Social media are sites on the web, mobile or online that people use to interact with friends and other people or entities who are participants on the social media sites.  The most popular social media sites are Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

The purpose of social media marketing is to be [...]]]>

What is Social Media?

Social media are sites on the web, mobile or online that people use to interact with friends and other people or entities who are participants on the social media sites.  The most popular social media sites are Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

The purpose of social media marketing is to be connected and engaged with your market, your prospective customers, and/or your existing customers.  It is a means for you to have a two-way communication with your market.  In social media marketing, not only do you talk to your market but you listen to what your market is telling you.

People engage in social media sites through their desktop computers,  laptops,  tablets,  or mobile devices.  In fact, an increasing number of people are using social media sites mainly through their smart phones.

When marketing your business online, look at social media as only a part of your overall effort.  It supplements and does not replace creating or managing a marketing-effective Web site,  content updates,  search engine optimization (SEO),  inbound link campaigns,  online press releases,  event calendar postings,  e-mail newsletters,  testimonials and reviews,  affiliate or loyalty programs,  online events or promotions,  pay-per-click ads,  banners,  sponsorships, and others.

What are the Social Media Outlets?

Facebook

Facebook is a web site where people join and connect with friends.  With Facebook, people can update their status (or share what is going on with them), share and recommend news, videos, pictures, web sites they found, and more.

People and businesses can also set up accounts called Facebook Pages.  These are not personal accounts, but accounts of businesses, organizations or a group of people with the same interests.   It is through these Pages that businesses interact with their market.  When a person “likes” a Page, he receives updates and communication on his profile page.  He is also able to post any message on the Page, if the Page owner allows it.

It is through these Facebook Page that businesses are able to interact with their market.

Social Media Marketing is having conversation and engagement with your market.

Twitter

Twitter is a social network that streams real-time information posted by other people or people representing businesses or entities.  Twitter users get this information when they “follow” other people or entities.  This information is in a form of 140 characters maximum posts called “tweets”.   The tweets can contain announcements, updates, questions, or links to the business website, video, pictures, and more.  Followers can tweet the businesses back with responses.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a social network for professionals.  It LinkedIn connects you to your trusted contacts and helps you exchange knowledge, ideas, and opportunities with a broader network of professionals.  LinkedIn is used by small businesses to build their industry network and keep in touch with people relevant to their businesses.

LinkedIn keeps businesses in touch with their industry partners and professional customers

Others

Smaller or niche-related social media sites include MySpace, Friendster, Google Buzz, Meetup, Ning, Tumblr, and a lot more.  Location-based social networking includes Foursquare and Gowalla.

Advantages of Social Media

Social media marketing carries many benefits.

• Social media is free.  You do not have to pay to sign-in to the most popular social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.
• The audience for social media is huge… and getting larger every day.  Furthermore,  many people visit these sites many times a day, and spends a lot of time in these sites.  Many of the users are your customers and prospective customers!
• Social media is a great place to build your brand.  It is a great way to present to your audience what your brand is about.   It gives you an opportunity to give your brand a favorable image.  Are you hip?  Do you strive for product excellence?  Dedicated to customer service?  Not only do social media take your brand in front of your audience, it also makes your audience a part of your brand.  This happens when you share with your audience what’s going on with your brand and when your audience shares with you and other people their love for your brand.
• Social media builds relationship with your market.  Relationship with your customers results in customers’ loyalty.   If you have great relationship with your customer, your customers tend to recommend you to their friends and social circle.
• Social media enables you to do informal market research.  With social media, you can learn how customers perceive your products, how they use your products, ways on how to improve your products based on customers’ input, and many things that you used to learn from expensive market research.
• Social media helps you improve business processes and customer service.  Your social media audience tends to be more vocal about your product, and provides valuable feedback to improve your product.  Promptly acting on their feedback will improve your product and if your product has a problem, save you from losing customers.
• Social media enables you to sell when opportunity arises.  Although social media is mainly for establishing relationships with your customers for the long term, there will always be opportunities to recommend your product and directly produce sales.  Through the social sites, you can also encourage your audience to go to your site or page with promotional pitch.  You can also offer discounts, special offers, and coupons and hold promotions.  Make sure however that when you engage in social media, you do not use it flagrantly sell your product, as you would be seen as spam, and thus turn off your audience.
• Social media can drive “captive audience” to your website.  Your website should be the hub of your online marketing efforts, and you should make use of all the ways to drive traffic to your site.  It is not a good idea to be dependent on just one way to drive traffic to your site, like from search engines because search engines change their ranking rules or algorithms and may affect your ranking anytime.  Next to search engine marketing, social media is one of the most effective ways to drive traffic to your web site.
• Social media improves your web site’s search engine ranking.  Search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo look at links from social media and social media buzz to determine your brand’s standing in the market.  Positive mentions about your brands and social media link to your site can boost your ranking in the search engines for keyword that people use to search for your product or service.

Look at social media as a long-term ongoing effort.  The benefit may not come immediately, but will be for the long term.

Disadvantages of Social Media

• If you make a mistake online, it may hurt your brand or even damage your reputation for good.   Things said in social media is easily passed around (or gets viral), and it would be difficult or impossible to control its spread.
• It may require time and effort to engage with your audience.
• As social media gets more popular, with many companies and businesses joining in, it is becoming harder to gain visibility among its hundreds of millions of users (this is especially true with Twitter).

When Social Media Makes Sense for your Business

The benefits of social media depend on the business.  For some businesses, it does not make sense to spend time and effort in it, since these are better spent on other online marketing efforts.  Also, social media marketing does not make sense to businesses that cater to customers who are typically not involved in social media.

Mobile phones and devices are wonders of modern technology. Aside from making phone calls, these devices have the capabilities of mini-computers, plus it is ultra-portable. Mobile phones are also very personal devices and are usually an essential extension of their owners. In fact, many people feel naked when they leave the house without their [...]]]>

Mobile phones and devices are wonders of modern technology. Aside from making phone calls, these devices have the capabilities of mini-computers, plus it is ultra-portable. Mobile phones are also very personal devices and are usually an essential extension of their owners. In fact, many people feel naked when they leave the house without their mobile phones.

People also use mobile phones to solve many of their problems. It is a great channel for business owners like you to offer your solutions via your product and services. Mobile marketing or engaging with your audience in an interactive and relevant manner through a mobile device has the following advantages over traditional forms of marketing:

1. There is a large number of mobile phone users, and their number is rapidly increasing as the price of the phones become affordable, and the monthly payments reach the level of regular wired phones. It is predicted that in the near future, there will be more users of mobile phones than desktop PCs.

2. Through mobile phones, you can send your message that is specific to time, location and even person. You can send your advertising message to a prospective customer who is already in or near your place of business, thus he is more receptive to your message. Messages can be tailored to meet the needs of a person at the exact time that he needs to see the messages.

3. Mobile’s ability to deliver real time advertising can prompt immediate response. For example, you can ask your customer to come within next 30 minutes so they can avail of a 20% discount.

4. Mobile advertising integrates well with offline marketing like outdoor, TV, print, events, and others. On print, for example, you can ask readers to scan a QR code (or 2D code) to go to your site, download your app, opt-in to your mailing list, and more.

5. Ads on mobile phones are much less crowded. A mobile page can only show one or two ads per page. Therefore, these ads get more attention.

6. It is reported that mobile ads have higher clickthroughs (users clicking on the ads) than other forms of online advertising.

7. It is also reported that mobile advertising shows more conversion. People who search for restaurants in mobile are more ready to enter a nearby restaurant, for example.

8. Like other forms of online marketing, the effectiveness of mobile advertising campaign can be easily tracked.

Mobile Marketing Elements

There are many elements that you can use to promote your business on mobile phones. You can get really creative with engaging with your prospective and existing customers. Be aware, however, that mobile marketing is fraught with legal land mines, and you have to make sure that you get users’ permissions when you make contact:

1. Mobile ads – The major advantage of mobile ads over the traditional ones, and even internet ads, is that the user is sent to a site where he can immediately take action like click on a link to call, or send SMS.
Depending on your strategy, you decide on what ad unit or combination of ad units to use. You can use text ads, banner ads, audio ads (inserted in audio content), or rich media ads (multimedia ads that expand to full screen) on mobile internet pages. They can appear appended on text messages, MMS messages or mobile pages, the start or end of a video or audio clip, or when pages or apps are loading, within mobile apps, and so on. Also, like on the regular web, you can also display your ad on Google or other search engine’s search results pages.

Mobile search engine ads have the advantage of being optimized for location or geo-targeted. These are called hyper-local ads. One of the leading advertising networks for do-it-yourself mobile advertising is Admob.

Mobile Ad example

2. Mobile landing page – A landing page is a page on your site where you take your customer when they click on your link from an ad. A landing page should be optimized in such a way that shows up well on mobile devices.

Upon landing on this page, your customer is enticed to take action after reading your page, such as buy your product or enter information for you to gather leads. In contrast to a regular website, your mobile landing page should be clean, swift-loading, and the whole page should be visible without your user scrolling horizontally. Therefore, you make your customer convert using very few words. It can make use of Click to Call or email opt-ins.

Example of a Mobile Landing Page with a call to action

3. Mobile Coupon – This is a type of coupon that you don’t have to cut or print, but just show on your mobile phone. Coupons incentivize your customers to buy, as well as to opt-in to your email or SMS marketing.

Example of a Mobile Coupon that gets your customer to try your product

4. Click to Call – Through mobile advertising or other promotions, you can drive your audience to your mobile landing page. On this landing page, you can highlight your phone number, much like highlighting a link to your web page. When your customer clicks on your phone number, your number is automatically dialed, and you get connected with your customer.

Example of a Click to Call button you can place in your mobile page.

5. Maps – Maps from Google maps and other Mobile apps let people know where you are located, especially if they are near your place of business. When you have claimed your listing in Google Maps, your place of business appear in maps searches. Your map location links to a places page where you can put details about your business, and more.

Clicking your Business Name in Google maps sends customers to your Places Page

6. SMS – On offline media such as billboards, print ads, posters, and other places, you can ask people to text a mobile keyword on a short code, for example “Text Pizza to 45324” to win a free pizza. This is a great way to get leads. When your customer sends the code to the SMS number and indicating clearly on what he’s opting in, you can send future text messages to him about special offers and new products, for example.

Other uses of SMS include couponing, asking for votes, launching trivia programs, sending information and text alerts, triggering interactive calls, and more.

One advantage of SMS or Text is that it can entice immediate action. Ninety five percent of people receiving text messages open them up and usually within minutes.

Example of an SMS message you can send when your customer opts in

7. Multimedia Message Service (MMS) – also referred to as picture messaging or video messaging. It is similar to text messaging, but instead of text you send multimedia objects. With MMS, you can tell a story through entertaining and informative images, audio, video or rich text. You can also embed links that sends your audience to call services or a page with more information. Couponing via MMS involves compelling pictures, sounds and videos.

Example of Multimedia Message Service (MMS)

8. QR Code – This is a printed code which is a 2D image. You can print your QR code on anything, or even show it on a screen. QR codes can be found on business (like restaurant) entrances, posters, postcard, publications and many other places. When scanned on the mobile phone using a QR code reader app, the code transfers information to the mobile phone.

With QR Codes, you can share your URL and take the user directly to your site, your address for instant direction, social media accounts, or multimedia content, such as videos or images.

You can print your QR Code anywhere to transfer message to mobile phones

9. Location based social networking – Through the mobile devices GPS, you can do location-based promotions that take advantage of social networking and rewards users when they “check-in” on your venue. Examples of this are Foursquare, Facebook Places and Gowalla.

This is a the Foursquare screen in a mobile phone

10. Mobile Email – You can send marketing email to your customers who opt-in via ads, SMS, or other mobile advertising and promotion efforts.

Email marketing work great too in mobile devices. Make sure your customer opts in.

11. Voice (Interactive Voice Response or Call to Voice Mail) – Simply, IVR is automating your voice communication. It is not limited to an automated answering machine prompting your customer to press 1 for support. IVRs can also be used for setting appointments, sales assistance on location, do voice-interactive promotion, information requests, automated ordering, and more.

Mobile IVR

12. Apps – You can create your own app that users find useful, and promoting your brand. It can contain elements such as text updates or RSS feeds , multimedia, games, calculator, photo galleries, a little shop, and more. With Apple Apps you have to be approved for Apple before you can make it available in their App Market.

There are thousands of mobile apps competing for people's attention

With the internet and online world being a big and almost essential part of modern life, the traditional ways of reaching other people are being replaced.  Phone directories, newspapers, direct mail, print ads are not as effective as they were anymore in marketing your business.

Nowadays, when people search for your local business or [...]]]>

With the internet and online world being a big and almost essential part of modern life, the traditional ways of reaching other people are being replaced.  Phone directories, newspapers, direct mail, print ads are not as effective as they were anymore in marketing your business.

Nowadays, when people search for your local business or finding a solution to their problems via buying products and services, they go to the internet.  Their destination is usually the search engines, specifically Google.  Google holds around 70% of share of total search, while Yahoo and Bing combined have less than 30%, and so we shall focus primarily on getting prominent Google listings.  The basic principles also apply to Yahoo and Bing.

Google gives search for local businesses a boost by incorporating “Google Places” results in their search results.  Whenever a user looks for services or merchandise that is served by local businesses, or when Google predicts that a user is looking for local information, Google shows results listing businesses 5 miles away from where users do their searches.  In many cases, Google shows these results even higher than their normal or “organic” rankings.

An example of Google results for "pizza" search in Edison, NJ

The Google search results consist of the listing, the phone, the location, the maps and even reviews.  Indeed this gives richer information than any phone book can ever offer.  Google Places results also give a link to your website, or your “Places” page.

Your “Places” page is a web page that Google gives you to give more information about your business.  It includes hours of operation, photos, videos, coupons and products offered, to communicate with customers, and to get insights through the Local Business Dashboard that help them make smart business decisions.  What’s more important, this page is free!

An example of a Google Place page for pizza

Although your Google Places page contain enough information about your business, it does not replace having your own website because you get more flexibility presenting information from your website.  Also, users get the impression that you are a reliable business if you have a professional looking site, and Google might also have a ranking boost if your business has its own website.

Your concern is how does your business gets to be listed in these results?  Or better yet, how can you get high rankings from the listing to ensure that your business gets the best visibility.  Studies have shown that people click through the first rank results are substantially more than those than the second result, and so on.

Google Places ranks business listings based mainly on relevance to the search term used, as well as the geographic distance indicated by your search (example, “barbers in newark, nj”), or where you are doing your search.  Google knows that 80 percent of customers of your small local business come from people who live or work five miles from your location.

There are also other factors that go into the ranking, which Google keeps confidential.  There are, however, best practices that seem to help in getting a high rank in Google Places results.

Here is a step-by-step guide that could make your business show up, and even rank highly, in the Google Places results:

1.       If your business is already listed in Google Places, claim it.  Go to maps.google.com and search for the name and location of your business.  If you find your business already listed, click on the “more information” link on the results.  In your “Google Places” page, click the “Business owner?” link and supply all information being asked by Google.  Google will ask you to verify your listing by phone or by mail.

Click "Business Owner?" as first step to claim Google Local Listing

2.       If your business is not listed, claim your Google places page at www.google.com/places.  Fill out all the information that Google is asking for.  Google will ask you to verify your listing by phone or by mail.

3.       Within your website, make sure that your address and phone number is prominently seen in text (not graphics).  Use your local number if at all possible.

4.       Make sure your business information is consistent in the internet.  Search for all mentions of your business on the web, and see if your address, phone and business name is the same on all listings like in Yelp.com, CitySearch.com and other directories and yellow pages sites.  Update any inconsistencies. This will make Google become more confident about the information they put out there about you, and thus may result in a higher ranking.

5.       In Google places, find out if the categories you choose produce a Google Places search result.  Test and see which ones work best for you.

6.       Get local positive reviews of your business.  Some places where you can get reviews from customers are in Google Places itself, as well as third party websites Yahoo.com, CitySearch.com, InsiderPages.com, Yelp.com, and a lot more.   Also, keep in mind, that bad reviews may affect your ranking.  Be sure to respond or address the issues brought up on your bad reviews.

7.       Along with positive reviews, citations are also important to rank well in local search.  Citations are mentions of your business name and address on other web pages, even if there is no link to your website.  These web pages include other web yellow pages, SuperPages.com, local chamber of commerce or your local business association.  Multiple citations may help you rank high in Google Places.

8.       Claim your businesses in Yahoo and Bing as well.

There are techniques and strategies in claiming your Search Engine Places pages, making sure that your contact information are consistent, as well as acquiring positive reviews and citations that will help you rank well in the Search Engines’ Places page.  Also, in addition to optimizing your local listings, you should optimize your organic search engine presence as well.  If you have no time and inclination and would rather concentrate on your business, you can get services for Local Search Engine Optimization experts.

In the internet, your most basic presence is a website.  It is the staging point and the hub of everything that you do online.

Almost all of your activity in online marketing goes back to your website.  Your website is the face you show for your business.  This is where your customer gets his [...]]]>

In the internet, your most basic presence is a website.  It is the staging point and the hub of everything that you do online.

Almost all of your activity in online marketing goes back to your website.  Your website is the face you show for your business.  This is where your customer gets his first impression of your business.  This is where they interface with your business.

A professional-looking website says that you are a reliable, trustworthy, professional business.  A sloppy-looking website says that your business is small-time, amateurish and cannot be trusted.

That is why it is important that your website has a design and content that speaks well of your business.  Also, if you have a site or plan to have a site where your customer can buy merchandise (an e-commerce site) you should also ensure that the process of ordering is easy and problem-free.

Below are the basic steps of building a website:

1. Get a domain name.  This is the URL or web address that people write on their browser to get to your website.  A good domain name is short, memorable, easily spelled and typed, easy to say, and ideally, should contain your business’ keyword.  Dot com (.com) domain names are more trusted than .info, .biz, or any other top level domains (TLD).  Popular places where you can buy a domain are GoDaddy and Register.com.  Very often you can get your domain name for free from the host you sign up with.

 

2. Get a reliable host.  A host is a company that owns the server where your website lives.  The main consideration for choosing a host is the amount of functionalities it gives you for managing your site, such as a cPanel where you can create a site with a few clicks, access your site via file transfer, see activities on your site via logs, and more.  As to cost, you can sign up for hosting for as low as $6 a month.  There are even hosts that allow you to build several websites with unlimited traffic on one account.   The more popular hosts where customers are happy with include HostMonster, GoDaddy, and BlueHost.

 

3. Determine the business objectives of your website from a marketing perspective. The most common objectives are the following:
   • Inform customers about your product and services
   • Enhance and reinforce your brand on your audience’s mind
   • Generate leads or convince customers to contact you
   • Generate sales or sell directly via your site

 

4. Decide what your website should contain based on your objective. Content does not necessarily be composed of only text and graphics.  Depending on your marketing objective, you can put multimedia elements such as video, audio or flash animations.  For example, a video on the features of your product or how to use your product can be a great tool to convince your web visitor to buy your product.

 

5. Design the structure of your website. How is your content organized?  How do your users navigate from the main menu and find your most important content?  Having a good website structure also helps in optimizing your site for the search engine (or SEO).  Put your outline or plan on paper.

 

6. Decide the technology of your website depending on your content.

 

• For a plain vanilla “brochure website”, brochureware, or business card sites. It can be as simple as a plain html site that you create via software like Dreamweaver or can be design-flashy using Flash pages (not recommended if you are optimizing your site for the search engines).

 

• There are vendors that offer templates for business websites, and you just have to supply the content.  Examples of this are Yahoo Business and Intuit Websites.  These are more expensive and less flexible though than building your website yourself.

 

• An interactive website where your customer can post comments uses javascript and other web technologies.  CMS or Content Management Systems use databases and website programming language such as php to enable you to build a site that interacts with your customers.  Many web hosts offer easy installation of these CMS.  The more popular ones are WordPress, Drupal and Joomla.

 

• A site with ecommerce is more complex still, and you would need, aside from a “shopping cart CMS”, mechanism to have a secure site that protects it from being hacked.

 

7. Plan to make your site search engine friendly or search engine optimized. In designing the structure, assigning page titles and meta tags, and putting together the various elements of your pages, apply the basics of search engine optimization.  This will enable you to get free traffic from the search engines.  It is preferable to have your site optimized for the search engine at the outset, rather than making fixes later.

 

8. Build and launch your website.

If you do not have the knowledge or the inclination to build a website, you can hire site builders or web developers.

One fact you have to face is that even if you build it, they will not necessarily come.  Your website is just one of the billions of sites in the internet competing for an audience, and your audience, unaided, has no idea how to find you.

That’s why you have to drive your intended audience to your website.  You can do this offline by putting your web address on your calling card, on print, billboard or other form of “traditional” advertising. Recalling your web address (or URL) from offline media, however, involves effort from your audience as they have to memorize your web address or write it down until the time they have access to the internet.  Unless your audience is very motivated to access your website, the chances of losing him is great.

The best way is to grab your audience is by getting in front of him while he is online.  If it takes just a click to get to your website while he is already online, it is more probable that he will visit your site.  Attracting an audience can be done by search engine optimization, pay per click, social media marketing and other online promotion techniques.

The first place where people go to for information about a product is the search engine.  Google accounts for more than 65% of searches, while Yahoo and Bing have less than 30%.

When users look for information to solve their problems or research about a product, the search engines give them the most relevant [...]]]>

The first place where people go to for information about a product is the search engine.  Google accounts for more than 65% of searches, while Yahoo and Bing have less than 30%.

When users look for information to solve their problems or research about a product, the search engines give them the most relevant and best results (as determined by links and other search engine optimization factors).  Users often do not go beyond the first page when looking for results.  If your site does not appear on the first page, you cannot expect to get a lot of referrals to your sites.  There is a way though to be visible in the search engines by paying for it, and that is through search engine advertising.

In Google, search engine ads are found on the right side of the results page.  It can also be found on top of the “unpaid” or organic results.  They are clearly labeled “ads” so that it is clear to users that they are paid results.  The appearance of your ad is triggered by the keyword search you want your ad to appear in.

Paid ads in Google

Search engine text ads normally consist of a headline, two lines of copy message and a web address or URL.

One great benefit of search engine advertising is that it turns up when people are searching for your product or terms related to your product (or whatever keyword search you would like your ad to be visible in).  This way, you are showing your ad to the user who is already interested in what you are selling or offering.

Another benefit of this form of advertising is that you only pay when your ad is clicked, or when the search engine sends a user to your site.  This is why search engine advertising is also called pay per click ads or PPC.   Paying per click makes advertising more cost efficient than many other forms of advertising because you only pay when the user who is actually interested in your product actually goes to your website.

Google and other search engines place ads not only on their results pages.  They also partner with thousands of website owners with informational content on their site.  These are called “content networks”.  Search engines have the ability to put ads on a page with content that is related to your product, as determined by their algorithm.  Ads that show up on these websites are called “content ads” or “contextual ads”.

Example of contextual ads or ads in Google content partners

Since content ads show up on content that are related to your product, you are making it visible to users who are already interested in your product and are predisposed to buy.  For example, a golf-related website has Google ads of golf-related products.

In the content network, you can also choose to show image ads.  Also, ads in the content network are usually much cheaper than ads in search result pages.

Example of an image ads in Google content partners

The price of a click is determined by bidding and the quality of the page where you are taking your audience (the “landing page” or “destination URL”).  You compete with other advertisers who want to show up on the same keywords.  The more competitive the keyword, the higher the price per click tends to be.  The higher you bid, the higher you show up on the “paid results”.  The higher you appear, the more visible your ad becomes in the search engine.  A click can be as cheap as .10 and as expensive as $35.00 or more.

In a nutshell, you perform Search Engine or Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertising as follows:

1. Create an advertiser account with Google, Yahoo or Bing, indicating billing and other advertiser information.
2. Do keyword research to find out what keyword phrases users use to look for your products and services, as well as other keywords that relate to the solutions you offer.  You want these keywords to trigger your ad in the search engine.
3. Create an ad following the copy constraints.
4. Create a page where you want users to land when they click the link on your ad.  Your landing page must have content that effectively converts your visitor into customers.
5. On your search engine account dashboard, create a campaign with its own keyword group and ad copy.
6. Indicate your bid or the amount you are willing to pay per click on your chosen keywords.
7. You can also control the day and time when you want your the ads to appear, in which location, and whether your ads appear on the search results, on the content network, or both.  There are many other options that you can choose to make your ads as cost effective as possible.
8. Prune the keywords and ads that do not perform well, and bid higher on the ads that prove to be profitable.

Being successful in PPC and search engine advertising takes analytic skills and knowledge of specialized advertising strategies, beginning with keyword research, tracking your results, and so on.  If you do not have the time, the inclination or the skill to perform PPC advertising, you can hire an agency or a freelance advertiser.

You have the perfect product presentation on your site, and your content is sure to motivate your audience to buy.  Now,  your only problem is to get people to your site.

With billions of websites in the internet competing for visitor’s attention, it is not easy to get found.  The best way to be [...]]]>

You have the perfect product presentation on your site, and your content is sure to motivate your audience to buy.  Now,  your only problem is to get people to your site.

With billions of websites in the internet competing for visitor’s attention, it is not easy to get found.  The best way to be visible is to be in front of people when they use the most important sites to get information – the search engines.  Google is the most popular search engine by far, with approximately 70% share of users.  Far second is Bing and Yahoo combined with 27%.

Search engines have to decide which websites to rank on the first page of their results pages.  They look at a number of factors to determine the most relevant, most authoritative and the highest quality web site or page for the search.  Presenting your website in the best possible way to the search engines so that it will be visible in their results pages (without paying the search engines) is called Search Engine Optimization or SEO.

When building your website, it is best to have it optimized for the search engines at the outset.  However, search engine optimization can still be performed after your site is built by making changes.

But before you decide how to optimize your page, you have to decide on what search terms or search phrases (also known as keywords) to rank.  You have to know where your target is before deciding which direction to shoot.

Keyword Research

Keyword research is the foundation of SEO.  You have to know what keywords people use to search for your product or services.  There are many tools on the web that gives you this information.  The most popular tool is the Google Keyword Tool.

Remember that the terms you or your industry use may not be what ordinary customers use to search for your products.  For example, although you are a doctor who practices “physical medicine”, ordinary people do not search for that term to search for your services.  They search for such words as “pain treatment” or “chronic pain” instead.   Also, the most popular keywords are not necessarily the ones that lead to sales.  Needless to say, keyword research takes skill in order to unearth important keyword targets that will work for your business.

After keyword research and determining your targeted keywords, you then work on the three groups of elements that search engines look at to evaluate your website:  the elements that you put on your pages (or on-page), those that are beyond your page (off-page) and other attributes.  These are some of the more important elements pre group:

On-Page SEO elements

These are what site owners can directly control so this is fairly easy to do.

1. Page Title Tag – This is what you see on the left hand corner of the browser, and the primary signal that Google uses to find out what your page is about (and where to rank it).  Use your target keywords in creating your page title.  Each page of your site should have unique page titles as each should be focusing on unique topics.


The page title signals to the search engine what the page is about.

2. Content – The content of your page should be consistent with what your Title Tag says your page is about.  Strive to have a minimum of 300 words of search engine readable text in your content.  Also strive to focus on a single subject per page, so as not to confuse the search engines as to what your page is about.
3. Description Meta Tag -  This is what you see in the Search Engine results pages as description of your site.   Try to have an enticing description about your site so users will click on your link when they find it on the results page.



4. Internal Links – The pages on your sites should be interlinking to each other.  When you are linking to a page within your site, you are telling the search engines that the linked page is important.  Also, use descriptive text links containing keywords when you link to other pages on your site.  Use “Acme product benefits” or “Acme model 311 reviews” instead of  “click here” or “read here”, etc.

Off-Page SEO elements

These are elements that you may have very little control, or takes more effort to control, and are thus actually more important factors for search engines.

1. External links – Links from other websites to your pages are seen by search engines as votes on the quality of your pages as well as the authority of your site.  The more links your site get, the more votes it has.  Links coming from other authoritative and trusted sites are more valued by search engines than those coming from run-of-the-mill blogs, for example.  Relevant links are more valued than links from sites that are not relevant to yours.  Links coming from editorial content are more valued than links from footers, side columns or those coming from pages with lots of links in it.  Again, the text of the link going to your site is important. For example, if other sites link to your web page with the text link “New Jersey insurance”, the search engines see this as a strong signal that your page is an important page about New Jersey insurance.
2. Social media – Links and citations from social media like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. are considered by search engines as signals of the popularity your site.

Other Attributes

These are minor attributes that come naturally when building your site:

1. Domain name – Ideally, your keyword target should appear in the domain name, although you may prefer your domain name to have brand value instead.
2. Site age and history – The older your site, the more trustworthy it is.  Your site should not have a history of being banned for spamming or trying to game the search engines (especially important if you are buying an old site).
3. Click through rate in the results page – When search engines display your result, they may be looking if your listing is being clicked.  The search engines may look at this as signal that your page is relevant to that particular search.
4. Bounce rate – The search engines may also be looking if people exits your site immediately after they click on your link in their results pages.  If you have a high bounce rate, then your site may not be relevant to the search or of poor quality.

This, in a nutshell, is the basics on how to perform Search Engine Optimization.   There are a number of strategies that skilled SEO employ to give your site as much visibility as possible, such as targeting long tail keywords, testing what strategies work, acquiring links from authoritative sites, and more.  It is a science, as well as an art.

SEO skills are even more important if you are in a competitive industry, or your competition is SEO-savvy.

If you need to focus on managing your business, you can always hire an SEO firm or SEO professionals to perform your site’s optimization.

You have a local business site?  Click here for how to be visible in search engine local places results (the results with the red pin on them).