a signal that you respect their time. Subject lines that include phrases such as "immediate response required" can come across as arrogant. Adding "FYI" or "no need to reply" can take the pressure off while still signaling that the message contains valuable information.

Include your company name. Readers will be more likely to open an email if they know who it's from and if they perceive value from the sending organization. Including a company name is especially important if you already have a positive relationship with the reader.

Knowledge workers spend about 28% of their workday managing email, a McKinsey Global Institute report has found. We all complain about email volume, and unless you manage your inbox wisely, it can seriously decrease productivity by forcing you to weed through unimportant, unwanted messages to find the emails that are worth your focus.

That said, email is how we communicate in business. The issue isn't email itself, but inbox overload and finding a way to separate the mundane and annoying from the truly important. There are proven ways to tame overflowing inboxes, and every professional needs a sound strategy. Your challenge as an email marketer is to ensure that your message makes the cut.

Since you're an email consumer as well as email campaign developer, take a step back and think about what motivates you as a reader. Chances are, you respond better to messages that are brief and to the point. You want to know why you should open that message—what's in it for you. You want to know who it's from and how it can help you.

So write a subject line that you would open... and you'll likely get a great response.

Courtesy of  http://www.marketingprofs.com