Facebook in Numbers: Prior to the IPO

The big news in social media and business this week is Facebook’s new IPO.  This infographic from statista and creative commons shares some very interesting figures about Facebook, before it goes public.

Highlights include:

• In 2012 Facebook is expected to reach: 90% of U.S. Social Network Users & 60% of Internet Users.
• Assuming a valuation of $100 billion, Facebook would be work 67 to 100x’s it’s estimated 2011 net income.

The Social Media Buzz

“How to Harmonize Google+ With Your Other Social Platforms”  Search Plus has placed even more importance on blending your online marketing strategy in order to adhere to the social, personal, and personalized search algorithm.  This post offers some great tips on harmonizing Google+ with your current platforms.  Via Search Engine Watch.

“StumbleUpon Kills Direct Links, iFrames Everything”  With over 20 million users StumbleUpon may be getting some heat for their recent updates.  One particular change to be aware of is the removal of all direct links which point back to content sources from within the platform.  If you are a Stumbler I strongly recommend reading this article.  Via Search Engine Land.

“The Social Enterprise: Your Path to Job Security”  While it is not surprising that social networking technologies will receive increased budgets this year it is important to understand the shift that many industries are taking.  Social media has become a recognized method in which your customers and potential customers will consume information about your services.  Social media must be used a s tool to educate, communicate, and engage on an ongoing basis.  Via InformationWeek.

Your Brand & Your Customers

“Inside the mind of your buyers”  Each of your customers has something that makes them different.  It may be their specific pain points or their budget restrictions.  This article provides 6 helpful tips on how to close a sale by focusing on what motivates your customers to buy.  Via Entrepreneur.

“The big tip for 2012: Convergence is here”  The need for a multichannel strategy has been around for awhile.  However, this year marketers will be focusing more and more on the convergence of those strategies.  Some of the trends we are seeing these days are popular television shows encouraging viewers to interact via their mobile device or iPad in real time.  Since we are finding that many customers are multi-tasking the 4 tips within this article provide guidance on dealing with convergence and what steps you should take to keep up with a rapidly evolving means of communication.  Via Econsultancy.

“3 key features of Twitter brand pages”  This piece takes a deeper look at the changes rolled out by Twitter late last year and the potential impact for brands.  It covers changes such as the expanded header area, featured Tweets, and separating your mentions from replies.  Definitely worth taking a look.  Via Ragan.

Working as a Team to Bring You the News – TopRank

Alexis Hall – Pinterest Driving More Referral Traffic Than Google+
Reports are showing Pinterest is now driving more search referrals than Google+ and YouTube.  This post, from Search Engine Watch, explores the question if the online pin board can compete with Facebook and Twitter, featuring an interesting infographic from Monetate.  Via Search Engine Watch.

Brian Larson – Super Bowl Viewers Will Check Phones 10 Times During the Game
Sometimes it takes just the right stat or factoid to drive a point home. Mobile’s growth cannot be denied by any rational person, but how about this stat: super bowl viewers will check their smart phones 10 times during the game. That’s right, the most compelling and entertaining football game of the year, which is augmented by million dollar commercials and halftime performances from Grammy award winning artists, can’t keep viewers from the powerful pull of mobile. The real question isn’t whether you should engage in mobile marketing, but rather are you positioned to be on their screen when they check their phone one of those 10 times?  Via Mashable.

Emily Conley – Inside Facebook’s S-1 Filing: 845 Million Users, $3.7 Billion In Revenues In 2011
On Wednesday, Feb. 1st Facebook filed its S1 registration (which companies use to register securities with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission).  The filing makes public certain financial and user data, including:

• 2011 net income: $1 billion (up from $606 million in 2010)
• 2011 revenue: $3.7 billion (up from 1.97 billion in 2010)
• 2011 monthly users: 845 million (roughly 50% active on a daily basis)
• 2011 average daily photo uploads: 250 million

This article also delves into shareholder information and background on the company’s ‘hacker way’ culture centered on having a positive impact on the world. Some very interesting insights into this social media giant’s success!  Via Fast Company.

Ken Horst – 5 Ways to Brand Your New YouTube Profile
YouTube has provided users with a number of smart ways to get more out the Brand/Profile page.  Some of the great updates are the ability to add multiple custom URLs in an area that is clearly visible to users and the ability to create your own custom overly ad for your videos.  You can also prevent other ads from showing up on your videos.  Via Social Media Examiner.

Time to Weigh In:  Have you taken any steps to integrate Google+ with your other platforms?  If so what have you done that has worked?  When trying to get into the mindset of your potential customers, what is the most important thing you should know?

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2012. |
Online Marketing News: Facebook IPO, Harmonize with Google+, Pinterest Dominates Traffic | http://www.toprankblog.com

This article was originally posted on the Online Marketing Blog

Last year Eli Pariser released the book the Filter Bubble (see my review of the the Filter Bubble). As part of the promotion, he was asked to speak at TED. While I wasn’t there, I understand from people who were in attendance that it made several Googlers in the audience … lets go with “uncomfortable” …

Here’s the problem in a nutshell: when you work at Google, your fellow employees, friends, and people you connect with on social networks like Google Plus are going to be some of the smartest, technologically savvy, and Google-centric people in the world. This is not true for the rest of the online population. Using SPYW to take the collective wisdom of your social network of Google employee/friends to influence your search results is a really good idea. When your friends aren’t Google employees, are not the smartest people on the planet, and in some cases are narcissistic and generally a lot more self interested, using your social graph to influence your search results is somewhere between stupid and insane.

We come back to the basic concept of filter bubbles. Using filter bubbles only works if everyone in your filter bubble is smart, worldly-wise, and open minded to different view points and perspectives. Paradoxically, this is self-defeating logic. If your filter bubble is “good” and you don’t realize that everyone else’s isn’t, you’ll never get why filters bubbles and ideas like SPYW are such  bad ideas.

To be clear, this isn’t a case of sour grapes. All of my sites that I care about are doing better since SPYW went into effect. I’m playing the “social game”: broadcasting, engaging, and sending Google the signals it’s looking for so my websites benefit from SPYW and personalized search. However, I can tell you thatwhen I use Google as a regular user looking for answers to questions I don’t know and things I need to buy, I see the results are more polluted by the efforts of other marketers like myself who are playing the same social engagement games I do. The search results aren’t better. It’s nice to sit in the ivory tower of the GooglePlex and say this will teach people to choose wisely who they interact with on social networks. But, in reality, that type of thinking shows they are in a filter bubble: people have a tendency to act in their own best interests. Thousands of years of human history prove that people are really good at reacting to short term dangers like a lion or wolf who starts hunting near their home, but people are really bad at reacting to long term dangers like wildlife conservation, widespread deforestation, climate change, energy consumption, financial responsibility, worldwide poverty, and global starvation.

As regular users notice a decline in the quality of Google results, most of them won’t understand or quite frankly care that the people in their friend network are to blame. There is only so long you can serve inferior results and distract people with cutesy holiday logos before they decide to try another search engine.

photo credit: Shutterstock/NemesisINC

No related posts.

This post originally came from Michael Gray who is an SEO Consultant. Be sure not to miss the Thesis WordPress Theme review.

Why Google Thinks SPYW is a Good Idea and You Probably Don’t

This article was originally posted on the Graywolf’s SEO Blog

Is your company adaptable? Is your marketing optimized?

I think most online marketers get the fact that marketing and communications on the web is a fast changing place and that most companies are structured to move at a slower pace than the digital world is evolving.

Take for example, the notion of Search Engine Optimization (SEO). It’s been around for about 15 years or so and in just the past few months Google has made the most significant changes ever. Despite the crystal clear focus towards search integration with social, many companies and digital pundits are still skeptical about the role of organic search let alone how to optimize Google+ to attract and engage customers.

Yesterday I saw a video on the Inc. Magazine website titled, “Increase Your Search Engine Page Rank”.  Is that really what a business needs to succeed online? An inflated PageRank score? What about understanding how to attract more customers? What about engaging customers who are inspired to refer your brand to even more customers?

I think there’s something seriously lost in translation between real consumer behaviors and marketing efforts that succeed on the web. Companies see an article like the one above and start asking consultants for help with increasing their PageRank score which is a distraction from what’s important.

To make sense for companies in the midst of all this change and differing online marketing advice, there are two essential ideas worth considering for anyone in a position to create online content:

A different way of thinking about optimization

Rather than tactics like web page SEO, blogging or video driving an online marketing approach, what if companies instead made more of an effort to focus on customer behaviors and preferences for information discovery, user experience and engagement?  In other words, what if they researched what types of media, topics and channels both customers and those who influence customers prefer? With that knowledge, develop a content mix and corresponding optimization effort.

This is content marketing 101, but so many marketers are caught up in specific tactics, they lose sight of the target audience they’re after in favor of the crack-like effect of pumping out “a viral video”, another infographic or contest to attract more fans, friends and followers.

The Discovery, User Experience and Engagement optimization approach that I talk about at length in Optimize transcends those tactics and emphasizes that a web marketing effort should be focused on the role of content and human experience as it relates to meeting both the objectives of the consumer and the brand. Once those key triggers are understood, then the editorial, keyword optimization and social networking tactics are defined.

How people find information, what formats and topics resonate, how to inspire interaction, sharing and commerce are all part of this three part optimization approach. The platforms, apps and social technology might change, but a more holistic view of optimization can guide content marketing efforts regardless of what social media, networking or search engine platform rules the day.

In this scenario, optimization is more in alignment with the actual definition of  the word optimize: ” to make as perfect, effective, or functional as possible”. Then applying that approach to connecting customers with brand content and experiences in a way that motivates consumers to act: buy, refer, share.  Each touchpoint in the brand and consumer experience across the customer lifecycle can be optimized for better performance, for more desirable outcomes.

Develop adaptive models for online marketing technologies

By that I mean create processes and plans for rapid detection, testing and evaluation of shiny new social or online technologies to determine their potential role in the content marketing mix.  Many companies feel overwhelmed and don’t know what or when “the next Twitter” will pop. Or even if they should care. Others withdraw from testing and stick only with the few social platforms they know.

Creating an adaptive approach to incorporating new social and web applications, tools and platforms can filter down the most relevant shiny new objects and allow for more rapid incorporation with content marketing efforts. This approach means coordinating people that can fulfill these roles. For that, there will be some social business and internal collaboration tools involved. Leveraging your collective organization to monitor and filter for emerging social technologies relevant to engaging with your customer base can result in more rapid identification, best practices formulation and successful implementation.

Most companies don’t have staff or resources dedicated to testing out new social technologies, so why not tap into the collective knowledge, wisdom and reach of your employees, partners and even your customers? Without the ability to adapt, the momentum of many online marketing efforts will certainly die or at least lose out to the competition that’s paying attention.

As it is for the surfer in the image above, an adaptable approach to content and optimized online marketing is about the journey. It’s about trying to perfect your craft and continuously refine what you have to work with every day. Use the tools of the day knowing they will change. Focus more on whatever it takes to stay connected with your customers and community using the search and social channels that are most relevant.

How are you defining optimization in your organization? Do you see the value of taking a step back and viewing optimization more holistically? Does your organization have a process for monitoring, testing and adopting new technologies for marketing?

I’ll be talking about many of these key #Optimize principles at OMS and SES Accelerator coming up next week in San Diego. I hope to see you there. 

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2012. |
Essential Shifts in Online Marketing: Are You On Board? Are You Optimized? | http://www.toprankblog.com

This article was originally posted on the Online Marketing Blog

Picturesque view of Lake Minnetonka from the TopRank Online Marketing office

Today marks my 4 month anniversary at TopRank Online Marketing and almost 5 years in the online marketing industry.  It has been a goal of mine to learn as much as I possibly can from those who know the industry best.  In this seemingly short amount of time I have received, and continue to receive a top notch education at an unbeatable price.

I would like to share some of my experience to give other marketers interested in breaking into Internet marketing or continuing their online marketing education an idea of what it looks like from one person’s perspective.

The Interview Process

Do Your Homework
Walking into an interview with no base knowledge of who the company is, what they stand for, and how they operate is a huge mistake.  Especially if you are an Internet marketer.  I would recommend reviewing the following information pre-interview:

• Company Website: This should give you a sense of the services they offer and who some of their clients are.
• Management: If you can find information about the management team be sure to do some additional research on them as well to get a sense of their background and accomplishments.
• Content & Social Profiles: At the bare minimum I would recommend looking at the company blog (if they have one), Twitter profile, Facebook page, and Google+ page.
• News & Press Releases: Do a Google search to see if the company has released any exciting news over the past few months.

If you are working with a recruiter be sure to ask as many questions about the companies services, their culture, and preferences as possible.  The recruiter will typically have spoken with contacts at the company and with other interviewees post interview.  This is a great opportunity to gain some inside knowledge before you step in the door.  These are all great ways to educated yourself before walking in the door and will allow you to have an intelligent conversation about the company during your interview.

Demonstrate Value
Depending on what position you are applying for take some time to identify what you believe to be areas of need or improvement for the company.  You should walk in knowing you may not be 100% correct but it will be appreciated that you made the effort.  If applying for a social media position I would take some time to analyze what they are doing currently, what the results appear to be, as well as some recommendations for increased customer engagement.

Spending some additional time to identify what you believe to be their competitors will also be a great source for gather information.  Perhaps you notice a competitors blog or social profile that has a lot of readers or followers.  Try to identify what they are doing and how the company you are interviewing with could do that better.

Asking questions is also a great way to demonstrate value.  If you can think quickly on your feet then this will allow you demonstrate immediate value.  Some questions you might consider asking are:

• What do you believe is your biggest area of need?
• What would you like/need to focus on but don’t have enough time to do?
• What personality traits are you looking for in a candidate?
• What does the typical day look like for this position?
• Are there any other areas of your business that you would like to grow?

Consider Each Interview a Learning Experience
Whether it is your dream job or not I believe that you should walk into each interview hoping to learn as much as you possibly can.  In addition to being a great networking opportunity it can give you a sense of what companies in the industry are looking for in a candidate, industry buzz words, and a chance to learn more from someone else in the industry.

Even If You Didn’t Get the Job, Ask For Feedback
As disappointing as it may be you will not get every job you interview for.  If you receive word that they have decided not to hire you don’t be afraid to ask why.  I recommend sending out a brief and polite email asking for feedback.  Thank the interviewer for the opportunity and ask if they have any recommendations on skills that would make you more attractive to a company like theirs because you are interested in constantly evolving your skill set.

Working for an Internet Marketing Company

There Will Always Be Other People Who Know More Than You
No matter how long you have been in the industry there will be other online marketers who know things that you don’t.  Instead of foolishly refusing to learn from these other influentials I would recommend keeping tabs on what they’re teaching and apply information that you find useful to your own strategy.  There may be tactics that you do not agree with but if anything it will give you a sense of what other respected members of the community are recommending to your potential clients.

Welcome Constructive Criticism
I for one thrive on feedback.  If I don’t know what I am doing wrong or how to fix it how will I get better?  I have a tendency to take some feedback personally because I put so much of myself into my work.  However, I’ve learned that you can’t consider it a personal attack but instead an opportunity to learn more.  Take the feedback that you’ve been given, add it into your process, and work to avoid the same mistakes next time.  Say perhaps that you don’t agree with the feedback provided?  I’ve learned that there is nothing wrong with having an opinion as long as you have data to back it up.  So, until you have that information do not present an argument.  An educated opinion is worth so much more than an emotional response.

The Best Internet Marketers are Passionate About What They Do
In a field like Internet Marketing I think it is essential that you care about your work.  Care not in the sense that you like the paycheck, but that you actually have a interest in what you are doing.  Companies and clients can tell if you are not invested in marketing their product and getting results.  Social media engagement is a full time job.  You must be willing to connect even when it may not be convenient to answer the questions and address concerns of your customers and potential customers.

Adaptability & Process Are Extremely Valuable
In an industry that changes from one day to the next those that are not adaptable will be left behind.  Once you find tactics that work be sure to document them and make them part of your process.  This process will clearly evolve over time but it will help maintain order for yourself and the rest of your team.  If each team member is taking a wildly different approach to online marketing you will not be able to truly measure the success of your efforts or provide a best practice approach.

What Next?
I don’t consider what I do a job.  It is a journey and an education that I am extremely thankful for.  Through my experience I have learned what should be done, as well as what not to do.  I know that I have shared some of my personal experience but I am curious to know what helpful tips other readers in the industry might have.  If you could tell everyone one thing that you’ve learned while working in this industry, what would it be?

Are you interested in working for a company like TopRank Online Marketing?  If you would like the opportunity to work with us we would love to hear from you.  We are currently looking for Account Managers, as well as Search and Social Strategists to join our team.  Our Careers page on our website provides some more detailed information on our current openings.

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2012. |
Getting Your Internet Marketing Dream Job: How to Interview & Succeed at a Top Agency | http://www.toprankblog.com

This article was originally posted on the Online Marketing Blog

If you are selling products or services, chances are you good you probably have 10 – 20 questions your customers ask about how to use products, correctly, better or more effectively. Typically most companies create an FAQ where they answer all of these questions on one page. While this does work it’s not an optimal solution from an SEO traffic perspective.

Unless your questions and answers are very short, ideally you want to create a single page optimized for each question, this gives you the ability to create narrowly focussed posts around specific keyword phrases that will rank better and drive more traffic. Bear in mind this is something of a balancing act, and you may find these posts don’t get enough traffic on their own and have to be combined (see how to do a content audit) , so there is some experimentation, trial and error involved.

The next thing you need to consider is targeting and writing your posts using the same natural language, phrases,and queries that your consumers use, and not using your own internal company terminology. For example one consulting client I had insisted on using the term “waste receptacles” instead of “garbage pails”. This “wisdom” was firmly entrenched all the way up to the “C” level and they were completely inflexible on the matter, no matter how much keyword data I showed them to the contrary. We ended up doing some custom programming to catch internal searches for “garbage pails” and reroute the traffic to “waste receptacles” but we never ranked for those terms in the search engines.

Once you’ve got the basic questions covered, you can expand showing them how to use your products in new ways they never thought off, how to take advantage of advanced features, and use little known aspects of your products. You can even look for opportunities to tie into social media asking customers to submit pictures of their products in use. Cuisinart holds a recipe swap every few months, home improvement stores look for before and after shots, and fashion companies look for UGC photos of people wearing their clothing, shoes or fashion accessories.

One last option to consider is optimizing for some of your competitions keywords. Bear in mind SEO for your competition is not without consequences and not for the faint of heart, so think about it before you decide to start down that path.

Enough with the theory lets look at some real world examples of this in place. I’m a huge fan of the Sonos in home music system (full disclosure I was sent a review unit in the past see my Sonos Review post for more details). However to be honest I really really love it, in fact I’m a huge brand advocate of the product. Spend 5 minutes talking to me about it at a conference or on twitter and you’ll see me affection for the product is genuine. Sonos regularly blogs about how to use their system and how to get the most out of it with posts like Using line in on Sonos products or how to use AirPlay on Sonos Music systems. In fact they have a whole tips & tricks section.

Another example is the Whole Foods blog. In addition to recipes they have posts about how to cook with styles customers may not be familiar with like learn how to cook broiled fish or how to use new food types like Quiona (it’s a small grain like cous-cous).

The key lesson from these examples is don’t blog just to get new customers, blog to reach and help your existing customers, if you do it correctly they will stay repeat customers and pass along their experiences with their family and friends, and share them on Facebook, twitter, Google+, and Pinterest.

So what are the takeaways from this post:

• Look at your popular customer service questions and inquiries and look for ways to create optimized posts around those topics
• Use natural language and phrases your customers use, avoid internal terminology and marketing language
• Look for opportunities to show advanced or little known features
• Make your customers smarter this turns them into brand advocates
• While there is some danger optimizing for your competitions keywords can sometimes work to your advantage

photo credit: Shutterstock/darren Baker

No related posts.

This post originally came from Michael Gray who is an SEO Consultant. Be sure not to miss the Thesis WordPress Theme review.

How to Write Blog Posts For Your Existing and Repeat Customers

This article was originally posted on the Graywolf’s SEO Blog

The 2012 Community Manager Report

Community Manager is an essential, yet still uncharted territory for many companies that are expanding their presence on the social web.  What should you know about the current state of this position?

• 67% of Community Managers work for a brand
• The most popular city for Community Managers is New York
• 65% of Community Managers are Female

Be sure to check out the rest of this report presented by Social Fresh.

Google & FBI: All Your Social Data Are Belong to Us

For non-geeks, here’s the reference (Zero Wing video)

“Google Privacy Changes: What Do They Mean To You?” Google announced this week that it is rolling out a new, main privacy policy that covers the majority of its products. The company is consolidating over 60 privacy notices into the main privacy policy. User activities across Google web properties from Gmail to YouTube will be used to deliver customized ads. Via WebProNews.

“The FBI Wants to Monitor Social Media” The FBI is looking to develop a web application that can monitor social networks, including Facebook and Twitter, in order to gain better real-time intelligence about current or potential future security threats or situations. As with the Google combined service data collection, many people are thinking, “Weren’t they already doing this?” Via Mashable.

“McDonald’s Twitter Campaign Goes Horribly Wrong #McDStories” From McDonald’s PR: While #meetthefarmers was used for the majority of the day and successful in raising awareness of the Supplier Stories campaign, #mcdstories did not go as planned. We quickly pulled #mcdstories and it was promoted for less than two hours. Via Business Insider.

“Twitter Now Able To Censor Tweets, If Required By Law, On A Country-By-Country Basis” From Twitter: Starting today, we give ourselves the ability to reactively withhold content from users in a specific country — while keeping it up in the rest of the world. Danny Sullivan compares Twitter’s approach towards censorship to Google, which you might find interesting. Via Marketing Land.

The Online Marketplace is Competitive: Tips to Help You Meet the Challenge:

“The Top 51 stats for Generation Y marketers” How can marketers tap into this gadget-savvy, brand-aware demographic? The following statistics, taken from four recent reports listed below, provide an insight into the complex world of 13-24 year-olds. Via The Next Web.

“5 marketing Tips for Putting Customers First” The digital world of today offers many choices to customers, which means that marketing professionals have a tough job ahead of them.  We must not only ensure that our messaging is on target, but also work with our internal team to make sure that our promises can be delivered.  Via i Media Connection.

“10 Essential YouTube Tips and Tricks”  YouTube is currently getting over 3 billion views each day.  This article provides some great tips for getting more out of your YouTube experience including, improved search and better viewing options.  Via Mashable.

“10 Ways to Impress Your Industry’s Influencers” Often times your press releases are in the hands of influencers within the industry.  This article provides some great tips on identifying who these people are, buttering them up, and following their lead.  Via Ragan.

The TopRank Team Knows News

Brian Larson – “MarketingSherpa Research Shows the Avg B2B Deal on the Decline”
We know that B2B sales cycles are longer. The rebuttal from B2B’s has always been ‘the size of our sales are far greater’.  What if that changed? With B2B deal sizes diminishing, do B2B’s need to focus on increasing sales volume or developing new ways to demonstrate value and win back larger sales? Or both? The answers to these questions are sure to influence online marketing strategies.  Via Marketing Sherpa.

Ken Horst – “Social media for the complex sale: Where should you start?”
While most B2B companies are heavily invested in their social channels today; many are finding that for at least Facebook and Twitter, these may not be the best channels for companies with a longer sales cycle.  The good news is that in this post, the author lists 10 other social media outlets that B2B marketers could use to help prime the pump for those longer sales cycle products and services. Via SmartBlog.

Emily Conley – “Google Announces Privacy Changes Across Products; Users Can’t Opt Out”
Google released an announcement on Jan. 24th stating that the company plans to follow users’ activities across the majority of its sites, including YouTube, Gmail and Google search. With no opt-out option, as of March 1st all logged in Google users will be sharing data that will enable Google to create more complete user portraits.  The change opens new debate around privacy and competitive practices.  Via Washington Post.

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2012. |
Online Marketing News: Women Dominate Community Management, Google Privacy, FBI Social, Twitter Censorship, McD Hashtag Gone Wrong | http://www.toprankblog.com

This article was originally posted on the Online Marketing Blog

Content Marketing Not Performing? Troubleshoot SEO Basics.

This post is a preview of a new downloadable guide I will be offering for those who pre-order Optimize by March 13, 2012. The full guide will have screenshots, examples and more “SEO Deep Dive” advice. If you want the full, illustrated Content Marketing SEO Troubleshooting Guide, visit OptimizeBook.com to pre-order and subscribe to our mailing list for more details.

Content Marketing at it’s core is about planning information that is thoughtful about the needs and interests of target customer groups as they take the journey through the buying cycle, interacting with content and pulling themselves towards purchase. The role of search engines in making ebooks, white papers, case studies, newsletters, webinars, reports, video, images and many other content marketing tactics is often underestimated or overlooked.

The effect of best practices SEO on content to attract relevant audiences can be substantial. However, search is a dynamic marketing channel requiring ongoing attention. Without proper care and feeding, search traffic can fluctuate, fall victim to more aggressive competitor SEO practices or never get off the ground. Or search engines can simply take away features that make SEO easier to do. Because search can provide such a significant and relevant audience to content, it’s worth investing time to troubleshoot for better performance.

Seeing great SEO, social media and content marketing strategy and tactics being implemented every day, I can’t help but be biased towards having a dedicated agency, consultant or in-house resource for optimization. However, dedicated resources are not very valuable unless there’s some appreciation for what an Optimize and Socialize approach can provide.

To provide some practical and tactical perspective on this essential intersection of SEO, Social Media and Content Marketing, here are a few tips for basic SEO troubleshooting that just about anyone responsible for content in an organization can use. I’ve also included some “SEO Drilldowns” that a pro might explore further and key considerations for content marketers.

Before we get into the Basic SEO Troubleshooting tips, here are a few important things to understand regarding Google and personalization:

Logged out – Google search results when you or other users are not logged in are as close to “generic” as you’ll get, but they are still customized according to your geographic location and your click activity during the session.  The days of generic search results that can be predictably viewed by more than one person in different locations is gone. If you do search while logged out, you’ll get a more generic experience than logged in – so it’s worth noting the difference.

Logged in – Users of Google services who are logged in while searching will almost certainly be presented with unique search results.  Personalization can be influenced by a variety of factors, including the recent social signals integration of Google+ into Google search results – aka Google Search Plus Your World and especially from the universal Google product data sharing that will start March 1st 2012. Other influences include past search history, geographic location and your interaction with search results are factors for Google to adjust search results just for you. Keep in mind, logged in or out, there are over 20o signals used to sort search results.

Google has made SEO troubleshooting increasingly difficult by encrypting search for users who are logged in to Google. Initially at 9%, our “Unknown” keyword referrers to Online Marketing Blog are now at 26%. Through a combination of historical data analysis and extrapolation from other data sources, you can fill in that gap somewhat, but it definitely takes an experienced SEO/Web Analytics person to do so. 

For our purposes, we’re focusing on the basics that can provide insight regardless of logged in or logged out since they are so fundamental to improved visibility of content marketing assets in search engines. Basic troubleshooting often starts by a review of web analytics showing a decrease in traffic from a certain phrase over time or the aspiration to increase search traffic for a particular topic. Keep in mind, there is a difference between business competitors and content competitors in the search results (SERPs). Perform the following troubleshooting actions while not logged in:

1. Benchmark

From your web analytics, log the past 1-3 months of search traffic for the phrase in question (if any) to your website.  

What you’re looking for: How often has the target keyword phrase driven traffic via search engines to your website each month, week and day? What does the trend line look like over time? Which pages are attracting search traffic for this phrase and any obvious variations of it? (singular vs. plural).  If you’ve optimized specific pages for this phrase, look at all search traffic to it, including “Unknown” encrypted phrases. Basically, you’re documenting the performance of the phrase as a starting point.

SEO Drill Down: How a SEO professional approaches benchmarking current keyword performance might vary, but here are a few ideas. Expand on all the variations of the target phrase, the distribution of “unknown” vs. identifiable phrases, the split between different search engines as sources of traffic, brand vs. non-brand queries, the distribution of different pages and content objects across your domain that attract search traffic related to the phrase. Also review the appearance of the target keyword phrase(s) in Google Webmaster Tools ranked list of keyword phrases.  What are the trends for this keyword phrase for ranking (iffy), traffic, inquiries and sales over time?

Key Content Marketing questions: For the content assets you’re optimizing, what role does the content play for target customers in the buying cycle? Is it optimized for phrases relevant to awareness, consideration, evaluation or purchase? What is the relationship of your optimized content assets to each other and to a landing page (if used)?  If you’re using a hub and spoke or constellation model for publishing, map out the content and media objects intended to perform for the target phrase in question. Audit them to see what has actually been optimized for the phrase. What new content assets will be created on a go forward relevant to the target phrase?

2. Search Results Landscape

Search for the phrase on Google and/or Bing (logged out) and document the URL, title and description for each of the top 10 search results:

What you’re looking for: Identify the type of websites and content that have high visibility on the target keyword phrase.  Capture information about the pages or digital assets that the search engine finds most relevant. Besides capturing the title, description and web address, note the types of content and sources – commercial, non-commercial, web page vs. media or local. It’s helpful to know what kinds of content as well as which websites/pages the search engine finds most relevant for the phrase and topic. If the search engine favors video content, PDF files and news sources, then it might mean an adjustment in your content marketing media mix for that phrase.

SEO Drill Down: More data about the SERP can be quite useful to log including: Content Type (web page, social, news, image, video thumbnail, local, product, pdf, MS Word doc), Content Category (Business, News, Blog, Media, University). Documenting the search results page over time can reveal trends such as whether the same pages maintain top positions, and what the diversity of content types is. Additional research into social signals is worth tracking as well. All such SERP analysis is performed while logged out.

With the level of personalization now in place with Google, savvy SEOs will have access to user accounts that exemplify the target audience persona’s online behaviors in order to trigger a personalized search experience that is similar to the customer segment.

Key Content Marketing questions:  According to your content plan, what types of content and media are you creating and what’s the difference between those media types and the categories/formats of content presented in search results for your target keyword phrases? It’s useful to know of the content marketing types in place for your efforts have any particular preference in the search results for the target phrase. If not, what other types of content, sources and media are in favor? Having a picture of the logged-out search results landscape for target keyword phrases can influence editorial decisions about formats used.  If blog posts are virtually ignored but press releases are favored, then it may be useful to leverage news story-style press releasees in addition to your blog posts.

This task is also used to collect information about content competitors for use in our other steps below.

3. Keyword Presence

Use the Advanced search option in Google or Bing to check for the presence of the target search phrase anywhere within the pages of your site. Refine that search to look for the exact match presence of the phrase in the title tags of your pages. 

What you’re looking for: Does the target keyword phrase exist within content on your site? If so, where?  It’s simply amazing how many companies expect traffic from certain keyword phrases when the target keywords are either not present in a significant way or not at all on the website.

SEO Drill Down: Further refinements might include looking for exact match of the phrase as well as variations and with modifiers. Look for the phrase in Title Tags, within H1 tags as headings, within body copy, within anchor text links between pages, as image alt text, annotations to images, video or other media, use within breadcrumb and navigation links.

Additional considerations include any page level barriers to a search engine finding or crawling links. Document the presence as well as the lack of presence for keywords in the areas commonly used by search engines to determine page relevancy.

A review of the top ranking pages documented in Step 2 above should also be checked for the presence of the target keyword phrase.

Key Content Marketing questions:  Are keywords being used in your PDF templates used to create eBooks, Reports or White Papers? Are digital assets such as infographics, videos, blog posts, press releases and other content marketing objects using keywords where relevant? Are keywords used in file names, folder names and navigation to content assets?

4. Inbound Link Footprint

Using a link tracking tool such as majesticseo.com or opensiteexplorer.org, check for the total number of links to the content assets that have been optimized for the target keyword phrase. Do the same review with the top 10 competing URLs found in step 1.

What you’re looking for: Links are like electricity for content when it comes to visibility in search results. Links are also important sources of direct traffic. If you expect a page or digital asset to be considered the “best answer” for a query by a search engine, keywords on the page are not enough. A quantity of links to a specific page will make it easy to find and also serves as a ranking signal.

The more topically relevant the content is of the link source, the better. Also the actual text used to link from another web page to your web page matters as well. “Click here” for our White paper and Get “More info” on our Newsletter are not nearly as useful as “Download our Red Widget Whitepaper” or “Sign Up for our Product XYZ Newsletter” when it comes to anchor text.

SEO Drill Down:  Using advanced features of link analysis tools, check for the quantity and diversity characteristics of links to target pages. Also check for the on-topic relevance of the link sources. How authoritative are the link sources? What is the context? Is it a news story in a major industry publication or is it one of 200 links on the same page pulled together by automated software?  Look at the types of links: text, image, follow vs. no follow, redirect, placement on page (high, low), number of links on the page, context for the link, overall topic. How many links use the target keyword phrase as anchor text? How many variations of the target phrase are used? What is the rate of link acquisition over time for your optimized page?

Besides performing this link research on your own optimized pages for target keywords, it can be useful to review this data on the content competition identified in Step 1 for benchmarking and comparison purposes as well as to identify new linking opportunities for your own content.

Key Content Marketing questions: As you craft relevant content in alignment with target customers and their stage in the buying cycle, think about how you’re promoting that content to attract inbound links from relevant websites. Social networks (Step 5) can have a significant impact on the reach of the content you promote, but social isn’t the only channel of distribution. If your white papers, case studies, archived newsletters and webinars get links from other sites that have commenting functionality, be sure to publicly thank them in a relevant comment. Link out from your blog to get on the radar of industry bloggers and they may link to the next press release, infographic or report that you publish.

5. Social Shares

Check for social shares of the target URLs on your site that are most relevant for the search phrase in question. Do the same for the top 10 competing URLs found in step one.

What you’re looking for: Is your content being shared on the social web? It’s not a “nice to have” anymore. Social engagement and sharing of your content is absolutely essential in order to gain advantage within search and social distribution of your content. Social media optimization of your content is essential and includes making it easy for readers to share your content to their social networks as well as having an active social presence that’s focused on building up a community you can promote content to. Documenting the presence of social shares for your own content and that of the top 10 competing URLs form Step 1 can help identify opportunities.

SEO Drill Down: For the content that you’ve created, optimized and built links to, document the presence, frequency and sources of social media shares. Do so at regular intervals in the way you might take snapshots of the SERPs page for your most important target keyword phrases. Social shares means links within public Facebook posts, Tweets, public Google+ shares, Q/A sites like Quora and even bookmarking/news services. Pay attention to the presence of keywords along with those socially shared links and whether they are congruent with your keyword targets.

Beyond link sharing on social sites, look for social engagement with your content where there’s commenting functionality. Cross promotion with different social channels such as blog, video, image, document hosting (Slideshare) as well as social networks like Twitter and Google+ can provide rich signal for both search engines and users.

Key Content Marketing questions: While social network participation for content marketers is often focused on the social channel conversation relevant to the buying cycle and customer segments, it’s also important to consider broader visibility. In other words, when it comes to social promotion and shares as well as network size, bigger is better. As always, a quantity of quality (relevance) is the ideal. At the same time, the size of your network determines the universe of exposure.  In other words, the more Facebook and Google+ fans/friends you have, the greater the likelihood that your shared content will be seen overall. Facebook’s recent report showed on average, you are more than 7 times more likely to share a link on Facebook if you’ve seen the link from one of your friends, so get friendly and grow your network.

Social media and it’s direct influence on search visibility is a reality and content marketers must consider not only the topical relevance of the content they create, the keywords and links but also social promotion, sharing and engagement.

Another consideration for Content Marketers and the Social SEO equation is the importance of Author authority and trust. Officially there may be no such thing as “TrustRank” at Google, but with the forced Google+ accounts, Author Markup and unified user data sharing across Google services, trust associated with a user is clearly important.  An individual who has a significant social network, produces a quantity of quality content that a community actively engages with will have distinct advantages when promoting content over a brand that publishes generically.  Content Marketers should factor in named entities of individuals and/or the brand itself and what it will take to create a relevant presence to be considered authoritative for important topics.

Conclusion:

Clearly the dynamic and increasingly complicated nature of today’s search engines can make the reliability of any one conclusion valuable for an indeterminate period of time. That’s why, if search traffic is important to your business, that your business has an experienced professional analyzing search, social and website performance data on a regular basis. As content marketers, we put a lot of hard work into planning, creating and managing thoughtful content designed to attract, engage and inspire readers to become customers, advocates and participants in the brand community. Keeping tabs on how those community members and customers discover our content is essential for it’s ability to have an impact.

If you like this type of advice, then be sure to pick up a copy of Optimize: How to Attract and Engage More Customers by Integrating SEO, Social Media and Content Marketing (Wiley) available March 13.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2012. |
5 Basic SEO Troubleshooting Tips for Content Marketers | http://www.toprankblog.com

This article was originally posted on the Online Marketing Blog

As an author, frequent speaker at industry conferences, advisor to clients and the people who serve our clients, there’s a sense of urgency for me to stay current and to understand what current events in the digital marketing world mean in the context of individual situations. It’s not enough to observe that news events and trends are happening, but to understand what those observations mean as it relates to impact on business, on customers and how to continue the pursuit of successful online marketing.

Simply finding and sharing news ala basic ”curation” is a cheap commodity. Value comes from identifying bigger picture patterns and synthesizing that information into practical business advice.  I like what Christian Adams said in a G+ thread, “When you have information overload across multiple channels you start to pick up on common threads and trending topics”. This is the essence of curation that creates value and there’s no substitute for human filtering.

In Avinash Kaushik’s recent post, “The 2015 Digital Marketing Rule Book. Change or Perish” one of his 7 Rules for Digital Marketing Revolutionaries concerns the need for marketing practitioners (which is applicable to professionals in any industry) to extend their expertise beyond core skills. “You can no longer be good at just one thing, or two. It is a 10-thing world now (and maybe a 20-thing world soon).”

As a professional, it’s essential for you to filter signal from a mass of noise to grow expertise in your core discipline as well as others. The question is, where do you get the information to stay current? How do you filter out the noise?

After writing most of this post I tried the new quick video post feature on my Google+ account to ping the smart connections I have there for their ideas on how to stay current. While some people still use RSS via Google Reader, usage of the traditional RSS feed has been displaced by Twitter lists, Google+ circles and more so what Shel Holtz called “curated collections” like what you can find at SmartBrief and PR Daily newsletters. Other curated news services mentioned include paper.li, Percolate, news.me, Pulse, FlipBoard and the recently acquired Summify. Trunk.ly is another useful service that works with Twitter but is being shut down.

Below is a screenshot and here’s a link to see everyone’s full comments. Thanks to Shel Holtz, Scott Duehlmeier, Christopher Drinkut, Ash Buckles, Christian Adams and Corey McNeil for chiming in.

While I’ve been able to gain a lot of knowledge and insight over the past 14 years of being in this business, I know that I’m only getting a fraction of what I’d like to know. Every day is a learning experience. Every day is massive piece of humble pie working with a great team at our agency. Transparency, competition and information availability means earning your stripes every day. I think that perspective works pretty well as evidenced by the growth and quality of our team and client roster.

There are many people who have asked me how I stay current and on top of what’s important in the online marketing and PR world. Some of what I do is scheduled and methodical. Some is more intuitive and opportunistic. Both types of activities are guided by a pursuit of wisdom and an interest in being able to provide high value insight to others that will help our business grow. I have a feeling some of our readers are in the same boat: wanting to find ways to stay informed and several steps ahead.

Here are a few of the things that I do to stay current and on top of not only what’s  happening in the Search, Social Media, PR and Content Marketing world, but what it means for developing relationships, solving problems and growing the business.

1. Read social feeds & email. I typically do this between 4:30 and 6am. I’ll bookmark articles & media for later use and reading, taking notes on each item. I’ll also queue sharing with social networks and share insights internally. Evernote ROCKS for managing this.

2. Meet with my right hand marketer.  You may have noticed Ashley posting here frequently. She’s our Marketing Manager here at TopRank Online Marketing and we regularly discuss all sorts of content, social media, email, event, website, blog and book related topics – every day.

3. Meet with our group of Account Managers on tactical case studies, observations/insights into successes with client Content, Social, Email, PPC, SEO programs. We also discuss situations that need resolving. It’s great to see the AMs working together to identify solutions. Our AMs are project managers and consultants that directly interact with both clients and internal subject matter experts. They are on the front-lines of what it means to develop online marketing strategy, make recommendations, oversee implementation, measure results and work to identify new opportunities. Their insights into daily marketing problems and solutions is priceless.

4. Review our own Analytics & Reports: I’ve been watching key metrics related to our blog and website for a very long time. Traffic, links, search data, time on site, inquiries and other goal page activity paint an interesting picture when overlaid with external KPIs like social shares, comments, links and media mentions.

5. Marketing TopRank – Several of these tasks are related to marketing for our agency but I am involved with some of our marketing initiatives but developing approach and having things tested out to see what we might scale or adjust for better performance. Being able to test online marketing, SEO and Social Media Marketing tactics out on our own sites has been incredibly valuable over the years when it comes to developing first-hand knowledge that can be shared with staff and clients.

6. Talk with Customers – Every time I get to talk to one of our clients, I learn invaluable lessons about how they see search, social and content marketing contributing to the success of their business.

7. Research & Write – Between blogging over 2,500 times and writing numerous contributed articles, I have found that developing writing skills has been one of the most profitable things I’ve ever done.  I’ve been writing a book over the past few months, which has taken considerable time in addition to daily work. The process of writing a book is not for the faint of heart, but it has made me smarter and more strategic in how I view modern online marketing strategy.

8. Research & Presentations – Another profitable investment (in terms of knowledge and for our business) has been speaking at events. The research and preparation for presentations requires an understanding of the subject matter that extends far beyond day to day familiarity.  Packaging content to be relevant to specific audiences as well as educational and entertaining means thinking that content through. The process helps create mental models for explaining key concepts and can serve as a basis for many other forms of content creation.

9. Research and Training – One of the big initiatives I have this year is to develop internal training beyond the things we’ve established so far. Identifying external sources of training such as industry conferences and workshops for our team to attend as well as building our own workshops for internal use and for our clients is another situation that calls for thoughtful consideration, planning and packaging. Related to presentations, I’m also involved with providing SEO or Social SEO to other agencies (especially PR agencies) and marketing communications departments within companies. Collecting case studies, examples and keeping tactics current keeps me on my mental toes.

10. Connect with Industry Peers - In the time I’ve been publicly active in the internet marketing and PR world, I’ve been able to make some incredible connections with amazingly smart people. Outside of working with our internal team of consultants, there is no substitute when it comes to gaining high value information than connecting with other professionals that are as passionate and fanatical about marketing and online business as you are.

11. Revisit Social Streams - This is a later in the evening activity but it’s a good way to end the work part of the day and get ideas for the next. Using Google Reader, Hootsuite, Disqus and other tools, identify any new articles worth reading, cluster them together according to theme and take notes. I’ll take time to focus on mainstream media publications, not just industry blogs and news websites.

Another approach to staying current is to form a mastermind group. I first head of this from reading Napoleon Hill many years ago and it’s even more powerful now. Find likeminded professionals and agree to connect on collective and individual areas of focus. A mastermind is not only about sharing information but working with each other to achieve goals.

I don’t do all these things every day of course, but it represents a number of the things that have been instrumental in keeping me close to tactics as well as in line with more strategic perspectives on new events and industry changes.  Would reading my email and social feeds for 10 min a day be a better alternative to free up time for other business tasks? Maybe, but then I wouldn’t be able to output as much as I do or bring as much value that results in better service to customers, a healthier social network and a growing business.

If staying current and informed is essential for your job, how do you keep up to date? How do you make each day a positive learning experience?

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2012. |
11 Ways to Get Smarter & Stay Current in a World of Social Information Overload | http://www.toprankblog.com

This article was originally posted on the Online Marketing Blog

Whenever you are involved in an ORM (Online Reputation Management) campaign, your goal is to displace negative results in the search engines with positive results. In a previous post we looked at creating microsites. In this post, we are going to look at leveraging social media profiles.

As with every search result in Google, the top results are generally made up of the most trusted and authoritative results, so it makes the most sense for us to talk about the most trusted authoritative social media sites at the moment: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google plus.

Facebook

Facebook is by far one the most popular and visited sites in social media; however, for many people, it can also be the most problematic. The most common issue on Facebook is people or their friends posting unflattering or unflattering status updates or pictures. That status update or pic from that party weekend in Cancun where you …. let’s just not even mention it again … may have been funny at the time, but it’s not funny when you are applying for a job, trying to get the condo board to think you are a qualified, responsible tenant, or trying to prove that drunk driving incident really wasn’t you. Thanks to Facebook’s new timeline feature, it makes it incredibly easy for someone to skim through your profile and isolate those “wild college years.” My suggestion? Create a “close friends” group and edit all those items so only they can see them (see How to Create a Friend List). Alternatively, you could “go nuclear” and just block all the old info on your timeline. It’s much more drastic but also a lot more bulletproof.

If you are a company, you may not have those drunken college years to contend with, but you may not have a rich history, or even a profile. If you don’t have a profile, start one. I’d link to a resource but, to be honest, Facebook changes so often that the link would need to be updated every few months. Instead, just Google it [how to create a business profile on facebook].

Sadly, we all now have to treat our Facebook status updates like a Public Relations team. Don’t post anything outlandish or crazy that you don’t want to be associated with. An alternative course is to regularly post completely off the wall crazy information that is completely unbelievable. This gives you a bit of wiggle room and allows you to have plausible deniability. This really is only an option for personal accounts and not businesses.

Twitter

The next site you need to focus on is Twitter. Again, if the person or company you are doing ORM for doesn’t have an account, you’ll need to get one going ASAP. The more trusted and authoritative your Twitter account is, the better it will rank in the SERPs. While Klout isn’t perfect, it’s a good place to start. If the Twitter account isn’t posting content now on a regular basis, you’ll need to start. To get the most out of social media with the least amount of time, I suggest using Hootsuite and or Bufferapp (see How to be Involved on Twitter in Less than an Hour a day). Post good content, share good links, respond when someone talks to you (using the @ symbol). If you want to drive your Klout score up, get followed by people who already have a high Klout score. Have conversations back and forth with them ( it’s the back and forth that really counts). This advice holds true for a business account as well as for a personal one.

LinkedIn

Most people who have jobs have, at the very least, a LinkedIn account. If they haven’t changed jobs or at least tried to get new job in the past few years, their LinkedIn profile is probably outdated and could use some updating. Within the past few years, LinkedIn has added the ability to create company pages (see creating company profiles on LinkedIn). If you are doing ORM for a company, please ask all of your key employees to create profiles and to update their profiles to link to the company profile.

Google Plus

Google Plus is the latest serious player in the social media profile space. At the time this post was written Google had made some serious aggressive changes to “force” Google Plus results, giving them higher and greater exposure. Whether this is a long term change that will stick remains to be seen. At the very least the person you are doing ORM work for should claim and create a Google Plus profile. However, for maximum results, they will need to verify the profile and connect it to articles or posts they have written (see How To Create A Google Author Account). If you are doing ORM for a business or organization, see how to create a Google plus profile for your business. Again, these services are in flux so the actual steps may change.

You could simply set up these profiles, but to get the most out of them you need to keep them looking as “lived in” as possible. That means updating semi-regularly and connecting or being friends with other users and having a dialog or conversation with some of them. With the exception of Google+, all of these services have API’s so you can update them with tools on a scheduled basis such as Hootsuite or Bufferapp.

Once you have these accounts looking lived in, you can start pointing links to them. You want to use optimal anchor text (ie, the person’s name or name of the company in most cases). However, you do want there to be some variation. If 100% of the links pointing to a site have a 100% anchor text match, it look manipulated and and artificial, so mix it up a bit. You can do some interlinking but be careful: interlinking all of them, creating a nest of sites, link brothel, or artificial link pyramid designed just to manipulate link equity will stick out and will probably be discounted.

While I only spoke about four social sites in this article, there are hundreds of websites you can create profiles on for ORM. It doesn’t make sense to try and set up and populate all of them. If you want to establish them and prevent someone else from squatting on them, use a service like KnowEm. Once you have them secured, you can cherry pick the best or most appropriate ones to flesh out and work with.

So what are the takeaways from this post:

• When performing ORM, set up and register individual or business profiles
• The most important services currently are Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google Plus
• Use a service like KnowEm to secure secondary profiles
• Flesh out the most important or relevant profiles
• Come up with a plan for updating the profiles on a regular basis
• Develop and interlink the profiles without making it look overly manipulated
• Give the profiles a human feel and build trust signal by having back and forth conversations, interactions, and engagement with other profiles, especially profiles with established trust signals

photo credit: Shutterstock/82048177

No related posts.

This post originally came from Michael Gray who is an SEO Consultant. Be sure not to miss the Thesis WordPress Theme review.

Using Social Media Profiles for ORM

This article was originally posted on the Graywolf’s SEO Blog

The Social Job Seekers

The social media job market is hot! This infographic visualizes the 2011 Social Job Seeker Survey that was conducted by Jobvite.  It examines who the job seekers are and how they are utilizing social media to find jobs.  Some interesting statistics you may not be aware of:

• 61% of all employed Americans are open to a new job or actively looking for a new one.
• 4 out of 10 job seekers are “Super Social” and have 150+ contacts on Facebook, Twitter, or Linkedin.
• 1 in 6 job seekers found their last job through an online social network.

This Week in News About Google

“How to Get Actionable Data Out of Google Analytics”  Proper goal setting is second to none when running a website or blog.  If your goals are not properly setup then you are missing out on the most actionable metrics of your website.  This article provides some great tips on setting up and measuring your website goals.  Via KISSmetrics.

“Pages With Too Many Ads “Above The Fold” Now Penalized By Google’s “Page Layout” Algorithm”  Do you shove lots of ads at the top of your web pages? Think again.  The “page layout algorithm”  takes direct aim at any site with pages where content is buried under tons of ads. Via Search Engine Land.

“Google+ Now Lets You Share Straight From Search Results”  Aimed at making it easier for users to join or start discussions on particular topcis, Google+ has recently beefed up their search capabilities.  Additionally, Google+ will automatically attach search terms to your posted items.  Via Mashable.

“Google Real-Time Insight Finder”  This tool helps users make sense of data and spot emerging trends more quickly.  It also allows companies to gain insight in to attitudes, perceptions, and needs of your consumers so that you can adjust your strategy quickly to meet their needs.  Via YouTube.

“Google+ brands growing faster than brands on Twitter?”  A statistical comparison by Socialbakers shows that brands are growing their fan bases faster on Google+ than brands on Twitter.  How is this happening?  Read on to find out.  Via Socialbakers.

Connect with TopRank on Google+

Content Marketing for the Masses

“3 Content Marketing Ideas You Should Steal from Coca Cola” Heavy hitter Coca Cola has realized that a 30 second advertisement will no longer cut it.  They have instead turned to content marketing , which aims to double Coca Cola worldwide consumption by 2020.  Via copyblogger.

“3 (more) business blogging tips for beginners”  If you are one of the many bloggers with a new years resolution that includes doing more with your blog, then this post is for you.  What is the first step?  Be realistic!  Via SEO Copywriting.

“How to Overcome the 7 Most Crippling Blogging Challenges”  Time to take the “but’s” out of blogging.  This article does a great job of providing solutions for many of the excuses would be bloggers have today.  Via socialmediatoday.

The Social Media Beat

“7 Ways To Improve Your Social Media Skills and Influence” Social media sharing is still a very new role for many employees.  This article helps prepare newbies and social media dabblers for life in a social world.  Via Forbes.

“9 Small Business Social Media Success Stories”  Case studies speak for themselves.  Applying a real life example of success can make a large impact on your perception of a tactic or marketing strategy.  This post provides 9 great examples of how social media has helped small businesses grow.  Via Social Media Examiner.

“Facebook Expands Service That Lets Users Share Online Activities”  Facebook announced this week that they are adding over 60 new partners to a service which will allow users to let their friends know what they’re doing online from listening to music to news articles they are viewing.  Via Bloomberg.

“Twitter Acquires Social Aggregation Start-Up Summify”  Following Twitter’s other recent acquisitions it was announced today that Summify, a social news aggregation service has also been acquired.  If you’re a Summify user beware! Services will shut down in a few weeks.  Via Wired.

From the TopRank Newsroom

Alexis Hall – “Average Viewer Watched 23.2 Hours of Online Video Content in December”
According to the latest research from comScore Video Metrix, the average viewer watched 23.2 hours of online video content in December 2011.  That is a lot of time people are spending online, engaged with this channel. This post from Search Engine Watch discusses the impact of this research on marketers, including the reach of video advertising on YouTube.  Via Search Engine Watch.

Brian Larson – “PIPA and SOPA Co-Sponsors Abandon Bills”
SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) is on the minds of many marketers. From image sharing and content curation, to linking and keyword research, SOPA has the potential to drastically change the way we create, share, promote and optimize content. With the co-sponsor’s abandoning the bill, is this a sign that the public outcry was heard?  Via Mashable.

Ken Horst – “Twitter is adding 11 new accounts per second and could pass 500 million in February, says report”
If anyone is still holding out on starting a Twitter account, now would be the time to start thinking about it.  When Twitter hits 500 million, it will be very hard not to acknowledge Twitter as a strong channel for online marketing.  The trick is how to leverage Twitter and you can learn that by reading our post from earlier this month; 4 B2C Examples of How Companies are Using Twitter to Attract & Engage Customers.  Via The Next Web.

Emily Conley – “Yahoo’s Co-founder Jerry Yang Resigns”
Just weeks after the announcement of new CEO Scott Thomson joining Yahoo, the company’s co-founder Jerry Yang has announced his resignation.  Thompson called Yang’s 17 years with Yahoo a legacy of innovation and customer focus for the iconic brand.  2012 is shaping up to be an eventful year for Yahoo.  It will be noteworthy to follow how these changes trickle down to impact the world of SEO!  Via Search Engine Land.

Time to Weigh In:  What do you think of Google’s new search tactics?  Have they taken it too far?  Also, what other newsworthy items did you read this week that you think should be shared with our readers?

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2012. |
Online Marketing News: Say NOPA to SOPA, Google+ Strikes Again, Coca Cola “Gets It”, Twitter Gobbles Up Summify | http://www.toprankblog.com

This article was originally posted on the Online Marketing Blog