Coming up with unique and interesting ways to build links is an ongoing challenge for most SEO’s.  We sometimes take on clients that are in industries that are not very interesting, but none the less, they still need links.  So the challenge arises, how do we get people to link to this site when it’s in such a boring industry?

Below are 3 of the hottest, newest, coolest link building strategies for 2010!

1.  Infographs or Infographics

If you’re not familiar with infographs, they basically represent data in a visual format.  A couple of sites that have taken this strategy and ran with it include: Mint.com & CreditLoan.com.  These infographs can send massive amounts of traffic and get you hundreds if not thousands of backlinks, but they have to be well executed.  Be aware that the initial traffic you get will be social media traffic, which typically doesn’t convert well for most industries.  But the strategy with infographs is links!

2. Trends

Trends are hot in every industry.  People love to know what’s going on, what’s coming up and what others are doing.  Smashing Magazine does an excellent job of this as seen in their “Web Design Trends for 2009“.   This type of content works well for building backlinks because its rich in content, uses images to tell the story, is well structured and it also gives credit to others in the industry.  I know if I was a designer and Smashing Magazine linked to me I’d probably blog about or atleast shoot out a Tweet to let my friends know.  As you can see, this post got them over 200 comments and over 5,000 backlinks.

3. Extended Research

Doing extended research on any one topic can reveal all kinds of facts and statistics that you’re most likely not aware of.  Simply compiling such information can make for linkbait content, but let’s go a bit further with it and truly make it linkable.  If you don’t want to do the research yourself put together a process and post it on Mechanical Turk.  If you don’t want do create the graphics post a job on Elance or oDesk.  Becoming THE source of information is a sure way to get links.

Conclusion

There are countless ways to build links, but with some creativity and know how, anyone can create linkable content.  I challenge you to push the boundaries of link building to come up with new and creative ways of getting those links.  Knowing what others are doing is a double edge sword, you’ll either adapt their techniques or take note of what they’re doing and push yourself to find better ways.  I choose the latter.

- Marko Nikolic

Inside Adwords has announced today that Google rolled out a new feature to its Adwords paid search platform called product extensions.  Currently available to U.S. customers only, product extensions will be a way to enhance your existing ads by showing searchers your product images, titles and prices in a plusbox located beneath the ad.  The products will be most relevant to the searcher’s query and the advertiser is charged on a cost-per-click (CPC) basis.  If a searcher clicks on the ad text, or a product within the product extensions plusbox, the advertiser will be charged for the click.  The advertiser will not be charged if the searcher clicks on the plusbox, but does not click through to the advertiser’s site.  The use of product extensions will enhance a searcher’s experience by increasing the relevance for shopping-related queries by allowing advertisers to include relevant product information directly within the ad.  Even further, the product extensions feature give advertisers the option to select which products they prefer to display for specific search queries in addition to the ability to use automatic targeting.  According to the Inside Adwords blog post, a specific advertiser who implemented product extensions feature during Google’s beta test reported seeing over a 10% increase in click-through-rate (CTR) for their ads.

To get started with product extensions, simply go to the Google Merchant Center and add your Adwords customer ID to your account.

Kurt Kaufer

Google Adwords Product Extensions

Recently, I’ve received more and more questions regarding two important key metrics in the search engine marketing world, bounce rate and exit rate. There seems to be some confusion about the difference between the two, what they actually measure, and how they are valuable tools in a digital marketing campaign. I thought I would use the second installment of my “Back to the Basics” blog to help clarify these mysterious performance indicators.

Bounce rate by definition is the percentage of visitors who land on the website and view only one page (without visiting any other pages) before leaving. For example: Kurt sees a pay-per-click ad which was advertising a wetsuit sale at a local surf shop. He clicks on the ad which takes him to the “sale” landing page. After he reads the page he then leaves the website to go back to Google and start another search. Typical ways a bounce is recorded is by:

• Clicking on an internal link to a page outside of the website
• Closing the browser window or tab
• Simply typing in a new URL
• Clicking the “back” button and leaving the site
• Session-timeout*

*A session-timeout is when a visitor views a specific page, doesn’t look at another page, and leaves the browser idle for a certain amount of time. A commonly used session-timeout threshold is 30 minutes; so once this time limit has been reached a bounce is recorded.

Exit rate by definition is the percentage of visitors who leave the website from a specific page based on the number of visits to that page. The difference between bounce rate and exit rate is that the visitor who exited from this specific landing page may have viewed many other pages on the website before landing on this specific page and then exiting from here. For example: Kurt sees a pay-per-click ad for a local surf shop that just opened. He clicks on the ad which brings him to the home page of the website. He views a few different pages before going to the “sale” page. After he reads the “sale” page he then closes his browser window, hops in his car and speeds to the surf shop.

How to use these metrics:
Both of these performance indicators can create actionable insight, but are used very differently. Bounce rate is important for determining how your landing page might be performing. If you have a ppc ad running and you find that you have a 75% bounce rate for the specific product page which your ad brings the user to, then there is a problem with the landing page. Why would so many users leave a page that was specifically targeted for them? What about the page is preventing them from moving onto other correlated pages within the site? Optimizing the page, multivariate testing, and statistical analysis may help you determine what the root cause and solution may be.

Exit rate is important for determining how a particular page is performing in the sales process. If, as an advertiser, you have mapped out a specific sales (page) funnel, and visitors seem to be exiting from one specific page in that funnel, then you know that that page is problematic and needs to be optimized.
As you can see, both metrics can be powerful tools in identifying specific problems in the user interaction process and help you determine what changes are needed to increase sales and ensure a better return on your ad spend.

Kurt Kaufer

As the cliché goes, a house can’t be built without first laying the foundation.  This post is dedicated to “matching options”, a basic pay-per-click concept that can sometimes get confusing to new PPC advertisers.  The main goal for advertisers is to match their ads with the most qualified search queries.  i.e. The searcher most likely to click on the ad and complete the advertiser’s goal for their website (purchase/sales, leads, newsletter signups, registration, etc…)  Google has four keyword matching options that determine which searches trigger your ads to appear.  The options were built to help the advertiser control who sees their ads, control costs, and ensure the most targeted and qualified traffic is clicking on their advertisement.

1.    Broad Match:  This is the most basic option and happens to be the default when a campaign is set up.  This option is less targeted than the “phrase” and “exact” match options and Google will run your ads on relevant variations of your keywords, even if these terms aren’t in your keywords lists.  Keyword variations include synonyms, singular/plural forms, relevant variants of your keywords, and phrases containing your keywords.

Example:  The keyword you are bidding on is, snowboard jackets.  Ads may appear for searches including snowboard, jackets, buy snowboard jackets, Burton snowboard jackets, winter jackets, snowboard coats, used snowboards.

Pro:  This option allows you to serve your ad to the broadest audience.
Con:  It often generates invalid/unqualified clicks and can increase costs.

2.    Phrase Match:  With this option, Google matches your ad only against keywords that include the phrase you designate specifically in that order.  You can designate this by typing quotation marks around the keyword in the Google interface or by simply selecting the phrase match option.
Example:  The keyword you are bidding on is, “red coat”.  Ads may appear for searches including “cheap red coat”, “buy red coat”, large red coat”.

Pro:  This option allows you to narrow your audience and focus your marketing efforts.
Con:  If one of your goals as an advertiser is generating brand awareness you are eliminating a large base of searchers from ever seeing your ads.  Additionally, if the user happens to misspell a word, or not type it in the exact order, “buy coats red”, then ads would not be served to a segment that really wants your product or service.

3.    Exact Match:  This is the most specific option and your ad would only appear when a user searches for the specific phrase in that order.  You can designate this by typing brackets around the keyword in the Google interface or by simply selecting the exact match option.
Example:  The keyword you are bidding on is, [wetsuit repair].  Ad would only appear for searches including wetsuit repair, in that order, and without any other terms in the query.

Pro:  This option allows you to target your ad spend as much as possible.
Con:  Same as phrase match, but to a higher degree.

4.   Negative Match:  Negative keywords function as a filter to prevent ads showing to unwanted visitors.  This eliminates the amount of untargeted and/or invalid clicks and help control costs.

Example:  The keyword you are bidding on is, snowboard jackets.  If you add the negative keyword ‘cheap’, you ad will not appear for any searches containing the keyword ‘cheap snowboard jackets’.

As you can tell there is a lot to consider when building your keyword list.  In order for your ppc campaigns to be as effective as possible it is a good idea to have a clear understanding of your audience, your marketing and business goals, and your budget well before-hand to ensure you are getting the most effective return on your ad spend.

Kurt Kaufer

If you’re not familiar with the Google Ad Preview Tool than this post is an opportunity for you to add something new to your PPC tool belt.  It seems that more now than ever clients are interested in seeing their ads in action.  They are doing multiple searches daily with the hope of seeing their ads show above their competitors or just to monitor the ad generation that hired guns are doing on their behalf.  What most fail to realize though is that the impressions generated from these “false” searches count towards specific metrics utilized to measure success on both the agency-side and the Google algorithm-side.  Essentially, these searches inflate impressions without the chance for clicks, thus lowering the campaign’s click-thru rate (CTR).  The click thru-rate is a large component of the ads quality score, and the quality score has a direct impact on the bid that is needed to obtain a certain position.  Agencies and consultants need to communicate to their clients that while these searches are alleviating their obsessive need to micro-manage their ad campaigns, they are ultimately affecting the performance of the ads and their wallets.

The benefit of the Google Ad Preview Tool is that clients and account managers now have the ability to check ads without generating impressions and affecting key metrics.  Additionally, this tool was designed to help advertisers see the ads when they’re targeting a location outside of their own location, and target specific languages other than their own computer language setup.

For access to the tool, please click on the image below.

Kurt Kaufer

A new addition to Google Webmaster Tools has popped up, its called Parameter Handling.  Found under the Settings menu, Parameter Handling allows site owners to specify up to 15 URL parameters that Google should ignore while crawling and indexing your website.

Google will list any parameters they have found and will auto select what they think is best for you, but this can easily be changed by selecting the drop down and selecting “Ignore” or “Don’t Ignore”.

The main benefit of Parameter Handling is to help eliminate duplicate content issues.  If you’ve used some of the older shopping carts out there (xcart, oscommerce) then you can probably recall the session id’s being loaded in the URL when a user signs in and out.  Well now thanks to this nifty little addition to Webmaster Tools we can eliminate these duplicate content issues.

In addition to helping avoid duplicate content, Parameter Handling can also help with crawl efficiency and PageRank dilution.   If search engines are crawling multiple pages with session ids for example, then they are putting a load on your server and theirs.  As for PageRank dilution, someone can easily link to one of your URL’s that has a session or id tied to it and unless you are using Parameter Handling, link juice will flow to that exact link.

The main drawback is that Parameter Handling is only for Google, but who knows Yahoo and Bing might offer something like this soon.  It wouldn’t be the first time they added a feature Google came out with.

-Marko

In an age where a backlash against traditional advertising is fueling the growth of social media as a robust marketing channel, this un-intrusive and user engaging alternative communication medium is experiencing unprecedented growth both in terms of the amount of user generated content splashed onto the web and the tools available for understanding what these conversations mean to your brand.  As marketers become hyper-sensitive to the buying public’s increasing use of instinctive advertising defense mechanisms (such as selection and filtering), they are simultaneously being bombarded with an assortment of new tools and services to combat this messaging avoidance.  Staying on top of these new tools as they roll out is becoming a full time job upon itself, but ultimately the role of the marketer is to effectively integrate these tools in a way that not only connects with their target audience, but measures how this interaction impacts the business.

The earliest forms of social media were built on the premise of “members” exchanging information with other “members” across a wide range of topics.  Members create the content, the conversation, and have control over the conveyance and distribution of information.  In keeping with that tradition, this blog post, which presents five tools for social media measurement, is in itself a fundamental platform representing the principles of interactive social information flow.  I am neither trying to endorse nor detract from the below tools, and I am simply using this forum as a springboard for conversation, awareness, and information sharing.

With that said, the tools listed below are useful platforms for measuring brand reputation, tracking user trends, understanding influence, and analyzing customer sentiment.  As a marketer, the ability to organize and understand the massive amount of data available is paramount in not only being able to engage with your target customer base, but in converting them into loyal advocates for your brand.  The main goal is to create actionable insight from your conversation audit, thus advancing the brand and ultimately the business.  Below are five tools that help you get one step closer to realizing qualitative bliss.

Kurt Kaufer

With the recent merge of Bing and Yahoo a lot of SEO’s will be carefully dissecting data to better understand what major factors affect the Bing search results and how those factors compare to how Google ranks websites. It only makes sense that this is done, search volume will inevitably increase in Bing and you will want to be on top of it.

In order to better comprehend how Bing and Google rank sites I compared the keyword home remodeling, and explored various SEO factors that might influence this keywords positioning.

Domain Trust
Comparing the domain trust for each website we can easily see that DoItYourself.com has a much higher trust over LetsRenovate.com. This is probably the first indication and biggest reason why Google has ranked this website number one over LetsRenovate.com.

On Page Factors
Looking at the on page factors, it’s very evident that DoItYourself.com is relying on domain trust for its rankings. The only related keyword in their title tag is Home, compared to LetsRenovate.com who is using the full keyword Home Remodeling. You can also see that DoItYourself.com does not use the exact keyword home remodeling anywhere on the homepage, this again reinforces the fact that their domain authority is high and that is the main factor they are relying on.

Now, the keyword in question, home remodeling, can be broken up into two keywords, home and remodeling. Let’s take a look at each site and how it is using these keywords separate from one another.

As you can see, LetsRenovate.com is using both keywords much heavier and in a lot more places.

Off Page Factors
Backlinks will always be a huge part of any Search Engine Optimization strategy but when it comes to Bing, it’s not really THAT big of a deal. LetsRenovate.com is ranking for a highly searched keyword but is not harnessing many backlinks to do it.

Before getting into the Top 5 Bing SEO Tips, I will assume you’re doing most of the standard on page SEO stuff like a unique title tag, meta description, H1, H2, H3’s, etc… Now that you know what main factors are influencing the Bing search results, I will cover the 5 Unique SEO Tips to get you to the top of Bing.

1. Meta Keywords – Using the meta keywords tag is something that is not heavily emphasized in the SEO world but looking at a lot of the websites that rank in Bing you will see that they are used.

2. Bold Keywords – It has been shown that bolding keywords tells search engines to put a slightly larger emphasis on that keyword. Having looked at quite a few search results in Bing, many of the pages that were near the top utilized this method.

3. Image Alt Tag – Adding image alt tags has long been used for SEO but it seems that it is more important in Bing then Google. Most of the websites I looked at were utilizing the image alt tag well and thus were ranking higher in Bing.

4. Keyword Density – In general, Bing seems to like a keyword density of 4-6%. Not to say I didn’t find websites that ranked with a much lower and much higher percentage, but overall, the top websites seemed to fall in that range.

5. Domain Age – The older the domain, the better. This is a common positive factor for any website but it holds especially true in Bing.

Well, there you have it! 5 Unique SEO Tips to get you to the top of Bing.

- Marko