As local SEO continues to evolve it’s always nice to take a look at tips and trick that may help you get your business on Google’s map. After all, that 3-pack gets approximately 80 percent of the click-throughs. So how do you get your business to be on the map?
Historically it was the consistency of your name address and phone number. or the NAP. As time has gone one that remains one of the fundamental ways to get on the map and we have our Citation Lock tool that will assist local business owners to correct that.
Next, we all know reviews are important but the thing is, that you can’t fake those although many will try. But we all also know that soliciting good reviews is hard. People don’t want to be bothered unless they are mad and then they review like crazy and say crazy things. We’ve all been there.
But there now is an inclusion of links as a ranking variable on local search and map results. So what are local links? Well, they are the links that come from your kid’s swim team or your church. But they are also local things you join such as a chamber of commerce or BBB.
The Chamber of Commerce is particularly interesting because the BBB is a bit onerous for local business. They have rules and often create sitatuions which cause business owners to take a loss and the smallest business cannot take that loss. But the local chamber of commerce is great.
For starters, they are reasonably simple and inexpensive to join, around $300 a year on average. But if their website is set up properly they will allow local links to be made to your website. This is a golden signal to google that it is a safe assumption that your business is located right where you say it is and that you are not playing a game for rakings.
These chambers if they are taken care of well, also help pass value over to your website and the better taken care of the website is, the stronger the value of your link is. And if your page is soft put out a press release and point it to the page on the chamber of commerce that mentions your business to make it have more power.
Often, especially with new members, we hear the question of how to make sure you are getting an ROI on your chamber membership. And if you are only vetting it through how many dollars you make you are missing an integral point if your site is ranking on Google especially in the map area.
So if your looking for a quick effective LEGITIMATE link a chamber of commerce is definitely a route to consider. It doesn’t require a lot of upkeep and it is a safe way to get a reasonably high powered link pointing back to your site. And best of all it is a link that can deliver traffic back to your site through that link simply because often chamber members rely on each other for referrals.
So a chamber link will check several local SEO boxes and should be one all small business owners can get and keep with very little expense or overhead. And if you are so inclined you might even choose to network with these folks and find a few new prospects. Win win for all.
Now even Facebook is inspiring blog posts. Not because I want to write a post on social media, but they put up that silly ad for a t-shirt that reminded me all I do is talk to people all day that wants to tell me they are experts in SEO, did their own SEO so that makes them an expert, or find smart people who are experts that tell them what they want to hear, regardless of whether it’s the truth, and then want me to validate their ability. SEO is not a hobby. SEO is not easy. And real SEO experts are hard to find and even harder to identify.
So often the information I hear is just flat out wrong. And it’s so difficult to tell someone that. Web Designers at times are yes people that can do what they want with only a rudimentary nod to SEO concerns. But how is a consumer to know who and what is real and what is not?
Here’s a list of all the things people think they know about SEO, that are just not correct:
#1 Talks about how the PPC helps Organic Search
I usually get this from the client side. Now for years, there has been this undercurrent of why PPC helps organic search, but if you ask Google they will tell you that they house those departments in two different buildings and never the two shall meet. And although I have my own opinion on this, and maybe will write a post on it, when a customer leads with “I want you to do PPC so you can drive my organic search,” you know this will be a problem. You don’t do PPC as an organic strategy. And in fact, if it’snot done right it can screw up your organic results. It should be complementary at best.
#2 Talks about Building Citations and Links
This one is tricky to navigate in this regard. Yes, you need links and yes, you need citations. But going and getting thousands of junk links from every directory site on the planet is now passé. Getting citations from places that have no traffic or no relevancy is just a waste of good resources. Furthermore, adding pages to article directories for backlinks is not only passé, but more or less taboo in this day and age. Yet I’m still asked about it.
#3 Talks about Social Sharing and Yet has No Followers.
There for a while, you could add your page on social and have no followers and still get credit. Now, Google is looking for that social activity and it’s no longer good to just have the link found. Google wants the engagement. So, to just put a page up for the sake of putting up a page is long gone by the wayside.
#4 All you Need is good MetaTags
So yeah, Google stopped ‘honoring’ that in 2009. And although you need to have proper title tags and well-written descriptions, it’s not the beat all and end all of an SEO game. But many times I see bids built around how they are going to fix the meta tags and make a website rank. Hardly.
#5 I have 5 “Great” Keyword-rich Domains and I want to use them all to Rank on the Same Keyword
Hello, its 2003 calling and they want their strategy back. I hear this a lot too, and customers get mad when we advise that would not be the way to go. Some days not being a yes man is hard. I had over 25 web hosting domains and have systematically shut them down and pointed all their power to this website. I now have a website that ranks well, is focused and is a perfect lead generator. I admittedly have three brands we work with here, and each serves a unique clientele and purpose. They are not setup to compete on Google or optimized to game Google’s system. It is next to impossible to own multiple properties, give them their own identities and develop each of them so uniquely.
#6 Pricing
This one is so hard to explain, but you cannot have good SEO for $100 a website. Or $300 a website, or even $1000 a website. It’s just not possible to do all the things that need to be done in all the directions it needs to come in from. But so often I find people taking the bait on low-cost SEO. In the end, those folks end up with more problems than solutions.
#7 News Papers and TV stations are not SEO companies
More and more I hear this that SEO has been outsourced to the local big newspaper. If they can’t deliver the news why do think they can do SEO? I know, all kidding aside. $3000-$5000 a month to rank on 10 keywords is not good. I don’t care how many reports they give you. Those reports are ways to buffalo you into thinking they did something more than 10 keywords.
#8 Take a #1 Ranking Website and Flush it
This pains me. I treat our websites like children and work with them, nurture them, and build them into big, strong sites that can compete with even the biggest brands. But occasionally I have a new person come into a client company and want to replace us with ‘their own people.’ And then over the next six months, I watch the website be systematically dismantled in the name of progress by another SEO firm that simply did not know what they were doing. There are very few that do, honestly. Unfortunately, that is pretty much always the case. Out of the last three clients, I’ve had leave, two have completely decimated their web presence. One has done better because the company was sold and the new owner put more resources in.
With the two that are decimated, I’ve noticed that they have used PPC to prop their sites back up. When you have a #1 website don’t change drivers for the sake of changing. Respect that someone did the work and got you to that spot, and that did not happen by accident. Furthermore, flipping a website is an art form and very few people can do it successfully. We can, but very few others can do it right because of how much is involved. It’s not simply putting a few 301s in and walking away. Remember, it’s much harder to fix a website after it’s been destroyed than to do it right in the first place, especially if it’s a competitive field.
As a P.S. to this topic, if you have traffic and are not making a sale, find out why don’t just turn the site off without even redirecting the traffic. It’s very hard to get a website that has 10,000+ organic visits, and to throw it away is…well…no words.
#9 We Have an In-house SEO Guy
I hear this a lot too. You cannot have one guy that you’re paying less than $50K a year do all the SEO. Besides there not being enough hours in a work week, it’s not possible. You need writers, tech people, editors, link builders, creative/graphics people, content people and security people, and they are all different skill sets. So, for a small to mid-sized business you are far better advised to use the $50K-$75K a year and hire an agency that provides a turnkey solution that covers all of it than one guy who knows how to work a computer, maybe. The in-house budget really needs to be over $250K and more pushing $500K for a normal company. For web-based companies that number really needs 25 or more people. Ever see The Intern? it’s not all that far off.
Digital marketing requires commitment and consistency most of all to be successful. There is no secret sauce, just a lot of hard, coordinated teamwork. And one secretary that knows how to use Facebook is not going to cut it.
#10 Your Web Hosting Needs to be in the Loop
Bad web hosts, and for that matter web designers, can hurt your efforts far more than you can ever account for. Slow connections, hacked websites and no firewalls are among the basic problems website owners may encounter.
And I guess while I’m on the subject, knowing how to use WordPress and add plugins does not make you a web designer, and in fact, improper use of plugins can kill your efforts.
I admit that at ACTWD I’ve put all the components under one roof by accident. I didn’t start out to have all three components under one roof. I did it because I kept hitting things that were needed that we couldn’t do, so I found solutions and have been doing that as long as I can remember. I know we are the exception, but honestly, we should be held up as the norm and the litmus test that is used when choosing an SEO company.
I received a client email that was riddled with misinformation someone had told them regarding SSL. This post has been on my mind for a long time and this seemed to give me the perfect opportunity. This also a timely topic with hacking being in the news and Google losing yet another 2+ Billion lawsuits in Europe, both of which related to this topic.
To understand the role of SSL in security and how it’s being co-opted, misused, as well as touted as the end game in cyber security as well as SEO, one must first understand how and what all these things are, as well as the proper application. Every day I see people throwing around a lot of words but most people don’t really know what they mean.
Hacking
So, let’s first look at what hacking actually is and how to avoid it. Of course, the most understandable definition is breaking into a computer, network, or account and gaining control, usually for nefarious purposes.
Brute Force Hacks
is when a username and password combo are sent repetitively to a computer or server in hopes to gain access. This can be done via Shell Logins, FTP Logins, Email Logins and Website Logins (such as WordPress and Magento).
By way of oversimplification, there a few ways to slow a brute force hack. Usually, this is seen when the end user experiences a lock out because they have logged in wrong too many times. This slows up the process because often users are blocked for a period and the system administrator is notified. And of course, using a secure password is mandatory. When someone uses a password of password or qwerty1234, it almost guarantees a break-in. No SSL encryption can save stupid.
FTP, Telnet, SSH
These three protocols are ways people access remote systems. And are also weak spots used to access and gain control of networks. Often malicious code is uploaded that will allow the servers to be compromised with things that monitor keystrokes, opening or exploiting security holes or running a spam mail zombie or phishing email campaign, usually with an accompanying website hack that fools users into turning over their usernames and passwords.
Using an SSL encrypted protocol (SFTP, and SSH) will slow hackers down and are a front line of defense, but the way to stop exploits of these protocols is great security policies, patching servers and a hardware firewall with intrusion protection that protects the entire network (something our web hosting accounts receive free of charge).
Virus Activity
Hackers use computer viruses to take over computers, networks and sometimes countries, such as the Ukraine experienced just this last week. Ransomware is just the latest iteration of virus that attacks mainly unpatched versions of Microsoft Windows and locks the owner out of the system until a ransom is paid.
In most cases, viruses are one of the simplest things to avoid. Unpatched systems and Email users are the two biggest failure points that allow the virus to infiltrate the computer or network. And in most cases, the viruses are designed to either help spread the virus or cause outages in things like DDoS attacks. I’m not even sure I want to say that SSL offers any level of enhanced security here because, in my opinion, most causes of a virus spreading are because of human ignorance or apathy.
So, what is encryption?
When speaking of encryption in regards to cyber security, the simple plain text is taken and scrambled so it is unreadable to a human. There are fancy words like ciphers involved in this process, but unless you’re a security wonk, there is no need to go into that.
Again, a way oversimplification (although important). Basically, when a file is encrypted, it’s scrambled and along with it is sent a key. If the file is intercepted it is of no value to the interceptor because they do not have the decryption key that is sent along with the file. Presently and 128-bit Encryption Key is the standard and believed not to be breakable, but as computing power and hackers advance in this war, it’s only a matter of time before we need to move to a 256-bit Encryption Key.
Encryption and SSL
SSL or Secure Sockets Layer is the connection that is opened between two computers, i.e. a website and your computer that allows sensitive data to be transmitted securely between the two computers.
The way SSL was intended to be used is when a website needs to pass sensitive data, the SSL is called (for a website its HTTPS, for FTP its using SFTP and so forth). Usually, that is things like credit card numbers and passwords. The SSL also confirms that the data that is sent is the same as what you receive, as well as validates the computer that is sending the data to your computer. Browsers are also programmed to alert end users when a connection is not TOTALLY secure, with totally being the operative word.
When SSL is activated on the page, it means that every file must be encrypted, including images and graphics or the browser will alert the end user if it is not. But Google has taken this to a whole new level.
Now before I go any further, I want to say that when SSL is used properly, it is a very good thing.
SSL SEO and Privacy
So, last week it was announced that Google was fined another 2.7 billion in the EU over manipulation and privacy concerns. This is the second time this has happened in the last few years and the lawsuits against Google continue to mount because of the amount of data it collects on each user, their query and how that data is used. And in my opinion, what in essences amounts to a demand of each website owner by Google that their sites be made secure is born out of this.
So let’s talk about the pros and cons of making your whole website secure regardless if you’re the one passing sensitive data. Nearly 2 years ago (and what seems to be around the time of the first EU ruling) Google came out saying that it was going to offer and organic SEO credit for any website that forced their website to respond as HTTPS in all cases regardless if sensitive data was being passed, such as a credit card or password. The whys they requested this is lost in the hyperbole of it all in my opinion.
So webmasters ran out, bought SSL certificates installed them, forced their site to HTTPS to activate the SSL in the browsers and their websites sunk like a rock. Word quickly spread that this was not a good idea after all and webmasters started to back off the idea.
Why Forcing a Website to HTTPS Breaks Organic Search?
Simply it breaks the link profile of a site for a substantial amount of time. It seemed that initially, there may not have been an adequate consideration of the effects on and impact of links in relation to how a website ranks. So, taking http and forcing it to https, even via 301, saw the effects of those links be devalued, thus causing smaller sites to tank. It is even possible that even Google underestimated the deduction a site would receive and did not provide adequate compensation via their magic SEO credit they said everyone would receive.
Eventually Google seemed to change the way the SEO credit and 301s and 308 codes were handled to give more credit for the process, trying to add better incentives to make the move to HTTPS. But it seemed that loss, although not as great was still not worth it.
So Google turned up the gas, and started using their browser, Chrome, to alert end users that the website was not safe. And even the simplest non-ecommerce websites were having end users alerted about the website not being safe. Now again on the surface, this sounds good but a small engineering first with 5 basic HTML pages that request no personal info really has no business being required to use and SSL connection without Google issuing a scary warning about internet security, especially when Americans are hearing nightly about hacking, ransomware and such.
This of course lowered conversion and forced many webmasters to convert to HTTPS, regardless of the reduction in organic search. Google continues to be aggressive in warning chrome users of sites that are not using HTTPS.
It has taken approximately 18 moths for our lower trafficked sites to stabilize after conversion.
From an SEO standpoint, there isn’t’ a great reason to do it. From a conversion standpoint, there are many reasons to do it. But from a system admin side, the side that is often overlooked there is a lot of negatives.
4 Sides of the SSL Discussion:
SEO Viewpoint – To convert a site to SSL, there still isn’t enough ‘credit’ being offered to make this be worthwhile. Expect at least 8-12 weeks minimum of upheaval.
Conversion Viewpoint – Big scary warnings about your website, make this an absolute slam dunk as to why this need to be done and outweighs all the other reasons in our opinion.
Website Owner – There are security benefits from using SSL on parts of websites where passwords are involved, but to secure the whole site for a password is not necessary.
System Administrator – They are not thrill with this improper use of SSL. SSL should only be used with something needs to be encrypted. So, if buying a product, and adding a credit card SSL great. Logging into a web account would be another great use. But using SSL just for the sake of doing it, it is a unnecessary burden put on any server and slows websites down. Honestly, from the hosting side of this, the imposed use of SSL really is maddening. It is an unnecessary blanket use of something. So why would Google go to such lengths to force webmasters to use SSL? Great question, isn’t it?
Why Google Why?
Noticeably missing from my viewpoints of SSL is the end user and that is where the truth lies. This is all being done to protect the end user so seems to be how the story goes.
But what are we protecting the end user from? Remember the proper use of SSL is to stop the user data from getting stolen. Google is going to great lengths to force website owners into the use of SSL, so much so they are using Chrome to cajole SEOs and website owners into using SSL by making the warnings about entering an http website more and more visible. And offering credits for better organic SEO results seem to reinforce that Google can manipulate search results by rewarding certain behavior that is unrelated to punishing people who operate outside its guidelines. It would seem this issue is very important to Google. And in my opinion, it transcends the ability to buy something on the internet.
One hypothesis and opinion may be that this is an actual legal strategy or defense. SSL protects user data. So with the myriad of lawsuits Google is facing all involving user privacy would the universal use of SSL blunt the privacy lawsuits? Will this still allow Google to collect and sell user data, but yet now be able to argue they are doing this securely? It would explain the big push to force everyone on the planet to make their websites SSL.
So is the juice worth the squeeze. From a pure SEO standpoint, no. The credit is not large enough to offset the loss of link juice on lower level sites and with Google now using your traffic as a ranking variable it’s a recipe for disaster. However, if Google is going to put big scary warnings on websites via Chrome which is now the most used browser coming in at just under 50%, website owners have little choice but to implement SSL on their sites.
It’s been a busy start of a new year, with a lot of weirdness. I have met a few people that wanted to tell me SEO is dead. What they really mean is SEO is way too much work for them and requires way too many components to do it right. Of course, several of these people were selling impression-based advertising from long dead phone company directories trying to stay afloat, but I digress.
Admittedly for those without a brand, the digital marketing lift is much heavier. Unfortunately, that is usually the small business or the upstart that has a limited budget. SEO, or more holistically and more accurately described by the term digital marketing, need to now be pointed, strategic and have a multi-functional purpose, and it has to serve multiple masters. It’s no longer viable to throw random keywords out in hopes to attract a customer. The visual of throwing birdseed or chum always pops into my head, whenever I say that out loud. Integrated strategies are mandatory now because Google is reading all these signals, deciding what the site is about, and ultimately choosing the winners.
Before I proceed much further, I want to provide a helpful hint:If you are a business owner and your SEO vendors are not talking in the terms I’m going to layout below, you need to re-evaluate your engagement with them. If you have multiple vendors, they all need to interact with each other. If they are resistant, you need to re-evaluate your engagement with them. And if you have an in-house department, you need make sure there is a dedicated team in place, and the employees on that team are dedicated to just the digital marketing aspects of the business, nothing else.
Anecdotally, organic search is a customer’s first encounter with a company; or the top of a funnel. To hear Google, they say 98% of all searches are informational and only 2% are transactional. And although that is correct, the buying process starts at the top of the funnel.
The best place for business owners to start is with an understanding of who their customers are. Commonly business owners think in terms of what they sell as opposed to the problems they solve. The internet is predicated on this one simple fact, people go there to solve problems. It’s the best way to meet customers where they are and win them over. I find that one of the hardest things for business owners to do is identify the problems they solve, because most think in terms of what they sell.
#1: Define the problems the business solves and create a content strategy that is in alignment with that.
In days gone by, web marketers were always talking about keywords and allowed to steer the direction. It was more of a scattershot approach that didn’t always consider what a potential customer needed. The article may have directly referenced something sold on the website, or maybe was just a basic information piece, but often the goals of that article was nothing more than to rank on a particular word. Because there is so much clickbait running around the internet, the end user is now sensitive to this and far less likely to interact with a page just because they have tripped over it, and they are far less likely to buy from or contact a business that is perceived that way.
One of the best sources of what problems a business solves is found in the corporate email box or on the telephones.
So in this case: Discuss the construction of a commercial Christmas tree vs a typical artificial tree.
It’s easy to see, I have added keywords into my premise so those keywords are going to be present throughout my campaign, but this page of content can be a comprehensive overview of the construction of the two tree types. This is a common question. Provide a good, solid, comprehensive answer. If one person is looking for that, many people are looking for that, rest assured of that.
#2: Create Videos
It’s 2017, creating a video is not all that hard. Sticking with the our Commercial Tree discussion. A video that highlights the difference in the two tree types would be a great video. It allows you to address clients, and explain how it best benefits the business. Other than providing a customer experience, this also allows the visitor to stay engaged with the page. This teaches Google that the page has value and helps them decide to organically rank the page higher.
If you’re able to, consider starting a video series that can build an audience. With a topic like Christmas, the sky’s the limit. And you can be witty to boot. Twelve Days of Christmas Trees comes to mind. That tells the user you may have a daily video explaining types of Christmas trees. Douglas Fir, Scotch Pine. Oh so much potential!
#3 Create a Graphics that Illustrate The Page:
Okay stop groaning. It’s not that bad. There are many great programs out there that will anger many-a-parent that put their kid though graphic design school. Our personal favorite is Canva.com. It’s easy to use, and the benefits are far reaching. Not only does your page or post look better, but it increases your click through rate from social platforms. The more appealing the page, the deeper the benefits. In as much as a bad graphics will hurt perceptions, good graphics will make the message and the brand clearer.
#4 Speaking of Graphics….Infographics
Yeah, yeah, I know they were all the rage for a while for link building. And in some circles they can still be used that way. However, their use is not just a link building method. But again, keep in mind we are teaching Google. When we do the infographic for this page it will be on our bullet points on how to support a page, make a strategy, and send the right signals to Google and not about Christmas Trees. An infographic does not have to be created for each page, however, it’s advisable when creating integrated content to consider it. After all the work that has been done there is no reason to minimize its impact by not supporting it properly.
There are many that will have a different opinion and say not every infographic has to be tied to content. In as much as they are right, I am for squeezing every drop out of something that I make an effort to do. So if i can get a larger amount of signals and then get that content shared socially…
#5 Speaking of Social Media
Social Media is a driver, and if used properly can really yield good results. Notice the “if used properly.” That’s where most businesses fail, and fail in the biggest sense. I always point to Williams-Sonoma as the best example of a well run social campaign. Problem is, most small businesses don’t have that type of budget. But there are many things to learn. And an in-depth post on them would be appropriate.
Let me first say they never post “buy our crock pot” or “order our broth.” Instead, we get quality posts that lead to the blog that have seasonal based recipes. Useful recipes that may or may not be used, but you don’t mind them entering your life daily. They have first and foremost identified why people will follow them, and put out the perfect response. The internet is filled with inane nonsense, there is no reason to add to it so your three friends like your post.
Yes, William Sonoma does have it a little easier than say Houston Mover JTMelia. But tips on how to move are a great way to get followers and be engaging. But in as much as I want the social property engaging, I also want the post to the website to be so well written that it too is shared. I then have traffic moving in both directions. People that like the page will see the post and go to the site. The people on the site like the post and share in the opposite direction. It again sends those signals that Google needs to learn what your site is about, it drives clicks and engagement and helps visitors remain on your site because they are busy reading. A huge score.
I also have been recommending using some of the paid ads inside the search networks. Its cheap, reinforces your brand and best of all teaches Google. How’s that for $5 a day.
#6 Link Building
Yes, it’s still on the table and probably more important than ever. But I never lead with link building because I truly believe if you run a site right, the links will come. Imagine all the effort being put into creating blog networks if these folks just concentrated on putting up good, solid, sharable content. I have picked up multiple links to this site simply through this blog. Admittedly, you have to be an expert on your topic or know how to run a good interview with clients to create this.
Recently I had the chance to visit an old friend who is running a website that makes 8 figures. It was a very impressive operation. But one thing they did not do is ‘link building’ via creating faux links. Their link building consisted of top tier content that was being picked up by universities and journals naturally. It was like a scene out of the movie the Intern with 35 people working to run the website. It is not viable for ‘small business’ to do this, but it is necessary to come as close to this as possible. If you put the effort in, sales will come.
#7 Pay Per Click or SEM
Yes, you read that right. I believe that every company needs a budget for PPC. It does not need to be primary because remember it will only capture less than 7% of all clicks, but if you do all these other things right, this reinforces the brand and makes it easier for people to find you when it comes time that the informational search turns into a transactional one.
Beyond the Google ad is the retargeting, the fancy word for the ads that follow you around the internet. Again, it creates a sense of brand recognition. This is important because the more people are familiar with your brand, the more apt they are to make that purchase at transaction time.
Do you need a huge budget? No. But you do need a budget.
As you can see there is much to do and all parts of the strategy need to be working together. The more effort that is done following this methodology will yield better results. I don’t believe any part of this can be skipped at this juncture.
Every day when I come to work, my mailbox is flooded with people that have domain issues. Two years ago Tucows came to me and asked if we would help with all the problems domains out in the marketplace. To give a little back story on this, Tucows is a wholesale domain registration company, meaning only people like me, you know a web hosting company, can buy from them, and those resellers then service the clients. Tucows is not allowed to interfere in the relationship. But, as many have experienced, not every company is like ACTWD, committed to its customers. So we were a perfect fit for Tucows, because had been with them as a vendor 15 years, and we knew the ins and outs of domain ownership.
So as with most of my blogs these days, they are customer inspired. And so it goes with this particular blog. I received an email from a customer who didn’t want to pay redemptions fees and explained to me how his domain was worth $1.
First, let me explain about domain name renewals and how that process works. Domains are ‘purchased’ from the registry. In the early days, the government ran that registry, and you basically purchased or really leased that name from the government. They maintained the name servers which then translates the domain from letters to ultimately land at its numeric home. After all, servers work off IP addresses, not names. The basics are still the same but in 2001, domains were deregulated and allowed to be sold by multiple companies, with Tucows being one of those companies. These type companies are called Registrars. Not to be confused with the registry and its governing board ICANN. The registry is above the registrar, and they set the rules.
The rules go like this. You have to pay your domain fee annually. Prices wildly, because some use the domain to incentivize purchase, so this is where domain pricing under $10 happens. Know anything under $13 total price, the company is taking a loss on a .com/.net/.org domain. You can buy(and I really mean lease) that domain for up to 10 years. Yes, I know some folks sell 20 and 100-year domains. It can only be renewed up to 10 years at any one time. The rest of your money will be disbursed (if the company is still around) down the road.
If your domain expires you have 40 days to reclaim this domain for its normal renewal rate. HOWEVER, I have had it happen that domains were taken almost immediately and sold to the highest bidder before they should have been. That has not been the normal course with Tucows, but I personally bought one from a competing registrar that was expired for 5 days. Bluntly, domains have value, regardless if you as the domain owner recognize that. I will explain how later in this article. You should never let your domain expire or depend on your web hosting company to just handled it. If you cannot be billed, your card on file is bad, or any combination there of, the domain will not be renewed.
At the end of the first 40 days, the domain will fall into a period called redemptions. This is where things can get expensive. The registry retakes the domain and places a hold on the domain until approximately day 61. In doing so they charge the Registrar a large fee to have the domain back. And this is where I see a lot of customer confusion when we give pricing. Depending on the extension that fee can be over $500 to reclaim the domain. There are now hundreds of domains extensions and each one has their own redemption policies attached. Canada or a .ca charges just the one-year renewal. And .i0 charges $300+ USD to redeem the domain. There really is no way around this.
At the end 90 days, that domain can (notice I said can) be released back into the general population and become available for ‘normal’ registration. Most never make it to this point. What most domain owners don’t realize is there is an entire cottage industry out trolling for aftermarket domains, which is a fancy way of saying previously owned domains. Our SEO411.com was purchased for $5000 in that exact manner. So why would we spend crazy money like that on a domain when we could have just bought something else.
Why would anyone want your domain? What happens to Domains that are not Renewed on time?
There are many reasons why people want aftermarket domains.
#1The domain Iscatchy or sounds great, or could be developed into a great brand.
I personally hold domains like Mixed-up.org, that I was given to me by a client years ago. Great domain. Not sure what i want to put on it. But great domain. I have named whole companies based on domains I’ve purchased aftermarket. SEO411 is one of them. Exclusively Commerical (sells commercial lighting), Basic-Natural sells all natural organic products. When I look at aftermarket domains, I get the best branding ideas when I walked among expired domains.
But why bother with that exercise anyway? That leads us to the next reason.
#2 Old Expiration Dates
Those of you that have met me know that I often say that my eyeglasses have Google prisms in them. Meaning everything I do I look at it through Google’s eyes. There was a time that there was a feeling that Google would sandbox domains, meaning they would stop a brand new domain from ranking organically for a specified period of time. There was a time that people would spin up websites, rank them using black hat techniques until Google caught them. Buy a new domain, move the content and do it again so this was Google’s defense. But for new business owners, most can’t afford to sit in a sandbox for a year waiting for traffic to come.
So in the mid-2000s when we would onboard a new customer, we would look for an after marketing domain to give the client the best chance at quicker successes. Somewhere in my psyche I still view domains registered prior to 2004 as special. And ones that are 1990-something are rare and I scoop ’em up anytime I see them for a reasonable price.
For the purposes of building a site on the domain, always check to see if it has a Dmoz Listing, make sure that google hasn’t banned the domain, and how old is the domain. Just so we are clear there are a lot of banned domains out there. Domains with a bad link profile that can’t be salvaged Or pages that were used to spam are often why domains are banned from Google. (sticky note reminder on why domains get banned blog post).
#3 Pick the Carcass
I know a little graphic huh? Paints the right picture though. Well as many SEO folks know link aquisition is pretty hard these days. The days of reciprocal links are over. The days of setting up a directory long enough to make the links, done. Site are penguined all over the place. But out in the world are these domains with great PA or PageRank (yeah yeah, know its dead) that are just sitting out there for $19 that can be bought after market. Some have Dmoz links, although those sometimes have a higher value. Some have sought after hard to aquire links. So sometimes people go in and move that link credit to a domain that they are trying to promote. It takes alot of time to do this, but sometimes its just easier to just do this rather than write good content, and build a proper link. We don’t advocate this, but this is another use for an after market domain.
#4 Build a Private Blog Network
Did you know that there are people that by after marketing domains so they can build websites, get link credit to it and then link to their client websites. These are called private blog networks (PBN) and in my opinion, this is a link building technique that is just primed to be penalized when they can identify it. They host at multiple webhosts so they is no apparent affilation. Then strenghten those websites to build links to their own websites that need links. Google knows this is going on and my guess is they will eventually figure out a way to stop this practice but for now, old expired or abandoned domains are very very valuable to the web marketer.
What is the Value of a Domain?
So the customer that inspired this emailed telling us his domain is worth $1 and that was all he was willing to pay for it. But what value does a domain really have. I was just looking at a website we run that is ranking on 26,000 terms organically with an estimated traffic value of $394K a month. That’s not the norm. But there are other hidden costs. Business cards, email and brand value. Even if your a tiny guy. If your customers know you, its hard to rebrand.
Rebranding has to be thought out and shouldn’t be inspired by not paying for your domain renewal. And if a big enough company the cost for this can be extermely expensive. Things like Google My Business hates conflicting information so mixed up domain info can cost you in in SERPs too.
When I appraise domains, I look at things like age and their links. The Google rankings and if there is keyterms on it. If there are, what are they. But a domain exceeding 5-7 years old, always has an interinsic value to an SEO firm and they are out trolling for them. You may have heard stories like business.com being sold for $8M. There are two domains we have recommend purchasing that were $25K plus. We have bought some really good ones for $2500-$5000. And to me every dollar was well worth spent. So look at your domain as an investment.
One alternative should you find yourself in domain redemption is to use a service like Snapnames that trieds to claim the domains as it comes out of deletion. You may lose some of your street cred because it will issue the domain as newly registered. But it may be better than the alternatives. There is also a real chance you dont get your domain back. Bottom line renew your domain redeem your domain. And don’t let someone else snatch it out from under you. The absolute beset advice we can offer is renew and if you have to redeem. Its the only way for you to maintain your value.
Happy day after the 4th of July. I am a little late in my day with the post because everyone who was off decided to write in with questions and it’s been a get caught up from all the people that also celebrated kinda day.
I received a question on Saturday as I was on my way to the beach that jumped out of my mailbox flashing the words blog post on it. The question went something like this. If you’re the SEO lady, what do you care what I do with my social media?
I think over the last 20 years, we have strayed away from a tenant of marketing 101. The website drifted out into its own space and got treated as a redheaded step child. That is no longer acceptable. And in 2016, all marketing efforts need to be well- coordinated and integrated. Google has demanded this to have ANY success ranking in their search engine. Let me say that again. Google basically requires an integrated marketing plan.
Every one of these items i vitally important for a site to rank well.
So why does the SEO lady care if the website closes deals; if the message is right; if the blog is pushed out through social channels; if the content is compelling and natural; if people click on your page? Because if these things are not done right and sending the right signals you do not have a ranking website. I have used this graphic for years to explain everything is necessary for good Search Engine Rankings Additionally, PPC is also dependent on appearance and conversion as well. Plus, having a good SEO presence helps shoppers at the top of the sales funnel to buy and use the PPC link for the brand they know and trust. Even traditional marketing in the form of TV, Print and Display ads support the overall health of the website and affect how well your website ranks. If all these things are not right the website will not rank.
Now let me say upfront, I suppose in lieu of doing things right you can employ black hat techniques and be forever chasing an algorithm or being one crazy zoo update away from being out of business. And I know people who do this and SEO companies that act in this way as well. More times than not, I’m asked to go in and clean up their craziness.
Why SEO and Social Media are conjoined and inseparable?
The word Conjoined is not often used in marketing. It’s a great word to use here because it really paints the right picture. We’ve all seen conjoined twins and in many cases when separated one of the twins flourishes and the other twin lags behind or worse. And so it goes with SEO and Social Media since the beginning of 2016.
Officially Google says that it is not dependent on the social networks for high ranking websites. But they don’t really put out statements on why things do or don’t rank, so take that with a grain of salt. But let’s look at this first Google is dependent on great content. And what happens when you have good content, people link to the great content. And how would people find the great content? If only there was a way to push that content out into the world.
Now theoretically people will make links to great articles they find. And those links are a vote. So when you think about the social networks, why wouldn’t you want those folks to count. It’s an army of people validating a website. So every great piece of content that goes up has the potential to send links and/or signals back to the website. So the social networks basically are sending endorsements or votes to your websites. If you don’t hook up and do this properly, the site is missing these signals and is not really an option any longer.
Next is tackling the need to build a large audience and become a social media influencer. Influencers definitely carry more weight. Influencers bring more traffic. More traffic is a signal to Google. And how does one become an influencer? Well, by writing great content of course.
Now one thing it takes to be an influencer is followers and what most will tell people in the know, say you should post at least 10 times a day. Now that for the normal small business is just not possible nor is there that much to say for most of them. Additionally the mistake I think most people make is they post other people’s stuff. So this morning I was watching a video by Eric Enge. And theoretically I could of/should have shared that on twitter with my comment. But who gets that credit. Eric Enge, not me or ACTWD. So as I say 10 things a day, it really doesn’t help the small business owner to post 10 links to 10 other websites.
But here’s what else you don’t want to do. Post silly stuff, just to post. I saw one guy years ago that would put up a spammy article on gondola shelves and then just go spam his social networks with them. So he and 3 of his friends would like the post and he would do this every day 30 times a day. This doesn’t help anything either.
You need to post a well written useful graphic or article, video, slide presentation and share that with great hashtags and make people want to like you or make sure they hear what you say on a daily basis. And once you get enough posts, start repurposing and reposting. You then begin to influence how things happen, how people perceive an industry or in my case I’m always teaching how not to be taken advantage of or how to run a website, from the front end Marketing side to the under the hood web hosting side.
Why Don’t Other People Have To Do This?
I hear this a lot from customers, and then they point to someone that is much larger than they are. And 9 times out of 10, it’s not right or not effective. I had a friend recently show me something on Exxon’s site. And asked me about how they could do what ever it was. Exxon for starters has 3.7 million links point to them from over 16,000 unique websites. This makes them have a lot of lead way. I have a custom tour operator that wanted to know why he couldn’t make his site like The Knot. The knot has 13.7 million link point to it and 53,000 unique domains. So they have a completely different set of rules than a local tour operator in Houston Texas. I did promise his wife though when we got as big as The Knot I would be happy to do what they wanted. Bottom line is the smaller you are the more things you have to do right within Google’s mind to overcome these large sites.
And even for me, I’m not a huge fish compared to a GoDaddy or Network Solutions. I have to work to get every link I can. Sure some of my customer link to us to say we run their sites, and that’s helpful. But when they are little guys with no power I often think their well meaning may hurt us. But I have a long way to get 38 million sites linking to me with 800,000.
So what does this all get me?
So remember I said that Google says that social is not a ranking variable. Let me tell you an antidotal story. Three months ago I went to PubCon in Austin and I love Pubcon, because I often walk away saying yes I knew all this but it adds a perspective. Also often there are nuggets buried in the talks that a sharp minded pro will identify and run with it.
When I came back home to Houston, I decided I was going to put full efforts into getting this blog running right and see what impact it had on the ranking of this website. Mind you this is a really old domain that I’ve taken care of it though the years. In fact I let it sit for about 10 years with just one-page links for our customers. So there was pretty well no traffic.
Since I’ve put this blog on the site and am writing it myself with my personality, quirky as it may be, we are now on the first page for some very coveted terms locally as well as some other terms nationally. The content on this blog and the social twitter interactions are driving this site. No doubt in my mind. I’ve gained only 4 links and none of them have been great ones. But I’ve gained followers, and people are interacting and voting on my posts and with all that going on my SERPs just keep rising.
So as with conjoined twins, website owners need to understand that separating SEO and Social will damage one side of the equation. And honestly, I think that if you were to separate Social and SEO, Social can be well developed and do well. SEO the job is far harder because you’re missing a huge component. Sites end up missing the link building that is needed and you begin missing the signals that allows google to know what your site is about. If you’re Exxon it doesn’t matter but if you’re a Business trying to go national, it’s simply something you should not be missing if you intend to do with driving traffic to your website.
So this week it seemed was Google Speed week. So as both
the web hosting company and the SEO company, we get a lot of how do I fix questions. Inevitably, it’s not usually a web hosting problem as first presented to us. (‘Google says my site is slow. Fix my hosting”) Most times it’s a design question When these calls come, the first thing we do is look at the Google Page Speed Test, which can be sparse on solutions. Also, Pingdom, gives oodles of information and usually is more helpful in addressing issues and the one I like the best, however, is Webpagetest.org.
The waterfall gives you a clear picture of any issues you may have and a graphical way to understand the slowdowns. Now on ACTWD, I know those slider headers have to be minimized and because I have a whole redesign sitting on desk I’m not bothering with addressing it until it rolls out but at minimum I understand the cause of some of my failures and they are acceptable at the moment because the site is still scoring @ 89 despite them.
Now without a doubt, the one thing that is required to pull a passing score with Google if you are using WordPress is a caching engine. What we use here is W3 Total Cache as well as Auto Optimize. When configured properly this clears up a majority of what Google complains about with predominately WordPress sites. Now I say WordPress, not because I’m singling it out but yesterday I ran a bunch of tests across our entire network. I was looking for any ‘hosting-caused’ failures.
Additionally, I have added an extra layer to our network intentionally that most normal folks don’t have which is intrusion prevention. This literally inspects every packet and confirms if its is known hack and stops it. So I needed to make sure that this procedure was not causing issues. So I randomly pulled sites from each of our servers and here were some of the observations.
Customers with very old websites, most built in MS FrontPage 100% passed the speed test.
Customers running custom CMS systems (and we have quite a few), 100% passed the speed test
Customers running OSCommerce 100% passed the speed test.
Customers running Magento 100% failed the Server response times.
And most importantly every WordPress site not running Cache failed 100% of the time.
So what we learned from our test is that the added layer of security had no negative impact on sites ability to load quickly. But more importantly, the DIY website builder or a customer with a less experienced web designer, need to understand that they must use a caching plugin or suffer a diminished speed.
Additionally one of the reasons we use the W3 Total Cache, because it addresses issues that google keep displaying about scripts and image compression. The plugin helps minify HTML and CSS. This is two sticking points with Google. Minification is a process that removes unnecessary or duplicate code. This is stuff normal people don’t know how to do.
Leveraging browser cache may be a little harder to control for the average user. When we see this, it usually is coming from third parties, Facebook, Google to name a few. You may choose to run those scripts locally to be able to control them better, however you will need to monitor this. You will to be notified about structural changes and things make break so it will require some level of diligence.
And then we saw this one yesterday. We disabled Google-fonts because we were taking a hit for using them. Now if you stop and consider why the answers goes all the way back to when I rookie back in ’97. The first thing we were all confronted with was not to use non standard fonts. If you did, the website reverted to time’s new roman, which is really ugly. So while we were cleaning up the speed on a site we had recently stood up their brand manager called saying that the fonts weren’t right. “Their Font” was having to be rendered and impacting the loading speed of the site. So although this sounds so 1997, it still is advisable to use standard web safe fonts and not pick fonts that require rendering.
As I thought about the font situation, it struck me that as far as we have advanced in web development, personal devices, pads/tablets. These speed concerns, which are valid only arose because people got sloppy with their websites. The younger groups don’t remember the days when a 1 meg took minutes not second. And as we try to be cooler with our design, some are forgetting the basic principles of running lean and quick. WordPress makes it easy for the average user to integrate items that in the past would of been costly but unless you utilize caching and minification techniques. You are going to have a slow bloated website that is not streamlined, making it slow and awkward for the end user.
From the Web Hosting side. I don’t want to minimize something, you web host can ultimately slow your website down. Servers that are overloaded, hacked or just not optimized right will cost you points on your speed. So picking a dependable web hosting company is extremely important. I”m fortunate here, I could take web hosting bottleneck, poor configuration and hacks off the table because we had already addressed the server part of this and continue to do so with every server we stand up.
Trying to retrain customers might be as hard as training Harley, my 9-year-old Dachshund. There are a lot of similarities too. Neither understands that I tell them no not because I’m a big meanie, but because what they are wanting to do will hurt them. Sometimes they do things and try to sneak it by me because what I don’t know won’t hurt me. In Harley’s case, he likes to steal the food off my plate. In the case of the customer, sometimes they have their developer add features; rewrite their home page, or tell me ‘What do I care what their website looks like?’
And if you know anything about Dachshunds, they are fiercely independent and always do things their way. They rely on their gut. And this is the same with the Entrepreneur or small business owner. They most times want to do it their way. I’m the same way, and it may be why Harley and I get along so well.
I keep finding myself having this conversation. “You just do your SEO” and we’ll worry about (fill in the blank). Unfortunately, SEO no longer functions that way, and now Google has accountability built into it called engagement. So now SEO is about everything. And really, is it about search engine optimization, or is it really VEO (visitor experience optimization)?
All too often SEO is considered a piece of the puzzle. It is understandable after all because historically it was its own animal. If you did certain things correctly you ranked. And if you didn’t you didn’t rank. Pretty cut and dry. But as search has become more personal, the results need to better address each individual user. What does that means to the marketing company? The click needs to be induced, and then when you get the click, the entire page needs to address the needs of the visitor or they bounce away, and that bounce is logged.
Good search engine rankings are now dependent on good user experience. What that means is content needs to be outstanding. It has to be authentic and the page the person lands on from the search engine needs to address their needs. I am of the opinion the SEO company should borrow the SEM landing page concept that each page is optimized not only to rank in Google, but to convert to a sale. Intrinsically, this will benefit both the search and the visitor.
#1: Know Your Client
This requires us, as well as the site owner, to adequately identify their visitor. I’ve said before that I know my hosting clients and what they need for us to do, and my blog and my site has been geared specifically for them. As business owners, it’s hard sometimes to view ourselves how we are instead of how we want to be, but that now can have a very negative impact on the visitor experience. Understanding who your users are is important. If you don’t understand who that user is and you land them on a page that is inappropriate, you will end up with a bounce and be penalized.
Personally, this is the hardest part to get across to customers. Whether it is vacations, jewelry or Christmas decorations, it’s imperative your site design and call-to-action be clear for your specific audience, and that sometimes requires you to step out of your own self to evaluate that. It’s in part why we have minions here.
#2 Understand How You Compete With Your Competition
Understanding your competition is also important because if you sell customized vacations or customized jewelry, that is a different market share than a person who wants to take a trip and buy it on Expedia. If you want to sell custom jewelry, then you need to carve that niche out that is both personal and intimate. That means the site needs to address those challenges. If you look like Expedia, your clientele will measure you against Expedia.
#3 Misrepresentation
Good SEO is now dependent on Good User Engagement Reviews and Feedback. Because of the advent of Social Media, it is necessary to properly represent what and who you are. Marketing messages, Web design and content all need to support what or who you are properly. Not addressing your business challenges in your design or content can quickly cause a high bounce rate or bad feedback across the Internet.
#4 Get the Link
As we all know SEO is dependent on the link. As I was reading this morning, Matt Cutts floated by in my twitter feed that said something to this effect. Don’t build a link that looks like you did it naturally. Naturally build a link. Now this can be confusing, but since I’ve been writing all my Blogs myself and actually made them meaningful, I’m picking up links 3-4 a week on average now. What this really means is to do this legitimately you have to put out good, useful information. And you have to work towards getting a following.
I think the real issue with SEO is that for far too long it was compartmentalized. And now everyone is having an issue adjusting that everything from messaging to graphics to color to buttons affect how your website sells. And until the day your website is not the #1 salesperson on your team, you can’t just put SEO in a box and isolate it, which makes SEO everything, not just a thing.
I got this question from one of my students. It was a question where I could just reply “Yes,” or I could seize an opportunity. At its core it’s a web design question, but also has pretty deep implications for SEO if done properly.
So here is the challenge. He has a long bulleted list that has some definitions on it. And if you put that page into mobile, it would be too much time is his fear. Now his question went on to ask if he should make a page for all the bullet points, and the answer, of course, would be yes. But to me it realistically wasn’t related to the bulleted list and mobile. You should always have a page that is like a table of contents type page or a bullet list that further develops those topics.
This goes back to how to structure a website really, and how to write a topics page. So here is an example of something I did. I wanted to let Google know that this customer was a moving company in Houston. Google was getting confused over this site because it also offers storage services, but not like a storage locker facility, and they also offer nationwide moving which keeps shifting the focus some, and it makes some issues because it’s diluting what Google feels the main purpose of the site is about. To start to sort this out, I went in and added a moving services page that looks like this:
Under each of these topics are a whole section, and then each of those become their own set of sub-topics that allow me to send the right information to Google to help it be less confused on what this company does. What this does is set a course for Google to follow with the proper reinforcement.
As search gets smarter it becomes more necessary to make sure you have topics that clearly set up a structure for the website. This is something many designers do not account for. So for George, the right answer is please shorten the definitions on the page next to the bullet points and then build a real substantive page of content that corresponds each of your bullet points, and make sure you link them to appropriate well-written pages that support the bullet point.
Beyond the obvious, the other thing this does is create a strong interlink set of pages that will allow Google to understand what the nature of your page is, and why it is important. We discussed why site structure is important in a previous blog, and this is a great example that supports this answer.
I always say my customers make the absolute best blog ideas and the best training experiences for the minions. Case in point, one of our very old customers called me today to tell me that their site isn’t ranking any longer and wanted to know why. Now they on and off had employed us to do SEO, at least two tours of duty on this site. I think the last time we touched the site was maybe in 2011. And we all know how much time had passed and how rapidly Google continues to evolve.
As I like to say, SEO is no longer a stand-alone event. And, I really don’t think you can do ‘just’ SEO any more. The proper term is Digital Marketing. I will keep saying it. But for someone calling on the phone to look at a site that hasn’t been properly maintained in about half a decade, how do you encapsulate that?
So I put together a list that may offer some solutions. Understand that this is written for a site that used to rank but doesn’t any longer, so it assumes there is proper title tags.
#1 Content
Well, of course, you had to know this was going to be my first item. But, it’s not sufficient to just say add content any more to a website. It has to actually be good content, written properly, and not just keyword focused. I know many of my old timers heard about keywords and adding keywords. And, why keywords are important, but I’ve had to adjust that over time. Just like the writing you see here. I dare to say none of it has been keyword oriented, but more thematic and helpful.
To my mind, this is how you pick up links properly. It also is a great way to build engagement and get people clicking on your site.
#2. Google Analytics
Yes, this may be a little of an odd thing to put on this list, but you would be surprised how long-time site owners still do not have Google Analytics on their website. The old log file readers like AWStat and Webalizer just don’t go far enough anymore to make a reasonable guess at what really is happening with your website.
If someone asked me now, I would not say I was overly concerned with the pure number of visits, and I’m more concerned with how those folks got there and what is the intent of the user. Am I meeting the needs of the user, and are they doing what I want them to do, like buying or contacting me? I can’t adjust pages people are landing on if I don’t understand. And if I don’t have my conversions set up, I’m not able to track the success or deficiencies of my website.
Overall I don’t see how it would be conceivably possible to run a website without Google Analytics at this point in time.
#3 House Keeping
I know, another very odd duck to see on a list, but if you don’t keep up with the security of your website, you may just find out that people are exploiting it. That can happen from various directions, but it’s incumbent on the customer, not the web host to patch WordPress installs. I can’t tell you how many times people call me to tell me their website isn’t working, and it’s because they have not patched a plugin or WordPress core.
Lots of bad things happen when you don’t keep your site up to date. And that just doesn’t go for WordPress. Magento has a bad record, and Joomla, we tell people yes we will host it, but you are on your own because of how insecure it is.
The problem with not monitoring or maintaining your website properly is that as things happen to it that you are unaware of, the site becomes damaged. Just like house neglect is never a good thing.
#4. Webmaster Tools aka Search Console
Why they changed the name has yet to be made apparent, but if you do not have a webmaster tools account set up, set it up. It tells you all sorts of neat stuff about your website, so when you’re wondering why it is not ranking, it will help you understand if the site is hacked, or if the site has bad quality because 404s are not handled right. Often it can help you find improper use of 301s and 302s. Frankly 302s are devastating and should NEVER be used, and someday I will address that too. It also will help you make a list of links and then allow you the opportunity disavow bad links (which is the next topic). Also, make sure you set up proper sitemaps in WMT.
#5 Links
Not keeping up with your once-ranking website also may be caused by bad links. We now live in a world where links can hurt you just as much as they can help you. Here we audit our sites constantly to unearth bad sites linking to us. It’s not easy, however, it needs to be at least checked. If you see a bunch of Chinese sites linking to you and you have no business in China, it’s a safe bet there is an issue with either bad link building, bad webmaster or neglect.
#6 Bad Webmasters
Yes, bad or incompetent webmasters can really screw up a site. As I was talking to the minions on this topic, Christina minion said to me this is why you tell us ‘know who you’re getting into bed with.’ Yes, that is the exact reason that you don’t just trust your website to anyone. Understanding how to run a website and understanding how to care for a ranking website is often an art form. Unless your webmaster has extensive tech skills and understands how to structure and work on a ranking site, they can do a lot of damage.
I admit this is one of those things that rub me the wrong way. If you don’t think our company is the right company for you, we are fine with that, but more times than not I have the new, less qualified and often cheaper webmaster standing on my doorstep asking me how to perform the job they were hired to do. If you find yourself in that position, it probably means you have the wrong person for the job.
Bad web designers are very hard to spot. But they are lethal to a website.
#7 Social Media
So this person that called me yesterday asking why her site wasn’t ranking anymore, and telling me how she hired a PR Firm to do her content also hasn’t posted one single item since 2014. For the seasoned Digital Marketing pro, you may have rolled your eyes. For the rest of you, social media is imperative, and far too often social is not done properly or overlooked.
I admit that I’m not a social person. I could sit in a house by myself for hours and read or play video games and not interact with another human and be perfectly happy. But when it comes to the health of my website, what I know is that I can no longer ignore social media, and I’ve been really pushing Twitter in my Houston SEO classes. Yes, I typed that right. In fact, I have a 2-hour seminar next week that explains how to do social properly. Gratuitously, you can see our class schedule here.
#8 Blogging
Yeah, so this has now changed. Blogging for SEO used to be way different, but now, to have a sustainable site, it is not possible to avoid this or not do it right any longer. One blog every 6 months really isn’t going to cut it, but neither are BS blogs that just reiterate a keyword, which is how we used to teach blogging.
Now blogging must be real. Blogging must be authentic, and it must be relevant. I used to prescribe to a short and punchy blog, but now, if you have something to say, say it. For example, this post is at 1336 words right this second. It is not set in stone, and there are some time considerations with this post, so it’s not an article. It’s also got my opinion throughout it.
When I teach I often say the blog is like the op-ed page of the newspaper or your website. It lets your readers see how you think and how knowledgeable you are. You know those bad web designers, they could never have a blog like this, one reason is because they don’t know enough.
#9 Old Brown Sweater
One last reason to have issues is not to have a modern web design. Old date websites telegraph bad things to your end users. This will lower your engagement and really stop people from doing business with you. Millenials are particularly suseptible to this.
So, 1518 word story short, if you are not actively working on your website daily, or at minimum weekly; if you are not doing the things outlined here in their totality and every facet then you are at a severe deficit, and if your site ranks it’s probably a fluke or a niche in the modern age.
SSL or Secure Sockets Layer is the connection that is opened between two computers, i.e. a website and your computer that allows sensitive data to be transmitted securely between the two computers.
It’s been a busy start of a new year, with a lot of weirdness. I have met a few people that wanted to tell me SEO is dead. What they really mean is SEO is way too much work for them and requires way too many components to do it right. Of course, several of these people were selling impression-based advertising from long dead phone company directories trying to stay afloat, but I digress.
It’s 2017, creating a video is not all that hard. Sticking with the our Commercial Tree discussion. A video that highlights the difference in the two tree types would be a great video. It allows you to address clients, and explain how it best benefits the business. Other than providing a customer experience, this also allows the visitor to stay engaged with the page. This teaches Google that the page has value and helps them decide to organically rank the page higher.
Okay stop groaning. It’s not that bad. There are many great programs out there that will anger many-a-parent that put their kid though graphic design school. Our personal favorite is Canva.com. It’s easy to use, and the benefits are far reaching. Not only does your page or post look better, but it increases your click through rate from social platforms. The more appealing the page, the deeper the benefits. In as much as a bad graphics will hurt perceptions, good graphics will make the message and the brand clearer.
#5 Speaking of Social Media
