Esther C Kane

Can you guess?

Could it be on page optimization?

Or perhaps researching the keywords?

Or maybe it’s restructuring the architecture of the website?

Wrong!

The biggest obstacle in the SEO (search engine optimization) process is the website owner. Yep, you heard me right.  For the most part, website owners will argue with their SEO firm every step of the way!

Why?  It may just be mis-understanding by the client on the SEO process (maybe poor education by the SEO firm) – it may be that the client considers his/her website their “baby” and therefore, all hands off!  But mostly I think it’s just ignorance of the SEO process.  And that goes for both site owners and SEO firms.  Many firms promise the moon, the sun and more but they rarely go into detail on what exactly needs to be done to get the moon and the sun!

As an SEO webmaster who has been in practice for 10 years I can give you some of those details.  If you’re a website owner working with or looking to work with an SEO firm, you should know the implications before you sign on the dotted line.

1) Your website will be changed – know that from the beginning.  If you’re not comfortable with changes to your website, consider having an alternate website marketed but be aware that it’s the alternate that will be found on the search engines.

2) Your website will require continuous change. Yes, it’s true, you can’t just create a website and then let it bring in business for you.  Are your competitors doing that?  Maybe so.  Maybe you and one other company are the only two selling a particular product.  And that product happens to be in demand.  If that is the case, then yes, you can get away with not changing your website.  Because truthfully, the niche and demand are so specific, the search engines will HAVE to find both your websites.

But this isn’t normally the case.  A Pompano Beach personal injury attorney won’t be the only PI attorney in Pompano Beach!  So, his/her website will have to compete with the other personal injury attorneys in the area.

Here’s a little secret - if you want to see how often your online competitors change their website, put their domain on Code Monitor.  It’ll give you an idea of how often they make a change either on their site or blog, etc.

3) Your website needs to grow. Yeah, I know.  You’re thinking “Well, of course you’re going to tell me it needs to grow!  That way the seo firm or the web designer keep getting a steady income from me for new pages!  Ha!  I’m smarter than that!” – Sorry to tell you, NO, that’s not the reason.  Believe me, any web designer and any SEO firm (who are worth their salt) are busy enough!  Just ask my clients!  They’ll tell you how often they get emails from me at 1:30 AM (or later!).

But, here is the TRUE reason as to why you need to keep adding to your website.

a) Your website is your online office/retail space.  So that means that if your client base searches for a service or product that you sell, you need to have that on your website.  That means every single service or product that you sell must be on your website.  Most businesses change their list of services, products throughout the year.  Those changes need to be reflected on your website.

b) Your client base are also searching for answers to their questions that have to do with your product or service.  It doesn’t matter if you sell divorce services, name tags, maps to movie star homes or whatever.  There are questions out there that you can answer and why should your target audience find those answers somewhere else?  They shouldn’t.  They should find them on your website.

Are you going to have all the answers to all the questions on your website when it first launches?  I doubt it.  But you can continuously add to your website.  After all, you may not be able to afford a 500 page website at first, but you could certainly build up to that a little at a time.

c) Every business has seasons.  If you’re smart, you’ll know what your audience is looking for at each season of the year and you’ll alter your website to accommodate them.

Another Secret: most business websites receive the majority of traffic on Wednesday.  If this is the case with your website, then make sure that every Tuesday night, your web designer puts up a special page or sets of pages just for Wednesday!  Take advantage of the extra foot traffic to your website.

So, don’t be an obstacle to your own SEO campaign.  There is no benefit to the SEO firm if your website does not succeed.  For their own reputation, they WANT your website to succeed so they’re not just blowing smoke, they need to do what they’re telling you.  Work with them and you will reap the rewards!

The SEO services provided by Eckweb Designs, Inc. mainly deals with small businesses.  If there’s one thing that we’ve learned in the 10 years of SEO services that we’ve been providing is that small business owners are usually very “opinionated” about what they want.  In other words, we can give them all our expert advice and knowledge but ultimately, it’s the customer we have to please.

So, if we report that it would be good to have a section on the website for testimonials, but our client doesn’t feel it’s important enough to spend the dollars, we can only give them the facts but in the end, we have to do what they want.

We understand, believe me, we’re a small company as well and we have to watch our spending dollars too.

BUT – the reality is, that optimizing a website for the search engines is just one step in Internet marketing.  Another step is gaining the trust of your Internet audience.  After all, why should anyone buy from you?  The answer is that you have to let them know why.  Here’s a great article by Eric Brantner on this very topic.

The 7 “tips” he provides are…

1) Ditch the Gimmicky Sales Copy
2) Use Testimonials / Lists of Your Clients
3) Incorporate Statistics In Your Copy
4) Offer a Free Sample
5) Eliminate The Risk
6) Don’t Just Tell, Show
7) Include Accreditations On Website

Read through the article and you’ll see that when your SEO firm gives you advice, they’re not just blowing steam.

As usual, it’s almost 11 PM and I can’t sleep so I’m catching up with some reading.  And of course, I’m reading about Internet marketing, seo services, cool new gadgets and some other geeky kind of things that I like!!

Just finished a great article – http://www.seobook.com/the-100-ranking-variables-google-uses-and-why-you-shouldnt-care – written by Peter Da Vanzo.  I was reading another article interviewing Google’s Sergey Brin in which he was talking about Google’s algorithim looking at 100 differrent variables.

So, I ran a search on 100 Google variables and came across this SEO Book article which is quite interesting .

In the article, Da Vanzo expresses his concept  that the current search engine model of using “web crawlers” to find information on the Internet is soon going to be outdated.  The reason is that there are so many different types of media now coming out, video, audio, etc. that can’t be picked up by web crawlers.  He contends that when Google introduced Universal Search a while ago, they basically began the end of the era of web crawlers.

Well, I think I agree with that to a certain extent.  I mean, Universal Search is already in play.  We’re already getting results of blogs, news, videos, etc. all mixed in with regular websites when a search is conducted.  How are those being picked up?  It’s the web crawlers.

So, will web crawlers be extinct or are they just going to evolve?

DaVanzo contends that in the future, it’s the audience that will determine the relevance of a search result.  It won’t be the web crawler.  I can see some merit in that.  I mean if 1000 users like your content a certain percentage of them will mention it in their social media outlet and share it with others and link back to it.  So, a search engine crawler would have to recognize this and give the content credit, as it should.  So, in this instance, yes, the audience is helping the engines to determine the relevance of the content.  But is it solely responsible for that content being in the top of the search results?

Hmmm – I don’t think so.

What do you think?

For anyone providing SEO Services – the spectrum of knowledge they need to have is immense.  I mean, how many other industries evolve so quickly?  How many other industries require a weekly (at least) review of their business practices and techniques?  How many other industries have to remain so flexible that they can literally change the way they work within a few hours?  Not many, I don’t think.  But SEO firms have to.

One of the ways we all keep up with the constant amount of change is by reading what so many other professionals learn and do.  Here are just some of my favorite articles…

SEO Tips for the Real World
…demand for SEO services, which means we have less time to contribute to blogging since our business has nearly doubled in the past few months. Without further ado, let’s kick this first post of the new SEO Tips category off in style. The Preface Search engine optimization (SEO) revolves around creating consistencies in a websites’ architecture, …

10 SEO Tips For Maximizing Facebook Visibility
No discussion of social media’s effect on organic search results is complete without considering Facebook’s well-laid play for “search” domination, in a closed-loop-members-only end run around Google’s public algorithmic crawl. With 250 million users, the recent purchase of friendFeed and newly offered ability to search at macro and/or granular users’ network levels, Facebook’s internal community-search platform [...]

Optimizing the “Most Searched Keywords” to Target your Niche!
Based on your link building strategy, you have the opportunity to focus on highly competitive terms with inherent high search volume, or moderately competitive short and medium-tail searches (which are known for their saturation ratios for any search conducted comprising any of the keywords that are optimized).

Powerboost your SEO with social media to drive links, revenue
As the economy struggles, marketers are challenged to do more with less. Many are turning to SEO as the efficient, effective way to drive links, conversions and revenue. But, here are a few words of experienced caution as you consider search engine optimization (SEO).

What Makes A Good SEO Report
What makes a good SEO report? Have you ever thought about that? Most people rely on automated rank checking reports, which I feel provide some value (if you track the rankings as trend lines on a graph) but they don’t really get into the meat of what I would want reported to me, [...]

SEO Rankings and How To Create Them
Often the effectiveness of search engine optimization is predicated by keywords and SEO rankings. Since this is a primary metric for performance, I would like to share a previously guarded SEO tactic that allows you to control which …

I hope you enjoy these articles.  And who knows?  Maybe you’ll even learn a thing or two?

For anyone who still believes that Internet marketing is a one shot process, SURPRISE!!  It’s not!  Why?  Well, very much like PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising, your competitors are always on the lookout (as you should be).

How does this play out in real life?  Let’s see if I can explain…

1) You hire an SEO firm (or you do it yourself) to get your website up to snuff for the search engines.
2) The SEO firm conducts the keyword research, cleans up the coding, optimizes the pages and begins the process of submitting the website to engines, directories, blog sites, etc.
3) Your rankings go up.  You go from page 10 to page 1.
4) Your competitors see you on the first page.  They begin scanning and viewing your website to see if they can figure out what you did to get onto the first page.
5) They begin making changes to their own site.  They hire an SEO firm (or do it themselves) and the entire process continues.

So, you see?  Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is not and cannot be, a one time affair.  It’s constant.  Today, with so many programs available to “scan” competitors’ websites, what makes you think that your own site isn’t getting scanned and scrutinized?  If it’s on the first page of Google, I can just about guarantee that it is being seen by your competition.

I can tell you that here at Eckweb Designs, Inc. we scan hundreds of competitors’ websites monthly so that we can give our own clients the advantage of understanding what their competition is doing just so they can keep up.  Does it change month by month?  You betcha!

So, the next time you meet with an SEO firm and they tell you that they can optimize your website for a one time fee, don’t believe them.  And make sure you make them pay for the coffee!