Archive for March, 2008

Check for www and non-www domains and/or index.html and non-index.html ( i.e., canonicalization issues). If both are used, then only one should resolve; the other should redirect.

How to Detect Canonicalization Issues:
1) Search for site:mysite.com, and site:www.mysite.com.
2) Similarly for the index and non-index pages.

Is there a difference in Pages Indexed?
If there is a difference, then most likely you have canonicalization issues.

Additional Resources:
SEO advice: URL Canonicalization
Canonicalization Tips

This post is far from perfect. I thought I’d post these thoughts anyway because Michael Arrington says, it’s okay to “post stuff even though it’s not perfect“. Just a guess…but I bet that strategy works better for him than a lot of bloggers.

Writing a PPC ad that contains a “Unique Selling Proposition” can significantly increase conversions. The USP concept offers consumers something desirable & different than the competition. The challenge is getting your USP stated in so few characters. You’re limited to 95 characters on Google.

There are 3 general principles behind a USP - Unique, Selling, and Proposition.

A classic example of a USP message is the M&M’s slogan: “The milk chocolate melts in your mouth, not in your hand” [56 characters].

Uniqueness:
It’s best if your product or service is unique. But, if it’s not unique, then think of something unique about the package, message, or benefits.

Benefits can be classified into “checkable” and “uncheckable” benefits.

- An example of a checkable benefit is FedEx. Their USP is: “When your package absolutely, positively has to get there overnight”. The consumer can easily check that.

- An example of an uncheckable benefit is Wonder Bread’s USP, “Wonder Bread Helps Build Strong Bodies 12 Ways”. It’d be pretty tough for somebody to check that benefit.

Selling:
The PPC ad copy needs to be so persuasive that it helps the consumer decide to purchase. The ad copy should be targeting the basic needs of the consumer. Base it on deep motivations or threats to either learned and unlearned needs.

- Learned needs are things like appearance weight, social prestige.
- Unlearned needs are physiological needs such as health, shelter, hunger, and thirst.

Just remember to target a specific need rather than a solution to everything. Specific targeting has been shown to increase conversion rates.

Proposition:
Ideally, the proposition should indicate that the promised benefit will be obtained upon purchase. In order to accomplish this, the USP needs to be believable & credible. Credibility is the most important aspect of the USP.

Methods to aid credibility:
1) Illustration and demonstration.
2) Prestige through association with a person, or organization.
3) Testimonials by ordinary people, (not celebrity endorsements).

Writing compelling PPC ads that contain a USP can be very challenging. If you are running large search campaigns, you might want to consider using an experienced PPC ad copywriter.

In 4 minutes 30 seconds Chris Winfield talks about the benefits & risks, key factors, pricing, targeting, and success metrics of a Social Media Optimization.

Want more traffic from Image Search? Here’s some general guidelines to follow to optimize for image search.

1) To optimize the URL, make sure the image filename contains the keyword (eg: /keyword.jpg).
2) Use descriptive Alt tags on the image.
3) Place image files in an “images” directory.
4) On Google Sitemaps, make sure to “Enable enhanced image search” within the Tools section.
5) Use anchor text keywords in links to images
6) Make sure the image URL is indexed.

A good clean image URL could look like this: http://www.mysite.com/images/keyword-phrase.jpg

By following those basic guidelines, you should see an increase in traffic from Image Search.

Additional Resources:

• 19 ways to optimize your site for Google Images.
• Using Flickr in your SEO & Traffic Building Strategy.
• A Comprehensive Guide to Using Flickr for Traffic Building.
• Using Photos to Build Inbound Links.

Questions & Answers about Symbols and Punctuation, and how they affect the Search rankings:

Question:
Do symbols matter in the Search Results? Eg: ®, $, @, #, !, or Trademark Symbols™ in the SERP’s.

Answer:
Optimizing for symbols is impossible. For example, both Yahoo! , and E! use the exclamation point (!) in their company name, so guess who ranks higher for the exclamation point (!) ? Neither!

Imagine a financial company wanting to optimize for the dollar sign ($). But, as you can see below, nobody is listed:

Similarly, it doesn’t matter if you use the registered symbol ®. Because, Google recognizes punctuation. Using the registered symbol could help with clickthroughs and credibility. But, it won’t make a difference in ranking on the Search results page.

Question #2: Does using an apostrophe matter in the SERP’s? For example: optimizers, optimizer’s, or optimizers’.
Answer #2:
Grammatically, words are different when an apostrophe is used. I find using the apostrophe matters in ranking. Although, the more competitive the term, the less it matters. The more optimized the website/webpage, the more keyword combinations get ranked.