For several years now, I have worked with one of the best SEO experts in the business. After seeing her generate amazing results for clients, I decided to get alittle free advice for my readers...and Gabriella Sannino, Owner of Level343, graciously answered all of the nitty-gritty SEO questions that plague businesses.
Why is SEO important to my marketing efforts?
You’re kidding right? It’s like asking why do you need flour to make bread… or why do you need strawberries to make strawberry jelly? Listen if you're using the Internet for your business, SEO helps your website get seen. Unless you have a very small niche market, you'll have a high amount of competition for pretty much any business. The right SEO strategy will raise the individual pages of your website up the ranks of the search engine results so people searching for your products or services can find you.
Mixed with a great marketing plan, optimization can - and, more often than not, does - turn into conversions/sales. Another aspect of SEO’s importance is this “science” allow you to test words, strategies based on your business.
What are the best methods of SEO?
You could break it down to budget or you could be smart and base it on natural organic traffic. For example any SEO strategy should include in depth keyword research and competitor analysis. They should include a comprehensive plan for how your pages will be laid out and what content will be in which page. User interface is an extremely important aspect of keeping the visitor on your site. How many times I have seen sites that make it difficult to find what they want. Keep in mind make things easy to find navigationally. That’s why it very important for your SEO to work hand in hand with your designer. Using your plan for the content pages, you would optimize the code and content of each page to match the corresponding keyword. From the name of the page to where it leads the readers. If you have a competent SEO provider they will look at all these aspect as part of their strategy.
Much like marketing, you need to continually assess the results. Are you getting the results you expected? If not, why not? If so, what can you do to expand on those results?
How do I pick a good SEO provider? What do I look for and how do I know if I am getting scammed?
Let's answer the last question first. The biggest indication of a scam is the guarantee. A good SEO can guarantee top 30, top 20, or even (if they're really good) top 10. However, they CAN'T guarantee #1 placement for competitive terms. If they have this guarantee and expect you to pay at least half up front, I'd say walk away.
When looking for a good SEO provider, you want a company that has proven results. How have they performed for previous clients? You may not be able to get references because many clients require a signed NDA, but they can show results.
As well, you need to look at prices. Some companies may not list their prices on the website, and that's okay. However, a legitimate business won't be offering $50 a month for top quality SEO. It's expensive because it's time consuming, and you'll need to keep that in mind when searching for quality providers. Cheap isn't always better, and is often worse than if you'd never bought SEO services in the first place.
Lastly, look for ethical SEO services. If you've read anything about optimization, you've probably already heard the term "blackhat". Blackhat sounds great at first, as far as a method to get you up the search engine rankings quickly, but it can, and will, get you banned from the search engines. This is comparative to being taken out of all the phone books. Look for ethical or organic SEO services - the results may not be as quick, but they're longer lasting and will keep you where you can be seen.
What is the difference between SEO and Internet marketing?
Everything! Optimization is just that - it's optimized website code, content, etc. The only way that SEO really deals with marketing is in the type of content, such as landing pages (sales pages). Internet marketing doesn't have anything to do with coding, anymore than sales has to do with optimizing code. Our job as the SEO professional is to get the client and product seen. Your job as the Internet marketer is to get the product sold. :)
What is the number one failure of companies regarding SEO?
Quitting. SEO is not a "set it and forget it" situation. It is a long-term strategy. The first month, there's a lot of flurry and action because it takes a lot of work to get everything started - the business owner sees something being done and they're content. The second and third month focuses on raising their website through the search engine results - again, they can see work being done. However, after that it's a matter of maintenance - once the business is there, we want to keep it there. There isn't a flurry of action and the business owner starts wondering why they're paying out money still. They quit, and then can't understand why they're sliding down the rankings again.
You can't stop. It IS an ongoing process that requires continual maintenance, research, modification and brainstorming to stay on top - much like any other business and marketing strategy.
About Gabriella Sannino and Level343
An Italian citizen with over 20 years in the Internet business she knows a few things about marketing and communication. Graduating from the University of Texas in the mid 80’s she moved to New York to work for a small advertising agency. While there she became fascinated with how people were interacting with new the new technology… the Internet. She decided to hone her skills with human interactions and took several graduate classes in industrial psychology at the New School of Social Research. After her first winter in New York she realized the California sun was her next destination.
Landing in San Francisco in the late 80’s she embarked on a restaurant career and left corporate America for 5 years. During the Dot. Bomb era is when Gabriella used her marketing and communications education along with her language skills to start her own boutique International marketing agency B Studio. It has grown and branched out into three copywriting agencies which are now run by Level 343
http://level343.com/about_us.php
http://www.urban-seo.com/urban-geeks/
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