Optimizing Your LinkedIn Company Page to Hook Leads & Drive Traffic
LinkedIn has become an incredible marketing tool, especially for businesses who know how to optimize their LinkedIn company page.
The premiere professional networking platform is a great place to scout talent, network, and nurture sales prospects. But that’s not the only way to leverage it.
LinkedIn also has powerful search engine optimization benefits. Creating a LinkedIn company page is of the fastest ways to rank for branded keywords, and it sends strong signals to Google’s ranking algorithm.
Want to quickly and effectively optimize your LinkedIn company page? Focus on these key areas.
Why LinkedIn is Worth Your Time
LinkedIn is home to over 500 million users from 200 different countries. And those users are impressively active, with over half of them visiting the site at least once a month.
Having a dedicated company page gives you direct access to customers, clients, and talent in your industry. It’s a free platform for showcasing products and services and promoting important news.
Company pages also unlock valuable engagement assets, like how many people see your posts and what they’re saying about your company.
LinkedIn’s not only popular with professionals – Google’s ranking algorithm loves it, too. LinkedIn company pages quickly climb the rankings for branded key phrases, giving companies a free and easy opportunity to get their content in front of more searchers.
Optimizing a LinkedIn Company Page
When we talk about optimizing a LinkedIn company page, we usually have three broad goals in mind:
- Increasing LinkedIn user engagement with the company page;
- Helping the company page rank for relevant queries in search engine results; and
- Helping the company page rank in LinkedIn’s native search engine results.
Each of these goals can be refined and targeted to a company’s specific key performance indicators; if the company is looking for sales leads, for example, the focus will be on user engagement at specific points in the marketing funnel.
Whether you’re focusing on organic engagement or plan to boost your LinkedIn strategy with sponsored content, optimizing a LinkedIn company page should begin with these basic steps:
- Fill out the company profile completely.
- Write a keyword-rich company description.
- Upload high-quality photos.
- Link back to the company website and other social profiles.
- Post-industry-relevant content.
- Have employees connect to the page.
1. Complete Your Company Profile
Start by filling in the blanks.
When a user first enters a company on their profile, LinkedIn generates a bare-bones page for that company to serve as a hub for employees; however, the information that automatically populates the page is far from complete and not necessarily accurate.
Enter all the information someone would need to find and identify your company: its address, phone number, website URL, etc. Make sure it matches what appears on the company’s website and Google My Business page
This step increases the page’s legitimacy in the eyes of users and search engines.
2. Write a Compelling Company Description
What does your company do? What makes it unique? Boil it down into 156 characters.
The first 156 characters of a company’s description appears as the page’s meta description, or the summary that appears below the link on both Google and LinkedIn’s the search engine results page.
It helps to think of the description as an elevator pitch: a concise summary that tells people what your company is all about and entices them to learn more.
The company description can be longer than 156 characters, of course, but it’s important to make those initial words count. Be sure to include keywords and key phrases that people use to find companies in your industry.
3. Upload High-Quality Photos
The profile picture is the first impression people have of your company on LinkedIn. It appears in the LinkedIn search results, on employees’ profile pages, and above everything your company posts.
Company pages with profile pictures also get six times as many visits as those without one.
The best profile picture for a company on LinkedIn is a clear, high-quality image of its logo. LinkedIn recommends a minimum profile image size of 400px by 400px and a max of 7680px by 4320px.
You should also personalize the page with an eye-catching header image (recommended 1584px by 396 px). It can be a simple banner, a photo collage, or an image with call-to-action text. Since it always appears alongside the profile image, the header doesn’t need to include a logo; however, it should reinforce brand recognition using relevant imagery and colours.
If your ideal logo or header image doesn’t quite fit LinkedIn’s dimensions, Sprout Social’s Landscape Resizer tool is a quickly modify it.
4. Link to Other Sites and Profiles
Social media pages are most effective when they’re interconnected.
Add links to the company’s other social profiles so LinkedIn users can easily find and follow your company across the web.
In turn, add a LinkedIn button to your company website.
5. Post-Industry-Relevant Content
LinkedIn isn’t just another company listing; it’s a platform from which companies can broadcast their best content to clients, customers and industry colleagues.
Posts are one of the most direct ways to engage with viewers and followers since posts appear both on its page and the home page of each of the company’s followers.
What to post depends on the company’s goals for the social network. LinkedIn posts can be used to:
- Showcase an awesome company culture
- Share company news and updates
- Publish original blog, video and image content
- Spread the word about timely industry issues
Always include some form of visual content – those posts get 98% more engagement than text-only posts.
6. Get Employees on Board
If your business is new to LinkedIn, but your employees aren’t, chances are they’ll have already named the company in the Experience section of their profiles.
But that doesn’t always mean they are connected to the same page.
For example, the user who entered “Company Inc.” may be linked to a different page than the one who simply put “Company.”
Ironing out these inconsistencies is an important step in increasing the company page’s reach, especially for smaller businesses. The more employees who connect, the greater your reach.
About LinkedIn Sponsored Content
Once you’ve done all the above, it’s time to consider furthering your reach with sponsored content.
Sponsoring content puts your company’s posts in people’s LinkedIn feeds, appearing almost exactly like an organic (non-sponsored) post. It’s a great way to reach clients and customers, especially for B2B businesses.
LinkedIn’s advertising tools enable highly specific targeting, allowing you to aim content at specific people, companies, or positions within a company. Insight tags help to define further your audience based on who visits your site and their actions on the page, detailed conversion tracking gives a clear understanding of the value of leads through LinkedIn.
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What the Google+ Shutdown Means for Businesses
Updated December 11, 2018.
On October 8, the Wall Street Journal broke news of a major Google+ privacy leak that occurred earlier this year.
Hours later, Google announced in a blog post that it would shut down Google+ by August of 2019. Then, in the wake of a second data breach discovered in November, Google stated the Google+ closure would be expedited to April of 2019.
What does this mean for Google+ users, including businesses using the platform to boost their online presence and search engine ranking?
While the demise of Google+ may represent the end of an era for Google, its impact on the rest of us isn’t as significant as you might think.
Why Google+ is Shutting Down
The reasons behind Google’s decision to shut down Google+ is twofold: low user engagement and security troubles.
Back in March of 2018, Google uncovered a serious software vulnerability in the Google+ API. Essentially, the bug gave outside developers access to private information on nearly 500,000 Google+ users: names, email addresses, birth dates, locations and more. Mallory Locklear at Engadget penned a good overview of the Google+ data leak here.
Although Google didn’t find evidence that anyone used this bug (for malicious reasons or otherwise), they felt an in-depth audit of the Google+ platform in general was warranted.
The audit, named Project Strobe, raised a couple of red flags:
- Google+ had not achieved broad consumer or developer adoption and had limited user interaction with its associated apps.
- Though Google’s engineering teams put a lot of effort into building Google+ over the years, there were “significant challenges in creating and maintaining a successful Google+ that meets consumers’ expectations.”
Google found that 90 percent of Google+ user sessions last less than five seconds. To put that in perspective, the average Facebook user session lasts six minutes and 23 seconds, and the typical user logs 173 sessions a month.
Considering these issues, Google is shutting down the consumer version of Google+ over the course of the next six months. The process will conclude when the platform closes for good in April 2019.
Google+ and Search Engine Optimization
When it launched in 2011, Google+ was intended to make Google itself more social. Users could make profiles and connect with networks of family, friends, and other contacts. The platform had a stream akin to Facebook’s News Feed.
Google+ was also a part of one of Google’s newest search features, the +1 button. As the launch video explains, the button allowed users to ‘recommend’ webpages to their Google+ network.
The +1 button was important for another reason: search rankings. Initially, Google indicated it was one of many ranking signals Google’s search engine algorithm used to gauge search quality and rankings.
Over the years, Google+ made appearances on Google’s main site in various other ways, but none seemed to stick.
For a time, Google+ and +1 button activity were used to personalize users’ search results, and Google+ assets like photos and posts showed up in some results as well. Content posted to Google+ was often indexed faster than other sites.
Before Google My Business, Google+ pages also served as a public face for businesses in search.
Marketers and businesses flocked to the platform for its purported search benefits. But the public didn’t follow, and as time passed, Google downplayed the importance of Google+ and the +1 button as ranking signals.
What the Google+ Shutdown Means for Search Engine Optimization
The end of Google+ will mean the end of its effects on search engine rankings, however minimal they may be.
It’s welcome news to businesses who were compelled to use Google+ only for its search benefits. The time spent posting to Google+ can instead be used to engage communities their customers already use: whether it’s Facebook pages and groups, Twitter, LinkedIn, or niche industry forums.
If you’ve invested time in building a presence on Google+, there’s lots of time to tie up any loose ends. The platform doesn’t officially close until next April, and Matt Southern at Search Engine Journal has put together a timely guide on how to export your Google+ data.
Have questions about the Google+ shutdown? Don’t hesitate to ask – we’ll be watching as this continues to unfold.
The Smart Way to Deal With Fake Negative Reviews on Google, Yelp and Other Sites
If you’re reading this, chances are you’re in damage control-mode. Your business has been hit with a fake negative review on Google, Yelp, or another online platform, and you want to deal with it ASAP. Preferably by wiping it off the face of the Internet.
Fake negative reviews are all too common. It’s trivially easy to create an account on these sites and write feedback for all the world to see. For business owners who’ve worked hard to build their reputation, these types of reviews are exasperating.
It is possible to get fake reviews removed in some cases. But that’s not always the case. Dealing with fake negative reviews is a delicate process, and it’s one you should prepare for before it becomes necessary.
We’ve laid out a step-by-step process for how to deal with fake negative reviews of a business, including how to report fake reviews and what to do when removal isn’t possible.
How to Deal with Fake Negative Reviews, Step-By-Step
Dealing with fake negative reviews is easier when you have a plan of action. The process will differ between businesses, but the basic steps are as follows:
- Verify that the review is fake.
- Determine if the review violates the rules.
- Report the fake review through the official channels.
- If the review stays up, decide on the best course of action.
1. Are You Sure the Review is a Fake One?
When we say ‘fake negative reviews’, we’re talking about reviews that are either:
- Written by someone who was never a customer, client, or associate of the business; or
- Making claims about the business that aren’t true.
It does a business no good to conflate bad reviews with fake ones. Do your research before alleging a review isn’t genuine.
If you have a very small customer or client base, it’s easier to tell if a review is coming from someone the business has never dealt with. Otherwise, some tell-tale signs of a fake review include:
- Review was authored by a brand-new profile with no other reviews and a sparse profile
- Tone is overly aggressive or threatening and clearly meant to provoke
- Language includes industry jargon that actual customers or clients rarely use
2. Does the Review Break the Rules?
Suppose the review comes from someone you know has never dealt with the business. What next?
You can tell that to Google or Yelp. Trouble is, they don’t know who your customers are. Should they take your word for it?
People don’t even need to be customers to leave a valid review; they just need a customer experience. That can mean reaching out to the business by phone or email, or dropping by the premises.
It’s seldom possible to get a fake review removed simply because the reviewer wasn’t a customer. The most promising route to taking down fake reviews is to report them for violating the site’s terms of use.
Google, Yelp, Facebook, and other sites each have their own separate community guidelines. In general, the following behaviour is usually grounds to report a review:
- Demonstrably false information
- Current or former employees reviewing their employer
- Business owners or their employees reviewing a competitor to manipulate rankings
- People posting the same content repeatedly, or reviewing the same business from multiple accounts
- People claiming to represent an individual, company or organization without permission
- Obscene or offensive language that goes beyond ‘colourful’
- Threats, harassment, bullying, or discrimination
If you believe the review in question violates the site’s rules, proceed to step 3; otherwise, skip to step 4.
3. Will Google/Yelp/Facebook Remove the Review?
Don’t call out the reviewer as a phony in public. Go through the website’s official reporting channels. While awaiting a verdict, decide how to proceed if the review stays up.
To report a review on Yelp:
- Locate the review in the Reviews section of your Yelp for Business Owners account.
- Click the button with the three dots, then click Report Review.
- Submit your report.
To report a review on Facebook:
- Locate the review in the Reviews section of your Page.
- Click the button with the three dots, then click Report Post.
- Submit your report.
To report a Google review:
- Locate the review on your Google My Business page.
- Move your cursor over the review and click the flag icon that appears.
- Submit your review.
4. Should You Respond to a Fake Review?
It’s never a good idea to ignore fake negative reviews.
51% of customers expect businesses to respond to negative reviews within seven days. Posting a response gives you an opportunity to demonstrate you’re responsive to customers, even if they have nothing nice to say.
How best to respond to negative fake reviews can be tricky. It’s not smart to accuse the person outright, because it makes the business owner look petty and defensive.
A better tactic? Take the high ground. Write a courteous, professional response. The most important thing is for customers to see that the business is willing to acknowledge negativity and do something about it.
If there’s a clear sign the review is fake (talking about products or services you don’t have, or an experience that couldn’t have happened), there are subtle ways to address the discrepancy.
Don’t say, “We don’t sell ice cream, liar.” Say, “We’re sorry to hear you had a bad experience, but you may be confusing us with another restaurant, as we don’t have ice cream on our menu.”
Don’t say, “You never once used our service and we know it.” Say, “We’d like to investigate, but have no record of a client with your name. Please provide more information about your experience.”
Bad reviews hurt; fake reviews can hurt even more. But don’t give into frustration. The worst thing you can do is fight fire with fire, responding inappropriately or threateningly to someone who’s trying to bring you down.
Dealing with Fake Reviews
We’ve helped various clients navigate the process of dealing with fake reviews, and it’s never fun. But with a solid plan and a clear head, you can minimize the damage.
As always, the best way to overcome negative reviews is to surround them with positive ones. Don’t forget to let your happy customers know how much you appreciate their feedback.
Reputation Management SEO: Why Branded Keywords Should Be On Your Radar
Online reputation management involves more than establishing a website and social media profiles. Conversations about brands are happening at various channels around the web, and the loudest of these discussions converge at one important place: the search engine results page. This post covers the basics of reputation management SEO, including the relationship between reputation and search engines, branded keywords, and strategies to dominate page one.
What is Reputation Management SEO?
Have you ever Googled yourself?
Not everyone might admit to it, but it’s doubtful anyone could resist Googling their name at least once or twice.
For most people, the results are typical: a few social media profiles, a company “About Us” page, maybe a quote in a local newspaper. Depending on your name’s popularity, the top results might be about an entirely different person; someone you’ve never met, but with whom you share a search engine results page.
You might’ve Googled yourself out of curiosity, or boredom, or because we put the thought in your mind just now. But there could be a time in your life where someone makes that inquiry with more significant intentions: a manager thinking of hiring you, a college weighing your application, or a potential partner scoping you out before a date.
In that case, the search engine results could have very real and lasting impact on your reputation.
The same goes for brands.
What shows up on page one of the results for branded keywords (searches that include the name of the brand) has a measurable effect on that brand’s reputation. That’s the importance of reputation management SEO, which is search engine optimization strategies and tactics to influence the results for branded search inquiries in order to preserve and improve a brand’s reputation online.
How the Search Engine Results Effect a Brand’s Reputation
It’s Friday night, and you’re decidedly too exhausted to make dinner. But you’re not feeling like any of your go-to restaurants, either. So, you pull out your phone and Google the name of that new place in town.
The first result is the restaurant’s homepage; the second is a link to their menu. Perfect. But there, in place three, is a preview of their Yelp rating:
Rating: 2.5 – 63 reviews – Price range: $40-$60
In an instant, your opinion has turned; there’s no way you’re paying 5-Star prices for a 2-Star meal.
Review sites like Yelp can have an enormous impact on a brand’s reputation online. So can Google reviews, news stories, blog posts, forum discussions, directory pages, career sites, and all the other third party websites that rank for branded search inquires.
The problem is that brands can’t control the content on these sites as they rule their own domains. A well-optimized homepage will usually outrank third party sites for branded inquiries, but customers aren’t as likely to click through if it’s surrounded by negativity on the SERP.
You can ask the authors to remove negative pages, but that can easily backfire and result in an even worse reputation.
So, what can be done about it?
Reputation Management SEO Strategies
Rarely do brands have the power to remove negative search engine results outright. However, it is possible to:
- Use search engine optimization (SEO) to influence the results for branded search inquiries
- Influence the content of third-party review sites
- Publish new types of content to claim more above the fold space on the results page
The goal is to enhance the ranking of positive items in favour of negative ones, either by displacing the negative content or improving it. There are several ways to go about this; we’ll briefly cover three strategies in the sections below.
1. Encourage Positive Reviews
Third party review sites like Yelp (along with industry-specific sites like G2Crowd for B2B software, or HomeStars for trade contractors) are crucial when it comes to reputation management SEO for local service industries.
These sites tend to rank well because they provide relevant information consumers want to see. Authentic customer reviews tend to carry more weight than curated testimonials on a brand’s own website.
It might not always be possible to outrank them, but it is possible to turn these sites into an asset:
- Most third-party review sites allow brands to “claim” and modify their profiles. Take this step and fill out the profile completely, using it as a platform to speak to potential customers.
- Upload enticing, high-quality photos that put products and services in the best possible light.
- Encourage happy customers to leave positive reviews on the site to bolster the score. Great reviews are the most effective way to diminish the weight of negative ones.
2. Publish New Content
With proper placement and optimization, quality blog posts, videos, and images that utilize branded keywords can rise in the rankings to displace negative pages.
YouTube videos are especially powerful in this way, since they can even claim the coveted position zero ranking, claiming valuable above-the-fold real estate.
It’s worth utilizing off-site publishing platforms as well as those on the brand’s domain. Industry-specific news sites, as well as pop news sites like The Huffington Post, can be valuable both for back-linking and reputation management.
3. Get Others to Write About the Brand
Journalists, bloggers, editors, and video creators are always on the hunt for great content. Pitching positive stories about the brand helps to seed the web with a variety of content relevant to branded search inquiries.
Over time, these stories can gain enough traction to rise in rank and claim a spot previously occupied by negativity.
Managing Your Reputation Online
Reputation management SEO takes time. Positive stories cannot displace negative ones overnight; high-quality links need to be developed over time; and legitimate customer reviews don’t always come easy.
But at this day and age, reputation management SEO is absolutely worth the time and effort.
The search engine results page serves as a brand’s first impression to many, many people. Negative results can stop potential customers in their tracks.
It’s like the old saying about planting a tree. The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now. Change takes time, so there’s no better time than the present to work on your brand’s online reputation.
Get in touch with us if you’d like to chat about where your brand stands in the digital marketplace.
Blog Optimization Checklist: 10 Clear-Cut Ways to Boost SEO
When you’ve poured time and energy into a great blog post, you want it to reach as much of your audience as possible. Small changes matter when it comes to boosting blog SEO. Take a run through this blog optimization checklist before you post — it won’t take long, and it’ll help your blog get seen by the right people.
1. Keywords
Keywords are words or short phrases that encompass what the blog post is about (see our blog: What Are Keywords and Why Do They Matter?). When you use them well, keywords can help the post rank for search queries that include those words.
Why Blog Keywords Matter for SEO
Search engine algorithms use repeated words and phrases as clues to what a webpage is about. Placing relevant, natural-sounding keywords in the blog content, title, meta description, and URL can contribute to a blog post’s search engine ranking.
How to Optimize for Keywords
Incorporate your chosen keywords into the blog:
- Title
- Headings (one or more)
- First paragraph
- Meta description
- URL
2. Length
There’s no perfect word count for SEO, but the length of a blog can factor into its ranking.
Why Blog Length Matters for SEO
Search engine algorithms often deem pages with less than 300 words inadequate to rank in the search engine results. However, longer isn’t necessarily better; a 3,000-word post stuffed with irrelevant content will fare just as poorly as a short one.
Optimizing Length for SEO
Aim to write at least 500 words per blog post. Beyond that, the ideal blog length will depend on your audience. Pay attention to how your blogs perform and look for trends related to page length.
3. Readability
It’s in the writer’s interest to make a blog post as easy to read as possible. Spacing, formatting, and writing style all weigh on a blog’s readability.
Why Readability Matters for SEO
Making your content easy to digest will increase the time people spend reading it and encourage them to share it with others. It can also increase the likelihood the content will rank in Featured Snippets, which is a huge boost to blog SEO.
How to Optimize Blog Readability
- Add informative headings and subheadings to make the post easier to skim.
- Format lists or step-by-step instructions as numbered or bulleted lists.
- Break large paragraphs into shorter chunks. Single-sentence paragraphs are common in the blog world.
4. Title
The title is your chance to convince the reader to click in 50-60 characters or less. A good title:
- Is short (search engines cut off titles longer than 60 characters);
- Is compelling (but not clickbait); and
- Promises readers something of value if they click.
Why Blog Titles Matter for SEO
A great title will drive more traffic to the blog, which significantly impacts its rankings. As mentioned above, the title should also include relevant keywords.
How to Optimize Blog Titles
Craft your title around keywords and the value readers receive from the blog. Shorten it 50 characters or less and add compelling adjectives to make it pop.
5. Call to Action
The title succeeds in persuading readers to click on your blog post. What do you want them to do once they’re there? Whatever the goal, readers are more likely to do it if you guide them in the right direction with a clear call to action.
Why a Call to Action Matters for SEO
An effective call to action keeps people on your site and discourages them from bouncing back to the search engine results page (see our blog: Understanding Bounce Rate, Long Clicks and Pogo-Sticking).
How to Optimize Call to Action
Place the call to action prominently on the blog post (the best spot will vary audience-to-audience, so consider testing different placements). It should be relevant to the subject matter of the article and the user’s pain points.
6. Internal and External Links
Internal links are links to content that is within the same domain as your content: other blog posts, product pages, contact pages, and so on. External links are the opposite: they point to other websites.
Why Internal and External Linking Matters for SEO
Interlinking helps search engine algorithms to understand the website’s structure. Links to credible, authoritative external sources help build your site’s credibility within the eyes of the all-seeing search algorithm. Both are an important part of boosting blog SEO.
How to Optimize Links
Be picky about the links you include! Credible external sites will bolster your blog’s credibility, but poor sites will do the opposite. Insert internal links should in a logical way that benefits the reader.
7. Anchor Text
Anchor text refers to the clickable text of an internal or external link. On most sites, anchor text is underlined and highlighted in blue.
Why Anchor Text Matters for SEO
Search engine algorithms use anchor text another clue to what a web page is about, both regarding your blog and the page you’re linking to.
How to Optimize Anchor Text
Good anchor text is succinct, informative, and relevant to the target page. Incorporate keywords where it sounds natural to do so.
8. Images
Images are a necessity in any blog post, no matter the length or the topic. Along with their visual appeal, original images can help boost your blog’s SEO.
Why Images Are Good for SEO
Images make the blog easier to read, increasing the chance people will share it and explore the rest of your site. Keywords in image titles and file names can help give the algorithm context on your blog’s topic. Images also allow the site to rank in image searches.
Optimizing Images for SEO
Upload high-quality images with keyword-rich titles and file names. Avoid adding overly-large images, as they can bog down your site’s loading speed (see our blog: Why Page Speed Matters.
9. Meta Description
The meta description is a 160-character summary of the blog that can display below the headline on the search engine results page.
Why Meta Descriptions Matter for SEO
The meta description can be a huge factor in a reader’s decision to click through to your blog from the search engine results page. Like blog titles, meta descriptions are a chance to pique the reader’s curiosity and promise something worth clicking for.
How to Optimize Meta Descriptions
Meta descriptions that exceed 160 words will be cut off, so be sure to include the good stuff in the first 160.
10. Proofreading
Spelling and grammar checkers have come a long way, but they’re still not perfect! Take time to proofread your blog before posting it.
Why Spelling and Grammar Matters for SEO
Poor spelling and grammar will stop some readers in their tracks. Few people will share an error-ridden blog with their friends, let alone peruse the rest of the site. Proofreading keeps readers on the page and preserves your credibility.First, give the blog a once-over yourself. Then, pass it to a colleague for a second look. If no one’s available to help, a free proofreading tool like Grammarly or Hemingway Editor beats no proofreading at all.
5 Reasons Why Voice Search is Relevant to Local SEO in 2018
Voice search is set to become one of the top ways people find local products and services online. ComScore predicts that by 2020, 50% of all searches will be made using voice assistants like Alexa and Google Assistant. With the majority of voice searches being local queries, there are tons of reasons why voice search is relevant to local SEO.
These are some of the voice search trends in 2018 we’re eager to explore:
- Use of voice search is increasing in all age groups, including seniors.
- The hospitality industry is experimenting with voice-enabled devices in hotel rooms, which is a boon to retailers and restaurants who invest in local SEO.
- Voice-enabled devices are becoming more common in college dorms, giving local businesses another route to the lucrative student market.
- All signs point to pay-by-voice as a major e-commerce force in coming years.
- New schema markup can tell Google that your website’s text is perfect for voice search queries.
Let’s look at why these rising voice search trends are relevant to local SEO and discuss how to prepare for them
1. Voice Search is Not Only for Millennials
Millennials were the first generation to adopt voice assistant tech, and they’re still the biggest age group of voice search users. But voice search is increasingly used by people across age demographics.
In 2017, 10.9% of Americans used a voice-assisted device at least once, a 128.9% increase over the number in 2016.
One of the most surprising aspects of this increase is the number of adults over 65 who are eagerly purchasing and using voice assistant technology. Seniors aren’t usually early adopters of new tech, but voice search is different: it comes onboard familiar devices like thermostats and takes barriers like small text and complicated user interfaces out of the equation.
This trend presents a novel opportunity for businesses to speak to a demographic that has historically been tough to reach online.
2. Amazon Wants Alexa in Hotel Rooms
Until recently, the hospitality industry has struggled to integrate voice assistant devices into the guest experience. Many hotels have existing automation systems that don’t interface with new crop of smart home devices, while others lacked the information infrastructure to support them.
But as voice assistants have become ubiquitous, more brands are testing out voice-enabled tech in hotel rooms. The latest experiment comes from a collaboration between Amazon and Marriot. The companies plan to place Echo devices with specialized Alexa for Hospitality software in hotels, vacation rental spaces, and other hospitality locations.
Why is this exciting for Local SEO? Because tourists spend more than natives in local categories like restaurants and retail, and 33% of local search business comes from tourists.
When visitors land in an unfamiliar place, they turn to the internet for recommendations on where to eat and where to shop. In a future where voice-enabled devices are a hotel room standard, more and more of those valuable local queries are going to arrive via voice search.
3. Voice Assistants Are Becoming a Part of College Life
Today, smart speakers are still primarily used for entertainment purposes: playing music, reading audiobooks, and so on. But there’s a huge marketing push underway to frame voice-enabled smart speakers as a tool for college and university success.
Last year, Amazon partnered with four major universities to provide free Amazon Echo Dots to students, along with funding for schools to develop Alexa-related curriculums. Other schools are experimenting with smart speakers in dorm rooms to help students transition to college life.
Regardless of whether students will actually use their devices to keep track of class schedules and due dates, voice-enabled devices on campus are good news for local businesses.
Off-campus student spending accounts for as much as $17.5 billion in local economic activity. If voice assistants become a part of college life, businesses who invest in local SEO for voice search can reap even more of those benefits.
4. You Will Soon Be Able to Pay By Voice
In 2018, just about every major payment platform is working on enabling transactions through voice commands with voice-enabled devices.
Mastercard is looking to bring its Masterpass online payment platform into Amazon and Google’s voice systems. Google recently enabled peer-to-peer transactions through voice commands to Google Assistant, and Amazon has announced plans to let users make purchases with Amazon Pay directly through Alexa.
Once people can easily pay-by-voice, businesses who claim top local listings for voice search queries could see their conversions soar. It would also make calculating the return on investment for Local SEO easier and more accurate than ever.
5. Google Has Started Looking for ‘Speakable’ Text on Websites
Google recently announced a new form of markup called Speakable, which web publishers can use to indicate bits of text that are ideal for text-to-speech conversion.
To briefly summarize, schema markup is code on a website that speaks directly to search algorithms. It’s designed to provide information that helps search engines deliver better results to searchers. Speakable is a new kind of schema code that is meant to tell the algorithm which parts of a web page (if any) might be good answers to voice searches.
Essentially, Google wants to know which parts of your site are perfect for voice queries. That’s a huge opportunity for local businesses.
Speakable is still brand-new, and Google is currently only using it for news-related searches in the US. But its relevance is likely to expand over time, and it could become an important piece of the local SEO puzzle for businesses who want to rank in voice searches.
Preparing for Voice Search in Local SEO
The rise of voice search presents a world of opportunity for businesses who invest in local SEO.
Voice search optimization is still in its infancy. As voice search trends evolve, so will the tactics for optimizing a site for voice queries. However, there are steps you can take now to prepare for rising voice search trends in 2018 and beyond:
- Optimize your site for mobile. 20% of voice search queries come from mobile devices. Many users will follow up a voice search with a trip to the site that comes up in the answer. If your site isn’t mobile-friendly, it’s time to change that.
- Start paying attention to While Google is the leading search engine overall, Bing owns a huge share of the voice search market thanks to Amazon’s Alexa. Make sure your site has a complete and accurate Bing Places page and a strong presence in its rankings.
- Focus on long-tail keywords. The biggest difference between voice and text search is the tone, phrasing and words used in searches. Voice queries use natural language and a more conversational tone. They’re also usually phrased as questions. Keep this in mind when targeting long-tail keywords.
For more on voice search optimization, read our post on the key differences between voice search and text search.
How Local SEO Services Can Increase Inquiries and Drive Foot Traffic to Local Businesses
Local search engine optimization refers to tactics that increase a website’s visibility in local search queries. Search engines have become the primary directory people use to shop local (64% of customers use search engines as their main way to find local businesses), and Local SEO services are meant to ensure a business ranks in the search engine results for localized inquiries.
The bare basics of local SEO are things most business owner can do on their own: creating a complete and current Google My Business profile, encouraging customers to write positive reviews, and writing timely Google My Business posts. However, outranking competitors in a crowded local market requires a deeper optimization strategy.
How Google Determines Local Rankings
Search engine algorithm are built to recognize when a user is searching for results specific to a certain geographical location. These queries often include the name of a city or town (“donuts in Guelph”) or another geographical marker (“donuts near me”).
When someone makes a local query in Google, the search engine algorithm tailors its results to the specified location. In 93% of local queries, the top of the results page includes a box called the Local Pack, which highlights three local results for the query.
The Local Pack is a coveted spot in the rankings. It’s the first thing people see on the page, placing above even the top-ranking search result, which bolsters the business’s visibility and credibility.
Whether the query produces a local pack or not, local SEO is essential for businesses that want to reach new potential customers through search. On average, only the top three search results have a clickthrough rate above 10%.
Local search results are based primarily on relevance, distance, and prominence. Distance is just as it sounds how far away the potential results are from the location specified in the search. Relevance refers to how well: a local listing matches the search query, drawing from information the business provides in its Google My Business profile. Prominence is more complex.
Although Google has not released the full details on how its algorithm determines prominence in local results, we know it includes:
- How well-known the business is in the “real world” (famous landmarks or well-known store brands are likely to be prominent)
- Backlinks to the business’ website
- Number of Google Reviews
- Overall star-rating in Google Reviews
- Business’s ranking in web results (Google states that, “SEO best practices also apply to local search optimization”)
Return on Investment of Local SEO Services
Local SEO services provide a high return on investment for businesses focused on dominating a specific geographical market. No other advertising channel is as successful in targeting the most people who are currently looking for your product or service.
Local SEO is:
- Highly Targeted
Local SEO tactics are designed to increase exposure to people who are already searching for the business’s products or services and thus more likely to convert. Unlike traditional advertising channels, there is little exposure wasted on people who aren’t interested. - Able to Reach Massive Potential Audience
Google says that 46% of the 3.5 billion searches it processes each day are local queries. Local SEO is increasingly important as more and more people embrace search engines as their primary business directories. - In the Moment
Local search tactics position a business to reaching local customers who are looking for that product or service right now. Half of all local queries from mobile devices are searching for basic information like a company’s hours, address or phone number; 78% of those result in an offline purchase. No other advertising channel is as effective at capturing customers at the exact moment they’re ready to make a purchase.
Local search tactics and strategies are particularly effective in reaching prospective customers in the middle of the marketing funnel. They have already decided they want a certain product or service; all businesses have to do is help them choose between local options.
Landing Page Optimization: How to Create a Landing Page that Converts
Driving traffic is only half the battle. Once people have landed on your website, it’s time to turn those curious web users into clients or customers. That’s where landing page optimization comes in.
What is a Landing Page?
A landing page is the first page people see after arriving to your site from a web ad, social media post, or search engine results page. But unlike your home page, which gives a general overview of your products or services, a landing page is tailor-made to motivate visitors into acting on a specific call to action, like:
- Signing up
- Making a purchase
- Downloading a software trial
- Filling out a form
- Sharing your content on social media
…And so on.
A landing page can serve one-time events, like weekly promotions, or “evergreen” offers designed to generate ongoing leads, like a newsletters or email lists.
In either case, the landing page is optimized to achieve a single conversion goal.
While the term ‘landing page’ may be new to you, chances are you’ve seen one before. For a visual reference, check out this landing page round-up by Hubspot — this will help you along as we cover the ins and outs of landing page optimization.
Why Create a Landing Page?
Landing pages are designed to respond to nudge curious visitors towards becoming paying clients or customers. The power of landing pages is their versatility: different landing pages can be crafted and optimized to cater to buyers at all different stages of the marketing funnel or buyer journey.
Take cold prospects who are only just learning of your business for the first time. Instead of pitching your products or services outright, you could optimize a landing page to encourage those prospects to sign up for your email newsletter; later, you can direct that person to another landing page designed to nurture warmer leads.
Beyond lead generation, landing pages can be used to gain tons of useful information about your prospective customers:
- By analyzing the performance of your landing pages, you can learn more about the types of offers most interest your customers.
- You can create separate landing pages for the same campaign and audience to A/B test different offers, images and copy.
- With a Facebook Pixel, you can retarget landing page visitors with highly relevant Facebook ad campaigns.
Landing pages are also a valuable part of the search engine optimization equation.
Relationship Between Landing Pages and SEO
Each landing page is another opportunity for your site to rank for relevant, desirable keywords. Although they may be somewhat separate from your main site, search engine crawlers will pore through landing pages the same as any other page on your site, and they have an impact on your search engine ranking.
The relationship between landing pages and SEO is another reason why it’s important to optimize your landing pages to convert; if visitors who land there are quickly closing the window or bouncing back to the search engine results page, it reflects poorly on your site as a whole.
So, how do you convince people to share, sign up, download, or buy?
Using Lead Magnets
One of the most tried-and-true landing page tactics is the lead magnet: a freebie offered to landing page visitors in exchange for their contact information. You can then utilize that contact information to build an effective, highly-targeted email marketing list.
In the words of digital marketing geek Russ Henneberry, lead magnets are designed to be an “irresistible bribe.” It’s something that makes prospective customers feel like they are getting the better end of the bargain.
What makes a lead magnet irresistible? The specifics will depend on your industry and your customers, but in most cases, successful lead magnets are:
- Highly relevant and specific, answering a specific customer need and tailored to a specific buyer persona.
- Polished, effective, and well worth giving up one’s contact information.
- Immediately useful or gratifying.
Popular items given away as lead magnets include eBooks, reports, case studies, templates, checklists, and coupons.
Landing Page Optimization: What Makes a Great Landing Page?
The purpose of landing page is to entice visitors to complete a specific conversion goal, like signing up for an email list. One of the best ways to do this is to offer something in exchange for that action. An effective landing pages are concisely and fine-tuned towards achieving that goal, with:
- Clear, action-based headline that tells visitors exactly what you want them to do.
- Subheadings that provide a bit more information to generate further interest.
- Eye-catching but minimal visual elements, like a single gorgeous photo or catchy graphic.
- Concise but keyword-rich copy that explains the lead magnet, answers potential questions and tears down any barriers that might stop customers from converting.
- Prominent, impossible-to-miss action button that completes the exchange between you and the customer.
Creating Landing Pages That Convert
There are a lot of ingredients that go into creating a landing page that works: copywriting, coding, graphic design, advertising, and more. But when it all comes together and leads start coming in, it is well worth the effort it took to plan and execute. Don’t leave landing pages as an afterthought — a well-designed and optimized landing page is an essential part of a winning digital marketing strategy.
Contact TrafficSoda to Help Optimize Your Landing Page!
Image: alfaphoto
SEO Writing Tips: 5 Blog Writing Do’s and Don’t’s
Writing for SEO is not all that different from writing well in general. You want to make it clear, compelling, and as concise as possible. But there are a few essential SEO writing tips you should know if you’re new to the world of blogging.
We’ll start with keywords, word count, and a few notes on style.
1. Keywords
Writing for SEO means choosing your words carefully. If a word or phrase reoccurs throughout a web page, the search engine algorithms are more likely to dig up that page when someone searches for that phrase. Those are your keywords: words and phrases that help to define what your blog post is about.
Do: Use Keywords Them Strategically in Each Blog Post.
An effective keyword is one that:
- Accurately reflects what the blog post is about.
- Is something your customers are searching for.
- Does not have steep competition for the keyword.
We visit the topic of how to use effective keywords in greater depth here.
Don’t: Stuff Blog Posts Full of Keywords.
Search engine algorithms look at more than the number of times a keyword reoccurs in a blog post; they also consider its semantic value. Algorithms penalize sites that engage in ‘keyword-stuffing’, which means cramming a dense volume of keywords into a post to try and game the system. While the ideal keyword density is up for debate, writing for SEO means integrating strategically-chosen keywords into natural-sounding prose.
2. Post Length
Ironically, it often takes longer to write a concise piece than a lengthy one. But there is such a thing as being too concise when it comes to writing for SEO.
Do: Write At Least 500 Words.
Like your high school English teacher, search engine algorithms may take points off if your work is too short. There’s no strict word count for blog writing, but any page with fewer than 300 words may come under scrutiny for having thin content. We generally aim for 500 words at minimum.
Don’t: Pad It Out With Fluff.
Most readers are looking for fast, clear answers. Don’t bury key information beneath a lengthy introduction or sprinkle it among irrelevant tangents. If you are stretching to reach 500 words, consider broadening your chosen topic.
3. Active vs. Passive Voice
There are two ways to write action. One approach puts the force driving the action first; the second focuses on the person (or place, thing, etc.) at which the action is directed. That’s the simplest way to explain active and passive voice, a choice which can have a big effect on a blog post’s readability.
What does this have to do with SEO writing tips? It’s simple: the more people enjoy reading your post, the more likely they are to consume it in full, explore the rest of your site, and share it with others. Search engine algorithms take these as signals of a high-quality post that should rank well in the search engine results.
Do: Use Active Voice Whenever Possible.
With few exceptions active voice makes for clearer, more effective writing. Active voice is generally more concise and transparent than passive voice, and it flows naturally. Try reading some examples of examples of active and passive voice out loud: you’ll notice how active voice is smoother.
Don’t: Use Passive Voice Unless You Have To.
Passive voice, on the other hand, is often stiffer and less exciting compared to active writing. While most readers won’t nit-pick your post for passive voice, it will affect their reading experience. Switching from passive to active voice is a small change that has a big impact on the quality of your work.
4. Grade Level
Grade level is a way of measuring how easy a post is to read. The higher a post’s grade level, the more work it takes to read and comprehend its content. You can assess your post’s grade level using Microsoft Word’s built-in writing tools or a free tool like Hemingway Editor.
Do: Write for An Accessible Grade Level.
Don’t shut out potential readers by using long, complex paragraphs and unnecessary jargon. For a general audience, we recommend aiming for a grade level of six to eight. This limitation also has the benefit of encouraging you to write clearly and concisely.
Don’t: Make Errors.
Writing at a sixth-grade level doesn’t mean you should make sixth-grade spelling and grammar mistakes. The occasional typo is fine, but readers are unlikely to read through a post that is rifled with errors.
5. Be Connected
Your blog is not an island. There are many reasons to incorporate outbound links to other sites into your post. Chief among them is the fact that high-quality links gives your readers more value when they visit.
Do: Vet Your Sources.
Emphasis on high-quality. Search engine algorithms judge you by the company you keep, penalizing sites that link out to sub-par pages. If you wouldn’t put something on your own blog, don’t link to it, either!
Don’t: Forget to Give Credit.
There are times when backlinking is mandatory. Borrowing content from other sites without attribution is plagiarism, which can tank your search engine ranking as much as your reputation. Always take notes on the origin of your information while you’re researching your blog post.
How to Make Sure Your Site is Ready for Mobile
In the early days of smartphones, the ability to search the web on-the-go was a wonderful bonus. Few realized it would become the predominant search method for an increasing number of people.
Statistica reports that global mobile internet traffic rose from 31.16% in the first quarter of 2015 to 51.12% by the end of last year. However, the importance of the mobile information revolution goes beyond even that.
A 2017 study by the Pew Research Center revealed that 51% of people now use their smartphone to make online purchases. When you consider there are about 1.15 billion mobile daily active users, the commerce possibilities are mind-boggling.
In light of this, the world’s leading search engine is taking steps to make its rankings more indicative of user behaviour trends. Currently in testing, Google Mobile-First Indexing may well roll at some point this year, though there is no exact date at the moment.
As the name suggests, mobile-first indexing means the mobile edition of your website becomes the starting point for how Google determines rankings, replacing the desktop version.
It’s no longer enough for a business to have a website; it also must now be mobile friendly.
You have no doubt landed on sites that look tiny or horribly cropped when viewed on your smartphone. This makes a terrible first impression and makes one less likely to trust that company. Soon, it will also impact those all-important search rankings. Google will still crawl websites that don’t have a mobile version, but the search rankings for those organizations will inevitably suffer.
If you don’t have a mobile-friendly site, the Google Webmaster Central Blog offers steps you should consider:
Deliver an Equal Experience
Your mobile site must offer the same quality content and images as the desktop version. It’s quite possible that if the mobile version has less of either, Google will only index the former.
Strive to have your pages looking identical in both versions. Expandable content will remain important and should be fully accessible on mobile as well.
Structured Data and Metadata
Users expect the same degree of ease and navigation from a mobile site. Your structured data must be on both sites. The structured data’s URLs must also update to the mobile version.
Metadata must also be on both versions and should be identical. If some content has a different title in one version, this just creates confusion and can impact ranking.
Higher Traffic
You might have noticed from your site statistics that the mobile site’s traffic equals or maybe even surpasses the desktop. That trend will almost certainly continue, so if your mobile version is on a separate server, make sure it can handle this increased volume.
Separate Mobile URLs
When it comes to interlinking with separate mobile URLs (e.g. m.sitename.com), there are no modifications. If you use separate mobile URLs, you will simply retain the current link rel=canonical and link rel=alternate elements between the two versions.
Hreflang Attributes
Because you have the potential to attract visitors from all over, alternate language options are extremely important. Review hreflang links on the separate mobile URLs. For sites with multilingual capability, be sure to link separately between the mobile and desktop URLs. It is imperative that the mobile URLs’ hreflang points to the other language and region equivalent on the other mobile URLs. They must also link the desktop with other desktop URLs that use link elements.
Your mobile URLs’ hreflang should point to the other language/region versions on other mobile URLs, and similarly link desktop with other desktop URLs using hreflang link elements there.
Google has promised to roll out Mobile-First Indexing gradually to give sites time to make any necessary alterations. However, it’s always wise to stay on top of such changes as they will benefit your business in both the short and long term.