Roy Hunter

July 27, 2009

www.MyMarketingCompany.com

I have been following a lot of forums lately and one of the things I have noticed is many posters, and surprisingly some SEO providers, really do not understand what Page Rank is.

The common misconception seems to be that Page Rank is your placement or ranking in search results. Page Rank does have an effect on ranking higher in search results but not the location of your website within those results. Page Rank is the overall value placed on your page by Google and that value gets passed to the pages you are linked to. It is still possible to achieve high placement in search results with a Google Page Rank value of zero.

Over time Google will place a value on your page based on its popularity and perceived authority. This value is is then used to determine the value of pages you are linked to. The theory is; quality sites will link to quality pages and this is how Google differentiates quality websites from questionable ones and assists them in removing spam sites from the search results.

I saw a blog post by Danny Sullivan in reply to a post made by Matt Cutts. Mat Cutts is the head of Google’s Web spam team and he  basically sets the standard for what Google indexes and deems valuable content.

In Matt’s blog, Danny Sullivan provided a very simplistic example how Page Rank works by defining it as a $ value. Each web page has a value, maybe $5, maybe $10, etc. If you have 5 links on your page and your page is valued at $10, each link has the ability to spend $2 of that value and transfer it to the page it is linked to. The linked page now gets a value of $2, if that page has 4 external links, each link is worth $.50 and transfers that value to the linked page and so on.

That is an overly simplistic definition of sharing Page Rank value as Google ultimately determines the value of the link based on the type, location, some links are worth more, some are worth less. But you get the general idea.

To get Page Rank you need to have links to your website on Page Ranked sites, when websites with Page Rank link to your site and “share” some of their value, the Page Rank value of your site will increase. Page Rank is also given by Google as a result of the number of  inbound links to your website regardless if they are from Page Ranked sites or not. You can gain page rank from links in social sites,  forums and blogs, as well as links from media companies such as local magazines that are promoting your website as a result of advertising with them. The more links you have pointing to your website, the more Page Rank your website will receive from Google.

Consider your Page Rank as money in the bank. Choose to spend it wisely. Each page you link to will get some of the value that has been placed on your page. A good rule of thumb is to only link to quality pages with a trusted authority. If you are not sure about the quality of the website you are linking to, you should define in the HTML code of your website instructing the Google bot to not follow that link. If you are confident the page is a authority, or quality website then by all means link to it. Google likes quality websites to share their value with other quality websites.

Here is an example of a “nofollow”  link for an untrusted link within a web page you can use to adjust your code:

<a rel=”nofollow” href=”http://www.THELINKSWEBSITE.com” target=”_blank“>Anchor Text</a>

That will open the page in a new window, use _self in place of _blank if you wan the link to open in the same page.

Now I am sure some of you SEO savvy developers who have used link sculpting in the past to enhance the value of interior linked pages to preserve Page Rank may disagree with me about sharing page rank freely between worthy sites, if you have been paying attention, Google has made a fundamental shift from it’s stance on “link sculpting”.

If you would like to learn more about the update that Google has implemented and learn more about the practice of Link Sculpting do’s and dont’s you can read Matt Cutts blog here:

Matt Cutts Blog

If you would like to begin a forum discussion on the subject you may do it here:

Free Marketing Forum

Roy Hunter

Florida Marketing Consultants

July 27^th, 2009

http://www.mymarketingcompany.com/

I love that joke!

The sad thing about it is, for the most part, the promise of search engine optimization and the companies that provide that service, really are a joke.

Granted, there are some legit SEO companies out there, don’t get me wrong, but the ones that really get results are VERY few and far between.

I recently did a search in a directory for SEO companies nationwide and sent out nearly 700 emails of which I received about 100 or so responses at the time this article was written.

I made a simple request. I was willing to bookmark their website on all the social bookmarking sites I submit to (17 of them) if they were willing to do the same for me.

Of the hundred or so responses, NOT ONE SEO company at the time this article was published had bookmarked my site in any of the social bookmarking sites on the internet today. The main bookmark sites that come to mind are Blinklist, Delicious and Google Bookmarks.

But here is where it gets really funny!

I bookmarked every single company’s website that had sent me a reply. Over 100 of them. When I logged into my Delicious account to see how many times my site was bookmarked, (and discovered no one bothered to return the favor) I looked at all the SEO company websites I had bookmarked to see what the average number of bookmarks my competitors had.

Ready for the punch line?

75% of the SEO web pages I bookmarked had NEVER been bookmarked on Delicious before. NEVER! I was the first person to bookmark their site! 20% of the companies had less than 5, and the remaining sites had more than 5.

5% of the nationwide SEO companies understand one of the most basic SEO techniques available to get sites some exposure!

That is 1 out of every 20, or 256 companies out of every 5,120 for you number nerds, that actually get what social bookmarking can do for your website, let alone theirs, or even has any customers willing to bookmark their website! One out of Twenty!

One of the simplest things that can affect your page rank and placement in organic search results is how many “links” there are to your site on the internet and the quality of those links.

If an SEO company is promising to get you higher placement in search results and can not even get their own site up the search engine results list, what are they REALLY going to do for you? If the owner of the SEO Company can not even take the time to get links to his own site, does he really know what he is doing when it comes to Search Engine Optimization?

Before you hire a SEO company I am going to tell you the easiest way to know if that company will do what it says…

First, check their placement in the search results for your area. If they are not in the top 10, dont bother. If you have a google tool bar, check to see if their site has any page rank.

Sign up for an account on www.delicious.com and bookmark the page of the company you want to hire. You will then be able to see how many Delicious.com members have bookmarked that company’s website. It gives you a hint to their popularity.

If it is more than ten, you probably have found an SEO God.

If they have 1 or less, stay away, you are going to get burned. It is what we call in the marketing industry “SEO Malpractice!” Anyone can provide SEO services, but few understand what SEO really is.

And when you think about it, it really is not that funny…. Websites can actually be hurt by black hat SEO tricks and owners of those websites will be up against some huge losses for the privilege. Both financially, and from lost revenue previously generated by the website.

My next article will define Page Pank as this is another conversation you can have with your SEO, if they do not understand page rank and how it works, then you will really know you have a bum steer!

Roy Hunter
July 16, 2009
http://www.mymarketingcompany.com/

I get a lot of inquiries about web page ranking in search engine results by a lot of my clients so I thought it would be helpful to write a quick article on the subject.

We have all heard the term, build it and they will come. That might work for McDonald’s, however, just having a web page on the internet these days simply is not enough to get the customers you need. If you are representing your business with a single web page that only contains a minimum of information, chances are pretty good it will not be seen in the organic search results of most search engines. Then you find yourself forced to rely on pay-per-click advertising if you want to have your site appear on the first page of relevant search results for the goods or services you provide -  and this can get expensive.

What most business owners think is a simple task of getting their business offerings seen, creating an effective web page that is a highly useful tool for marketing of goods and services is much more complex than it seems.

You have to market your marketing.

Not only do you need to market your business offerings, you also have to effectively market what you are using to market your business.

This is where so many business fall short of achieving an effective internet marketing strategy.

I ask my clients, “Why should consumers do business with you?” and they begin to tell me how good their customer service is, how unique their products are, about the quality of their work, how affordable it is to use their service, how good their food is…

Then I ask them “Why should someone look at your web page?” So they can see what we do. What are you doing to make them want to see what you do? That is usually where I am responded with silence and confusion.

What a lot of business owners do not understand is they are often not the only business offering the goods and services they provide. Search results often display 10 results per page for a search query. For example, if you are a Mexican restaurant in a very large metropolitan area such as Dallas Texas there may be 200 Mexican restaurants for local residents to choose from.

What are the first ten Mexican restaurants in the search results doing to be ranked in the top ten? How did they get there?

They are offering viewers a reason to look at their website, they are offering more than one web page as a point of entry to their website, and they are using search keywords other than “Mexican Restaurant Dallas” to do it.

There is one basic principle that needs to be kept in mind to understand why a web page is in the top 10 search results, POPULARITY. They are the websites that viewers like the best, go to the most often, and can get there the easiest.

Don’t think about marketing the business, market the website.

I don’t know how many times I have said this to a client and had them look at me like I was crazy. “We want the website to market the business!”

First things first. A website is not going to market your business if it can not be found and offers no reason for viewers to look at it. It will not be popular as a result, and it will not come up in the top 10 search results.

What will make viewers want to view your website? CONTENT, VARIETY, and INFORMATION!

If you can create content for your website, it is like waiving a magic wand over it and viewers will come.

This article is a little too short for me to go into a lot of different ways of creating content for various businesses. I am going to stick to the Mexican restaurant example and show a few ways content can be created that is specifically designed to boost the popularity of a website, which eventually will increase it’s placement in search results, so the real customers you are interested in finding – can find you.

Consider interests that are related to what you sell and produce content based on that interest. What is common to a Mexican restaurant? Mexico. If you are from Mexico create a page on your website about the area you are from, some local pictures, points of interest, things to do, great hotels in that area, how to travel there, the favorite local cuisine…

Do you have a recipe that you are willing to share with a viewer? Create a page specifically for that.

What you are doing is creating web page’s within your website that someone looking for information on traveling to Mexico, or a new Mexican dish to try at home will find. They may be located in Colorado and your business is in Texas, but you are creating popularity for your website through content, which will boost the search ranking of your website for the viewers in Dallas Texas.

Multiple Points of Entry

If you are focusing on a few search words for people to find you and drive them to a single web page page for your business, you are limiting who can find you, the search words used to find you, and how many people will find you.

If I enter the search term “Restaurant specials in Dallas” I expect to see in the search results the Dallas restaurants that are offering specials through their website. If I see a Mexican restaurant is offering a free margarita with every dinner and I like margaritas and Mexican food, I am going to look at that website.

Having a web page within your website that is devoted to your restaurant specials, you are creating a side door for viewers to find you based on different search terms and interest. They may not be specifically looking for a Mexican restaurant, they are more interested in specials being offered by restaurants, and because you have a page dedicated to specials, you just found a new customer.

What side doors can you offer your customers? What can you do to make your website popular?

Marketing a website is a complex task, it takes time, effort, and content. The results are not immediate. A local marketing consultant in your area can be a wealth of assistance in proper website development and show you the best ways to market your marketing website.

If you want to see a good example of a website optimized for multiple points of entry, look at our company website located HERE. As you browse through our links you will see that every page has the same header, footer, and link table. If you were not directed to our home page and you entered our site through any of our other link pages, you would think you had found our main page. We have 9 categories of marketing listed in our link table, every page has been optimized for each specific category. If a searcher is looking for internet marketing, the Internet marketing page is what will come up in their search results.

That is a lot of categories which includes a lot of keywords.  How many does your website have?

Looking for free marketing advice? Join our free marketing forum and post your questions HERE.

July ^5th, 2009

Roy Hunter

http://www.mymarketingcompany.com

Internet marketing is vastly becoming a mandatory choice for businesses wanting to market their goods and services. Through development of a company website and everything else that is required to get your information in front of the customers that matter the most, the solution to internet marketing has become an increasingly complex one.

For many businesses the days of being located on Main Street and having customers that just walk in the front door are gone. Brick and mortar stores are being replaced by cyber-storefronts of companies whose customers will never know where they are located.

The most basic level of internet marketing is your company’s website. It is your Internet storefront and it alone represents your company, its goods and services, to customers you hope, and need, to get. But how do these potential customers find you?

Having a good website is not enough. It could be the best looking site on the Internet but if your customers don’t see it, they don’t see your company. Not only does a company need to market what it is they are selling, now they also need to market their website.

Several options exist for website marketing. They include:

• Placement in organic search results
• Paid placement in search results
• Paid placement on other websites
• Social site networking
• Direct email marketing

For the moment I want to focus on the topics of paid placement in web results and paid placement on other websites.

The paid placement model in search results works like this; if you are the owner of the Widget Manufacturing Company, you can bid for placement at the top of the search results in the sponsored ad section. Your placement in that section, and how close to number one on the list your ad resides, depends on what you are willing to pay the search engine company each time your ad has been clicked by viewers of your ad that are interested in purchasing your widgets. The ad has a limited life depending on how much per month you are willing to spend and how many users click your ad.

For example; if you have an advertising budget for pay-per-click placement of $200 per month and you bid $5 per click to get the number one spot in the paid results, your add can be clicked 40 times that month before it disappears until the next placement cycle begins. If you receive all 40 clicks in the first 3 days of the month, the other 27 days you can not be seen by your customers. In order for you to be seen all 30 days of the month, you will need to increase your ad budget ten fold to maintain that exposure. Suddenly your add budget has increased to an amount that is more than what you are willing to spend each month to acquire customers. Can your business survive when it can only be seen 3 days a month?

Another alarming statistic by Burlingame market researcher Outsell Inc. suggests that click fraud cost merchants $800 million last year and is a significant enough threat that 27% of merchants are cutting back on click-based advertising.

What is click fraud? Click fraud is when a phantom user, which has no interest in your business, clicks on your ad to generate revenue for the ad host or its affiliate. Many affiliate websites that host pay-per-click advertising get a share of the pay-per-click fee your company is charged each time a user clicks your ad. It’s free money to them, your ad budget gets blown, and you still do not have the customers your business needs to survive.

Though pay-per-click advertising is still a very reliable way of getting customers, business owners that opt for this method need to be aware that the potential for fraud is extreme, and an ever increasing problem within that ad placement model exists if your ad is displayed on affiliate sites.

What I recommend to the clients of my marketing company is a mix of pay-per-click advertising,  fixed placement using a paid-to-perform model, and paid subscription ad.

The paid-to-perform model is simple. Your business info is listed on multiple sites free of charge until a user clicks your ad and completes a transaction of which you agree to a fixed or variable commission only if a sale was completed. Most companies offer a commission from 3% to 15% of the sale to the owner of the host website which hosted the ad that generated the sale. The downfall to this model is the lack of a cap you can place on your monthly ad budget, but if every completed transaction resulted in a profitable sale to your business, the ad budget can be built into your margins to cover the cost of the commissions.

If your ad budget is still a concern and prefer your budget be fixed, you can also opt for a subscription placement. Subscription placement works like this; you pay a website a monthly fee to host your advertisement. They are paid upfront and your ad will be displayed constantly, or randomly, to every viewer of that page during the subscription period. Regardless if you get one sale or fifty, you still pay the same price for the placement of that ad.

Needless to say, marketing your website is a complicated matter especially when the survival of your company depends on it. I advise my clients to diversify their online ad budgets to include a mix of all three. It has proven to be the best solution for marketing your company’s website as well as the goods and services your business provides.

Would you like some free marketing help? Post your questions in our forum HERE.