SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING INCREASES SALES. 72% of local businesses achieve business objectives with formal SEO roadmap to address their goals.

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1 2012 ITVibes, Inc. All rights reserved. Material may not be reproduced or distributed in any form without permission. SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING INCREASES SALES 72% of local businesses achieve business objectives with formal SEO roadmap to address their goals. Contact Us

2 INTRODUCTION Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a process of ranking a website high on organic search results of a search engine like Google for relevant search terms (keywords & phrases) entered by consumers. The search engines use a set of rules and check points in their algorithm to determine the ranking of websites. It s noteworthy to understand how Google, leader in search engines, works in terms of the organic optimization and White Hat methods (other than the paid option). Google is known to change their search algorithm constantly to improve the search experience of the online consumers. About 86% of the buyers in current generation use search engines to research products and services before making their purchasing decision. Hence, it s vital that your business website is fully optimized for search engines so potential clients can find you quickly and easily before they can find your competition. If your website and social media presence is not optimized you are losing valuable customers to your competition. If Google says you are No. 1, everyone wants you. 2 of 12

3 6 WAYS TO GOOD SEO Google is known to change their search algorithm constantly to improve the search experience of the online consumers. The changes in the Google s algorithm emphasize on 6 main factors. CONTENT FRESHNESS SOCIAL MEDIA ONSITE OPTIMIZATION EXTERNAL LINKS LOCAL LISTINGS MOBILE SITE 3 of 12

4 DYNAMIC CONTENT Original content that s published 3 yrs, 3 months, 3 days, 3 hrs, 3 mins ago matters. The latest the better. Actively updating content on your company s website in a timely fashion helps in getting the website reindexed by the bots. Blogs Blogs are powerful content mediums to businesses. Blogs streamline the way businesses can publish their current news, product updates, services information and activities. Blogs are self-publish and self manage systems that enable nontechnical users to write, and publish their content seamlessly. 68% are well known in their industry because of their blog. Benefits o Creates social & user engagement o Positions you a thought leader o Increases inbound traffic Original content is King! o Helps in visitor retention o Results in Organic SEO Recommended publishing frequency: 3 times or more per month. 4 of 12

5 SOCIAL MEDIA As businesses move into 21st century, social collaboration is important for businesses to create an active online relationship and engagement with their loyal and potential customers. Google personalizes search results based on consumers social interactions and sifts through feeds for latest content. Companies are using Social Media to create awareness to their services, products and publish company updates simultaneously receiving feedbacks to improve their offerings. Small businesses are embarking into implementing Social Media to streamline their Sales, Marketing, Public Relations, and Customer Service and to energize their Business s online presence. Benefits 70% of businesses increased investment in Social Media Marketing o Creates user engagement o Establish brand awareness o Generates inbound traffic o Increases customer loyalty & reputation o Results in Organic SEO Recommended publishing frequency: 5 times or more per site per week. 5 of 12

6 ONSITE OPTIMIZATION Onsite optimization is a right mix of keywords, phrases, meta tags, headings, descriptions and html tags throughout the website content to create relevancy, easy crawling and better indexing. This means few onsite standards and best practices need to be followed in order to make a website search engine friendly. Content This typically is the first step in the website s optimization process. Three key areas to consider: Navigation Intuitive navigation plays a major role in helping the search engine robots to crawl & index the site s content seamlessly. Design The site s design and layout not only affects the target market audience in getting positive or negative connection with the website, it also significantly impact the search engine optimization. A thorough content and keywords strategy is vital to help search engines determine on how to index the site and to which keyword phrases the site should be shown in the organic search results. Onsite optimization is setup as part of the website design and development. 6 of 12

7 LINK BUILDING The more sites linking back on keywords (also called link backs or back links) to your site increase popularity and ranking. Hence, submissions to external sites help in link building increasing the Google placement and authority. Social Media posts on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube can also create back links. The process of building external links is time sensitive, frustrating and confusing. But this ultimately, helps in creating higher search engine rankings. Popular ways to build external links: Link building is among the top tasks required for keyword ranking and search traffic success. o News & Syndication o Online Directories o Social Bookmarking o Cross Blogging o Social Media Posts We can help you setup and manage the link building process as part of the search engine optimization. 7 of 12

8 LOCAL LISTINGS Almost about 80% of the online searches on search engines are related to the local content. Consumers use location based keywords to find businesses closer to their zip codes to follow up with a call or a visit to buy offline. Business listings created on local search engines, maps, and online directories create a good local search optimization strategy generating targeted local traffic. Even though about 52% of the consumers use location in their search like, Houston Web Design, Woodlands Commercial Realtor etc. Google uses IP address to target the location of the search request to serve the results around that area. Popular local listings sites: o Google Places o Bing, Yahoo, MapQuest o Yelp, SuperPages o FourSquare, Yellowbook o MerchantCircle, CitySearch o Exit, EZLocal, Fave Reviews on search sites help businesses with reputation management & search ranking. We can help setup and manage your business listings on about 30 local search sites. 8 of 12

9 MOBILE SITES Sites optimized for smart phones get a percent boost in SEO. Smart phones are driving a large amount of web traffic, with the numbers growing as more customers becoming Mobile oriented. About 40% of online searches are generated from mobile phones, meaning that people are browsing from their phones before making their buying decision. So having your website readable on mobile devices has proved to increase customer conversions. Mobile sites are designed for small screens with compact, vertical scrolling designs with simple navigation, thumb-friendly buttons and easy to read font without having to zoom in or to rotate the phone. Why Mobile sites are important? Your customers are already on Mobile. Are YOU? o Mobile customers are increasing enormously o Mobile commerce is exploding o Increases consumer call to action o New generation consumers are mostly mobile o Helps get an edge over the competition o Improves users browsing experience o Enables local customer influence We can help setup and manage your business mobile site for iphone & Android phones. 9 of 12

10 WHAT S MY GUARANTEE? Individual Search engines control the keyword ranking and website placements in their search results. Google changes it s search algorithm constantly. Only certain information about the changes and recommendations are made public. Hence, it is practically impossible for any SEO company to guarantee specific results in search ranking. IT S A PROCESS Search engine optimization is an ongoing, step by step process of applying techniques and best practices to increase the chance of a website to be ranked for specific keywords. The organic optimization takes time and the results vary by business to business, location and economic conditions. Our work, education and past experience could give your website a best chance to rank well on search engines for specific targeted keywords. The results and keywords needs to be analyzed quarterly and the strategy needs to be adjusted accordingly. Many customers have seen positive results by following the steps and strategy diligently. There are no shortcuts to Google s search optimization. Avoid any Black Hat methods that could result in penalty and being black listed from Google. 10 of 12

11 GET IN TOUCH The journey to the top pages of Google starts with a single step. By reading this guide you already took your first one. SEO can create tremendous opportunity for your business to outgrow your competition. This is a time to evaluate and analyze your SEO strategy and refocus on your year end goals. Put your business on the search engines to increase inbound traffic, conversions and sales. Don t know where to start? Contact us or call us at to discuss your questions and to get a FREE 1 hr consultation about your business online marketing strategies and next steps. You could also start with our FREE educational seminars to get more information. Phone: info@ Let s connect! facebook.com/itvibes twitter.com/itvibes /linkedin 11 of 12

12 2012 ITVibes, Inc. All rights reserved. Material may not be reproduced or distributed in any form without permission. WEBSITE + SEO = SUCCESS If your business is not on Google, then where is it?