We’ve previously discussed the importance of creating traffic for your website and one of the techniques we mention is Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).

SEO is a big topic, with many methods, theories, updates and changes circulating as to how best get your website to the ‘top of Google.’

This leads to much debate about the best SEO practices, but one methodology you cannot afford to omit is the use of keywords.

Often websites are launched before any thought is given to what keywords are being targeted with each page.

Needless to say this is wrong on so many levels and can lead to keyword duplication, overuse of keywords for pages, keyword stuffing or no keyword targeting at all – not good practice if you want your website to rank highly on search engines.

If you don’t have a keyword plan for your website – then by implication you have created or are creating a website that has no focus, is not targeting your target market and therefore will have inefficiency BUILT IN.

Before you begin a keyword plan you need to have your navigation structure in place so you can indentify which pages to target with each keyword.

Creating a Keyword Plan – selecting keywords for individual pages

Here are the steps for creating a keyword plan.

• Optimise Page by Page – you can only optimise one page at a time (search engines index pages not websites) – so work through your navigation structure (or site map) one page at a time.
• Three Keywords per Page – ideally you should select three key words or three key phrases for each page. Any more than three keywords then, by definition, they are no longer [key] words and a search engine will struggle to define what is “key”. Bear in mind that the more words a page is optimised for, generally the lower the ranking on an organic search.
• Topics, Themes & Content – your Home Page can be more generic than the other individual pages, which should be more focused. These should strongly relate to the theme, topic or content of that page.
• Keyword Selection – you can choose keywords from your knowledge of what is bringing traffic to your current website (by using Google Analytics), by using the Google Keyword Tool (best accessed via your AdWords account) or by looking at your most profitable keywords for Google AdWords (if you are using AdWords).
• How Many? – when you are starting out it is a good idea to begin with your top 60 keywords. At 3 keywords per page this gives you enough keywords for your 20 most important pages. However, there is no reason why you shouldn’t do the whole website, or even start the other way and make sure you have enough pages for your keywords.

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If you are creating a new website from scratch, then you will want to ‘build in’ traffic generating techniques from day one.

If you currently have a website and are not looking at developing a new one, it’s worth evaluating your current traffic generating activity.

It’s important to remember that you do not just want any traffic; you want to focus on attracting high quality traffic that leads to conversions and ultimately new customers.

The key ways to attract traffic to your website are:

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Usually most traffic for a website is generated by search engines such as Google and Yahoo. This traffic is free and is the ultimate goal for anyone serious about developing a hugely successful website and online marketing strategy.

If you want to generate as much relevant traffic as possible, then your website strategy must involve building a website that is search engine friendly.

This is a big topic which cannot be covered in a single article, but in essence your website must have highly relevant content and copy which builds the relevancy and strength of each page so that they rank well for searches.

A search engine can only read text. When the search engines visit your website to view what is on each page, the text they see must be written in such a way that the search engine can understand exactly what each page is about, so it can offer your page as a relevant match to a searcher.

Tightly written ‘clean code’ is another essential element to good search engine optimisation.

In short, you will want to work with a search engine marketing expert, and a website developer who understands how to create a search engine friendly website.

Pay Per Click Advertising

While search engine optimisation is the ideal way to generate large volumes of traffic for your website, it can take months and even years to get anywhere near to a first page listing in a search engine.

And although clicks from ‘organic’ or ‘natural’ listings on Google are free, anyone who has seriously implemented an SEO strategy can tell you that it is often anything but free.

They have either paid many tens of thousands to an SEO professional to target a list of keywords, or have paid the indirect costs of members of staff who have devoted huge amounts of time and effort in pursuit of high search engine rankings for important keywords.

Pay Per Click Advertising, using programmes such as Google AdWords, can rapidly get your website landing pages onto the first page of search engine results.

If your goal is to quickly increase traffic, then Pay Per Click advertising will play an important role in your online marketing strategy, and the development of your website.

In addition, not only will this increase traffic, the statistics generated will give you immensely valuable information about search engine marketing, which can be applied to your search engine optimisation, so in time your ‘paid for’ traffic can become free traffic.

Online Directories

There are two good reasons for using online directories.

The first is that by submitting to directories you will build the number of links directed at your website. This improves search engine rankings for your website. This is hugely valuable and a key to any search engine optimisation strategy.

The second is that by subscribing to (and sometimes paying for) listings and links in high-traffic, relevant and industry specific directories, you can drive quality traffic to your website.

For example, if you are a franchisor, you can list your franchise with a range of franchise directories, including your basic details and a description of your franchise offering. This listing will usually include a link to your website, or at least your website address, and can result in good volumes of high quality leads.

Recent Google algorithm changes have penalised website owners who have ‘over optimised’ their website by aggressively developing a huge number of links from directories (especially poor quality directories) so this should be balanced with links from other kinds of websites and sources to avoid being penalised.

Email Campaigns/Newsletters

Email broadcasting is not only be a very profitable marketing strategy in its own right, it can, with the right effort put into creating compelling and relevant emails or newsletters, become a strong source of traffic for your website.

Usually this involves emailing opt-in lists of customers or prospects that have freely given you their email address and other details.

Articles

Writing and publishing authoritative articles on your area of expertise can produce significant volumes of traffic to your website. In the past this was a strategy that got a bit (a lot actually) out of control with some websites creating and distributing articles on an industrial scale to generate inbound links and traffic.

Predictably the search engines have wised up and now take into account the quality of the website where articles are published, and they also look at the overall link profile.

Offline Marketing

Integrating your ‘offline’ marketing with your online marketing and website can be a hugely profitable exercise. After all, even Google uses direct mail and magazine advertising to promote their services.

A good example of this is when you write to prospects or clients offering a Packaged Information piece in the form of a White Paper, Report or Guide, sending responders to your website to complete a request form.

The post Creating Website Traffic first appeared on WD&M.

Five Advanced Google AdWords Techniques…

Google AdWords is getting more competitive, costs are rising and it is getting harder to generate low cost or profitable leads.

But despite that, when it comes to online marketing it is still THE big one.

Despite the emergence and rise and rise of Facebook, LinkedIn and the like, you just can’t ignore Google and expect to maximise your market opportunities.

Today, most buyers are still opening a browser and going to Google to search for new products and services.

So – it’s getting tougher, it’s getting more expensive and harder to compete – what to do? Walk away? Cut the Google budget? Try social media?

No. Emphatically not.

At least not until you have exhausted every opportunity to get your business into the top 5% of Google advertisers.

The answer in most cases is that you simply need to get better.

You need to be great at the basics…

• keyword research
• broad, phrase and exact match testing
• use of negative keywords
• spilt testing ads
• improving keyword quality scores
• testing and refining your landing pages
• testing networks
• …and so on.

That will get you a long way. But to be better than average, you need to do what average advertisers don’t do and you need to be testing advanced Google AdWords techniques as well.

Some of these techniques are relatively new, some have been around for a little while now, but the vast majority of advertisers are not using these techniques, which gives you the opportunity to fight your way to the top of the pile.

Here are 5 techniques you can use to fight your way back into the top 5% of Google AdWords advertisers…

1. Remarketing

What is remarketing? To quote Google…

“Remarketing allows you to communicate with people who’ve previously visited key pages on your website.”

“When you use remarketing, you’ll tag pages of your site that correspond to certain categories you want to promote. For example, you could add a “TV” tag on all of the pages where you sell televisions.

You can then create an AdWords campaign to show highly relevant messages (such as ads displaying a special offer on TVs) to people who’ve visited these pages as they browse sites across the Google Display Network.”

From initial testing and case studies that I have reviewed, remarketing is showing some very promising results and in my view is a ‘must test’ advanced Google AdWords technique.

2. Image Ads

It is estimated that 60% to 70% of all AdWords clicks come from the Content Network, and that around 30% of AdSense Advertisers carry image ads – yet only 2% to 5% of all advertisers use image ads!

We are seeing some really good results with Google image ads, with decent levels of traffic and cost per conversion figures of 1/3rd to 1/2 the cost of text ads.

This means you either save 33% to 50% for the same number of leads, or you get 50% to 100% more leads for the same budget!

If your AdWords results are flagging, and you already get reasonable results from the Google Display Network, image ads like the examples below (from the Google website) could put you right back in the game!

3. Site Links

Site link are interesting. What are Site Links – well to quote Google again…

“Ad Sitelinks is a feature for search-based ads that lets you include up to 4 additional links to deeper content on your site beyond the main landing page. Sitelinks extend the value of your AdWords ads by showcasing additional targeted and relevant links for users whose search queries have triggered your ad.”

“The following best practices will help maximize your chances of showing Sitelinks:

• Your ad should have one of the top positions above the search results.
• Your ad should have a very high Quality Score.
• Your Sitelinks URLs must direct users to pages that are part of your main website.

If your ad qualifies to show Sitelinks, up to four of the additional links you associate with your ad on the Ad Extensions tab may appear on your ad.”

There is good evidence coming through that Site Links are working very well in some cases.

However, I’d be very cautious about adding Site Links to an ad that is directing traffic to a very high performing landing page or opt in page. Why send traffic to a less successful page?

On the other hand, listing various product or service options at a deeper level could really help you drive more traffic to the most relevant pages on your site.

As with all techniques, the proof is in the eating (or testing in this case).

4. Google Display Network (GDN) Optimised Campaigns

This is where you break up an existing campaign running on both the search and display networks, and run separate campaigns tailored to each network.

This allows you to take a more strategic approach to theming the AdGroups, leading to more relevant placements of ads and hopefully a higher CTR.

Tip: When you copy the campaign so it can be split, I prefer to leave the existing campaign running as the GDN campaign, as the ‘learned’ history of websites that are performing, and any grooming you have done of this list of websites (such as exclusions) remains intact.

5. Mobile Optimised Campaigns

If you have mobile devices activated in your campaigns settings module, and if mobile is performing well, there could be a good case for splitting out and setting up a Mobile specific campaign.

For example, with mobile ads being shown on a typical smart phone screen, you may need to be much more aggressive in your bidding to achieve rank 1 or 2 as ads below rank this will simply not show on the screen.

You may be aiming for rank 3 with search, so having the two separate campaigns gives you the flexibility of setting higher bids for mobile where you aim for rank 1, and lower for search to achieve rank 3.

And you may get better results with more specific ad text, tailored to smart phone users.

You can still win big with Google AdWords.

Very few Google advertisers get all of the basics right, let alone test advanced techniques such as these.

That works to your advantage.

It is still possible to get your business into the top 5% on Google – you just have to work a bit harder and a lot smarter than you did in 2005, 2006 and 2007.

Google AdWords Campaign Management

By the way – our team set up and manage Google AdWords accounts for many companies of all types and sizes, and are successfully managing many tens of thousands of Google AdWords spend each month.

If you’d like to discuss how we can help to develop and manage your Google AdWords account, please call on 01536 461 597, or contact us online.

You can also sign up to our free newsletter to get regular information on strategies that will help you get more from your business.

The post Advanced Google Adwords Techniques first appeared on WD&M.

Banner Ads are Back – But This Time Google Have Figured Out How to Make Them Work…

Banner Ads were all the rage in the dotcom boom.

And they got a bad name. Really bad.

Back then, advertisers purchased large bundles of ads, for seemingly small amounts per impression – which usually added up to large invoice with nothing to show for it.

Then Google came along…

It took Google to come along and to invent the Pay Per Click model (supported with Conversion Tracking) to rehabilitate the reputation of online marketing.

But this was based on Text Ads (see examples below) like the small classified ads that used to fill page after page in newspapers.

Now Google have combined the Banner Ad format with their Pay Per Click model, Conversion Tracking and the Content Network (Ads displayed on other people’s website’s) to give you a really effective new online marketing tool.

Google call the new generation of Banner style ads Image Ads.

While AdWords success is getting harder…

The good news is, while Google AdWords based on the traditional Google Text Ad, like this one…

…is becoming more and more competitive and harder to crack, with Google Image advertising the field is wide open.

With Image Ads the Field is Wide Open…

It is estimated that 60% to 70% of all AdWords clicks come from the Content Network, and that around 30% of AdSense Advertisers carry Image Ads – yet only 2% to 5% of all advertisers use Image Ads!

Google Image Ads are graphic based ads, similar to the Banner Ads of old, like these examples from Google’s website…

These Image Ads appear on selected websites within the Google Content Network.

Google say that “Image ads combine two powerful features: graphics and proven AdWords targeting technology”.

And they go on to explain that “Unlike traditional online graphical ads, image ads can be matched to a page’s content. This targeting makes image ads more attractive and relevant to anyone browsing the site. Therefore, image ads offer you yet another effective way to increase your business exposure and reach new prospects”.

And our testing results, conducted over the last 6 months, back this up.

50% to 100% More Leads…

In fact, results show that when applied, Image Ads are generating conversions at around 1/2 to 2/3rds the cost of a text ad conversion, which gives the advertiser a significant advantage.

This means you either save 33% to 50% for the same number of leads, or you get 50% to 100% more leads for the same budget!

Perry Marshall, Google AdWords guru and author of The Definitive Guide to Google AdWords has this to say about Google Image Ads on the Google Content Network…

“The other revolution that’s happening is Image Ads. I’m going to guess that only 3% of Google advertisers are even using them at all. It’s an elite group and they get a hugely disproportionate share of the traffic”.

“Really great text ads get 0.25% CTR’s but the best image ads are getting CTR’s of 2-3%. That’s 10X!”.

That is indeed a revolution.

So if you feel that you have pushed your Google AdWords campaigns as far as you can with Text Ads, or want to lower your cost per conversion, start testing Google Image Ads on the Content Network.

And if you want to get really adventurous, you can even test Video versions of your Image Ads as well.

For more information on Image Ads visit Google’s website.

And for examples of Image Ads and placement options from Google follow this link.

To find out how we can help you design and test Google Image Ads, or to maximise the performance of your Google AdWords account, call us on 01536 461 597 or contact us online.

You can also sign up to our free newsletter to get regular information on strategies that will help you get more from your business.

The post Google Image Ads first appeared on WD&M.