by Carl Weiss
Before the 1990’s businesses
were relegated to using print, TV and radio to advertise their wares. Then
along came the Internet in the latter half of the 90’s and suddenly businesses
had a whole new lease on life, along with a new set of skills to hone. Because when it comes to promoting products
and services online, there is no such thing as one size fits all. Far from it.
Before the turn of the
century webvertising was a bit simpler, due to the fact that it all came down
to two things: a website and a search engine.
Back then, there weren’t any such things as blogs and social
networks. Video was something that was
worse than useless, due to bandwidth considerations. Web designers back then had to selectively
choose images due to the slow loading speeds that dial-ups provided. Too many images could cause a site to load
like molasses, or even freeze the screen solid.
Then came the development of
broadband and suddenly it was a whole new ballgame. With that ballgame came an entirely new set
of rules. Instead of relying almost
exclusively on text, many sites began experimenting with podcasts and
video. With the advent of YouTube, where
anyone can post and host videos galore, multimedia went from being an anomaly
to being practically a requirement.
Search engines as well began
to capitalize on the multimedia nature of the Internet, with many of them
adapting their search algorithms to take into considerations all the latest
online offerings. Several, most notably
Google, went one step farther by developing their own brand of blog, social
network and video portal. This meant
that website owners and optimizers had their hands full feeding all these
additional mouths. As a result, many sites
that previously dominated the search engines were relegated to its backwaters. It also meant that SEO was no longer SOP
(standard operating procedure.) Whether
you choose to administer your web presence yourself or outsource the task,
there are a number of factors you need to take into consideration if you hope
to succeed.
1. Geo-Targeting – One of the things that has changed in
a big way is the ability to geographically target online ads. Unlike in the early days of the web where
global advertising coverage was the norm, today online ads can be directed to
targeted regionally, state-wide or locally for both pay-per-click and organic
search.
2. What is SEO Today? – When I hear people conversion
about search engine optimization, I ask them to define the term SEO. Before the turn of the century everything a
search engine needed to determine who ranked best resided exclusively on the
website. Today, only twenty five percent
of the criteria used for ranking purposes is contained on-site. The remainder consists of everything from
blogs and social networks to videos and podcasts.
The
other thing that has changed in a big way is the acumen of search engine
spiders. Not only
can the spiders read,
they can understand how well your website, blogs and social posts are
constructed. They are also programmed to
look at how often you post as well as how much engagement this content
generates. The only things they can’t
understand are your images and videos.
This is why it is so important to make sure your alt tags are filled in
and the text and tags used to wrap your videos is complete.
3. Blogging for Business – Blogs are without a doubt one
of the least understood of all web assets.
Most people treat them as a bastard stepchild of the web, not realizing
that blogs can not only achieve search engine ranking on their own, but you can
also sell products directly on your blog.
Add to this the fact that well-written blogs can be far more engaging
than websites since they change more often than your site. (The average website is updated quarterly,
whereas the average blog is updated weekly.)
I have known clients who literally generated more traffic and sales from
their blog than they did on their site, even when their site had page-1 ranking
on Google, Yahoo and Bing.
4. How Social is your Business? – There is a big
difference between having a social presence and feeding your social
presence. If you hope to turn Facebook,
Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn and other social networks into a way to promote your
business you need to understand a couple of things. In the first place, social nets are all about
telling as opposed to selling. This
means that for every attempt to display ad copy on your nets you need to deploy
at least twenty pieces of information that would be of interest to your
followers. And by “information” I don’t
mean ad copy. The second factor is that
social nets are all about your followers, not you. If you provide them with useful information
and prove that you are an authority in your area of expertise they will
inevitably buy from you when they are ready.
However, if you rarely feed your nets or if you bombard your followers
with ad copy then don’t complain that social networking doesn’t work.
5.
Do You YouTube? –
YouTube is another area that most businesses do not really get. Look at it this way; If your local TV station
told you they were giving away space for free TV spots and that they were
looking for programming to fill air time, you would probably bust a gut to
provide them with as much video content as they would accept. Then why is it
that the world’s largest superstation is not on every business owner’s radar in
a big way? Not only does YouTube stream
more video than all the other TV stations on the planet combined (4 billion
videos per day), but they provide free hosting and broadcast, plus they are
owned by the world’s most popular search engine (Google).
YouTube
is much more than just a video portal.
It is a search engine, it is a social network and it is a free web TV
station that can place your videos on page 1 of Google. How cool is that? Yet most businesses are not taking advantage
of this free marketing powerhouse. By
taking advantage of it, I don’t mean having one or two videos on YouTube. What
I am talking about is having dozens or even hundreds of videos on YouTube. Better yet, why not start a channel that
focuses on your business? Don’t think
that’s practical? Think again. We have shown all kinds of businesses from
chiropractors to plumbers how 2-minute microcasts can be used to generate a
following and turn their owners into rock stars. Shooting 2-4 short videos each and every
month isn’t all that complicated or costly.
All it takes is a little imagination to turn the world’s largest
superstation into a business asset that’s hard to beat.
6. Reputation Management – In years past it was all too
easy for companies that produced slipshod workmanship and poor customer service
to remain below the radar to consumers.
As a result it was very difficult to judge a business’ reputation until
after the fact, by which time it was too late.
With the advent of online reputation management all that has
changed. Today the emperor wears no clothes
and it is simple for the public to find out how your customers perceive the
quality of your company. Whether they
use Google Local, Yahoo, Angie’s List or any of the hundreds of sites dedicated
to broadcasting reviews good and bad about a business, this is generally the
first place that consumers go to check out a company with whom they have never
done business.
That
being said, many businesses have no system of encouraging satisfied customers
to post positive reviews. What this
means is that for the vast majority of businesses, all there is to be found are
negative reviews. I don’t care how
capable and courteous you are, as they say you can’t please everyone all the
time. So it’s a foregone conclusion that
sooner or later you will rub someone the wrong way. That someone (or even a wily competitor) can
sully your reputation at the click of a mouse if you aren’t actively
encouraging your best customers to submit positive reviews all the public will
find are complaints.
One
of the things we use to promote our business as well as those of our clients is
to ask your best customers if they wouldn’t mind telling the public what they
think of your services on video. By shooting a 2-3 minute interview and then
cutting this down to 60-90 seconds not only will you have a powerful
endorsement of your business, but while they are there you can then have them
submit a positive review on Google+ that will go a long way toward helping you
prove once and for all that you are the man or woman for the job.
7. Who You Gonna Call? - Obviously creating and distributing everything
from daily social posts to weekly blogs and monthly videos takes time. And time is something of which no business
owner or manager has enough. So
outsourcing some or all of the above mentioned tasks is the path of least
resistance for many businesses. That
being said, you need to be very careful who you allow to promote your business
online. While there are a number of
legitimate digital marketing agencies, there are also thousands of shortcut
artists that can do more harm than good.
In
past blogs, we have written about Black Hat tactics that can put your website
between a rock and a hard place. It
isn’t at all unusual for a search engine to delist or even black ball anyone
caught using black hat techniques. While
it would take more than a blog to cover them all, the biggest red flag to watch
out for is anyone who claims they can get your site listed organically with Google
or any other major search engine within 30 days or less. Depending upon the competition involved with
any keyword or phrase it can take anywhere from four to six months or more to
produce enough compelling content to leverage page 1 on any of the major search
engines. However, the results can be
well worth the effort.
In
short, with the exception of pay-per-click advertising (which takes an entire
skill set of its own to employ successfully), there is no shortcut to online
success. The only way of leveraging the Internet in the 21st century is
to take the long view. Just like your
business, working the web to win takes time.
But it’s time well spent.
When he isn't surfing the
web, Carl is Working the Web to Win,
which is both a digital marketing agency in Jacksonville, Florida and a weekly
online radio show on BlogTalkRadio.
No wonder these guys were just featured in the "Jacksonville Business Journal." They know their stuff.
ReplyDelete