SEO Trends for 2014

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1 SEO White Paper Future of Organic Search Marketing Best Practices SEO, Content Marketing and SMO In 2013, marketers across the board experienced challenges from Google which is set to continue. So if haven t started planning your SEO strategy and budgeting for 2014 must begin soon. Content Marketing Division, TheSEOInc

2 SEO Company USA Passion, Innovation and Partnership About TheSEOInc TheSEOInc is an integrated search engine optimization agency that helps to build your organic positions through a series of best practices. We deliver expert SEO services to USA, UK, Europe and Asia Pacific clients. The scope of our services includes organic SEO, local SEO marketing, social media optimization, technical SEO, content marketing, keyword research, SEO competitive landscape analysis, website gap and opportunity analysis and conversion rate optimization. We provide electives to choose between standalone services under Ala-Carte plans or agency level SEO USA plans. Our SEO fulfillment team works in highly challenging environment of search marketing which goes on a transformation every days. Basically in order to make sure we are 100% ethical we do a lot of research and training ensuring that we maintain our tag of best SEO company in USA. Over the years we have been elated with the support of our clients, investors and the employees who has made us successful. That s TheSEOInc.your long team search partner. For more information visit Alternatively call

3 SEO White Paper Search Engine Optimization Strategies 2014 & Beyond Search engine optimization is a powerful and cost-effective means of expanding reach and acquiring new customers, but the world of search is getting more and more competitive and harder to master. Research shows over billions of online searches happening every month and social networks that rival populations of large countries, which means there s an unlimited opportunity for you and your business. But in order to take advantage of that opportunity, it is vital to have your site rank highly in the search engines and make sure your website converts visitors into leads and sales. As more widespread knowledge of search engine optimization techniques stiffens the competition in the SERPs (search engine results pages). In this cutthroat environment, developing a sustainable, defensible SEO strategy and using the right tools to help you along the way is crucial to your success in your search marketing campaign. Equally important is ensuring a proprietary advantage that your competitors will be hard-pressed to duplicate. SEO Strategies 2013 vs. 2014: 2013 was an incredibly challenging year for the SEO industry. The biggest challenges this year for many came from Google Inc, which is on a never ending fight against web spam. They did make 3 major updates - Penguin refresh back in May 13, followed by their covertly releasing the brand new Hummingbird, in early September 2013 which was swiftly followed by another Penguin refresh. Theoretically all these changes are supposed to target the spammers but there are several instances that companies preferred to settle at early stage of SEO, content marketing and social media suffered by losing targeted keywords. New Organic SEO Challenges For 2014: Social media reaches to its maturity throwing a new dimension of competitiveness to the marketers. In order to rise above the high level of noise generated by your competition, you need to more adept and out of box in planning, executing and measuring your content and social media campaigns. Break through approach in technical SEO, usability and analytics. It s pretty clear that technology is evolving in a way to collaborate these 3 metrics into a single dimension, i.e. website promotion should be aimed for users over the search engines. It s no secret that your website hierarchy, informative content and usability are the keys to enhancing conversions. Content marketing (creating and promoting) is now an overwhelming job for marketers across the board. If you ve tried it then you probably know it takes time to formulate ideas, do the 3

4 4 research and do the writing or recording necessary to create something great. You ve done the content but its half way on the road unless your prospects and customers can find it. Ethical Search Engine Optimization Strategies 2014 and Beyond: Experience Driven Design: Different designs evoke different user experiences. Any design will have some level of effect on the user, whether the designer intended this effect or not. These experiences are important by influencing purchase decisions, usage behavior, and time spent on your website. We have seen a rapid technological advancements resulting to evolution of highly complex websites and web applications, however one thing that has been unchanged ever since, How user perceives it. In view of this personalized experience driven web design will always keep you one step ahead. The key to design great website that creates ultimate user experience and generates huge sales: - Understand the current level of user experience on your website - Conceptualize and model the future user interaction - Materialize and build new concepts that works Transparent and Authoritative: Web is trying to meaningful and so also the search patterns. As we become more sophisticated, refining our queries and evolving our understanding of what a quality website and what quality content is, so are the search engines. They are employing discreet algorithms to measure the authority of a business with background metrics that formulates this authorship value. That s why online businesses are opting to invest in those opportunities that help them establish their authority. In view of this complex environment high value link building, content marketing and social buzz are best regarded as next level strategies to penetrate the market. Keyword Research Strategy: There is a buzz that search engines are trying to bring personalized search. Google has already encrypted the search results and Microsoft is trying to do so. Despite of these improvements, your targeted customers remain to be same. So you should follow a user centric keyword research process. Use keyword research to understand what type of information your customers are seeking to guide the content you ll create throughout the year. Determine how they're asking the questions and evaluate whether you're able to answer them through focused, optimized content or if you need to supplement your SEO strategy with other online marketing channels to get your offerings found. Though there are some changes your search engine optimization and content marketing is going to be keyword focused. Technical SEO Best Practice: Technical SEO factors are the aspects of a given web page that influence search engine rankings. In 2013, the whole demography of SEO has changed vastly, even though the basic premise has remained the same. Because of these changes, the way we perceive on-page SEO has to adjust as well. The changing demography of search engine algorithms has altered the factors playing in to how one chooses to perform SEO. Technical SEO isn t just about how your site is coded.

5 It s also about how your site looks bare-bones (the robot view), and how your website responds to different screens. It includes load times and authority. And with the direction that Google is headed in 2014 and beyond, it s clear that your technical SEO elements and off-page elements must line up and agree with each other in a natural, clear, organic manner. Link Building What to Expect: One of the important jobs of SEO manager is building high quality and relevant links. Even after several algorithm updates, we still see high quality links benefit you. As we predict link building trends in 2014 and beyond would be mostly influenced by what will be the next Panda & Penguin updates. Google has clearly mentioned that it dislikes unnatural and massive link building. This search engine giant has also confirmed that they are working on creating more effective tools for analyzing link quality. Google likes to see websites having natural backlinks from related sites. Your strategy in 2014 and beyond is to venture into: increase links outreach, content marketing, infographics and relationship building. Social media links are also going to play a pivotal role. Long version short, backlinks are going to be always important however quality parameters will be stricter. Mobile Within SEO Framework: Mobile devices are here to stay. Therefore by creating a mobile adaptable version of your website, you ll be putting yourself directly above any competition that fails to provide mobile catered content, and you ll be in a position to stop yourself from falling behind any other businesses that have already adapted to mobile technology. Being mobile-friendly does not just mean that your website can be viewed on mobile devices. A mobile-friendly site should be designed specifically for smaller screens (mobile, tabs, Ipads or smart phones), allowing easy navigation via larger touch-screen buttons, and only display relevant information and content for the users needs. So from 2014 and beyond your search engine optimization campaign must have space for mobile optimization. Effectively Measure Your Conversions: Search marketing is about measuring the effectiveness of your campaign and making adjustments to ensure that your search engine optimization is brining the intended results. With the right SEO KPIs and metrics, you can gauge your performance and improve to your return on investment. The rules of SEO seem to be always changing, but one thing remains true: there is no substitute for great content. By measuring your results, you can pinpoint which web pages are resonating with your audience based on SEO KPIs like click-through rates and goal conversion rates. Some other critical SEO KPIs are SERP(keyword rankings), SERPs over the time, impressions, new keyword opportunities and back links are going to critical as well. Search Engine Landscape: The search landscape is changing dramatically and so also search marketing techniques and process. You might have experienced 2013 as an eventful year guessing the volatility of organic search environments. With universal search and personalized search around, marketers now require a collaborative strategy to bring link building, Blog, content marketing, social media and video marketing under one roof. Several independent research shows, a collaborative strategy preserves your current natural listings while helping you to gain even more search exposure. Therefore if you have not done already, be agile to adapt an integrated organic SEO process. 5

6 Things to Avoid: With Google s algorithm constantly on the move, it s hard to keep up with what s considered right and wrong in the world of Internet and Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Barricades between offline and online business have broken down and the rapid shifts in technology, and the way customers adapt to it has transformed businesses significantly. In view of the above complex environment it becomes highly imperative for the small business to plan out a ROI driven SEO strategy. It does not matter whether you are doing it by your own or hiring a search engine optimization agency, do consider the following: SEO is going to be a long term game, because you aim to gain authority and there are no cutting corners. Don t expect to see quick turnaround. Technical SEO is mandatory and should be done over and again to make sure you are 100% updated. It s goes beyond making your website. Several tests are essential before you finalize on your converting landing pages. Targeting highly generic keywords for rankings is not the best strategy. Ask yourself, What can bring me more targeted visitors and how I can make sales out of the visits. Your strategy should be to get more targeted traffic over just rankings. Invest time in building content, social media engagement to enhance your authority score in you given industry. This takes real amount of time and efforts. Just writing some articles or a while social media post or irregular blog posts would not solve any purpose. Invest time in understanding the Analytics which is more than just number of visits. You get enormous inputs for decision making. Don t ignore their importance. Content Marketing: Content marketing is a proprietary promotion strategy that involves the creation and sharing of media and publishing content in order to acquire customers. But how does your business craft a consistent and effective content marketing strategy? Develop a Content Strategy: The biggest challenge involved with content marketing is to identify tactics, platforms, and trends which are garnering the greatest interest by the users. Based on the findings content marketers produce great content regardless of what company may be promoting. Since content marketing would connect your consumer behavior with marketing legends, it s a mind boggling work and in order to get success you will need a strategy that works for you. Some key features of your content marketing strategy: How to implement a content marketing plan that will attract and engage your audience. Best ways to integrate content marketing into your traditional and social media activities. 6

7 Innovative methods for creating and distributing valuable and helpful content. What the most innovative global technology companies are doing with both practical and innovative strategies around owned content. Developing Content: Once you have created your content marketing strategy, the challenging part begins: creating the content! Before that you will need to answer some generic questions: Do you really understand your core audience their aspiration, information consuming ability, technical knowhow, level of curiosity etc.? Where do your targeted visitors consume content from? Is it social media, news, whitepapers, videos or Blogs? How much time they have? How much time they are ready to consume? This is a quite difficult metric to ascertain but brings great value to your business. Do you have a have a customer and prospect segmentation strategy in place? Answering the above questions will more likely make your strategy more ROI driven and precisely provide topics on which your periodic content will be published. It s advisable to make a yearly strategy since that makes you more organized. It s always advised to integrate your topics on your yearly content calendar. Using Collaboration Tools: In addition to planning and developing content, any business that has multiple team members working on content marketing needs a collaboration tool that gives them ability to create legends, set deadlines, upload files, collaborate the tasks and generate the to-do lists. This simplifies the array of activities defined under a content marketing initiative. Furthermore content syndication becomes seamless and automatic which is extremely necessary. After all your will always want your initiative must follow the tasks you have laid out to avoid any glitches. Syndicating Content: Syndicating your content means you re publishing either a piece of content you ve written or a video you ve created onto a different website. Your content will be published on this website for others to share and comment; however it is imperative that you earn a link back to where the content was originally posted. You re not allowing someone else to take credit for your work; you are simply allowing your content to be published with credit given back. Your considerations for syndicating content: 7 Selecting your syndication partners or media The technical infrastructure of your partner Trade carefully between paid and non paid content syndication Your back linking pattern and consideration How to measure conversions from your syndication

8 Nurture Your Brand Awareness: Brand awareness is the combination of your brand perception and your overall web presence through positive reviews. With the overall growth of social media and consumer advocacy sites, your customer is genuinely expected to go through your company s overall reviews. Imagine how positive/negative brand discussion will impact in the decision making process. While positive brand reinforcement will win you business, negative discussions will kill your business. Therefore a part of your content marketing, SEO and social media efforts should be to nurture your brand. Be Sociable Be Searchable: Successful social media marketing is more than just gaining a presence over the social media. Social channels are inherently built for sharing and engagement, making them the perfect place to cultivate valuable business relationships. However the astronomical growth of social media channels has reengineered the marketing thought process. A business that fails to embrace the power of social media runs into the risk of losing the power of peer-to-peer communication which is one of the most important form of marketing communications. Not only social media provides you the power of ultimate form of online marketing but also it gives you the ability to sustain your organic rankings. However measuring the success of your social marketing is a big goal. There are two legends of your social media. Either it can be to raise the voice of your brand or website communication by creating soft engagement metrics like tweets, shares, likes or core business generation through effective social marketing. Selecting your Channels: Upon you are selecting your goals and metrics; it comes down to selecting the social media channels. By far many online businesses have embraced the power of social media so it s going to be a tuff space to play. There are plenty of channels out there. Note all the social media channels don t bring equal benefits to your marketing efforts. Also working on cross channel is not so easy it takes time and effort. So you must start from the basics and write down your goals with respect to your media channel. As an example for having a solid video presence nothing is better than YouTube. Twitter might be helpful in customer support. Remember your strategies should be clear and legible to set the foundation of a long term relationship with your followers. Conclusion: There are several discussions going on the future of search engine optimization. Is SEO dead? Are we moving away from SEO? No it s not dead. It s more collaborative and it s evolving and venturing more into content marketing, social media, and conversion rate optimization. So if you have not started to evaluate your strategies do it now. All you need is a Game Changer plan to excel in your search engine optimization campaign. What we suggest is be proactive rather than being reactive. 8 THANKS A LOT!