FREE SEO Tips

Pay-Per-Click Marketing is a Quality Battle, Not a Bidding War

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Here’s a quick recap of a recent conversation I had with the owner of a successful small service business here in Southern California:

Mark: Wow. That’s such a unique service. I bet the competition on Adwords (Google’s pay-per-click advertising platform) for your keywords is fairly low.

Biz Owner: Oh, I don’t spend the money on online advertising. I hear Google is too expensive.

Mark: What makes you think it’s too expensive?

Biz Owner: Well, all I know about it is that it’s a bidding war and that competition drives up the click costs too high. I can’t afford to waste the money.

Read morePay-Per-Click Marketing is a Quality Battle, Not a Bidding War

Treat Every Page Like a Landing Page

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A common web management mistake is the assumption that all traffic funnels through a website’s home page. As a result, websites can suffer from high bounce rates (people that arrive onto a website and click off without visiting a second page) and, consequently, lose potential sales.

Let’s assume your website contains valuable content, like a resources section for example, that people find link-worthy. Those people are not going to link to your home page and include directions on how to find the resources section. They are going to link directly to that resource article they think is so great.

So, the big question all of you business owners need to answer: does every page on your website include a way for users to complete your goal?

Continuing our example, let’s say your goal is to get users to fill out a newsletter sign up form. If that sign-up form is only available on your home page, how are users who get to your site via other landing pages ever going to sign up? The answer: they’re not! Think about it. They don’t even know your newsletter offer exists.

Start thinking about user experiences on your website via avenues other than your homepage. An impressive home page is worth a pat-on-the-back, but landing pages that guide users to your goals are more valuable to your business.

3 Links Still Worth Paying For

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I’ve said it before, the best way to get inbound links is to produce a lot of quality content. The better the content, the more people will want to link to it. It’s tough work, but it is the most effective method.

That doesn’t mean you should completely ignore all other methods. There are some other tactics worth your time and money. One that I always get asked about is directories. People want to know if they have lost their luster.

My philosophy is this: there are still a select few directories that are worth it. For example, a link from the Open Directory Project is still a must.  (In fact, that is one of a couple links from free directories that are valuable.) But I am not a huge believer in the services that promise to submit your site to 10,000 directories.

If you can afford to spend little bit of money (around $1,000), spend it on these links rather than mass submission services:

  1. Yahoo Directory: $300/year – for years this has been at the top of the premuim list. Now that Microsft has teamed up with Yahoo, there are rumors out there that the future of this directory is in jeopardy. So keep that in mind. Here’s a link to actually start the submission process.
  2. Business.com: $300/year
  3. Best of the Web: $299 one-time charge – I’ve seen SEO experts debate the value of this one, but I believe it is still worth it. Again, I’m only suggesting these sites for companies who don;t have to necessarily worry about dropping $299 for a link.

Remember, when it comes to inbound links QUALITY wins in a landslide over QUANTITY. So if you can spend a few bucks to get some added link juice while you continue to create great content, spend it on those few sites.

Paid Search Campaigns: Focus on What Matters

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Fortunately for us, we frequently get contacted by potential clients to perform our free search evaluation service.  Recently, we’ve seen a uptick in the amount of requests for reviews of paid search campaigns, as opposed to a review of a website’s organic search results. That’s inspired us to write a short series of tips about the most common paid search mistakes companies make.

Our most recent article focuses on a very common occurrence we see with companies that manage their own paid search campaigns – focusing on being ranked #1 more than the fundamentals that make up a successful campaign.

I hope you’ll take a few minutes to read the article. But for those of you really crunched for time, here’s the Cliff Notes version: out of the allotted time you have to run your campaign (and I believe you should be running your company, not your campaign), stop spending it on increasing your bids so that your ad is ranked #1 all the time.  While being at the top of paid results is great and probably gets you more looks, it doesn’t guarantee you more business. Getting higher click-thru and conversion rates is where you need to focus your time. That means you need to constantly tweak you ad text, calls to action, and landing pages until you feel like you’ve reached optimal levels of conversion. And when you reached that rate, keep tweaking and improve it some more!

Bottom line: stop worrying about the fact that your competition might be ranked #1 and you are ranked #2. Let them drive up their price per acquisition while you increase your margins.