SEO in 2014 - Be the business you want to be, and SEO follows

Search engine optimization (SEO) strategies and results have changed faces a lot over the years, but there is one strong strategy that will always work. 

I came around to write on websites when silly black hat techniques still worked, when we as internet users were overriddled with nonsense websites that did not deserve the top spot in search results.  I have been doing on-page SEO before the Google animals were introduced.  I have also spent a few sleepless nights whenever animal updates were up, and I and co-workers had to re-write content quick, or substanitally lose customers.  I focused my work elsewhere for sometime, and when I came back, boy, the SEO strategy changes were fast and too many!  I felt kind of threatened, unsure if I can keep up with the rapid changes.

The good news is there will always be that overarching, unchanging SEO strategy that worked before, and still works now, regardless of software and apps that were introduced, or no matter how organic search seemed to have become so complex with the details.  In the old days of search, just having the root words in so many mentions is enough.  These days, I still see job adverts that look for SEO writers and require them to write 10 articles per day on the same topic, and I wonder how far this kind of speedy, quality-at-risk, unsustainable practice will take the business. 

Content that talks to people automatically qualifies for good SEO

Personally, I find it strange why current SEO requirements have to be uptight about quantity and repetition.  I have seen that regularly talking to website users - addressing their needs, identifying their concerns and answering questions - will easily fill up the website with quality content that people will find and go back to, and forward to their friends.   

Search engines might at first glance look like they are after quantities of words, but really they aim to capture human interaction in the web that will benefit other people as well. It just happens that keyword mentions and links indicate that real interaction is happening, but this cannot be faked by long articles that no one bothers to look at.

By communicating with customers, these quantities of keywords easily fill up search engine optimization requirements, even without thinking about it.  When search engine spiders see that not only do you have a keyword rich site, and that people are responding using your keywords, and linking to it, and having users' friends come over and mention all those keywords too, then the spiders know your website is a reliable, recognized source in your industry or niche. 

This also means that, as you get to know your customers, marketing ideas will open to let you tweak your website and pages frequently.  Make your web pages easy to use.  Make it a pleasure to buy from your website.  Be the business you want to be, just online:  strong, reliable, trustworthy.  All these will have effect on your SEO, you will see.

By thinking about your customers first, you will then find that your snippet in Google search results does not capture what your customers want from that page.  You will wonder why you rank top three for this keyword when all you ever wanted was to rank no.1 for the other keyword.  So you will think, and ponder, and see connections that hey, my target market shows recurring patterns in preference for this, that's why my main keyword is not working so well.  So you and your SEO team adjust.  And after you do, then SEO results adjust, then customers adjust, and traffic behavior changes, then you adjust, etc. etc. At this point, you and your target market are interacting, and SEO will see human interaction really is happening on your website.

Some side activities that are important for SEO in 2014

I call these activities because, even if they are called SEO strategies, they are SEO tasks that yield to attainment of the SEO strategy.  These tasks interest people to approach you, maybe talk to you, and ask their friends to come near as well.

Make content that people need and like.  Infographics, guest postings and items that may go viral make people like your site, your company and your product.  These may not be out to directly sell your product, but it puts your product at the back of their heads for something to watch out for, and engage in in the future.

Ensure your analytics and user testing are in place.  From there you can continuously monitor if your keywords are working and if more should be added.  You can also use it to check if your website changes are working for people.  User testing is also an important component that gets to the root of how you should write your copy, how easy or difficult it is for potential buyers to do what they want to do, etc.  Use these well. As mentioned, by going after the interests of the customers and fixing your website accordingly for them, even the SEO  improves indirectly. 

Old school, on-page SEO.  After presenting your item comprehensively and presenting clear, easy to understand information after the interests of customers, give a quick run-over of the page and check that it complies with SEO standards.  You will be surprised, that with little tweaks (or none at all), it will usually come up to SEO standards.




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My "Formal" Internet Voice,

... does not sound like me.

Flipping through my posts, I'm all serious and criticizing and whotsit. I sound like this:

When really, I look like this as I type:  

Maybe it's the topic?  Maybe, maybe.. maybe....  Excuses.  Okay, I'll just accept I'm a Tard.  For now.


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Blogging in the Age of Microposts

It feels kind of strange having to write long posts again.

We are so used to tweeting in 140 characters, fb posting in as fewest sentences as possible (if at all), pinning pics, instagramming pics and vids, etc etc.

Blogging feels kind of retro now, reminiscent of a seemingly distant past, but we all know it's not so distant.  It's just that tech changes have been on uppers, behavior patterns on tech usage whiz by just as fast.  Before we know we've changed, another set of behavior is the it behavior.

But nothing beats having the venue to explain things as short and/ or as long as the reader wants...

Still and always be about the reader/ user.

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Office desk and chair on my mind

Office furniture is pretty much on my mind these days as I am preparing to come back to working from home.  When one works at home, simple furniture such as one's desk and chair is taken for granted.

My unsolicited two cents for you, work from home-r, is spend on your work areas.  After all, it's where you sit going to and from your work, and incidentally, also where you work.  lol. If you have the means to, but just don't want to, allocate a bit more for your:

-  comfort.  Helps you work long and fast hours.
-  some white space.  Helps you breathe, which makes you relaxed, making you more focused, making you more productive.
-  posture.  Take care of your body, and this includes having the right posture as you work for hours on end.
-  prettiness factor.  If where you are inspires you, all those long hours pass by quickly, with better results.

 I'm still looking, and haven't found the perfect office desk for me yet.  I'm also planning on having a small computer desk for the balcony. and also a portable, when-I-feel-like-it-I-stand-up work table.  All this, even if I now live in a tiny shoebox.

Warning: I will bore you in future posts about desks and chairs.  ;-)

Help me out please, post links to pics of your favorite desks and chairs.  I need some inspiration besides the usual ones we see in local stores.



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Use your web space efficiently with copy relevant to customers

Summary:  When writing product copy, consider the page where the copy will appear in, note what you want the web user to do in that page.  Then attract, interest and build desire in potential customers through giving relevant information on why the product will be useful to them.  You have just a few seconds to do so, so put the meat right in. Whimsy copy is useless and turns off customers.

----

Finally, one local coupon site has stopped using psycho and useless product copy.  Hallelujah!
Another site who does this practice has hidden the weird copy in the middle of the product page.
 The only local coupon site that I've seen who used copy optimally is Cashcash.  The others were just yikes.  (Or maybe I'm not subscribed so I missed it.)

As a loyal customer and a copywriter for usability, I always cringed at their weird product copy.

Example:

 ... Traditionally, lasers have been used to point out important portions of slideshow presentation, to shrink one's children, or as a super villain's go-to weapon of mass destruction.  Find out what good things lasers can do for you with...   ?

This is from an email I received just this June.  

As of today,  their site only has 1 product with weird copy, the others are more efficiently written.  

 The writer definitely knows how to write, but it is big waste of web real estate.  I click these ads when I want to buy something, and I expect the blurb on the email to tell me:  

• a bit more about the product,
• if the feature I'm excited about is mentioned, or 
• if  I have a question, seeing it answered immediately on the snippet under the attractive picture.

Any of these would really excite me to click "View It" to lead on to the product page.  And of course, if all information and terms are satisfactory to me, I would buy at that very moment.

In writing copy, let us treat each page as having its own objective.  Then we write according to that objective. In the photo I posted above, the conversion objective is:  to click on the View It! button that leads to the product page.  I am not clicking to read on shrinking one's children.  Truth to tell, since I did not glance at the title, I didn't know what the product was.  If I liked the picture and price, I would click the button, but the desire for buying is held off until the next page, when desire to buy could have been built directly on the email received, even before landing on the product page.  Time is wasted.

Unfortunately, hurt as it may, but as your buyer too, I can say that most of your sales come from the pictures, the price, the no-nonsense product headline, and in the product page.  But that blurb, it turns me off, and I'm sure a lot of us cringe at those blurbs because it's (sorry) quite cheesy, given the context.  In the past, there were instances when I see people in my timelines snickering about the product copy.  Many times, I have been impatient with this copy as it is not helpful and quite annoying and takes up my time when all I want is to learn more about the product.  

 I am not sure if it's a management policy to write this way, or a personal preference of the writer, but whoever decided to stop it, well, props to you.




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Great example of internet marketing campaign in the Philippines

SM plays smart internet marketing with the Sarah Jessica Parker campaign.

As I have recently resurrected this blog, one of the last posts from 2012 was SM finally advertising in an email site.  I wanted to find out the update so this morning, at the office, I logged in to my Yahoo mail.

I found... tada!, Sarah Jessica Parker endorsing dresses for SM.

Good call, I noted, and showed it to my cynical office mate.  Her face lit up first, then smirked when she noted it was from the masses' department store.

What?  I asked her.

"Why did they choose her?  And is she endorsing their higher end dresses?"  Clearly, she was cynical of the effectiveness of the endorser vis-a-vis SM's market.

I explained that for this web campaign, SJP was perfect.  I love nitpicking through marketing strategies, especially online ones.

For the web users ages 30s-40s, Sarah Jessica Parker is the perfect endorser.

First, this was advertised in Yahoo mail.

Yahoo mail people are in their late 20s (if any, lol) but mostly 30s and 40s.

Yes, these are the same people who were around when Sex and the City was THE default setting for cool.

Sarah Jessica is the goddess for shoes and dresses if you knew that show.

And yes, these same people who still use Yahoo, associate Sarah Jessica with dresses and shoes coincidentally are also earning now AND surely can afford those dresses and shoes... and wait! also do the grocery shopping, hold the toys shopping budget for their kids, etc etc.

"And since you now have money, of course you won't buy your dresses from SM.  But now they have SJP to lure you back in to SM to buy dresses at first. And since you're there anyway, this will also carry on to buying everything  else from them -- food, equipment, toys, hardware..  Salamat kay Sarah Jessice Parker." *evil laugh*  Muhahaha ... I love it!

I concluded, if only for the internet marketing side, this campaign is brilliant. SM may or may not use SJP's ads in print, I think. For the Filipino internet users though, who identify with her and have the spending powers, Sarah Jessica Parker is perfect,  and advertising at the Yahoomail log in page is smart.

Again, great work, SM marketing and web team!

But of course, the best metric is still sales, so I wonder how that plays out. But still, this is very well played.



PS.  Tonight, I sauntered over to the Yahoo mail log in, but saw Ramon Bautista for Smart instead.  Brilliant use of scheduling for accessbility of the target market.  Mornings for email are the best times to flash your dress ads for the working ladies/ mommies.

Yey.  I love how they know their market.

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I totally loved this when I saw this a year or two ago. I just had to say it to my computer-psycho kid then.  Someone re-posted it today, but now I tell my kid the opposite.  He much prefers to be downloaded, I think (and over at Pirate Bay too, for additional irreverence).

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Internet Trends Happening Too Fast, Not Furious

Seeing that my last blog entries are from almost three years ago, I cannot help but marvel at how vast the differences are in lifestyle now and then.  These differences in integrating lifestyle and internet use directly reflect things I have missed in my online work, since, technically, even if I reported to a brick and mortar office, the circumstance is that I almost live under the rock (internet skills wise).

Top differences in internet use that happened too fast under your nose you barely noticed it:

• Of course, the convenience and dependence on mobile gadgets. And we have finally come to that age when we can carry our internet with us everywhere.  We get to pick whether we view it in large, medium, or small, thanks to tablets, large phones and smart phones.  I used to have a hard time getting to chat with my sibs thrown everywhere.  It was always a pain to have everyone pasted in front of their computer, camera and microphone.  And I never realized we would all suddenly be able to talk because of the smart phone.  Yup, still using the phone, but only because of the internet.
• Internet speed, definitely up.  I knew the day would come that all of us would zoom through our surfing, movie watching, uploading, downloading, but I never expected it to happen (even to my country with greedy internet caps) in a year or two.  I don't even need to buy movies now.  Never expected I could go watch a movie anytime even if I was huddled in a corner toting just my phone.
• And because of handy gadgets and speedy access, everyone talks everywhere.  Finally, it's the consumer who gets to have a say now.  The once 1-way communicators, the big companies, politicians, and other opinion makers, have finally gotten the message that customers like to talk to them, and they talk quite a lot.  And customers/ clients/ stakeholders expect to be replied to.  So be very careful about throwing your weight around.
• We used to tell our stories through text and pictures, now it's a happy assortment of copy, still and moving visuals, and sound.  Opinion makers, wanna-be opinion makers, and people who just want to share get to pick the sense they find it easiest to appeal to the most.  Because of the speed and convenience, instagram, video uploads, soundcloud, pinterest, maps, weather updates from the other side of the planet are easy to use, putting the followee and the followers in total control of their preferences.  
• Integration of all media, accessible in one gadget of choice - net, phone, tv casts, radio, etc.  Taking one media venue and being able to access all of them in one big or small gadget (whatever you prefer, like I said) blows my mind away.  

For my friends who scan through my ancient posts, you will notice how I like comparing the current to the recent past.  I am fond of this exercise as I like being awed at the rapid changes escaping me in the present.

I am writing all these things down for me to ponder on what issues to address for my internet marketing studies.  As I sift through these happenings, I am content.  These are fast, happy times for the internet-using public.




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Why Hire Online Filipino Workers?

Would it be worth it to hire online freelance workers from the Philippines?  Even Google and Yahoo does not encourage telecommuting anymore.  Why should I if the gurus have tested it and seen it does not work?

My observation all these years is: Not all people with an internet connection can work at home.  However, there is a very small percent of people who DO thrive, perform well and even enjoy working for you, regardless of physical location.

So my answer to your question is, yes, it would be worth it to hire online Filipino workers because:

• They continue the work you need done as you spend time with your families and on yourself (because of the time difference).
• As you come in to work, the work for those hours off are now done.
• You will have the time to strategize and grow your business, as the little things (maybe even big ones) are being taken care of.
• The real online workers have the initiative to work on their own, with minimum supervision
• They research how to do tasks if there is a small detail they do not know how to do, and learn quick.
• Filipinos find it easy to talk to you in English, at least better than other online counterparts.
• A lot are university-trained and can tackle advanced, strategic or managerial tasks as well.
• A lot are respectful, honest, and hard working

When you do find your reliable and honest online worker, ensure they are comfortable and they will do a lot for you so you can focus on growing your business.

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You know internet marketing is finally mainstream in the Philippines when...

... when SM buys ad space in the Yahoomail sign-up page.

Gudjab, SM! (nice ad too, btw)

Do you have banner blindness in sign-up pages?

Hmm... now I'm thinking if people are so accustomed to having banner blindness on signup pages, especially in a page where they've been signing up for years... I wonder if it will be that effective (if the objective is getting people over to their FB or Twitter account). We'll only know if they check their traffic over at fb and twitter if the people came from the yahoomail signup page.

Not interested because...

For me, they got my attention, yes. However, I am not interested to click links leading to FB or Twitter because:

1) I want to sign in to my mail because I need something there (work-related). Have to attend to that now, the SM accessories online page can wait.
2) Since I'm an SM homegirl anyways, I have decided that next time I go there, I'll check the accessories department.

So, SM web team, do not lose heart if the traffic from the Yahoomail signup page is less than you expect. Lots of times, conversions manifest in the brick and mortar stores, not really online and traceable by web analytics.

For a big org like SM Department Store, most likely conversions of a campaign will happen offline.

 Still, like I said, good job!



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