If you are selling a product that others are retailing especially if there are 1000′s of other vendors selling the exact same thing, then ranking higher for the brand name you are targeting will lead to more conversions.

The amount consumer demand will dictate the amount of succes you have. The SEO work doesn’t really create new demand in and of itself, but it can provide the opportunity to convert visitors to customers of adjacent products your website sells. The sort of demand creation needed has to come from broader generic search queries and/or arbitraging competing brands.

Not everyone’s website is based upon selling others products. Many websites are branding opportunities to help create demand for your product. This is in turn will drive sales on vendors websites there by increasing your brands sales. This is where Authority SEO comes in. We work to get your website ranked for keyword phrases related to your industry.

We Help Build Your Brand

Authority SEO we help you to gain exposure on broader related generic keywords. There are several ways to build brand, from socail media to press releases about your products and their features. Authority SEO covers all aspects of growing your presense on the web. With writing more frequently on our blog, setting up your Facebook page, to keeping your Twitter account buzzing. These are all things that take time away from you focusing on your business. The good thing about building brand exposure is that branded keywords tend to be the keywords with the highest conversion rates. When you build your brand you create a surge in traffic and a surge in conversion rates either for you or your vendors.

Using the internet is the most cost effective way to build your brand and Authority SEO is here to make sure its down correctly.

To get your own website ranked by yourself or your in house staff for competitive keywords is almost impossible now. You need a team of professionals who know the latest techniques and approaches to help get as many keywords and keyword phrases ranked as possible. Trusting your search engine rankings to a employee who spends a lot of time on Facebook and Twitter is not going to be your best approach. In fact when it comes to Google, a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. There is a lot of mis-information or old information on the web. Information that 2 years ago was accepted as White Hat practises but now can get your site banned. Getting your site banned from Google can put your website business out of business.

This is why if you have a e-commerce business you should put your trust in a SEO firm with a long reputation of delivering results. Those results are not cheap. Beware the company that tells you we guarantee #1 ranking on Google. First off, the #1 guarantee is going to for a 4-6 word phrase that may deliver 1-2 visitors per day if your lucky. Secondly if they promise this for a few hundred dollars how much could they really be doing.

Good quality search engine marketing takes time and a lot of original creative work. Copy must be written orginally and it can only come from industry and keyword research. We develope a strategy that is designed to drive the maximum amount of traffic while maximizing your marketing dollar.

I hear what your saying. How can I afford SEO/SEM in this economy? The good news is that SEO/SEM pays for itself when done correctly and normally provides a boost in revenue in a relatively short amount of time. Most of our larger clients spend on average of $50,000 per year on SEO/SEM. However most see an increase in revenue that far exceeds that amount. So now your saying $50,000 I can’t afford that! Well you really don’t have to. SEO/SEM is always a on going piece of work. Authority SEO has many items you can select from to get your site started in the right direction towards solid search engine rankings. In my next post I will start to discuss how that works.

So with that in mind here are some tips to make your eCommerce site more likely to convert sales… TRUST 1. First of all, don’t build your own website, unless you are already a web designer, don’t try to take the time to learn how to design a website. There are  people who spend every day doing that they are going to be better than you at doing. Building a website incorrectly can hurt your chances of ranking in the search engines and putting up a “homemade” looking site can hurt your trust factor. Authority SEO has a team of website designers to taylor a website to your needs.  It takes an investment, but one that will yield more sales and a stronger business.

2. There are some elements you can easily add to your site that will instantly make you appear more trustworthy. An 800 number in the header. This gives the feel that you are a bigger company, even if you’re running it from your kitchen table. And people often assume that a “bigger” company is a “safer” company, and they’ll want to buy from you. A trust seal and credit card logos. Again this gives the look and feel of being a bigger professional company online. Also people often assume that if you have these elements then other people are buying from you too. The credit card logos instill trust. Essentially, you’re borrowing trust from the credit card companies.  Each of these elements has been tested and by adding them to your site and you will see your conversions increase.

BEST PRICE: You’ll have more success selling online if you’re selling what people are already buying. But that means you’ll also be selling what other websites are selling. So when your customers begin price-shopping, how do you compete without cutting your prices?  Position your products as unique with unique content.  Most marketers make this mistake. They take the photo and description provided by the supplier and use them as is. If instead you’ll take a little extra time, it’ll pay off in huge dividends. Start by changing the stock photo. Test different photos. Avoid using the same photo everyone else is using. Also re-write the descpription so it’s unique. You can even give your products a unique name so that when people price shop products from your site, they won’t find any other products with the same name.

Don’t give away your merchandise. Trying to be the cheapest source rarely works for long.  Every new website owner thinks I’ll get the customer in with the lowest price and raise them later. There are millions of websites that have tried this tactic and they are all out of business now. Also there will always be someone else to come along who’s willing to sell the same items cheaper than you. Instead try bundling related items into greater bargains for your prospects. Doing this not only allows you to set the price you want, it also makes your offer unique. These are just a few tips for making your eCommerce site more profitable. But there are literally dozens of different ways, just like this, that you can use to have a higher converting site.  Authority SEO is constantly working to help sites increase their conversion ration and generate more revenue.

With absolutely no search results we started working. It was a multi faceted approach. Local,  google maps, video, website work, content creation, restaurant rating website submissions, social media were just part of the work we did to his lowly little site. We new that some of the ranking results would easier than others but what we achieved in a 2 week period was no less than a miracle. In 2 weeks his sushi website went from being unknown to dominating the Google search results.  The original search phrase I looked for him was “Sushi Restaurant in Edgewood”  which he did not turn up in the top 100 results, well after our work he now controls the entire first page of Google. Check it out for yourself, do a search for it and you will see.

Not only does he now rank for that term but every related term concerning his genre he ranks on the first page of Google. We even impressed ourselves. Never before in the 10 years history of Authority SEO have we had such results so quickly.

Showing up in Google is one thing, but turning that traffic in to revenue is another. That is where the website work came in. We had to make the customer want to go to the restaurant after seeing his site. Noting works better for driving dining customers than pictures of food, good reviews and a discount coupon. Well we are happy to report that the customers have been pouring in and Chef Ferreri has record sales day after record sales day.

It feels good to do good!

PriceWaterhouseCoopers in a new report estimates that internet marketing with be 36% of all marketing dollars spent by 2013.  One key factor in the increase on web marketing is the ever increasing availability of wi-fi and broadband cards allowing people to have access to internet almost every where they go.

One clear sign that the change is coming toward internet advertising is from Group M, a media buying agency in UK, who states that online advertising will outspend tv advertising in 2009.

You can see the first video Top Keyword Ranking Google Completition by clicking on the link.

The goal is to make them short and to the point so you can gain valuable web marketing information as it relates to your business.

Authority SEO is using onscreen technology for the creation of the videos so you can see exactly what our experts are talking about.  Authority SEO will guide you through what you see on the screen so you can take the information to your own website and perform the objectives shown in the video.

I hope you like the video series.  Look for new videos by subribing to our posts and you check the videos section under categories.

With the rise of the Internet, competition from small firms to large corporations can be at instant access to the consumer. This high level of competition forces people that are going to be successful into smart marketing and advertising campaigns, as well as, what happens once they land on your site.

No matter how successful your seo efforts, tv commercial, or paid per click advertising are nothing is as important as the product or service you are offering. The best way of looking at is that your product is more important than your marketing wit.

A different strategy to take to your marketing is making your product or products the focus of your advertising instead of how flashy the advertisement is. A new goal that can make a world of difference is getting your product’s name imprinted onto the minds of your future customers. To give an example of the opposite; have your ever talked about how funny a certain commercial was only to not know the product or company that was selling the product. Sometimes the more boring commercial is a winner because at the end of the day you remember the products name.

Does your product or service have an unique selling proposition? What separates your product or service from the next website? In some cases there really isn’t any difference, though in the proposition you associate with your product that people can see and remember can make the difference from them buying it from you.

So lets say that you have done all of that and you still got low conversions into sales for your products or services. Does your website’s message clearly backup and enhance the message that got people to your website to begin with. What if you claim to have fast shipping? When people are then reading about your products do they see fast shipping and follow up terms like ships same day or within 24 hrs on the page. You may have this information in a shipping policy page though not everyone reads those. If fast shipping is what separates your company from the rest than you this should be instantly available on every page of your site. You have to remember that people land all over your site and you want your main message communicated instantly.

Online where are real profits made, when people return to repurchase again. This probably the most overlooked aspect of online sales and marketing. We are always so worried about more traffic and higher conversions we forget to take care of our customers and make it easy for them to return and repurchase.

When comparing two companies conversion rates we often study the landing pages, keywords that drove the traffic, or the price of the product to determine how to increase our own conversion rates. After looking at this and beating your brains in as you believe everything you are seeing online you have a better offer without better results. You forget the repeat customer and the high conversions of direct traffic back the website. Getting repeat customers is more than just good customer service. Do people even know who you are? Have you ever bought something online only to later not know what website it actually was? It is important to continually brand your website with your unique selling proposition so people remember both not just the slogan.

The last thing about your website’s success is the value of your product or service. If you want growing repeat business the product has to be good once the customer receives it and uses it. In some cases our products may be personal to us so it may be important to get outside opinion on the real value of your products. No company sustained any consistent growth and success without a really good product in the end.

]]> http://www.authorityseo.com/2009/05/28/why-is-my-advertising-and-marketing-failing/feed/ 0 http://www.authorityseo.com/2009/05/28/sample-seo-proposal/ http://www.authorityseo.com/2009/05/28/sample-seo-proposal/#comments Fri, 29 May 2009 00:41:19 +0000 Authority SEO http://authorityseo.com/?p=26 Objectives

Authority SEO is an online marketing and search engine optimization company specializing in driving site specific traffic to websites.  Authority SEO takes a comprehensive approach that achieves short term and long term search traffic that converts to sales.

The goal is to reach search and web traffic specific to customers who are interested in your products.  Through Search Engine Optimization (SEO) of your site, your website will generate web traffic that converts into sales.

Authority SEO creates a personalized plan for each website.  Every company has its own goals, budgets, and resources.  Authority SEO works with you to maximize your results based on your situation.  No website is too small or too large for effective search engine optimization and increasing sales.

4 Core Tactical Elements to the Plan

1.    Website Needs Analysis
2.    Link Building
3.    SEO Continuity
4.    Online Community

Why Hire an SEO Specialist

People are now using the web as their new yellow pages.  Now with a few clicks on the web a person can find a list of custom card websites to make a buying decision.  People searching Google and Yahoo are 90% of all web traffic.  99.7% of all search traffic clicks the websites that are on the first 10 listings of a search page.  Fifty percent of all people searching keywords enter website #1 on the search listing for that keyword.

Keywords/ Traffic Monthly (Google)

Authority SEO creates keyword tracking lists that focuses on keywords specific to your site.  Through a complex comparison test, Authority SEO ranks the keywords to target based on traffic, competition, direct relevance to sales, current rank, and more.

The most important thing to understand about keywords is that people search a variety of different terms for the same thing.  Most people search questions like “how do I,” “I want to,” or “looking for.”  It’s important to find out all the different variations and which ones have more traffic.   It is Authority SEO’s job to find as many keywords as possible and then get your site ranked for them.  Authority SEO also uses tools to find out what your competition is ranking for.

Services

Authority SEO will work with your website as its online marketing partner to implement short and long term online marketing campaign.

Website Needs Analysis

The Needs Analysis is broken down into two parts.  The first being the internal structure of the site.  This relates to how the website is structured for navigation, intralinks, text, and setting up analytics software to track conversions and traffic.

Quick examples on some sites

Authority SEO noticed that your entire home page is a photo.  Google picks up text, so as it stands right now Google has no keywords off your homepage to rank in its search engine.  This is true for all search engines.

With the needs analysis, Authority SEO looks at everything on the site from meta tags, titles of pages, all links on the site, urls, and everything else on the site to find ways to make what you already have indexed better in search engines.

The second needs analysis is external.  This is creating a profile of who the target audience is for the your site’s products and the keywords associated with that target audience, and analysis of competition on major keywords to create ongoing strategy for keyword optimization.  During the analysis period, a 90 day plan of the keywords that we are going after is created.  This allows for a tangible result to the progress of your site.

Also, extremely important is that immediately analytics code is installed into the site.  Then through conversion tracking, you can determine how the keywords and traffic is working.  A million visitors doesn’t mean anything if they don’t covert into sales.  There are many ways to get poor traffic to the site that looks good from a volume stand point that never converts into sales.

As part of the needs analysis, Authority SEO will create a blog optimized for information and your site.  The blog serves three purposes.  The first, being a way to communicate with future clients.  The second, a way to support the link building process explained below, and third, it is one of the easiest ways to get new content complete.  Blogs have the ability to get instant traffic as they are listed by time in blog search engines.

Competition Sites

As part of the needs analysis, I create a profile for who your competition is.  It is important to understand how optimized the competition is and to find keywords that we can rank faster that have good traffic.  I also use a tool where I can see what keywords they rank for and the traffic they get.  This works great in creating our list of keywords we are targeting.  To be successful in SEO we have to optimize each keyword better then the competition for that word so we need to know what keywords are worth going after.

Link Building

Link building is the most important aspect to search engine traffic and rankings.  Proper linking building delivers high conversion traffic and is considered up to 80% responsible for website traffic.  Link building is how search engines determine your site’s importance.  Also, through link building we are telling the search engines what is important on your site.

The text that is linked (anchor text) is just as important as the link itself.  If we want to rank for birth announcements than we want to create links that have the text birth announcements to the optimized page for birth announcements.  One common problem is people may link the word birth announcements to multiple pages which confuses search engines as to which is the most important page to rank for birth announcements.

Link building will be an essential ongoing feature of website optimization which is needed on a monthly basis.

Baseline stats related to link building

Authority SEO starts a baseline looking at key stats associated with your site.  Authority SEO looks at a variety of key performance indicators and creates a chart for you to monitor your sites progress.  The baseline demonstrates quantitative results that support the understanding of how Authority SEO accomplishes its goals.  Stats consist of indexed links, pages, rankings, and more.

Don’t get too caught up into Page Rank and Alexa Ranking as they mean nothing when compared to search traffic specific to your site.  They are more just good references.

SEO Continuity

Authority SEO will work on a monthly basis to optimize new and old content, meta tags, and market trends.  Any new information will be optimized to make the best difference on the web.  Also, every month we monitor tracking of keyword rankings and competition.  The goal every month is to increase the number of keywords that your site ranks for and increase traffic.  A constant increase in traffic can be shifted due to market trends like less people searching on the web in the summer.

Important to understand with site rankings and traffic is that Google and Yahoo like new content.  For a site to continue to rank no matter how good the SEO work was the site has to be updated on a regular basis.  Once a site stops with regular updates the site will start to lose it rankings.

Community

The better the content on your site, the more this allows yourself to be seen as an expert in your specific area.  This is important as people search social bookmarks, blogs, message boards, and other sites that create a good reference to you.

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