Video SEO can get you a first page ranking quickly; often in less than 24 hours.
Quick – name the second biggest search engine…
If you said YouTube, you're right. (…for the English speaking world ok?)
YouTube really? Yep. In fact something like 70% of all the traffic online is from video. YouTube has millions and millions of viewers and hours of video uploaded every minute. And there are many other video sharing sites – close to 60 at last count!
If you are not using video to market your business online you are missing a hugely popular and fairly simple avenue to grow your business.
However, the real kicker here is that with video, you are using the most effective marketing medium available – video. Numerous recent studies are showing that TV (which is video right?) is still the most effective persuasion advertising medium.
TV has some serious problems, of course. #1, it's prohibitively expensive. #2, it's fractured all over the place with 200 channels, so to get your message in front of enough targeted people is well, see #1.
Online video can be done quickly, inexpensively and still be very, very effective. It can reach your target market fast and last for years to come. Online video for SEO purposes is a good reason to do this, but it is certainly not the only benefit. Video drives traffic. Video builds credibility. Video can dramatically improve your conversion at all stages of your sales process. Online video is affordable.
Here are 7 steps to consider when beginning to put together your online video campaign.
1. Simple videos – these do not need to be fancy or studio quality videos. Check YouTube out and take a gander at some of the video there that has millions of views. Much of it is at a quality level than any of us can produce. The key here is get moving. Get your video done and start on the next one!
2. Your video can just be pictures. You can put together a slide show that tells the story you want and add a voice track and music. Save it as video and you're done!
3. Provide value (share some of your secret sauce) while keeping the video as short as needed and as possible. These are key points. Give your potential customers some of your insider tips and they will be back for more. But never bore them! Do it as quickly, succinctly and elegantly as possible. We're all programmed to gobble information in 30-60 second bites. You might not be able to go that short. Go as short as you can – edit ruthlessly!
4. Put keyword phrases in your video title and tags. Use a keyword research tool to find what your customers are searching for and then use those phrases to name your video and in the tags (tags are required on most video sharing sites). My favourite free tool is
Google's keyword tool.
5. Distribute as far and wide as possible. Often people just put a vid up on YouTube and expect a flood of traffic. Sometimes, that happens… but a much better strategy is to put your video up on many places around the web, so you cast your net as wide as possible. There are close to 60 video sharing sites – use as many as your time allows.
6. Get maximum bang for your efforts and provide value to people searching with other keywords; change your video up and redistribute it again. Your customers search for you using many different keyword terms and phrases, so re-title your video, change it a little in length, save it in another format, and post it up to the video sharing sites again. Your information is providing value so do what it takes to get it seen.
7. Have a call to action. When planning your video, make sure you know your "most wanted response." Do you want people to sign up for your email list? Do you want them to call you? Always end your video with your call to action!
Lucky bonus, secret 8. Get over your bad self and just do it.
Have fun with this. Your first efforts are going to not be as good as your 30th. Such is life. The benefits far outweigh your perfectionist side figuring out how to be great out of the gate. Take action and get better by doing it, now.
Almost everyone thinks they look funny on camera. On the looks thing… do you have friends? Do your funny looks stop them from being your friend? Seriously, being passionate and expressing yourself with energy is way more important than looking beautiful. Get started!
If you want experts to do this for you, (cause I know exactly how much spare time you have to devote to learning and doing another thing in your business…) shoot us an email. We'd be happy to help.
What do you think? Please comment below to tell me.Filed under Blog, SEO Ranking by . 
Local Traffic is the Lifeblood of a Small Business Website
There are many factors and tasks involved in having and creating a website. I've seen many small business people concentrate on one factor or another – the look and feel, building their brand, building a mailing list, etc.
While all of these things are important and must not be neglected, let me suggest that there are 2 overriding steps that are primary.
#1 – traffic. If no one sees your website… well bluntly, why did you sweat over the other details?
#2 – conversion. Traffic that doesn't convert into sales is just as bad as having the pretty brochure that no one sees.
5 steps to get more free local traffic.
1. SEO Your Pages – Paying homage to Raul Julia in Gumball Rally, "Whatsa behind me is ofa no consequence!" SEO starts with keywords. What terms are your customers looking for you with?
Keyword research is where you start. Use tools like Google's or do a search for keyword tools – there are lots! I like Market Samurai. This is the boring shite of SEO, but without it, you will never "getta nowhere."
Then you use those keywords on your pages – in the Title tag, in the Meta description (tell a short story there!), in the image Alt text, and use them in your content at least once and near the start preferably. Never stuff your article with keywords though.
Use the high traffic (and ideally low competition) keywords you've found as the link text for navigation around your site. This is a very good way to improve your rankings.
2. Video SEO – Video is the communication medium that people and search engines like the most. Use video to answer questions, make "how to's" and provide value. Be interesting and high energy – that is far more important than looking polished and professional.
Use your keywords to name and tag your videos. Publish them on your site and then on the 60 or so other video distribution sites. There's more than just YouTube! Use the classic persuasion techniques of having a title, a message that provides value to your customer, an offer and a call to action.
Video with a call to action will increase your phone calls by at least 20% and can easily add thousands of visits to your website.
3. Social Linking and Bookmarking – This is using sites like Delicious, StumbleUpon, Propellor, Facebook, Twitter, etc to create links back to your pages. Here's a good video that explains this.
You can register and link or bookmark articles and video at each site or use a free tool like Socialmarker to automate some of this. Careful though; be random in which sites you use and make sure you bookmark other content besides just your own, so you do not get banned.
4. Article Directories – Putting your articles on article directories also gives you links back to your site as well as spreads the word on your subject. On article directories, there is a resource box that goes with your article where you put information about yourself, your company and a link back to your website.
Some people say the more directories the better, some say only use the high quality directories… I suggest that it depends on how much time and automation you are using. Less time = high quality over quantity.
There are tools that can automate this for you as well. Used judiciously they are real time savers. I like Unique Article Wizard but it is an investment.
5. Local Directories – Make sure your business is listed in as many locally focused directories as there are. This is a moving target as local search is booming with more directories being added all the time! One third of all local traffic is coming from the aggregate of these local directories. There are usually between 10 and 20 for each metropolitan area.
Usual suspects are Yelp, Weblocal, Citysearch, etc. Do a search for local directories, then look on each directory for "Add a business" and start filling out the forms. Here's a hint; save the data from the first one, because most of the rest want the same info.
These actions hinge on one thing; consistency. Doing a ton for a couple weeks and then nothing for a month or 6 is counter productive. Be regular – publish once a week or every day but do it without fail.
And if you want help, give us a call!
Please let me know what you thought of this post... I'm dying to find out...Filed under Blog, Local Search, SEO Ranking by .
Local SEO for Vancouver Business: Quick, down and dirty
How do you indicate to a search engine that your webpage is about a certain (insert your keyword phrase) subject, so you rank well? Here's 11 fresh, "proven to work today Sept. 2009" ways to clearly indicate what your pages are about, so you rank higher immediately.
Bonus New, New Thing: On Site Video and SEO
SEO experts are chiming in that, in as little as one year from today, without onsite video – you will not rank. Wow! Even if it takes longer than that, clearly video is rapidly gaining importance.
Check out Reel SEO for a treasure trove of information about this!
1. More content, and exclusive material
Applicable, distinct information and more of it, always helps rankings. What's new, what's cool, what's secret, etc., these are all interesting to humans and thus, the search engines.
2. Frequency of publishing
Frequent and regular(!) additions to your content is best. How much? As much as you can manage – 2X daily, daily, 3X weekly; more is better! (I know – it sucks!)
3. Keyword Phrases in Your Web Address
Having keywords that describe your site in your URL (website address) helps. For example: http://www.vancouverlocalseo.com Pick your highest traffic keyword phrase, if it is available. This is still an important part of the ranking criteria.
4. Keyword Phrases in Title tag
This tag lives in the Head area of your html code and it shows in search results as your page title.
A general guideline to follow is that the further up a page of code your keyword phrases live, the more important they are. This is like when you start reading a book page and the headline is most important.
So the Title tag is very important and for best effect SEO wise, it should be short with the keywords at the beginning.
5. Keyword Phrases in Anchor text
Keywords in anchor text from other internal pages on your site is an important criteria. It indicates that this page is authoritative on the given subject. Takes some planning, but it works well.
6. Heading tags
This used to be more important than it seems to be now, but keywords in headings is still a useful way to further indicate what your page is about. It is also a great way to create other headlines and sub headlines to make your text more human friendly.
7. Keyword Phrases in Alt text
Search engines do not read images (yet) but they do spider image descriptions in the Alt text. Use keywords in those descriptions.
8. Keyword Phrases in Meta Description tag
This is the only meta tag that does anything. Sometimes a search engine publishes this text on the search result page, so it is worth the effort.
9. Keyword Phrases starting your content
Start your content text with your keyword phrase. Some people will insist you put it also in the middle and at the end, but I feel that once you've started with the phrase just write normally and let it reoccur naturally. Careful about overuse though!
10. "Good" code
Your site must be spider friendly – no broken links, 404 errors (page not found), excess javascript on the page, text alternatives to flash content, etc. Run your site through a code checker to find errors and get them fixed!
11. Sitemap
A fresh, always updated sitemap is very important – html or (better) .xml version.
Call us to help you with this.
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YouTube Video: Is it worth doing?
Some people think that "video" sites are already over-crowded and that there is little point in putting your video on there. After all, how can you stand out from the massive amount other stuff on there?
There's about 20 hours of video uploaded every minute, just on YouTube. That is more content every 2 months than all TV broadcasters combined, have produced in the last 50 years. How to stand out from that much competition? How do you get your video found and then get it shared?
Here's the good news. YouTube gets 107 million visitors a month and growing. The "average" is 65 video views per visitor… or 6.9 Billion videos viewed per month.
Plus there are 3.5 Billion searches a month on YouTube. To me, that seems like a place to be.
"Why bother with video on YouTube? 'Cause that's where the viewers is!"
10 Steps: SEO for Video
1. Producing a great quality video - that provides value for your target market is the most important criteria to fulfill. Without this core element, no search engine trickery will help your video rank high for very long.
2. Video SEO works best integrated with your website marketing strategy and overall SEO. Just optimizing the video will produce results that are a fraction of what a coordinated strategy will accomplish. Plus, Video SEO is much more than a couple keywords and publishing your content on a lot of video sites.
3. To get found on YouTube requires proper SEO of your video. Good keyword research, with proper titling, descriptions and tagging.
According to YouTube; be clear and precise with your description. Describe your video with complete sentences and include a date for the video, where it was shot and any other interesting data that helps YouTube with indexing. Start your description with your web address and make it clickable.
3. To optimize your tags, use tags that are consistent with one another. Do not use popular but inaccurate phrases to spoof or spam for more searches. It won't work. I use a co-occurence keyword tool like KRA Pro to discover semantically related phrasing to use in my tags and descriptions.
5. It's a good practice to put your video up on your site first - before putting it on YouTube or other Video hosting sites. That helps setup your page to get the links back from the other sites.
6. Put your video on other websites and blogs using the YouTube embed tools - and encourage others to do the same. The resulting links back to your video, help it's search ranking. You will get more views.
7. Not all video site links are equal; research them. For instance, Vimeo embedding provides links to the site, to your video author page and to your video page. They also have a premium account that allows you to redirect after your video has played.
8. A proven idea is to have more content on your site (like a part 2) - compared to the video sites. Make the content on your site richer and deeper; have transcripts, excerpts and links to more of the same. This will encourage linking and embedding of your site.
9. Allow ratings and comments on all video sites. They are an important part of the ranking criteria – more comments and higher ranks will help your video search rank, both at the video site and with Google.
10. Build a channel and use the annotations to create links to more of your videos.Participate and create video responses to comments on your original video and interact with the community.
The online marketing takeaway here is take your content to where the people are. Your customers are on Video sites, (and on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.) Put your content, and your unique value there as well.
Hopefully these tips have been helpful. What do you think?Local SEO Tips
I've had a number of calls from local businesses who are
upset that their website is not ranking for "their keywords." Sometimes it's a case of where they had a good ranking and the competition has knocked them off.
More often it's the result of a couple Google searches for what they think are the best search terms and their hated rival is occupying the top place in the search results.
After talking to a few companies about this, here's how it plays out. The owner does a search and they see the most hated competition owns the top places. They call their web developer and ask, "Can you get me to number 1 for such and such a keyword?"
So the web team gives it a crack. In my experience some of them have good SEO people; more often than not though, SEO is just another hat that they wear along with design, graphics, copy, css and flash coding, maybe some database coding, wordpress setup and customization, website conversion and testing… oh and we do SEO too!
The owner pays the web team to get a higher ranking for the competitive keywords and after a few months of poor results, the owner ends up at my door. They are gun shy and thinking that SEO is all snake oil, smoke and mirrors.
Here's the problem. The owner and their web development team are targeting the wrong keywords. Often, the obvious keywords have lots of traffic that does not have a high commercial intent – they are lookie loos (so would not be worth having in the first place).
We use a different and proven methodology. We do systematic and thorough keyword research for our local clients where we discover a "basket" of keyword phrases that usually numbers in the hundreds, if not more. From there we also look at the competition and the online commercial intent of these phrases.
Accurate local keyword research data is still hard to get. We know that the local search numbers that are reported by Google are far less than the actual local search volume. No one in local search has an answer for this yet. What it means is that we have to be very meticulous in our research in order to uncover all the areas and terms that people use for local company searches.
Once we have gathered this data, we analyze and sift through it looking for the low hanging fruit. It's always there (so far…) and it means that we target phrases that have less competition, convert into business at a high rate and have decent traffic.
Often these are so called "long tail" terms and phrases. Most of them are high converting phrases. While the traffic numbers are not as impressive as the most popular terms, a basket of these produce far more business both short and long term for a company.
Here's How to Find the Low Hanging Fruit.
1. Start with the Google Keyword Tool
A little R&D to start… Click on the website content radio button and put in a high ranked, competitors website. Select which country you want to get results from (…I wish this drilled down further!) Check the box to "Include other pages on my site linked from this URL" and hit the "Get keyword ideas" button.
Google Keyword Tool
Google will pull keywords off of that website that you can analyze. Expect a lot of related keywords. For local search purposes, many will not be targeted.
2. Select appropriate results
You will have to reject some keyword phrases and obvious misses. I also filter the selection to "exact match".
3. You can download your selected list as a .csv file after you "Add Exact" to the right hand column. Alternatively, just choose the keywords that first grab you and do a Google search. Here's where I like using the spreadsheet, because the task is to record which keywords, which competitors are ranking for.
It will probably play out something like this, for example:
High Traffic keyword phrases = wedding photography
Medium Tail keyword phrases = wedding portrait photography
Long Tail keyword phrases = Vancouver wedding portrait photography
As you dig through this list you will start to find the keyword phrases that they all are targeting. You will also note the ones they missed.
4. Often you will note that there are other websites that are focusing on the medium tail keyword phrases. They are going after less competitive keywords, that have less traffic. Note the sites and the keyword phrases that they rank well for out of your total basket of phrases.
The long tail phrases are the ones you want to start with. These will start to form your target keyword phrases since you can optimize your site and content for and then rank for them quickly. A good strategy is to pick the highest traffic, local targeted search term (or two) and optimize your home page for them.
Then target the longer tail phrases on other pages through your site. Use our "11 On Page SEO Tips" article to do it right. Once you have page one ranking for the Long tail phrases, you can start optimizing other pages for the medium tail phrases.
Again, once you gain good ranks for the medium tail phrases, tackle the high traffic phrases. All of this takes time, but this is a proven plan of how to gain and continually grow paying traffic for your business in the near, medium and long term.
Your site gets noticed by standing out for the lower traffic but high converting terms; which also brings business fairly quickly. Once you have established that beachhead, ranking for the other terms is an easier task.
Do you want more blog posts like this? Comment below telling me you want it...Filed under Blog, Local Search, SEO Ranking by .
The SEO world is all atwitter about three moves that Google has made in the last week; these are all extensions to what has already been implemented by adding Video, Press Releases, and Maps to Universal search. All three of these new additions have implications for search results and they will likely add to the tasks needed to get and keep a high ranking.
First was the addition of Place Pages
Google described these as “a webpage for every place in the world, organizing all the relevant information about it.” An ambitious goal like that is something to pay attention to!
Google stated that they would not be indexing Place Pages. Local Search guru Andrew Shotland reported that there is no crawlable architecture – at least not yet. Goggle is blocking the googlebot in it's robots.txt file on Place Pages.
That does not stop people (and SEO's) from linking to Place Pages, so they will rank in short order.
When the 10 pack Map (Google Local Business Center) were introduced the result was less traffic for directories and Internet Yellow Pages. With Place Pages arrival, an easy prediction to make is that over time at least one out of the remaining top ten search results for a local business name will be a Google Place Page.
Ultimately, one or more sites per local search could lose the page one position they have. If Google changes Place Pages to include a local category or tag pages, that result will be multiplied. For More – check out this from Andrew Shotland
Second was SideWiki
Google Sidewiki is a new feature of the Google Toolbar that lets you leave comments about and on any website. When someone is using Sidewiki and views that page, they'll see your comments. It's "pages" are indexed.
Sidewiki is available for Firefox and IE, coming soon to Chrome and other browsers. This is a powerful tool that lets people add information to websites. Google promotes it as a way to "Help and learn from others as you browse the web".
You have to login with your Gmail account ID so hopefully that is a caution to people who might normally use anonymity to spout off. Is there a moderator?
According to Google "…instead of displaying the most recent entries first, we rank Sidewiki entries using an algorithm that promotes the most useful, high-quality entries. It takes into account feedback from you and other users, previous entries made by the same author and many other signals we developed".
In Google's view Sidewiki will add rich, relevant info to websites, sort of a distributed version of Wikipedia. However, Sidewiki could also be rife with advertising, spam, scams and worse. Google will attempt to control this with algorithms, but some inappropriate comments will still slip through.
For an extensive article including excerpts from Google's engineers, Check out this SearchEngineLand article.
Third: Google trends in Google universal search results (in US and Japan)
Google has begun adding real-time search data to search engine result pages.
Google has put "Hot Trends" information within Google's regular search results. People searching on topics that are popular that day (in the top 100) will see "Hot Trends" data near the bottom of the search results page and just above the related search area.
Clicks on the link allow users to explore the topic with top news items, blog posts and web results listed. This is a limited response to the popularity of Twitter.
Twitter has news of breaking events and reports of interesting activities, often available well before the broadcast media or bloggers. It is fast becoming a constantly-updated info stream posted by users on a by-second basis, from all over the world. Many are using Twitter as a real time search engine to reveal useful, timely breaking news and observations. Some have described it as a view into the conversation happening inside customers heads.
Google Trends potentially reduces the search result real estate for websites; however so far the impact is minimal.
How about you, what do you think?Filed under Blog, Local Search, SEO News by .