Partisans have been announcing the death of SEO ever since the web was in nappies. Till now, reports have been premature. But thanks to Pandas and Penguins and other changes Chez Google, top internet marketers are less willing than ever to rely on natural search.
The reason is, SEO’s perennial limits have been exacerbated. The old problems of narrow scope and exposure to changing search trends have been joined by two new problems: personal search listings, and ever shifting goalposts.
It all adds up to crisis time for any site with all its eggs in the SEO basket.
Before we go any further, let’s take a quick look at each of those limitations:
Limit #1: Narrow Scope
As any good SEO knows, you can only optimise a given page for a handful of keywords. At best, you’ll rank for umpteen variations on the same phrase, but it’s unlikely that you’ll ever get one page to rank for every suitable variation.
Example: a courier agency has multiple segments, like ‘parcel courier’, ‘mail courier’, ‘international courier’, ‘same day courier’, ‘motorbike courier’ and so on. And each of those segments will attract dozens (maybe hundreds) of different searches, from regional variations to random phrasing. So e.g. ‘parcel courier’ opens up a whole niche, including ‘parcel courier + region’, ’24 hour parcel courier’, ‘cheap parcel courier’, ‘courier packages’ etc.
It’ll take a lot of work to get your ‘parcel courier’ page to show up for all those searches, plus the dozens of others that will emerge through detailed research. And that gives you three choices:
(a) use paid search to boost visitor numbers
(b) create sub-pages within every niche to target stray variations
(c) focus on the best opportunity and forget about the other searches
Limit #2: Changing Search Trends
SEO depends on the ‘fingers crossed’ belief that if 1000 people search for ‘xyz’ this month, then another 1000 will search for the same thing next month. Spookily, that theory does kind of work, albeit with a 20-30% shift up or down from one month to the next. But there are still two weaknesses:
What if demand ebbs and flows with the seasons...or worse still, the keyword just drops off the radar altogether?
Seasonal demand mainly hits the obvious victims, like ‘seaside holidays’, ‘sun cream’, ‘Christmas presents’, ‘Valentine cards’ etc. (But hopefully, if your business is seasonal, you have other irons in the fire for the rest of the year!)
But the outright drop-off factor can strike just about anywhere.
The biggest driver is innovation. When a new product hits the shelves, the old product name immediately loses popularity (except on eBay, Gumtree and co).
Plus there are economic, social and political forces at work, each with the power to wipe out search trends and make SEO efforts redundant. Prime example, we haven’t seen many searches for ‘100% mortgage’ in the last few years!
Of course, Limits #1 and #2 have always been there, and SEO bods have put up with them because of the untold advantages of getting free traffic from Google.
But now we’ve got the two newbies...
Limit #3: Personal Listings
Google’s mission is to tailor its listings to individuals, based on available data like previous search habits and peer endorsements. That adds a whole new layer to SEO.
In its plainest form, it means that if Mrs Jones searches Google for your type of business, she’ll be more likely to see your listing if she’s been to your site before, or her social media contacts have given your page the thumbs up.
I spoke to some members of the Google crew about this recently, and the party line was they’ll only factor in ‘Plus 1’ endorsements through Google Plus – i.e. not Facebook ‘Likes’ or other votes through social platforms. How long that position will last, we don’t know, but I’d be loathe to take Facebook Liking out of the mix, especially if you want traffic from sources beyond Google.
Anyway, the upshot of all this is additional work and a lower addressable market. You have to jump through extra hoops (building a network of endorsers with your likely prospects in their circles) and still, you’ll get fewer listings, because inevitably competitors will touch the circles that you can’t.
Limit #4: Shifting Goalposts
The move towards personal listings has rewritten a slice of the rule book. Traditional link building is no longer the be all and end all. And that’s typical of how the goals are shifting month after month.
The latest example is anchor text. Till recently, it was deemed good practice to present links to your website through keyword-rich anchor text. So taking an example where you want to rank for “Children’s shoes”:
ABC Shoe Shop sells all kinds of children’s shoes
...would be more effective than a ‘naked link’, as in:
For children’s shoes, go to www.abcshoeshop.co.uk
But that’s (kind of) changed now. Google has recognised that too many webmasters have been exploiting anchor text, with the same anchor links repeated time and again across the web. So the key now is, make sure (1) all anchor links are uniquely worded, and (2) you’ve got more naked links than anchor links pointing to your site.
In fairness to Google, this was always best practice - they’re just doing more now to clamp down on offenders, and in some cases the penalties are likely to get heavy. But it’s all in the interests of improving the user experience, so we can’t cuss and moan about it. We just have to roll with the punches.
Still, it can hurt, especially if you’ve been badly advised in the past and acted in good faith using tactics that Google is starting to frown on or outlaw.
And the pain goes deeper, because this process will never come to an end. Google will always be tweaking the algorithm, to keep its users on cloud nine and stop the nasty black hat types who are hell bent on working the system for their own evil and spammy ends.
So where does it leave the ethical, quality business who just wants to do the right thing?
The best way to show up on Google is to follow their one guiding principle, that good quality content is the only thing that really matters. In other words, put the user first, instead of stuffing the page full of keywords – and don’t try to trick the search engines by plastering the web with badly placed or badly worded links. They’ll catch you out!
That said, there are still a few tactics. Using keywords in title tags, headings and sub-headings is as effective as ever, as is letting them fall naturally into the body text. And prompting endorsements through social pages can’t be a bad thing either. Just as long as everything happens naturally.
If they sense you’re overdoing it, pain will surely follow.
So back to the big question: has SEO had its day?
No. But it’s not the straight forward process it used to be. It’s not about ticking boxes then reaping the rewards, it’s about doing right by the reader in a way that’s a bit less tangible now.
And that has two consequences:
One - SEO is only worthwhile if you can take it on warts and all. That means putting in the investment of time and money to make it work, and accepting the delays and obstacles as an occupational hazard.
And two - it’s a brave decision to rely solely on SEO traffic. Play nicely and it will come, but it will take time and in the early days it will be harder than ever to forecast. So a mix of paid search and other traffic sources (especially social media) will be a sound security measure.
That’s my tuppence. What do you think?
Monday, 7 May 2012
Thursday, 5 January 2012
Follow up...but be subtle!
There’s a new generation of snooping tactics on the web, offering new ways to interact and get a second chance of selling. But it will only work if you handle the conversation carefully...
When you visit a website, you’re just an anonymous statistic. That’s something we all love as consumers, but in business it’s been a source of anguish for a whole web generation.
As webmasters, we go to the ends of the earth to drive in traffic – paying Google, or endlessly building links and carefully optimising – so it’s painful to sit back and watch as visitors leave, like the in-store customer who refuses help because they’re “only browsing”!
We want a second bite of the cherry!
OK, a handful might leave a name and email address, but opt-in rates have been in decline for a good few years now:
(1) Because “Join our newsletter” has become meaningless – and most sites that offer an extra bribe are pedalling the same old resources.
(2) Because Social Media and all those newsletters are giving us info overload.
(3) Because to quote Bill Gates, “People hate, hate, hate to subscribe to things on the Internet!”
So if the visitor won’t co-operate, we’ll have to smoke them out!!
In the last few years, boffins have been hard at work, developing new widgets that identify the visitor in one form or another. Examples being:
Live Chat: plenty of tools out there, letting you track the visitor in real time and initiate a conversation. It’s all slightly Big Bro, but if you set parameters (like waiting a minute, and only bothering people who hit transactional pages), it can boost conversion without scaring the proverbial pants off the visitor.
Re-Marketing: Google’s own miracle, that puts a mark against the visitor when they get to your site. Then as they move around the web, dropping into Google’s Content Network, they see your ads, as if by accident – thinking you’re a ubiquitous brand instead of a new-age cyber-stalker!
Lead Forensics: my personal fave will ID the (business) visitor’s IP address and tell you who they work for! You don’t get names, but you see what they searched for and which pages they viewed...more than enough for intelligent follow-up to the relevant department.
So the big question is...
How to exploit all these new-fangled (or in some cases mid-fangled) gadgets?
And the answer is, learn from the last generation of visitor intelligence.
Mail Servers have used “smoke ‘em out” tactics since the dawn of spam. When someone clicks on a link from your email or newsletter, you can see where they went and when. And that’s info that’s been handled well by some, disastrously by others!
Right approach – ring fence people who click through and send a more detailed follow-up message, building on the info you’ve already given. Or invite them into an inner circle, like a Social Media group where they can ask questions or join in discussions.
Wrong approach – get straight on the phone and say “I saw you’ve been on the website, what do you want?”
Obvious, I know, but we all know it happens! But no-one wants to think there’s someone out there who can crack the code and work out where they’ve been online! It’s a sure-fire way to make the visitor feel uncomfortable - and chances are they’ll never darken your virtual door again.
So what does that mean when it comes to the new generation of snoopers?
Well, it means be subtle! Use the technology for opportunity and intel, without spurring the prospect into taking out a restraining order:
...Using Live Chat, don’t jump on the visitor before they’ve found their feet.
...Re-Marketing, make your ad relevant to the product or service viewed...but stop short of reminding them they've seen you somewhere before.
...And if you get the visitor’s company details, wait as long as you can before contact - then spark a gasp of “coincidence” via a phone call or follow-up letter.
Ultimately, with all these tools, you can act on two things: the fact that the visitor is interested here and now, and your knowledge of the product or service they’re looking at.
Use that to your advantage, and keep your surveillance tactics under wraps, and you can finally get that second bite.
In other words, be subtle...and you can enjoy the cherry!
When you visit a website, you’re just an anonymous statistic. That’s something we all love as consumers, but in business it’s been a source of anguish for a whole web generation.
As webmasters, we go to the ends of the earth to drive in traffic – paying Google, or endlessly building links and carefully optimising – so it’s painful to sit back and watch as visitors leave, like the in-store customer who refuses help because they’re “only browsing”!
We want a second bite of the cherry!
OK, a handful might leave a name and email address, but opt-in rates have been in decline for a good few years now:
(1) Because “Join our newsletter” has become meaningless – and most sites that offer an extra bribe are pedalling the same old resources.
(2) Because Social Media and all those newsletters are giving us info overload.
(3) Because to quote Bill Gates, “People hate, hate, hate to subscribe to things on the Internet!”
So if the visitor won’t co-operate, we’ll have to smoke them out!!
In the last few years, boffins have been hard at work, developing new widgets that identify the visitor in one form or another. Examples being:
Live Chat: plenty of tools out there, letting you track the visitor in real time and initiate a conversation. It’s all slightly Big Bro, but if you set parameters (like waiting a minute, and only bothering people who hit transactional pages), it can boost conversion without scaring the proverbial pants off the visitor.
Re-Marketing: Google’s own miracle, that puts a mark against the visitor when they get to your site. Then as they move around the web, dropping into Google’s Content Network, they see your ads, as if by accident – thinking you’re a ubiquitous brand instead of a new-age cyber-stalker!
Lead Forensics: my personal fave will ID the (business) visitor’s IP address and tell you who they work for! You don’t get names, but you see what they searched for and which pages they viewed...more than enough for intelligent follow-up to the relevant department.
So the big question is...
How to exploit all these new-fangled (or in some cases mid-fangled) gadgets?
And the answer is, learn from the last generation of visitor intelligence.
Mail Servers have used “smoke ‘em out” tactics since the dawn of spam. When someone clicks on a link from your email or newsletter, you can see where they went and when. And that’s info that’s been handled well by some, disastrously by others!
Right approach – ring fence people who click through and send a more detailed follow-up message, building on the info you’ve already given. Or invite them into an inner circle, like a Social Media group where they can ask questions or join in discussions.
Wrong approach – get straight on the phone and say “I saw you’ve been on the website, what do you want?”
Obvious, I know, but we all know it happens! But no-one wants to think there’s someone out there who can crack the code and work out where they’ve been online! It’s a sure-fire way to make the visitor feel uncomfortable - and chances are they’ll never darken your virtual door again.
So what does that mean when it comes to the new generation of snoopers?
Well, it means be subtle! Use the technology for opportunity and intel, without spurring the prospect into taking out a restraining order:
...Using Live Chat, don’t jump on the visitor before they’ve found their feet.
...Re-Marketing, make your ad relevant to the product or service viewed...but stop short of reminding them they've seen you somewhere before.
...And if you get the visitor’s company details, wait as long as you can before contact - then spark a gasp of “coincidence” via a phone call or follow-up letter.
Ultimately, with all these tools, you can act on two things: the fact that the visitor is interested here and now, and your knowledge of the product or service they’re looking at.
Use that to your advantage, and keep your surveillance tactics under wraps, and you can finally get that second bite.
In other words, be subtle...and you can enjoy the cherry!
Tuesday, 13 September 2011
So, did you get mauled by the Panda?
Now the dust has settled on Google’s divisive Panda Update, and the nightmare stories of overnight ranking dips have fizzled back into the ether, it’s a good time to take a discreet peek at the aftermath, and what it all means for SEO in the long run.
Bit of history first: ‘Panda’ (if you didn’t know) is the name affectionately given to a sweeping change Google made to its algorithm back at the start of this year.
Don’t ask me why they called it ‘Panda’. Pandas are cute and cuddly, and this algorithm can do the business equivalent of ripping your head off and using it as a novelty serving bowl for bamboo shoots.
Still, they had to call it something, and maybe ‘Rottweiler’ was already taken?
For all its ferocity though, Panda was a big fat necessity. It was all about downgrading the trashy 83rd rate content that’s been littering the web in the name of link-building. Google is about relevance and user experience as much as popularity, so the boffins had to do something to end the frenzy of synthetic ‘voting’ that came from directories and article hubs.
Any website with genuine, useful content supported by relevant backlinks might have felt a slight wobble post-Panda, but defo not the Richter-shattering tremors reported by the spam-happy link-stuffing brigade.
So, how did Panda change the rules?
Clearly, the big casualty has been Article Marketing. It’s no longer ‘good practice’ to write an article and syndicate it to 300 article hubs, and the industry has been quick to point this out.
A few caveats, though: (1) multiple links can still send you multiple visitors, who follow through from the article site direct to yours; and (2) a well written article placed on a good article site (without mass syndication) can still give you a valuable SEO boost.
Here’s an example: a few months ago, I optimised a page of my main website for the keyword direct mail copywriter. Initially, the page made it to something like 93rd on Google (despite ticking all the boxes for on-page optimisation).
My next move was to write an article about direct mail, and post it to Article Base (one of the better article sites IMO). The article included a footer credit with an anchor text link back to the target page. A week later, I’d made page 2 of Google, and I’ve now graduated to page 1, with no other links from any source.
(Except the one I’ve just added above!)
I’ve seen dozens of other cases just like this, so if you’re reviewing your article strategy, I’d be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. There is still value there – just know that the rules have changed.
And the other casualties are...?
Scatter-gun link building is out, full stop. Google’s emphasis is firmly on quality over quantity – so if a link is relevant and adds value to the visitor, it’s brownie points all round. But if it’s one of 12 dozen links on a page or a fish out of water content-wise, the spiders will shrug it off like never before (and laugh at you behind your back).
Of course, this all points to one large hairy question:
With so many opportunities to manipulate the linking process, can links be taken seriously now as a measure of popularity?
For the time being, the answer seems to be a tentative Yes, qualified by the new Draconian steps. But other displays of social proof (Facebook likes, retweeted links etc) are suddenly the young pretenders, likely to dethrone links as the big boss arbiters of genuine popularity.
OK, so what does it all mean in practice?
To put it succinctly, it means quality rules - and any site that plays the SEO game nicely (that means putting the user first) is unlikely to suffer significant knock-backs.
Here are 5 steps you could take:
1. Take a fresh look at your content. Make sure it’s user-focused, intuitive and a handy source of info.
2. Add some video. As you probably know, Google owns YouTube, so best to import it from there...pretty soon, they’ll be analysing the audio track of every video, and factoring in the transcripts when they place you for given keywords.
3. Get blogging. These days, blogs are a big and much under-used opportunity. Choose your keyword, then optimise a quality post and see what happens...
4. Write some guest articles. Team up with people who target the same market as you and worm your way into their contacts by sharing some expertise. You’ll only get one link, but with the right partner, it’s one worth having.
5. Add social media icons. Invite people to join your facebook page, ask them to share a link or just click the ‘Like’ button. This could make a massive difference somewhere (not too far) down the line.
OK, there are lots of other things too, but that’s enough to be getting on with!
And if you’ve had an Apres-Panda experience, feel free to share it below...
Bit of history first: ‘Panda’ (if you didn’t know) is the name affectionately given to a sweeping change Google made to its algorithm back at the start of this year.
Don’t ask me why they called it ‘Panda’. Pandas are cute and cuddly, and this algorithm can do the business equivalent of ripping your head off and using it as a novelty serving bowl for bamboo shoots.
Still, they had to call it something, and maybe ‘Rottweiler’ was already taken?
For all its ferocity though, Panda was a big fat necessity. It was all about downgrading the trashy 83rd rate content that’s been littering the web in the name of link-building. Google is about relevance and user experience as much as popularity, so the boffins had to do something to end the frenzy of synthetic ‘voting’ that came from directories and article hubs.
Any website with genuine, useful content supported by relevant backlinks might have felt a slight wobble post-Panda, but defo not the Richter-shattering tremors reported by the spam-happy link-stuffing brigade.
So, how did Panda change the rules?
Clearly, the big casualty has been Article Marketing. It’s no longer ‘good practice’ to write an article and syndicate it to 300 article hubs, and the industry has been quick to point this out.
A few caveats, though: (1) multiple links can still send you multiple visitors, who follow through from the article site direct to yours; and (2) a well written article placed on a good article site (without mass syndication) can still give you a valuable SEO boost.
Here’s an example: a few months ago, I optimised a page of my main website for the keyword direct mail copywriter. Initially, the page made it to something like 93rd on Google (despite ticking all the boxes for on-page optimisation).
My next move was to write an article about direct mail, and post it to Article Base (one of the better article sites IMO). The article included a footer credit with an anchor text link back to the target page. A week later, I’d made page 2 of Google, and I’ve now graduated to page 1, with no other links from any source.
(Except the one I’ve just added above!)
I’ve seen dozens of other cases just like this, so if you’re reviewing your article strategy, I’d be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. There is still value there – just know that the rules have changed.
And the other casualties are...?
Scatter-gun link building is out, full stop. Google’s emphasis is firmly on quality over quantity – so if a link is relevant and adds value to the visitor, it’s brownie points all round. But if it’s one of 12 dozen links on a page or a fish out of water content-wise, the spiders will shrug it off like never before (and laugh at you behind your back).
Of course, this all points to one large hairy question:
With so many opportunities to manipulate the linking process, can links be taken seriously now as a measure of popularity?
For the time being, the answer seems to be a tentative Yes, qualified by the new Draconian steps. But other displays of social proof (Facebook likes, retweeted links etc) are suddenly the young pretenders, likely to dethrone links as the big boss arbiters of genuine popularity.
OK, so what does it all mean in practice?
To put it succinctly, it means quality rules - and any site that plays the SEO game nicely (that means putting the user first) is unlikely to suffer significant knock-backs.
Here are 5 steps you could take:
1. Take a fresh look at your content. Make sure it’s user-focused, intuitive and a handy source of info.
2. Add some video. As you probably know, Google owns YouTube, so best to import it from there...pretty soon, they’ll be analysing the audio track of every video, and factoring in the transcripts when they place you for given keywords.
3. Get blogging. These days, blogs are a big and much under-used opportunity. Choose your keyword, then optimise a quality post and see what happens...
4. Write some guest articles. Team up with people who target the same market as you and worm your way into their contacts by sharing some expertise. You’ll only get one link, but with the right partner, it’s one worth having.
5. Add social media icons. Invite people to join your facebook page, ask them to share a link or just click the ‘Like’ button. This could make a massive difference somewhere (not too far) down the line.
OK, there are lots of other things too, but that’s enough to be getting on with!
And if you’ve had an Apres-Panda experience, feel free to share it below...
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