by Charles River Interactive | October 16, 2013 | Organic Search, SEO, Uncategorized
The SEO world is buzzing over the loss of organic keyword data from Google. While it does change *some* of SEO, it’s important to remember that SEO isn’t only about keywords. In fact, there is still a LOT of data out there, including quite a bit of referring keyword data and proxies. SEO, like any industry, is always evolving and changing so, take heart! This does not spell the end of SEO. Read on for why.
Not all keyword data is gone.
Although most websites receive the majority of their traffic from Google, other search engines like Bing and Yahoo follow their own rules. The 20-30% or so of traffic from these and other search engines does have valuable nuggets of search data in it. There are also other keyword research tools available including Google Trends, Webmaster Tools, AdWords, and, although you might have heard that keyword rankings are dead (viva la keyword rankings), the data is still very useful to benchmark which keywords you already rank for and which areas need improvement.
SEO goes beyond Keyword data
SEO is not only about keywords! If search engines can’t “see” or “read” a website because of broken links, improper redirects, navigation issues, and site speed issues – it’s likely the site won’t rank well in organic search results. Even the best, most beautiful website in the world won’t convert if no one can find it!
There are other cool SEO tools including new(ish)-to-the-scene techniques like Schema.org and the Data Highlighter Tool in Webmaster Tools – both of which make your search results more interesting, encouraging CTR. Also, Authorship, Places/Local, Video, Images, you get the idea – basically the kitchen sink that shows up in most search engines’ SERPs. These are all valuable tools in the SEO arsenal just begging for optimization.
And, who could forget Social Signals (yes, with 2 capital S’s J). While social media posts that are set to private or with limited sharing don’t show up in search results, being active and participatory in social profiles boosts your online presence, and it’s been said that ~10% of Google’s algorithm takes these signals into account.
And last (but certainly not least) is CONTENT. We still have all kinds of data about organic searcher behavior and interaction with a site’s content that is very useful for benchmarking successes and informing future initiatives.
Conclusion
Be active, be fresh, be smart. Over the past 5 years or so, SEO has been moving much faster toward a more ‘natural’ approach – the days of link buying and stuffing pages with keywords are gone. If you’re on top of keeping your website code clean, are active with social media, and create fresh, properly tagged content people (and search engines) will take notice.
by Charles River Interactive | October 2, 2013 | Organic Search, SEO, Uncategorized
The search engine landscape is *constantly* evolving – and the past month has been a big one for major changes. On the heels of last week’s big news that Google will be moving all of its organic search keyword data into the (not available) bucket, Google Senior VP Amit Singhal announced that the search engine giant has been rolling out the “Hummingbird” index update. This story has been picked up even by many mainstream news providers, but what does it all mean?
Google Index Basics
The last time Google made a significant change to its search index was with 2010’s Caffeine, which provided “50 percent fresher results for web searches than (the) last index.” This update confirmed what SEOs had been encouraging clients to pursue for some time – blogging and other “fresh” content initiatives like video, news and real-time updates were going to become critical to getting and keeping organic search rankings.
Hummingbird is similar in that it’s not a small algorithm change – there are plenty of those – but a completely new algorithm – a change to the index itself. Before Caffeine, Google’s index had “several layers, some of which were refreshed at a faster rate than others; the main layer would update every couple of weeks. To refresh a layer of the old index, Google would analyze the entire web.” This is why it used to take much longer for SEO strategies to take effect – websites just weren’t hit as often.
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by Charles River Interactive | September 25, 2013 | Organic Search, SEO
The buzz in the SEO community for the past week has been about Google’s move toward totally encrypted Organic Search. Secure search (also known as “Dark Google”) has been around since October 2011 when Google said there would be a single digit impact on keyword data in Analytics programs. The reason for this move to secure search, straight from Google is:
“As search becomes an increasingly customized experience, we recognize the growing importance of protecting the personalized search results we deliver. As a result, we’re enhancing our default search experience for signed-in users.”
This essentially meant that Organic Search marketers began to see their referring keyword data disappearing under the (not provided) field in Google Analytics, Keyword Unavailable in Omniture, etc. Many of our own clients have seen their percentage of (not provided) keyword data grow up to 60% of all organic traffic and higher – so much for the single digit impact.
What does encrypted Organic Search change for SEO practitioners and clients?
The “black hole” of (not provided) keyword data is going to keep growing. It will present challenges to traditional SEO reporting and strategies including in the following ways:
Parsing out branded vs. non-branded traffic: this measure of SEO campaign performance has been a good indicator of success – especially in growing non-branded traffic. Now the few keywords that will trickle into Analytics programs via non-encrypted searches will likely make up <10% of all organic traffic making a real measure of unbranded vs. branded organic traffic virtually impossible.
Identifying high conversion/high conversion potential keywords: what keywords are driving the actions that really matter on a website? This is a critical piece of information in SEO strategy creation. Throwing resources and energy into keyword optimizations for terms with a low likelihood of conversion is a waste of time for everyone. Conversely, using converting keyword data to inform keyword/content strategies has been a solid tactic for years.
Measuring types of user engagement: visits from organic searchers entering a site on unbranded terms do tend to look a bit different than organic visits from searchers entering on branded terms. Branded searchers know what they’re looking for (in most cases) and tend to have better engagement metrics – time on site, pages/visit, bounce rate, etc. There are, however, those organic searches that produce “a- ha” moments for SEOs – oftentimes long tail terms that indicate a visitor knows very, very well what they’re looking for, and are as ready to convert as a “branded” visitor. These terms have also proven very useful in keyword and content strategies, historically.
So, what can we do to understand Organic Search behavior and results on our site?
Our Organic Search team has been strategizing about presenting secure search data for almost 2 years now. We’ve come up with various ways of presenting this data and of optimizing toward it. Among our solutions are:
- (not provided) top landing page analysis – page topic gives an idea of what kinds of terms visitors are likely searching with.
- user behavior stats – again, branded and non-branded visits often look very different. It’s interesting to measure (not provided) visits against these stats to see which side they lean toward.
- Google Webmaster Tools data – while this doesn’t provide the whole picture that we had gotten accustomed to, free data on clicks, impressions, etc. is still available from Webmaster Tools.
- AdWords – many search marketers speculate that this whole issue arose from Google hoping to nudge marketers into paid advertising in exchange for data. We have always thought that paid search/AdWords is a viable way to both quickly and long-term test keyword performance.
These are just a few of the ways we are thinking about new ways to understand Organic Search performance for our clients. It’s a whole new world, but one we’ve been approaching for some time. SEOs tend to be a creative bunch, always up for a challenge – so viva SEO!
by Charles River Interactive | August 19, 2013 | Paid Social, YouTube Marketing
Having an attractive and fully functional YouTube channel for your business is very important. A YouTube channel that contains quality videos and takes advantage of all of the features YouTube offers can make a significant difference in page views and conversions. Below, we have compiled a list of suggestions that can drastically help improve the look and functionality of your YouTube channel.
Step 1: Use annotations to build subscribers
YouTube gives you the ability to add annotations to your YouTube videos that incorporate clickable calls to action. These annotations appear on your videos for a specified length of time and they can include links to other videos and playlists, or even a subscribe option. Any administrators to the specific channel will have complete control of the annotations including what they look like as well as where and when they will appear in the video. By adding annotations to certain videos, you may be able to quickly convert casual viewers who saw your video indirectly, into subscribers of the channel. Strategically placing annotations at the right time and in the right place on the video will give you the best opportunity to funnel viewers to various parts of your channel where they have the highest chance of donating.
Creating annotations can also be helpful if you have created a video with out-of-date information. Instead of deleting the video, you can direct people to the newer and more relevant video by using a simple annotation.
Here is a simple tutorial on how to add annotations to videos: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qZmGDN30PI
Step 2: Leverage other social media platforms
YouTube is a great social media platform that allows you to easily extend the reach of your videos through sharing tools that automatically share new videos with other popular social media sites like Facebook and Twitter. In the socially connected world that we live in today, it is critical to have every one of your social platforms connected to one another as it will give you the best opportunity to reach the most interested audience.
Every time you release a new video, you should create a blog post around it. Create keyword-rich title and fill your post with complementary content to describe and support the video. This will deliver your video to your blog subscribers and increase its chances of being found in a search. Plus, you can add your own sharing buttons on your blog, making it easier for other people to share your content.
Every time you release a new video, you need to put it on your Facebook page. By connecting your YouTube channel with your Facebook page, you will ensure that your Facebook audience has direct access to your YouTube channel. Followers will receive updates when a new video is released and they can even watch newly posted YouTube videos directly on the Facebook platform. By linking the two social media platforms together, your YouTube channel will see a rise in views, visits and subscribers.
Newly released YouTube videos should also be posted to your Twitter page. Similar to Facebook, a Twitter page has a significant amount of followers that can easily be notified when a new video is released. By connecting your YouTube channel to Twitter, followers of your business will know when a new video gets posted and can have instant access to it.
StumbleUpon is a social bookmarking site has always been a powerful referrer. It drives a significant amount of traffic to social media sites including YouTube. This is a very simple way to gain exposure for your YouTube channel.
Step 3: Analyze YouTube Analytics
YouTube has very powerful analytics that give you insight into who is watching your videos and how they discovered them. Analytics are vital to regularly review because it will indirectly tell you what your channel has done well, what things need to improve and where new potential opportunities lie.
Don’t take a chance on creating wonderful content and letting it go unnoticed. Try these easy steps to get your channel noticed today!
by Charles River Interactive | August 10, 2013 | Local SEO, Organic Search, Uncategorized
Google has released a new search engine results feature which is making a large impact on the way consumers find local businesses. This new type of result is called the Google Carousel and its prominent display located above paid search results is giving some marketers pause.
The Google Carousel is very much what it sounds like. It is an eye catching carousel of search results for a specific keyphrase. It focuses on local search results and is heavily integrated with Google Maps and Google Plus. The most common search queries that produce a carousel results page are those of local consumer based businesses. A Google search query of, “Hotels in New York” for example will return a SERP that has a carousel containing upwards of 20 different hotels in New York City. Each individual property in the carousel will have the business name, picture, address and numerous reviews from prior customers.
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