SEO

The SEO vs. PPC Grudge Match

Posted on July 16, 2018December 4, 2018 by Chari Harris

In the world of Digital Marketing, two behemoths rule the landscape. Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, reigns supreme as a producer of organic, search results-based traffic to your website, while Pay-Per-Click, or PPC, provides immense advertising power by granting you direct, pay-as-you-go access to your target market.

You may have heard that you need to optimize your website for SEO only to then understand that you need to be running a targeted PPC campaign as well. The idea is to grow your online presence both organically (through SEO), and through paid advertising (via PPC). We are often asked by our clients which of the two nets the most profit for dollar spent, and the answer is simply that it depends.

To understand why we’re demystifying SEO and PPC. In this article, you’ll learn the differences between both, and why they matter for your business.

SEO vs. PPC: The Grudge Match Continues

SEO vs. PPC: SEO

In a nutshell, SEO means making the content on your site as relevant as possible to people who are searching for businesses like yours. There are many ways to do this, and they each have their own set of best practices depending on how your site is structured and the kind of product or service you are providing.

SEO optimization often includes at least the following:

Keyword Inclusion: To be found online, your site needs to have the right keywords placed at strategic locations throughout your website.
Link Building: Earning links to your site from other locations on the internet improves your popularity score with Google and other search engines.
Load Speed Auditing: If your site doesn’t load well or doesn’t have a mobile-optimized version, your SEO rankings will likely suffer.
Site Design and Usability Enhancement: Google gives preference to websites that have higher user engagement. This makes it very important to keep your visitors on your site for longer. Good site design and sticky content achieve this.

As far as reaping digital marketing results from your campaign investment, SEO doesn’t stand alone on an island. It’s complementary powerhouse, PPC, also has unique benefits to offer the savvy business owner.

SEO vs. PPC: PPC

When Google, Bing, or Yahoo present their search results to users looking for “hardware stores nearby,” they also include advertisements typically inserted into the margins of the search results page. These advertisements are paid for by the companies wanting the attention of that search user. In the case of hardware stores, a paint manufacturer might want to have their ad presented to search users as they’re shopping for a store to visit.

Google has streamlined the PPC experience for businesses through their development of Google AdWords. Leveraging the enormous power of Google’s traditional web and mobile search along with other sites on the Google Display Network, AdWords is one of the most popular online advertising platforms offering companies deep, targeted reach within their markets.

We Don’t Choose Sides – We Choose Success

Developing a smart digital marketing strategy for our clients involves an appropriate mix of both SEO and PPC. Learning what’s best for your small- or medium-sized business comes from working with experts who specialize in both disciplines, experts like the Altitude Agency team.

To supercharge your online presence with results-driven SEO and PPC services, get in touch with us today.

Google Serves Up a New Way to Verify Your Online Presence

Posted on July 9, 2018December 4, 2018 by Adam Frost

If your business has a website, YouTube channel, or any other online asset, it’s probably something that can be located through a web search using Google. As sites and online media get more and more popular, Google assigns them a Knowledge Panel – a quick, at-a-glance window of key facts related to whatever search term was used.

Search users rely on the Knowledge Panel to get basic information about a business, from operating hours to consumer reviews, and more. Google often uses site metadata, index pages, or other site pages to derive this information – but, it might not always be accurate.

Verify to Modify

The information contained in the Knowledge Panel for your business may not contain the most up-to-date facts about who you are as a company. This can hurt your brand and create confusion among your customers, but it’s avoidable through verification and modification of bad data.

Once you verify your authority to manage your online presence through a simple verification process administered by google, you’ll be able to suggest changes to your Knowledge Panel, including the graphics that are used in its presentation to the search user. Here again lies another opportunity to improve your branding message.

Keep in mind that your communication to Google about your Knowledge Panel is just a suggestion, but when suggestions come from verified accounts, they carry a lot of weight.

The steps involved in verification are easy. Just…

Find yourself or your business online using a Google search.
Locate the Knowledge Panel with key information about your business.
Click on the link next to the text, Do you manage the online presence for [name]?
Go through the verification steps.
Submit your change recommendations.

Google has stated that the entire process shouldn’t take longer than a few days, and most recommendations from verified online presence managers are evaluated within 24 to 48 hours of their submission.

Broaden Your Reach with Smart Site Strategy

Utilizing the Knowledge Panel to improve an online company profile is only one of many ways Altitude Agency can help to leverage the power of thoughtful digital marketing for our clients. Let us help you take your business to greater heights through SEO, content development solutions, and more. Get in touch with us today.

3 Ways to Jumpstart Your On-Page SEO in 2018 and Beyond

Posted on June 11, 2018December 3, 2018 by Barb Senkala

What SEO tactics will jumpstart your digital marketing efforts for the rest of 2018 and beyond? How about exploring your site’s content to make sure your website is as optimized as it can be? That may not be on the list of things to do this year, but it’s easy to forget about your website’s SEO as you run your business, add fresh content to the site, run your social media channels, and more.

Before you sit down to do any work on your site this year, take the time to audit your content’s SEO in these three critical areas.

3 Ways to Jumpstart Your SEO Now

Content Relevancy

In digital marketing, relevancy is key to ensuring the customer’s place in the buyer’s journey moves towards the sale. The top notion in the marketing world is to think of relevancy as funnels. The top funnel is your content that answers fundamental questions and gives an overview of your brand or company. The top funnel catches a lot of people.

You can use top funnel content to bring in guests from broad searches and funnel them into your well mapped out link structure to further explore your site. Mid-funnel content is directed more towards specific customers and specific needs while bottom funnel content is all about you, what you can do, and how you do it. Think of the funnels as a sales process with the close being the bottom funnel. Try to set your internal link structure in this pattern to capitalize on relevancy which we discuss in the next section.

Internal Linking

Your website is easy to navigate, and users love it – in your head. What will search engines think of your website’s internal framework? Have you asked someone else’s opinion on your site’s layout? Your site’s internal linking should be organized and structurally consistent for both the ease of your site’s visitors and to make your website easily accessible to search engine crawlers.

It’s not enough for your on-page linking to be concise and organized. While the organization is essential, you must also factor in what the internal links are pointing to. Consider that Google favors links to unique and well-written content, especially your site’s content. Easy to navigate internal links can help focus site traffic and users to your best content. When crawlers see users navigating to these pages in high frequency, they’ll explore them too and reward you with more top marks in ranking criteria.

Categories and Tags

Categories and tags have long been a box to check off when doing on-page SEO, but unfortunately, many sites still don’t do it correctly or don’t do it all. If you’re aren’t tagging your pages and content in your CMS, you could miss out on the SEO benefits offered by categorization.

Proper tags explain to search engine crawlers the hierarchy of your site and Google will use your tag information to catalog your site for consistency and relevancy. Appropriate tags result in higher search engine rankings, longer user time on your site, and organic increased search traffic.

Take a moment when you have it to pour some time into your on-page SEO including tags, internal links, and content relevancy to give your site the boost it needs to climb the rankings and give your site’s visitors an easy to navigate experience.

All the rich content in the world won’t be useful if users and search engine crawlers can’t browse your site and its hierarchy. Put effort into tags, internal link structure, and relevancy to lay your site out in the best way possible. This roadmap will please your site’s visitors and Google.

Category: SEO