What to Focus on for Local SEO

Written by Carlos Morales on . Posted in Blog, Marketing, Online Marketing, SEO

local-seo-imageCheck Out What You Need for Local SEO

Local SEO has evolved over the last several years from a fairly simple proposition to one that is a little more involved. While that may seem “harder” on the surface, what it actually offers is a lot of opportunity for those who are willing to do what’s necessary to get their sites to rank well locally.

Toward that goal, we’ve listed several best practices you’ll want to be aware of when it comes to local SEO. Some might not be new to you, while others will. Bear in mind, it’s a stew, and all of it works together to make it tasty!

Local SEO Best Practices

Increase your site speed – Google loves a speedy page load, and besides, people simply won’t wait for your slow pages to load.

Optimize for Mobile – With half the traffic on the Web these days originating from a mobile device, it’s insane to ignore this any longer. Make a responsive mobile version of your site today.

On-page SEO – Make sure your title tags, descriptions, internal links and website schema are all representing your business the way they should.

Get more Reviews and Citations – Reviews are starting to overtake citations, but for now both are still important.

Acquire high-quality links – Make it your business to get the best links you can, from relevant high authority sites and high traffic sites. This is best if it originates from your content.

Give your content a local flavor – As much for visitors as for anything, ensuring that your content appeals to the local audience is a good idea.

Geotag your images – Geo-tagging your images with local geographic information tells Google what it needs to know, and greatly improves your chances of showing up accurately in Maps.

Encourage social signals – In addition to likely being a search engine signal, social media can become a far-reaching evangelist for your brand.

NAP data – As always, making sure your business information is consistent across ALL your platforms is a must. You should probably start right here!

Local SEO may be a touch more involved than in years past, but the rewards for getting it right are also greater. Don’t let it wait another day!

5 Ways Your Content Can Make Conversions Easier

Written by Carlos Morales on . Posted in Blog, Content Marketing, SEO

Content-MarketingNeed More Conversions? Look to Your Content!

Quite often content marketing and conversion optimization don’t even reside in the same paragraph, much less sentence, in terms of how we think about making it all work together.

There are ways to help your visitor get to that happy place where they’re grabbing their wallet, and completing the sale.

5 Ways to use content for better conversion rates

Use easy to follow navigation – Enabling your page visitors to go where they (and you!) want to is a cornerstone. Use one clearly defined navigation bar, and augment this with text links inside your content pointing to other pages or resources you’d like to show.

Use visuals! – The more images and videos you use in your content, the more often it will be read, shared and acted upon. That’s not opinion, but a fact. We love to look and watch, read not so much.

Optimize for mobile – With well over half of all web access and search now coming through a mobile device of some type, if you’re not optimized for mobile you are undoubtedly losing out.

Create unique, valuable content – The best way to help your conversions is by creating content that is valuable, sharable and leads logically (and one would hope with some urgency!) to the next step, conversion.

Create killer calls to action – Optimize your calls to action with some thought. Test the various elements just like you would content, and make every effort to make your CTA be noticed. Using colors that stand out yet are complimentary is key here, while remaining within the design elements of your page.

The best way to proceed is to be sure that when your content is being created, that conversion is part of the thought process. Thinking about it then will lead to more conversions afterwards!

Are you using content to drive traffic to your website or offer and do you have a Call-To-Action (CTA) to increase conversions and ultimately sales?

Seven Mistakes Your Are Making when Promoting Your Business Online!

Written by Carlos Morales on . Posted in Blog, Marketing, SEO

viva technology - Local SEO Mistakes You May Be Unaware Of!

If you have a local business and you aren’t utilizing local SEO for all its worth, then you are likely missing out on a huge chunk of your audience! Likewise, if you are attempting but failing at your SEO efforts because of lack of knowledge to flat out blunders, you also will be pretty lonely hanging out at the ol’ website. So in an effort to avoid that dreaded scenario, let’s identify 7 downright daffy local SEO mistakes you’ll want to avoid at all costs!

7 Local SEO Mistakes to Avoid!

  1. Create Separate Listing for Each Location – Not having location-specific listing for each of your locations is a lazy blunder. If you want to rank for your locale, be sure to create listings for it, and don’t compound your error by duplicating the content from other locations.
  2. Your Content Marketing Isn’t Local – If you opt for the one-content solution fits all approach, you won’t rank as highly for local terms, and, you will fail to win the trust and business of those locals who do find your page. Include local color!
  3. Not Optimizing for Mobile – Having a site that mobile ready can make all the difference! Since now more than 50% of people browse on a mobile device, it’s imperative to be optimized for mobile.
  4. Flawed or Non-Existent Keyword Strategy – Not having targeted the correct keywords, or worse, no keywords at all, is a recipe for failure. Shoot for a mix of longer tail, more local in intent keywords, and only target one main keyword per page. You will rank for more than that, but you need to give Google a clear picture of what your pages are about. Whatever you do, do not keyword stuff! If it doesn’t read like you really wrote it, or you can read it with a straight face, you may want to look at that.
  5. Not Getting Reviews! – It’s a large mistake not to hit up your most satisfied customers for positive reviews. This will help you in so many ways. Whatever you do, don’t pay for or otherwise generate reviews on your own. They will be found out, and your site won’t see the light of day for some time!
  6. Bad NAP Data! – If your NAP data, (name, address, phone) is inconsistent across all your web and social platforms, you will not fare well. It’s easy enough to do; simply make sure your business information is presented in a consistent manner.
  7. Not Utilizing Videos for Local Terms – As well as Google ranks YouTube videos, it’s a bonehead play to not create videos utilizing local search terms. Moreover, they are easy to produce and very quick to implement! 

Have you made any of these mistakes? How is your business using Local Search results to gain more exposure and increase revenue?

Local SEO Strategies for 2014

Written by Carlos Morales on . Posted in Blog, Online Marketing, SEO

local-seoUtilizing local SEO to rank your sites in 2014 is more defined than in the past. There are a variety of best practices you should use that will certainly help you in the local search results, and with surprising speed. Let’s look at a few of these techniques that will turn up the volume on your search results.

How to do local SEO for 2014

  • Optimized Google+ Local page – This is a must-do. Not only will it help you rank highly for this specific location, your pages will be indexed nearly immediately, and Google features these search listings, especially on mobile.
  • Make sure that citations, NAP listings and on-page address data are accurate – NAP (name, address, phone number) citations are a major ranking signal for local SEO, and work much the same way that backlinks do for a non-local site. Make sure you have consistent information across all of these platforms.
  • Optimize local pages for local keywords – This can be something of an art to weave in location geo-modifiers into your copy and make it sound human. The payoff is worth it however. Be sure that your primary page keyword, brand name and location is in the title tag, the first third of the page, and the description tag.
  • Business directory listings – Make it a point and claim your listings in any local directories. These will turn out to be the easiest citations you’ll acquire, and will also be of great benefit in terms of SEO, search rankings and traffic.
  • Get awesome reviews and testimonials – Be sure you encourage your customers to leave reviews for you on your Google+ Place page, or third party review sites like Yelp. Make it easy for them to do so by providing links on your pages. And don’t ever write fake reviews, or buy the same for your own site! The sites are very good now at discovering phony reviews, and it won’t be good.

The good news is that Local SEO in 2014 can be performed with little fuss, just a bit of work!

Attract Visitors with Content Marketing

Written by Carlos Morales on . Posted in Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing, SEO


ContentMarketingContent Marketing: Are You on Board?

Did you know that more than 70 percent of consumers prefer getting to know a company via content marketing rather than ads? Still companies spend more on advertising than on content creation, according to ContentPlus. So is this a matter of really trusting the content marketing model, or more a reflection of the need to generate traffic and leads more rapidly? The answer: probably some of both. Content marketing is without question the best vehicle for developing your authority and brand. The thing is it can be a lot of work. Plus, it can take much longer to find out whether your content is delivering in terms of leads and sales, in contrast to advertising traffic.

Content marketing is an important part of the success of your business!

While it can be difficult and time-consuming, if you wish to develop your brand into a long-term success, you need to sell out to making content marketing an integral piece of your online marketing. But how do you make it work for you? With all the new content arriving every day, exactly what can you do to make yours stick out from the pack?

5 Ways to make your content marketing rock!

  1. Write what your audience wants to read – Ask or otherwise obtain clues as to what your site visitors wish to read, and supply this. Checking out your Google Analytics for your best performing pages can be a help in this.
  2. Write substance – Longer, more purposeful content is what Search engines love, and ultimately this type of content is shared a great deal more often.
  3. Answer questions – One of the better ways to endear yourself to readers, is to answer their concerns and questions. See how one pool company did it.
  4. Use Google authorship – Not only does this help in the search results, it can improve your authority in Google.
  5. Encourage and promote sharing – Sharing brings links and traffic. Have you already got enough off those? Not to mention that social signals surrounding your content are now a part of Google’s search ranking algorithm.

Get your content marketing helping you now so don’t have to buy that traffic later.