Timothy Carter

11 Ways Local Business Can Maximize PPC Management

By Timothy Carter on January 24, 2018

When you run a business, pay-per-click (“PPC” advertising) is one of the marketing tools at your disposal. It’s a cost-effective, flexible, and powerful way to target your audience and can even work at drawing people to offline retail stores and offices. The trouble is, many would-be marketers aren’t making the most of such a versatile advertising platform.

As a result, people that start PPC advertising campaigns often waste their time and money on things like irrelevant keywords, poor geographic targeting, and even low-quality landing pages! What’s worse is that some advertisers don’t maximize their local marketing potential in their PPC campaigns. [Read more…] about 11 Ways Local Business Can Maximize PPC Management

Why Long Form Blog Articles Are Critical To SEO

By Timothy Carter on December 12, 2017

It is no secret that when we go online, we yearn for instant gratification. We want to view content that answers our questions or solves our problems in some way. What we don’t want to do is invest time checking something out only to discover that it doesn’t give away much information or guidance.

When we search for things online or frequent our favorite websites, we expect to find content relevant to our search queries and interests. It used to be taken as fact that website owners should curate content that is quick and easy to digest. After all; who wants to spend ages reading a blog post or article online, right?

The truth is, things have changed. Today, we still want relevant content – but if we find something “juicy”, we will take the time to explore that content in-depth. It seems that the change of landscape in reader retention is something reaffirmed by Google; that’s because they reward publishers that write longer, relevant content. [Read more…] about Why Long Form Blog Articles Are Critical To SEO

Why Link Building Starts With Relationship Building (and How to Do It)

By Timothy Carter on October 14, 2017

Link building has evolved a great deal since its original inception, when you could post links almost anywhere and improve your rankings in search engines based on the quantity of those links. Today, the quality of your links matters far more than the quantity, both protecting you from the threat of a Google penalty and earning you more domain authority in the process.

Still, there are some differing philosophies when it comes to the top priorities in link building. Some argue that it’s all about intrinsic value, producing the best onsite content to naturally attract the best links. Some argue it’s about opportunism—hunting down key opportunities to exploit in a timely manner. Instead, I think link building starts and ends with relationship building; with stronger, longer-term publisher relationships, I can almost guarantee you’ll see better SEO results. [Read more…] about Why Link Building Starts With Relationship Building (and How to Do It)

How to Calculate the Value of a Link

By Timothy Carter on August 18, 2017

Much to the dismay of perfectionists everywhere, link building is a marketing tactic that doesn’t come with an easily calculable ROI (return on investment). Link building is a crucial element of any search engine optimization (SEO) strategy; without links pointing back to your domain, it’s almost impossible to increase your authority, and thus, your search rankings. However, with the wide array of variables affecting the contributions of a link, it’s hard to say exactly how much “value” a given link has.

This introduces a special kind of headache when you consider that building a link takes anywhere from a few minutes to a few days, depending on the nature of the publisher, the tactic you’re using, and other (sometimes uncontrollable) factors. Most optimizers spend many hours per week on link building, but how can you tell if those hours are a profitable investment?

It won’t surprise you to know that I can’t offer a concrete, black-and-white answer, but I can help you estimate your link values to point you in the right direction.

Three Dimensions of Link Value

First, understand that links are more valuable than just their contributions to your domain authority (and search rankings). In fact, there are three “dimensions” of link value I’ll be exploring in this piece:

Domain authority. This is the amount of authority a link “passes” to your domain; the more authority you earn, the higher you’ll rank in search engines for various queries, and the more organic search traffic you’ll receive.
Referral traffic. Anyone reading your piece has the chance of clicking the link you’ve built, which cuts out the search engine “middle man” and rewards you with instant traffic. There’s a value to this as well.
Merely including the mention of your brand in the context of an article can have long-term benefits for your reputation. This is especially true as your prominence as an author increases over time.

Domain Authority

First, let’s determine how much value a link can pass in terms of domain authority. There are many factors that can affect this:

Source authority. The authority of your source is probably the biggest indicator for how much authority your link will pass. There are many tools that can help you determine this, though most operate on a basis that scores domains between 0 and 100. Any site with an authority of 40 or higher is considered good, but the power players rest between 80 and 100. One link from a high-authority site from this can instantly boost your domain authority if it’s low, and make a measurable impact on it even if it’s already high. The authority curve is exponential, so you’ll see declining returns as your authority rises (but bigger jumps in search rankings).
Link placement. The placement and nature of your link will also come into play. For example, is your link pointing to a specific internal page of your site, or the homepage? If you funnel multiple links to a single internal page, you’ll increase its page authority, which can help it rank faster than your other pages. If your link is on a “core” page of a source, rather than the blog page, you may earn extra authority as well.
Repetition and diversity. Posting multiple links on the same source will yield significantly declining returns. It’s much better to post links from multiple different sources; the more you have, the better. Therefore, the first link on a new 85 authority source will probably be more valuable than a second link on an old 90 authority source.
Anchor text. The anchor text of your link can help you earn relevance for specific keyword terms, though this effect isn’t as powerful as it used to be. In most cases, you’re better off using anchor text that flows naturally in the body of your article.

Overall, any link on a source with an authority higher than yours will likely make a positive impact on your domain authority. That impact has the potential to influence upward movement in your search rankings; depending on your keyword targets and previous positions, this could result in moving to the number one position, or earning hundreds to thousands of new visitors. Unfortunately, there are too many variables to tell for sure.

Referral Traffic

Thankfully, referral traffic is much more straightforward and easy to calculate.

Traffic volume. If you log into Google Analytics and check out the Acquisition tab, you’ll see site traffic broken down into different sources, one of which is “referral traffic.” Here, you can analyze where all your referral traffic is coming from, down to the individual page and link. Obviously, the more visitors a link generates, the more value it holds for your brand.
Traffic relevance. You’ll also want to consider the relevance of that traffic. For example, writing a “buyer’s guide” to a product you offer will likely send more traffic to your site than a topic outside your area of expertise.

Reputation Value

Finally, consider the reputation value that your link and/or brand mention is earning you:

Brand exposure. First, mere exposure to your brand can lead to increased awareness. Depending on the size and visibility of the publisher, this could result in hundreds of people learning your name for the first time.
If your brand is connected to the authorship of the article—and it’s an informative article—those people will learn to trust you more, and become more loyal to you. This is a somewhat incalculable effect, but it’s worth considering.
Posting links to your site multiple times on the same source may not grant you much additional domain authority, but it will make those readers even more aware of your brand.
Bigger opportunities. Getting work features on a mid- to high-level publisher could open the door to even bigger opportunities. On top of all the other valuable benefits your link provides to you, it may also earn you the chance to post an even better link somewhere else. This is especially important to consider for early-stage campaigns.

The Value of a Visitor

The lynchpin variable in all these calculations is the value of a visitor. When looking at domain authority and referral traffic, the end goal is getting more people to your site, and you’ll often use “visitors” as a metric to demonstrate effectiveness. But how valuable is a visitor? Look at the average value of a conversion, and your average conversion rate to calculate this. Then, in combination with the estimations you’ve made above, you should be able to calculate an estimated value each link has.

There’s no clear-cut way to isolate a rigid value for a given link, but you can use secondary metrics and your understanding of a link’s general value to determine whether your strategy is effective. Use these tools to audit your campaign and, if necessary, make adjustments to your approach for higher ROI.

12 Reasons Why Local SEO Audits Are Required

By Timothy Carter on July 6, 2017

Search engine optimization or “SEO” is a proven way to increase a website’s rank on Google, Bing, and other popular search engines. The idea behind SEO is that one follows a series of processes to improve a site’s visibility and accessibility to both search engines and human visitors.

Why local SEO should matter to you

SEO techniques are broad and, when used correctly, the right ones will always return the best results for website owners. One approach to optimization is local SEO, and it’s a technique that is becoming more important and relevant in today’s digital world.

As a business leader and website owner, you will want to ensure that your brand quickly reaches your target audience on the World Wide Web. Local SEO is a crucial way to deliver details about your brand on a regional level and is vital for those with retail stores and physical premises that customers can visit.

Because of Google’s “Venice” algorithmic updates, most search engine results pages (SERPs) are filled with localized results tailored to relevant queries. For instance, if you search Google for supermarkets, the SERPs will display details of such vendors in your vicinity. What’s more, you don’t even need to be logged into a Google/Gmail account for those relevant results to get displayed.

It’s also worth noting that nearly half of all search queries carried out on Google are done so to seek out local products and services. As you can appreciate, local SEO is now a powerful concept to embrace for your online marketing strategies!

The sad truth is that many website owners fail to recognize the importance of local SEO or, indeed, how to harness its power for their sites.

Regardless of whether a site is new or established, if you have a physical presence in your area, you should carry out a local SEO audit of your website. Here are 12 reasons why:

1 – Consumers go online to find local businesses

It’s no secret that when we need to find a local company to provide a service or offer a particular product to us, we’ll search online for them. Gone are the days where we would spend time searching through paper-based local directory listings. Thanks to the Internet, we can now get the answers we need in seconds.

An interesting fact to bear in mind about local business searches on Google and other search engines is this: mobile searches have surpassed desktop ones! That means the likelihood is high that people will be searching for local businesses while they are on the move.

2 – Local SEO is a highly targeted marketing strategy

While the primary reason for local searches is to find specific businesses, the secondary one is to seek out products and services. In essence, there are two groups of people performing local searches.

The first is trying to identify a specific company or brand in their local area, usually a retailer. Meanwhile, the second group don’t have a particular business name in mind. However, they know the name of the product or service that they want.

Local search engine optimization tactics ensure you can position your brand to best meet the needs of consumers in your area. If your website’s aim is to attract people from a particular town, city, or region, a local SEO audit is a must to help you achieve that goal.

3 – Local SEO can help you achieve high conversion rates

Have you ever noticed that online directory websites often dominate the first page of SERPs for local searches? That’s because they include NAPs in their listings – Names, Addresses, and Phone Numbers.

You will no doubt have deduced that those three pieces of information are vital to attracting consumers to a local brand or the products and services that it offers. What you may not realize is that NAPs are a brilliant way to help you achieve high conversions from your website!

Because more people are turning to the Internet for help than classifieds pages in local newspapers, you’ll have higher response rates from your website. As long as you carry out a local SEO audit first, of course!

4 – Smartphone ownership is rising to exponential levels

The days of “ordinary” or standard mobile phones are numbered! These days, more of us are opting for smartphones – even people that seldom use all of their functions and features! The main selling point of smartphones is they allow us to connect with other individuals in a multitude of ways.

They’re also extremely useful for displaying website content without the need to use a desktop or laptop computer.

Devices such as the Apple iPhone and Samsung Galaxy are pretty good at loading up web pages, even those that aren’t designed for mobile browser screens. According to StatCounter, smartphones and tablets accounted for 51.3% of all web browsing back in Q4 2016.

With the processing power of a computer in a small, compact form, smartphones make it easy for us to search for brands, products, and services wherever we are. They are also a convenient way of searching for local retailers that stock specific products.

By conducting a local SEO website audit, you can ensure that your brand becomes at the forefront of people’s minds when they search for the types of things that you sell.

5- Local SEO gives a high ROI (return on investment)

Business leaders will naturally want to keep their marketing budgets small and only stick to strategies that work. In the world of Internet marketing, search engine optimization can sometimes feel like a gamble to entrepreneurs. With all the time and money invested in promoting a website, they will worry that they aren’t getting value for money.

One of the huge advantages of local SEO strategies is they provide a high ROI, regardless of the budget spent! So, if you’ve got a retail store or local service business, you will no doubt want to promote your brand to the local community first and foremost.

As mentioned in point three earlier, local SEO is a highly targeted marketing strategy. When you complete a local SEO audit of your website and carry out any required optimization work, you will soon discover just how fruitful your investment will be!

6 – A local SEO audit can reveal crucial competitor insights

Whenever you plan a new marketing strategy, you will no doubt carry out plenty of research before you execute it. For instance, if you were doing a PPC ad campaign, you’d determine which keywords were most relevant for the things you were trying to promote.

For local search engine optimization, an audit of your website can actually help you find out valuable information about your competitors. For example, a local SEO audit could show you the best-selling products and services in your area from the range that you sell. And it can also give you insights into how saturated the market is in your immediate vicinity or region.

If you head over to Google Maps and search for a type of business in there, you’ll see a list of relevant results. That information can be handy at helping you size up your competition and give you an edge over them. Plus, it can alert you if you’ve not taken the time to complete your listing on Google My Business (the details of which would be shown on the map results).

Of course, not everyone uses Google Maps to search for local businesses or firms that sell specific products and services. But, the SERPs for standard Google searches usually include a small map on the page with a list of local providers if you’re doing area-based searches.

7 – You will learn more about the feedback your customers give you online

When you have a local listing on Google My Business, people won’t just find out vital contact details about you. They also view such listings to determine what kind of feedback you get from other customers.

Online feedback is a very powerful thing and can either propel a brand’s reputation into the stratosphere or destroy it. Do you know what your customers are saying about you online? If not, conducting a local SEO audit will help you find out that information.

8 – You’ll find out more about consumer spending habits

You might not realize it, but your best-selling products and services online might not sell like hotcakes in the offline world! An advantage of selling to consumers face-to-face and on the Internet is you can learn a great deal about their spending habits and tailor your offline and online offerings accordingly.

One of the benefits of having a local SEO audit done on your website is you can find out more about the types of products and services consumers are most likely to buy from your physical premises.

9 – Your website will rank higher in Google and other search engines

One of the basic things we get told about SEO is that we can measure the popularity of a website through an unofficial metric called Domain Authority. In a nutshell, the higher your DA rank, the more of your content will get shown in relevant SERPs.

As you probably know, search engines like Google use a variety of factors to rank sites. Local SEO is now an important aspect of website ranking and one that will contribute to a higher domain authority.

Even if you don’t have a retail store, you should still optimize your site for local SEO. Don’t forget that some of your customers may wish to speak with you in person or on the phone to discuss their requirements before buying from you.

If you don’t make it easy for those potential sales leads to find you, they will take their business elsewhere. And that’s obviously something you don’t want to happen!

10 – Proximity-based searches are on the rise

Sometimes when people are searching for brands, products, or services on their smartphones, they might not enter the name of their local area.

However, Google will magically display relevant results that list local businesses and organizations in the SERPs. Most modern smartphones have GPS built into them, and Google uses that information to locate where the searcher is.

These days, it’s not just smartphones or even tablets that more of us are using to search for things on the go. The evolution of wearable technology means things like smartwatches are also enabling people to find nearby local companies.

A local SEO audit will give you the best chance of being seen by people using mobile devices and wearables to search for the products and services that you sell.

11- You need local SEO to give you a competitive edge

There is no denying that competition is getting even more fierce these days for most industries and sectors. With search engine algorithms and technology, in general, evolving at such a rapid pace, it’s crucial that your brand keeps up to avoid getting left behind in the dust.

Having a local SEO audit performed will give your brand a much-needed competitive edge. Even if you don’t have premises where customers can visit, it still helps your business get found online by your potential clients.

12 – You need to know if search engines are penalizing your site

It might shock you to learn that some business leaders have no idea whether their websites are “blacklisted” by search engines or not! Sure, typing in their brand name into Google might show up a link to their site in the SERPs. But, what happens if none of the products or services you offered come up on the first or even second results pages?

One of the most important things about search engine optimization is that you know whether you are in Google’s good books or not! A local SEO audit is an ideal opportunity for you to find out the answer to that question.

You may find that your website got penalized for something as simple as duplicate content on a couple of pages – an easy mistake to rectify.

So as you can see, there are a myriad of reasons why making sure your site has implemented all the local SEO best practices to ensure it’s maximizing the organic visibility you need to reach your clients.

If you need help with your local SEO and are now considering a comprehensive SEO site audit of your site, let’s get together and put a plan together for your website.

The Mathematical Reason SEO Is the Best Long-Term Marketing Strategy

By Timothy Carter on June 23, 2017

Two major considerations differentiate marketing strategies from one another.

The first consideration is that the bottom line is what really matters. Having more people interested in your brand and talking about it is nice, but hearing someone mention your name on Twitter doesn’t usually equate to making a sale.

For most marketers, the bottom line is [Read more…] about The Mathematical Reason SEO Is the Best Long-Term Marketing Strategy

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