The lessons of Google’s Panda algorithm update launched on February 24 are simple: (1) Don’t do black hat SEO. (2) Think hard about the risks of grey hat SEO. (3) Do what Google tells you in their extensive guidance pages. (4) Design good website usability. That is, put your human Read more…
My previous post discussed considerations in contracting with an SEM consultant, and concluded that you should (1) ask how the firm trains new and old employees and (2) interview the people who will actually work on your account. Here I address criteria for hiring in-house. My 2003 article “SEM: In-House Read more…
The hospital’s website rocks, but who the heck will be holding the scalpel over your anesthetized body? Likewise, a search marketing firm can sport a fantastic website, employ great sales people, be led by a luminary (who used to do the actual work), but success for your website depends entirely Read more…
In a recent post Rob painted a bleak picture of the SEO playing field for small businesses – that an ever increasing number of small businesses soon won’t be able to compete in the organic search space because of limited budgets and increasingly savvy and well invested competition. For some Read more…
In previous posts I discussed how to allocate investments in SEO, and DISC’s head PPC guy, Dale Webb, recently posted on determining your ideal PPC budget. Here, I try to help you understand that if you spend too little in monthly PPC management, you will pay more in click costs Read more…
If you decide to do SEO in-house, what tools should you use? Companies create SEO tools for link bait, leads, and cash flow if the tool is for sale. Those incentives have spawned literally thousands of SEO tools and scores of tool suits, both free and paid. How can you Read more…
You’ve climbed a mountain of information by which to decide how much to invest in SEO. Now you’ve got to pay for it. What are typical payment plans? When is it worth hiring in-house, and what are the pros and cons of doing so? One SEO payment plan that I’ve Read more…
Uh-Oh!: This post has lots of numbers and is not chatty, fun, or easy to read. It is intended for marketing managers who really want to figure out what to invest in SEO. You can read just the bold text for a quick overview. My post two weeks ago broached Read more…
So you’ve decided that you want the free, relevant traffic delivered by SEO, but how much should you invest? That’s one of the toughest questions you’ll ever have to answer, for it asks you to predict the ROI of SEO vs. all other web marketing. By mining in-house and industry Read more…
That depends on what you’re trying to rank for. Usually you can easily rank #1 for your company name (if it’s original). After that there’s a boatload of variables, some of which you can control, some of which you can’t. But since businesses always want to know if they can Read more…