Search Results And Social Media: Any Connection?

We pay very close attention to search rankings and social media trends. No doubt, search engines are trying to figure out a way to incorporate social signals (activity on social media sites) into search results. How much of an impact this currently has on search rankings is up for debate. So far, we don’t see a significant impact. We recommend that you participate in social media activities so you’re prepared for the day when social media becomes an important factor in search rankings. Evidently, that day is coming!

Social media certainly has a place in online marketing. Facebook has 800 million users (compare that to Google+'s 62 million) and more than 50% of Facebook users log on every day. Twitter has more than 100 million users and posts more than 250 million tweets per day. Facebook and other social media sites are great for reaching out to customers and building a community around your business. We'll be happy to talk to you about adding social media to your online marketing plan.

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Make your Blog into A Search Engine Magnet!!

Blogging on your website is a great way to add fresh content but more importantly, blogs can be a search engine traffic magnet! Your long-tail keyword-rich blog has potential to rank highly for any number of long-tail keyword phrases that are relevant to your industry.

Many marketers are inclined to target head terms, which are high volume keywords consisting of one or two words. Example 'lawyer' or 'tax lawyer.' But head terms are very competitive and there's little chance they'll improve your search rankings. The smarter strategy is to use long-tail keywords. Example, 'tax lawyer specializing in small business.' Yes, there are far fewer searches on long-tail keywords BUT, a recent industry study demonstrated that using long-tail keywords can help a website move up in the search rankings far more rapidly than head terms. And, long-tail terms converted two and a half times more than head terms. Long-tail keywords may bring smaller traffic volume to your site but chances are, it will be the profitable kind of traffic!

Need even more evidence that targeting long-tail keywords can be good for your search results? Last month, Google announced that it would be doing more comprehensive indexing, making long-tail documents available in its index. That means that your blog that contains long-tail keywords is now more likely to rank for relevant queries!

Many people throw a blog post up every day/week without much thought to keywords or quality. Our advice: concentrate on using long-tail keywords in your blog and make sure the content is useful to your readers.

Need to have a blog setup? Want some help writing content? We have a wide variety of services to help you. Request a Quote on Creating a Blog Today!

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Google Panda Update have Made an Impact on Searches

The Google Panda (aka Farmer) updates were designed to knock content farms out of the top spots in the search results. Apparently, they've succeeded. A study by New Science Magazine shows strong evidence that Google has gained the upper hand against those unruly sites that scrape content from legitimate sites. The study was run by computer scientist Richard McCreadie at the University of Glasgow. He ran 50 search queries prior to the Panda updates and found that content farms were present in the top search results. Following the Panda updates, content farms were no longer in the top search results. High-quality websites are now far more likely to be found at the top of the search results.

This is very good news for all of us who work hard to publish high quality content. The update eliminated many of the sites that don’t deserve a high ranking so now there's more room for the rest of us at the top. Most sites that achieve top rankings use Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategies. If you have questions about SEO services give us a call at 888-831-0483 or Request a Quote!

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Who Knew? Google Has Real People Evaluating Your Website

When it comes to evaluating website quality, we usually think in terms of robots. We talk about spiders and algorithms and so on. We know that Google has plenty of secrets about its search results that it won’t reveal to anyone. But there are reports that the 120+ page training manual for Google human search quality raters was recently leaked!

How Google uses the input from its search quality rating team is unclear but surely, it has some impact on search results. Maybe Google does this only to find and eliminate some of those websites that use less than ethical tactics to get page one results. (In other words, they don't belong on page one but have found a way to game the system.) Or, the data could be a big factor in search results. Only Google knows for sure.

Based on what we’ve read, it seems that the search quality raters evaluate 30-60 sites per hour. So that reinforces what we already know about designing a website and landing pages: you must make a good first impression, and quickly. Besides looking for a website’s relevance in relation to the search query, they’re also looking at page titles and snippets on the search results page. Keep that in mind when you’re working on your onsite SEO. Need some Help with On-Site or Off-Site SEO? Would you like to know more about how your could improve your website's rankings? Contact us for a Free Consultation by clicking this link.

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Looks Like the Facebook IPO is Coming Soon

Expect to see an IPO from Facebook in the very near future, probably by the spring of 2012. Reportedly, Facebook Inc. is considering raising about $10 billion in an initial public offering that would value the social-networking site at more than $100 billion. This is a strong signal that social media is only going to get bigger and more powerful and cannot be ignored by online marketers. Avoid it at your own peril! Ask us if you want to know how social media can tie in to your marketing plans.

Facebook recently got into trouble for violating privacy standards. In late November, Facebook and the US Federal Trade Commission announced a formal privacy settlement. Essentially, the proposed settlement “bars Facebook from making any further deceptive privacy claims, requires that the company get consumers’ approval before it changes the way it shares their data, and requires that it obtain periodic assessments of its privacy practices by independent, third-party auditors for the next 20 years.”

Facebook will likely put more energy into search marketing, including placement of ads in its mobile apps, now that it has to be more mindful of privacy issues.

If you're interested in learning more about Social Media Marketing or how Pay Per Click Advertising can help your business gain exposure call us today for a FREE consultation.

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Pay-Per-Click Advertising Is Not for Amateurs

Pay-per-click advertising spend increased 20% in the US this year. Google controls the vast majority of the clicks and spend (estimated to be about 68%). Google is still on top and may be gaining ground—reportedly, it has taken back some of the market share that was lost to the Yahoo/Bing alliance.

Google has made strides in the past year to help advertisers attract only qualified traffic. Keyword settings and other tools have been improved and ads are unlikely to be triggered unless they are relevant to the search query. Consequently, Google is seeing an improvement in overall click-through-rate. A well structured campaign that uses the proper keyword settings can be a very efficient lead source.

Even with the improvements to the keywords settings and tools, it’s still very easy to make critical and costly mistakes. If you’re thinking of taking the do-it-yourself approach, we suggest you have an experienced PPC manager (LIKE US!!) set up and launch the campaign. We’ll be happy to do that for you! Just give us a call 888-831-0483. To Get Started & get $100 in Google Adwords Advertising on us visit this link.

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Google+ now available for google apps users & Business Pages!

Since the Roll-out of Google+ there has been a lot of buzz about how influential Google+ will be. From what we could see it was much like speaking to an empty room. It could be a really nice new room, but there was no audience. With the opening of Google+ Pages for businesses and also opening up the platform for Google Apps users (gApps) will make it so there's another wave of people trying it out.

In the meantime, Here's a link to Impulse Creative Studios Google+ Page. Be sure to check it out, and you can connect with me also by clicking here.

When Using Social Media For Business we often tell clients to avoid the "black hole" of social media, not having a plan or wasting time on "all" social networks sometimes can be counter-productive.

Have a plan, execute it, and evaluate your results.

Should Google+ be in an everyday social media marketing campaign? We're evaluating it and will let you know in a future post.

What's your opinion of Google+?

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