Jul
14
Killer Case Study: SEO, Why You Care, And Free Tips
Right now, I’m staying in a lovely bed and breakfast in the booming metropolis of Burlington, Ontario. When we found it, we figured we’d found a little piece of heaven. (Location independent business challenges notwithstanding.)
I was talking a little bit with Lin, the lady who runs the place, about her business. (You tell somebody you do marketing and business help for small businesses and the floodgates tend to open. Finding out about other people’s businesses is one of the coolest parts of my job.)
Apparently, her husband Steve takes care of all things technical. He did their website and he organizes getting them listed on various listing sites and Burlington tourism sites and so on. Apparently, Steve is a busy little business beaver. (Try saying THAT five times fast. No, seriously, try it. I’ll wait.)
Anyway, so I’m talking to Lin about their booming little ittybiz and she drops the bombshell. (It should be noted, new people, that I wrote a lil ebook about SEO.)
They get 99% of their business from Google.
Not advertising. Not pay per click. Not flyers. NOT EVEN WORD OF MOUTH. All Google, all the time, baby.
This is why you care about SEO.
Yes, we all want to talk about relationship marketing and how Twitter will make us all rich. Yes, I know that you’re a guaranteed failure in business and in life if you don’t have an active Facebook presence. I know that you’ll die homeless, hungry and alone if you don’t have a blog. But let’s not forget about SEO, okay?
If you have good presence in Google, even on long-tail or low search volume keywords, it is quite reasonable that you won’t have to do anything else. You’ll never have to hide your misanthropic tendencies at another networking event. You’ll never have to fight negotiate over ad rates. You’ll never have to sweat your balls off in a monkey suit, handing out flyers outside Starbucks again.
You, too, could have so many customers that you have to rent out your own damn bedroom and sleep on the couch to meet the demand. (Oh, and by the way? If you find yourself in that situation? Raise your rates before you sleep on your couch.)
Seriously, dudes. SEO is important.
OK, that all brings me to today’s free SEO tip, because I’m feeling all generous and vacation-y and shit.
Free SEO Tip du jour:
Internal linking — as in, the links you send to yourself, like when I linked to my own SEO ebook up there — is important and highly beneficial. It’s especially valuable when you’re looking to rank for less competitive keyword terms. (This is because it’s easier to rank for them, which means you don’t have to do so much goddamn work.)
Be mindful of the anchor text you use when you’re linking to yourself. Sometimes all it takes is just one link to yourself with a certain anchor text to get you on the front page — or even number one — for a desired search term.
Rinse and repeat to rank for numerous keyword phrases.
(Note: This tip applies when you’re looking to rank for “life coach in Tallahassee”, not just “life coach”. There is hope for the former. On the latter, you’re fucked no matter what you do.)
And a damn fine SEO book it is too!
I tend to forget about keywords and links when I’m writing posts. I think I need to write a checklist and keep it in front of my face until checking these things become second nature.
Thanks for that and enjoy your holiday! :-)
Here’s something I’ve always wondered:
Do the tags at the end of a post (I don’t see any on your post, but on mine, they’re called labels) have any bearing on SEO?
Here is an example: If I am tagging something as “quote,” would it be better for me to tag it as “literary quote about love”?
Oh, and one more thing. I’m glad to have you back in North America. It felt all empty here without you.
I’m glad you’re enjoying your vacation on this side of the globe, too.
Your SEO book helps me, too. When I can use a timely tag, I rank, baby. Pure and simple.
Come to think of it, I’m about due for another re-read of your SEO book, like I used to review my camera manuals when I was a photojournalist. Seriously!
FWIW, re-familiarizing yourself with your tools is a great idea. It’s like a refresher course that you can take in the comfort of your own home. Or even in a comfy B&B. :)
A lot of bloggers, even ones trying to sell something, either don’t know the difference between categories and tags — or, worse yet, can’t be bothered.
Thanks for the reminder. Social media may be the heralds, but content for Google is king! Or queen. Although I’ve heard that it’s good to be the king … carry on. :) Thanks again.
I still think this varies by type of business. Lots of people who don’t use the internet for anything else (like my dad, for example) will go to the library and use the internet to look for B&Bs.
In my business, where people don’t even know that there are people out there selling what I’m selling, they aren’t searching on the internet for it. They are sitting there struggling with their research grants, swearing at the research office in their institution, and thinking that this is just the way it is. Until one of their friends say “Oh, Jo VanEvery helped me with my grant and she was great.” Then the google my name. Which might explain why the top ranked google searches that land on my site are variations on my name.
Unless my seo really sucks and that’s the only thing that lands. But I don’t think so.
My best keyword is “johnny b truant.” True story.
Although I did once get a visit for “bad things happening to peoples testicles.” Also a true story.
…Unless you’re Tim Brownson, who is THIRD ranked for Life Coach in Google (after Steve Pavlina and Wikipedia, which is understandable), even managing to be a cut above LIFECOACH.COM.
NICE.
You can imagine my relief (or maybe you can’t) now that I’m not getting Google traffic for the phrase (and phrases related to) “stick up my ass” because of a breakthrough blog post I made. Seriously, it’s not that kind of blog!
I get lots of traffic for “dogs as shark bait.” Always makes me wonder…
I’m form South Africa and I have found your blog on google and read a few of your other posts. I just added you to my Google News Reader. Look forward to reading more from you in the future. If you want you are more then welcome to visit my website by Googling (Mortgage Plus cc). Keep up the good work. Morne Prinsloo
I bought the ‘How to Become an SEO Ninja’ to see if I could improve my page position on a few key search terms. I also wanted to see what I was doing right and what I was doing wrong. Well even a blind squirrel can do SEO correctly and not even know it. I was actually doing a lot of things right just by trial and error. I also picked up a few tips that have really worked for me. After reading the book I made a few changes to see how I would fair. Well I went from page 3 to page 1 on the search term
Diecast Model Cars. So, I’m here to say this WORKS. Now I’m working on Model Cars.
Thanks Naomi