All things seo column

It’s tough being an SEO practitioner. Every time you think you’ve got the best practices down, some new development comes along that forces you to change your tactics or adjust your strategy. From algorithm updates to SERP layout adjustments to new search features, optimizing a website for organic search can often feel like trying to hit a moving target. That’s where our All Things SEO columnists come in. By sharing their insights and advice, columnists were able to help SEO newbies and veterans alike navigate the fast-changing organic search landscape throughout the year. As with previous years, 2015 saw its fair share of major developments in the organic search world, each of which presented challenges as well as opportunities to search marketers. In particular, we saw a huge shift in focus towards mobile this past year. On April 21, 2015, a day known within the tech world as “Mobilegeddon,” Google released an algorithm update which gave a rankings boost … [Read more...] about Our Top All Things SEO Columns For 2015

While 2015 saw some significant and exciting new developments in search, marketers this year were seemingly less reactive and more proactive — a sign of a maturing industry. Rather than scrambling to adapt to the latest algorithm change or rushing to implement the newest trend, readers instead gravitated towards high-level thought pieces and detailed, tactical how-tos. This is evident in the fact that many of the most popular columns in 2015 were focused on getting the fundamentals right. Where do I get started with local SEO? How can I build links in an ethical manner to avoid penalties? What’s the best way to manage my AdWords campaigns? How do I optimize video content on YouTube? These are all questions that were addressed by our top columns on Search Engine Land this year. And despite 2015 arguably being the true “year of mobile” in search — we lived through Mobilegeddon and we saw mobile searches overtake desktop searches on Google — only one of … [Read more...] about Search Engine Land’s Top 10 Columns Of 2015

All Things SEO is by far our most widely read column here on Search Engine Land, and our columnists have worked hard all year to provide a wide variety of helpful SEO content for our readers. While many in the organic search community turned to these industry experts for their insights regarding major SEO developments this year — such as the Penguin 3.0 rollout and Panda updates 4.0 and 4.1 — it seems that readers were most interested in actionable advice that they could apply to their own campaigns. Our most popular columns included many tactical and strategic pieces that run the gamut from basic to advanced, covering topics like how to write good meta descriptions, how to integrate Bing into your organic search strategy, and which tools to use in your daily work. Readers were also very interested in forward-thinking pieces, suggesting that the industry as a whole is maturing — rather than scrambling to recover from unexpected changes in the search landscape, SEOs … [Read more...] about Our Top 10 Organic Search Columns For 2014

The first part of this article series on SEO in omni-channel marketing explained how search engines are intimately integrated into your customers’ lives. Ignoring SEO will eliminate you as an option when customers evaluate and buy things. SEO is critical to any company’s financial success and should be a top priority. Today, let’s look at a seven-step process to incorporate SEO into an omni-channel marketing strategy. Note: This blueprint was inspired by P.R. Smith’s SOSTAC framework, an effective model for various elements of business strategy planning. You can learn more about it here: http://prsmith.org/sostac/ Step 1: Situational analysis — Where are you now? On a treasure hunt, it’s better to know where the chest of gold coins is buried before you start digging! Data from an SEO analysis that looks at your customers, competitors, potential growth areas and ways to secure your investments help your business grow faster. Ignoring situational … [Read more...] about The importance of SEO in omni-channel marketing, part 2

It’s hard to believe, but as of this month, I’ve been the owner of an SEO and online marketing agency for 10 short, yet very long years. If you’re reading this, you’re probably “in the industry,” or at least aspire to be — so you don’t need me to tell you how difficult it can be to attract and retain quality employees in an ever-evolving, high-stakes and fast-paced work environment. It’s certainly something my leadership team and I have spent countless hours trying to figure out. It’s also one of the questions I get asked most often from colleagues in the industry: What makes a great SEO employee? Though qualities like knowledge of HTML or information architecture are useful, the one thing SEO rock stars all have in common is that they seem to have certain “intangible” qualities. Personality traits like self-motivation, leadership and the constant thirst for knowledge top the lists and seem to be a predictor of … [Read more...] about 7 Traits That Will Make You A Great SEO