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What changes does Google see in marketing online in 2015?

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(In other words, where are they looking…?)

As hard as us online businesses try not to be a slave to Google and the other major search engines, the truth of the matter is, we are.

Just like buying the cheaper supermarket own brand cereal and hiding them in a clear plastic container in a vain attempt to fool the taste buds of the cereal connoisseurs of the household does not work, trying to avoid Google and what it wants from websites is something that businesses cannot afford to do… too much.

You might think that it is OK to have the same content across all 40 pages describing your services in and around Frodsham, but Google chews it up, spits it out and says that is not building a quality website.

And so, through the fug of mince pie overload and increased cholesterol from the annual over-indulgence in local cheeses, here at Locally we spent some time sifting through the various online reports and articles about what this mammoth search engine wants from online businesses in the coming year.

The great news is that it is not complicated and the majority of online businesses are starting to swing in this direction anyway… the writing has been on the wall for some time. Following on from our post ‘your website is a live and kicking thing that needs feeding and nurturing’, we take a closer look at what you need/must/try to with your website during 2015.

Why please Google?

Because it is massive. And, its dominance shows no sign of wavering and shrinking just yet. With billions of users worldwide, why would you ignore this search engine?!

How the Internet, searches and relations between customers and businesses have changed

Cast your mind back to when there were three TV channels in the UK and having a colour TV was a novelty… actually, we jest, we don’t mean that far back but we thought it sounded dramatic and when you rewind the clock only a few years to the early days of the Internet and compare then to now, you realise the changes have been dramatic, more dramatic than the closing scenes of an EastEnders’s cliff hanger.

Back then, the run-of-the-mill Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of a larger company back then was probably just shy of their 50th birthday, had learnt their craft and art over the years, with the Internet – a recent invention – providing a platform on which business was done to a customer. The thought that a customer had any real power or opinion was not entered into.

Fast forward to January 2015, and this seems almost ludicrous; a CEO of some massive brands can be whippersnappers with a handful of GCSEs but with a natural ability and flair for seeing what a consumer wants, and giving it to them – with bells on.

The Internet is now a place of engagement. If your website is all about the sell, sell, sell then no wonder you are no higher than page 102 in Google’s search rankings. Times have changed and we all need to keep up with them (harks back to ‘your website is a live and living thing’ post…)

Put the textbook down

Some things are not in those pages and what Google sees happening in 2015 is not in there yet, so sit up and take notice.

If you learn nothing else from this post, take away this fact: Internet users (your potential customers) are looking for sophistication.

Hitting customers over the head with information and broadcasts is no longer acceptable; people want information given in a more considerate way.

Another fact: the Internet is a restless place. Just as one thing is ‘on trend’ it changes, morphs and steals away and this is something that you, and your website, must be constantly alert to. Just because you have always had that bouncing graphic on your home page and no has complained, doesn’t mean it is not damaging your online viewed reputation. Stop harking back to last year and be ready to constantly move forward and evolve.

So what IS Google predicting?

  • Mobile money will become the norm in 2015

 

We have talked about making sure your website is mobile ready in a previous post and now it seems this is more than just a must-have for aesthetic reasons. Financially, Google predicts that 40% of online spending will be via mobile devices so you need to be more than just mobile friendly; you need to be mobile active.

In terms of other financial incentives, Google reckon that coupons, vouchers, gift codes – call them what you will – will become more tailored and specific to customers. And, customers are no longer just searching for the best price, or so it seems.

Google also suggest that customers will pay a bit more, if the service they get is second-to-none. Cheap is not the name of the game, but customer service is.

If you have a high street presence as well as an online presence, be prepared for merging these two strands of your business even closer, with mobile payments – for example, using PayPal in store – possibly becoming the norm (although they also suggest PayPal may have a contender by the year’s end… is that a hint?!)

  • Foster community

 

If you website is still a one-way track, with limited or no interaction between you and your consumer, then your website will, by the end of 2015, if not before, fall into a dark place. So, if you are not harnessing the power of social media to invite comments etc., you are missing a trick; Google predicts that consumers will rely even more on this ‘social branding’ to decide if a brand is the right one for them.

The local and the personal, suggest Google, will also become a bigger influence in the search engine terms used.

  • Real-time is where it is at

 

And this means looking at the capability of your website and your online strategy for communicating with customers, quickly – if not, now (that is, real time). Emailing, tweeting or commenting on a company’s social media platform, only to have a delay of hours (or days!) is no longer acceptable. For small businesses this could present a logistical problem – how can you create the bespoke wedding dress with one eye on Twitter?) thus, outsourcing some of these powerful elements will become more important.

Take away points

Google is looking for, and predicting, continuous improvement in websites:

Search will be more location-based – so if you operate in and around a certain area, get this back on your website and optimise you content as such. Add to this real-time – scrolling news feed about your business, price, availability etc. – could see a significant return-of-investment (ROI)

Don’t be dull, boring and – dare we say it?! – predictable – do something different with your brand and let people know. If you haven’t sponsored a local event before, could this be the year you take a leap into the unknown BUT, don’t just sponsor it, stream it!

Relevant – you are a local insurance company, a client finds your website online, likes your prices and then ‘clicks to call’; your phone rings and you have a new client. This can work for so many businesses but it does take technical know-how… the great news is that there are people who can help set all this up and make it run without a hitch.

Your website needs to be working for your business – spending hundreds and thousands on creating a website is all well and god but, if it is not being accountable (working for the business as a platform for business and brand awareness) then it is wasted.

It all sounds very big and involved, possibly beyond your technical skills but, with some small, but clever tweaks in all the right places, your website could be running at full throttle by the end of 2015.

Getting ranked higher by Google (the second half) – A Locally Mini-Series

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Part 2 of 2

Welcome back! In this second part of getting ranked higher by Google we are going to examine the other 3 factors that can influence where your website stands in the ranking.

They all inform the authoritative nature of your website, along with how trustworthy it is as well making sure that it is relevant.

Let’s re-cap…

So far we have look at page title descriptions, the actual text on a page, as well as the relevant SEO keywords being in the page URL. The remaining three factors look at links.

Links according to Google

Rather than being a little slapdash and shoving in links where you feel like it, think about how Google views a link.

Links, in the all-seeing eyes of Google, are votes for your website – in other words, it is popular and relevant.

F-a-b-u-l-o-u-s you may say, and go back to shoving links in but STOP… just for a moment and consider how you are using these links, as well as other considerations, such as…

  • Certain links are considered more authoritative than others and will look better in the eyes of Google if the originating link is from a website that Google already ranks quite highly.

*Here at Locally, in our blog posts we use links; however, we rarely use more than 3 in a longer blog post and always check that a. the website we are linking to is relevant and b. it is an authoritative one. We like websites that complement our business, as well as the topic we are blogging about. We always use the links within the main body of the blog article too*

  • Google PageRank is the name of the algorithm that sorts the wheat from the chafe in terms of whether links are any good or not. Don’t confuse this with a websites’ Page Rank, Google used to publish Page Ranks but these haven’t been updated for a long while, so now you’ll have to find other ways of working out how authoritative Google thinks a site is. Most SEO’s go on either MOZ’s SEO Explorer Domain Authority or Majestic’s Trust Flow versus Citation, but as neither are Google, these are informed guesses rather than definitive.

In terms of links, don’t overstuff and don’t use ones from less-than-salubrious sources. You have been warned.

And so 2 of the remaining factors that can influence where your page comes in the rankings of Google are all to do with links, with the final one looking at filters.

Number 4: Domain Links

This is about links on other websites that link to your websites; so in other words, someone writing about SEO and Google rankings in the future might find this post and think ‘wow!’, and copy and paste the web page URL in to their website. We would be chuffed as it means that Locally’s website is gaining in authority in the eyes of Google.

Links help your online reputation and so if you can get a link from another relevant, authoritative website then all the better. BUT, do not fall in the trap of buying links as Google takes a very, very dim view of this and rubbish links could actually be harming your page ranking.

In the past the SEO industry was nearly 100% focussed on generating links and much of those were dubious if not downright spammy. Google has pretty much killed of that ‘quick win’ approach. Today any SEO offering you 50,000 backlinks and instant success, a technique that worked a few years ago, is likely to seriously damage your rankling today.

Google had realised that websites that were stuffing themselves full of shoddy links were outstripping websites that were more genuine in their approach to commerce. And so a filter was ‘switched on’, if you like, that started to look for websites that were simply using any old link… so beware the backlinks, the link farms and all those other ‘get rich quick’ types of schemes. It can be very difficult to bounce back from being penalised by Google.

In fact the best way to handle links is actually not to try and earn them, but instead write authoritative content and get is out there by social or any other means. If your content is good, people will link to it.

Number 5: Page specific links

You can form links within your own website too and this can also help in terms of website being seen as relevant, authoritative and trustworthy in the eyes of Google. Your home page may be the landing page that people find, but if you want them to bob along to your blog, put a link on your home page. Keep these links running down the side of your page too and, if you have an active page specifically for a certain time of year, then link this page to other pages in your website.

This is seen as helping the customer to navigate your site; customers like this as it is an easy way to get around and make a purchase. They will buy more… and you can see where this is going!

Number 6: Quality filters

The Google Panda update at the start of 2014 was all about improving the user experience on the search engine, in other words, improving the quality of the search results that user would see. One area that it choose to look at was the user experience of a website; how easy is your website to use?

Two factors of usability were previously not heavily on the SEO radar, but now are becoming increasing important

  • Performance. Sites that respond quickly are easier to use, so that is a significant usability signal. Bad code, unoptimised images and slow servers are things that need to be addressed.
  • Multi-device friendly. Today websites are visited from phones & tablets as well as desktops. Infact many sites have 50% of their traffic from mobile devices. Google is now looking and analysing how multi device friendly your site is. If your site is not currently responsive, now is a good time to make a small investment to make it so.

What about social media signals?

Social signals as they are known, is when a customer or user likes, shares, tweets, G+’s, pins etc. content or pages from your website.

If you surf the web, you will find a range of conflicting advice and opinion about how much social signals do or do not play in ranking your website, in both Google and other search engines. However, if you look at your competitors, as well as other popular websites, you will see that they have high counts in terms of shares, tweets and G+’s and the like.

You can see them as links in some ways, but those that say social signals should be used with caution point to the fact that some of these likes and shares etc. can be fabricated or bought. And just like spammy links, buying hundreds if not thousands of likes or shares can be to your detriment.

See social signals in the same way as links; invite people to genuinely like and share things on your website.

Put it in to practice!

Armed with the knowledge of the 6 factors that could make a very big difference to your website ranking you know need to do two things:

  1. Take a look at your competitor sites that are ranking higher than yours – what are they doing, that you are not? What can you emulate and improve on?
  2. Look at the 6 factors again and then look at your website – is your website up to scratch?

If you have enjoyed our two part mini-series, why not joy sign up for our newsletter?

You can also join us on Google +, Twitter and Facebook!

Getting ranked higher by Google – A Locally Mini-Series

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Part 1 of 2

Is it your ‘dream’ that when potential customers search for a product or service that you offer,  that on page 1 of the search engine listings, your business ranks up there with other great companies?

It is not a pipe dream; it can be a reality BUT, you need to be focused and committed – and you also need to be doing the right things, from setting your pages up correctly, to telling the search engines you exist to then staying committed, constantly pushing your website so that it looks and ‘feels’ authoritative and trustworthy.

In this first part of a two part mini-series, here at Locally we take a look at how online, local businesses can figure in those top spots on page 1, starting with understanding the ranking equation used by one of the major search engines, Google.

Why Google?

It is huge. Gargantuan. It has the lion’s share of the search engine market (up to 90% according to some estimates). With 2 billion Internet users worldwide, it is probably not unrealistic to estimate that half of these will use Google as either their preferred or default search engine. It would be silly, almost the kiss of death to ignore Google, there are other search engines out there. However, for the purpose of this Locally Mini-Series, we will focus on Google.

In a nutshell

To understand how to win the coveted crown for a ‘Page 1 Top Spot’, you need to understand two things:

  1. How Google’s algorithm works – what it uses to rank pages
  2. Understand why your competitors are ranking higher than you, at that particular time.

Google’s algorithm

Ah yes, just like algebra at school, we can see your eyelids getting heavy as you prepare for a mid-afternoon nap but now is not the time.

First thing’s first; apart from the very top executives at Google, no one really knows all the secrets, twists and turns that this search engine uses to create its magic page 1 list but, there are some highly intelligent technically minded people who have a fairly decent idea of how the algorithm crunches number and data.

But, don’t forget that this algorithm also changes over time, so what was working this time last year, might not be delivering the results now. This way, the web is kept vibrant and fresh.

Walking in Google’s shoes – try and see what it sees

Basically what we are saying is this: when a customer searches for something on the Internet using its browser, they want to see results that are accurate. We all know the frustration of surfing for information on something specific, only to find that what we get is some tripe from a far off place that makes no sense.

And so, you need to see what Google will see when it takes a look at your website – think relevance, popularity and quality. If people are buying from or using a website, it must be offering something worth having. It must offer a worthwhile buying experience, and customers must be happy with it. Hence, to Google, that website looks a fairly good one, so they move it up the rankings…

Simple?

In that case, your website needs to show good it is relevant, popular and offers high quality experience, such as an authoritative blog or news section, along with FAQs and the like. In this way, customers may also be reviewing your products or services, liking your page, enjoying your tweets and just generally in conversation with you.

Google says that it has 200 variable factors that it uses to rank websites but, there are some things that can be done that will help you website climb the slippery pole on to page 1 – and stay there.

So sharpen your elbows, because here are 6 factors that can influence your ranking with Google (yes, only 6… but they are important).

The Locally Whistle Stop Tour of 6 Things You Can Do To Get a Higher Ranking with Google (might work with other search engines too!)

Tickets please! Now fasten your seat belts and let’s look at the first 3 of these factors (the remaining 3 will be addressed in Part 2 of this blog post… due for publication on the Locally blog on Wednesday 5th November)

Number 1: Page Titles

 

This matters because it is a description of what the page is about. It must be accurate and at least 3 words long. So, in your page if you are targeting a particular keyword or phrase, then this should be included in your page title and in the right order.

E.g. if your home page keywords were ‘local (and) online personalised gifts (for) sailors’ then you would use this in the page title html description.

The (and) and (for) are in brackets to highlight that they are STOP words. These are words that Google does not count in its searches, simply because you would have all sorts of weird and wonderful results. There are literally hundreds more stop words…

Number 2: Page text

 

Search engines read words quickly and easily, but like the stop words from above, they don’t bother with the connective words, instead they look for the important ones, if you like; the more times the word or phrase pops up in the page, Google assumes that is what the page is about.

Hence, if you want people to find you product or service because your business offers flexible website design for local online businesses, then this phrase would be used maybe two or three times, and other keywords or phrases that relate to this.

In other words, the page is relevant.

Over-stuffing – we think over-stuffing should be a word entered in the dictionary, a bit like oversharing. In any given 500 words, do not over-use your keyword or phrase – use it, at most, 5 times, but 3 or 4 will do just fine, or actually once may be enough. Over-using a phrase will make your text look artificial; it won’t look like to a eyes of a real person, and neither will it look right to Google (or any search engine).

Number 3: keywords in the URL

 

You also have control over whether these keywords appear in the page URL or not (not sure about URLs – check this out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxu7eZrPUyQ)

It can really help if your keywords are in the order that a person searching for something like your product or service would type them in; this is a little SEO tip which is why this blog post is called ‘getting ranked higher by Google’ because you never know, someone out there may be frustrated that their competitors are on page one and want to how they can be too…

In summary

We have covered three factors that we can directly influence how Google sees a website in terms of being relevant, authoritative and trustworthy and they are:

  1. Page titles
  2. Page text
  3. Keywords in the URL of a page

Want to know what the other three factors are? Great!

Join us on Wednesday November 5th when your second part of this Locally Mini-Series will be published – in the meantime, how does your website rank?

Social media wars: which is better?

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With the fallout from the Google Authorship and ‘is it a ploy to get us all using Google+?’ question still being bandied around, businesses can be easily confused as to which social media platform is the right one for them.

It can be tempting to be on everything but the problem with this blanket approach is that you may be using platforms that are not suitable and, keeping up to date with them all can be a timing nightmare.

In this article we look at Google+ or G+ and what it can offer you, as well as looking at arguably the most powerful and well-known of social media platforms, Facebook.

Things are changing

Facebook is the ‘daddy of ‘em all’, with a reach that is phenomenal it has, for many years, held the top notch position; it was and still is, the social media platform you must be on. If you wanted to reach out to the largest audience ever, then FB was the place to be.

But things change and on the world of online sharing. Once the poor relation, is seems that the ugly duckling is blossoming into the beautiful swan; 2014 has marked the best year for G+ yet, with its monthly active users reaching 540 million across the globe.

The difference between the two? G+ allows people to search for your business and is obviously geared towards this end of the market, whereas Facebook is more ‘personal’ in its approach but there are reasons why both could be useful, if not essential.

Circles

Some people think that circles on G+ are complicated but they are far from that. It’s a way of sorting the wheat from the chaff if you like and rather than being bombarded with every single post or share, you can group people together, choosing what you see and when.

Facebook has a similar set up now with Edgerank, the algorithm it introduced in December 2013. Rather than users being bombarded with items or posts they may find irrelevant, this algorithm sorts what it thinks the user will like. The only problem with this is that you don’t control it – unlike the G+ circles which you set up – the algorithm checks what you have been looking at and makes the decision for you.

Reach

On Facebook, any posts or statuses you make will need to reach a certain level of ‘likes’ over a set number of times before it is available to the masses, hence the almost begging Tweets and messages from businesses imploring you to like them on Facebook.

BUT, if this doesn’t work, you can always pay for the privilege with various adverts to boost your appearance and views on the platform. But, some say that this is losing sight of its original intention as small businesses may not have the budgeting resources to play alongside the big players.

The algorithm

Facebook’s algorithm is a double-edged sword; on one hand it has a positive impact but recent bad press from experiments such as the ‘emotion experiment’ has made some people question the platform and its integrity.

However, you cannot throw away 1.32 billion users around the world lightly and so, by improving your Facebook posts, from asking questions to running competitions, you do have an excellent way, at your fingertips of attracting new people and customers to your business.

Is it just about numbers?

Reaching the masses is great but, if only a small percentage buy your product or service, is it worth it for a local, online business?

No sale is a bad sale, and so if it reaps the smallest reward then that is not to be sniffed at but if it comes at a cost in terms of both time and money, it may be worth a re-think.

A G+ ‘hangout’ is as some people say, an awesome resource that allows businesses and customers to connect. Think of it as a modern-day equivalent of consumer research and with G+ and Google being the same, you are sending out some strong signals to the most popular search engine.

So, who to choose?

Internet trends change from week to week; it would be sheer folly to predict today what will be right next week or the week after and so on. However, the rub is that, as a business you need to connect to a wide an audience as possible, but balance it against time spent ‘doing’ social media and the return it gives you.

The answer is this – place the same post across the social media platforms you currently use and see where you get the most responses; do this a few times at different times of the year and it gives you an indication of where your audience is at.

Once you feel you know which platforms are right for your business, put time and energy into creating a plan so that you have something to offer customers and something to talk about over both G+ and Facebook – and any others too!

Which platforms do you use? How did you decide which social media sites were best for your local business?

Avoid Google’s Wrath…

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Thankfully, not all relationships in life are as fickle but as we near the end of the first full week since Google Authorship disappeared (see previous post ‘Storm in a tea cup?’) what the announcement will have done is create speculation and double-guessing of what Google could have in store for the future of search engine optimisation.

Which got us thinking here at Locally about SEO, websites and when things go sour between your website and Google.

It’s an odd relationship

One sided, in many aspects – you spend money, time and nervous energy creating a website that customers will love and buy your services and products – it feels like you do all the hard work. You constantly covet the favour of Google as, after all, if they like you, your website could be catapulted to the stars…

But, some people, in their desperate attempts to climb their way up this ladder, take a wrong turn; Google punishes them and down they fall. Even worse, once you have fallen out of favour with Google, it is incredibly hard to get back in (…although, for those of us with a slightly skewed vision of the online world, it seemed that some huge corporations have managed to buy favour back…)

And so, here is Locally’s guide to avoiding being told off/punished/scolded/call it what you will by one of the most powerful search engines in the world today…

  • Plagiarism

Just like you were flung outside of the head’s office at school for copying someone else’s work, the same is true for the content on your website. Using duplicate information from somewhere else on the web completely goes against the underlying principles of the Internet, as far as Google is concerned – users don’t like it, it’s useless and it is a hindrance to originality.

Locally’s Top Tip: Don’t do it!

  • A web address that doesn’t fit

This means that a company, business or person needs to select a Uniform Resource Locator (URL or web address) that best suits their business. Google will give you credit for this when it searches for results zillions-of-times-per-second across the globe. The more apt your URL, the healthier Google will rank it.

Locally’s Top Tip: do you research not just about your name, but all the component parts of a URL

Things that don’t work

Included under this title are links that do not work; we’ve all clicked on what looks like a great resource only to be met with the ‘error 404’ code. These dead links, and other broken bits, do create a disadvantage for your website but on a scale of 1 to 10 – 10 being the worst thing ever – it is fairly low down the scale.

Locally’s Top Tip: keep your website fresh and maintained.

Absence of Key Technical ‘bits’

Sitemaps and Robot.txt files are just two of the ‘technical bits’ that many people do not understand but they are essential for when Google crawls your website looking for it needs in order to know what you are and who would be interested in your site. Having a greater knowledge of SEO can help…

Locally’s Top Tip: ask us how we do all the background techy bits…

Keyword phrases – using them TOO much!

We all know the importance of key words, phrases and the like but it is possible to over use them! This sends a rather wonky signal to Google who sees it as you stuffing your text with keywords, which means it probably makes very little sense. Your content (and your writing) needs to be genuine and disciplined.

Locally’s Top Tip: in a 500 word blog, post or article, your keyword should appear no more than 5 times (and even that is pushing it in such a small space! 4 times works better…)

Bizarre H1 header tags!

This is usually the title of a post but what can happen is that they are used across the website/post/article and it all becomes a little bizarre, with whopping titles leaping off the page. Try to keep your desperation under wraps and use them sparingly, with the biggest profit.

Locally’s Top Tip – identify when a H1 tag really needs to be used…

S-L-O-W response times

Just like we moan about waiting for the shop assistant to get off the phone etc. the same is true when it comes to surfing the web. Naturally impatient, any website that takes longer than a nano-second to load is an instant turn-off. Google feels the same; it shares the pain of the user and so dumps you down the rankings. Sorry.

Locally’s Top Tip – get expert help on why your website is taking so long to load…

Trying to hide things

When text is hyperlinked, it appears a different colour from the surrounding text. The user can choose to click on it or not (we do it in our blog posts – it means we’ve come across something that offers more info on what we are blogging about, and think you may be interested in it too). Quality and appropriate links are great BUT, what some have done is change these links to match the colour of the surrounding text (the user doesn’t know they are there) but Google does and it sees this as over-stuffing and not playing fair.

Locally’s Top Tip – don’t do it! Keep you link visible, useful and relevant.

Cloaking

This is a really poor exercise that upsets users and that is when they are deceived by keywords that when clicked, takes them to a website that has nothing to do with the content of the original website, business etc. It is frustrating, can be embarrassing depending on what the link is to and Google hates it.

Locally’s Top Tip – nope, don’t do it.

Spamming links!

This again is a source of huge frustration to users hence, Google comes down on it like a ton of bricks and this is using links on your web pages that have absolutely nothing to do with your website. Google take this very seriously and, in all honesty, is very hard to come back from.

Locally’s Top Tip – this is a definite no-no.

And so, we see that if our websites follow certain rules, feel and look ‘genuine’ then its climb up the rankings may be slow, but it will be a quality step each time, rather than precariously teetering on every rung.