SEO Diagnostics @ SES San Francisco 2012

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Diagnostics for the Skilled Search Mechanic

Speaker: Chris Boggs, SES Advisory Board; Director, Rosetta

This session at Search Engine Strategies San Francisco 2012 was one of the most valuable strategic guidance presentations during the entire SEO knowledge-packed week, which is saying a lot, as all the SEO presentations were top-shelf in terms of quality and value. Chris covered mission-critical steps anyone can take to help understand the true situation when confronted with poor or mediocre SEO. He then shows a path forward to fix problems and exploit opportunities on a prioritized basis.

First SEO Diagnosis Steps:

• Confirm the SEO problem exists
• Look at the log data
• Look at the analytics data

Second SEO Diagnosis Steps:

• Begin Assessment
• Look at off-site promotion
• Look at on-site promotion
• Look at website's technical status

Ask yourself: 

• Is the content still worthy? Unique? Up-to-date? 
• What are the competitors doing?
• Does your snippet still work for a keyword?
• Is the right webpage ranking high? 

Links:

• Review your linking strategy, as the Google Penguin updates are punishing low-original content sites and spammy sites which have heavily relied upon link-building for SERP rankings.
• Black-hat Negative SEO - - beware of competitors buying links to YOUR site to hurt you.
• Is your anchor text over-optimized, so that Penguin is punishing your site?

Social Media:

• If you're having SEO problems reviewing your social media activities will be valuable. Are you exploiting this growing area of search behavior? Are your competitors busy with social media postings and content? Evaluate your relative positioning with Social compared to your competition, and take steps.

Intelligent SEO Diagnosis will help
your SERPs stand out in the crowd.

After diagnosing and taking action - - Go BACK and RE-MEASURE. "Things change rapidly with SEO."

Chris Boggs emphasized that putting a priority on potential actions to take is crucial.... there is never going to be enough time, investment or knowledge to do it all. So our priorities for diagnosis and action must focus on the most lucrative fixes - those fixes we think which will generate the most profit at the end of the day. He stressed that SEO managers should be in 'diagnostic mode all the time' to get the most out of your efforts.

Chris stressed the 'sweet-spot' is when you are working on PROACTIVE fixes, not REACTIVE ones. Proactive actions include analysis of a new competitor, review of algorithm updates, catching market or industry shifts, and 'cleaning your own rifle' - - making sure your SEO campaigns are clean, efficient, and effective. Reactive fixes are similar to panic-driven actions - - scrambling to repair sudden losses in traffic, conversions, phone calls, email, etc. Better to avoid having to implememt damage control in the first place, with proactive diagnostic methodologies.
Common SEO problems may be caused by our own people. Serious problems can occur from our IT making changes  to pages which can hinder search engine bots (robots.txt), for example. Other SEO problems can originate from issues as simple as not using best practice for H1 and H2 titles. Your existing CMS system may be lousy, or inadvertently set-up to hurt your SEO efforts. Constantly  "check with your IT team!" is Chris' advice.
New competitors, or reinvigorated competitors, can cause SEO problems. "Check your competitive neighborhood". Use analytical tools to drill-down, analyze, and see those important "Uh Oh" moments.
Chris listed a number of useful SEO tools he likes, including Bright Edge, Google Webmaster Tools, URI Valet, Majestic, Raven, and SEOMOZ.
At the end, Chris emphasized that the best SEO diagnosis and fix is good content. "Content is still King". Links will still have place in SEO, though deliberate at-scale link-building campaigns are losing value thanks to Penguin. Chris stressed don't ignore social media. Matt Cutts from Google himself pointed in a direction where Google will search deeper and rank social media content more highly than in the past. This all points to having great, original content on  your website as a prime proactive step which can be taken to improve your SEO and SERPs.
My other take on this presentation and many others at SES is that we should learn to exploit Big Data (analytics) as much as possible. Conducting SEO campaigns without factual website analytics knowledge to help guide us is similar to driving a car with just one eye open, a lot can be missed!

Paid Search Marketing Wisdom @ SES San Francisco 2012

Pay Per Click Analytics Marketing Tips at SES San Francisco 2012

I attended as many PPC focused sessions at SESSF 2012 as I could. The presentation by Steve Latham and Crispin Sheridan was a motivating, and useful addition to the full day of PPC training I had earlier in the week. See Fun With Adwords @ SES San Francisco 2012 for more details on Monday's two 1/2 day classes devoted exclusively to PPC.

Paid Search Analytics and Multi-Touch Attribution Analysis
Moderator: Andrew Goodman, SES Advisory Board; President, Page Zero Media
Speakers:
Steve Latham, Founder and CEO, Encore Media Metrics
Crispin Sheridan, SES Advisory Board; Sr. Director Search Marketing Strategy, SAP

Make Adwords work smarter for you.

There were good strategic key points and take-aways in this informative session. Some suggestions may seem obvious to someone familar with Adwords, but these points go deep and require going beyond the routine.... using drill-down efforts to really benefit from gained knowledge and insight. These suggestions can have subtle and important implications in the success of your PPC campaigns.

A good rule of thumb is to never get complacent with your PPC campaigns. Ignorance is not bliss with PPC, it is merely just another way for Google to make more money off your Adwords account!

• Paid Search is much faster than any other marketing channels. Exploit this advantage.
• Paid Search provides a sense of urgency, on a constant basis.
• Paid Search provides a form of inexpensive market research. 
• Start your PPC campaigns with actions, then apply and study the analytics.
• PPC Factors and Measurements to look at:
  CPA (cost per action), ROAS (return on ad spend), CTR, Conversion Rates, Ad Quality Score, Match Type, Ad Text.
• Bid Management Tools can be useful. Try automated tools for routine work. Monitor!
• Inaccurate bids are some of the biggest costs in PPC today.
• The Quality Score is connected to search intent. A poor quality score score can be a warning of misguided notions about potential client behavior.

There are 7 suggested areas ripe for PPC Campaign Improvement:

1. CTR and Conversion:

• Ad Content makes a big difference. 
• Test your ads often. Don't rest. Try A B tests. Use Ad extensions. 
• Conversion Rates can be misleading if the volume is low. Don't assume!
• Understand and use setting filters and negative search terms.

2. CTR on Keywords:

• "Sculpt" your campaigns. Remove or move poor quality score keywords. Filter. Use negative search terms to weed out wasteful clicks. Focused keywords "tend" to perform better than broad search.
• Get the keywords closer in intent to your ads.
• Get more granular in your campaigns and ad groups.
• Conversion Rate is an important quality factor, but what if the search term is generating quality first time visitors who are researching, in discovery mode, and don't convert on the first click? It is very important to use analytical data to track actual behavior over time before slashing low conversion rate keywords.

3. Bad Segments:

• Are there differences between device behavior? PC versus Tablet versus Mobile? Apple versus PC?
• Are time zone settings, geography and language campaigns in need of dire attention?
• Adwords 'teems with waste' - - find and prune.

4. Attribution and Analytics:

• Try to understand how PPC works with your other marketing channels. Dig into Analytics for insight. The book Advanced Web Metrics with Google Analytics by Brian Cliftin is highly recommended.

5. Steady and Constant Account Adjustment and Expansion:

• Always look at adding new products, services, offerings. 
• Capture trends and opportunities before your competition have time to think about it or react.
• Target category leadership.
• Try using Display Ads, Geography and Language settings. 
• Never stop experimenting. 

6. Reshape your Adwords accounts to pursue 'high intent keywords'.

7. Be proactive. Less reactive.

• Over time, you'll be spending much more of your PPC time working on opportunities than fixing problems.

Search Stars Summit @ SES San Francisco 2012

Google + Search Engine Land + Pubcon = Matt Cutts, Danny Sullivan and Brett Tabke in Surprise Panel Discussion at SES San Francisco 2012.

This was a don't miss event at SES San Francisco, and once again drives home the point that SESSF is a highly recommended conference to attend if you want the latest developments in Search Engine Marketing.

The big surprise on Tuesday afternoon was that Matt Cutts would participate the next morning. The surprises kept coming when Danny Sullivan joined him on stage, followed by Brett Tabke. You knew this was going to be an interesting session.

Mike Grehan, Matt Cutts, Danny Sullivan, Brett Tabke.

Matt Cutts is Google's chief manager guarding search results from spammers and spammy websites trying to 'game' the system. Essentially Mr. Cutts and his team protect and enhance Google SERP value and relevancy for the end-user. Matt is head of Google's "Spam Fighter Team", a team of employees located across the world. The team has been renamed, from "Search Quality" to "Search Knowledge", reflecting the expanding mission for more quality information, more relevancy, and less spam. Matt's team also manages releases of PANDA, PENGUIN, and other seemingly non-threatening search engine update animals which wreak deadly havoc on the website rankings of sites employing black-hat or spammy SEO techniques.

Matt Cutts' comments today revealed a bit more about thinking and intentions at Google for search.
I took furious notes, and hopefully captured some of these thoughts with some semblance of accuracy:

• Symantec Search is expanding.
• Knowledge Graph is being used more and more.
• Beta: Individual Gmail accounts can be included in personal search results, and are being displayed in an experimental phase with limited users. 
• Social Media will be used "a lot more" in the "long term" for organic search rankings.
• Links ranking will still be a factor of measuring site popularity.
• Panda: Monthly updates continuing. The updates are now routine and incremental changes.
• Penguin: More "jolting" updates are coming for spammy websites.
• "If you build a quality website, you will have nothing to worry about."
• "Original Content is Best."
• Duplicate content within a website with original content is not penalized so much, if needed. But avoid too much boilerplate repetition. 
• However, duplicate content associated with affiliate websites is of a lower quality and is subject to penalty.
• Social Signals: Facebook is only partially open to search-bots and crawling. Twitter has blocked Google from crawling. Social is a fluid space which is evolving quickly.
• Expect more transparency from Google over time regarding communication, warnings, and alerts to webmasters.
• "Do SEO." "But do SEO well." Avoid Spam Tactics. "Google doesn't hate SEO!"
• To rank well in organic search, look at the value you are adding. Simple copy and paste link affiliates add no value.
• Google users expectations rise each year. They expect more and more. We need to give them that quality experience or we'll be surpassed. 
• Matt make a good joke about the danger of a potential voice enabled search tool being created by another firm, a firm which names that search tool "SIRI". This brought a good laugh from the large audience. SIRI shows that Google cannot stand still.
• Q&A: "Is Google transitioning from Search to Content?"  Cutts: "We're trying to get the knowledge out there." The Knowledge Graph was cited as an example of enhancing results for users.
• Matt indicated that Google has indexed over 30 Trillion URLs.
• Google now handles over 100 Billion searches a month.
• Even with these astounding numbers, Google has only indexed or can access only a portion of the world's internet space.
• Google+ was discussed. Cutts said "Don't jump to conclusions about Google+" and search engine rankings. "We don't put a lot of weight on this quite yet."
• Cutts emphasized that Google must stay unbiased on search results. Google does not favor its own products or services in organic search, such as phones and travel. "Google has a strong commitment to search neutrality. Like Switzerland. There is no boost for Google properties."

There was a huge amount of web activity today from this historic summit on blogs, twitter, websites, etc. To learn more detail, and get some different opinions or perceptions on this panel discussion, please visit these postings:

See videos of this historic SES meeting:

• Matt Cutts on Google Entering New Spaces On The Internet
• Matt Cutts Q&A: What is the Impact of Google+ on Search Rankings?
• Matt Cutts Q&A: What is Google's Commitment to Webmasters?

Related news articles on this historic panel:

• Search Convergence In SF: Matt Cutts, Danny Sullivan, Mike Grehan & Brett Tabke
• Spotlight Keynote With Matt Cutts #SESSF
• Q&A with Matt Cutts at SES San Francisco: Social reputability for SEO, traffic cannibalization and the promise of transparency from Google

Regarding PANDA, PENGUIN, FARMER, and other Google updates:

• Thoughts on PANDA, FARMER and other Search Engine Creatures.

Fun With Adwords @ SES San Francisco 2012

Adwords Deep Dive.

I've just finished an intense full day of Adwords training: "Advanced Keyword Research & Management" and "Mastering the Google Display Network" at Search Engine Strategies in San Francisco, courtesy of ClickZ.

Search Engine Strategies 2012

Adwords is a complex system that is stuffed with a complex, diverse range of tools, data, and options which can be overlooked and under-utilized due to time restraints and/or a simple lack of awareness. These classes shed light on the array of options available in Adwords.
The ClickZ Adword classes today were focused, in-depth and extremely useful. Applying the techniques, tactics, strategies, technologies, analytics, lessons and options learned today can transform paid search campaigns.
Paid Search is a vital tool to help drive in business, quality leads, and market awareness. It should never replace organic search success, but PPC does a great job in  complementing it. Direct Search ads and Display Network ads are important tools in a proper search engine marketing kit. I've been using Adwords since 2003, but I'm not ashamed to say I learned quite a bit of useful information today!

Adword experts Bill Hunt and Joseph Kerschbaum put on the classes today:

Advanced Keyword Research & Management

Bill Hunt
SES Advisory Board; President, Back Azimuth Consulting @billhunt
Summary: 
Don't assume your search campaigns are 'optimized'. Most likely, they aren't. There is always room for improvement. Bill Hunt spent 4 hours showing how adword campaigns can be improved, even transformed.... and how lucrative new business opportunities can be discovered. Bill shows there is huge potential for improving your current campaigns.... generating more leads, more intelligently, and quite possibly at lower cost. It didn't matter if attendees were rookies or grizzled Adwords veterans, this was an extremely useful class. I recommend Bill's class to anyone touching an Adwords account.

Mastering the Google Display Network

Joseph Kerschbaum
Vice President, Clix Marketing @joekerschbaum
Summary:
Display Ads with Google have been evolving. Joseph shows that the lower expectations and poor perceptions of Display Ads from a few years ago is now unjustified. Joseph guided the class through the improvements and innovations in display options, tracking, exclusions, remarketing, etc. He also dived into tactics and strategies with Display Ads. Joseph makes it easy to understand that the 2012 Google Adwords Display Network is not your Father's old clunky Google Content Network. Thank God. Thanks to Joseph, a new appreciation for Google Display Ads is possible. Display Ads is a resource which should not be overlooked, nor under-managed. For anyone ready to take a serious look at Google Display Ads, Joseph provided an exceptionally informative and eye-opening class today.

My impression of today's events at SES:
There was so much valuable, useful information presented today by both gentlemen that it is impossible to provide an outline here without writing a small book - - in outline form. Based on the wealth of Adwords and Paid Search marketing information received today, I'm confident a rapid payback and positive ROI will quickly result from today's classes  - - even if only a few of the many ideas, tactics, and suggestions they presented are used.