2011 seems to have been the year that many woke up to the fact that search and content are the two key battlegrounds of digital marketing. They are the starting point in the user journey and put simply; search engines are the first place people go for information, so ensuring you have great content with relevant, high-authority links is vital to win the online content battle.

This realisation has had a big impact on organisations and many now know if they want their content to have the best chance of being shared, commented upon or ‘Liked’, Google bots needs to be more than an afterthought. That’s why I have put together the second of a three part guide on writing content for search engines (you can find Writing Content for Search Engines in 5 Steps here).

Before we start it’s worth referencing some best practice examples of organisation winning the online content battle in the form of online publishing powerhouses; the Daily Mail and Huffington Post. The Mail masterfully strike the balance between news, trending content and celebrity gossip to create one of the worlds most popular news sites.Whilst, HuffPo excels at producing excellent news coverage and content people are searching for. Despite the vast editorial differences between these giants of traditional and hybrid media, they both share a similar strategy that has improved search visibility and increased both readership and revenues.

1. Maximise meta description
Meta description is the couple of lines which appear on a Google search below the title. It’s perhaps best thought of as your pitch to readers, as well as Google – and strong meta description can be the deciding factor that gets someone to your website. There is a character limit of 160 to consider, but the principles of writing for both humans and search engines in mind, as well as front-loading with relevant keywords apply here. So make every character count.

2.Keyword URLs
Wherever possible use relevant keywords in web page URLs. This is for two reasons; Google says that it helps SEO efforts and inner pages now rank more frequently for keywords than homepages. Secondly, people will be likely to link to your website using the keyword URL as anchor text; further strengthening the association between your website and particular keywords – all of which increase search visibility.

3. Rename image ALT text
Although the importance of ALT text has diminished somewhat in recent years, it still acts as an effective way to drive traffic to your website and should be considered as part of good SEO practice. Many websites automatically generate a random title for ALT text which is unhelpful. You should amend this to describe primarily what is happening in the image, but also look to incorporate relevant keywords.

4. Use images
Although, the Google search page is constantly evolving, it won’t have escaped your attention that images feature prominently at the top of listings. So if you want your content to score highly on search, images should not only fully be optimized for search, they have to be an integral part of your SEO strategy. It’s also worth noting that search results with images tend to have higher CTRs and lower bounce rates.

5. Utilise SEO plugins
If you’re thinking about re-designing your website I would recommend using WordPress due to its formidable online community of developers who are constantly innovating and improving what has become an industry standard platform. Another  reason is that WordPress boasts many fantastic SEO plugins, such as Yoast, All in One SEO and Platinum SEO Plugin all of which can optimize content with relatively little effort.

This week I received a heads-up about the latest piece of branded content from Eloqua and JESS3. You may remember this duo created the innovative and useful Social Media ProBook back in July, so I was curious to see what they had in store for us this time around.

Their latest offering is an infographic called The Blog Tree: New Growth which shows the interrelationship between many leading new (post January 2009) digital marketing blogs in a rich, hyperlinked, visual and fun way. In its most basic form I see the infographic as a good piece of content; a ‘who’s who’ of the digital space that would make a great addition to any Reader or blogroll.

But there’s more to it than that. When you deconstruct this part of the campaign coupled with the Social Media ProBook you realise that Eloqua and JESS3 are putting content marketing at the heart of their marketing strategy. Eloqua and JESS3 are positioning and I would go as far to say, fast establishing themselves as content marketing leaders with these efforts.

It’s perhaps unsurprising Eloqua and JESS3 have opted for an infographic on this occasion as they have proven high value on the web. By their very nature infographics communicate a lot of information in an engaging way – and it is this type of content people want to write about, link to, ‘Like’, comment on and share throughout their social networks; all of which generate good quality inbound links that help improve SERPs.

Lastly, the outreach from Hotwite PR is worthy of praise too. As someone who is regularly pitched with poorly targeted press releases, it was refreshing be offered two clear benefits when contacted, namely:

1)      A good piece of content that my readers would be interested in

2)      The possibility of driving traffic to and from influential blogs (via hyperlinks on the infographic)

What do you think of the The Blog Tree: New Growth infographic as a standalone piece of content and more importantly as part of a content marketing and link-building strategy?

The Blog Tree New Growth Eloqua JESS3

We’ve just published a 46-page Internet Marketing Strategy briefing which is free to download. It analyses five key current trends:customer centricity,channel diversification,data,social media and content strategy.It’s a bit unusual for us to make something like this free. It’s an experiment in ‘content marketing’ – a hot topic in digital marketing and something we examine in the briefing itself.

Of course we’re interested to see how many visits and downloads we get,the tweets and social mentions,but we’re most interested in getting links to this page (ideally with the link anchor text Internet Marketing Strategy) to see how this impacts our natural search rankings for the phrase ‘internet marketing strategy’.

Currently we’re nowhere near the first page of Google,or other search engines,for this competitive search phrase. But could we be with a bit of ‘content marketing’? And what value might that drive to us?
We plan to publish a mini case study with the results of this experiment which hopefully you’ll find interesting and which might help put more concrete value to the effectiveness (or otherwise) of ‘content marketing’.

You can help with our experiment…
Of course we encourage you to download and read the briefing itself (we think it’s very good) but,ideally,you would send a link to this page (not the file itself – little SEO value there…) to relevant contacts or,even better,you’d link to the page from your blog,via social media etc.

In an ideal world you’d even use the anchor text Internet Marketing Strategy to the link to the page.
I’m sending this email to around 30,000 of Econsultancy’s members globally so,if you do your collective bit,then we should stand a good chance of building some great,and relevant,links…?

Will we shoot up the rankings as a result? Or get punished for the suspiciously quick build-up of links with the same anchor text? Who knows… watch this space.

Obviously we’re not incentivising you to do this in any way because that would be “paid links”.

All the best and thanks for any help.

Ashley

Ashley Friedlein
CEO
Econsultancy

I received an email last week from industry colleague Roger Warner, Founder of Content & Motion telling me of their latest vacancy which may interest SWT readers.

C&M is looking for a Social SEO Executive to work with Hackett, IBM, Continental, Rightmove, TomTom amongst others. They are an online PR agency specialising in social media PR and social SEO, based in Lewes, East Sussex.

It sounds like a fantastic role and for me, encapsulates the two key PR battlegrounds for the future – search and content. I’ve followed the fortunes of C&M since I interviewed Roger back in 2009 when they were a fledgling agency and having caught up with him at the recent Social Media Week panel event, it’s good see the agency doing so well.

Likely candidates will be those who:

• Have been working as an SEO for the past few years

• Understand that their world is changing and want a new role where Social wizardry is the name of the game

• Read SEOMoz and the like on a daily basis

• Enjoy a good Whiteboard Friday

Desired skills and experience:

• Research, create and deliver game-changing Search and Social programs

• Deliver on all the traditional SEO basics – programs for linkbuilding, content syndication and so forth

• Understand how Content and Social Media strategies are fundamentally changing the nature of SEO– and can implement programs to exploit new opportunities

• Deliver research, insight, analysis and action plans that opens up new traffic acquisition (and engagement) possibilities via Social Media

• Establish strong links between Search and Social Media Marketing – and back this up with data and analysis

• Pick out a Search and Social trend at 30 paces

• Specify, plan and deliver projects on time and on quality

• Flip a brilliant piece of insight into a working program with more élan than Eric Cantona lobbed goalkeepers

• Deliver a winning client service experience

• Work collaboratively across internal work groups to deliver out of the park programs and solutions

For more information about the role, please click here.

The Edelman Trust Barometer 2011 findings were published last week on the eve of the opening of the World Economic Forum in Davos. Whilst everyone agrees that being trustworthy is undoubtedly a good thing, it is fascinating to hear the impact being trustworthy has on consumer behaviour and corporate reputation.

2010 will be remembered for some huge corporate crisis situations, such as the BP oil spill, Toyota product recall, as well as bank bail outs and other misdemeanours in the financial sector. Given such a roller-coaster 12 months it was interesting to hear that if you go into a crisis as a distrusted company, it takes only 1-2 negative stories for a person to believe negative news. However, if you go in as a trusted company, it takes only 1-2 positive stories for you to achieve belief.

Whilst there is a lot of data to digest, the following points are what I think will have the biggest impact on my work in 2011.

1. The importance of search
Most PRs are beginning to appreciate the importance of search and the barometer confirmed this, with search engines ranked as the first place people look for information. This is really important as an understanding of SEO is not within the traditional skills set of many PRs – something that will have to change. The key point to stress is how important it is to ensure content about your client can be easily found online. Some simple solutions include having information that people want on an optimized website, blog and digital embassies, such as a Facebook Group, Twitter stream and YouTube channel. I expect search and content to be key battlegrounds in 2011.

2. Get your CEO or expert to talk
Given the economic uncertainty over the last 12 months, it is perhaps unsurprising that credible spokespeople such as CEOs or experts are the most trusted people to speak during a crisis. People are looking for expertise, knowledge and reassurance as we emerge from the financial crisis into an age of information obesity. The key insight for me is which expert should do the talking during a crisis. The barometer found that if a crisis is related to a product recall issue a company expert or the CEO should do the talking. However, if the issue is to do with the environment or a community issue, it has to be the CEO. Generally speaking, trust in the CEO is actually rising and I believe there is an expectation that bad CEOs have left their posts, whilst good leaders have successfully guided their organisations through tough economic times and remained.

3. Engage NGOs
One of the standout findings from the barometer is that for the first time, trust in NGOs in key developing markets is equivalent to that of business, a fantastic increase over the past five years, which has been attributed to the evolution of local civil society brands and rising prosperity. Importantly NGOs continue to be the most trusted institution in Western economies. Subsequently, serious consideration has to be given to NGOs and the role they could play in any communications programme. NGOs have far more credibility, trust and influence than many give them credit for.

4. The media are less trusted
Trust in the UK media is falling, which no doubt can be attributed to the march towards infotainment from hard news and the phone hacking saga which shows no signs of relenting. As PR professionals this is hugely significant. Although, a double page spread in a red top is often deemed a huge success in terms of ‘coverage’ and ‘AVE’, if the publication is not viewed as credible or trustworthy you are going to struggle to transfer this ‘success’ into action. Action is the important word here. Communications activity needs to transfer into actions that have business outcomes. This finding should also get us thinking beyond the traditional PR model that targets journalists and towards the stakeholder universe model. PR is about engaging communities that matter to companies rather than gaining column inches.

5. Decrease in trust in ‘people like me’
The barometer found that people over the last year have been turning to experts rather then ‘people like me’. This is interesting for anybody working in social media and could impact how we approach communications, but it may also be something to do with the maturing of the definition of ‘people like me’ which Mark Hanson, Deputy Managing Director of Wolfstar also picked up on. Personally, my Facebook friends and Linked In connections are people I know or have down business with, but a much smaller number I consider to be ‘people like me’ or those I would trust for a recommendation. The report notes:

“This may be a result of changing attitudes about what constitutes “a person like me” rather than an indication of a significant decrease in the actual credibility of peer-to-peer communication. With some estimates indicating that the average Facebook user does not know one-fifth of the 500 people typically listed as friends on his or her page, it is reasonable to ask whether the meaning of the word “friend” and by association “a person like me” has become devalued.”

You can check out the #Trust2011 hashtag to see other people’s thoughts on this years findings. It’s always insightful to see what the Edelman Trust Barometer discovers and I would be interested to hear what your key takeaways from this years findings are.

I thought I’d put this post together as it’s something I’ve been thinking about and discussing for a while – Search Engine Optimization (SEO) has to be Social. Well, more Social than it currently is.

‘Why?’ I hear you ask. Well, to put it simply; good quality links are the currency of the Web as search engines equate them to authority. Google takes these links as an endorsement or vote which in turns enhances search position. Therefore, a key part of any SEO strategy has to be the generation of good inbound links to your website or Digital Embassies.

However, last weeks announcement between Facebook and Bing that will see the search engine return results based on Facebook ‘Likes’ from users friends is significant as it signals a greater focus on Social in SEO. This coupled with Google’s inclusion of Tweets in its search shows that the increase in focus is already under way.

Somewhat inevitably, this announcement will affect SEO placement strategies and Social Media professionals are going to have a greater say in the planning and execution of SEO campaigns. Some agencies understand this already and create SEO strategies in conjunction with a Social Media team. Most don’t.

One of the reasons for the shift towards Social SEO is not only the huge growth in Social Media usage, but the techniques SEO professionals employ, such as, researching keywords, altering pages names, meta tags, headings and anchor text, internal links to keywords and keyword rich content. These techniques are employed with Google spiders, rather than human beings in mind.

Above is a great case study from Content & Motion who undertook a successful Social SEO campaign for Morgan Stanley Real Estate company.

Social Media is different. It thinks about people from the outset and enables them to have conversations around brands and products which provides genuine opportunities for recommendations and links. Whilst, keywords, titles, descriptions, tags and links give Google valuable context, it is Social Media which provides the most natural platform for humans to link, vote, and endorse content.

Although, KPIs such as sales or ROI will always be the main business objectives, Social SEO and Social Media compliment each other by enhancing a brands earned and owned media – leading to higher Google rank – and hopefully sales.

This is why a Social approach to SEO coupled with a robust Social Media strategy should be the cornerstone of any online activity. Tools like widgets, badges, sharing, social sign in and social commenting are great ways for brands to generate positive organic backlinks and social recommendations – all of which enhance brand visibility, amplification and Google rank.

However, the Social aspect of SEO planning still seems an afterthought for many and there is often a gap that needs to be bridged between the often fragmented SEO and Social Media functions. SEO activity should not be owned by one department. Nor should Social Media.

However, the reality is that the Social Media team normally manages Digital Embassies adequately, but SEO is nothing more than an afterthought. Whilst, the SEO team often overlook the value of using Social Media, such as blogs, videos, audio, images, social networks, forums and messageboards to increase SEO. It’s rarely joined up or integrated and too many people miss the link and benefit between Social Media and Google rank.

Image from David Saunders under Creative Commons

I’m adamant that Social Media teams are well placed to produce the engaging, rich content that people want to share, comment and link to. I should also make it clear that I’m not suggesting Social Meda teams are best placed to undertake traditional SEO (far from it). However, the evolution and growing importance of Social Media means that they should become part of SEO planning. Right from the start.

Technies know the traditional and latest SEO techniques, but the way Google’s search aglogrithm has evolved has given more weighting to Social Media, which is where the Social Media strategists come in.

As always I would be interested to hear thoughts from both sides of the Social Media and SEO divide and anybody in between about the increasing importance of Social Media in SEO activity.

I gave a presentation yesterday to some Public Relations students at London Met University, having been kindly invited by their lecturer Gareth Thompson who got in touch after our paths crossed at the Euprera Spring Symposium.

The presentation details my thoughts on Personal SEO and how this is often a more accurate description of what people term ‘personal brand’. It contains quotes from senior PR colleagues and explains how blogging, putting real work online and networking can generate strong Personal SEO.

It’s always great to meet current PR students and see how other university’s ‘do’ PR education. I was impressed by this group of young people and look forward to seeing how they get on in the industry.

Here is a copy of the presentation – if you have any questions, please do get in touch.

There has been an awful lot written about personal brand and how people should be aware of their digital footprint, especially students and those starting out in their careers. I hear these terms bandied around semi-regularly, but a quick look online shows there is very little specific information on how people can actually manage their digital footprints and enhance personal SEO*. So I thought I’d pull together 10 easy to follow steps which should improve your personal search in no time at all.

For starters…
To begin with search Google for your name and see what comes up. Then include the industry you want to work in. The fact is employers do google potential employees, so it is well worth monitoring this. Then have a look at 123people.com which is essentially a people search engine that aggregates people’s photos, videos, email addresses, and social network profiles. This will basically show you your digital footprint. At this point it may be best to consolidate your social media platforms and close any dormant accounts.

1. Blog
I would strongly recommend to any PR student or person wanting to break into the industry to start a blog. Not only is it an effective way to document your thoughts on the industry and improve your writing, but it can be a great networking tool and will score highly on search. In my experience, being able to demonstrate a firm grasp of wider industry issues at an interview is a brilliant way to stand out.
Tip: be sure to make full use of tags by tagging (appropriately) key words and your name within the blog, as this improve search further.

2. Linked In
Create a Linked In account. It’s an excellent way to showcase your career, latest achievements and network with industry professionals. There is also numerous groups and discussions to join, as well as many jobs advertised. Quite simply it’s a great online community to be part of and if you think of it like a professional Facebook, you’ll be alright. Linked In also scores highly on search.

3. Twitter
Twitter has been the darling of the PR industry for the last 18 months, so it is well worth gaining an understanding of this platform. In its most basic form Twitter can effectively be utilised as a tool to share your industry thoughts and personal observations.

Whilst, Twitter scores highly on search, for me the real benefit is the unparalled access to industry colleagues and importantly what they are thinking and up to. Although, there is a lot of noise on Twitter, it still has the potential to be a really neat networking and personal SEO tool. Do remember that employers will check your tweets to try and find out more about you. So it is worth considering what you broadcast.
Tip: show your true personality, but also demonstarte that you are interested in the industry by talking about and re-tweeting PR news.

4. Comment on other blogs
Whilst, I know many PR students who blog, too few regularly engage in the online conversation by commenting on other people’s blogs. Making comments is a great way to network with industry professionals, promote your own blog, and encourage comments from others.
Tip: when you comment on someone’s blog it will ask you for your website/blog URL, by entering this you are linking back to your own site which will boost SEO.

5. Upload a CV to Scribd
I would strongly recommend all students to create a Scribd account and upload their CV. This can be easily edited, downloaded by prospective employers, scores highly on search and can be embedded into a blog or website. Whilst, Linked In is great for an initial introduction and networking opportunities, it is yet to produce professional looking CVs. Indeed Linked In’s poorly templated, CV PDFs are one its biggest weaknesses.

6. Privacy settings
Whilst, this post contains lots of tips to enhance personal SEO, you should also take steps to protect your online reputation by having your privacy settings on private for Facebook and all other personal networks. In addition, leave any Facebook groups which betray the image you trying to project e.g. someone companies would like to employ. Remember that social media is often immediate, public and permanent. You don’t own your Facebook page, Mark Zuckerberg does.

7. Write for other publications
Students I speak to do not seem to consider this, but by guest blogging or writing for other publications and websites you will boost your personal SEO. Indeed, just a couple of articles for different publications will make a lot of difference.

Writing about the PR industry, as well as having your name appear online with some good use of tags will also boost personal SEO. At the end of the day employers will be impressed if they Google your name and find a number of well written article on the PR industry.
Tip: I would recommend writing something for PR student magazine Behind the Spin.

8. Google Profile
When Google launched this feature in 2009 it was designed as a kind of virtual business card. Whilst, Google Profile usage has not quite taken off as expected, I’m sure that creating a profile with the worlds biggest search engine can only be good for your personal SEO. I would recommend creating a profile with a vanity URL ASAP.

9. Make yourself contactable
This is something that I still find frustrating. I’m not saying publish your home address and mobile number, but I would say make an email address available online so people can contact you directly. Whilst, being active on various social media platforms is a great start, most organisations still communicate by email not via social networks. So make sure you are easily contactable.
Tip: To avoid spambots you should write your email address phonetically, for instance my email becomes contact[at]ben-cotton[dotcom].

10. Make your work sharable
If you do a great piece of work, don’t be afraid to share it online. There are a range of platforms that you can use to host work such as Scribd, Slideshare, YouTube etc. It’s all about setting your work free so others can see and share it – once again this scores highly on search. We advise our clients to have content that is sharable to the largest possible audience and the same principle can equally be applied to individuals looking to enhance their reputation.

I would then recommend waiting for a week as it normally takes a couple of days for Google to trawl the web for these SEO improvements.

*Caveat: I’m a great advocate of e-portfolios, but have omitted them from this particular list. Whilst, I think they are a great tool, I’ve chosen to include tips which can be carried out fairly quickly, whereas an e-portfolio takes months to put together. Click here to watch the video of the e-portfolio presentation I gave to Leeds Met earlier this year.