Dan's Daily Word

Mobile marketing is emerging as the new SEO.  Why you ask, well it is very obvious for a couple of very interesting facts.  Number one, there are almost 310,000 mobile devices in the USA.  That is about the total population of the US.  Not only that the cell phone is with the user almost 24/7.  So, communication is done with data plans and texting is done with unlimited text messages, and Internet searches are increasing 1.5% each month from cell phones.  Number two, smart phones are outselling PC's five to one, and other mobile devices 25 to one.  This is incredible growth.

Today, we all wonder what all the talk is about with Analytics.  Well first you have to realize that without analytics it is virtually impossible to determine whether or not you are successful.  We have many clients in the greater Rockford, Illinois area that claim that they are doing the absolute best they can do on the Internet.  Funny how they just feel it to be true, but rarely have any evidence of it.  Businesses claim to have thousands of visitors to their website, yet a very small percentage of  visitors actually take the call to action they require to make a sale.  The magic is in analyzing what happens to the visitor once they are in the site.  By having something as simple as Google analytics places on every page of your site you can determine much.  The behavior of a visitor to your site is the Magic behind analytics.  Just the raw data provided is not enough however.  The data must be analyzed and summarized to have solid recommendations to modify your site to enhance conversion or increase the percentage of visitors actually making a purchase.

Although this method has been around for a long time it is still one of the most effective ways to get on the first page of Google and get 100's if not 1000's of impressions where searchers are seeing your ad.  And even if they are not click through to your site they are still developing a pattern of seeing your company presence.  The beauty again is that unless they click through to your website you do not pay for the impressions.  However, the ad should be written properly for the correct keywords so that the percentage of click through's increases and the effectiveness of the ad leads to greater conversion rates.  In this case the number of click through's over the number of impressions for the ad.  The greater the rate the better the results.  Immediate traffic.  And next is to analyze what happens to the traffic that is coming to your site and from where?

Have you ever placed an ad with Google Adwords?  You may have for millions of people have.  But, the point of Google Adwords is what?  Well, point number one is that if you set up a campaign creating an ad around a keyword you can have the ad display on the first page of Google if you are one of the top ten bidders for that same keyword.  You do not pay to have the ad appear and create impressions on the search results, but rather when someone clicks on the ad you pay the click through rate.  The click through rate is what you pay to get someone from a searcher to your website.

Ads can be created quickly and depending on your budget you can, within a couple of minutes create a campaign that can drive immediate traffic to your site.  This is very important especially if your search engine optimization hasn't had a chance to kick in yet.  Imagine being on the first page of Google within minutes.

Now, the second component of successful results oriented Search Engine Optimization is steadfast Off Page Optimization.  Here are these components:

1)  Monthly link building
2)  Article Submissions (new relevant content)
3)  Directory Submissions (products/services)
4)  eBook submissions
5)  Product Directory Submissions
6)  RSS Submission
7)  Blog Directory Submission
8)  Press Releases or any sort

The key is to consistently build upon both On and Off page techniques at least monthly.  The goal is to reach the first page of Google in the first position.  After that the goal is to add keywords so that you are on the first page of Google for many keywords and if possible multiple times on the first page.  One of the worst thing is to have a fabulous site that no one can find.  Make it optimized and keep optimizing.  This is a never ending process.

Search Engine Optimization is not Magic, not fairy dust, or incantations.  It is systematically methodically preparing your website to be ranked and found by both search engine robots and potential customers.  This is accomplished with both on-page and off - page optimization.  Today, we briefly discuss the types of on-page optimization.  Without using all the methods on a regular basis, the competition may push you down on the search results.  Optimization is ongoing and not a one time event.

This is a list of techniques that will through regular systematic implementation help you achieve first page ranking or maybe even dominance of the first page.  Dominance will be left for another time.

1)  Choosing keywords that people are actually using in their search
2)  Set up analytics, so that monitoring of the progress can be done
3)  Research keywords
4)  Competition Analysis
5)  Perform a site study
6)  Rank check of keywords
7)  Provide monthly activity report
8)  W3C Compliance Check
9)  Blog implementation and training
10) RSS creation
11) XML sitemap creation
12) Robots.txt set-up
13) Submission to Google local
14) Submission to Google Webmaster Tools
15) Social Bookmarking
16) Video optimization
17)  Meta, Title and descriptions optimized

So, once all these items are complete, then you have a very good starting point.  30 days later continue to optimize until you get the results you wish.

Search Engine Optimization is very misunderstood.  There are some that claim that they have had their website optimized and they are done.  Others claim to have their site optimized and I ask, "what is it optimized for"?  Then again, others think that by putting in the correct or meta tags that they are good to go as well.  I am here to tell you that the majority of websites out there have been optimized incorrectly and serve little to no purpose on the web.

The ultimate purpose of any search engine optimization is to be "found".  There are two audiences that are necessary to be found, one, someone needs to search for a term that you have optimized on your website, and two, the search engine robots need to be able to rank you high enough on the search results (first page) or generally your site will not be found.  So, to finish this post you must be writing your content of the site for the searcher (customer) and the search engine spiders who rank you.  More later.

Conversion Architecture involves two very distinct and separate elements that one without the other results in no results.  From Conversion Architecture One we found that the website is really the conversion tool once there are very highly targeted  visitors to your site.  Once in your site the call's to action must be prominent in order to get the highest conversion rate.  The industry average on conversion is about 1.00% - 1.75%.   Out of every 100 visitors to your site this means 10 - 17.5 take a call to action.  Moving the conversion rate up to 3 - 5% will possibly triple the number of visitors converted or 30 to 50 visitors taking your calls to action.  Pretty amazing.  However, part two, highly qualified traffic to your site is the key.  So, conversion depends on lots of traffic driven not only to your home page, but to the specific page on your site that deals with the exact and very specific search that someone has made.  If your site is optimized correctly, random searchers will have a greater likelihood of finding you if you get first page ranking in the results.  The number one position is best.  In conclusion, both a website capable of taking a visitor to a call to action and lots of very highly targeted traffic to your site create the most effective environment to convert visitors to buyers.  The more visitors the more buyers, and the higher rate rate at which they convert the more buyers your will have. 

Conversion Architecture is a very unknown, but particularly important feature in any businesses website.  Conversion is the essence of taking a visitor from any page in your site and moving them to a "call to action" or conversion.  The higher the conversion rate the greater chance of transforming qualified traffic into customers.  Moreover, for businesses that want conversion to sales this is absolutely one of the most critical pieces for making your site produce income.  Without the conversion architecture built in to your site it would be like opening the doors to your new store and forget to put in cash registers or signs giving shoppers the price of the items so they can make a purchasing decision.  The only thing worse than a poor conversion rate is to not have any visitors to your site to be converted.