Thanks to the Internet Archive’s “Wayback Machine”, we’ve been given a priceless opportunity to look back and reflect on how we’ve changed and grown over the years (or at least, how our website has!)
Freaker Kickstarter from freakerusa on Vimeo.
Next to put into perspective what goes on in a given year of search on Google.
Finally when you get depressed about when someone says something bad to you online watch this:
Country Music artists read out angry tweets written about them.
I don’t think you can find a better song about the new online world. And Alanis Morissette just had a way speaking to my soul. Hope you enjoy!
Want to see a brand new website the @Stratlab team just launched? Welcome to Normanview Dental.
This week’s #InTheLab I get to interview Mitch Gallant, Marketing Manager for the Capital Auto Group. I’ve worked on and off with him and his team for around 4 years now. Mitch is brilliant when it comes to online marketing let alone Google Adwords. This talk is mostly focused on Google Adwords.
“Buying a car is a hassle! That’s probably why buying a car is one of the most researched industries on the internet.”
In the real world if your store has a better location, if you can get in front of more people, if everyone can recognize your store from a mile away, you have a distinct advantage.
The Internet doesn’t work that way.
If you rent space in the West Edmonton mall beside a popular retailer you’re sure to increase your foot traffic. The catch is, retail space beside Holts, the Disney or Apple store will come at a premium.
When you build a website it’s like you put your store in a farmers field somewhere near Grenfell, SK. As your site acquires more links, is updated more often, you move closer and closer to a bigger town (more “traffic”). The front page of Google, the epicentre for qualified traffic, takes time and deliberate effort to get to the front page of and every day it’s getting more and more competitive.
as one website goes up, another has to go down. All four major players in the market can’t rank number 1. As one company builds links and increases their rankings, other websites feel the equal and opposite reaction. If you don’t start being proactive about your online presence you’re going to see you traffic decrease from Google.
And I’m not sure if you’ve checked your traffic sources report in Google Analytics lately, Google organic search is probably your websites largest traffic provider. Might be a good idea to build a strategy to increase that traffic from Google.
You could advertise on Facebook or LinkedIn or reddit or the Leaderpost.com. Telling more people to come to your website should help you get closer to your goal.
You have defined a goal haven’t you?
You need a contact us page so people can get a hold of you. You need a products page so people can see your new products regularly. You need a staff page so potential customers can see ‘who’ they’ll be dealing with if they so choose to set up an appointment. But no one really needs a website, a website is a tool, a tactic within a strategy. The sooner you recognize this the sooner you can being to use your website to its full potential.
No one really needs a website, companies need to be found, they need to be searchable, within a couple words hopefully. So that in the moment when your next customer has a problem, they pick up their phone, pull up Google and search for (insert your company’s keywords here) “funny marketing speaker Regina” and boom you’re right there.
Your search results are wrong. Well not exactly, but kind of. Google personalizes your search results based on your search history and location. To get a true look at the top search results in Google you have to turn off your cookies or use a service like Moz (the company we use).
Before we get into the 20 top Regina keyword searches we need to define a few terms for you.
Domain Authority
From Moz (formerly known as SEO Moz): “Domain Authority represents Moz’s best prediction for how a website will perform in search engine rankings.”
Page Authority
From Moz: “Page Authority is Moz’s calculated metric for how well a given webpage is likely to rank in Google.com’s search results.”
External Linking Domains
External Linking Domain are hyperlinks on websites pointing back towards your website.
Here are 20 of the most difficult “Regina” keywords to rank for in Google. It’s interesting to compare these keywords to the same for Vancouver, San Francisco and Palo Alto. It’s obviously not as difficult to rank here in Regina, but looking at other centres to see what the future of search engine optimization holds is always a good idea.
SERP
Search Engine Results Page
20. Apartment Regina
19. Dentists Regina Read more
Have you ever wondered how many people in Regina are searching on Google for what you provide? From Pizza Regina (12,100 monthly local searches) to Yoga Regina (1,900 monthly local searches), some surprises and some obviously very popular searches (Hotel Regina).
Below you’ll finally get an idea of how many people actually Google Church Regina, Lawyer Regina, and Party bus Regina. We also solve the age old question, what do people from Regina Google more, Pizza or Chinese Food? (hint, pizza Regina wins by a long shot. Shocking.)
***Warning*** these numbers aren’t’ perfect, they are the average and they fluctuate just the same as local demand fluctuates. If you want to find the search volume of your own keywords check out Google Adwords Keyword Tool.
Listed below are 101 of the most searched Regina keyword terms in Google. Listed is the local search demand and the global search demand in Google. Read more
Why:
Long-term strategy:
In a tech economy with four major players (Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Apple), Fast Company’s Farhad Manjoo describes what Google has as “a coherent, long-term strategy to fight the tech war on every front.” While the other three are leaders in a specific area, Google’s strategy can prevail on three different time horizons: today, next year, and the far-off future.
Diverse strengths
Amazon has become the online shopping leader, Apple’s iPhone garners 3/4 of the world’s mobile phone profits, and Facebook has, by far, the largest social network. Despite this, as Apple fan and blogger John Gruber puts it, “Google is getting better at what Apple does faster than Apple is getting better at what Google does. Google, despite trailing in mobile profits, Google’s Androids account for nearly 70% of mobile units sold worldwide — a total that has sparked competitive action from Apple in the form of the iPad mini release and talks of a cheaper iPhone. What few may realize is that Google has 330% more ebook titles available than Amazon. Finally, Google crushes Facebook in online ad revenue and, despite possessing a smaller network, collects more data from its users.
Data-mining superiority
How can data-dependent app developers compete with Google? How can other search engines improve at a competitive rate? The fact that Google’s mobile advertising game is unmatched is an indication that, in our increasingly data-driven world, if you’re winning data-mining then you’re well on your way to a sustainable competitive advantage; something hard to come by in a turbulent tech world.
What This Means for You:
For the purpose of this post I’m going to focus on business owners. As a business owner, Google’s strength means two things:
Analyze
Google’s data-mining capabilities are reflected in its Google Analytics tool, allowing you to do what they do in a smaller way. Google Analytics should be the backbone of any company’s marketing plan. Educate yourself before you spend a single dollar.
Optimize
Use tools like SEO-Moz to evaluate and improve your search engine optimization. Google’s success and our increasingly referral-based world will have your business’s success depending on where you come up on Google and what people are saying about you. It’s as easy as our mantra: Create, Engage, Share, Measure.
As I hope you’ve read in my recent post, An Urgent Message for All Businesses on Twitter, it’s (still) time to stop shouting about yourself and start listening to others on social media platforms and in life in general. Marketing is now way more about what others are saying about you than it is about what you are saying about yourself. If there’s a disconnect between these two things, people will find out. That’s now easier than ever to do so. Think of marketing as being completely reversed. Advertising and bleeding incessant brand info is the old way. Now, you can be the most effective by zipping your lip for awhile and listening to what others are saying and, whether its positive or negative, using the information constructively to make improvements to your product or service’s core and rectify customer dissatisfaction.
I’ve tweeted my thanks to multiple businesses on this week upon receiving slightly above average customer service and quality repairs. I’ve received a response or acknowledgment roughly one third of the time. Yes, ONE THIRD. ONLY ONE THIRD. I’m basically tossing Jose Bautista an underhanded lob in the middle of the strike zone and watching him refuse to swing. As far as I’m concerned, these businesses who aren’t listening might as well delete their accounts immediately. Their tweets about themselves have very little value and EVEN LESS VALUE if they aren’t going to respond to their satisfied customers.
I’m going to cease this rant to illustrate three easy ways to listen to your customers online:
1: Twitter Search
This is so simple. Search your business name, your product name, or some industry keywords to get a perception of what people are saying. Just be sure you’ve got all your basic bases covered before you do this (replying to those who have mentioned you, thanking people for sharing your information, and acknowledging new followers). Twitter culture allows you to jump in on conversations that pertain to you without being deemed a troll. Try this out and don’t fear negative feedback. It presents a world of opportunity.
2: Net Promoter Score
Net Promoter Score is a feedback system easily added to websites and bricks and mortar businesses that asks customers to answer one simple question: How likely are you to recommend our product or service to a friend or family member? We love it and think no business should move a muscle until NPS becomes their starting point. View a quick slide show.
3. Asking Simple Questions
Sometimes listening and getting feedback is as simple as asking. Don’t be so afraid of the answers you’re going to get that you avoid asking your customers questions. Avoid asking just for the sake of asking or asking questions with the sole intention of sounding like you care. Embrace any information you receive. This is a tactic that will result in valuable information if executed correctly AND create the kind of engagement that will be constructive for your business.
Hands down I think Search Engine traffic is better, below are 3 reason why.
I’d love to hear why you think social media traffic is better in the comments below. Read more