How a Marketing and SEO Strategy Should Grow With You

Do you run your own website or blog? If you’re just starting out, you need to be employing SEO to your corner of the web. If you aren’t familiar with the term, it stands for search engine optimization. Basically, SEO is placing keywords (and other strategies) on your page that people will commonly search for on sites like Google, Yahoo and Bing that will in turn bring visitors to your website by having your page listed near the top of the keyword search results.

Growing Your Company

If SEO has helped your company grow, you should be able to have a higher budget. This can be used with fantastic results as you can have one person (or a group depending on your growth) devoted to utilizing SEO as a valuable asset. Of course, a larger budget means that since you have more money to spend, it can go into the SEO development itself.

As your company grows, you will want to utilize SEO more and more as you develop the resources to enhance your SEO tools. Google Analytics is a good place to start to see what search results are getting visitors to click on your website’s link. This way, you are able to put more focus on certain results and use a marketing strategy that fits best for your budget.

Having your site appear on the top of search engine rankings for a keyword search isn’t going to happen overnight unless you are in an extremely niche market. You can use some of that new money to advertise yourself through SEO even harder and become a top result for sites such as Google. Google brings in almost 5 billion searches each and every day. Not a year, not a month, not even a week, but every day. It will be important to take advantage of those searches as your SEO can help bring a wide array of customers through these searches.

Getting SEO Help

There are experts that have nearly mastered the skill of using search engine optimization to bring clicks and visitors to sites. If bringing in a team of people hasn’t been as effective as you had hoped, then hiring online contractors to get the job done may be the way to go. Your budget can be what you want it to be. As your company grows and you have more to spend you can get more time from these experts that will surely drive in the customers.

If you do not have the time to work with these experts, it may not be worth it for your company. But if you have someone willing to work with them and utilize and implement the strategies that have been placed before you, you will see a lot of success through SEO. Some managers can be too busy which is why it is important to assign that term or person into this specific category.

As you grow and get more visitors, you will be able to track which strategies are working best for you and will now have the budget to utilize those strategies. You will now be afforded the luxury of expanding your SEO result possibilities as your company continues to grow. Instead of a specific search, you can call for a wider array of search results that are less specific and more general in nature. This way, it attracts a larger group of possible customers will continue to generate traffic and ad revenue if you advertise on your site.

You can also use your expertise to expand your website as SEO will take the larger sites into account first. The more words you have on the site, the more likely you are to be towards the top of a search for a keyword. So remember to continually grow your website as the company gets larger and you will surely get more hits and customers.

With the increased budget, you can also offer surveys for customers to help enhance SEO. Asking questions such as, ‘when you think of our company, what is the first word you think of?’ Having surveys filled out for free isn’t very popular amongst customers, but there are services that you can pay to have surveys taken. This can be vital in developing an SEO strategy that works best for you.

Use these tips for helping you along the way. Search engine optimization has been one of the most valuable assets in the past few years for business and will continue to be for quite some time. As long as there is a Google or Yahoo or Bing, your company will rely on these search engines to increase business as your company grows.

Angie Picardo is a staff writer for NerdWallet. Her mission is to help consumers stay financially savvy, and save some money with the best 6 month CD rates.

Related Links:

How to Improve Your Website's User Experience

5 Big Components of a Keyword Strategy

Getting Found is Only Half the Story

5 Practical Ways to Get More Likes on Your Facebook Page

Whether you’re a blogger, a small business owner, or have an online enterprise, you are likely to have a Facebook page. If you don’t already, you should, as a Facebook page is a great way to not only promote your product, but reach a bigger audience base as well. How so? Well, every time someone likes your Facebook page or a photo in it, makes a comment, or shares something that you may have wrote and posted, this change is reflected in the timelines of every single person that has liked your page, creating some sort of publicity for you. With this said, the goal of every Facebook page is to boost our online marketing and promotion, but we all have to remember that in doing this, we can either come out professional, or come out annoying, which could turn off some people instead. So, how does one get more likes in their Facebook pages, in a non-annoying way? We have some tips:

1. Make the liking option visible, but not pushy - What do we mean by this? Well, a great way to start out is to have a facebook like box on the side of your website or your blog. This is the standard Facebook like box, showing the like button, as well as other people who have liked your page. Your blog readers have the option to click the like button, but you are also not forcing them to do it. The box is there if ever they want to like it, but you don’t put any pressure, such as in the case of a gated-like post, that it turns them off.
2. Post appealing, fun, attractive and intriguing photos, status messages or captions - If these posts get your fans to like and comment (hopefully more than once), then this particular post will appear on their Facebook friend’s feeds. If their friends like what they see, or are interested in finding out what you guys are talking about, then he may be very likely to press the like button on your page too!
3. Make sure your Facebook friends and fans are part of the conversation - While it is natural for a Facebook page to have promotional posts, make sure yours is different by not going overboard with it. Every once in a while, talk to your fans, and ask them questions, or their opinions. Posts like these make fans feel valued, because they feel like you are actually listening to them.
4. Make sure you know what makes your audience tick - After a time of posting photos, statuses, and messages, you may have a clearer idea as to what posts fly, and what go by unnoticed. Take this information and use it! Start to post things that you know will create a buzz, that you know will get hits, and that you know will get likes.
5. Use your blog, and other social media to help your Facebook page - Your blog and your Facebook can actually help each other. While you may have originally set up your Facebook page to promote your blog or your website, no one is saying why you can’t also do the reverse. At the end of your blog posts, encourage your fans to like your Facebook page. A few of them may just do it.

What are you waiting for? Time is of the essence! Start implementing these tips now so you get more Facebook likes!

This is a guest post by Sam Briones, a freelance writer and also contributes at Technovate Translations. If not writing for the language and culture subject, she's on the keyboard writing about fashion and pop culture.

Is Guest Blogging Worth It?

Guest blogging is one of the latest buzzwords in content marketing. Nearly everyone understands what it is (it's essentially writing blog posts for another blog, as a guest), but not everyone understands how to do it, whether Google likes it, why to do it etc. Fortunately, Matt Cutts of Google answers one of these questions in a video published several weeks ago, but he left out a few crucial aspects about guest blogging that ought to be addressed.

What if You Pay to Have a Guest Post Published?

In the video, Cutts says that Google is fine with guest posting for links, as long as the content quality and the link quality are really good. If the practice is taken to extremes by publishing awful guest posts all the time, sort of treating it like a new way to submit tons of articles to tons of places, then that will work against you. However, Cutts does not address paying to have your guest post published, which is something that we have come across with our own guest posting services.

This is important to address because Google doesn't like back links that are paid for, and will count those against you. However, if you pay to have someone write you a quality guest post (with a few back links included) and/or you pay to have it published, do those count as paid links? Technically, they would be paid links, even though you didn't pay money for the links specifically, although without the payment those links won't exist. If so, then all that work is for nothing. If it doesn't, then all those blogs that are charging may be driving away otherwise great content by scaring away those who don't want to, or can't, pay the fee.

We've encountered prices as low as $25 and as high as $150 for a guest post that includes links (this $150 charge was even for a link that was meant to cite a statistic, not be a backlink for a client). That's pricey for most bloggers and businesses that want to engage in business blogging, and that price only goes up if businesses want to hire someone to write these quality guest posts. We'd very much like to offer a guest posting service, but we also don't want to offer a service that won't help our clients in the long run. We also hate the idea of charging $300+ for one guest post, since there aren't many in our target market that can afford that.

What about Guest Blogging Guidelines?

It's so easy for everyone to talk about guest blogging, but it's incredibly tough to implement. One of the reasons for guest blogging is so tough is that each blog has its own set of guidelines i.e. formatting, word count, number of links, where/how to submit the post, post approval how often they publish. It's taken us as long as one month just to get a single post published, since it could take the contact a while to review the post, to follow up with our emails/submissions, and to schedule the post for publication (if the blog approves the post).

If Cutts had addressed some optimum guest posting guidelines, or maybe provided suggestions to what makes a great blog post, since Google has done something similar with normal blogging, it would make a world of difference. Those accepting guest posts as well as writing them would have some sort of standard to abide by, and working through all these different guidelines may make things a bit easier. Yes, Google doesn't want anyone writing blog posts or guest posts for the sake of Google, but Google is also big and powerful enough to set a few standards. The search engine just did that with normal blogging, saying that it is favoring quality content that's of value to potential customers over those that simply meet quotas and Google's algorithms.

Guest Blogging is Great, but at What Cost?

We, like a lot of other bloggers and marketing companies, are all for guest blogging, but it's harder to do than most people think. It may be worth it if you're a blogger, and you have the time and the writing ability to write guest posts on your own and work with various guidelines and schedules and topics. However, not everyone or every business has the time for that. Not everyone has time to find another blog for a post that's been previously rejected. Not everyone has time to even find blogs that are active, yet interested in what we want to write about.

There's a gap here that needs to be bridged, one between folks who want to engage in guest blogging but don't have the time and/or ability to produce great content and folks who run great blogs that may need this content but don't consider guest posts or want to charge $100 for it just because it has a few links. If people are going to be encourage to do guest posting, then we ought to make it as painless a process as possible.

Want Inbound Links? Then Just Blog Already!

It's clear that most businesses understand the value of inbound links, and what they can do for search engine optimization and referral traffic. What isn't clear with businesses is finding the best way to get those inbound links. It seems that many businesses believe the best way to get those inbound links is to have other, better ranking, websites link to you, either through guest posting, article marketing, link exchanges, and other similar techniques.

Guest Posting for Links? You're Doing it Wrong.

Although those are ways to get inbound links, they certainly aren't the best and the easiest ways to get inbound links. First of all, link exchanges are frowned upon by the search engines, and doing it for the sake of building inbound links and trying to game the search engines is an absolute no-no. Second of all, while guest posting and article marketing are legitimate, they are costly and time-consuming. You have to find appropriate websites to write/pitch articles to. You have to write those articles and those pitches. You then have to wait for a reply, or make corrections based upon that website's guidelines, and that's if you actually get a reply (or a reply in a timely manner). Even if the article is ready for publication right away, there's still the time between acceptance and publication, which could easily be days or weeks. On top of that, if your goal in all this is to get links, you could pay anywhere from $25 to $250 and up to publish an article that has includes back to your site.

What a hassle! And to think that these shenanigans are what some businesses consider their primary method of getting inbound links! With business blogging, a company can skip all those hoops and hassle. In the matter of a few hours, they can write an article and get it published on their business blog for a fraction of the cost. No need to please a third party. No need to wait for replies and approvals. No risk of duplicating content. No more months of back and forth of trying to get one specific article on one specific website.

Business Blogging is Way Better!

Business blogging accomplishes the goal of inbound links, and much more! With business blogging, every blog post is one more opportunity to rank for a keyword and to get found online. Sure, article marketing can kind of accomplish keyword rankings and getting found online, but readers aren't necessarily finding you. They are finding Blog X and Online Publication Y, with no guarantee readers will click on those links that you paid so much to have. There's also no guarantee that they'll associate that article you wrote with your company, especially if your links have keywords as anchor text.

Besides, business blogging ensures that when people do find your site and do click on your links, there's something of quality for them to read and to engage with. What good are the inbound links if you are leading them to promotional pages and other pages that readers don't want to go to or won't find interesting? What good are those increased rankings if all web visitors find is poor quality content and a horrible web experience? Business blogging eliminates this problem by being a place of value, by being a place that has something for readers and web visitors, instead of being one more place to make a sale.

How Does Business Blogging Get Inbound Links?

Simple! Creating quality, engaging content encourages people to share it, to link to it, to quote it in their own blogs. Over time, you get more and more inbound links because people will figure out that you are worth linking too. This may seem harder than the other way of doing things, but business blogging is the organic way of getting inbound links. You're not paying anyone for links. You're not wasting valuable time that could be spent writing more quality content or working on other projects. You're not trying to game the search engines. You're doing what you're supposed to be doing: providing the information your readers and potential customers need and want to move through the buying process.

If you want inbound links, then get business blogging! If you're already doing the other inbound link methods, then you are already producing content that can go on a business blog instead of other thankless websites. These inbound links are organic, and if you are consistent with your business blogging, you will get more of them in the long run.

Need help coming up with business blog ideas? Then download our list of 101 Business Blog Ideas! Not only could you use these ideas right now, but there's enough here to fill your blog for one full year!

3 Things I've Learned from Managing My Own Blog

This is a guest post from Farhan Niazi, an IT professional with expertise in the fields of Web and Database Development. Niazi is the founder of SMB Tech Guide and is currently serving Sarhad University of Science and Information Technology, Pakistan as the Deputy Director of Information Technology.

When I started my first blog about three years ago I didn’t had much idea about how things would turn out to be. But as I progressed, things got more and more interesting and very fruitful! The first blog that I started didn’t do well, and I had to dump it eventually.

But over the years, I have learned a lot about how to get run a successful blog. I thought I should share my own experience with the world so they may benefit from it and get a head start.

1) Choosing the right platform for your blog:

The first thing you need to do is to decide the platform on which you will be publishing and running your blog. There are a lot of platforms available out there but I’ll just stick to the popular ones.

Blogger by Google is undoubtedly the best out there followed by Wordpress (which is a bit advanced as it offers more features and is highly flexible). You can use any of these to start off a blog.

In a simpler language, I would actually differentiate these two on the basis of your interest and the motive behind your blog. If you’re just a hobbyist who loves to blog and likes to keep it simple, then Blogger is definitely for you. However, if the reason behind your blog is business, then I would suggest that you go with Wordpress (as an FYI, this blog uses the HubSpot platform).

2) Choosing the right niche:

This is somewhat controversial but I will mention it anyway. What I’ve learned over the years is that blogs with a specific niche tend to do better than the blogs who are blogging about everything. Unless you’re LUCKY, I personally don’t think you’ll do well if you don’t define a niche for your blog.

Focusing on one niche will also help you when you’re submitting your blog to directories as it gets easier to categorize your blog.

3) Letting the world know about your blog:

Once you’re done with selecting the right platform, the next thing on your to-do list should be to let the world know about your blog. Because if you’re generating worthy content and no one is going to read it, then it’s a waste!

There are different ways to get traffic for your blog, let’s discuss them briefly.

Search Engines:

Everyone uses search engines and they are definitely the best way to get traffic. Sign up for Google Webmaster Tools and Bing/Yahoo Webmaster Tools. Get your site listed there, so these search giants can find out about your blog. It is a long discussion if we go into the details of these tools, but the main things that you need to know is that you should submit an updated sitemap of your site to these tools and make sure your site is error free, it is not blocked for robots, and that the SEO for your site is done properly. Both Webmaster Tool services will guide you on every step and once you’re familiar with them, you won’t be facing any problems.

Social Media:

Search engines may bring you traffic but in order to retain your traffic, you must have a social media presence for your blog. Besides that, it’s a great medium to get you started initially as you can ask your friends and family to join your page, so they may get regular updates on what’s happening on your blog.

It can be a hectic process to post everything to your social media profile/page so the easiest way to do this is to sign up for a free service that will post your latest blog topics automatically to your profile/page. I suggest using dlvr.it for this purpose.

Word of mouth:

Word of mouth is another way to get your blog noticed. The more the people talk about your blog, the more it’s going to get popular.

Some useful tips:

-       Never over-optimize your site

-       Never use blackhat SEO techniques

-       Never infringe copyrights

-       Always generate original content

-       Make sure what you write is interesting and appeals to your readers

Final Words:

This is a very basic walkthrough of my personal experiences of running my blogs. I will be posting in-depth tutorials on how to do everything properly, so keep on checking back for more!

If you are already business blogging, but need some extra help, the download our ultimate checklist to great blog article headlines. Blog titles are just as important as the content itself. Click to button below to download the checklist: