Search Engine Marketing : More than just SEO

I have too many people who come to me just for SEO.

There are so many other Search Engine Marketing things to be done. Search Engine Marketing, I mean TRUE Search Engine Marketing means attracting traffic and more specifically, customers from ALL OVER THE WEB. It involves MANY marketing channels that use search engines and other internet venues.

How do you know when you Search Engine Marketing job is done? (hint: it never truly is)…here’s how:

First: When you have dominant search engine positioning across the major terms that accumulate traffic for your site on Google.

Second: When you have spread that search engine dominance across other major search engines such as Yahoo and MSN.

Third: When you have reached some semblance of dominance of the long tail keywords for your site.

Fourth: When you have dominated the Pay Per Click business associated with your site for all of the same terms (both major and long tail terms) associated with your site.

Fifth: When you have partnered or acquired the leads from as many of the others that compete against you on the top 10 as possible. (Often times the cost to acquire these leads is higher than doing the original SEO, but it creates diversity and insulates you from a drop in rankings.) Think of this as growing by acquisition.

Now it is time to broaden from Search Engine Marketing to Online Marketing in general.

Six: When you have researched ALL of the other places online where people go to buy your product and have created ways to capture as much of those leads as possible. Examples of this are Facebook advertising, advertising on competing media websites such as newspaper sites, radio station sites, where appropriate, and on any other site where there would be relevant traffic that is COST EFFECTIVE.

Dominating all cost effective options (marketing channels) either by presence, placement, purchase or partnership is the only way to say that you are a TRULY dominant online marketing force for your niche.

Thoughts?

I’ll show you mine if you show me yours…

Did that grab your attention?

Are you blogging or optimizing for fun? or for profit?

If it is for profit, the keep reading otherwise, this is a waste of time for you. If you took more than 5 seconds to decide, don’t read the rest of this either. Go back to the first sentence and DECIDE if you TRULY are building your blog or website for PROFIT.

Once you build some relationships within an industry or among some blogging counterparts, the next step is to take the trust that you have built up and kick it up a notch. One of the highest leverage activities that you can do with friends is comparing notes among non-competitors in a similar industry. Seriously, BENCHMARKING WORKS. If you truly want to win in this world of online marketing, you have to be willing to give in order to get.

Here are some things that I am shared with trusted friends in the last few months:

My Analytics. When this Blog dropped off the face of Google. How many visitors I was turning into leads,given my traffic. Tons of different strategies that I was testing SEO wise. Which blogs I was working on. More WordPress plugins than I care to count. Sources of links. Tons of on page SEO stuff…Etc. Etc. Etc . The list could literally go on forever.

Do you know what I got in return. Much of the same thing! By being willing to share and opening up what I don’t know to others, I LEARNED and GAINED EXPERIENCE. Here’s the bottom line:

In a business like online marketing, you HAVE to stay on the cutting edge. To stay there, you MUST be able to evaluate quickly and have a neural network of many friends watching your six o’clock while you watch theirs. It is also CRUCIAL to know what works and what does not. Wasted time on misinformation and disinformation is death rattle. Don’t be too prideful or too vain about your site stats or analytics data. Trust me…being humble enough to show yours in exchange for a peek at someone else’s can be an enlightening process. (grin) Usually you BOTH learn something.

Microsoft ends bid for Yahoo…

Yesterday, Microsoft President and CEO Steve Ballmer publicly announced the end of Microsoft’s bid to acquire Yahoo. In recent weeks, the bid had grown, largely on impressive 1st Quarter results by Yahoo. From Mr. Ballmer’s press release:

“Despite our best efforts, including raising our bid by roughly $5 billion, Yahoo! has not moved toward accepting our offer. After careful consideration, we believe the economics demanded by Yahoo! do not make sense for us, and it is in the best interests of Microsoft stockholders, employees and other stakeholders to withdraw our proposal,” said Ballmer.

OK, so what does this mean to search engine marketers? Not much and more of the same. For the most part, the only search engine to be optimizing for is Google anyway. Yahoo does not carry near the traffic and is bleeding relevance. Is it possible that the impressive 1st quarter stats were window dressing and will fall in the next few months. My research would say yes. Is it likely that Yahoo stock prices will fall now that Microsoft has ended its bid. Highly likely. Could this force Yahoo back to the table with Microsoft. Ummm..yeah…that is a possibility. Will it happen? Who knows…

I am interested in others’ opinions on this…what impact do you think it has?

Greatest real estate agent in the World – Your name here!

Are you the GREATEST real estate agent in the world?

There is a contest underway on the internet to see (according to Google) who the Greatest real estate agent is…not just in your location, but the world. Their contest ends on May 1, 2008. what I offered members of my team was IMMORTALITY!

How can you be the GREATEST REAL ESTATE AGENT IN THE WORLD?

The top 10 contributors to my TEAM Project win the Title! REMEMBER-Since I do NOT sell real estate, I am only helping YOU promote yourself! WIN-WIN!

Team Eric Member #8: There are several ways to contribute and EARN your way in– just like there are MANY ways that Google determines Authority, we need to credit the many ways authority can be built!

LINKS–linking to this page is a HUGE way (grin), but Links are only ONE way of authority building. The top six link contributors to our community project (as determined by the amount of quality links contributed) are in!

PUBLICITY–The two REALTORS providing the most publicity to this project also wins! This does NOT mean that they contribute links. Raising awareness BUILDS AUTHORITY and thats what Google wants.

IDEAS / INSIGHT / CREATIVITY: This contest is for 3 months…I reserve the right to award 2 of the ten spots to REALTORS who assist me with ideas and insight–EVEN insight into what competitors are up to! Want to be devious and help me out? (grin) You can earn a spot on TEAM ERIC and be the GREATEST REAL ESTATE AGENT IN THE WORLD.

GOOD LUCK!
So here are the members of Team Eric so far. They are listed in no particular order. You are about to find out who they are and WHY they are on my team!

Team member #1:

Jennifer Karlen (and her husband Jon)–aka the Greatest Real Estate Agents in the World for Horse Farms

Known officially as the K2 Group at RE/MAX Properties East in Louisville Kentucky, Jennifer has been in the real estate business for years and they have built up a GREAT business for clients with Kentucky horse farms. While due to the rules of this Contest I cannot put a link to their site here, you can call Jennifer at 866-353-6353. They are the best.

Team Eric member #2:

Greg Swann –aka–The Greatest Real Estate Agent in the World of Arizona.

Greg runs Bloodhound Realty and the Bloodhound Blog (Google that–then read it). He is a great guy and a writer in a league of his own. The Bloodhound Blog is hosting a conference in May called Unchained. Go to his blog and sign up! Best $199 you will EVER spend. The greatest real estate agents in the world understand their markets, the real estate business and technology and he is the quintessential example of all of that rolled into one package.

Team Eric member #3:

Ken Smith–aka–The Greatest Real Estate Agent in Arlington Heights.

Ken owns Suburban House Hunters, a team of real estate professionals that specializes in the suburbs that surround Chicago Illinois. He is a veteran broker with tons of experience who understands online lead generation like few others. I am honored to have him on the team and call him a friend. Thanks Ken …

Team Eric member #4:

Wayne Long–aka–The Greatest Real Estate Agent in the world of Columbus Georgia.

(We won’t tell anyone, but the Greatest is actually his wife Donna!) Wayne’s a great REALTOR who has seen a lot in the market. I would without a doubt send referrals to Wayne because I KNOW they would be treated to a world class experience.

Team Eric Member #5:

Judy Orr –aka The Greatest Real Estate Agent in the World of Cook County, Illinois!

Judy and I have moderated together on RealEstateWebmasters.com and she is one of the nicest people I know. She is experience and has been in the real estate game a long time (she must have started when she was 12!) Google Cook county real estate and you will see JudyO there…she knows her stuff and don’t let the sweet smile fool you. She means business-grin.

Team Eric member #6:

Cal Carter–aka The Greatest Real Estate Agent in Gulf Shores Alabama.

More people need to know about Cal…and the beautiful area of the country that he is from. He is incredibly smart and has the experience that comes from YEARS of online lead generation. This contest has allowed me to get to know him MUCH better. I am a better person for knowing Cal. And that’s EXACTLY how you’d define the Greatest Real Estate Agents in the World. They make you better for knowing them.

Team Eric Member #7:

Mike Dammann–aka The Greatest Real Estate Agent in the beautiful world of Costa Rica.

Mike is a search engine veteran who I bumped into a few years ago and instantly liked. We all have different levels of search knowledge and I (personally) have really benefited from his experience. We have spent a TON of time online during this contest. The banner ad below and donating the proceeds to the Eco Preservation Society was his idea and I am really enjoying hanging with him as part of the team. Get in there and Donate! grin

Team Eric Member #8:

Charles and Jacqueline Richey–aka The Greatest Real Estate Agent in the world of Las Vegas

I first met Charles at PubCon last December. I enjoyed the time that we got to kick back and learn there. Since that time, and especially as part of this contest, he has been a great source of authority for our little effort. If you are moving to Las Vegas, these guys truly are the Greatest.

Team Eric Member #9:

Matt Scoggins–aka The Greatest Real Estate Agent in the world of Atlanta

Matt is the guy behind his wife Louise’s site and he gives me the PERFECT opportunity to make a point. Even though I am great friends with Ryan Ward, one of his competitors in Atlanta (but who is competing with us in the contest), Matt has been a GREAT member of our team. Great Real Estate Agents work together with other agents, regardless of the competitive issues. They simply make them NON-issues by being great people. Thanks Matt, for being part of Team Eric and helping to demonstrate the true value in creating synergy where others would only create competition. The bottomline is that by giving, we get and Matt is a great example of that. Our friendship certainly will not end with this contest and I truly appreciate your quiet but unwavering supprt.

Finally, the Greatest Real Estate agents GIVE to causes that they support!

MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT: OUR “GREATEST REAL ESTATE AGENT IN THE WORLD” TEAM IS NOW PLAYING FOR A CAUSE!! JOIN US AS WE SUPPORT THE ECO PRESERVATION SOCIETY’S EFFORTS TO SAVE THE COSTA RICA ENVIRONMENT. WANT TO HELP?? HERE’S HOW.

Here is a video about them:

At the end of the contest, we will donate our winnings to this unique charity as well…

Oh yeah… there is a mystery #10 spot…Who’s gonna get it???!!
ANNOUNCEMENT:

TEAM ERIC has appointed a #10 MEMBER.

Team Eric Member #10:

Marc Rasmussen–aka The Greatest Real Estate Agent in Sarasota

Marc owns LUXURY SARASOTA REAL ESTATE .COM and he is a great guy that many of us have known for years. We have been STUNNED to see the way that the Sarasota Association of REALTORS has treated one of their own. In our view they are hypocrites and cowards. We therefore have given him an honorary membership on our team. We know how to treat “members”…

FINAL NOTE:

It is now just about 40 hours before the end of the contest, (but who’s counting-grin). One of the things that I needed to do as part of the rules was to comment on what I have learned from one of the other contestants…I am going to comment on two: Ryan Ward and Greg Boser.

Ryan is a consumate friend and professional. I would link to his post, but it is now linked to mine. I trust him and was he ahead of me coming down the home stretch, I honestly would have done the same thing. What did I learn from him? That friendship counts.

Greg is someone who I don’t know as well and yet, what I have learned from his contest piece was no less important. Greg was the un-contestant. It is a strategy that he used to great effect in the Dave Pasternak SEO contest, so I have to consider him a contestant despite his insistance to the contrary. What I learned from Greg was / is the skillful use of redirects. I am not going to go into it in public, but it was interesting to me… I admire Greg as a SEO technician and tactician. Both of those things are essential in optimizing a site.

Greg may or may not be bouncing up in these last few hours of the contest. Essentially I see three options:

a) He is too busy with company stuff. (totally understandable)
b) He is gonna come out of nowhere (possible but not likely in my book)
c) He is gonna redirect to one of the others in the contest and push them over the top. (a likely scenario as well)

The genius of Greg is–you NEVER know (grin). He plays this stuff close to the vest. So, whatever the case is, Greg, my hat is off to you. Even if you decided a few weeks back to focus on other stuff, it was fun. Even if you come out of nowhere and or push someone else over the top, let’s meet up sometime–have a few laughs and talk shop…sound good?

To all of the worthy competitors out there…(whether we win or lose), here a round of applause from Team Eric and my continued best wishes for all of you.

Greatest Real Estate Agent in the World – according to NAR

Our team for the Greatest real estate agent in the world contest, Team Eric, has had a lot of fun, learned a lot and made a lot of friends along the way. But our original greatest real estate agent entry did not do one thing.

Define what make a REALTOR great.

So we thought that we would go to the AUTHORITY on what makes a REALTOR great…the National Association of REALTORS site- REALTOR.org and provide folks curious about the contest with the REALTOR Code of Ethics

Take a read through the code of ethics…does your REALTOR measure up? If they don’t, they should! The greatest real estate agents in the world live up to this code day in and day out.

On top of that, if you want to call your self the GREATEST, you had better be able to PROVE that you can MARKET a Home and not just list it. The folks on Team Eric are the best of the best at online marketing and since the vast majority of folks are buying homes online these days, that is important.

What else makes a real estate agent great? Hey, drop us a comment about what made YOUR REALTOR great! We’d love to hear from you!

YahSoft! Analysis – Part 1 Will it happen and was Ballmer smart to do it?

Since Southern Indiana Web Works is devoted to web development and online marketing, it only makes sense to analyze the news this morning of Microsoft’s offer to buy Yahoo! Rumors had been going around for awhile and many in the industry were hoping for a rival to Google, but now the offer is on the table.

Will it happen? (read: Will Microsoft actually buy Yahoo!).

In my mind, the answer is yes – with about 90% certainty. The reasons are fairly straightforward:

Yahoo is in T-R-O-U-B-L-E with their current stock valuation – The world has now truly started to put a number to Google’s domination of the search engines (and as well on Yahoo’s LACK thereof). Relevance is the mother’s milk of search engine traffic and Yahoo has seen better days in that regard by comparison to Google. They recently have been laying off employees in an industry that is experiencing double digit growth…that only happens if you lose focus -TOTALLY.

Microsoft is running out of growth opportunities to keep advancing their software and is sitting on a pile of cash. Their entrant in the search engine beauty contest is neither pretty enough to attract a majority of the eyeballs nor dominant enough to demand advertising respect. It is an “also ran” at this point in the game.

The pending “recession” (if you believe in it.) will reduce the expenditures on other marketing and advertising, but online will continue to be a growth market while print, and other media ventures struggle to compete for ad spend.

The additional factor in this is that there is a growing number of Google execs that are now fully vested…will they migrate north toward Washington state? Google countered recently with their senior management saying they have a plan to stay together for 20 years. How defensible are the non disclosure / non compete contracts that they have signed? Hmmm…there’s about a month straight of research waiting to be done there, but I am guessing that at least a few “knowledge workers” will find their way to the new headquarters.

All of this has Ballmer chomping at the bit to make his mark on Microsoft by taking on Google…He sees the ‘perfect storm’ and knows that it will never be easier than now to put this deal together. His eager nature is reflected in the size of the bid. At $44+ Billion, the offer is a significant premium (north of 60%) to what shareholder market cap currently is. Why pay that much? Because it will put IMMENSE pressure on Yahoo and their team to take the offer.

Was Ballmer smart to do it?

It is an interesting question. Time will tell, but I think the positives WAY outweigh the negatives here…even though he is only buying himself less than 25% market share in the search engine business with Yahoo and MSN combined.

Given that revenues are still acceptable at Yahoo and there are numerous opportunities for “synergy” (read: workforce reduction) when combined, I think he made a good move. THIS IS DIFFERENT THAN –’WILL IT GIVE HIM SEARCH ENGINE COMPETITIVENESS WITH GOOGLE’. I think it is REALLY hard to dethrone someone who has 70+% market share in the short run…even if you ARE Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer.

OK so there you have my initial opinion. Now for what matters…how does this affect search marketing?

Thoughts?

I will post mine tomorrow on that subject.

Search Engine Optimization Purpose of Pinging-in plain English

I get asked occasionally from Search Engine Optimization clients about my recommendation that they “ping” Google after each addition of content to their site. “Why do I need to do that after each post or page?” “How do I do it?’

With WordPress as your blogging platform or website CMS, pinging could not be simpler, but first the WHYs… Let’s start with the obvious ones. It get’s your site indexed in Google and other search engines quickly. Simple as that. Many’s the time that I have optimised a post for search engines and published it, followed by a “ping” and the page was indexed almost immediately and post ranked in Google almost that fast.

It is eery the first time you do it. Magical the second time. Downright addictive after that.

But there is a better reason. You may have heard of “scraper sites” – -sites that “scrape” your post and then put it on your blog. Here’s a test: Put a post up on your blog and wait for a couple of weeks. Go to copyscape and SEE where it has gone on the web. You will see at least a couple of copies of it floating around.

Search engines’ only way to determine WHOM to credit with the original ownership of the page is the first one that they have found (or indexed). Being first helps assure your ownership. You would be surprised how quickly other sites grab your content.

There are the WHYs…a couple of pretty doggone good Search Engine Optimization reasons to “ping” after each post. Fortunately in WordPress, the how is a piece of cake. I use a plugin called Sitemap Generator that generates a new sitemap (taking into account my latest post) AND it pings all in one step. This gives me everything I need in one click of the button. Download the plugin and install it in the usual way, with the files under Content – Plugins. Activate it and you are SET.

First, I finish the post and publish it. Then I go to the OPTIONS menu in WordPress. After activation, there will be a menu item under options called “Sitemap”. Click on that and click the “Manual Rebuild” button.

Pretty simple huh?

Posting to your blog or adding pages to your website should be a process of lather-rinse-repeat. Post great content – Publish – Ping.

For other practical insights on how to Simply and Effectively get to where you want to be on the search engines with a WordPress blog or WordPress based Website, feel free to contact us. The form on the upper right hand corner of this page will work just fine.

Thoughts from others on pinging?

Yahoo lays off hundreds, the librarian wins again.

With the news breaking this morning that Yahoo will reportedly layoff hundreds in an effort at retaining profitability. WOW. What caused this, in an industry that is generating a stagggering increase year after year in advertising revenue? How can you have layoffs in such a great environment?

Here’s my take:

This is a CLASSIC example of a large company losing focus. I mean sure, we are a search engine, but we are a portal, I mean, but we are free email, I mean  but we are all about connecting people. WHAT?? They didn’t really WIN at any of those other things before attempting to expand.

Meanwhile, the librarian (Google), has focused primarily on being a search engine. Look at their website. (Yeah, that’s all Google is is a website…but they have become a VERB…you Google something.) Their interface is clean and simple. Want something? Google it. We’ll give it to you FASTER and MORE RELEVANT. Spot on what you need and when you need it.

Meanwhile Yahoo has been beleiving the hype of their own marketing campaigns that 2nd place is good enough. It isn’t in today’s internet.

But you say, well…Google has added many other companies as well (YouTube, etc.). They puchased DOMINANT entities that have created VALUE that have SYNERGY with their MAIN focus –being a search engine. Subtle, but critical difference.

FOCUS is the key. Google, as librarian to the world has succeeded in providing the best and most relevant answers to Title, Subject and Author related queries and has won the hearts and minds of consumers in the process.

Yahoo is neither a great librarian, nor a great email platform, etc, etc…Jack of all trades and master of none.

There’s a lesson to be learned there with online marketing. Focus. Focus. Focus. Find a niche and DOMINATE it. Just my opinion.

In for a change? Want to sell your domain?

Southern Indiana web works has clients looking for local domains in a variety of industries. Domains have value. If you are closing down a shop, shifting to a new line of work, retiring, or otherwise in for a change, your website and its domain can have value to others. Here are a few tips to keep your domain value as high as possible:

1. Don’t let it expire- It has value. Many sales professionals (insurance, mortgage, real estate, etc) let their domains expire and needlessly throw away much of their value. It is like bending a baseball card can remove much of it’s value.
2. Plan ahead to sell it– It may be worth a little or a lot. The difference is often in PLANNING and taking time to find the RIGHT people to sell it to. Southern Indiana Web Works can help. We will happily offer free appraisals of your domains value and show you EXACTLY what adds value to your domain and who would be best to sell it to.
3. Avoid hustlers and shysters- There are a lot of people out there buying domains. Did you know that? You need to talk to experts and not simply take the first thing you are told as the gospel truth. Respectable people in the world of websites will be happy to give you a list of others to check with on the value of your domain.
4. Don’t be dissapointed if the value is less than you thought–you can increase it’s value and then sell it!! Unlike baseball cards, you can actively build the value of your domains! Want to know how? Give us a call, we will be happy to consult with you! The time to get started on this is NOW.

Network Solutions – Holding Domain Ideas for Ransom

So you are thinking about building a website or two. You go to Network Solutions and look up some domain names. But then you look around and decide to register them elsewhere and they are not available? WHAT!!!!????

Network Solutions (as reported in several places on the web–Like Here. ) is temporarily buying those domain names and FORCING you to buy them FROM them at 3 X the money! Talk about anti-competitive.

If indeed it is true and it seems to be since they themselves have called it a “security measure”…It is time to BOYCOTT them. The answer is simple. Search for your domains elsewhere. Any other registrar is fine.

In my opinion, Network Solutions’ move is LOW CLASS and we need to vote with our feet. Security measure my eye….this is a revenue grab plain and simple. They say it is to stop “Domain Tasting”. Ye, tasting IS a problem. No, I don’t participate in domain tasting. And No. This isn’t the solution.

This is simply a way for this overpriced company to charge unsuspecting searchers who are looking for possible domains much more money.

Just my opinion.

Eric

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