A BrightEdger

M Posted 10 years 8 months ago

t 9 min read

Meet Eric Enge

As a professional who has worked in SEO since 2002, Eric Enge has seen his share of industry changes. He now serves as the CEO of Stone Temple Consulting and is the lead author for The Art of SEO, which will be released for its 3rd Edition by O’Reilly Media in August 2015.

The 50-person Stone Temple Consulting agency works with some of the world’s largest brands and truly practices what they preach. They bring in their clients exclusively through their content marketing strategies - there is no sales team! Eric will be attending and speaking at Share for the first time this year and is excited to rub shoulders with some of the greatest minds in the industry.

Getting together so many advanced and experienced marketers promises to provide everyone in attendance with fantastic learning and networking opportunities. Eric and BrightEdge sat down to discuss the upcoming conference as well as the changing digital landscape and how companies can get noticed.

About Share

BrightEdge (BE) We are excited to hear about your presentation at Share. Tell us more about it.

Eric Enge (EE): I am going to present on the evolution of the digital and SEO professional (or the SEO team) and what it takes to be successful in today’s environment. My talk will illustrate how a successful SEO program contains many different elements that must work together to successfully get content in front of the appropriate audience. At the heart of the talk will be some ideas about how to pull together an organization or develop a personal strategy that will help you deliver outstanding results while also minimizing potential disruption from future Google algorithm changes.

In my experience, it’s best to stay focused on your customer. Yes, you need to be smart about what Google is doing as well as the mechanics and limitations of search engines. Your primary priority, however, should always be on your customers and how to create a superior experience for them. That is what Google wants to rank highest anyway, so by making this your chief focus you will be prepared for future Google shifts. I plan on exploring these and other ideas to a much deeper degree so that people can walk away with a firm idea about how they can create a strong, lasting content strategy.

BE: What advice can you give share attendees in order for them to make the most out of their Share15 experience?

EE: Pick out the people you really want to hear speak (pick me, pick me!) and make a point of putting aside the time in your calendar to see their presentations. Then, take advantage of networking opportunities to meet some new people and perhaps forge some new partnerships.

About the industry

BE: How do you see the space evolving over the next year - what should marketers look out for?

EE: Google will continue pushing towards building the Star Trek computer. That means they will expand their computing capacity, continue to experiment with more rich-answer boxes and continue to add more structured databases of information. You will see more progress on this during the coming year. You will also see more action against various types of spam as well. Perhaps more doorway updates, a Panda or Penguin update, etc. I’d also expect that the mobile update will see a major revision before the year’s end.

BE: How are you aligning your content and search optimization efforts?

EE:The search world and the role of the web is now highly integrated. Content on your site plays a direct role in bringing links to your site and establishing your overall authority. Content measurement is also the primary driver of growth for our business and we take it extremely seriously. Measurement allows you to gauge the success of your efforts and helps you fine tune your campaigns so that you can see continuous results over time. At the same time, one of the biggest challengers for marketers is finding a way to stay above the noise. The sheer amount of content being produced now means that for your content to attract attention it has to be meaningful and it has to be helpful.

Generic, uninspired content is not going to cut it any more. You need to choose your channels wisely and pick the ones where a large percentage of your target audience spends time- for both your paid and owned strategies. Creating differentiated content and distributing it through the right channels will help you get the most earned media results.

About BrightEdge

BE: How do you work with BrightEdge?

EE: We get fantastic competitive analysis data from BrightEdge. We use this valuable insight on our client’s behalf to help them see results from their content campaigns. Our clients use the BE platforms to collect key data points, such as Share of Voice measurement, to perform Content Optimization and much more. We use the data to tune the digital marketing strategies we put in place for our clients.

The fun stuff

Did you know that Eric was the 1984 World Champion in Foosball? It was in an event known as Goale War. He also won the US National Championship in 1985. Foosball at Share15 for a beer anyone? Anyone? Eric promises to deliver an engaging and informative presentation at Share15 this September.

We look forward to speaking more with him about the industry and the future of digital marketing in just a few weeks.

If you have not signed up yet to participate in this exciting conference, there is just a short time left to take advantage of the Early Bird Special! Early Bird pricing ends July 31.

Share15 Details September 21-23 Westin St. Francis San Francisco, CA We hope to see you there! 

enewton@brightedge.com

M Posted 10 years 9 months ago

t 9 min read

How to design a site that get backlinks and, more importantly, traffic

Content Performance Marketing requires you to develop content that can target organic demand, that your audience readily consumes, has on-page optimization, and get backlinks.

There are two main reasons you want to get backlinks to your site: page rank and traffic. In the SEO industry we have been more concerned with the former, but now is a good time to recalibrate how we orient our efforts to page-building efforts and performance. On May 5, 2014 Matt Cutts released a video that described that backlinks will become “a little” less important over time because they have determined that “people care about the quality of the content on that particular page” and “Google is getting better and better at understanding actual language.” We can also surmise that it is harder to game quality content than it is to get backlinks and therefore will become a better measure of worthiness as a destination to send traffic to.

When people link to your website they provide you with a lift in SEO. Google looks closely at how many people link to content as a way to gauge how helpful the site is and whether it answers people’s questions and provides them with value. The search engine operates on the premise that when quality sites link to another site that website can also be trusted, but as its ability to understand language, meaning and intent evolve, it will shift weight away from backlinks.

Reputable websites that produce the quality backlinks you want for your site are most interested in keeping their readers engaged and providing them with value. Linking to a website can be likened to giving the site a nod of approval. The link says that this information can be trusted, so people generally are careful about where they link. Professionals want to link to other quality websites that they know will treat their readers to the same level of value that they receive on the initial site.

If you want to get backlinks to your website, you need to understand these needs and make sure that your website is equipped to be that professional page that has the answers for readers. When others see that your site is worth visiting, you will have a link-friendly site that can improve your SEO and reputation. Check out this post to get some backlink building ideas you could do in a day.

The Importance of Design to Get Backlinks

For people who arrive on your website, the first thing they are going to notice is the page load speed and the second is the design and UI. People will form an opinion about websites in two tenths of a second, and the simpler and more logical the design, the better impression the site will have on visitors. Google co-published a study demonstrating that sites with the least complexity and designs that mirror what customers expect rank the highest for likability. Make sure that the design is visually appealing and it is easy for people to navigate your pages and find information about your brand.

Flashy advertisements can be particularly detrimental for the beauty of the site. Readers will struggle to remain focused on the content on your page when they are continually distracted by blaring advertisements on the side.

Similarly, if there are any graphics on the websites, they should fit well with the information on the page and not disrupt the flow of the content. High-quality images and graphics can be enormous assets to written content, articles with images receive 94 percent more views, but if the images draw attention away from the written content, they may reduce your chance to get backlinks.

The layout of the page also addresses the ease of navigation. People do not like to click or scroll excessively. You want to avoid forcing your visitors to click from page to page unnecessarily whenever possible. This means that you do not design articles that require people to click to see pages 2/3/4 of the article.

The Value of the Content Itself to Get Backlinks

Quality content will be what brings people to your site and first entices them to link back to you. People do not want to link back to posts that are weak and lack substance or direction. Writing the type of content that people will link to requires three criteria:

• understanding your buyer personas
• educating your personas on topics that interest them
• writing regularly

When trying to develop content that your buyer personas will be interested in, begin by looking at your own FAQs. Consider the questions that people ask you when they first enter your office. Think about news related to your industry and your opinion on the stories. Use information that can help your personas educate themselves.

The articles should not be thin and only retell information that can be found on thousands of other pages on the internet. You should work to include your own expertise and experience through the tone, depth of the content, and the information you provide. When you get backlinks to content, it's because the person found the content helpful and believe that others will as well, so write with this intent in mind. Keep the writing clear, concise, and informative.

Some keys to organically popular and linkable content include:

1. Useful information
2. Entertaining content
3. Fresh, current, timely
4. Original information based on unique findings or research

Good content also incorporates appropriate on-page SEO:

1. Naturally incorporate keywords in the prose and anchor text
2. Scannable writing with headlines, subheadlines, bullets, and lists that use the H1 and the H2 tags
3. Promoting articles on social media to boost traffic and reach and recorded social signals to indicate topical trending

This will make it easier for people to discover your content and the value you offer.

Monitor success

As you work to get backlinks and traffic to your page, use a technology like the BrightEdge StoryBuilder to build a Backlinks Report to track your overall progress. The powerful technology will enable you visualize the backlink data from every perspective. The image below breaks out links by product line. It will be helpful for you to see how your site is ranking and if your efforts to get backlinks are having the desired impact. You can use this information to enhance your future efforts and build a well-connected site that serves your business well.

Encouraging people to link to a website, however, requires making sure that the site is valuable, professional, and inviting from the content on the page to the design and appearance. By optimizing the quality of content on the site, however, you can help to create a page that is link- friendly and can help build your traffic and brand’s impact.

A BrightEdger

M Posted 10 years 9 months ago

t 9 min read

Creating a strong community based around a company through a forum is a fantastic way to build the bond between customers and brand. This connection to other customers and to the company itself is excellent to inspire loyalty in customers. It also provides the business ample opportunities for getting to know their customers and what matters to them. By listening to and participating in conversations they can gain far greater insight into their consumer base, improving the customer experience and further enhancing brand loyalty.

How to create a forum

There are a variety of different techniques that site owners can use to create effective forums.

• Create a hosted forum on one of the many free hosting sites
• Create a hosted forum on a hosting site and buy a personal domain
• Create the forum directly on the company website

A forum can be on the company website, which will ensure that the site is protected from ads and other extras. You also have much more control over the appearance of the forum. When the topics on the forum that show up in the search engine results page (SERPs), they will point traffic back to the company site, further enhancing backlink count and SEO results.

There are several different types of forum options for those who want to host their forum. Those using certain website hosts, such as WordPress, can use plugins that will easily create a forum with just a few clicks. PhpBB is the open source forum software that requires a little more work but can be a good option for those who are comfortable doing so.

Follow these steps to successfully download the program.

1. Secure the FTP and login credentials for the database from the host
2. Secure an FTP client if you do not have one already
3. Download the phpBB package
4. Unzip the package to find the directory (which can be renamed)
5. Login to the serve with the FTP client and upload the folder

Making the forum a success

Create a forum to find people in your preferred business niche and convincing them to stay and engage with others on the forum. While accomplishing this goal can become progressively easier as the forum becomes established, the most challenging aspect of running a successful forum is getting the conversation started.

Many people quickly click off an empty forum, even if they would have made the ideal participant. One of the fundamental decisions is whether to moderate and approve all comments, review and remove inappropriate ones, or let it be more wooly and open. If the forum membership has a reasonable hurdle, like being a paying customer or a certified user then regulation is less important. If membership is open, then the comments should be moderated to prevent competitors’ negative or specious comments.

In truly large forums of more than 10,000 the moderating effort may require a few hours a day. At BrightEdge we have more than 2,000 BrightEdge certified users who are admitted to a LinkedIn group, and we run our customer forum there. Both BrightEdge employees and customer forum members start topics and reply to questions. The forum helps define and support the community and improve customer satisfaction and retention. Additionally, a professional network makes an excellent platform because it allows members to display and gain career value from their BrightEdge certification.

Attracting people to the site

Like any other website, it is important to optimize the site for search engines. That means using keywords to communicate your purpose clearly to search engines and participants. Use keyword and keyword phrases in sections such as:

• the page title
• headlines
• the ‘about us’ page

The meta descriptions of the pages when you create a forum should also be strategically developed. This is the text that a search engine user sees when your forum appears in their search results. Use the text to include keywords and to invite people to explore your high-value forum. Here is what users see when the TripAdvisor Forum appears in search results: it is concise and appealing for those interested in learning more about travel.

You can also invite people to your forum directly. Let regular customers, friends and family know that the forum is ready for conversation and that their input would be appreciated. It can also be valuable to post links letting people know about this community option in places such as the business’s social media pages, at the end of communications from the brand-- such as emails or newsletters-- and on the company website. Many customers appreciate the opportunity to connect with the business’s representatives as well as other customers.

Create a forum that encourages conversation

A common mistake of many over-eager forum builders is to create a forum filled with dozens of different conversation categories. What they neglect to remember, however, is that having so many different options just makes the entire forum look empty. New forums will only have one or two conversations at first, so that leaves room for numerous empty categories. Instead, focus on building a forum with only a few categories, maybe even just two or three.

Define these options broadly to give people flexibility. Forums can always be restructured and new categories added if the conversation successfully attracts regular participants. Site owners should also show initiative to start conversations themselves. Most casual page visitors will not arrive at an empty forum and start conversations. Regularly begin new topics under each category and purposely invite people to respond to those particular conversations. It is important to remember the purpose of the forum. It is generally accepted for brands to create special areas of the forum to deal with topics directly related to the brand, as the company AVS did here.

At the same time, people do not come to the forum to receive a direct sales pitch. Even in the AVS forums, there are over 30 different categories, but only a handful that mention the company name. You should foster genuine dialogue among community members and not be afraid to step back when the conversation begins picking up speed.

Protect the forum

Forums regularly come under attack from a variety of different sources, including spambots and trolls. It is important to protect the forum from these sources to maintain the integrity of the community. There are a few practices that can help keep the forum secure.

• disable the search function for guests and only allow it for registered users
• enable CAPTCHA or similar visual confirmation for people registering
• enable CAPTCHA or similar visual confirmation for people making guest posts (or disallow guests from posting without registering)
• Use the GD CAPTCHA foreground noise to make it harder for spambots to recognize the text

It is also important to protect the forums from some of your registered users. It is not unheard of for people, protected by the anonymity of the internet, to say things that they would not say in real life. To make sure the community remains safe and secure for those who want to genuinely discuss issues related to your business, include a list of clearly define behavioral expectations for users. This would be an example of forum rules, as posted on the popular forum, Reddit.

The popular American Express Open Forum is more lengthy and more professional in appearance with each example fitting well with their intended audience.

In addition to SEO value, the legacy conversation makes an effective knowledge base that helps customer self-solve problems. This can help reduce customer service costs. Before beginning a new forum, companies need to establish a clear plan of how they are going to build the community, which at a minimum include goals, strategy, tactics/cadence, resources, budget/staff, and measurement system. Whichever route is selected, the company should assign at least a partial full-time equivalent as a community to operate, facilitate and police the forum.

Creating a successful forum requires a bit of work to establish the community and a few quarters to nurture and build it, but when done well, it contributes to loyalty, retention and efficiency. See some fun community content that is really working: check out BrightEdge's SEO Jokes post.