Local search, well, it’s just different than regular search optimization. The signals are different, for one. Reviews are key, and local search engines are absolutely critical.
In the US, these sources are well known. Yahoo and Bing Local, Angie’s List, Yelp, Localeze, Judy’s Book and Dex are among the top sources for local influence.
In Canada, it’s a very different story. None of the above accept submissions from Canadian companies.
For Canadian companies, the options are there – but they’re not as obvious. For an example, let’s look at our friends over at Big Green Storage.
Big Green Storage is a small self-storage facility located in my home town of Nanaimo, BC. Like many small businesses, the owner – John – is busy running his business and wearing the half-dozen hats that small entrepreneurs wear.
The goal of setting something up for John is to rank, first and foremost, for the business name. I can’t say how important it is to have ownership of your content – when you have ownership, you have control of the user experience when people land on your site.
The first steps were a domain, hosting and a small, modest website. Those done, we needed to get some links going.
I won’t list all the sites I submit to (I don’t want to give it all away), but they include a mix of fast-acceptance and high crawl frequency (like Craigslist and Kijiji) with longer term, high authority (Google Places and Yelp). The fast acceptance is so the site gets crawled and indexed quickly, the high authority is to build ranks.
For icing on the cake, this post on my blog serves both me and my client well. I get to write about local search marketing, my client gets a contextual link from a decent source – one which I know will help his site get indexed.
It’s a shame that the sites said to have the most influence don’t have a great global presence, but it’s not unusual and, if you’re Canadian, it’s something you’ll have to get used to. The upside is that the sources are harder to find, so it’s easier to get an edge over the competition.
This entry was written by Sean Enns, posted on October 24, 2011 at 1:34 pm, filed under Link Building, Search Engine Optimization. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.
I’m kind of a type nut.
Even though I’m not a designer, I have a yearn to learn more about type. Things like kerning and line spacing excite me.
Web fonts, their use and their proliferation online is something I can really sink my teeth into. And have, since the beginnings of Harbour City SEO when I launched my UFO site, and then last year when I pushed on with my main site and used Day Poster Black as my headings, last Halloween when I launched Scary Pants SEO and this year when I relaunched my site with Press Gothic and Museo driving the content.
I like to think I’ve grown and gained some maturity in my usage, and I’d like to think that my designs reflect that growth. I’d also like to think that I’m showcasing the best of the web, (at least, not the worst) by using modern CSS, HTML5 elements and liberal doses of current content.
If you’re a website that hasn’t yet adopted web fonts in all their glory, well, I want to help you with that. I’m going to help you by giving you five reasons to start using web fonts, and then, if you need it, I’ll help you implement them.
- It’s easy. Sites like Typekit, Font Squirrel and Fonts.com provide you with kits, even host the fonts for you.
- It’s (at times) free. There are lots of sites with great and free fonts available. (Font Squirrel has tons of ‘em)
- It’s a good way to make your site stand out. Nothing says “unique” like a site with custom web fonts.
- It’s hip. Currency (current-ness, not money) is a great way to show clients and visitors that you’re not just online, but that you’re active online.
- It’s marketing. I just submitted my site to the Web Font Awards, and might win stuff. At the very least, I’m gonna get a link out of it.
Like what you see? Contact me to add web fonts to your website.
Shameless self promotion - vote for me in the web font awards!
This entry was written by Sean Enns, posted on October 17, 2011 at 10:55 am, filed under Content Marketing, Fonts, Link Building. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.
I’m trying to organize my content more effectively. By that, I mean that I want to have things positioned in such a way that everybody sees the content that was created with their needs in mind, regardless of who they are.
Not that there’s content people shouldn’t see, but each person that visits any of my web personalities is drawn in because they have a specific goal in mind, and my current goals are to connect them with that content as quickly as possible.
My first step is defining the things I do and creating a taxonomy of sorts, and nothing says “fun” like a venn diagram. I’m also testing out some new fonts (A display gothic, and Museo slab) that I may use in some new marketing as my headings and body text respectively.
This entry was written by Sean Enns, posted on April 14, 2011 at 3:49 pm, filed under Content Marketing, Copywriting, Link Building, Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Social Media. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.
As I look into 2011, I also look back to 2005 when I started doing SEO and think to myself – the more things change, the more they stay the same.
When I started, SEO seemed essentially a black art based on programming and chicanery. There were whitehats like Doug Heil marching around the web with ramparts that shouted “spam is spam, you know it is” and on the other end of the battlefield, blackhats like Zwart and Earl Grey made it their mission to thwart the highly exploitable Google.
It’s a very different world now. Opportunities for links are endless and limited only by creativity and a desire to participate. It’s much less like the wild west and more like a well established frontier town. Suffice to say, business is booming.
So I find it maddening when I see companies selling certain services. There’s a lot of stuff that’s free and takes just a few minutes. There’s an equal amount that’s worthless and will do little more than drain your bank account. I’ll say it now, if you are paying a company to do these things for you, you’re being ripped off and should hold them accountable. Ask them why it costs so much to do it and how they can justify the expanse. What are those things? I’m glad you asked, they’re right here.
1) Submission to ‘multiple’ search engines
It’s a complete and utter waste of time. There are three (really two, OK one) search engines. Google, MSN (aka Bing) and Yahoo! (Ya-who?). Submitting in no way guarantees that your site will get indexed and anyone that charges for submission is doing you a disservice. The fastest way to get indexed is by creating a single link from a site that is already in Google (any site will do) to your site. If you want proof, give me a call – I’ll give you a link for free (non-indexed sites only).
2) Sitemaps for small sites (XML or otherwise)
Most business websites are 10 pages or less. Some are 15, fine, but even then – so long as all pages on your site are accessible via text links on the home page, you won’t have a problem getting crawled and indexed. There’s some SEO value to having a standard sitemap but no SEO value to the XML version, so I would only do it if your site isn’t already indexed. This doesn’t include new sites either, I’m talking existing well established sites. It’s a cash grab.
3) Meta Keywords
If you’re paying for the meta keywords element, insist that it be removed and that your costs be lowered accordingly. It doesn’t work. It didn’t work 5 years ago and it doesn’t work now. Google has stated that it doesn’t work. I’ve heard a ludicrous counter argument that since Google doesn’t disclose their algorithm, they might be misdirecting us by suggesting that it doesn’t work. It’s codswallop, malarkey and a million other euphemisms for bullcrap. Seriously, if you don’t want to click through the link above – the video below is worth the 2 minutes to save a couple of bucks.
4) Google Places
It takes 5 minutes, and can’t be done by anyone but you. Companies that offer this service for a fee are stealing from you; they can’t verify your listing and they can only enter the info you give them (meaning you have to type it anyway). It’s like paying someone to list you in the phone book. Optimizing your places listing, getting it higher in results is worth the price you pay for consulting because it’s an art and takes time, but you should have a Google account anyway.
5) The first link to your website
This one cracks me up. Many agencies will embed a link in your footer to the effect of “SEO by such and such” or “web design by such and such” and then have the unmitigated gall to charge you for a link from their own ‘high quality portal’. Did they pay you for the free advertising you provided and continue to provide? Without the link from your site and the sites of those who went before you, a lot of SEO companies would drop off the planet. You own your site, if the company who built it wants credit that should be outside of the scope of any initial agreement. Take a look at your site now (I’ll wait)…
Is it there? What are you getting in return?
The reason I’m telling you all of this is because I think your agency should have told it to you years, or months, or days ago when you got your website built. It’s time that more SEO professionals stepped up to the marketing plate and adopted a more honest approach to search marketing.
So here’s my pledge, and I hope others will join me.
You’ll never pay for a a strategy I can teach you in five minutes or less. Harbour City SEO is a company focused on the big picture, not quick cash. If you’re faced with an upcoming expense, check with me first (tweet @harbourcityseo, or contact me here). It may be the best five minutes you spend today.
This entry was written by Sean Enns, posted on December 15, 2010 at 9:31 pm, filed under Link Building, Search Engine Optimization. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.
We can take it as a given that social media profiles (Twitter and Facebook mostly, but there are certainly others) influence SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). I was over on Search Engine Land today reading What Social Signals Do Google & Bing Really Count? and learned a few interesting tidbits that should convince you to have at least one social presence that your company is committed to.
You can read the entire article, there’s a great Q&A with Bing and Google about authority. This particular question really jumped out at me.
Q: Do you calculate whether a link should carry more weight depending on the person who tweets it?
Bing: Yes.
Google: Yes we do use this as a signal, especially in the “Top links” section [of Google Realtime Search]. Author authority is independent of PageRank, but it is currently only used in limited situations in ordinary web search.
Whoooa! Hold on a tick, are they actually suggesting that people with more followers should carry more influence on organic search results? Let’s play this out.
Let’s look at a Nanaimo example. If I tweet about SEO, something local, I have a fairly active tweet history so I may get something from that. Now, here’s where things get interesting. I’m fully aware that I’m not the most prolific of local tweeters, so my authority probably isn’t very high. If I had to guess at who, locally, is an authority, I’d say Don Power of Sprout Social is up there so I’ll use him as an example (Hi Don).
As I understand it, there is more search engine weight given to a link retweeted by someone like Don than a link retweeted by this girl. Talk about an opportunity to game the system, let me say what I think is broken about this.
First
It encourages a Pay-Per-Tweet system where it becomes simpler to pay someone who already has authority to rewteet for you. I can see an entire marketplace for this where you can hire authoritative tweeps to promote your stuff and you pay them based on their reach. For example, I might give Kimberly Plumley $20 per month to RT my communications oriented posts, Don Power another $20 for social content and Hired Guns Creative and Impact Visual a sawbuck each for anything design related. The graph gets more complex when your content is targeted at readers outside of your operating region. I’m not suggesting that the services of the above are for sale (are they? wink wink), but if I were someone who already tweeted a lot looking for a way to make cash, I would tunnel in on this opportunity by building a big list of followers in different industries and then market the distribution of content to that list.
Second.
The issue of authority should not go to the one with the most links, it should go to the one with the most knowledge. Consider two people, one a student of economics and the other a professor of economics with published papers and 20 years of experience in the field. The student, being hip and tech savvy, posts between 5 and 10 tweets each day on the state of economics. The professor, mildly interested in the idea of micro-blogging, posts 1 tweet every week or so. Authority doesn’t go to the professor when it obviously should, since they have the most experience and insight, it goes to the 20 something student who shares more because it’s comfortable for them.
Third.
It’s more of the same old ‘top down’ approach to search results. Search engines keep moving further away from what’s really happening in the world, especially small businesses and smaller regions outside of major population areas and especially outside the US (where we don’t have social tools built into our TVs). Most businesses here in Nanaimo don’t use Twitter, not actively anyway. It’s largely due to the prevalence of sole-proprietorships who are already wearing a dozen ‘hats’ and don’t have time or resources to be a social media juggernaut. Inevitably, this will lead to agencies selling more “pay for tweeting” services which result in inauthentic conversations based around sales, not discussion.
Conclusion.
I’m a bit of a cynic, so I’m looking at the worst case scenario for social influence and authority. Twitter and Facebook are valuable, but this flies in the face of Google’s claims to always focus on the user as it’s the marketers who will rule this roost. Agree? Disagree? Comment below.
This entry was written by Sean Enns, posted on December 1, 2010 at 2:50 pm, filed under Link Building, Search Engine Optimization, Social Media. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.
If you haven’t heard, I’m involved in the Extreme Website Makeover project. Extreme Website Makeover is a joint project with Hosting Nation, Oceanside Web TV, Fusion Creative, Square Eyes Media, and Harbour City SEO.
We’re currently working with Robbin’s Wreaths of Parksville and providing them with a FREE state of the art e-commerce system for their small wreath manufacturing business. The site will include a custom design built on the Magento framework, hosting and a domain, graphic design, development, programming, internet marketing and search engine optimization. As we work to complete their new site, we’re taking applications for new contenders.
If you have an engaging story to tell about your company and the challenges you have faced to get onto the web, we’d love to hear about it. You never know, you could be selected to receive a custom website valued over $5000, absolutely free!
How do you apply? Well, drop me a line through my contact form or visit extreme website makeover to get the complete application.
Incidentally, items like this are a great way to promote your business. Getting involved with community driven projects and coordinating with other agencies work wonders for building your online presence.
This entry was written by Sean Enns, posted on February 1, 2010 at 4:33 pm, filed under Link Building. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.
In the last post, I mentioned the importance of qualifying your search engine marketing firm in various disciplines. You wouldn’t take your car to a brake specialist to get the oil changed, and you shouldn’t go with a marketing firm that doesn’t specialize in link building or SEO.
To round up, today I want to talk about some qualifiers for SEO and Social Media marketing. You should be asking questions of your SEO company, in effect interviewing them to get an idea of their qualifications before you commit to a contract.
If they specialize in SEO
SEO is made up of two distinct areas, on and off-page optimization. On page optimization involves things like keyword research, competitive research, copywriting and content development and structure as well as an understanding of the technical requirements to set up and work with a variety of website types and content management systems.
Off-page optimization involves link building through various methods, like directory submission, link exchanges and content development and syndication.
More often, a firm will specialize in one or the other. I, for instance, specialize in the on-page optimization strategies, though I am familiar with many of the techniques for building links.
When you hire a company to do your optimization, there are questions you can ask to find out exactly how qualified they are before handing over your dollars.
Q: Can you tell me about your background in marketing and SEO?
A: look for at least 5 years of experience in marketing. For young companies with less experience, you can sometimes get a better price on SEO campaigns if they have the qualifications.
Q: What methods do you use for keyword research?
A: They shouldn’t just be targeting the most popular terms, but those that provide the most value and relevant traffic. Look for an understanding of how keyword research works and how they’ll target the best opportunities. Most firms won’t tell you everything, as they want to protect their trade secrets, but they should be able to tell you enough so you feel confident to buy from them.
Q: Do you offer full disclosure of all your methods?
A: Transparency is a huge deal in SEO, as the wrong strategy could get your site penalized. If they don’t offer 100% disclosure, go with someone else.
Q: What types of link building are you proficient in?
A: Ask for specifics, if it’s directory submission, link exchanges, content development or syndication. They should be able to provide specific examples for each form of successful link building. From most to least valuable (in my opinion) are: 1) Content development, 2) syndication, 3) directory submission 4) link exchanging.
Q: Can you give me some examples of websites you’ve optimized?
A: This is easy, they should be able to provide examples of work they’ve done AND be able to provide results for their own website. Researching their website and the company will give you great insight into their business practices. Ask for references too. Make sure you Google their company, check out their links and check with companies they’ve worked with.
Q: What sort of guarantees do you provide?
A: This is a tricky question. No SEO firm worth their salt will guarantee specific results unless you pay through the nose for it. Every SEO firm worth their salt should guarantee an improvement in results and rankings for targeted terms.
If they specialize in Social Media
Social media requires a lot of ingenuity, great timing and the ability to develop enticing and engaging content. If you can’t do it yourself, you may be able to farm it out to a third party who will work on your behalf. That sort of marketing would be too costly for most businesses to outsource based on the time commitment alone. If you must outsource here, or if you plan on hiring someone for an in-house position, here are some questions you should ask before committing to a contract.
Q: What sort of results have you generated for other companies using social media?
A: For a small business, brand awareness is less important than actual traffic and new business. Building social profiles and embracing web platforms are wasted efforts if they don’t generate the desired action. I would want case studies of businesses they’ve worked with in social media campaigns.
Q: Which social media channels do you leverage for your clients?
A: They should be able to answer with the main ones. YouTube, Flickr, Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Digg etc…
Q: Are you a power user in any of these networks?
A: The social media networks are ruled by the power users, those who have spent hundreds of hours developing loyal followers. Many power users are able to have a content item pushed to the forefront by tapping into their social networks, these are the people you want on your side when you have something ready to go viral.
Q: What benefits do I get from using your company to run my social media campaigns vs. running it myself?
A: There may be distinct advantages to using another company ranging from experience in creating successful viral campaigns to overall know how. I would want an answer that spoke specifically to the benefits of using their company over doing it myself. Time saved is NOT a good reason.
—
There will be other questions you can ask, and I’ll post them in future updates as they come to mind. To round up, you just can’t ask enough questions of your marketing company before committing to a contract. If they don’t have the answers to your questions or aren’t willing to provide them, you should probably look somewhere else.
If you’ve just had some work done and want to know what the results are, drop me a line and I’ll check your existing SEO strategy and send you a brief report on my discovery.
This entry was written by Sean Enns, posted on January 18, 2010 at 4:00 pm, filed under Link Building, Search Engine Optimization and tagged Marketing, SEO, Tips. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.
The Open Directory Project (also known as DMOZ) is a free directory created and hosted by the Netscape Communication Corporation (remember Netscape? They’re now part of Time Warner’s AOL).
The ODP has lost favour with webmasters and search professionals over the past few years, mainly due to two reasons. The first is the theory that the volunteer editorial staff doesn’t evaluate links and submissions objectively, that they have their own ulterior motives when it comes to whether a link makes it in. The second is that the sheer backlog of submissions means that you could wait weeks, or months before your site makes it in.
I still think it’s worth the effort to submit your site, even if you have to submit multiple times and wait for months. Here’s why.
The ODP is used by many sites to provide directory results, including Google.
Google still uses the data from the ODP to seed their own directory, which means they trust the ODP, which means they likely trust listings in the ODP. Along with Google, there are over 150 sites using the ODP’s data to seed their listings – so one link often equals 10, 0r 20 good directory links.
The odds of getting a link are as good as with any free directory.
Most SEO’s will tell you that they hate directory submission. It’s a long, painstaking process and often the links are worthless. The ODP isn’t worthless (as we’ve established) and the links you get are of solid quality.
The ODP is essentially non-commercial in nature, which is good for you.
There’s nothing that says that non-commercial sites carry more weight with major search engines than commercial sites, but I’ve seen strong evidence to support the value of a link from a non-commercial site over one from a commercial site.
Now That I’ve covered why, I’ll take a quick moment to cover how. Getting in to the ODP isn’t easy, but it’s not rocket science. You just have to follow the rules.
Drill down to the right category
Find the category that most closely reflects what your website or business is about. Don’t go for the most popular categories, just because they’re there.
Don’t be sleazy when you’re writing your description.
If you write your description with loads of sales copy, “the best” this and “the greatest” that, you won’t get in. Well, you might – probably not though. Keep it simple and real. For instance, if you sell widgets to the Greater Nanaimo area – your description should be short and accurate, like this.
Supplier of widgets and widget related accessories serving greater Nanaimo and surrounding areas. Includes Ladysmith, Cedar, Nanaimo, Lantzville and Parksville. Free same day delivery in Nanaimo.
See? No puff, no shmooze – just the straight dope.
Like I say, you may have to submit more than once and it may take a while – but I’ve seen it continue to produce results for over a decade where many other directories are dead and gone.
This entry was written by Sean Enns, posted on June 1, 2009 at 7:26 pm, filed under Link Building and tagged Marketing, SEO. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.