As more and more companies are discovering, even locally-oriented brick and mortar businesses need search engine optimization (SEO) services to attract customers. People head to the internet before they go to the Yellow Pages now (and the Yellow Pages are online anyway!). Even if your store’s just blocks away from customers you need to make your presence known in their homes, through their broadband connections. To get there, you can’t just rank for general keywords. You need search engine to respect your location to cater to people who’ve entered their town or neighborhood in as part of the search.

Professionals can optimize for local searches using a powerful arsenal of tools but virtually anyone can make basic inroads into local search success if they’re willing to put in the time. The development staff at GILL Media has outlined a simple five-step procedure for local SEO.

Step 1: Localize Your Keywords

Keyword (search term) research is essential for any SEO campaign. Beginners should simply find phrases related to their business, but to localize they need to take things a step further by adding the name of their region, municipality or neighborhood to each term. Make full use of your local knowledge. Is there a common slang term for an area? A prominent local landmark? Create variants of your keyword phrases that include these phrases. Your list shouldn’t just include “blue widgets,” or whatever your business sells, when “Bay Area blue widgets, Yourtown” drills down to the region you serve. Remember that some slang terms are common across several regions and specify as much as possible.

Step 2: Localize Your Content

Now that you have a list of localized keywords it’s time to apply them to your on-page content. Write about your experience selling blue widgets in your area. Like any page content, don’t force the keywords in. Your product descriptions, blogging and other writing should integrate these phrases naturally, so that the sentences make sense and are still a pleasure to read. While you’re at it, make sure your street address and store hours are placed prominently on the site. Many SEO experts instruct search engines to ignore the contact page, but you should not do that! You want search engines to index your location!

Step 3: Get on the Map(s)

Major search engines have services that allow you to submit your business to a local directory, where it will show up in services like Google Maps. Take the time to do this for every major search engine, including Google, (www.google.com/local/add) Yahoo (local.yahoo.com) and Bing. In addition, submit your business to directories such as DMOZ.org and the Yahoo Directory (dir.yahoo.com). In some cases you may have to take extra steps (and in DMOZ’s case you may have to wait for a long time, as volunteer section editors have spotty records when it comes to performing updates) so if you must set priorities, take care of local search engine listings first.
Step 4: Link Build in Your Local Network

Do you know other local businesses with websites? Is there a local business directory on the Web? Approach these organizations first to ask for links back to your site. The most valuable links will come from people and groups you have sincere connections to, because you may be able to get additional supporting content, such as a description of your business. Don’t be shy about mentioning your target keywords and when you can ask your contacts to use them as anchor text. Try crafting your own example link entries – more often than not, your associates will be happy to add them as is.

Step 5: Socialize Locally

Social media tools like Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook are becoming more and more important for SEO. Kijiji is also worth noting for businesses. Don’t let its “want ad” orientation fool you; it gets plenty of traffic from established businesses as well. Search engines are striving to include more “social” results, but the best value you get out of these services is by meeting people through local networks, starting conversations with them and building positive buzz through reviews. Make contact with other local businesses and individuals whenever possible and present yourself sincerely – not as somebody just out for cheap promotion.

When Bing Crosby sang ‘You’ve got to accentuate the positive/and eliminate the negative’ back in 1944, he probably wasn’t thinking about the Internet and promoting business reputation.

Take Google. It accounts for 50% of all Internet searches.  Many Google searchers reportedly never look beyond the first ten links.  For businesses and individuals worldwide, this means their most visible reputation is dictated by ten blue links and a few lines of text.  So, it is worth monitoring your online reputation.

Reputation Monitoring

Reputation monitoring involves keeping track of what is being said about you online and is necessary and useful for the reasons outlined here.

Finding out what’s being said about yourself or your company online needs to incorporate blogs, micro blogs, social networking, video sharing websites, news feeds, forums, message boards and whatever other new buzz tool web 2.0 throws up this week.

There are a variety of free tools online that will allow you to search through these sites or monitor in real time, but watching everything can be complicated, confusing and time-consuming. And that’s before you even attempt to respond to the content.  This is why there is a growing need for services which can help you track your online profile and reputation by providing a consolidated view of comments from all sources, and then filtering and categorizing these to make it easier to see the wood for the trees.

A free tool to help you gauge your online reputation is Google Alerts. However, it is hardly the entire picture. Google (and Yahoo) only alert you to content once they index it for search.  This will be quick for major sites such as the BBC and CNN, but for many others it will be once a day, once a week or even less frequently.  Nor does Google aim to be comprehensive.  For example, they tend to ignore comments on lower ranked sites.

So Google Alerts is thought to cover only 30 % of all the online content.  In particular Blogs, Forums and Social Media sites are not comprehensively covered.  For example, Technorati and Board Reports are better for Blogs and Forums.

Generally the answer is to have an aggregator to bring these sources together and collate and categorize the results.  BuzzMonitor and LeafRSs are examples of such tools.

As for paid services, there are a confusing number.  A significant advantage they offer over free tools is in offering custom filters to fine tune the results, and reduce the number of irrelevant ones.  However, many of them are targeted at tracking marketing or advertising campaigns to assess ‘buzz’ value. 

Negative Content

If your business is ‘Travel XYZ’, and your potential customers are searching for information about you, their first impression is most likely influenced not by your official website, but by the information that comes up when they conduct a Google search.

The first or second link might be to the official ‘TravelXYZ.com’ site.  But what if among the other search results  in the top ten, there is one featuring links to a disgruntled review of one of your holiday packages, a forum thread about how ‘Travel XYZ stole my money’, or even a dedicated complaints blog called TravelXYXsucks.com!

It is immaterial whether the comments on the negative sites are correct or not.  The problem is that just like in the offline world, first impressions count. No matter how good your official website, those negative sites are going to sit in the mind of your potential customers, and contacts, and at the very best raise doubts. At worst, it could see the potential customer pass over your business and seek out a company with a more favourable online presence.

So what can you do? Your first instinct is probably to do everything you can to get the negative content removed. After all, if someone spray-painted something about your business on the side of your shopfront, you’d do everything in your power to have it removed as quickly as possible.

Unfortunately when it comes to online content, having items removed is not always straightforward.   On many occasions efforts to force people to remove online comment has backfired, only creating more attention on the negative content, attracting visitors and shooting it up the Google rankings…maybe even ahead of the businesses’ official site!

Rather than move in a heavy handed fashion to have negative content removed, a more ‘softly softly ‘ approach may achieve a better outcome.  For example, you could try putting across your side in a constructive and positive way (sometimes you may want to engage the services of a PR expert to help you).  Another tactic sometimes might involve engaging the services of a Search Engine optimisation expert (SEO) who specialises in this type of work to manipulate the search results striving to eliminate the negative, by starting to accentuate the positive.

What does this mean?  It includes establishing a positive identity for your business online.  This has two effects. One, by becoming more prominent online you stand a better chance of ‘owning’ your search rankings (so as to lessen the chance that isolated incidents will rise to prominence on Google).  And two, you begin to engage your customers in a positive and transparent way, and maybe even head off potential negative comments before they are even made.

Websites

The first and most obvious way to establish your profile online is with your own website. A website allows you to strengthen your connection with your existing customers, and also act as a first impression for potential new customers.

A simple good informative site with lots of interesting and helpful information describing how you can meet people’s needs will reflect favourably on your brand and can help create an image of professionalism. Chances are most businesses already have a website, but there is often scope for enhancing its presence and ranking by providing useful content, such as regularly updated information on your business and advice on new developments in your industry. 

What else can you do?

Internet forums

A good forum is a public meeting space where like-minded people can come together to discuss their interests in a friendly and supportive environment. 

However, watch the online forum environment for a while before you leap in.  Careful consideration should always be given in advance to the way in which you will engage with your customers in a forum.  Some companies have tried creating ‘dummy profiles’ and logging onto forums to promote their products direct to users under the guise of being a member of the public.

This kind of marketing is almost always a failure, and serves only to alienate potential customers. People (especially internet users!) are cynical, and a new user with a handful of posts who only seems to promote your product will probably be seen through, and most likely be banned from the forum.

What’s more within the EU this type of  ‘buzz marketing’ exposes you to a possible fine of up to £5000, and two years imprisonment following the Consumer Protection  from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 which came into force last year.  In practice, even if no prosecution is brought, a practice deemed illegal by the Advertising Standards Authority could lead to other undesirable consequences.  For example, insurers may disclaim liability, suppliers may argue they have a right to walk away from particular contracts, other bodies such as the Consumers’ Association could become involved. 

So, in view of the potential ramifications, and the practices known to lead to online success,   if you want to engage forum users, the key is transparency.  Make a profile in your own or your company’s name, include links to your official website, and make an effort to contribute useful information to the forum so as to become a valuable member.  By establishing yourself as a trustworthy authority on a topic, you can grow the profile of your business and your potential customer base. 

Blogs

While traditionally journals have been introspective, blogs which are effectively an online journal  are open for viewing by millions of readers worldwide, with some of the most popular blogs attracting thousands of daily readers.

While blogs are normally associated with individuals and personal interests, corporate blogging is become increasingly popular. A 2006 study by Jupiter Research estimated 34% of large companies had weblogs, with many more companies planning on starting their own web logs.

A corporate blog which is open to the public can be a great way to engage with your customers and give them an insight into the day to day operations of your business. It’s also flexible, and allows you to comment on news, announcements, or even potential bad news about your company in a friendly, easily accessible and less formal way than a traditional press release.

Microsites

A microsite is a website which is separate to your main business website and has its own domain. For example, VandelayClothing.com might be your primary website, which advertises a range of clothing available for order. However, perhaps you want to give prominence to a Christmas sale, without distracting from your core site and changing its content.  In that situation you may look at creating the microsite VandelayChristmas.com, which focuses on the specific Christmas sale. The added benefit of such a microsite is you can conduct contextual advertising.

Contextual advertising involves banner advertising on other websites depending on keyword. For example, using contextual advertising you could target Internet users who are searching for Christmas information with targeted advertising about your specific Christmas website.

Social networks

So, in general terms, a social networking site is an Internet website that allows you to connect and interact with people with similar interests. There are literally hundreds of social networking sites, with the most popular including Facebook, Linked In and Twitter. They vary, but at their heart all these sites allow you to create profiles and proffer your thoughts, opinions and musings with a worldwide audience.

But what if you do a Google search of your business and nothing comes up? Is there still a need to ‘accentuate the positive’, by establishing an online presence and actively promoting your business? If anything it’s more important than ever.

As Oscar Wilde said, ‘the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about’.

SEO, an abbreviation for search engine optimization, has become a rather indelible buzz-word on everything from blogs to forums and contracts to – you guessed it – search engine results pages, or SERPS, for short. Search engine optimization defines the process of increasing the number of visitors (amount of traffic) coming to a site through the avenue of the large search engines – Google, Yahoo!, and Bing. SEO’s obvious use in targeting keywords is highlighted among two hundred additional factors in which search engines base their analyses. Who has time to plan and implement a marketing campaign when all of your productivity is being sapped by referring to a cookbook of desired particulars arranged by search engine analysts? We thought you’d never ask. That’s why we’re discussing the facets of selecting a good SEO company.

First, let us stress the importance of local, one-on-one contact. It’s ‘oh, so easy’ – in our inundated-digital-information-overload-age-of-computer-technology – to rely on some faraway, faceless firm to lead us down the information superhighway. Why not get up close and personal with a solid handshake and a square look in the eye? Do business with someone you can see and meet with when the need arises. If you’re marketing widgets from Kalamazoo, maybe your Kalamazoo SEO company should understand the local Kalamazoo widget market. Maybe they have other clients who make accessories for Kalamazoo widgets. Maybe they have relationships with other companies in the local market and are able to network your information around the community.

That being said, there are a few qualities of trustworthy search engine optimization companies of which you should avail yourself if you’re in the market for a good SEO firm.

They should be willing and able to provide references for you to call. You should be able to talk to past clients of the SEO company and ask questions. Some may guard the performance of their website and search engine rankings, but ensure them that you’re just looking for advice. Do your homework.

A one-size-fits-all approach works for Halloween costumes – not SEO marketing for your website. Your old site may be full of SEO unfriendly elements and non-compliancy issues. Sometimes this might need to be fixed first above all else. Also, some sites require more content, while some require much less. Let your SEO company tell you how they plan to fix your site. Listen intently.

Next, the SEO firm’s game plan lays out how they intend to accomplish the job. They should not be hiding the process from you. It should be clearly laid out and make sense. A good SEO company will divulge the basics of what they’re doing and how your business will benefit.

Content, content, content – it’s the icing on the cake. Good SEOs create killer content to attract links from other sites. Thought-provoking articles and press releases can expose your business, build name recognition, and garner brand loyalty.

You may have spent a fortune on your site design, trendy flash movie, and giant-sized logo. A truly honest SEO company sets the record straight with you by informing you of things that are detrimental to your site rankings. Listen and learn. They’re the experts, not you – remember. That’s why you’re contacting them, right?

The most inexpensive, high quality Video Optimization packages have hit the Search Engine Marketing market in a big way. Endless Rise, the renowned SEO Reseller Provider, has added another high value service to their SEO reseller plan, leveling the playing field for small and medium size businesses who bring new products to market.  This innovative SEO reseller plan allows for a video optimization package that is turnkey and easily marketed.

Included in these video  SEO Reseller Plans

Video Landing Page creation –

Endless Rise will create a landing page in the appropriate spot for those “hands-off” clients who are too busy running their business to hire a programmer to add the page for their new product or service.

Google Analytics –

This Endless Rise SEO Reseller Plan installs this great service for the new product/service which will allow the client to specifically track the progress of their marketing.  This is critical to the projects effectiveness.  Tracking how long the viewer stays on the page and how they arrived at the page ensures the success of future marketing efforts.

On Page Optimization –

In this SEO Reseller plan, the page offering the video will be fully optimized on with meta-data, content, and code ensuring ranking ability in the Search Engines and almost immediate indexing.  This is critical in pushing the target page to its ranking potential.

Social Bookmarking –

Endless Rise gets this video started off on the right foot by giving you different levels of Social Bookmarks with their video optimization packages.  This function is a great way to start the viral buzz of a great video!

Video link Submission-

The video SEO Reseller plan also includes placing link structure for the video.  Once the page and video are optimized, this helps with page indexing speed and allows the video to get recognized in video search.  Google, yahoo and Bing are all included in these submissions.

Video Sharing –

Endless Rise submits the video to sites requested by the client in this SEO Reseller Plan.  Pick your favorite Video website and we will submit there.  With the smallest package starting with 5 different video website submissions, you cannot go wrong with this package.

Video Optimization Package prices start at $55 for Endless Rise SEO Resellers.

In addition, this and other Endless Rise SEO Reseller plans, allow client’s who aren’t ready to put all of their marketing eggs into one basket the option to “test the waters” with your SEO Firm.  These packages last for 1 month and show your client’s the value proposition you promise them and high ranking results on just a small portion of their products.  This will wet their pallet and help them understand the vast opportunity in Online Marketing.

There is a new buzz about local seo doing the internet rounds and it is hardly surprising when you take into account how many businesses have websites that just sit there and do nothing.

The internet has galloped forward at a pace that is faster than anybody expected during the past 5 to 10 years. A typical example is that today more people use the internet to search for local goods and services than use the traditional Yellow Pages. Of course this gap between using a telephone directory or a search engine like Google is widening every day.

Today, business owners of large or small companies can no longer be content with have their website URL on stationery, business cards or the side of a truck. Today you website must do for you what Yellow Pages used to do plus a lot more. In short it is time for your website to start making money for you.

We use Australia as an example because we are based in Sydney but the problem of attracting new clients is worldwide and is crucial to all businesses. It is a business fact of life that nothing remains the same. Today you may have one client who is responsible for 50%, or more, of your business; have you asked yourself the simple question: “What happens if this client closes down tomorrow?”

Are you aware that the most common reason for a business closing after the first two years trading id because they lose one major client.

Another fact to be aware of is that by using your website properly you can halve your advertising costs and double your new customer enquiries?

So what is this super performance marketing that we should all be looking at? In the case of most businesses you already have the tool but it is just sitting there doing nothing: Your website.

Some businesses have used cooperative marketing in the hope of making their website work for them. By cooperative marketing we mean that somebody builds a website called local-plumber dot com and have promoted the site onto the first page of local search engines. They then go around all the plumbers in the area and sell advertising space on that website. You need to ask yourself how much return am I getting from that ad? In most cases it isn’t sending many new clients to your plumbing business because on that website you are just one of many competing plumbers.

Just think of the result if you could put your own website on to page one of Google, Yahoo or Bing? Everybody that clicks on that link in the search engine comes to your business – there are no competitors on the same site. The cost of doing this is around the same as you are paying to share with your competitors right now.

In the current market every business needs to keep topping up their customer base and to do this you need your advertising to be aligned to the latest search trends.

Search engine optimization in your local market (known as local seo) is the way forward today. Gone are the days when you can use a name like Aaardvaak and get an unfair advertising benefit based upon alphabetical listing. Today your website must be seen as an authority site in the eyes of the search engines and to achieve that most will need the assistance of a performance marketing specialist.

Today the ball is firmly in your court and the decision you need to make is: Do I move with the times or linger with mob?

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a constantly evolving field. By improving site content and the numerous factors the Google, Yahoo! and MSN’s Bing use to rank sites, SEO experts work to improve their clients’ ranking and visibility. As search engines change their criteria and the Web changes with new applications, SEO needs to adapt. What will we see in the future? There are several emerging trends afoot, some of which promise to transform the way search engines rate sites along with what SEO professionals need to do to keep up. GILL Media has watched these trends closely. Here are five of the developments that will change searches and search engine optimization in the next five years.

4G Smartphones

Fourth generation (4G) cell phones (so-called “smartphones”) promise to provide rich-content internet access through improved connectivity and seamless roaming. Convenient true Web access will mean that it’s no longer necessary to create lo-fi versions of websites. On the other hand, the cell phone interface favors a different way of surfing, where users have access to widgets and aggregated content through a single application. Typing in URLs or performing searches is less convenient on a phone, so sites will have to optimize themselves to either appear in popular aggregation hubs, or bundled with applications that perform a service.

Next Generation Localization

4G networks also herald the next step in localized searches. A mix of GPS functionality, street level imaging and records of physical addresses will lead to what experts have called “augmented reality.” You’ll be able to look through your phone’s camera to not only see whatever the lens is pointing at, but the web addresses, contact information and other online information associated with whatever you see. There are already some primitive applications that do this, and in time this will become a routine way of meshing the Web with everyday life. Businesses will need to find some way to stand out in the barrage of information, particularly in dense urban areas.

The Real Time Web

Twitter provided the first taste of the real time public Web. SMS broadcasting and services like Google Wave will finish the job, providing up to the second information on popular sites and trends. Google has already listed real time search updates as an objective. As a result, future website promotions will have to be far more dynamic than they currently are. SEO experts will need to provide a stream of regular content and buzz to keep sites in the evolving conversation.

Improved Semantics

Web semantics (the relationship between words and their meanings) is in its infancy. The ultimate goal is a search engine that not only indexes data, but actually understands what it is, at least in relation to search queries. As search engines improve title tags and other coding signals (meta data, CSS structure) will be less important than the overall “tone” of the content — whether it seems to have a strong or weak relationship with its target search term. Search engines will understand synonyms and slang better. This puts the focus back on content over coding.

User Mashups

Mashups (user generated combinations) of sites and services are currently delivered in a “top down” fashion via applications and social bookmarking sites such as Digg. Eventually one or more generalized applications will evolve that not only make it easy for the average person to mash up content, but may even automate the process based on the user’s search history. To get noticed, sites will have to find synergy with others to form vertical communities.

Searching for internships online has been made easier because of numerous tools you can use. You have social networks such as Facebook and MySpace, live feeds like Twitter, and social media like YouTube. But if you still can’t land the internship that will serve as your foundation in building a good career in the future, then here’s one power tool you should utilize starting today: RSS feeds.

RSS (aka Really Simple Syndication) feeds were created initially for tech geeks to gather multiple information feeds by means of grouping topics of the same interest in one specific location. If you’re using RSS, you can check on these feeds anytime and check on the latest news and information of your chosen topic, in this case, all topics about internships. You don’t have to bookmark a website or blog if you plan to continue to visit it. If you have subscribed to a website’s RSS feed, you can browse headlines when new posts are updated and decide if the new entry is of interest.

Benefits of RSS Feeds

Get your news-fast and fresh! You don’t have to go to each website just to check on the latest buzz about their internship offers; all you have to do is click on the RSS icon found on your screen to get a rundown of the latest posts from the websites you have registered on. That saves you both time and effort in checking each site one by one only to know that there’s nothing interesting for you to read.
Get the feeds in a more organized manner. RSS Feeds are more than just bookmarks-they are live bookmarks that get updated each time there’s a new post on the site. Also, you can organize the feeds depending on your tags, keywords and assigned locations, so it wouldn’t be hard for you to find valuable posts during each routine check.
You can spread your own feeds too! Do you have your own site or blog which you update everyday? Then it is a must that you subscribe to RSS feeds so you can spread your own posts to your chosen sites. This is a good way of keeping your contacts informed of the latest news about you-and who knows, they might even notice you because of your posts and possibly hire you on that internship you’ve long been craving for.

Different Types of RSS Feeds

Now you know the benefits of RSS feeds, it’s time to ask, what kind of feeds will you get? It actually depends on what you register on your feed reader, and these can be blog posts, articles, forum replies and comments, videos, news, and industry-specific feeds. You will also enjoy the efficiency of this tool because it not only contains the sites and update alerts, but also comes with titles, dates, short summaries and as well as videos about the new information coming in to your feeds.

Using iGoogle to Organize Your Internship RSS Feeds

If you’ve decided to take advantage of RSS feeds in searching for that perfect internship, then all you need is a Google account. As we’ve discussed in the article on How to Utilize Google during your Internship Hunt, we recommend making iGoogle as your communication base to keep things simple. iGoogle will serve as the storage space for all your feeds.

Once you have created a Google account, you’ll automatically have your own iGoogle page (It’s just a matter of using it or not). If you’re new to this, simply log-in to your Google account, then visit http://www.google.com and click on “iGoogle” at the upper right side of the page.

Now, the next part is easy. Whenever you visit a website or blog that updates internship listings daily, all you need to do is subscribe to its RSS feeds.  To do this, click on the RSS link (the orange square logo with three curved white parallel lines inside which you just couldn’t miss) on the site you visited, then choose “Google” to subscribe, which will land you to a page that asks whether you want to “Add to Google Homepage” or “Add to Google Reader.” Simply click and add to Google Homepage and every new post from that blog or website will be posted on your iGoogle.

Aside from internship sites, you can also get RSS feeds from job sites, such as Monster, Career Builder and Simply Hired, among others. Another good source of internships are news sites, such as Google News, Bing and Yahoo. Since these search engines are always up-to-date with new posts, you can be sure that new internship listings are sent to your iGoogle, giving you an advantage over other internship seekers who rely only on one source to find internships.

iGoogle also allows you to customize your page and even add widgets. Another advantage of using iGoogle as the home base of your RSS feeds is that once you’ve finished your internship and you’re now looking for a full-time job, you can still use it to find your preferred job.