Search Engine Marketing - ABT Web Services

Minor Changes

2005-09-17T11:54:00.000Z

Recent Results

We have left the site to settle within the search engine results from the initial optimisation around the keywords:

We have seen a small dip in the performance as shown within the recent ranking results.

Search Engine Optimisation - Minor Changes

We have made some minor changes to the Web Design Liverpool page to judge the effects of the ALT and TITLE Tags with images.

ALT Tags

We have added the keywords (web design liverpool and Website Design Liverpool) to the ALT tags for images, while ensuring that the text reads correctly for screen readers.

TITLE Tags

We have added title tags to the images including the keywords within them. Title tags are the screen tip that is displayed when the cursor is hovered over the image. This happens with the ALT Tag within Internet Explorer but not with more compliant browsers such as Firefox.

Heading Tag

We have made a small change to a heading within the right panel. This provides the Keyword as a single phrase, as shown below.

Monitoring Results

We would anticipate that the pages will be updated within the next 2 weeks in Google, Yahoo and MSN and will report the results of these minor changes.

Improved Rankings

2005-08-02T07:46:00.000Z

In the first month we have performed better than expected, with a #1 at Yahoo and a top 10 at Google for web design liverpool.

View the latest ranking results for our web design services (new window)

This success has seen some improvement in visitor numbers and has brought us two serious enquiries. This a good start but needs to be improved on for it to provide us with a steady stream of business.

New Keywords

During August we will be selecting some additional keywords from our keyword research sheet to optimise pages around to increase the visitor numbers, this will first start with areas.

We will report once the search engines have re-indexed the status of the web page.

Risky Changes

We have also made some major changes to the web design index page, this is to provide better detail of the services that we offer, Web Design, Dymanic Web Design and E-commerce solutions.

The risk is that we have increased the words on the page and have therefore reduced the keyword density. However we feel that this will add value to the site. The stragtegy therefore has been adopted that we will publish the page and wait for both Google and Yahoo to re-index to see the effects of the results.

#1 at Yahoo! - First SEO Success

2005-07-17T22:02:00.000Z

With a little effort we have managed to attain a number 1 spot at Yahoo for the following terms:

Website Design Liverpool
Website Design Cheshire

View our latest search engine positions - new window.

Although this number 1 listing may not bring us a huge amount of traffic is provides us with a solid base to work off to promote our web design services.

The changes have mixed effect at Google but we envisage that this will increase as we increase our content pages and linking between pages.

This initial success is based on our keyword research and the development of our keyword strategy, targeting key phrases that we can attain high rankings. If you would like support with your search engine marketing then contact us for more details.

First Success - Web Design Page Optimisation

2005-07-11T11:01:00.000Z

On Sunday afternoon we had detected that both Google and Yahoo had updated their index of our web design services page and that Google had also included the web design liverpool page.

This has had a limited improvement to our search terms.

View results - new window.

Results Summary

Although only one new top 10 result has been achieved for our keywords the results are significant.

The web design liverpool page has given us improved position at Google for "web design liverpool" first index at 33 and "website design liverpool" up to 9 (from 43 at Google UK).

Also an important finding is that on this the first index of the page the description is taken from the meta description and not a code snippet, as shown below.

This is interesting as many SEO's do not believe that Google place any weight on the meta tags.

As part of the experiment we have updated the both the title tags and the meta tags to have Web Design Liverpool at the start of the tag.

We will report back any changes to position, we are hoping for an improved position for web design liverpool, maybe into a top 15 place from the current position of 27.

Search Engine Optimisation - Web Design Liverpool.

2005-07-07T15:58:00.000Z

We have built our first information page for web design liverpool.

This may be considered a doorway or gateway page, however we have made considerable effort to ensure that the page has unique content and is relevant to the visitor when they land on the page.

Initially this page is to be used for our search engine optimisation but will become integral to our PPC campaign.

Doorway Pages.

Doorway or gateway pages are frowned upon by search engines. They are usually considered spam as the content is so much targeted at the keywords that the text often does not make sense. Often these pages, because the content is not meaningful are cloaked, i.e. automatically transfer the visitor to another page such as the home page.

We feel that although this may get visitors (until the method is detected by the search engines and blocked as spam) it will not improve the conversion rate for the website. If someone searches for website design liverpool and is then presented with a company in Colchester who redirect them to their home page, they will not see the relevance and reach for the back button.

As stated in previous articles we are only practicing ethical optimisation techniques, so our gateway page, is really a targeted information page.

Web Page Layout.

We have added an image to the Web Design Liverpool page of the Liver Buildings. This is an image that is strongly identified with the city of Liverpool and instantly recognised by the visitors that we wish to attract to this page. This is designed to add credibility to the page, making visitors recognise the scene and be at ease.

The aim of the Search Engine Marketing of our web design services is to increase visitors and more importantly to convert those visitors into sales leads.

The Long Wait

We now need to wait for the search engines to index the Web Design Services and the Webb Design Liverpool web pages so that we can see the effect. While we can expect quick results from Google, indexed and updated every other day, the other search engines such as Yahoo and MSN take a little longer, possibly up to 2 weeks.

While the new pages may take a little time to be indexed it may take a little longer for the pages to get reasonable positions. This is as the pages get PageRank with Google. Other engines also employ similar methods for ranking the importance of the web page.

We will report the results once the search engines have re-indexed.

Search Engine Optimisation - Web Design.

2005-07-06T15:30:00.000Z

The keywords research phase is now completed (well for a while) and the next phase is for the search engine optimisation of our content around the selected keywords.

The first area of the site that we are optimising for is our web design services.

We identified the target keywords within our web page as detailed within the keyword selection article.

Optimising the Web Design Page.

The following elements will be considered when optimising the page.

Title tag (page title)
Body Copy
Meta Tags

Title tag

The page title is considered very important to search engines. It sets the tone of the page. Including relevant keywords here are important.

The title tag is also very important, as this is what is generally displayed to the searcher when they review the results of the web page. The title has to balance well between including keywords and encouraging searchers to click your link.

The title tag for the page is:

Website Design UK | Liverpool Runcorn Cheshire North West | Professional Website Design

From our keyword research we have decided that we will be targeting:

Liverpool
Manchester
Cheshire

for our web design services.

We do not just need to add Manchester to the search results we also need to remove the Runcorn and Cheshire. These keywords do not provide sufficient traffic so at this stage they can be removed.

The other point of note is that we have moved the "uk" to the end of the areas covered. This increases the prominence of the keywords that we are targeting, while keeping the UK part of the title.

We have therefore changed the title tag to:

Website Design | Liverpool Manchester Cheshire UK | ABT Web Design Services.

Body Copy.

We need to ensure that our keywords are included within the body copy of the site. Not just for search engine marketing purposes but so as to ensure that visitors can recognise their search within the site. This builds credibility and helps improve the conversion rate of visitors to customers.

We have made a major change to the web page copy, but the importance of getting the keywords within the text is important. However getting the keywords "Web Design Liverpool" in to the text is not simple. e.g. web design in Liverpool reads better.

We have added a footer to the page which includes the keywords. This looks in place and will help with the ranking.

This has given us the idea to create information pages for each of the keywords we are targeting. Although considered to be a doorway page the information is targeted at the reader as an introduction to the services we offer and is not designed as spam. This is important as we are only practicing ethical optimisation techniques.

Meta Tags.

There is still some argument as to the relevance of meta tags used by search engines. We still add two meta tags to the page, Description and Keywords. We do not add any of the other tags available as standard as we feel that they are not relevant.

We have added the first following meta tags to the page. These will form a baseline for future optimisation:

Description: "Web Design UK - ABT Web services provide a professional website design service locally in Liverpool, Manchester and Cheshire and nationally throughout the UK."

Keywords: "web design, abt web services, liverpool, manchester, cheshire, dreamweaver, contribute, dynamic website, php, MySQL, uk"

Monitoring and Improvement

The updated web design page went live on the 5 July 05.

Search Engine Optimisation is not an exact science. We need to monitor the page, review the status during each update and adjust further dependent upon the results.

However we have decided through this exercise to include the information, or landing, pages for the keywords. These will be specific pages that will target one key phrase per page.

These pages will also be used on our PPC campaign so that we can deliver relevant content directly to the searcher query. We hope that this will improve the number of visitors converting to sales leads.

Current Ranking.

2005-07-05T16:07:00.000Z

Before we start our search engine optimisation we have used WebCEO to chart our current ranking for our selected keywords.

View current ranking - New Window.

We will be using these rankings to determine the success of the optimisation campaign to improve our rankings. We will publish changes to this as we detect a change in performance.

Keyword Selection - Web Design.

2005-07-05T10:31:00.000Z

The web design area of our site is due for a major update, with extended portfolio and greater details of the services that we offer.

It is therefore the first area of the website that we will use our keyword research to promote our website.

Keyword Strategy.

The top keywords for our web design services from our keyword research are:

web design - 53,831 searches
website design - 646,719 searches

Figures from Overture UK.

You can download our a PDF of our keyword research sheet.

A top 10 placement for either of these search terms at any of the major search engines (Google, Yahoo and MSN) would provide us with the traffic target that we set in the Website Marketing Plan. However a top placements would difficult to achieve given the amount and strength of the competing sites for these keywords.

We are measuring the strength of the site using Googles PageRank as an indicator. For these sites the Average top 10 PageRank is:

web design - A-Pr 7.7
website design - A-Pr 7.1

We currently have a Google PageRank of 4 for our web design services and therefore the competition is significantly stronger.

This is where our Keyword Strategy comes in. Defining a balance between the keywords and the current strength of page we are optimising.

From our keyword list we have identified the following matches that meet the business and website profile.

web design manchester- 2,336 searches - A-Pr 5.3
website design manchester - 1017 searches - A-Pr 4.8
web design liverpool - 1,824 searches - A-Pr 4.6
website design liverpool - 834 searches - A-Pr 2.9
web design cheshire - 2,899 searches - A-Pr 3.5
website design cheshire - 964 searches - A-Pr 2.4
web design uk - 8,317 searches - A-Pr 5.6
website design uk - 9,379 searches - A-Pr 5.5

All the keywords returned are based on locations. This is known as Geo Targeting keywords. We did not set out with the purpose of targeting keywords by location, however these offer the best chance of a top 10 spot.

In summary adding the location to the services narrows the competition and increases the chances of a high page rank.

We have now selected our keywords and are ready to start the updates and optimisation of the ABT Web Design page. We will detail the optimisation and updates within the next posts.

Keyword Strategies.

2005-07-04T13:17:00.000Z

Different strategies are employed for search engine optimisation and PPC campaigns.

Search Engine Optimisation.

With search engine optimisation a pragmatic approach must be taken to the results that can be achieved for the optimised site.

We use Google PageRank as an indicator of the position that a site might attain through our search engine optimisation services.

If the top 10 results at Google for a selected keyword we use our keyword research to identify an alternative that meets our clients content.

It is better to be in a top ten ranking for a search term that has a popularity of 1,000 searches per month than on page 2 or 3 of the results for a search term having 100,000 searches a month.

Our experience tell us that searchers rarely click below the fold (i.e. on the screen without scrolling) never mind moving through the results to the second or third page.

We offer a professional keyword research service to identify practical keywords for our clients to target and improve their search engine rankings. If you would like more details then contact ABT.

Pay Per Click Strategy.

A pay per click strategy is completely different from your search engine optimisation strategy. With PPC the limitations are on the amount of advertising you can afford.

We use the following PPC advertising networks:

Google Adwords
Overture (feeds ads on Yahoo)
Miva (formally espotting)

Each has its advantages and disadvantages which we will discuss in further articles. However the using a range of PPC search engines gives a wide coverage of the site.

Where with SEO you need to take a pragmatic approach to the keywords you optimise for, with PPC you must view the bids and determine the appropriate levels of costs for your budget.

Large companies with large budgets will pay up to £5 per click as Google and Overture, this can be a little expensive for smaller businesses like ours.

However researching the cost per click and the popularity of keywords can bring you significant traffic at lower costs.

We will discuss this further in later articles when we plan and detail our PPC strategy.

Keyword Research Sheet.

2005-07-04T10:10:00.000Z

In our last article we published our keyword research spreadsheet.

This article provides information on reading the keyword research worksheet.

Makeup of the Keyword Research Spreadsheet.

Our keyword spreadsheet is divided into 4 parts for each set of keywords.

Part 1 - the keyword and popularity (number of searches in the past month).

Part 2 - The exact match (as entered using quotes).

Part 3 - The general match, this is the most popular search type, the user types the search terms in to the search engine without any operators.

Part 4 - The in title match. How many pages include the search terms within the page title.

Using the Search Types to Select Keywords.

We use the Exact match and the in title matches to determine the number of sites that have some optimisation for the selected keywords.

The exact match tells us how many pages and the strength of the top 10 results for the search terms within the body copy.

The in title match at Google tells us how many pages have been optimised for the keywords using the important title tag.

This is useful when considering the keywords for our search engine optimisation campaign.

The general match is the way that most searchers use search engines. That is just entering the keywords into the search box without any operators (quotes, etc.).

Selecting Keywords from the Spreadsheet.

Selecting keywords from the list to target for the search engine optimisation of the page is now straight forward.

We are looking for a keywords with a high popularity and high KEIin the general match and a Google PageRank equal or less than the page to be optimised in the Exact and In Title matches.

In future articles we will be putting the keyword research into practice to optimise our web pages.

Reviewing the Competition - SEO.

2005-07-01T16:45:00.000Z

In the last post we detailed the keyword selection process.

We now have a spreadsheet with a list of the keywords that relate to the services offered by ABT. The next stage is to enter information relating to the competition.

Search Engine Optimisation.

For Search Engine Optimisation purposes learning about the strength of the competition is important so that we can develop a keyword strategy that meets the strength of our website. There is little point in targeting a keyword or phrase that has competitors website much stronger than your own.

Gauging the Competition.

Google PageRank Search

We have written a script using Google's API tool to provide details on the strength of the competitions PageRank for our selected keywords.

This script works by querying Google for each of our selected phrases for the following match types:

Exact Match
Standard Match
In title Match

For each result given our Google PageRank script returns:

Total Number of Matches
Average PageRank for the top 10 results
DMOZ/Google Directory Categories for sites in the top 10 results

This provides us with a gauge of current strength of the competing sites and the sites that have been optimised for the selected keywords. This will play an important factor in the selection of the keywords to optimise web pages within the ABT website.

This information is also entered into our spreadsheet.

At the time of writing our Home Page has a Google PageRank of 5, secondary pages 4 and deeper content 3.

Keyword Effectiveness Index

Sumantra Roy of First Search Ranking developed the Keyword Effectiveness Index (KEI). This was made popular by Wordtracker a keyword suggestion tool.

Wordtracker has a detailed explanation of how the Keyword Effectiveness Index works.

Basically KEI is calculated as follows:

P/C * P

Where:
P = Popularity (Number of searches)
C = Number of competing pages.

The higher the KEI the more popular the keywords are and the less competition.

Although KEI has some use in identifying keywords to target it does not take into account the strength of your competitors for the selected keywords.

For example

"website design" has a count of 46,719 searches with 29,100,000 results at Google. This gives a KEI of 75.01.

"web design liverpool" has a count of 1,824 with 171,000 results. This gives a KEI 19.46.

Using KEI alone would state that the term to target is website design. However "website design" has an average Google PageRank of 7.1 while "web design liverpool" top 10 results have a PageRank of 4.6.

Unless you have an established website with a Google PageRank above 6 you are going to struggle to get a top 10 placing for "website design". For "web design liverpool" a relatively new site, such as ABT Web Services will have an opportunity to get a top ten placement at the major search engines and to pick up a percentage of the traffic.

We therefore use KEI along with PageRank to determine the keywords that we should target for our Search Engine Optimisation.

We will no doubt come back to KEI during later postings.

Our Keyword List

We have now published our keyword list that you can download in PDF format. This includes the keywords and competition analysis detailed throughout the posts.

Download ABT Keyword List - PDF 79kb.

We will analysis this keyword list and select phrases to target for our Search Engine Marketing services. Details of the keyword analysis will be published in further posts.

Keyword Research

2005-07-01T11:31:00.000Z

Keyword research is the first stage of developing or keyword strategy for both our search engine optimisation and PPC campaigns.

Top Level Keywords

The main area of the website that we wish to promote through our search engine marketing campaign is the Web Services that ABT offer.

These services are:

Website Marketing and Management
Web Design
Search Engine Optimisation
Website Usability and Accessibility Reviews

These terms will therefore provide the basis for our keyword research.

Selecting Keywords

The method we employ for selecting keywords is to pick single words relating to the site we are promoting and entering them into the keyword suggestion tool.

For ABT Web Services we entered the term "web" as this common to all the services we offer.

The results returned from the search engine suggestion tool includes related phrases with the term web included and the number of searches of the past month. Each of the phrases that relate to our website are entered into our keyword spreadsheet.

We have developed a page within the spreadsheet for each category of services we offer.

we drill down through each of the suggested key phrases selecting and entering each of the phrases that relate to our website and enter them into our spreadsheet.

We repeat this for each single keyword that we have identified from the content of our website including:

Internet
Marketing
Usability
etc ...

Each of the 2 to 4 word phrases returned by the search suggestion tool is entered into our spreadsheet along with the number of searches.

This can be a long process, but worth every effort as these keywords and phrases will provide the basis for both our search engine optimisation and PPC campaigns.

Completed Keyword List

Our spreadsheet now has a list of keywords and phrases for each category. However before we can start our search engine optimisation campaign we must review our competitors and develop a strategy to improve the ranking of the site. This will be addressed in our next post.

We will publish our keyword list in PDF format once we have completed the keyword analysis.

Keyword Research Tools

2005-06-30T10:39:00.000Z

With the Marketing Plan in place with targets and budgets set the next phase is the selection of keywords and phrases for our Search Engine Marketing campaign.

The purpose of the keyword research process is to identify common search terms used by real searchers and plan a strategy.

This post provides details of the tools that we use for the keyword research process, future posts will provide details of the methods and the implementation of the strategy.

Keyword Research Tools

We utilise a number of tools for identifying search terms relating to our clients websites, to ensure that we are targeting the most effective keywords.

The following sections details the tools that we will be using throughout this campaign.

Keyword Suggestion Tools

We utilise Overture UK Keyword Suggestion Tool as our primary source for keyword research.

Although results from a PPC search suggestion tool may not be ideal the results provide sufficient insight into the terms to target.

We also use WebCEO as a secondary search suggestion tool.

Google PageRank Search

We have developed a PageRank Search tool that searches the top ten results for an entered keyword from Google. The results are returned for each of the following types of search:

Exact Match
Standard Match
In Title Match

Each result match we can identify

Number of competing pages
Average Google Page Rank - top 10 results
DMOZ Directory Categories

This provides us with information on the competition for each of the search terms for our Search Engine Optimisation campaign.

Overture Bid Tool

The Overture Bid Tool provides details of the cost per click for paid advertising. Unfortunately Google does not provide such a tool and therefore we gauge costs from Overture.

Website Marketing Plan

2005-06-29T16:26:00.000Z

We have developed a website marketing plan to define targets and set budgets for the search engine marketing of the ABT Web Services Website.

The ABT Web Services website currently receives 200 visitors with 3 sales enquires through the site per month.

Our targets are to increase the traffic to the to 1000 visitors per month with a 2% (20) conversion to sales enquiries within 6 months.

Search Engine Marketing Methods

We are planning a mixed campaign of Search Engine Optimisation techniques and PPC marketing.

With a large marketing budget it would be an easy task to buy our way to the top of the search engines and increase the traffic to meet our targets. We have therefore set a budget of £60 per month for paid online advertising.

We will monitor the results of the performance of the website using a number of tools including WebTrends and WebCEO, we will provide more details of these in later posts.