What You Need to Know About Getting Found Online

presented by seOverflowMary Bowling & Mike Belasco

Do I Really Need a Website?

presented by seOverflow

YES!

Website = Branding & Control

•Your website isTHE authoritative web document about your business.

•Your website ranks #1 for business name.

•Your website helps you own your own brand name online.

Website = Marketing & Trust

•Your website gives you the opportunity for much more promotional messaging than any where else on the web.•Your website enables you to provide as much information as you want to prospects.•Your website helps build searchers’ trust and confidence in you.

Website = Rankings

•When well-optimized, a website gives you the opportunity to rank well in organic search.

•A website can also help your Google Local Business Listing rank better by building the Search Engines’ trust in the info they have about you.

Shopping for a Website

Get something simple that you can make simple changes on

yourself!

But make sure it’s professional looking.

What Is SEO?

Search Engine Optimization

presented by seOverflow

Creating and improving a website so that it will rank

highly on the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs)

to help potential customers find the website.

For Local Businesses, SEO Is…

Anatomy of a Google SERP

Organic Web Results

Local 7 Pack

Pay Per Click

Pay Per Click

• Default search settings = 10 per page

• #1 spot = 42% of visits

• The top 5 spots get about 3/4th of the traffic!

Organic Rankings Are Worth…

#1

Who Gets The Clicks?

Source:

COMSCORE

US Search Engine Market Share June 09

65%GOOGLE

20%Yahoo

Bing8%

•65% of searches are made on Google

•Now, Yahoo Search Engine powers the Bing Search Results.

•Yahoo now powers about 30% of all searches.

The Google Algorithms

There are 3 distinct algorithms (ranking formulas) in Google that concern local businesses:• Organic Search• Google Places (aka Maps or Local)• The Google Local 7 Pack

The Algorithms are Different

Organic Search

Organic Web Results

Searches made here

Results displayed here

Organic Search = Web Pages

Organic Web Results

Web pages are shown in the organic results –you need a website to rank here

Maps Search (aka Local or Places)

Searches made here

Results displayed here

Maps Search

Local Business Listings are shown in Maps results-You need an LBL to rank here

Web Search With Local Intent

Local Pack

Searches made here

Results displayed here, when there is local intent

Web Search With Local Intent

Local Pack

LBLs are shown in Local Packs. You need an LBL to rank here. Your website can help you rank better here!

•Search using a geographic term (explicit intent) Denver Aurora Colorado Springs

•Searching for something traditionally found nearby you (implicit intent)

ATM Chinese Take Out

Haircut Veterinarian

What Is Local Intent?

Local Pack Variations

Local Packs at Yahoo & Bing

Small Business Advantage in Maps

RESTAURANT SITE

RESTAURANT SITE

Local Directory

National DIrectory

National Directory

Local Directory

Wikipedia

Local Directory

Local Directory

National Directory

ALL RESTAURANT

WEBSITES

Maps (Places) and Local Pack algorithms give local businesses a BIG advantage!

SEO BasicsOn-page and Off-Page Optimization

The Search Engines want to return the most relevant results for every search query.

So, we have to demonstrate the relevance of our pages for appropriate search queries.

What the Search Engines Want

• By the titles and tags we place on our web pages.

• By what they learn for themselves when they spider or read our pages.

• By what we and others tell them the web pages are about through the text in the links pointing to them.

The SE’s Determine Relevance…

Google Ranking Factors…Simplified

Incoming Links

On-page Keyword Use

Everything Else

On-page Optimization

Keyword Usage on Your Web Pages

Keyword research lets you find out exactly what your potential customers are searching for on the Search Engines.

Don’t Guess! You can get free information on how many people are searching for which words and how hard it will likely be to rank for those keywords.

Keyword Research

•How much many searches are made for it?•How many other webpages are trying to rank for it?•How likely is someone using that keyword to find your site to turn into a new customer?

What Makes a Good Keyword?

• Google Suggest - find popular search terms you didn’t think of – just start typing into search box

• Yahoo Suggest –start typing into Yahoo search box

• WordTracker Questions Tool – see questions people are asking

• Google AdWords Keyword Tool - generate keywords and get competition data

• Market Samurai – use for research and competition data – lots of free training material

• Google Wonder Wheel – visually brainstorm keywords

Free Keyword Research Tools

• Pick keywords with a balance towards low competition and high volume.

• Toss out non-specific and highly competitive terms (e.g. “restaurant”) despite the high volumes.

• Include terms that may not get many searchers but are very specific to what you do and sell – easy to rank for.

Selecting the Right Keywords

Implement your optimization plan by using your chosen keywords naturally in the important areas of your pages:

• HTML page titles• HTML meta descriptions• H1, H2, H3 tags (headlines and subheads)• Unique content – 250+ words per page!• Internal links• Image alt tags

Implementation

Page title + Meta description = Your “Ad”

Your Ads in the Search Results

Title: no more than 65 charactersMeta descriptions: no more than 170 characters

Title

Description

Links = “Votes”– When another website links to yours,

that site is essentially casting a “vote” for your website.

– The more votes you have the better, although the quality of the votes is very important, too. Not all links are equal.

– Continually build new links to your pages.

Linkbuilding

Use your website to reinforce your Local Business Listing by:

• Using location terms in your on-page optimization: keywords plus location

• Getting links from local trust sites, like Chambers, BBB, CVB, local newspapers, schools, business directories and other sites that rank well for location searches.

Your Website and the Local Pack

Make Your Location Absolutely Clear– Place your full street address (with

Zip Code)– and local phone number (with Area

Code) on all pages of your website in text form.

Help Establish Location Trust

Technical Issues

What you don’t know can really hurt

If the Search Engines can’t find or can’t read your

pages, they cannot appear in the Search Results –

NOT EVER!

Crawlability

Use Free Google Webmaster Tools!

Crawlability – Can They Find You?

http://www.google.com/webmasters/

View the text only cache of pages

To See (Mostly) What Google Sees

Duplicate content is bad for searchers.– Do not expect it to rank.– Often, it is automatically generated by

certain types of websites.– You (and your web

designer/developer) may need help from an SEO pro to deal with it.

Duplicate Content

Local Business Listings

The single most important factor in ranking well in Maps and in the Local Pack.

Google Maps (aka Google Places)

www.google.com/local/add

Yahoo Local

http://listings.local.yahoo.com/

Bing Local

https://ssl.bing.com/listings/ListingCenter.aspx

If you never do anything else online, do this!

Claim Your Local Business Listings

Local Business Listings

• Google has gotten much stricter in the past year. Spammers are being penalized or removed from Maps.

• Follow the guidelines given here:– Business Listing Quality Guidelines – Local Business Center User Guide

• LBLs should be good landing pages-searchers may never go to your website.

Do Not Spam Google Maps!

Core Data = Name, Address, Phone (NAP)

These should be the same everywhere online.

Confusion about these can keep you from ranking well in Google Maps and in the Local Pack.

Standardize Core Data

• Internet Yellow Pages• Local/regional online

newspapers and magazines

• Local business directories

• Convention & Visitor’s Bureau

• Chamber of Commerce

Partner Instead of Competing

• Trade associations• Industry directories• Local city guides• Locally focused

powerhouses, like Kudzu, CraigsList, Yelp, CitySearch, etc.

• Better Business Bureau

Partner Up for More Customers

RESTAURANT SITE

RESTAURANT SITE

Local Directory

National DIrectory

National Directory

Local Directory

Wikipedia

Local Directory

Local Directory

National Directory

2 of the Top 10 organic search results are for this restaurant’s own websites

AND the business is also listed on every other page that ranks in the top 10 for italian dinkytown mn

Local Business To Do List

•Optimize your Local Business Listing for Google Maps & Local Pack search results.•Optimize your website for Google Organic search results.•Optimize your website to help your Local Business Listing in the Local Pack results.•Partner up for links and more customers.

Be Relevant!

Reviews and ReputationReviews are not going away!

• Google thinks reviews are exactly what people looking for a local business want to see.

Get Reviews

• Google pulls reviews from all across the web

• Different industries have different trusted review sources & they change

Sources of Reviews

There is general agreement among experts that having online reviews associated with your business can help your Local Business Listings rank better in the Local Search Results.

Reviews Help Local Rankings

Don’t wait until you have a problem to pay attention to what people are saying.

Join the Conversation. It’s About You!

as of Sept 1, 2008,

85% of all the reviews on Yelp are

3, 4 or 5 stars.

Do Not Fear Reviews (unless you suck)

Have a process in place for encouraging reviews from happy customers and for resolving complaints from unhappy customers.

Use reviews to improve your business!

More happy customers = more good reviews = more happy customers!

Use Reviews to Improve

• Look at the reviews your competitors have and see if you can get them in the same places.

• Look at the reviews businesses like yours in other areas have.

• Look at the reviews of businesses related to yours.

• HINT: Use www.LocalSearchToolkit.com

Find Sources for Reviews

THANKS!

seOverflow

http://www.seoverflow.com/

Local Search Toolkit

http://www.localsearchtoolkit.com

Optimized!

http://www.marybowling.com

3457 Ringsby Court Suite 307 Denver 80216

(303) 905-1504