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Small Business SEO Just Got More Affordable

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One of the biggest challenges small business owners face is trying to find affordable marketing solutions that work for their company.  Recently we have been talking to a lot of companies that simply don’t have the money to optimize their websites or can’t swing a big up-front payment to get things going.

With that in mind, we have made some changes to the pricing of our SEO Plans and have added two other options.

First, we have reduced the setup fee on all of our SEO plans.

Second, we have added an SEO Jumpstart plan.  With this plan you will have a one-on-one phone conversation with us to determine the direction you want to go.  We will then conduct our keyword research and optimize the home page of your website.  We will also provide you with a Comprehensive Website Marketing Analysis so you will know exactly how to improve your site’s overall optimization.

In addition to the SEO Jumpstart plan, we are now offering a free 30-minute SEO consultation and online marketing review.  This call will be packed with information to help you optimize your site.  We’ll identify the primary issues affecting the ranking of your site and provide you with guidance to correct those issues.

In our December Monthly Marketing Newsletter I set some goals for our company.  One was to help 100,000 small business owners market themselves more effectively.  The other was to add 100 new clients to our roster in 2010.  My hope is that by reducing the prices of our SEO plans and offering some introductory products, more small businesses can afford to optimize their web sites.

Give me a call at 1-877-334-8022 and schedule your free consultation today.

To your success,
Ken Partain

Search Engine Optimization – URL Structure

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Over the weekend I realized that I overlooked an important piece to the on-page optimization in our series last week on Search Engine Optimization – Back to the Basics.

The structure of your URL is just as important if not more so than your Title tag when it comes to your on-page content.  The thing you want to remember is to try and use the primary keywords in the naming of your page.  If you are optimizing a site that is already in place, you probably don’t need to worry about renaming the pages, but if you are adding new pages to your site you will want to keep this in mind.

If you are using a content management system or blog software for your site then you probably don’t need to worry about this either because most of them will use the title of your post as part of the URL.  And if you use your primary keywords in the title of your post you’re in pretty good shape.  However, you have to make sure and set it up correctly in order for it to work right.

Here’s an example of a poor URL:  www.yourdomain.com/?id=123.  ?id=123 is the name of the page in this instance.  It doesn’t tell the search engines anything about this page.

Here’s an example of a good URL: www.yourdomain.com/blue-widget-special.  blue-widget-special is the name of the page in this instance and it tells the search engines (and your human visitors) what to expect when they visit that page, a special on blue widgets.

I hope this series has been helpful.  If you have any questions please leave a comment below or get in touch with me.

To your success,
Ken Partain

Search Engine Optimization – Traffic

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This is the fifth article in a five part series title Search Engine Optimization – Back to the Basics.  Yesterday we talked about link-popularity.  Today we are talking about traffic as a ranking factor.

Getting visitors to your web site is not generally considered part of the SEO process though it is the main objective.  Without visitors you don’t have the opportunity to grow your business in the very place most people are looking today.

Although you don’t have any direct control of getting traffic to your website, traffic is nevertheless a factor in how well your site ranks.

Sites can get away without any SEO if they are a popular site and get lots of traffic without the benefit of being optimized.

This can happen if you drive a lot of traffic through offline means, but eventually, if you are providing good content and a great user experience then people will start linking to your site and therefore drive additional traffic.

This system begins to feed on itself and it just continues to grow as you add more compelling content which takes us right back to the first part of this series – your on-page content.

To your success,
Ken Partain

Search Engine Optimization – On-page Content

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This is the third in a series of five articles on Search Engine Optimization – Back to the Basics.  Yesterday we talked about the coding of your website.  Today we’re going to talk about the on-page content, including the meta tags.

There are essentially four parts to the on-page content of your website.

They are:

  1. Title
  2. Description
  3. Keywords
  4. Content

Title

The Title tag is a meta tag, which means it is not usually seen as part of the content a typical user would see.  However, the Title tag shows up at the top of your browser when a page is loaded.  Behind the URL itself, I believe the Title tag is probably the most important element of on-page optimization.  This Title tag tells the search engines what this page is all about.  The Title tag is also what shows up as a link to your website in search results. In the image below, from a Google search, the text highlighted in green is the Title tag.

wmme-serp-snipit

Description

The Description tag is also a meta tag.  It is basically a short description of the content the reader can expect to find when they click through to your site.  In the image above it is the text right below the Title tag.  Typically about 160 characters will show up in the search results.  So the best way to take advantage of that is to make your description compelling so that searchers will be enticed to click through to your site.  In our example above it simply tells who we are.

Keywords

The Keywords tag is also a meta tag.  Because this tag got so much abuse in the past, most of the major search engines simply ignore it today, but there are some that still look at it to pick up keywords that may not be replicated exactly in your content.

Content

This is the juicy part and what all of your human readers visit your site for.  The content is exactly that; your article, your blog post, your video, your pictures.  They all make up the on-page content of your website.  Your content can be really long or really short.  Ideally you should have about 500 words per page at a minimum.  If you are posting to a blog sometimes that’s a little much.  The key is to have unique content about a few keywords so that your content can rank well for those keywords.  If you try to put too much information on one page it won’t rank well for any of it.

Take this series of articles for example.  I broke it out into an introduction and four follow up posts so that each one could focus on one aspect of search engine optimization.  Take a lesson from that.

When all four of these elements are in sync you can rank really well for your chosen keywords.  If there is a lot of competition it may take a little longer, but it can still be done.  You will just need to work on getting more incoming links to those pages.

Tomorrow we are going to talk about Link Popularity.

To your success,
Ken Partain

Search Engine Optimization – Back to the Basics

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Watching one of my favorite movies this weekend, Hoosiers, with Gene Hackman, I was reminded that the same thing that applies to basketball, practicing the fundamentals like dribbling, passing and shooting free-throws, also applies to SEO.

In SEO, the fundamentals are just a little bit different.  When optimizing your web site there are essentially four main ranking factors, 1) the coding of your site, 2) the on-page content, including the meta tags, 3) your link popularity, or how many other, related sites are linking to yours, and 4) your traffic.

All of these factors play a role in how well your site ranks overall, although some will have a greater impact on your rankings.  Also, some of these you have a great deal of control over and others you don’t.

Throughout this week I’m going to dig a little deeper into each one of these factors.  I hope you will follow along.

To your success,
Ken Partain

Remodel Buddy SEO Podcast Resources

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master-logo

Thanks for visiting our site. I hope you enjoyed the interview we did with Kyle Hunt at Remodel Buddy, a marketing coach company for remodelers and home improvement professionals.  Below are some helpful links and additional information for improving your online presence as a contractor.

The most important thing to start with is to claim your local business listings in Google, Yahoo and Bing. Below are the links to do just that. Each of them are free so there’s no excuse for not doing this right away.

Google:

Here’s the link to look up your business.

Once you have claimed your listing you will need to verify your information. Google will provide you with a PIN by phone or by regular mail. Once you receive your PIN you will need to log into the Local Business Center and verify your listing.

Yahoo:

You will need to go here to sign up for your Yahoo Local Business Listing. You will need a Yahoo login, so if you don’t have one, you’ll have the ability to sign up during the process.

Bing:

You will need to go here to claim your Microsoft Map listing. You will need a Windows Live ID, so if you don’t already have one, get one of those first.

We also have our own Local Search Engine Business Profiles that are very well optimized for local search. Approximately 90% of them are on the front page of Google for their primary keyword phrases. For a limited time, we are offering a 50% discount for the first year. After that, it will automatically renew each year for $99.

We also recommend that you get your business listed in as many relevant online business directories as you can. You can find a multitude of free directories in which to list your business, but many of them will be of little value to your business.

There are also a handfull of paid directories (along with a couple of free ones) that we recommend. Below is a list of those directories along with a link to get signed up.

If you don’t have the time or inclination to do this yourself you can take advantage of our Link Building Program and we’ll take care of everything for you.

Don’t forget about doing a few press releases.  The two sites we recommend are PRWeb and FreePressRelease.com.  As I mentioned on the podcast, PRWeb seems to give you a little more exposure and a lot more flexibility, but you will benefit regardless of which one you choose.

If you have your own web site already and you’re not getting the traffic you want or generating the leads you want, you may want to consider one of our SEO Plans. After all, that’s our specialty and we’re proud to say that every single site we have worked on has gotten front page placement in Google, Yahoo and Bing.

And lastly, if you don’t have your own website, what are you waiting for? Every single day people in your town are searching for your services online. If you’re not there, you’re losing money. For a very reasonable fee we can set you up with a small business website and blog of your own, one that you can add content to and edit as often as you please.

To your success!

Ken Partain (follow me on Twitter)

Dollar Store Marketing Consultants

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This week I finished the web site optimization of a new client site.  The site is for Marketing Consultants of Nevada, Inc., a dollar store consulting company.  They help people get started with their own dollar store without any franchise fees or royalties and few regulations.

The site was actually built by my friends over at Greenbaum Marketing, a franchise website development and marketing agency.

Once the site was complete, they turned it over to me for the optimization and I’m thrilled to be working with the folks at both companies.

Check out their sites and if I can help with optimizing your web site give me a call at 1-877-334-8022, extension 704.

To your success!

Is Google Adwords Still The Top Marketing Tool?

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Another thanks to Mark Isherwood for submitting his Top 3 Online Marketing Questions.

His first two questions were:

Do Traffic Exchanges Really Work? and Can You Really Expect Good Marketing Results from Twitter?

Today’s question is:

Is Google Adwords still the top marketing tool?  What else brings good results (besides SEO)?

First off, I’m going to make a couple of assumptions about the question.  1. It seems to me that you are referring to online marketing tools, and 2) that you want quick results (don’t we all!).

I’m sure that we could assemble 100 people in a room and we would have about 100 different answers to what the top marketing tool might be.

Adwords is Google’s version of pay-per-click advertising, also referred to as paid placement.  The other major search engines, Yahoo and Bing, also offer paid placement, so I’ll lump them all together to answer this question.

Pay-per-click definitely has a place in your marketing toolbox, but in my opinion, it’s not the top tool.  From where I stand (and I’m a bit biased), Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is one of the best ways to attract qualified visitors to your site, for the money.

In a recent article, Is Pay-Per-Click Losing It’s Charm?, I mention the fact that the percentage of clicks in the paid placement area of the search engine results page (SERP) has dropped dramatically over the last few years.

I believe this is because more and more people realize that they are ads and therefore prefer to click on the natural results that the search engines believe are relevant, not just the advertisers.

My approach to online marketing is a more holistic one, that includes small business websites and blogs, article marketing, link building and directory listings, email marketing, social networking, social bookmarking and local business profiles.

I believe if you focus your energy on providing good content that your target market can benefit from and you spend a little time each and every day in all of the areas mentioned above, over time, you will build a strong following and loyal customers.

My approach may not bring a million visitors to your site tomorrow, but it will certainly build a strong foundation so you can attract a million visitors down the road.

If anyone else has thoughts to add, please leave them in the comments below.

To your success!

Follow Me on Twitter

The Benefits of Integrating Your Blog and Web Site

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Our questions of the day today comes from Al Ferriulo of Ferriulo & Associates, a provider of Health Insurance Plans for people throughout Texas.

Here’s the answer to your question, Al.

What is better from an SEO standpoint, creating a blog with it’s own unique website, or incorporating it as a page within your current website?

This is a question I had to address for my own business.  For several years I had a blog separate from my main website.  About two months ago I relaunched my main web site as a blog on the WordPress platform.

The reason I did this is so I could have one domain where people could get information about our company and the search engine optimization plans we offer while still having the ability to blog and connect with our readers through their comments.

From an SEO perspective this accomplishes two things:

We are continually adding content to our main site, which the search engines love,

Any new links to our blog posts count as deep links to our domain.

Google puts a lot of emphasis on incoming links when ranking a page, while Yahoo and Bing, though they also factor incoming links into their rankings, they tend to put more emphasis on the content.

So, by having our web site and blog on one domain, it helps our own SEO efforts and helps to solidify our rankings.

I feel that incorporating your blog into your website is the best way to go from an SEO perspective.

To your success!

Ken Partain

Follow me on Twitter!

Generating Traffic and Targeting Niches

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Thanks to Carisse Garcia at My Techie Friend for submitting her Top 3 Online Marketing Questions.

Here are your answers Carisse.

What is the quickest and easiest way to generate targeted traffic to your web site?

First, let me say that the easiest and quickest way is not usually the best way.  Having said that, pay-per-click (ppc) advertising is probably the quickest and easiest way to get targeted traffic to your web site.  Within just a few minutes you can have an Adwords account set up with Google and have an ad created for your most important keywords.

The most effective way to get targeted traffic is to optimize your web site for natural search.  That way, you have a very good chance of ranking well in all the major search engines, not just the one you are advertising in.  Visitors from natural search also convert better than visitors from paid search.  In my opinion, that’s because people trust the natural search results more than the ads.  They feel like, if the search engine ranks it highly, it must be more relevant to their search.

There’s a great article today over at Search Engine Land titled Selling SEO Projects against PPC Campaigns, that gives a little more information on the comparison.

What do you do with the traffic you generate?

Provide them with lots of content about what you do and how you can help solve their problems and ease their pain.

You can also begin building a relationship with your visitors by offering a free newsletter, free download, free audio or video, etc.  Then build a sales funnel with higher priced products and services and continue to build trust with them and offer them more expensive products and services.

How do you target pre-qualified searchers that are intereste in your niche?

The best way to do this is by conducting keyword research.  Find out how people are searching for your niche, then find out where they hang out online.  Is it in Google groups?  Is it on Twitter? Is in on Ning? Is it a forum created around your niche?

Find out those things, then get involved where your target market is hanging out.  Provide them with good information without being sales-y and start to build your reputation as an expert within that group.

To you success,

Ken Partain

Follow me on Twitter!

Welcome!

Ken Partain - Small Business Marketing ConsultantHello, my name is Ken Partain and I personally oversee every single SEO and Website development project that we take on at IPG Search Marketing and I stand behind our work 100%.

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Ken Partain
511 Ancient Oaks Dr
Marble Falls, TX 78654
United States
Local: 1.512.651.2963
Toll-free: 1.877.334.8022

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