Internet Marketing for 21st Century Business

Digital Marketing, Events, Internet Marketing, Training 2 Responses »
Oct 302007

Review of "Internet Marketing for 21st Century Business" — a half-day training seminar by PraxisNow.

Did you know that, according to research, around 80% of all Internet users find the web sites they’re looking for using a search engine? And that in the month of August 2007, in North America alone, the three main search engines fielded a mind-boggling 6.7 billion search queries between them?

That’s more than one search for every living person on the planet.

When it comes to Internet search, the figures are simply staggering – and if you’re a marketer the case for tapping into this burgeoning pool of online prospects is an incredibly compelling one. Having your company web site “pop up” at the top of the search engine listings at precisely the time your potential customers are looking for your products or services is the nearest to marketing nirvana you’re ever likely to get.

There’s no doubt that making effective use of internet marketing techniques like search engine optimisation (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising and e-mail marketing can revolutionise your business, but where do you start? For many website owners, traditional marketers and corporate managers the world of digital marketing is a mystery. It’s a world full of technical jargon and seemingly arcane techniques that have always been the preserve of a select few professionals… until now.

Continue reading »

Posted by Admin at 14:42

The Evolution of a Search Marketer - By Jill Whalen

Internet Marketing, SEO No Responses »
Oct 232007

I had to laugh when I read this article by Jill on the High Rankings website — it’s a fairly accurate synopsis of what I’ve experienced over the last month or so — albeit that I’ve been on the "accelerated" programme.

The Evolution of a Search Marketer – By Jill Whalen

If you haven’t seen the High Rankings site, and you’re interested in learning about long-term sustainable ranking strategies for your site you should definitely take a look. Jill talks (writes) a lot of sense — which is refreshing in a world that, to the uninitiated, all too often seems to make absolutely none.

Check out the site and the associated High Rankins SEO forum — they’re full of great SEO insight and advice. There’s also a great SEO FAQ on the site that sheds light on a lot of the questions people new to SEO might have.

Posted by Admin at 15:11

SEO/SEM is about people not algorithms

Internet Marketing, Just a thought, SEM, SEO, Search 1 Response »
Oct 192007

At the moment I’m working on a sample chapter of the book that will form part of a package that will be going out to a list of potential publisher’s that Damian has drawn up. I’m learning a lot… quickly, and one of the first things that I came to understand is that the fundamentals of search are really quite straightforward.

The more I think about this stuff the more I’m coming to realise that search optimisation / marketing is not about understanding automated robots and complex ranking algorithms (although some of the “experts” out there will probably disagree with me). Search marketing is about understanding people.

Understand the people using search, understand the people running the search engines, understand what both of those groups are trying to achieve… then align your site so that it meets their wants and needs.

Bingo! Sustainable high rankings.

People have this uncanny knack of wrapping things in layers of complexity that don’t really exist. More often than not poor ranking seems to stem from a failure to diligently apply basic principals in a consistent and iterative manner (something I’m as guilty of as the next man); not addressing the “prime directive” — which is to build a site with killer, information rich content that delivers what the user is looking for; or people basing their entire SEO efforts on finding and exploiting “loopholes” in the engines’ algorithms, and then wondering why their sites bomb out when the search engines slam the door.

If you’re looking to rank a site quickly to make a fast buck, those loopholes may well pay dividends. If you’re looking to build a sustainable, trusted online brand with sustainable long-term rankings though, it makes sense to work with the search engines and their users, rather than striving against them.

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Posted by Admin at 10:37

Multiple word phrases are tops

Keywords, SEM, SEO No Responses »
Oct 182007

Increasing numbers of people are using more sophisticated search terms to find what they’re looking for online.

This is hardly going to be news to the SEO experts among you — but for those (like me) getting to grips with SEO for the first time, it’s a pretty important concept to grasp.

1 2 word search phrases 32.58%
2 3 word search phrases 25.61%
3 1 word search phrases 19.02%
4 4 word search phrases 12.83%
5 5 word search phrases 5.64%
6 6 word search phrases 2.32%
7 7 word search phrases 0.98%

The 7 most used word phrase lengths for Web search engines averaged over a the two month period to the end of January 2004. (figures from OneStat.com)

Understanding how people are using search engines to find what they’re looking for lies at the very heart of your SEO/SEM efforts. Choosing the right keywords / phrases is critical both in terms of optimising (or optimizing, for Americans out there) your site for organic SEO, and choosing the phrases worth bidding on for your paid search / pay per click campaigns.

Web users are demanding more from search. They don’t want to trawl through spurious pages of results, and are getting much more sophisticated in the search terms they use in order to narrow those results down. Search engines are also getting better at handling these multi-word phrases, and are delivering back exactly what the user is looking for.

Search engines, and perhaps more importantly search users, are coming of age… typing more natural, and longer phrases into the search box is a natural extension of that.

Posted by Admin at 16:25

Internet Marketing Seminar in Cork

Digital Marketing, Events, Internet Marketing No Responses »
Oct 042007

I’m going to be attending a half day Internet Marketing seminar in Cork, Ireland on 25 October called "Internet Marketing for the 21st century". Run by John and  Noel Coburn of Irish company PraxisNow, the seminar is aimed at owner managers and high-level marketing professionals who want to maximise sales from their online investment.

Sounds like just the ticket to kick start my research, and I have to say I’m looking forward to the event. I’ll be posting a review of proceedings here after the fact — so be sure to check back.

Posted by Admin at 12:49
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