Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Twitter Is Launching Its Own Photosharing Service


Twitter has been completely emphatic about where developers should stake a claim, with Twitter Platform Lead Ryan Sarver warning the ecosystem to stay away from building “client apps that mimic or reproduce the mainstream Twitter consumer client experience.”


Well if Sarver stays true to his word the Twitpics and Yfrogs of the world can just give it up now. According to multiple sources, Twitter is on the verge of announcing its own built in Twitpic competitor. Like tomorrow, if things go according to plan (naturally this post might change that).

This shouldn’t really come as a surprise to anyone, as photosharing is the next logical step of Twitter expanding its in app experience. It’s basically grabbing at low hanging fruit.

Twitter is flinging money around; It just spent $40 million on power user client Tweetdeck which represents 13% of its userbase. It’s only natural that they would spend more resources on photosharing, especially considering how much money is being poured into the white hot space and that images were the crux of the success of competitor Facebook.

I’ve got no details on what exactly the photosharing URL shortener will be if any (Twitter has owned Twimg.com for a long time) or what the Twitter for Photos product will look like. Just that it’s coming, soon. And if they’re smart they’ll put ads on it.

Source: http://techcrunch.com/2011/05/30/twitter-is-launching-its-own-photosharing-service/

Sunday, May 29, 2011

13 Websites for Search Engine and Browser Market Share Statistics

Knowing which search engines and browsers are popular is vital in allocating resource and budget to campaigns and checking sites function across browsers. But once you move outside of Western markets, the assumptions many campaigns are based on become invalid – regional search engines become important, Yahoo and Bing may disappear from the mix, and browsers like Opera move up the rankings.

Below are 13 sites that can provide you with the stats you need to understand each market and ensure your time and money is well spent. It’s worth noting that the methodologies used to gather data vary by site – so it is worth comparing sources and understanding how data is gathered.

Experian Hitwise Logo

Hitwise has grown to be one of the heavyweights of Internet statistics. They provide search engine data for free via their blogs and press releases. You can access all of their blogs here as well as selecting posts by region or topic. They summarise big trends in their press release in the U.S. and UK. The data center collates data about search engines and industries. 

Hitwise sites for Australia, India, Brazil, Singapore, Hong Kong, Canada and France can be accessed via the drop-down in the top right of the site. The data comes from a variety of sources including ISPs.

comScore Logo

Well-known research firm comScore publish search engine market shares in their press releases. There are also blogs and whitepapers on the site. Their methodology spans panels and data capture.

Nielsen Logo

Another stalwart of the research world, Nielsen also publish stats in their press releases and on their blogs. They are present in “100+ countries”, although the data available varies by country. You can access countries via this page. Their methodology includes panel and census data.

Compete Logo

This US-focused competitive intelligence tool publishes stats on its blog and offers some free usage of the tool via their homepage. Their data also comes from a panel.

StatCounter GlobalStats Logo

StatCounter is one of a number of analytics providers who publish data about search engine market shares using data from their customer base. The dedicated stats site is easy-to-use, covers search engines and browsers and allows you to download the data to a CSV.

It’s worth noting the accuracy of any analytics data like this needs to be assessed – a package might be popular and therefore accurate in one country, but in another where it has a small user base, the data is simply useless. Comparing two sources is always a good idea.

NetMarketShare Logo

A similar site to StatCounter, NetMarketShare offers data from analytics covering search engines, browsers, ISPs and devices. As well as the data there are blog posts highlighting specific trends.

AT Internet Logo

AT Internet has a dedicated research section drawn from their analytics customers. The focus is on the UK, France, Spain and Germany. Topics include search engines, browsers, connectivity devices, behaviour and a monthly “Search Engine Barometer.”

Econsultancy Logo

Well-known digital marketing site Econsultancy has a relentless blogging schedule, and they often analyse third party stats in their posts – one of the easiest ways to find stats is the tags list on the site.

Search Engine Market Share Screenshot

When I first found Search Engine Market Share, it looked really promising – an easy way to browse stats per country on a Google Maps mash-up. It feels a little abandoned though – the data is from June, and their Twitter account stopped updating in December.

Google Operating System Logo

A crowd-sourced, public Google Docs file shows the market share of Google in multiple countries. Created and overseen by the independent Google OS blog.

Wikipedia Logo

A Wikipedia entry offers a summary of approaches to measuring browser market shares, historical and current data, and useful links.

W3Schools Logo
You can get browser, OS, and screen and color statistics from W3Schools.com, a web development resources portal.

W3Techs Logo

W3Techs Surveys features market share data across operating systems, site technologies, analytics packages and domain names.

Other Sources

There are of course plenty of other sites analysing search engine and browser market shares – including those I mentioned in an earlier article “How to Keep Up To Date in Search".

Saturday, May 28, 2011

New YouTube Statistics: 48 Hours of Video Uploaded Per Minute; 3 Billion Views Per Day

Happy birthday, YouTube! Yes, YouTube is celebrating its sixth birthday this month, and has shared a couple of impressive new statistics: 48 hours of video are now uploaded per minute, and YouTube has surpassed 3 billion views per day.

In November, YouTube challenged users to increase the number of videos uploaded per minute from 35 hours per minute to 48, and they have delivered. One year ago, YouTube reported 24 hours of video uploaded per minute, and 2 billion views per day.



There are plenty of impressive stats out there on YouTube. One of the most interesting ones was revealed back in April, when the YouTube blog reported that 30 percent of videos make up 99 percent of views on the site.

Some more recent stats on YouTube:
  • 13 million: Number of hours of video that were uploaded in 2010.
  • 60 days > 60 years: More video is uploaded in two months than the three major U.S. networks (ABC, CBS, NBC) combined created in six decades.
  • 30 percent: Amount of overall traffic coming from the U.S. YouTube is localized in 25 countries and 43 languages.
  • 700 billion: Number of playbacks in 2010.
  • 10,000: Number of partners, hundreds of which make six figures a year.
  • More than 7,000: Number of hours of full-length movies and shows.
  • 2 billion: Number of global video views per week being monetized.
  • 10 percent: Amount of videos available in HD.
  • 100 years: Amount of video scanned daily by Content ID, which is used by more than 1,000 partners, including every major U.S. network broadcaster, movie studio, and record label.
  • 4 million: Number of people connected and auto-sharing to at least one social network.
  • 100 million: Number of daily mobile views.

And what is the most popular YouTube video of all time? Justin Bieber’s “Baby,” which is the first YouTube video to be viewed a half billion times, while simultaneously holding the distinction of being one of the most disliked videos of all time. ReadWriteWeb has compiled the top 10 YouTube videos of all time.

The video-sharing site, founded in 2005 by Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim, was acquired by Google in October 2006 for $1.65 billion. What are the founders up to? Most recently, their company AVOS acquired Delicious.

And what’s next for YouTube? Apparently, they’re shooting for 72 hours of video per minute and 4 billion views. Could happen. Stay tuned.

Source: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2073962/New-YouTube-Statistics-48-Hours-of-Video-Uploaded-Per-Minute-3-Billion-Views-Per-Day

Friday, May 27, 2011

How To Hire A Great In-House Search Engine Marketer (Or Not)

At search engine marketing conferences, I am often asked for advice on how to hire people for in-house search engine marketing jobs.

Usually over lunch a business owner turns to me and says something like, I came here to learn more about all this search engine stuff and what I learned is that I need to hire somebody to do this, but how do I do that? Or, how did you get your job?

This has happened enough times that I thought it would serve well for me and those looking to hire SEM staff to put my advice in writing!


The Timeless In-House Or Agency Debate

Whether to outsource search marketing to an agency or hire to manage in-house is a debate as old as search engine marketing itself. Opinions on this vary, and I invite you to share yours in the comments, but here is mine.

If your company has a small staff and isn’t looking to increase that and manage a marketing person, then hiring a consultant or an agency may be the way to go. If you are looking to grow the business in terms of staff, or open to it, then consider hiring in-house, as often as search marketing programs mature and become more a core part of a business, there’s increased desire to mitigate risk and costs and move operations in-house.

For many businesses I talk to there’s the issue of not knowing what you don’t know. People know search engine marketing is important, but they aren’t sure what to do in terms of actions to improve it for their business, they don’t even know where to start.

An in-house hire in this case would need to be a fairly knowledgeable and self-motivated person, and one that a company can fully trust with this important area. Expense wise, this starts to cost as much as perhaps a small agency engagement, which might be a better option for businesses that need to increase their internal knowledge of search engine marketing before feeling comfortable about hiring an in-house position.

Have an honest debate with yourself about comfort level – ask yourself these questions:
  • How well do you trust yourself to manage an in-house hire and know what they need to do?
  • Could you learn more by starting off with an agency and pushing them to increase your education level?
  • Do you feel like you eventually will want this role in-house and are willing to put in the time to educate and train in-house?


Where To Look

Unfortunately, geography can still be a factor. If a business is in a big search state like California, Washington, New York or Florida, there are lots of professional search engine marketers around. In states with less search companies, or in smaller cities, businesses will have a tougher time finding in-house talent and may need to go with an agency out of necessity.

If Craigslist is widely used in your locale, that’s a great place to start recruiting. LinkedIn is another popular place for job postings, and often the quality of candidates are high. For specifically search engine marketing, SEMPO, the Search Engine Marketing Professionals Organization, is another great resource for job listings.


SEM Skills

There are plenty of articles on Search Engine Land that focus on hiring the right agency, so for the purposes of this article, I’ll focus on hiring someone in-house. What skills should you look for in an ideal in-house search engine marketing manager?

Strong Excel or Google spreadsheet skills are a must. I don’t know any search engine marketer who doesn’t use a whole lot of Excel when managing search engine marketing. Reports, bulk upload sheets for changes, bid management and more are all Excel driven. Additionally, the reports are only as useful as the person looking at them, so analytical skills are critical. Several successful search engine marketers have backgrounds in economics, physics or other highly data driven, analytical fields.

Many of the other relevant skills for a good search engine marketer apply to all marketing jobs. Being organized, able to juggle multiple projects or tasks, the ability to prioritize well and being a good writer are all important factors. Particularly for working with other teams on SEO projects, like engineering, working well on cross-functional projects and being a clear communicator and educator are important skills.


Experience

In an ideal world, the experience of a new in-house hire would map exactly to what the business needs. If the company is in e-commerce and sells lots of physical products, then a search engine marketer with experience doing that in-house would be ideal, as opposed to say a marketer with agency experience working with companies with online subscription services.

It’s not that any search marketing experience isn’t valuable or transferrable, but that more germane levels of experience can apply depending on the type of business and its ultimate search engine marketing goals. Finding a search engine marketer who has had success managing paid search or carrying out in-house SEO for the same goals and general type of business will be the best bet.

In the end, like in hiring for so many roles, getting a really smart person who is motivated to learn and develop their skills is better than getting someone with more experience but less natural ability. Search engine marketing isn’t magical, and there are plenty of articles, training resources, conferences and advice out there for less experienced search engine marketers to leverage. Smarts and drive you can’t teach.

Thursday, May 26, 2011

10 Ways For Entrepreneurs To Build Brands Online

Everybody needs to get their name out there on the social web. For entrepreneurs, however, it’s an even more critical aspect of the job. A social presence gives you the credibility to attract clients, partners and investors by making yourself available and demonstrating your personality and experience.

Building your online brand in a meaningful way is no easy task, and there are many tools available to get you on the right path. Below, we’ve picked 10 tested methods and highlighted some of the best web tools to help your brand gain momentum in a crowded online marketplace.


1. Media Requests



Being quoted in news articles is an excellent way to demonstrate your authority. It’s a free way to promote yourself and demonstrate thought leadership. There are a few excellent tools out there that connect reporters with people looking to get quoted.
  • HARO is an email digest that connects reporters and sources.
  • NewsBasis allows you to pitch stories to journalists.
  • FlackList is a Rolodex to help the media meet and maintain relationships with experts.
  • Media Kitty is a network that connects journalists with sources.


2. Custom Short URL






Having your own custom URL shortener is a great way to get your name out there. If you often share links on Twitter, Facebook and other social networks, it’s very useful. Eric Ries is a prime example. When he distributes a link, he uses his own shortened URL: ericri.es.
Here’s an informative tutorial on how to set up your own shortened URL.


3. Q&A


Sharing your knowledge on Q&A sites is a superb way to build credibility around your name. There are quite a few sites to choose from, so start with the one that has the most buzz around it at the moment: Quora. Robert Scoble has demonstrated the value the site can provide. Having answered more than 500 questions, he’s built a following of more than 22,000 people.


4. Profiles


Be present and active on social networks. It’s crucial to set up your profiles and use the sites to your professional advantage.
Below are some of the top site to establish your presence:
  • About.me: Personal landing page
  • Facebook Page: A valuable way to stay connected with your fans
  • LinkedIn: A business network with full resumes
  • Google Profiles: An important tool for ranking high in search results
  • Twitter: A means to engage and spread your influence through conversation
  • Disqus: Share your knowledge through comments


5. Meetups


Participating in meetups is another excellent way to network and build clout. There a few good tools for finding interesting events in your area. Here are two to get started with:
  • Meetup: Join groups of people that interest you then meet in person.
  • Plancast: You can see which events your friends are attending.


6. Social Email Signatures






Turn your email signature into a social and informative experience. When exchanging emails, everyone in your network will easily be able to find out more about you.

Wisestamp is a popular signature plugin that allows you to create sleek signatures with social icons, RSS feeds and more.


7. Guest Posting


Search for blogs in your area of expertise and pitch them specific ideas for posts. Each blog has its own style and focus, so make sure to tailor your pitches to each outlet. Be ready to share writing samples if asked, and be open to working with editors to revise your post as necessary. Alltop and Technorati are good places to start looking for tops blogs within your area of expertise.


8. Virtual Business Cards


Create a virtual business card so that it’s easy for people to find you and share your information with others. There are many ways to go about this:
  • MiniCard: Buy a domain name and set up a business card-like site.
  • QR Code: Have people scan your unique QR code instead of handing out text-filled cards.
  • Twtbizcard: This site lets you transform your Twitter profile into a business card.
  • Bump: This is an app that allows you to bump phones together to connect with people.


9. Newsletter






Sending out a monthly newsletter will allow you to build up a vast network. If you share valuable content with subscribers, they will then share it with their friends — bringing you a new subscribers and fans. If you do a good job, your list will continue to grow.
Some of the more popular newsletter services include:
  • Mailchimp: A newsletter platform that is free up to 2,000 subscribers
  • Tiny Letter: A simple platform for creating and distributing a newsletter
  • Aweber: Users rave about this paid service, which comes with many options for building out your newsletter
As an example, Kevin Rose, co-founder of Digg, shares interviews, products and knowledge through his Tiny Letter newsletter, Foundation. At $3.99 per month, it’s a bargain for readers who value his content.


10. Eat with Influencers


The opportunity to grab a meal with other potentially influential people is within your grasp. These days, it’s easy to set up networking meals through online tools like Let’s Lunch or GrubWithUs.

Monday, May 23, 2011

10 Creative Social Media Resumes To Learn From

Like flowers in early spring, new social media job openings are sprouting across industries as companies of all sizes look to create or expand their social squads.

The undeniable success and innovation of high-profile social media campaigns — from such brands as Old Spice, Google Chrome and Starbucks — have inspired this ongoing push for companies to hire people with social media skills.

If you’re seeking a gig as a community manager, public relations representative, marketing person or any other social media position, check out these resumes for inspiration on how to stand out from the crowd. Also, let us know in the comments about any creative tactics you use to promote yourself and your skills.

Source: http://mashable.com/2011/05/20/social-media-resumes/

Friday, May 20, 2011

Link Building For Life: Determining Lifetime Link Value

The ideal goal for some SEOs is to minimize maintenance and effort for a given website. Get to number one for all desirable keywords, sit back, and then move on to the next website while the previous domain rakes in the cash. This dream scenario is unfortunately rarely the case, because there are other competitors that make number one an increasing difficult mark to hit – and, also, most notably – the link graph has a rapid rate of attrition.

Losing Value – Losing Links

Every website succumbs to the reductionist nature of the web. Although the number of pages increase, the link graph also has a way of deteriorating – meaning that many of the initial links you receive could end up declining in value or otherwise, outright disappearing.

Your backlink profile, if ignored, will shrink considerably, and that number one ranking – or any ranking at all – could be lost. If that ranking’s future value is taken care of like a child and nurtured into adulthood, it’s even possible you can let it off into the real world – without needing but a phone call or two to maintain the same connection.

What you need to do to maintain your link graph – and/or insure its links appreciate in value – is be rigorous in the evaluation of the domain you’re attempting to get a link from. There is much, much more to the value of a link than the present value of the page. SEO is a long term game, so it only makes sense to future-proof your links.

Doing so can make one link, of seeming equal value to another link now, worth 2x as much in terms of lifetime link value (LLV).

Like the much referenced business methodology customer lifetime value (CLV), lifetime link value is a process – and an ideology – that can separate a highly profitable SEO campaign from one that barely covers your bills for McDonalds.

Determining Lifetime Link Value

Although I don’t suggest you plug approximate values in an equation to determine the LLV of any given link, keeping it in mind as a strong delimiter in determining link value is something every SEO should do.
A link with the a high lifetime link value has the following characteristics:
  • It will exist on the page as long as the page exists. That is, it is not a “rented” link or a link that faces temporary restrictions, like a listing as a speaker on the frontpage of a major conference website, or as a sponsor of an upcoming, yearly event.
  • Its positioning/stance in the current site architecture makes it unlikely it will ever “fall off” the link graph. Many websites, namely blogs, have a temporal state that poorly aligns with site architecture, meaning that your link will eventually be more than 10 clicks from the homepage. When this happens, and no other external links have been obtained, it is a near certainty that it will eventually be worth but a sliver of value, or completely fall off the link graph.
  • It exists on a domain with an upward backlink growth trend. If a webmaster is still actively promoting his or her website, it is a near certainty that link growth continues to trend upward. On the opposite side, if a website is trending downward, it is probable that the webmaster cares less, the topic isn’t as important, and overall, future link value will decline.
  • It is not off topic on the domain in question. Manipulative, off-topic links trigger disdain in the users that observe them. Even if historical trends show an upward climb, if your link is off topic and prominent, now, that’s a good sign that the future value of the link will trend downward.

Breaking Down Link Characteristics

Many SEOs don’t apply their own on-page evaluations to off-site link evaluation. This happens because we get lazy, because links are hard to get, and because we rarely put in deep consideration for domains that aren’t our own.

This lack of deep consideration – or even, deeper than standard consideration – can handicap some teams into getting links that aren’t worth much, that won’t continue to move the needle, and will cause long term costs to be much higher than they have to be.

Temporal Link Factors

How do you know if a link will be removed by a webmaster or other omnipotent party? If you acquired the link manipulatively, there’s a pretty good chance they are likely to do that at whim – especially if you use the popular “link renting” practice that will obliterate LLV. If you sponsor an event that’s yearly or have a link placed on content that doesn’t have perpetual value, you may face the same fate.

Perpetual value is the same concept that pervades with “evergreen content”. Evergreen content won’t succumb to temporal factors that will make the webmaster update them and potentially remove your link. A static page on the best plugins for Chrome is way more likely to have a receding LLV as opposed to a link on a page about “How to Tie Your Shoes” – as I think we’ll be tying them the same way for a long time to come, and those Chrome plugins, and Chrome in general, are way more likely to become extinct.

Site Architecture Of The Hosted Link

Many blogs are poorly constructed. They have posts that fall off the link graph and then just as quickly fall off our lives. They do a bad job of internal linking, there are no pages that serve as homepage-hosted HTML sitemaps – and as such, the best link in the world from the strongest domain can just as quickly become one that disappears if no external domains link to it.

So, in blogs, look for those same things you profess with your own blog. First, archiving and/or tags in the sidebar. The best blogs in the world probably won’t have these, but everyone else (the links you’re probably getting most of the time), should.



Many “big” blogs, such as TechCrunch or The New York Times, can’t possibly do this due to the less-than-amazing look this setup provides, the sheer volume of content they create, and also, because maximizing ad-space is a must. They make up for it through strong internal linking practices in their individual posts. But for those casual bloggers and other micro-sites with less-than-adept webmasters, you’re likely spending a lot of time getting a link from a blog with a terrible LLV.

Similarly, increasingly popular Tumblr is horrendous for SEO purposes, because there is no way to archive anything, and internal linking is terrible. It can offer some real traffic which can turn into other links, but for the pure power of a link, you’re better off twiddling around Blogger.

As it comes to getting posts on blogs (or any site), you should strive for a link that will always be two clicks from the homepage. Any more and you run the risk of losing the power of the link if the domain drops in value, your post is pushed back, or nobody else links to the post.

Historical Backlink Growth Trends

If we’re trying to determine where a potential linking domain is going and has gone, there’s no better option than Majestic SEO’s Backlink History tool.

There are several options to select with this tool to help determine the velocity of link growth for your domain. It’s not perfect, but with a keen eye, it points out clear situations where a domain has hit a wall or is declining, as opposed to a domain that’s growing exponentially.


If we look at Empire Promos and Amsterdam Printing*, two competitors in the promotional items space, we can see an example of this in action. Although both domains have positive growth trends going forward and aggregate domain strength, they aren’t equal domains in terms of probable LLV. The current map shows that it’s likely that Amsterdam will outgain Empire in the future – even if the current value, at least as this graph is concerned, is comparable for both.

Off Topic Link Placement

Manipulative, off-topic links are a sure sign of a domain that will begin to recede in the future. Even if the webmaster isn’t aware of it, the presence of these will mark the future steep decline of the domain – because they greatly impair user experience.

Understand that they will very frequently mark the beginning of the end for the website you’re placing them on. Your time would be better off obtaining on-topic links on evergreen pages – with the site architecture and backlink growth trends that offer a Lifetime Link Value that would make any economist drool.

Source: http://searchengineland.com/link-building-for-life-determining-lifetime-link-value-77030

Thursday, May 19, 2011

SEO & Website Redesign: Relaunching Without Losing Sleep

Redesigns can make an ugly site pretty, but they can also make a high traffic site invisible. Keep these tips and no-nos in mind and you can keep yourself out of the CEO’s office.

SEO Redesign: Teamwork First


It should go without saying, but SEOs, developers and designers must work together cohesively during the site redesign process.

Too often, companies look to refresh the look of their site, and in the end, destroy their search engine presence. How? This can come from a myriad of reasons from coding errors, SEO unfriendly design practices, to even more disastrous practices (e.g., content duplication, URL rewriting without redirection, information architecture changes away from search engine friendly techniques).

Starting the redesign process with a collaborative call between the SEO team, designer, developer, and company decision maker(s) is always the best first step.

Often there are two attitudes present. Either, “We are redesigning our site and are not open to your ideas…but don’t let us do anything wrong,” or the other attitude (and my favorite), “Let’s work together to achieve a refreshed look and functionality and instill any missing SEO opportunities if possible.”

To satisfy both scenarios, your information delivery as the SEO should be to inform designers and developers of the mistakes you shouldn’t make and also to announce to all parties what SEO revisions should be made to the site along with what search engines have recently been paying attention to.

Page Load Time

A site redesign gives you the opportunity to re-code, condense externally referenced files, and achieve faster load times.

Don’t let the designer use the word “Flash” during your call(s). In an attempt to make a new site look pretty, the reliance on multimedia usage can have a negative effect on site speed. Ignoring this is bad, as Google has stated in the last year that site speed is a ranking consideration – also, slower sites annoy users.

Content Duplication


Ensure that your development environment or beta sections of the site are excluded from search engine’s view. Relaunching your site when these elements have been indexed by the engines means your cool new site is a duplicate and you will be in a mad dash trying to redirect the development environment that was leaked. Also, make sure there are no live copies on other servers that have visibility with the search engines.

Another form of content duplication is the creation of new URLs without properly redirecting old URLs via a 301 permanent redirect. This will leave search engines wondering which page should be ranked.

It's also worth mentioning that 301s are a must and that 302 temporary redirects should not be used. Make it commonplace in the redesign process that no one used the word delete in reference to site content. You should never delete any pages, these should be permanently redirected to the most relevant launching page.

Content Restrictions

It’s important before you throw the site to the web that you make sure that you have identified what pages shouldn't be crawled.

Are there new parts of the site that shouldn’t be seen by search engines, login pages, etc.? Does the new site utilize dynamic URL creation or parameters that will need to be restricted?

Inversely, what pages might be restricted that shouldn’t be? Is there a folder in the robots.txt file that is inaccurately excluding pages that should be visible? Have meta robots tags been placed on pages that shouldn’t have been tags?

Tracking


Make sure that your analytical tracking code is placed back in the page source before the site goes live. Additionally, any conversion pages should have the appropriate conversion tracking code appended. Nothing makes an SEO want to cry like lost data.

Information Architecture


A redesign is the perfect time to rethink the direction of the site. Go beyond the need for a refreshed look and analyze the hierarchy of your content. Google is looking at this so be sure there is a clear view of the overall site theme as well as sub-themes flowing into the site through an appropriate folder structure.

URL Rewrite


If you're redesigning and shaking a site down to its core, there's no better time than now. You have the attention and devotion of the site developer to make your URLs right.

This is a continuation of the Information Architecture revisions. Be mindful of folder structure as well as relevant, keyword-rich text usage in page names.

Want to go the extra mile? Have the filename extensions removed so down the road if you redesign the site again and use a different script language you won’t have to do another URL rewrite.

Lastly, make sure all rewritten URLs include a 301 permanent redirect from the old URL to the new URL.

W3C/Section 508/Code Validation


Take advantage of this period to address code issues and how your site adheres to W3C and Section 508 compliance factors. Search engines want to see your excellence here and now is your chance to make their visit successful as well as your human site visitors.

Usability


Can you make the intended funnel of visit shorter or easier? This is great time for you think about what you want visitors to do. You may be able to remove a step in the purchase/goal funnel and increase your site’s convertibility.

Benchmarking


To truly assess the success of the redesign from an SEO and sales standpoint, ensure that you have recorded several site statistics as well as focused monitoring in post-launch. You will be happy you did because it will either be a visible success story or a lifesaver for finding problems once the site launches.
These include:
  • Run a ranking report.
  • Check your pages indexed in Google and Bing.
  • Run a page load time test.
  • Perform a W3C code validation report.
  • Note the bounce rate, time on site, pages per visits, and goal completions. Granted, this can be reviewed in analytics after launch, but be mindful that you should be watching this.
  • Run a site spider crawl of the live site to get a good list of URLs on the current site. You may need this for any clean of missed redirects.
  • Note the average time for Google to download a page and average pages crawled per visit in Google Webmaster tools. Also, “fetch as Googlebot” so you have a previous copy of what Google used to see.
Conclusion


Taking into account all of the mistakes you or the others on the redesign team shouldn’t be making will ultimately leave you much less stressed after the site launches. Meanwhile, minding all the opportunities that a redesign presents from an SEO and usability standpoint can lead to a successful launch and a fruitful post-launch environment.

Now get out there and show them how it’s done!

Source: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2070968/SEO-Website-Redesign-Relaunching-Without-Losing-Sleep

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

8 Steps to Optimize Your Blog Post

If you’re writing and publishing blog posts, but not putting in the few extra steps to optimize and align them with an overall keyword strategy, then you’re not leveraging the full potential of that content and you’re not making your website pages visible and highlighted for the search engines.

Blog Optimizing: Back to the Basics


SEO Back to Basics

Content is a form of online currency that is crucial to any business' online marketing. With consumers relying on search engines for product research and reviews, content is key for ranking among those search results because search engines largely determine the quality and relevancy of the Internet’s countless web pages by looking at the text on those pages.

Just having content, even great content, on your company's website isn't enough to grab the attention of search engines. Businesses must leverage this content using search engine optimization (SEO) tactics. Maintaining a corporate blog is a good SEO tactic that allows for rapid content creation without the constraints of website architecture and web development teams.

Here’s how you can optimize your blog post in eight steps.

1. Find a Compelling Subject


One method for differentiating your content from all the other writing available across the web is to offer a fresh perspective and a unique angle on a given subject matter. If you haven’t spent time working through this step, don’t bother with the rest of the optimization process.

2. Conduct Keyword Research


This step is the perfect litmus test for determining whether your blog post topic is aligned with what people are looking for. When developing your focused keyword list around the blog post topic, make sure to do a sanity check and confirm that consumers are actually using these keywords to search for your product/service.
Save yourself time in the long run and filter out visitors who are unlikely to buy your product by ensuring your keywords align with the purchasing intent of your target audience.

3. Select Keywords


In order to rank high for a given keyword phrase, it’s important that you only designate up to two to three keywords per website page. Limit your blog post to one primary keyword, as well as two or three variations of that keyword (e.g. optimize blog post, optimize blog, blog post optimize, blog optimize).

4. Track Keyword Ranking Trends


Make sure your focus keyword is worth optimizing for. If there are only 10 searches for a given keyword per month, it might not be worth your while.

Look at how your target keyword phrase is trending, in terms of global monthly searches, how competitive the search term is, and whether any of your competitors or one of your pages are already ranking for it.

5. Optimize the Page


Page optimization is crucial for boosting the visibility of your blog post for the search engines. After you create the content, insert your keyword phrase throughout the blog post in specific locations where the search engines will be looking for information about your page (i.e. URL, title tag, H1, H2, emphasized text in the body of the post, alt tags on images).

From here on out, every time you mention this specific keyword phrase on your website, use an internal link to its corresponding blog page. There are also available SEO plugins for certain blog platforms, like WordPress’ popular  “All in One SEO Pack,” to help you control these SEO elements.

6. Syndicate via Social Channels


Syndicate your blog post externally by sharing it across your social networks like Twitter and Facebook. Additionally, post comments with your blog post link on relevant, external articles to attract clicks through to your site.

Make sure to use the blog post’s target keywords in your syndication via tweets and Facebook status updates. Help your audience share your content as quickly and easily as possible by including social sharing buttons on your blog post pages like the tweet, Facebook Like, LinkedIn Share, and AddThis buttons.
Consider adding Facebook's new comments plugin to drive engagement and sharing. Also, make your content available via RSS feed, so subscribers can regularly view your latest content on their news reader of choice.

7. Find Top Links


Inbound links are essential for boosting the search engine rank of a website page. A handful of relevant links will help you better rank. Use a link suggestion tool to help identify and track high-quality, relevant websites that you can reach out to with your blog post and request a link back to your page.

8. Track Keyword Performance


Monitor your blog post on a regular basis, in terms of rank, visits, and leads from its given keyword phrase over time. By checking back on your progress, you can understand what about your content is resonating with your audience and what to improve upon. Evaluate what worked and what didn’t, then repeat the successful tactics with your next piece of content.

Summary


SEO is a gradual process, but by just setting aside an hour a week, you can make a lot of progress over time.
While many view paid search as a quick and easy way to drive traffic without a large time investment, once you switch it off, you lose that traffic. SEO, on the other hand, when done well, can have a long-lasting, sustainable impact for your website.

Source: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2071301/8-Steps-to-Optimize-Your-Blog-Post

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

How To Use Effective Navigation Labels for Search Engine Optimization

One of the key components of a website’s information architecture (IA) and corresponding navigation is an effective labeling system. Of course, as search engine optimizers, we understand that a website’s labeling system should contain keywords.

However, there seems to be confusion among search engine optimization (SEO) professionals, information architects, web designers/developers, and usability professionals about what constitutes an effective system.
Here’s an example: if I asked these aforementioned groups to write down their interpretation of the phrase navigation labels, I would probably get a wide variety of answers.

Most people assume that a navigation label is the text that is placed on a navigation button (formatted either in CSS or as a graphic image). While navigation button text certainly is a navigation label, other web page elements are also navigation labels, such as:
  • Titles
  • Headings and subheadings
  • Breadcrumbs
  • Embedded text links (in content)
  • URLs (web addresses)
When navigation labels contain keywords and are used consistently throughout a website, they effectively communicate aboutness of both page and site content, as well as provide a clear information scent to content that is not available on the web page. Navigation labels also appear in search listings on search engine results pages (SERPs), particularly title-tag text and URLs.

However, when I asked a client last week, “What are the naming conventions of your website’s URL structure?” he could not answer me.

When he went to his tech team and asked them the same question, he was met with blank expressions. When I asked the same question to a different client in a completely different industry, his answer was an oversimplified, “We put keywords in our URLs.”

Which brings me to this month’s article topic. Navigation labels are important to both web searchers and the commercial web search engines. How effective are your website’s URL labels? Here are some important points to consider.

Consistent Labels & Duplicate Content Management


One of the many duties SEO professionals have is managing duplicate content delivery to the commercial web search engines: identifying it, canonicalizing (when necessary), and excluding it from search engine indexing.

On smaller websites, URL naming conventions are pretty straightforward. If a web page contains content that is about the company? Then the URL can be:

http://www.domain.com/about.html


If the website contains a news section with press releases, then the URL can be:
  • http://www.domain.com/press-releases.html (category page)
  • http://www.domain.com/press-releases/2011/XYZ-announces-new-website.html (press release issued in 2011)
Sounds simple enough. Web searchers can understand the aforementioned URLs. The aboutness is clear. The URL about.html leads to the About Us section or page on the domain.com. And the URL press-releases.html leads to a web page that contains a list of press releases. The third URL communicates that in 2011, Company XYZ has announced a new website. In terms of information architecture, grouping news by topic and by date is normal.

However, URL naming conventions often are ignored or are based on the perceived logic of the boss’ son or a developer who is only trying to make his/her job easier. URL naming conventions should at lease be partially based on how people locate, discover, and label desired content.

I understand that many website owners are at the mercy of content management systems (CMSs) that do not allow for consistent and customized labeling. I understand that tech-team members typically do not have information architecture skills and are resistant to outside help. I understand that determining URL naming conventions often takes time due to considerable research and testing.

However, I have seen the results of ineffective URL naming conventions time and again. The workarounds cost far more in time and expense.

For example, we are dealing with a client whose use of capitalization in URLs has no consistency. Due to the lack of consistency, the .htaccess file is horrendously long, and the amount of time it takes us to manage the URLs that deliver duplicate content in the search engines’ webmasters tools is also considerable. For those of you who manage URL structures on a website, you know that it is very easy to overlook a single character, making troubleshooting another time-consuming and wasteful task.

The lack of consistency is so bad that we told our client to have us come up with a new information architecture and URL naming convention because it would be far less expensive for them to maintain in the long run. Plus it would help them with search engine visibility and conversions.

Exact Hierarchies


Part of an effective information architecture is a taxonomy, which is a hierarchical (vertical) classification. All websites should have a primary taxonomy. However, it is not necessary for a URL to express an exact taxonomy. Here’s an example.

On a travel website, it is common to have a taxonomy based on location and neighborhood. Look at this URL:
  • http://www.domain.com/vacation-rentals/usa/states/new-york/cities/new-york-city/neighborhoods/chelsea/chelsea-apartment-1525474.html
From a user standpoint, even though this URL reflects a straightforward taxonomy, the URL is difficult to type (132 characters) and difficult to remember. An easier URL for users/searchers might be:
  • http://www.domain.com/vacation-rentals/ny/chelsea-1525474.html

I am certainly not saying that this should be the definitive URL structure for this type of website. All information architecture projects require keyword research and user testing. I just wanted to point out that URL names do not have to be long and unwieldly in order for both searchers and search engines to comprehend them.

If SEO professionals, information architects, and others determine naming conventions before a site is build or redesigned, it can make duplicate content delivery more manageable.

Key Takeaways

  • Navigation labels are not only the words placed on navigation buttons. Navigation labels are also titles, headings & subheadings, embedded text links, and URLs.
  • Whenever possible, URLs should contain keywords that make sense to both searchers and search engines.
  • Consistency is extremely important for aboutness, information scent, and search engine visibility. Consistency also makes it easier to manage duplicate content delivery.
  • Don’t purchase a CMS that does not allow you to customize your URLs. Workarounds can be difficult to manage.
  • Hire an information architect to assist you with labeling systems. Their experience with research and testing is far more objective than than your tech team…and your boss’ teenage son.

Monday, May 16, 2011

5 Great Ways to Get More from Google News RSS Feeds

Google News has become a coveted resource for news websites, from major networks to tiny blogs, and it isn’t hard to see why. Information passes at the speed of light, and Google has managed to dominate from all sides of the field. Not only do they provide news and entertainment in one place, but they also have endless RSS feeds. Google let’s you select and personalize your RSS feeds to the point that you’re only getting the updates you want at all times.

In case using Google News itself wasn’t enough, I’ve listed five ways to help you get even more from your RSS feeds.

Google News RSS


1. Personalize Your Feed

You can easily customize your content to the point of complete preferential options. You start by simply selecting your location and language preferences at the bottom of the main page, but you can build it up further from there. The main RSS feed for Google News will use the selected language and location to provide you with regularly updated stories from your surrounding area. This is a quick and easy way to keep in touch with what’s happening through all local news sources.


2. Subscribe by Category

If need to extend your range beyond your local sources, you can also navigate by category. For example, if you’re interested in a specific topic, like health or technology, you can go to the “About Feeds” area on Google News’ main page to get a rundown of what’s offered. By selecting the categories you’re interested in, you can subscribe to their feed allowing you greater access to relevant sources. Since Google regularly features articles from many fantastic sources, you’ll surely see all major ones available for any genre.

About Feeds


3. Utilize the Google News Search Bar

As always, you can search for feeds using the standard link for general topics. Start by entering the term and then use the RSS URL to subscribe in the usual fashion. So what does an URL search actually look like? Let’s say you’re conducting a search for “cancer research.” If your location was based in the US, it would look like this:

http://news.google.com/news?pz=1&cf=all&ned=us&hl=en&q=cancerresearch&cf=all&output=rss

Here’s a deconstruction of the above link so we can understand it:
  • “ned=us” is the location (United States)
  • “hl=en” is the language (English)
  • “q=cancerresearch” is the topic (cancer research)


4. Manually Change Your Searches

By knowing what the general coding stands for, you can manually change your search in your RSS. For example, if you wanted to switch to local searches in France in French, you would type “ned=fr” and “hl=fr” to change it. You can also use this method to modify the topic. If you want to conduct a more general search, using the example above, you could enter “health” after “q=”, or anything else depending on the direction you want to take your search. This is a quick and easy way to alter your search.


5. Try Google Reader

Google’s latest brainchild, Google Reader, offers ways to organize your RSS feeds, email, blogs and people. While it’s a little basic at the moment, it’ll surely evolve well beyond what the current demo version offers. It’s an interesting idea and easy to use. It connects you with just about anything, from news to email and from people to documents, all via your Google account. It’s a simple way to see all of your feeds easily.

The only downside I see to personalizing your Google News Feed is that you can sometimes subscribe to too many RSS feeds. I have done this myself, and my entire Firefox top bar is covered with folder after folder of subscribed sites. They don’t fit so I have to open a drop down menu to see them all. I’ve even renamed most of them to single letter folders to save space and to allow even more. Of course, not all of these are news feeds, some are blog and website updates from some of my favorite time wasters on the web.

Nevertheless, this one possible drawback is overshadowed by how useful all of this is in staying informed. So whether you want local or world news, general current events or personalized updates – it’s easy to get the most out of your Google News RSS subscriptions by customizing your content and knowing what to look for.

Source: http://www.searchenginejournal.com/five-great-ways-to-get-more-from-google-news-rss-feeds/29647/

Saturday, May 14, 2011

Advanced SEO for E-Commerce Sites - A Presentation

How to Make Money on YouTube

In the past year, presidential parodies and clever online-only ads became viral sensations; "annoying" but lovable fruits and unassuming Alabamans transformed uncomfortable situations into triumphant social memes; and talented partners have drawn huge audiences with channels that showed people how to crochet flowers, apply the perfect lipstick -- and sometimes just how to have fun.

YouTube currently has more than 15,000 partners worldwide -- many of whom are making enough money doing what they love to buy a new house, or even make a career out of their videos. In fact, the number of partners making over $1,000 a month is up 300 percent since the beginning of 2010 and YouTube now has hundreds of partners making six figures a year. (See last month's column on how to become a YouTube partner.)

One of the partners making six figures a year is Michael Buckley, writer, producer, and star of entertainment news show "What the Buck?" For Buckley's backstory, read "YouTube Videos Pull In Real Money" by Brian Stelter, which appeared Dec. 10, 2008, in The New York Times.

One of his recent videos is "OMG! LADY GAGA KILLED OSAMA?!!!! - A "Superstar" Dance For Our Troops! :-)."




Two years ago, YouTube asked Buckley to share the secrets to his success. He created the video below that covers topics ranging from how to get more views on YouTube to how to make money on YouTube.





Another way of making money on YouTube is product placement. For example, Michelle Phan, a makeup teacher and also a spokesperson for Lancome, created the "Lady GaGa Poker Face Tutorial" video. It shows young women how to replicate the pop singer-songwriter's entire look, hair, accessories and makeup -- and as of this writing has more than 27.3 million views!





If you watch the video, you'll see that the blonde wig and gloves are from BeautyChoice.com. At SES New York 2010, I asked Jordan Blum, President of BeautyChoice.com, to provide more details about what he called "product placement on steroids."




Another way of making money on YouTube is to sit on a horse backwards pitching shower gel. Look at your ad, now back to "Old Spice | The Man Your Man Could Smell Like," now back at your ad, now back to the ad created by Wieden+Kennedy.




At Connected Marketing Week 2010 in San Francisco, Byron Gordon of SEO-PR interviewed Dean McBeth of Wieden+Kennedy about the success of their Old Spice "The man your man can smell like" YouTube advertising campaign.




You can also use YouTube's Promoted Videos to generate leads and make your cash register ring. I'll be discussing this topic on Tuesday, May 10, at the Direct Marketing Association of Northern California's luncheon in Burlingame, Calif.

One of the marketing case studies that I'll be presenting examines how Dynomighty Design uses YouTube to generate 50 percent of the traffic to its website. And the small business does this by using videos like its recent "Subway Map Mighty Wallet."




At SES New York 2010, I interviewed Dynomighty Design President and Designer Terrence Kelleman, who told me more details about the small company's success using YouTube as a social media platform to sell Dynomighty products.




At the DMAnc luncheon, I'll also explain how Orabrush sold $1 million worth of $5 tongue brushes using YouTube. If you want to watch a funny version of the company's success story, watch the recent video "Orabrush the Movie--Official Trailer."

At SES New York 2011, I interviewed Jeffrey Harmon, the CMO of Orabrush, and Abe Niederhauser, the company's Online Sales Director, about how to build your brand using video.




There are a ton of video marketing tips in these five YouTube success stories. You will want to go back and watch each video that you haven't already viewed. In case you skipped over a couple, here is an outline of four of the more important video marketing tips:
  • Optimize your video for YouTube
  • Create compelling video content
  • Engage the YouTube community
  • Measure outcomes vs. outputs
Next month, I'll provide a preview of my presentation at the Next Gen YouTube Marketing session at SES Toronto 2011. Although it will be tailored to Canadian marketers, my presentation should also contain some new YouTube marketing strategies and tactics that American, British and other marketers may want to know about, too.

Source: http://searchenginewatch.com/3642302

Friday, May 13, 2011

6 Ways to Socialize Your SEO & Content Strategy

If you think about it, the convergence of search and social media is a natural and logical process: not only can social data be used to personalize search results, but social activity (such as Facebook Likes and Twitter tweets) provide crowdsourced indicators of what content is popular with actual users. It's no wonder, then, that a lot has happened in the last year or so to "socialize" search engine result pages (SERPs).

For starters, in addition to including social content from Twitter, Flickr, and other sites into its SERPs, Google recently launched Google +1, allowing users to vote for pages and search results. Also, earlier this year Bing expanded its deal with Facebook, allowing it to both personalize search results and use Facebook Likes to gauge the authority of pages.

So what does this mean for your search engine optimization (SEO) strategy? Well, it means that you should be looking at new ways of using social media to boost your rankings.

Traditional onsite SEO and backlinks are still fundamental. But if you really want to get competitive with your SEO strategy, you need to send search engines the right "social signals" that your site and pages deserve to rank well.

1. Getting Tweeted to Rank


One aspect of your backlink profile that search engines monitor is age. While old backlinks carried tenure, new backlinks demonstrate that your site/page continues to be popular.

Well, tweets serve a similar function by sending "social signals" that a site/page is currently popular. Both Google and Bing have confirmed that social signals impact rankings.

So part of a social SEO strategy should be a Twitter-outreach campaign to get your content tweeted and retweeted. And, ideally, those Tweets should contain the keywords that you're trying to rank for.

2. Socializing Your Content Strategy


Granted, it can be challenging (or impossible) to get your product pages tweeted at a significant volume (unless they end up the butt of a trending meme). So you will need to modify your content strategy by producing content:
  • That has the potential to go viral, at least within niche communities relevant to you industry. Go beyond the run-of-the-mill press release or "look at us" blog post and produce content that your target market will find helpful or entertaining -- the kind of stuff that users will be likely to share via Twitter (and other channels).
  • Around or related to the keyword themes you're trying to rank on. The reason you want to do this is because you want Tweets and Retweets to include those keywords.
For example, it's great to have a blog post about the 10 fastest cars in the world go viral on Twitter. But the tweets that result from it would be more valuable if you sell auto parts/accessories than if you sell evening wear.

3. Influence Through Influencers


Having your content tweetable content is just the first step. You will also want to get tweeted by "influencers" because these are the users who are most likely to get retweeted.

When both Google and Bing confirmed that tweets count toward rankings, they both also indicated that they look at the social authority of the user's Twitter account. Getting tweeted by a user with a lot of followers (and many more than people they follow back) carries considerably more weight than being Tweeted by a handful or slew of "Joe Blows."

Furthermore, influencers are more likely to get retweeted, which means they can offer you more tweets for your buck. So you should look at ways to reach influencers and build relationships with them.

This way, when you do produce (keyword sensitive) "social content," you'll be that much more likely to have that content picked up by an influencer and (potentially) widely Retweeted.

As one example, a few months ago, when Smashing Magazine tweeted about SEOmoz's "Beginner's Guide to SEO" (resulting in countless retweets), SEOmoz began to rank on the first page for just "Beginner's Guide." This is because they had a page optimized for "Beginner's Guide" that got tweeted by an influencer whose Tweet contained the keywords "Beginner's Guide" and got widely retweeted.

4. Be Likeable
Bing Facebook Search Results

Through Bing's exclusive deal with Facebook, Bing can factor Likes into its ranking algorithm, and personalize search results according to whether a user's Facebook friends have Liked something.

This gives Bing a bit of a social edge over Google because Google doesn't have direct access to Facebook data. But Google does factor Facebook Likes and shares into its SERPs, and SEOmoz speculates that shares carry more weight than Likes.

Google is also working to catch up to Bing with the Google +1 button. Through Google's +1 feature, users are able to "vote up" content or search results in a fashion that's similar to Facebook's Like button.
These +1s, moreover, will soon be used to personalize search results based on whether any of your Google contacts have "recommended" a page or site via +1. Granted, it's too early to be sure how heavily +1 will factor into rankings, but Google's intention to crowd-source relevance and personalization is clear and present.

So a big part of socializing your rankings is by being "likeable." This should start with your social content strategy, but it will also involve having awesome products. After all, it's those products that you want to show up in the SERPs.

This is where user-experience and A/B testing will come in. First, you'll want make sure that there are Like/Tweet/+1 buttons on all your pages. But you'll want to play around with different layouts to determine what placements result in the most Tweets/Likes/+1s.

5. Diversify the Communities You Target


While going after the major "social signals" (Facebook, Twitter and possibly +1) is a no-brainer, you should also take your social SEO strategy beyond the fishbowl. Specifically, there are a number of social content communities that also offer a significant opportunity to get valuable backlinks and drive traffic (that may also result in additional tweets/Likes/+1s).

Diversifying your traffic sources is important in SEO. Your SEO strategy should aim to get links and traffic from as many sources as possible. Reddit, StumbleUpon, and Digg all represent significant opportunities for to get both.

This is where your social content strategy becomes even more important. Specifically, when targeting these communities, you'll have to reconcile your brand's messaging with the culture of these communities.
This means producing branded content that:
  • Is interesting, engaging, and entertaining -- or any two out of these three.
  • Has nothing to do with the products/services you sell.
  • Is still somehow on topic in terms of the keywords you're trying to rank for.
One company that does this well is Rackspace with the infographics they produce. But you can also achieve this with Top 5/10 lists.

Once you produce content that reconciles your brand with what these communities like, you'll have to actually seed you content across these content sharing sites.

Again, you'll need to access "influencers" within communities. That means investing in building and maintaining relationships beyond Twitter -- or partnering with someone who already has.

6. Build a Brand That Ranks


The days of resting your SEO on a keyword targeted domain name may soon be over. Search engines appear to be giving established and trusted brands the benefit of the doubt when it comes to search rankings.
For example, one of the reasons that it took Google so long to penalize JCPenney and Overstock.com was that both were major brands that were trusted by both consumers. Consequently, Google gave them the benefit of the doubt when it came when it came to suspicious backlink profiles.

Once that trust had been violated, however, their brands couldn't save them from tumbling down the rankings. But it does go to show just how far brand trust can go when it comes to search rankings.

Granted, building a trusted brand is something that takes time and money. Even if you launch a multimillion-dollar national ad campaign, you won't going to gain the trust of consumers and Google overnight. But that's all the more reason to start looking at ways that you can build your brand up as much as possible (at least within your industry).

Consider starting with an extensive social media presence where you interact with consumers on a frequent and consistent level. Your social content strategy will support you here, but you might also try more sponsored alternatives, such as Facebook Ads and running contests.

From there, you might step up your game through some kind of online of offline publicity stunt. In other words, once you get users talking about your content, look at how you might be to get them talking about you, whether it's through news mentions or stirring up community buzz around your brand or products.

Source: http://searchenginewatch.com/3642303