Author: Eric Brantner

SEO Website Copywriter

 

With the 2008 Presidential election drawing closer every day, it is interesting to study the role SEO plays in the political process. A recent study has found that some candidates are taking a far more active approach to SEO than others. Can we use search engine position analysis to determine the 2008 Presidential election’s outcome? Maybe not, but it sure is fun to speculate.

The April 2008 study of the candidates approach to SEO detailed both their natural ranking and their paid search results. For the purposes of this article, I want to focus solely on their natural results.

The Increasing Role of the Internet
According to this study, there has been a 31% increase throughout the past year in the number of people that are using the internet as a source of information about the election. As the election comes even closer, I fully expect that this number will increase even further. As it relates to SEO content, 42% of the people that use the internet for election information use a search engine as their main research tool.

Of the people that use search engines as their main source of information, 87% are seeking information based on the issues.

Since previous studies have determined that search engine users click on first page results about 60% of the time and on results within the first 3 pages 90% of the time, one would think that the candidates would be taking an active approach to increasing their search engine ranking on the issues.  Unfortunately, this hasn’t been the case.

And the Winner Is…
This study concludes that Barack Obama leads the way with a 60% share of natural search visibility on the issues. Hillary Clinton has 3%, and John McCain possesses only 1% natural search visibility.

Where did the other 36% go? That honor goes to Ron Paul which, given his lack of success in the primaries, raises some questions about the importance of SEO in politics. However, before we go off the deep end and claim SEO is not relevant in politics, let’s remind ourselves that the internet and SEO are still relatively young. Ron Paul has done really well with young people, but traditionally young people have not turned out to vote in high numbers. So while these young people love him online, they do not convert that love into results at the polls.

What’s Wrong, John?
With just 1% natural search visibility on the issues, John McCain is in the Bermuda Triangle of the search engines. After just a brief look at his page, it’s not hard to figure out why.

John McCain’s page on economics:

John McCain’s page on education:

At quick glance, can you tell the difference? I can’t, and apparently, neither can the search engines because he isn’t exactly dominating the SERPs.

Anybody that has been studying SEO for more than a few hours can tell you the importance of having unique, optimized title tags and urls for each page. Since most search engine users are seeking information about the issues, John McCain should have a website that has optimized pages with unique title tags and urls for each issue. Sure, a whole lot more goes into search engine placement analysis, such as inbound links and domain age to name a couple, but these terrible title tags and urls demonstrate that the McCain team has no knowledge of SEO.

What it All Means
It’s hard to dispute that the internet is playing a growing role in shaping people’s opinions. How it will affect the election no one knows for sure.

As the internet continues to become more accessible to a broader demographic, I think SEO will play a much larger part in the future elections. As it stands, the internet is already an important source of information, and there is no reason to believe it won’t continue to grow in significance.

 

Bookmark to:
         

Author: April Hall

Website Content Writer 

So here’s the deal: you sit down and decide to use the internet for a bit of personal intellectual growth. Your mission is to learn more about the presidential candidates. Since you have an open mind, you decide to do quick searches for the democratic candidates, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton before finishing up with a quick civic lesson on the accomplishments of John McCain. As you are happily learning about red phone ads and polling miscues, you notice something along the right hand sidebar of your browser: targeted advertising. What is going on here? How do the little men in the search engines know what you type into the keyword search box?

Search engines have indeed become quite “smart”; or, in reality, the programmers have become quite skilled at narrowing their advertising markets down to segments that are actively searching for particular products or services. In fact, Google and Yahoo generally also look at users’s IP addresses to provide local advertising (most often by state, but sometimes by city, as well). So, how does this make you feel–amazed, or somewhat infringed upon? In the age of spyware, many of us are conditioned to worry about any external source somehow “snooping” on what we are looking at online. Isn’t that somehow an invasion of privacy?

The answer is, of course, no. Search engines and their targeting advertising are completely harmless. Using this approach is simply a convenient way of providing internet searchers with information about organizations they might find useful. There is no creeping onto your hard drive or snatching your email address book.

Of course, targeting internet advertising is not perfect, and sometimes users will discover that they are viewing ads that have absolutely nothing to do with them or their internet search. Let’s say (for purposes of this exercise; this is admittedly a far-fetched example!) that you are searching for companies that make replacement “polls” (blunt ends of a hammer), and are hit with a zillion ads encouraging you to take polls that ask about everything from your opinion on the draft to who your favorite celebrity is. You might be puzzled, and even perhaps a bit annoyed, but you would understand that most people searching for “polls” are not needing a new hammer heads! Search engines are all about statistics and reaching the most people in the most accurate way possible.

Once you have tried out several internet searches and become familiar with how the search engines know which ads to show you, you might be interested in using this type of marketing for your own organization. Pay per click advertising is a great, cost-efficient way to reach your target market and build your customer base. Google has a relatively clear tutorial on how this type of advertising is used; but you may be better off entrusting your internet marketing strategies to the pros at a web development company, instead.

Bookmark to:
         

Author: April Hall

Website Content Writer

Every small business is searching for ways to save money on their advertising and internet marketing campaigns, which is why the following discovery may seem very exciting. As I was perusing the internet blogs this morning, I came across what seemed to be talk of an unbeatable offer: website services and marketing for under $50 a month! Who was offering this amazing deal? I searched further…

It turns out the company offering this service wasn’t a website development company at all-it was a huge small business warehouse that charges a membership fee to join (need I mention the actual name? they currently work to monopolize virtually all aspects of running a business…). I was, of course, quite skeptical. What reputable web development company could offer high quality, dependable website services and pay per click marketing campaigns for such a nominal fee? It turns out my first instinct was right-there isn’t such a service (yet. I say yet because I know the unrivaled power of this company and have no doubt it will only take a period of time before execs figure out how to make this work too… Call me cynical).

I noticed the company’s own website first, as the aesthetics and marketing targets used on a company’s own site is a great indication of what they can do for their clients. As I am automatically trained to look for keywords, I noticed a blaring lack of such words on their site. Instead, it was filled with foggy language (see the previous post by Eric on “fog”) that lacked any understanding of how keywords are used. There was talk of “submitting your website’s url” to search engines, but no discussion of how to get your site ranked high on the search engine results page. In short, I sensed a very real lack of knowledge about the way internet searches work and how to make use of the major search engines (besides a basic understanding of how to use pay per click advertising, which is completely taught by the search engines themselves).

While I’m sure that this small business warehouse company will outsource their web development services out to another professional web service firm, I am not confident that either organization will be successful getting their client’s websites noticed. Perhaps I am wrong, but I stick to be belief that sometimes it is worth paying more for higher quality, particularly when it comes to the highly competitive field of internet marketing!

Bookmark to:
         

Author: Eric Brantner

Internet Content Writer

One of the main things SEO content writers continually underestimate is the importance of content usability. Many writers think it is enough to produce keyword rich content that is decently written. This shortsighted approach focuses only on search engine implications and not on the effect their content has on the reader.

Scannable Content
People view content differently online than they do in print. Because users tend to have a very short attention span online, it is necessary that you produce content that is easily scannable. This means that you must avoid lengthy paragraphs. Huge blocks of text tend to scare readers off.

Instead, you should write shorter paragraphs. Users appreciate the smaller sections, and the white space helps the content appear less intimidating. Additionally, each section should include a bold caption that briefly explains the main idea. People like to have a clear, quick grasp on what they are reading about or they will just move on to another page.

Readability Should Match Audience’s Needs
Many SEO writers make the mistake of writing content that flies over their audience’s head. Sure, there is nothing wrong with having an extensive vocabulary, but you have to understand the overall purpose of your content. If the writing is wordy and difficult, your target audience will never read it.

Since at least half of Americans read at an eighth grade level or lower, you want to produce content that is accessible to a wide range of people. This doesn’t mean that your content needs to read like a Dr. Seuss book, but depending upon your target audience, you probably don’t want to be writing your SEO articles like they are your graduate thesis, either.

Interestingly enough, there is an online readability tool that can help writers understand if their content is hitting the mark or not. This tool analyzes your content on multiple levels and tells you the content’s level of readability.

Of course, the discovery of this tool made me want to see how readable our SEO blog is.

Each of these readability scores is based on its own formula for determining readability. I won’t go through each individual score, but I will touch on a few. These results are satisfactory overall, but they show us what we need to improve on to maximize our readability.

Flesch Index- The Flesch Index is one of the most widely recognizable readability formulas today. This score ranges from 0 (most difficult) to 100 (easiest to read.) The average person responds best to documents that are in the 60 to 70 range. Since the Directory One blog aims to be accessible to everyone from SEO beginners to experts, I think a score of 63.5 is great. It shows that our average post is well written and easy to understand.

Fog Index- The Fog Index assigns a grade level to content. Ideally, you want your grade to be around an 8. Our grade of 12.5 is a little higher than I would like, but I believe much of that can be attributed to the use of technical SEO terms. Furthermore, I think it is acceptable to have an occasional post that ranks a little higher on difficulty. It helps separate your blog from the spam. That being said, the average SEO client will want their content to be accessible to the average reader.

Paragraph Length- Perhaps the score I am most pleased with is the analysis of our paragraphs. Out of 38 paragraphs, the SEO blog averaged 4 sentences per paragraph. As I mentioned earlier in this post, short paragraphs are ideal for keeping your content scannable. An article that contains paragraphs with 4 sentences provides readers with content that is easy to read and not intimidating.

All SEO writers can benefit from analyzing their content’s usability. In the end, you have to give your audience what they want. Otherwise, they will leave your website and never return.

Bookmark to:
         

Author: April Hall

Website Content Copywriter

When your business decides it is time to update your website content, you may choose to finally fork over the money it takes to hire a web development company to perform search engine optimization (SEO) research and create some SEO content. By handing over this responsibility to a professional firm, you not only get the advantage of not having to worry about performing keyword research or editing your site content, but you also get to the added benefit of having experienced copywriters on your side.

Once you find a SEO company-or an independent copywriter-to hire, you may think that your part of the transaction is over; but you would be absolutely wrong. It has, in fact, only begun. Like any business relationship, you will need to make frequent contact with your SEO company to discuss how successful your internet marketing actually is, to make suggestions for how your site should look and to correct misleading or incorrect statements within the content. After all, you are the expert on your business; and although you may have hired a professional SEO content writer to add articles or page content to your site, you have the ultimate say on what information your company provides to internet customers.

The problem is that many SEO companies do a great job of getting both your attention and your business, but a poor job of actually making you happy. Perhaps you have gone with a company that advertises minimal fees for their work, only to discover that you are not able to make contact with them when you want to. It is usually insufficient to offer SEO clients simply an email or “technical support” request form–your SEO company needs to give you an actual contact number that links you to a real, live person! Who wants to leave an email message about false advertising or misstatements on their site? When you are confused, frustrated or concerned, you want to talk to a living, breathing representative of your SEO company!

So what is to be learned from all this? Basically that the old adage “you get what you pay for” is absolutely true when it comes to SEO companies. When you pay a nominal fee for copywriting and search engine optimization services, expect nominal customer service. When you want access to real people–even during non-traditional business hours–be willing to pay just a bit more.

Bookmark to:
         

Author: April Hall

Content Writer

Contrary to conventional wisdom, SEO content that will increase your site’s readership and drive your business is built upon good ol’ fashioned creativity. A well-written web page is not just a bunch of keywords that have been carefully targeted to your audience. It is a thoughtful, professionally-crafted piece of communication that is enjoyable and informative to read.

Many copywriters peruse their competitions’ websites to see what topics they are writing about, finally deciding on a popular topic and then simply rewording whatever it is they said for their own sites. This is absolutely the wrong method! Internet searchers (as well as search engines) value uniqueness of thought and creativity in approach. Saying whatever it is everyone else is saying will not make your web page stand out from the crowd. It is true that skilled copywriters understand how to use research methods to discover the most popular keyword searches, but creating worthwhile content around those keywords takes creativity.

Remember that content that includes too many keywords is “stuffed” and takes severe hits, if it is not outright banned from search engines. The key is to use one, or just a few, keywords and thoughtfully build an informative page that weaves them throughout the article in such a way that the reader hardly recognizes them. If your readers come to your site via a search engine–only to discover that the information you provide is exactly the same as the previous seven sites on the search engine results page–they will quickly stop taking the time to visit your website.

Bookmark to: