SOS is a melding of the minds that Dallas SEO Dogs looks forward to every year because we know there is always a significant amount of knowledge that we can use to improve our SEO services.

This year was no different, and we’re excited to put several new practices to work for our clients. Here’s a look at 7 industry tidbits we learned at this year’s SOS conference.

1. Link Building is a Personal Experience

Michael Johnson of Page One Power spoke to conference attendees about organic link building. Many people believe that link building is a completely automated process that leaves gaining great links up to chance. 

According to Johnson, the reality is that behind every website there is a person that has to monitor and edit it. He says one of the best ways to solicit the links you want for your site is to take a “real person” approach and reach out to the individual that owns the site. 

This helps build connections on a personal level, and while not guaranteeing the link you want, could help your overall linking efforts.

2. Expand Beyond Third-Party Metrics for Link Building and Content Ideas

Johnson also dove into how to create content that relevant sites want to link to. He stressed that with so many industry creators using third-party metrics and programs for content ideas, the web only sees a constant flow of regurgitated content ideas.

In order to stand out amongst the crowd, make sure that your content expands the runway for the number of potential links it could create. However, in order to find relevant content that you would even appreciate linking to, it’s going to take a little more work:

Creators should dive into the search engine result pages (SERPs), type in desired main topics, and look at the pages key sites are linking to. From there, determine if your content is similar to that content and what missing pieces are there that your content can add value to. “Content is currency,” and that this is a fact that even the leads from Google stand behind.

3. LinkedIn Goes Beyond Internal Job Hunts

Fanny Dunagan of PathLynks, LLC discussed the importance of using social media platforms like LinkedIn beyond being a resume and job search tool. In fact, LinkedIn already has 15X more content impressions than job postings, yet there is still a larger demand for content than the current supply.

Dunagan emphasized that using LinkedIn to attract the 47% of DFW users that are just “lurking” profiles is essential to building a consistent audience and carving out a niche for your brand in a saturated market.

Only 4% of LinkedIn users actually post content. So, by using your experience and stories to connect, you have a greater chance of breaking through to your target audience. 

Aside from taking time out of your day to follow and engage with fellow industry thought leaders, users who want to give their reputation a boost should spend their time posting content that:

• Educates
• Informs
• Inspires
• Entertains

4. Customer-Centric Sites Are the True SEO Winners

Eric Enge, of Pilot Holding, is no stranger to the SOS spotlight. Returning as a keynote speaker to the event, he brought insightful, forward-thinking ideas as to how to approach the current search engine audience.

This year, Enge focused on the customer-centric approach all sites should take when trying to climb the SERP rankings. According to Enge, Google is always trying to improve the quality of consumer results, so, sites that prioritize ease of use are the sites that get ahead of the competition.

That is best accomplished through:

• Excellent content writing
• Content that emphasizes long-tail keywords (which are a Google priority)
• Prioritizing the user experience (a core ranking factor)

5. Excluding a Specific Audience Could Improve Paid Ad Results

Steve Hammer of RankHammer turned successful pay-per-click (PPC) marketing on its head with his presentation about advanced audience targeting.

According to Hammer, for great PPC, it’s just as important to know which audiences to exclude as it is to know which to include. It may not always be clear which affinity audience or in-market audience is best for your campaign, but finding audiences that aren’t converting and excluding them may prove just as valuable.

In order to sniff out who to exclude, look at all audience categories for all visitors and visitors who have converted. 

If you see a divergence in some categories from your visitors and converting users, these may be good audiences to exclude. Then, you’ll be able to focus on the audiences that are eager for your products and services. 

Tangential Content Helps You Reach a Much Larger Audience

Amanda Milligan of Stacker focused on tangential content. This top-of-the-funnel content could be the key to organically reaching a general audience and funneling through new customers towards a conversion.

Tangential content is “zoomed out” content that should create brand awareness, brand authority, and greater link-building possibilities.

When creating tangential content that veers from a direct sales-like blog, writers should ask themselves:

• How they can be of service to their audience
• What context they can add to trending topics and longstanding challenges
• What data they can analyze to bring a new perspective to an age-old topic

7. Breaking Away From “What You See is What You Get” (WYSIWYG) Themes is Essential for Speed

John McAlpin’s (Cardinal Digital Marketing) discussion about improving your site’s speed reiterated that our team is already on the right track when it comes to making client sites faster and avoiding WYSIWYG editors in development projects.

The unveiling of his new WordPress theme, SEO Grid, definitely intrigues us. His new theme claims that users can earn a PageSpeed Insights score of 90+. We’re interested in seeing it in action!

Grow Your SEO Success With the Help of Dallas SEO Dogs

If any of the takeaways we mentioned sound like a great way for you to expand your web presence, Dallas SEO Dogs is ready to help!

We are a team of industry experts that believes constant improvement on our end helps our clients reach their target audiences and the top of search results.

Contact us today to learn more about our services and schedule your free consultation with a team member.

The post 7 Things Dallas SEO Dogs Learned at State of Search 2021 appeared first on Dallas SEO Dogs.

Here’s a look at why the experts at Dallas SEO Dogs think PPC is a great move for many local businesses.

You are in Control of the Marketing Costs

Some marketing campaigns come with an upfront price tag. With PPC advertising, the business owner makes the financial decisions and has full control over payment increases, strategic decisions, and the length of their campaign.

This allows local businesses in smaller markets to take their time and plan out a campaign that is affordable and will potentially reel in the desired ROI for the money spent on a campaign.

Not every strategy is going to be a constant winner, but as we’ve mentioned, business owners are the ones in control. If your PPC strategy starts to cost you more than it’s converting, you’re always free to switch gears without taking an added financial hit.

PPC can Help Identify the Keywords Your SEO Needs

Search engine optimization (SEO) and PPC are really the best of friends. Although they are separate parts with different strategies, each of them can contribute to the success of the other. 

When you use specific search terms for your PPC campaigns, the successful ones are often helpful in determining keyword priorities for SEO purposes. 

While Google says paid ads don’t influence search engine rankings, some people within the digital marketing industry have found PPC to be a factor that pushes sites up in search rankings.

PPC Brings You Immediate, Measurable Results

Although SEO is an effective way to measure your brand’s success, it can take months for on-site changes to show results. PPC is a faster way for businesses to achieve quick results and measure the success of their current campaigns.

Quick access to important information helps display what is getting your brand the returns it needs and helps you craft the next steps in a campaign. 

Some of the measurable results PPC brings a brand include the following:

• Who is buying your product
• Which products and services are the most popular amongst audiences
• What keywords are working in your digital strategy?

Reach Your Target Audience

PPC allows campaign managers to control who views their advertisements. You’re spending hard-earned money on clicks, so you’ll want to make sure that you’re reaching your exact target audience. After all, when you target the right audience, the odds of engagement and purchases vastly increase.

Managers can target their digital campaigns in the following ways:

• Keywords
• Income
• Age
• Location
• Online interests, and more!

PPC can Benefit Users at All Entry Levels

Whether your business is brand new or established, you’re able to try PPC. Regardless of how new you are to PPC, the rules around creating and managing a campaign are the same for everyone.

Although differing budgets between businesses can seem like a huge hurdle for a local brand, working with a marketing agency that specializes in PPC can help your strategy focus on keywords and phrases that make your campaign unique and successful with your target audience.

PPC Creates Brand Awareness

If your brand is new to the local market, you definitely want to use PPC as a means to create trust and brand awareness. A well-crafted display ad can let potential clients and your target audience know what your company is all about and give them a reason to visit your website!

Once audiences become aware of your brand, the more relevance it gains with potential customers and search engines. Therefore, the more relevant your brand is, the greater the likelihood of potential purchases.

Let Dallas SEO Dogs Guide Your PPC Campaign to Success

If you are the owner of a company that is ready to create a PPC campaign but needs some help with the technicalities, the team at Dallas SEO Dogs is here to help! Let our team of PPC experts work with you to create effective advertisements that attract your target audience. 

Not only can we help you with your PPC campaign, but we can also help you hone your SEO, content, and social media strategies to perfection. Contact us today to learn more about our success in your industry and to schedule your free consultation.

The post Why Does Your Local Business Need a PPC Campaign? appeared first on Dallas SEO Dogs.

Fortunately, the tech-savvy coordinators at DFWSEM and the cooperation of SEO professionals helped keep the event alive this year through a virtual conference that allowed minds to meld safely, from the comfort of their own homes.

Despite a virtual presence, keynote speakers, entertainment and industry wisdom were abound at this year’s online event. The team at Dallas SEO Dogs dropped in on this exclusive conference and returned with valuable information from every aspect of the field that we’re eager to expand upon in 2021. 

Here are some of the highlights that pave the way for the future of the digital marketing industry.

Approach Customer Value From the C-Level

One of the biggest pulls to the State of Search conference is keynote speakers with SEO insight. 2020 was no exception. Mainstays Eric Enge and Wil Reynolds kicked off each day of the event with insight about the future of SEO and how to integrate SEO efforts into big business clients.

One of the biggest takeaways from Reynold’s presentation was taking search data for clients and making it work for what they deem valuable. According to Reynolds, the way SEOs approach data usefulness isn’t the same way that C-level clients view it.

In order to meet expectations, it’s essential for digital marketers to understand the approach their clients want to take with marketing. From there, we should apply practices to fit that specific desire. Otherwise, the entire digital marketing process could literally fall on deaf ears and provide little perceived value to the client, despite actual results.

According to Reynolds, we must:

• Work at a “revenue per marketing dollar” level
• Use different branches of data to create a valuable customer service experience 
• Help brands find a “blue ocean” idea that helps them do something no one else is doing in the field

Level Up the User Experience in 2020 and Beyond

Improving a site’s  user experience was a core topic of the conference this year, since that’s how Google is approaching current site rankings in SERPs.

Enge also stressed the user experience at the search level. He said the importance of presenting your site’s content with expertise, authority, and trustworthiness (EAT) could not be overstated. Google itself has said that these qualities in a site’s content are what it uses as ground truth to determine if the site’s content is useful to users. 

According to Enge, some of the most important SEO success factors in the next year are going to seem indirect, but when focused at the user level, can bring in desired results. Aside from EAT, Enge said that SEO specialists and brands should focus on:

• Developing great relationships with users
• Creating the best user experience online
• Creating an excellent customer experience with your brand
• Promoting the best quality content and products

Based on Enge’s theory for 2020 and beyond, all of these signals should help improve the factors that lead to successful conversions:

• Site rankings
• Link quality
• Getting content placed in featured snippets

Your Reputation is Your Brand!

In our SEO approach, we constantly stress the importance of the brand. Uberall’s Greg Sterling seconded that strategy, noting that the emergence of the Coronavirus has made brand reputation even more important ⁠— specifically, for trustworthiness. The pandemic has severely interrupted relationships between audiences and brands. Furthermore, without a stellar reputation and the ability to adapt to consumer expectations, it’s highly likely that brand preferences will permanently change once the pandemic ends.

Tips to Maintain Trust in Your Brand

• Maintain a great online reputation
• Garner positive consumer reviews
• Have a lot of customer reviews
• Promptly respond to negative customer reviews

Studies show that between 82 and 97 percent of users say that user reviews influence their final purchase decision. Interestingly, most of those users don’t even have a specific brand in mind during their search query. 

The takeaway here is brand reputation can make or break a business. We’ll be expanding on this further in the near future, so look for more reputation-based SEO Dogs blog releases with the new year. 

SEO Insight From All Useful Angles

While these snippets from the socially-distant State of Search are important, they’re far from everything presented at the conference. From troubleshooting Google My Business issues to improving traffic for already matured sites, the event provided a nice update from information industry experts.

At Dallas SEO Dogs, we plan to integrate the knowledge we’ve gained in our content and strategy in what remains of 2020 and into 2021. Stay tuned for the latest and greatest in SEO best practices!

Create High-Quality SEO Results With Dallas SEO Dogs

The team at Dallas SEO Dogs stays on top of digital marketing and SEO trends and uses our expertise to push your brand forward. Trust us to help you create superior content and update your site to meet the ever-changing standards of search engine algorithms. Contact us today to schedule your free consultation!

The post State of Search 2020: Using Modern Technology to Look to the Future appeared first on Dallas SEO Dogs.

1. The Evolution of Keyword Research

In the past, SEO companies have relied on various automated keyword search tools to generate their list of targeted terms. However, this is slowly becoming insufficient in terms of meeting Google’s expectations. According to Jenny Halasz, founder of JLH Marketing, Inc., “the best keyword tool is your brain, your client, and their customers.” Of course, this isn’t to say that automated keyword tools are obsolete; they just aren’t enough. The days of keyword-spammy titles and content are over. We’ve got to think outside the box to make sure that we are answering the right questions and giving users – not just Google – what they want. What this means for our clients: Let’s revisit your current keyword list. Rather than targeting specific terms related to your business or industry, make a list of the most frequently asked questions that your customers have about your service or product. Your project manager will help derive a few new keywords from these questions and use your site content to answer them.

2. The Rising Value of “Realness” in Social Media & Blogging

Have you ever scrolled right past an article shared on social media because of the cheesy, unauthentic image accompanying it? You are not the only one. During his session on “The Art of Social Media – Advanced Strategies and Hacks”, Jabez Lebret discussed the importance of “realness”. Users want genuine, real visuals, and stock images just don’t cut it anymore. Even the most badly lit, poorly composed photo will be more effective on social media than a highly-quality, yet phony stock photo. What this means for our clients: If your package with Dallas SEO Dogs includes content and/or social media, supply your project manager with as many “real” photos as possible. A satisfied client, a finished project, your staff, a product used in a practical way, and/or a service as its being completed all make for great photo subjects that current and potential customers want to see. Remember, the content and authenticity of the photos are more important than the quality.

3. Personalizing Social Media Efforts

Internet users, your potential customers, have basic human needs – to belong, communicate, and associate with real people. If you feel like your brand is disconnected from your target audience, it may be due to the simple fact that it does not fulfill these needs. A personal brand representative (PBR) is a great way to help establish a relationship between your brand and the user. Rather than just speaking to your audience behind the name of your company, implement a PBR who knows enough about your brand to tell its story from their own perspective. Your audience is far more likely to engage with a fellow human being. What this means for our clients: Find someone who is likable, knowledgeable, has integrity, and is passionate about your brand to pitch your message for you. Your PBR can be a company employee or a loyal customer, as long as they possess the aforementioned characteristics. Implementing a PBR, if done correctly, can convert your “Likes” into “Loves”.

4. Using Reddit for Social Media Marketing

The majority of our clients want to focus their efforts on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Instagram. However, many businesses are missing out on great marketing opportunities on Reddit. As of December 2015, Reddit had 200 million unique visitors. Although it isn’t typically thought of as a platform for social media marketing, Reddit is a cohesive community that offers engagement potential truly unlike any other medium. It puts you in direct communication with sub-communities based on location and interests. That being said, it takes much more work and effort than other forms of social media. Reddit ads require research, wit, humor, creativity, and constant interaction to appease Reddit’s notoriously aggressive audience. If done correctly, however, it can create brand awareness, community, and even content ideas. According to Brent Csutoras, CEO of Pixel Road Designs, “if you can succeed at Reddit ads, you can be successful anywhere.” What this means for our clients: Reddit isn’t for every business. However, if you think your business could benefit from Reddit Ads, ask your project manager to set up a meeting with one of our social media specialists for information on setting up an account.

5. Usefulness is King

Until now, content has been the reigning king of the SEO world. However, things are beginning to change. No matter how great your content is, if it isn’t useful to your potential customers, it is worthless. Internet users have questions, concerns, wants, and needs. Google knows this and has adapted new features like Google Snippets to serve them. If you want users to find you, provide clear and useful answers to their questions. Look beyond just traditional keyword research. Find out what they are looking for and use your content to give it to them. What this means for our clients: Your project manager may re-evaluate your site’s content to make sure that it is as useful as possible to your potential customers. He/she may recommend making changes or additions to certain pages to maximize their usefulness factor.   If there was one key theme repeated throughout the entire conference, it’s that SEO is not dead. It is continuously evolving, and will take more time and effort – including a lot of non-SEO work – to succeed at it. This requires an SEO team who is able to think outside of the box and is dedicated to staying up-to-date on all of the most current practices. As a client with Dallas SEO Dogs, you can rest assured knowing that as fast as SEO is evolving, so are we.  

The post Dallas SEO State of Search 2015 Recap appeared first on Dallas SEO Dogs.

State of Search Day 1

After registration and a delicious breakfast, the first keynote speaker Marty Weintraub opened the conference by reviewing the common thoughts and ideas that are considered when not implementing social media into our SEM campaigns. The hot topic he also brought up is how important it is for all businesses to be actively on Google Plus and how social media is connected and does contribute to SEO. From there, everyone was able to head off to the different conference rooms where many SEO topics were presented and discussed.

• SEO Track – Throughout the day multiple experts spoke on SEO topics relating to digital strategies, managing/handling Google updates and changes, new levels of keyword research, link building tips, new approaches to SEO and much more, which were all on different levels of experience in the field.
• Local Track – This conference room brought up many topics relating to local search from user behavior to local search correlating with social to content marketing and what to expect with the future of reviews.
• PPC Track – Many Pay Per Click experts expressed all types of unique tactics and tricks for enhancing PPC efforts relating to keywords, local, national, international, Google Adwords, seasonal and even social network advertising.
• Social Track – With the ever changing social media world, experts discussed the updates, how to compete, being effective and efficient, and different strategies across all the social networks.

State of Search Day 2

The conference continued to day two with the opening keynote speaker Will Reynolds, the founder of SEER Interactive, who brought up topics about how advertising has changed over the last century and a half; from the innovating marketing tactics of Michelin Tires and their representation with the Head Chefs of Michelin to the branding of Guinness and the Guinness Book of World Records. Will mentioned simple yet important statements such as “would you rather build a brand or build a link” and “everything is SEO”; these comments were effective and can really get you thinking about the long term impact of what we do as SEO experts and online marketing.

Important SEO Topics Discussed on Day Two of State of Search

• Google Algo Update – Well known in SEO, Bill Hartzer reiterated the recent Google Algorithm Updates and how to handle different issues and situations regarding low quality pages/sites, importance of high-quality content, page layout, https vs http, and more.
• Site Crawls – What To Do & What To Look For – Kate Morris broke down Site Crawls by prioritizing the different website errors and what to tackle first and how to tackle it.
• De-Mystifying Mobile Search – Cindy Krum explained Mobile SEO in regards to optimizing your mobile sites, how mobile is surpassing desktop search, the benefits of responsive sites versus mobile sites and the upcoming changes with mobile search and SEO.

The State of Search closing keynote speech was given by Duane Forrester who has spoken at the conference multiple times in the past and always brings up many compelling topics. He reflected on the past, present and future relating to technology, business, advertising and SEO. Building up with many topics that resonate with all of us from different eras and backgrounds, Duane then led into his core message and what to take from his speech…SEO still matters and includes everything! It’s all about satisfying the user!

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