Tag: SEO

You’ve finally bought your very own CMS website and it runs on WordPress, people keep telling you about content marketing and how blogging is a great way to enhance your organic search and build a fan base. This is very true and thus why I am going to be creating several blog posts and vlogs (on The Change Creative YouTube Channel ) about how to use WordPress and what you should be considering every step of the way so you never get lost. In this post I will discuss how to create a successful blog post that will get attention.

Continue “How to create a successful blog post using WordPress step by step”

If you regularly visit my website or blog you will have noticed that I have made some changes ( and one reason why I haven’t blogged as much as I used to over the last two months). Before I allowed myself to take my local site to the live server I had to do some basic testing and every website should go through this same process to ensure as few problems occur so your users can enjoy your experience to its fullest and also make sure your business looks professional. In this blog post, I will discuss 5 areas that must be tested before you allow yourself to let the website into the public domain.

Continue “Testing a website before it goes live”

Being close to the front of organic search results is really important to anyone who owns a website. It is seen as the holy grail of a good website but it isn’t always easy to reach the top as many a blog owner knows.

Semrush keyword discovery tool

Semrush tool helps you discover who is ranking highest for particular keywords and in which country, you can discover which keywords are particularly expensive or alternatively cheap, if they are increasing in price to help you with your Adwords campaigns.

Discovering related keywords

Not only can you see how a particular keyword is performing and who is achieving the best result in search engines for it but you can also discover other keywords that relate to the keyword you are trying to target.

The benefit of discovering keywords is that when you start writing new blog posts or web pages around your product or service you can discover which keywords are less competitive and what seems to be trending to boost the likely traffic to your website.

So for example, in the below image you can see how many times ‘cardigan’ keyword has been searched for (49,500), how much it costs per click (CPC) and what I think is very beneficial, how competitive the keyword is to allow your content to be found and clicked on, the lower the number the less competitive the keyword.

There are many more options but I will let you explore the keyword discovery website for yourself. Just know that on the free version you can only search for a small amount of keywords and you don’t get as much results as you would on the paid version. Don’t let that put you off, go and check it out NOW!

Is the keyword still trending?

Lastly, to make sure you are targeting a keyword that may be increasing in popularity check out Google Trends. This tool helps you see if your particular topic is going to be worth the effort. Will it bring in a massive influx of new traffic and hopefully fans of your content or not?

If the keyword is not going to attract people to your website how else can you bring your services into your potential customers consciousness? Can you target another keyword, do you need to rethink your product and or service? Or do you need to reconsider how to reach out to the potential market you are targeting?

I hope you find these tools useful and if you have any other suggestions about creating great content to help improve organic search results and traffic then please feel free to comment in the box below.

Related articles across the web

• How to Get On the Front Page of Google Search Results (4 Tips)
• Understanding Keyword Research for SEO
• The Evolution of Keyword Research Tools [Infographic] by @jonharules
• 3 Top Strategies for Attracting Visitors to Your Website
• Top eBooks To Boost Your SEO Skills

There is a lotta lotta information out there about digital marketing and how to get your website seen and generate sales leads and by golly, don’t you just worry that you’ve missed something? Hubspot, probably one of the biggest, if not the biggest, digital marketing agencies offers a service to see if your website is meeting the online marketing ‘grade’. Take some to grade your websites digital marketing via how well it is performing.

Continue “Grade your websites digital marketing via Hubspot”

The blog Title is probably the most important part of any blog post.

You have finally decided that you want to start blogging as you hear this content marketing stuff is really good for drumming up a new business and thus you have created your first masterpiece but what do you call it? Blog titles are probably one of the most important parts of any blog post and in this blog post, I am going to discuss why. Continue “Choosing a user centric blog title”

The last blog post I wrote was all about three steps to increase your website traffic and it is clear that blogging is of huge importance to any online marketing.

Make your blog titles count!

Something that is very important is the title of the post and also the keyword selection you use within.

Incase you are unaware what a keyword is it is a word that you are targeting the search engines to look for in your page to give it more relevance to a users search.

For instance, my keyword might be ‘twitter profile’ then the website must include this keyword throughout the article without making it look ‘faked’.

Go forth and populate my keyword minions!

You need it in your title, your page url, your heading tags, your paragraphs and even in your alt tags for images! Don’t stress though, search engines are clever, they will look at the rest of your content and see how relevant your content  is to your keyword without actually being your keyword!

So now you have an idea about keywords you might realise why what you title your blogs is so important! If you are still a bit stifled for ideas then here are 9 ideas to help you start those creative cogs turning!

1. What does (fill in service/product) do?

2. An insight into a (your job)’s role

3. 3 things you should always consider when choosing (service/product)

4. What to expect from your (service/product here)

5. Should I buy a (your service/product)

6. Opposing service/product vs your service/product ( start with positive points about the opposing service and where that competition might actually be the answer to the readers problem).

7.  5 problems with your service/product (then turn it around to help people make decisions)

8. Best price for a (your product/service) –  ( make comparisons with others and why you are cheaper or more expensive than the competition or alternatively what you think is important in your/product service.

9. Should I buy product A or product B.

Notice that these headers are all asking questions , questions that your potential customer might have! By blogging about these topics you are educating your customers and that is great way to build trust with your possible customers as it empowers them to be able to make decisions and shows that you care about giving good service and advice to those that need your business.

A great tip I read from the http://www.thesaleslion.com/ is that to take time to consider questions that your customers ask you. Usually they are about pricing or time but there may be some other questions that are not price related, these are fantastic things to blog about and will help you generate new content for your business blog!

Best of luck writing your blogs and remember this is meant to be fun and not a chore!

If you have any tips how to generate new ideas for blog posts please comment in the box below! Or should you need help with a specific topic and want me to help you generate some ideas please get in touch and i will see what i can do 🙂

I have made many websites for people over the years & the amount of cold calls and poaching emails that they receive trying to take unnecessary money from them claiming to be able to magically improve their seo and reach to their audience is baffling. They prey on the company wanting to get their exposure out to as many clients as possible and the sound of this unbelievable solution is very enticing. I recently received an email from my current manager with 3 points that was raised by the marketing company. I will discuss for and against each point in this blog post

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They said…

1.Your website Migsolv.com is not ranking top in Google organic search for many competitive keyword phrases

My argument : –

SEO is an ongoing process of creating new content ( thus why CMS are so valauble to businesses) and making sure you create more pages that relate to longtail  keyword phrases will increase your reach. It all depends what your company sales target is and what you think your potential clients are looking for. ( Don’t understand longtail keyword? See here ). Any seo company can claim that we are not ranking highly for keywords because every single website on the internet won’t be targeting every area of the long tail keyword for their industry. What interested me most was they informed us “...I found your site using Google search…” so obviously our seo is working, bit of a shot in the foot my friend :-).

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They said…

2. Your company is not doing well in most of the Social Media Websites.

My argument : –

To attract potential new clients through social media you have to select the right social media tools ( as we know ) . Although social media is free if you want to use effectively as a marketing tool you have to spend money with it.

Look at this infographic below it will help you in choosing the correct social media for your target market : –

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I have already spoken about using twitter. Twitter encompasses every industry and every person you can think of so is a useful tool for anyone. Follow people in your industry and with similair interests will create greater awareness of your site. NEVER pay anyone to give you more followers, it is pointless and a waste of money as they are unlikely to purchase your products.

LinkedIn again a great tool for business owners to connect ( I will discuss this social media platform in a future post ) and more likely to create sales for my particulary industry I am working for at the moment.

Pininterest is quite irrelevant for the IT business man as you share things you are interested in and most users are not people who will deal in my industry.

Using Social Media effectively is about selecting the right social media for your needs.

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They said…

3. Your site is not user friendly on mobile devices.

My argument

Most internet users are starting to use their mobile to visits websites more and more and this is a relevant point BUT as most of our audience is over 40 they are more likely to do things the traditional way through a desktop and Google Analytics prooves that.From 4,000 visits this month alone,  3,611 people accessed the website from a non mobile device and 319 from a mobile. This issue they have raised is minor. Even over the last year the stats also proved to be a similar story..

Out of 7,952 visits –  7.341 people use desktop to access the site & 611 people access the site from their mobile. Relevance of mobile sites for our clients? Right now, its minor but it is something I am definitely going to work on as user experience is highly important to me but it won’t make a huge difference in terms of conversion rates of visitors right now.

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It is nice to get feedback from a fellow professional now and again as it does help me to improve on what I am doing and increase my skill set but due to my experience I can recognize when a company is just trying to squeeze a bit of cash out businesses that don’t really know what they are doing when it comes to web design, so when you get one of these emails or phone calls my friend just remember…think wisely and ask for a second opinion from a qualified professional before agreeing to anything.

Yes, as promised here are 5 more blog directories to submit your fantastic and informative blogs to. I do spoil you guys!

Blogs Avenue

BlogsAvenue is an blog directory on the Internet that allows you to get more exposure for your online publication. Every submitted blog is available to the public, and it displays some useful info like: a thumbnail of the homepage, some site information (owner, URL, category, etc.), the rating of the site, a set of SEO info (PageRank, Google / Bing backlinks, etc.) and the reviews (if any). Plus, you can check a statistics graph with unique daily visitors and pageviews for the present day, week and month referring to the blog site. Registration is necessary.
To add your site to BlogsAvenue, you must register first. Then select “submit blog” from the right sidebar panel. Here, add your blog URL, title and description of your site (160 chars minimum), RSS feed URL, and choose a category that represents what your blog is about. Last, add the BlogsAvenue reciprocal code to your blog to activate the submission.

Go Blogz

Go Blogz is a free directory and search engine where you can submit your URL to promote the content of your blog to a wider audience. Registration is not mandatory.
To submit your blog to Go Blogz, just add the title and URL of your site. Then, write a brief description for your blog and enter a reciprocal link. Last, add your e-mail address and you’re set.

Malatya

Malatya is a free RSS directory where you can submit your website RSS feed to obtain more traffic and exposure for your content. Registration is not mandatory to use the service. After you submit your RSS feed, the editors at Malatya will manually check your feed before displaying your content inside the directory.
To submit your RSS feed to Malatya, please choose a relevant category that describes your blog content and then enter the URL of your RSS feed.

Society of Socialpreneurs

Society of Socialpreneurs is a blog directory and social business network where you can submit your website or blog and get more exposure. The blog submission process is free as long as you place a button with a reciprocal link promoting the directory on your own website. Registration is not mandatory.
To submit your blog to Society of Socialpreneurs, after you post their button on your website, just provide your name and e-mail address, the title and URL of your blog and write a description for your blog.

Pingates

Pingates is not a blog directory nor an RSS directory where you can submit your website. What Pingates does is send a “ping“, a notification, to a handful of sites alerting them that your blog has been updated. Then, the web crawlers of these websites can come by and notify their readers of the update. No registration is needed.
To ping your blog using Pingates, simply type the title and url of your blog, select the sites you want to send a ping to (you can also check all of them with a single button) and then click on “Send pings“.

I will add one more blog post about top blog directories to add your blog to in the near future.

SEO is an abbreviation of the words search engine optimization, to the none web gurus out there (or the less strange), it can be explained as telling your local travel agents where you are and what you offer, telling them what kind of customers you would like and then those agents giving a direct map to your digital shop window. Basically, in a nut shell, it helps you be found by the types of people who want to find the service you offer or the product/s they desire. Continue “Why is SEO so Important”

In our last blog post we considered the importance of SEO and the importance of selecting a domain name with good keywords for your potential market and a brief overview of keywords for page selection. As promised, in this blog post we will give you some strategies to implement on your own website and some basic pratical advice when considering your SEO strategy. Continue “SEO Strategies”