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Rand Internet Marketing is known in the internet marketing industry for providing high quality services and solutions for their clients. Rand offers a wide range of services including search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC), responsive website design and development on the Wordpress and Magento e-commerce platforms, logo and graphic design, social media setup and marketing, online banner advertising, and online content marketing, among many more.
We are excited to be partnering with Shopper Approved, said Seth Rand, Founder and CEO at Rand Internet Marketing. We believe that cultivating positive reviews from clients and proactive reputation management are a crucial ingredient in having a successful online marketing campaign that generated leads and sales at the desired conversion rates.
Shopper Approved is able to directly syndicate and display a clients five-star listings in more places than any other review sites. By actively displaying five-star ratings and reviews both in the search engines and on a business website, that business will receive a steady increase in traffic while building instant trust and credibility with each new visitor. All of these factors combine to directly influence and increase your sales. Clients that switch to Shopper Approved from other competing services consistently collect up to 70 times more ratings and reviews than they did with their previous provider.
We are very pleased to partner with Rand Marketing, states Cresta Pillsbury, COO at Shopper Approved. This partnership reflects our desire to collaborate with companies that share our vision of helping clients grow and succeed.
About Rand Internet Marketing
Rand Internet Marketing, a division of Rand Business Services, based in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, offers a full line of design and marketing services including logo design, graphic design, website design, responsive web development, search engine marketing, and social media marketing. Rand specializes in professional responsive web design and development including WordPress websites andMagento eCommercewebsites, mobile site design and development, search engine optimization (SEO) and pay per click (PPC) marketing. Rand also offers video production, video marketing, full color printing, reviews and reputation management, product photography, merchant services and a variety of other professional business services.
If you are in the market for a new website, or looking to generate more leads and sales throughinternet marketing, let the Rand Internet Marketing team help you design an integrated strategy that will help your business succeed.
For more information, call 888-707-RAND or request a consultation online at http://randmarketing.com/request-consultation/.
About Shopper Approved
Imagine Your Reviews EVERYWHERE with Shopper Approved Customer Ratings and Reviews, trusted by more sites than any other review company! Shopper Approved collects valuable ratings and reviews from over 42% of your customers, and then automatically syndicates them to Google, Yahoo, Bing, Facebook, YouTube, Google+ and more, giving you the ability to display 5-Star ratings on all the major search engines and on your website, for the ultimate social proof and credibility. When it comes to selling online trust is everything. It's time to take your online reputation to the next level with Shopper Approved.
For a Free Test Pilot with no credit card required please go to https://www.shopperapproved.com/special/randmarketing/109.
###
Rand Marketing Newsroom
Original Source: http://www.newswire.com/press-release/rand-internet-marketing-announces-partnership-with-shopper
Related Keywords:Computers/Peripherals, Displays, Internet, Digital Photography, Web, Search, Video, Google, Social Media, Sales, Advertising, Marketing, Sales & Marketing, Internet, Business Issues, Web Design, Social Media, Search, Social Network, Search Engines, Search Engine Optimization, Management, Sales, CEO/CFO, Web design, Sales, Graphics Designer, Web Designers, Internet/Web, Graphics, Display, Business, Internet, Web, Social Media, Search, Design, Marketing, Graphics/Design, Video, Business, Business Services, Marketing Services, Internet Technology, Business, Internet, Other,Source:Copyright (c) iNewswire One. All Rights Reserved
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Microsoft and AOL have inked an exclusive 10-year deal that will see Microsoft's Bing replace Google as the search engine providing 100% of the organic search results and search ads when people search on AOL's sites. But the deal, which starts on Jan. 1, 2016, doesn't only target Google's search dominance. As part of the arrangement, AOL will now handle display, mobile and video ad sales for all of Microsoft's properties -- such as MSN, Xbox and Outlook -- in its top nine global markets, which include the U.S., U.K., Canada, Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Japan.
Executives from Microsoft and AOL declined to comment on the terms of the deal, such as how the companies will split ad revenue, and how else money may be changing hands between the two tech giants.
The deal between Microsoft and AOL appears to be aimed squarely at Google, which has dominated the search-and-display ad market for years and has provided search results and search ads for AOL's sites since 2002.
Of the $81.6 billion eMarketer expects advertisers to spend on search ads worldwide this year, 54.7% is expected to go toward Google and 4.2% to Microsoft. And of the $27.1 billion that eMarketer expects advertisers to spend on digital display ads in the U.S. this year, 13% is expected to go to Google. Microsoft is expected to receive 1.7% of that money, and AOL 3.5%.
Obviously Microsoft and AOL have a lot of catching up to do, but the companies are banking on the tie speeding up the process.
"Our clients will benefit from a very scaled solution to distribute media money at a global scale on the ads side, but also we're going to get a comprehensive search offer out of the deal that we think brings exceptional search capabilities, a great consumer experience and something that Microsoft continues to invest in," said AOL President Bob Lord.
In addition to increasing the ad supply that Microsoft and AOL can sell to advertisers, the deal should grow the number of people -- or "reach" in industry parlance -- that the two companies can sell. Microsoft and AOL are still ironing out details to make sure they don't violate their respective users' privacy, but the companies plan to eventually combine their user data as well as AOL parent company Verizon's customer data, so that brands will be able to target their ads based on that data.
AOL and Google most recently renewed their search agreement in 2010, but that renewal expired this year. AOL wasn't looking to re-up with a standalone search deal, but was instead "looking for an enterprise-wide deal," Mr. Lord said. He declined to say whether AOL had broached the idea of a similar-in-scope deal with Google, though that may have been difficult, since Google has built its own massive display, video and mobile ad-sales organization.
A Google spokeswoman was not immediately able to comment on the news when contacted on Monday.
The search deal between Microsoft and AOL is similar to the alliance Microsoft struck with Yahoo to supply organic search results and automate search ad sales for that portal's properties. However that alliance isn't as strong as it once was. Earlier this year Microsoft and Yahoo renewed their deal in a way that loosened ties by removing the exclusivity clause so that Yahoo could provide its own search results and ads or source results and ads from another company like Google.
The Microsoft-AOL deal is yet another blow to the search empire Google has built beyond its own sites. Late last year Yahoo replaced Google as the default search engine on Mozilla's Firefox web browser, and the portal is reportedly jockeying to also usurp Google as the default search engine for Apple's Safari browser; the deal between Google and Apple is set to expire this year. However it's unclear how big of a blow the Microsoft-AOL tie-up may be to Google's search dominance.
"It sounds like a good deal if any customer base is actually using AOL. I guess that would be my first thought. But I like the notion of competition. I think Google needs some," said Forrester analyst Shar VanBoskirk.
"I still think it will be just a blip," said one search agency exec when asked whether the Microsoft-AOL deal may lead advertisers to reallocate their search budgets and potentially take money from Google to give to Microsoft-AOL. Google still offers a lot of untapped search inventory that the effort to shift not only budgets but internal ad-buying processes to another search engine "becomes prohibitive."
"I think you'll see more budget go in [Microsoft's and AOL's] direction, but I don't think it will be any sort of game-changer," the exec said.
Google accounted for 64.1% of the desktop search queries conducted in the U.S. in May 2015, according to comScore, which does not release mobile search figures. By comparison Microsoft accounted for 20.3%, Yahoo for 12.7% and AOL for 1.2%.
Google has a similarly large share when it comes to searches powered by its technology, whether that happens on its own sites or other sites that use its search technology. Google provided the organic search results for 65.2% of all U.S. desktop searches in May, compared to 31.4% that were powered by Microsoft's Bing, according to comScore.
But when it comes to search, any increase in volume is a win because the primary way to improve search results and therefore get more people to use a given search engine is to have that engine process more search queries. The more queries, the more opportunities for a search engine to learn what are the best responses to those queries.
The deal with AOL effectively marks Microsoft's exit from the ad-sales business. A "big number" of employees from Microsoft's ad sales and marketing organization will join AOL as a result of the deal, said Frank Holland, corporate VP of Microsoft's advertising and online division. He said that over the next couple of days he'll be "working the phones pretty hard with the most senior clients around the world" to discuss what the deal means for them. An AOL spoksperson said 1,200 people will be moving from Microsoft to AOL.
Microsoft's automated search ad-buying tool will handle ad sales for searches conducted on Microsoft's and AOL's sites. Mr. Holland and Rik van der Kooi, Microsoft's corporate VP of its advertiser and publishers solutions group, have discussed the possibility of syndicating those automated search ads as display ads -- like how Google does with its AdWords product -- but haven't committed to any plans.
In the 10 global markets that AOL will not be handling Microsoft's display ad sales, Microsoft-backed AppNexus will take over the duties, said Mr. van der Kooi.
This isn't the first time Microsoft and AOL have teamed up to take on Google. In 2011 the two companies and Yahoo joined together to sell each others' leftover ad inventory in hopes of spurring more demand from advertisers by offering more ways to reach as many, if not more, people that brands could get through Google's ads. However that deal took a while to get off the ground and never seemed to get as much traction as initially expected.
Mr. van der Kooi described that three-company partnership as "deliberately a toe-in-the-water approach" to see if the companies could increase demand from advertisers. "If we wanted to do something meaningful for customers and in response to their requirements of reach and sacle and targetability around larger audiences," he said, "we knew we had to make a much bigger leap." Now it has.
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It focuses specifically on welcome emails, which is what a user receives after they subscribe or sign up for your mailing list.
Some of the interesting statistics they pointed out include:
Here's the full infographic:
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We will send the script to your PayPal email within few hours,Please add FullContentRSS@gmail.com to your email contact.One of the worst feelings in the world of inbound marketing and enrollment is to write an incredible blog post, publish it, share it, and then…crickets.
I actually just shuddered a little bit thinking about it. (Because I have been there way, way too many times!)
It's a lot better when the opposite happens: when you experience the thrill of seeing an expert in your space share and promote your content for you.
This post will give you a practical, actionable approach to writing and designing the kind of content that VIPs love to share with your audience.
How to Find the Influencers in Your SpaceThe first step to getting influencers to share our content is knowing who those influencers are. There are a few ways you can do this. And good news: they're not mutually exclusive, so we can mix and match these approaches.
1. Google Your KeywordsA quick Google of our keywords is probably the easiest way to figure out who the influencers are in our space. I suggest opening an incognito window in Google Chrome and searching for a keyword in your space.
For example, let's say you're a university that just launched a new program in Koine Greek. You want to get some exposure for the new program, but you're not sure who the big influencers are online.
Start by Googling "Koine Greek tips." Here's what I find:
Now we'll click through to the top results and find out who wrote them. If these folks are ranking for this search term, we want them sharing our material!
2. Buzzsumo: Search by TopicAnother way to find influencers is to jump into Buzzsumo to see who's creating the most popular content on your topic.
What's Buzzsumo? It's a web app that looks at pages on the Internet, and then sorts them in order of how many times they've been shared on social networks like Facebook and Twitter.
Let's use Koine Greek as an example again. This time I'll go to Buzzsumo and enter "Koine Greek" into the search bar.
This tells Buzzsumo to look at all the articles about Koine Greek online, and then list them in order of how much they've been shared. (You can also use Buzzsumo for specific websites and even authors, too.) Here's what I find:
I can see that the most shared post, "Learn New Testament Greek," has been shared 148 times on Facebook, twice on Twitter, and once on Pinterest for a total of 151 shares. In some cases, Buzzsumo shows me who the author of a post is. In others, I'll need to click-through to find out who wrote the content in question.
This gives me an idea of which websites are writing the most popular content on Koine Greek, which means there's a good chance that I'll find influencers on these sites! You can do this for any area of interest you want to find influencers in.
3. Ask Your TeamI did this recently with the team at Disciplr (a product in the pre-launch stages at the time I write this). I emailed the team and asked a few simple questions:
This returned a long list of people the Disciplr team thought of as influencers. (More on the results later in this post.)
4. Ask Your AudienceIf we really want to know who our audience views as influencers, we can also simply ask them directly.
Find a good place to keep your list of influencers. I use a simple spreadsheet, but you can use whatever you like. The important thing is to have a place to save your list so that you don't need to do all this research again!
How to Get Influencers to Share Your ContentOK, we have our list of influencers. Now here's how to encourage them to share our content.
It's time to write some content for them to share. Here's where it gets interesting, because that kind of content must meet two criteria:
We can't just produce content for the blog and then think of ways to get others to share it! The whole getting-VIPs-to-share-our-stuff process begins with the creation of the content itself.
There are several ways to write this kind of content, but I want to focus on two sure-fire ways to make it happen.
Strategy 1: Write Original Content that Makes Influencers Look AwesomeHow do you feel when someone publicly recognizes your good work? Warm fuzzies, right? I bet influencers feel the same way when someone thoughtfully points out their job well done.
That's why one of the best ways to get influencers to share our content is to write content that makes them look amazing. (Which shouldn't be hard—they're influencers for a reason, right?)
This strategy consists of two main steps.
Step 1: Write Content that Calls Attention to the Experts
When we're writing our content, we can sprinkle in some nods to the people our target audience respects. That might look like:
Doing this gives you a few benefits. First, it helps bring on the warm fuzzies for those experts. Second, when we recognize the people our audience respects, it make it easier for them to associate that kind of quality with us, too.
Sidenote: This happens to all of us. We immediately feel more connected to people who root for the same sports teams, listen to the same bands, and chow down at the same favorite restaurants. It works the same way with experts. If I know you read my favorite blog, I'm more likely to think you know what you're talking about.
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Market Motive was co-founded in 2007 by Michael Stebbins, John Marshall and former Google employee Avinash Kaushik. It builds curriculum that trains professionals on digital marketing, and has delivered web-based certification programmes to Fortune 500 companies, including Microsoft, Home Depot, Dell, Ogilvy, Federal Express and JP Morgan Chase, and education institutes like Duke University, Benedictine University and Concordia University.
Market Motive will continue to operate as an independent arm of Simplilearn with co-foun der Michael Stebbins staying on as CEO along with his entire team. Stebbins will also join Simplilearn as the chief innovation officer.
"Our focus continues to be to provide a wide range of short-term certification-based courses that have a direct impact on the learners' careers," said Krishna Kumar, founder & CEO of Simplilearn. "The digital marketing ecosystem is at the tipping point and this is the right time for us to expand our products in this hot segment."
Simplilearn has recently concluded a $15 million (Rs 95 crore) Series C round of funding led by Mayfield Fund, with existing investors Kalaari Capital and Helion Venture Partners participating in the round. Simplilearn has raised a total of $28 million (Rs 170 crore) from investors so far.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/followceleb.cms?alias=Simplilearn,silicon valley,Market Motive,digital marketing training company,Bengaluru-based tech-education company
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The Wall Street Journal reports that Yahoo has struck a deal with software company Oracle that has the potential to attract millions of new users to Yahoo's search engine.
As per the terms of the deal, when installing or updating Oracle's Java software users will be encouraged to make Yahoo their default search engine.
WSJ suggest if even a fraction of those who install Java software agree to make Yahoo their new default search provider, it could bring a meaningful number of new users to the search engine, which holds just 12.7% of the search market.
According to Oracle itself, 89% of desktop computers in the US have Java software installed, while billions of devices around the world also use Java software.
The partnership was announced by CEO Marissa Mayer at Yahoo's annual shareholder meeting on Wednesday.
When the deal comes into effect this month, one of the first screens you'll see after downloading or updating Java will include a checkbox prompting you to "set Yahoo as your homepage and default search engine on Chrome and Internet Explorer, plus get Yahoo as your new tab page on Chrome."
You'll have to go out of your way to uncheck the box before continuing with the software install, which could lead to many people setting Yahoo as their default without even realizing it.
Further terms of the deal between Yahoo and Oracle were not discussed. The recent deal between Yahoo and Firefox was only briefly mentioned, with Mayer claiming the deal has at least been "profitable".
Image credit: Shutterstock.com. Used under license.
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The all-new Explore page will comb through the 70 million photos and videos published to the social network each day to discover trending tags, places, and people.
Another new addition you'll find in the Explore page is curated collections. These collections will be featured right at the top of the Explore page, and updated regularly. Some collections you may find will include things like interesting accounts, extreme athletes, architecture, ancient ruins, and more.
At this time only US users will have access to the new Explore page, but the company says it will work on bringing these features to more countries after it "fine tunes" the experience.
Unlike Explore, all Instagram users are able to use the new search functionality. After tapping on the search bar you will now be presented with four tabs: Top, People, Tags, and Places.
The new 'Top' tab is a powerful new way to search across people, places, and hashtags all at the same time. Using the Places tab you will now be able to search for pictures and videos taken at a specific location, something that wasn't so easy to do before.
Previously you had to find a photo or video that was location tagged, and then tap on that tag to reveal other photos and videos that were taken at that location.
Now you can search for the location just as you would anything else on Instagram — from restaurants, to convention halls, to vacation spots — it's easier than ever to drop in on the location of your choice.
The new Search and Explore features are available today on the iOS App Store and Android's Google Play Store.
Image Credit: blog.instagram.com
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Unlike in the NFL, the first team on the NBA's draft board is only given the highest chance to win the first pick — it is not guaranteed. The NBA awards its top team a 25% chance to win the first pick, the second team 19.9%, the third 15.6%, and so on. That means the top team on the draft board still has a 75% chance that someone else will win the first pick.
Marketing channels are more like the NBA than the NFL in that occupying first place might not mean you get a majority of the market. Because search is not an exclusive marketing choice, you might even get a majority of users but not a majority of the use or time spent on various media.
The Local Search Association (LSA) asked consumers to identify the sources they use in looking for local businesses, products, or services, and rate the likelihood of using that source from 1-5, with 5 being extremely likely.
The below chart, put together by Marketing Sherpa using LSA data, shows those responses with a 5 rating. The data illustrates that, while search engines are clear leaders in the way that consumers look for local businesses and services, other media platforms and competition cannot be ignored.
Even when search engines and mobile search are combined, the cumulative volume of use of all other media significantly exceeds that combined number. Thus, it is important for SMBs to engage a cross-media marketing strategy to capture a diverse audience in different stages of the path to purchase.
However, this breadth in media channels presents a problem for marketers. Audiences are now much more fragmented, and each marketing channel reaches a narrower group. The thought of trying to use all of these channels is overwhelming for the resource-constrained SMB. How can SMBs effectively market in such a broad selection of media?
The answer lies in a Bruce Lee-esque kung fu technique of using the energy of the problem instead of trying to resist it. Each channel has its own strengths and presents an opportunity to market more efficiently and take advantage of those strengths. Simply put, invest in marketing where the return is greatest.
Targeted marketing reaches the right consumers and helps make marketing efforts more efficient. There are many ways to focus advertising such as by geography, demographics, or (as we discuss below) targeting media most effective for a particular business category.
This year's Local Search Association Local Media Tracking Study, conducted by Burke, gauged how consumers use different media channels based on business category. Eight thousand (8,000) consumers were asked what products and/or services they searched for and what sources they used for the search in the past week.
Some of the results are summarized in the below heat map, with dark green indicating the strongest use fading to red for the weakest use. Respondents may choose more than one source to accommodate cross-media search while shopping, and thus the combined percentages usually exceed 100%.
The results reveal that there are definite trends in consumer shopping behavior related to different media and different products or services.
Even though search engines dominated with a shade of green across almost every category, there was still a wide range of use depending on category with an up to 50% response variance.
The top business categories, with 80% or more of searchers using search engines, were employment agencies with 84%, cellular service with 81%, and health clubs at 80%. On the other hand, only 34% of taxi searches used search engines.
There often was an inverse relationship between search engines and directory listings, as 78% of taxi searches used PYP/IYP/WP (print yellow pages, Internet yellow pages and white pages).
Combined PYP/IYP/WP performed particularly well in residential home services such as electrical contractors at 64%, plumbing contractors at 61%, and appliance repair at 61%. Surprisingly, they also outperformed search engines in professional services such as attorneys at 67% and physicians at 56%.
Some highlights from other media include the following:
It is important for SMBs to engage in cross-media marketing strategies to capture a diverse audience in different stages of the path to purchase. But with the explosion in number of media outlets being utilized by consumers today, the marketplace is increasingly fragmented, and reaching consumers across all media channels is a daunting task.
Targeting the right consumers will make marketing more efficient, increase return and help generate the sufficient audience volume. There are a number of ways that can help: developing an effective mobile strategy, using geo-location to target consumers, and per the above, using the best performing media outlets for particular business categories.
While individual results will vary, there are definite trends in different media performing better in certain business categories. Marketers can help SMBs identify those top media channels that provide better performance based on the type of business and design for them an effective cross-media marketing strategy.
Some opinions expressed in this article may be those of a guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.
Be a part of the world's largest search marketing conference, Search Engine Land's SMX East. The robust agenda covers the latest tactics in paid search, SEO, mobile, analytics and more. Register today and save $300, or come as a team and save 10%-20%.
About The Author Wesley Young is the Local Search Association's vice president of Public Policy. He blogs about the industry on the Local Search Insider blog. (Some images used under license from Shutterstock.com.)Get the latest news in local search marketing each week.
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As a leader in cutting-edge online marketing solutions designed to help practices and other businesses succeed, iMatrix continually provides the best possible Internet marketing services and outcomes for its clients. In fact, iMatrix launched its new Premium search engine optimization (SEO) service on June 1, 2015 in response to Google's recent search algorithm updates — namely the Panda update, which penalizes websites without custom content, and the April 21st update, which penalizes websites that are not mobile responsive.
By signing up for the new iMatrix Premium SEO service, practice owners can satisfy Google's recent algorithm updates to help improve their search ranking and increase their organic Web traffic, which often translates into increased foot traffic at their physical office location.
About Google's Algorithm Updates
The algorithm updates affect how Google ranks websites. Two of the more than 200 ranking factors included in Google's algorithm include a website's mobile accessibility and the quality of the website's content. Again, by offering mobile-friendly website designs, custom content and comprehensive SEO services, the Premium Service addresses both these updates and can help improve clients' Web visibility and their websites' search rankings.
Additional Premium Benefits
With the Premium Service, iMatrix hopes to bridge the gap between the online marketing needs of clients on the Starter or Social Service and the more comprehensive SEO needs of certain clients. Justin Allen, director of product strategy and account development for iMatrix, was particularly excited to launch this product.
"We recognize the importance of increased organic Web traffic for the overall success of any practice. Premium provides comprehensive SEO services to improve your website's accessibility, to both search engines and online visitors. This helps our clients outshine the online competition," said Justin Allen.
About iMatrix
Founded in 2002, iMatrix provides small and medium businesses with online marketing solutions for every need and every budget. From mobile-friendly website design to advanced search engine optimization, iMatrix offers practice- and studio-based businesses a wide range of digital marketing tools and services. iMatrix is an Internet Brands company.
For more information about iMatrix or its new Premium Service, please contact Justin Allen, director of product strategy and account development, by calling 1-888-667-5236.
(C) Copyright 2015 GlobeNewswire, Inc. All rights reserved.
Despite what some in the SEO community will say, link building really hasn't changed. Not that much anyway.
Link building is, and always has been, the manual promotion of your website to another site. This version of link building has existed since Eric Ward practically invented the trade in 1994.
My definition of link building isn't the only one out there, though. There are others who think of link building as algorithmic manipulation and spam, devoid of any real marketing purposes.
As far as I'm concerned, these tactics completely misrepresent real link building.
Skewed by SpamI won't deny that link building has an unfortunate past. There was an arms race of spammy links to manipulate Google's algorithm, which confuses link building today with spam links of the past. For years and years, many people spammed in the name of link building.
Before Google introduced the Penguin algorithm in April 2012, spam links threatened their business model. A search engine's business (i.e. Google) is only as good as the amount of trust people put into their results. For many years, spammers were threatening the trust Google had established. Manipulating Google's algorithm meant less than ideal sites in their search results.
These tactics included everything from hiding links behind html to submitting links to article directories that no human would ever use as an actual resource.
There's an argument to be made that these practices wouldn't have existed if it weren't for Google's algorithm. At the very least, they wouldn't have been as prominent. The algorithm has always put a great emphasis on links, but it wasn't until Penguin that the algorithm could effectively discriminate a natural link from a manipulative one.
As aggressive as Penguin was, it didn't fully erase the perception of link building as spam. Not immediately anyway.
But now that we're three years removed from the first Penguin update, it's become increasingly clear that link building is still valid.
Links continue to be critical to not only organic search visibility, but the entirety of digital marketing campaigns as well. It's important to realize that link building is promotion.
Link Building is PromotionSpammers spend their time employing manipulative tactics to game the algorithm, tactics that do nothing to better the online experience for people.
The link building I know and do is far different from this. Link builders conduct industry research, contact other webmasters within the industry, and effectively explain the value our sites provide.
When you boil it down, link building is simply online promotion.
When you build links, you have to engage with the authorities and influencers in your niche. If you want these people to link to you, you have to convince them why it's worth their while.
There are only two reasons why a site isn't linking to you:
Both of these reasons can be remedied through link building.
In case A, the website may have never heard of you because you haven't engaged with them yet. That's okay – this is why you're building links in the first place!
If it's case B, that's okay too. Some webmasters need convincing. It's not their job to inherently see the value in your site, pages, content, etc.
It's your job as a link builder to explain why they should want to link to you.
If there's a website known as a valuable platform within your industry, you should attempt to engage the people who operate it. Email them, explain the unique value proposition of your site, and why it benefits the reader of their sites. Be explicit.
Either way, you're promoting your brand. It's not large-scale promotion, like a 30-second ad on television is. It's much more personal than that – it's direct, one-on-one contact with another important person in your industry. It's real engagement with a real human who cares about your industry much as you. This sort of relationship can lead to plenty of other marketing opportunities beyond link building as well. It's one of the reasons I love link building.
Link Building Complements All MarketingApart from building organic search visibility, link building supercharges your other marketing efforts.
Link building may not have changed, but the online landscape surrounding it is incredibly different.
For example, when link building was in its nascent stages, no online marketers knew what content marketing was. Today, content marketing is all anybody wants to talk about. Take a look at this chart from Google Trends:
Screenshot taken from Google Trends on May 16, 2015
The noise surrounding content marketing has resulted in a lot of confusion. I can't even begin to tell you how many times we've had potential clients ask us if content marketing is what we do to secure links.
Let me make this clear: link building and content marketing are NOT the same. They require different skill sets, and they have differing end goals.
Although they may not be the same, the fact is that they can coincide well with each other.
Really, link building can add to any of your online marketing campaigns.
Maybe people don't click on your PPC ads because your brand hasn't established much visibility yet. Link building can help. Ranking in organic search will help to cultivate brand recognition.
Maybe people aren't sharing your amazing content on social media. Link building can help here as well. Remember that the majority of traffic online is directed by search engines. The more visible your content is, the more likely people will find it and share it.
A lack of content visibility will plague a content marketing campaign as well. Once again, link building can help with that. The goal of content marketing isn't necessarily to build links. People may be reading your content, but not linking to it. A trained link builder will take the time to effectively persuade these people to link to it, creating more opportunities for others to find you in the future.
The point is, that no matter what online marketing strategy you're using, link building can help. You may be earning links with the other strategies, and more power to you if that's true. But for every link you earn, there are five more worth building.
ConclusionLink building hasn't really changed. Legitimate link building is the same as it ever was. It's still a promotional tactic that increases your visibility in organic search. It's a practice that requires you to engage with your relevant community, and to persuade them why your site is valuable.
Real link building isn't sitting at your computer and exhausting a series of instant submit directories. Penguin eradicated this and other spammy practices, and we should be grateful for it.
Because of Penguin, link building doesn't have to be a dirty word. We can keep building the natural links your site deserves; the kind of links that will benefit your site and all of your other marketing efforts.