How to Blog Effectively for Business (GF101)
blogging is about frequently distributing relevant content via the right channels, to boost credibility and findability
According to the State of Inbound Marketing Report by HubSpot, businesses that blog multiple times a day have on average 100% of customer acquisition, 42% higher than those that blog only once a week.
There are many ways of measuring the effectiveness of blogging. Common metrics include page views, inbound links (which are links to a blog from third-party websites), website traffic, number and sentiment of comments, and conversion rate. Both quantitative and qualitative data inform a business of its blog’s ability to attract qualified leads.
To identify keywords customers use to find its products or services, a business needs to
brainstorm customer needs. A company can use three methods to understand customers’
perception of its products or services: web analytics, customer survey, and competitors’ content.
It can review current web analytics to see what keywords that bring searchers to the website are
used most frequently. Customer interviews are another effective way of containing this
information. A business can ask what features, functions, or advantages customers associate with
its products. Researching competitors’ website content also helps a company understand what
keywords their competitors are trying to rank for, which may in turn lead the company to
brainstorm what keywords can differentiate it from competitors or are worth competing for.
A company can narrow its selection based on four criteria: category, popularity, competition, and relevance. For category, a company can divide its keyword collection into verbs, nouns, adjectives, and adverbs. Since people tend to remember a company by no more than a few words in total, a company should focus on one to two keywords from each category per page.
Popularity, competition, and relevance also help determine which keywords to use.
Specific, long-tail phrases are an effective solution. Long-tail keywords are more specific and target less competitive niche markets instead of highly competitive broad keywords. Longtail phrases containing commonly used words may significantly improve a website’s search ranking.
On-page SEO
1.“crawlability.”
To make the website crawlable, a company should use text links—hyperlinks that contain texts— in navigation. Ajax, Javascript, and Flash are difficult to crawl, which means that search engines will display no results for a webpage containing content only in these formats.
A straightforward, concise URL containing keywords makes it easy for search engines to decipher what that page is about.
2. search visibility
Changes in website design, content management system, or just one character in URL can destroy search visibility. When undertaking content migration or URL update, a company can take several precautions to avoid a drop in search visibility. It can map old URLs onto new ones, identify top inbound link sources and ask them to change links if necessary, and build new inbound links to the new URLs. A business can also employ permanent 301 redirects. A 301 redirect is the most efficient and search engine friendly method for webpage redirection. It enables a website to preserve its search engine ranking and thus visibility.
Changes in website design, content management system, or just one character in URL can destroy search visibility. When undertaking content migration or URL update, a company can take several precautions to avoid a drop in search visibility. It can map old URLs onto new ones, identify top inbound link sources and ask them to change links if necessary, and build new inbound links to the new URLs. A business can also employ permanent 301 redirects. A 301 redirect is the most efficient and search engine friendly method for webpage redirection. It enables a website to preserve its search engine ranking and thus visibility.
3. Keyword optimization
Page Title: Defines the title of a page. Keywords preferably should be used up front.
Name of a Root Domain (e.g. keyword.com)
Anchor Text in Links (e.g. www.abc.com/keyword 1+keyword 2)
Meta Description: often appears in Google search results to describe a link
Alt Text: text that describes an imageA short-run solution for a business is to provide “inbound” links to itself: cross-linking
internally.
Review
1. What is SEO (search engine optimization) and why is it important?
SEO refers to techniques to improve organic search ranking of a website. Most people rely on search engines for information, so ranking high helps a website obtain
significantly more visits and strengthen its online brand.
2. What fundamentally contributes to SEO?
On-page SEO: straightforward and concise URLs, search visibility by installing 301
On-page SEO: straightforward and concise URLs, search visibility by installing 301
permanent redirects during website redesign and ensuring unique URLs for specific webpages, and keyword optimization
Off-page SEO: inbound links from third-party websites
3. What are the differences between organic and paid search and which one should
businesses focus on?
Organic search does not cost money and allows a business to accumulate visibility on search engines over time. Paid search can be costly and, when it is stopped, causes a business to lose the visibility it has paid to build.
4. Where can a business optimize keywords?
Page title, meta keyword description, the name of a root domain, anchor text in links, alt
text, and URL.
Social Media and Building Community (GF201)
Create a step-by-step plan for how you could develop a community around your company on a social networking site of your choice.
Free SEO Tools
Google's official guide to SEO for beginners
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2010/01/google-seo-resources-for-beginners.html
Social Media and Building Community (GF201)
Create a step-by-step plan for how you could develop a community around your company on a social networking site of your choice.
For any social media site, a business should do three things to build an effective community:
connect, create, and engage. Connect applies to the people a business wants to invite to its community. It can either find contacts manually or review recommendations automatically generated on most of the commonly used social media sites.
Create
refers to creating content that potential customers might find interesting and
helpful. The idea is similar to that of blogging: the goal is to generate materials in which prospects can find value.Engage is equivalent to establishing ongoing interactions with prospects.Review
1. What factors should a business consider in joining a community?
• A business should join a community that has a large user base, attracts people who might
be interested in its products or services, and accommodates its objectives (optimally goals
along multiple stages in its sales cycle).
2. How can a business succeed in social media?
• Connect with customer targets and people who might spread its messages, create content
that prospects find engaging, and interact with them frequently.
3. What distinguishes LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter?
• LinkedIn is a business-oriented networking site that helps business owners build both
personal and business credibility through answering questions and sharing profiles.
• Facebook fan pages allow businesses to build a community of potential or existing
customers and share multi-media content
• Twitter enables succinct and text-only interactions that make talent recruitment, business
collaborations, and information sharing timely and effective.
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