How to create original Google-friendly copy for product pages

It’s been a few weeks now since Google shook the SEO world with what has come to be known as the ‘Panda/Farmer’ update . This massive change to the algorithms saw some websites plummeting in their natural search rankings overnight. Although most of the commentary was about how it affected content sites, retailers also lost out. Why? Because they were using manufacturer’s copy rather than writing large amounts from scratch. In Google’s eyes it makes for a better visitor experience if all the copy is original, unique and well-written. Most retail sites that have been hit prefer to keep quiet about it, for obvious reasons. One leading SEO expert said, “I can tell you there were some retail sites that lost out but I can’t quote any as I have signed Non-Disclosure Agreements.” The most well-publicised retail site to suffer was Play.com. Another retailer prepared…

Our recommendations on the best jobs boards sites (agency independent) to post/get jobs for digital marketing specialists

I recently received a mail similar to ones I receive quite regularly saying about the difficulty of filling posts for new specialist positions - you can see the outline job specifications at the end if this post - they're for a conversion exec and content editor. My suggestion was to place ads in one of several services enabling you to post a job independent of the costly route of using an agency. As far as I know, these services have the benefit that these are independent of agencies so can be more cost-effective since they attract a one-off fee and allow you to reach more potential candidates. Of course they don't provide the filtering process and a network of potential job seekers. Of course knowledge about "Jobs boards" can help for both finding new team members…

How to overcome company resistance to social media marketing?

I read the title of this blog somewhere in the Now Revolution (a great book by Jay Baer & Amber Naslund) and it occurred to me again recently on train journey home. You see, I have spent a lot of time over the last year working with a number of fantastic people to improve their social media marketing and I've often left feeling a little frustrated for them. Despite their talent, hunger, professionalism and creativity they're held back by the brand(s) that they want to shout about, despite sometimes seeing their competitors trail-blazing ahead in social media. The worst part is that it's a common problem, so far as I can see.

The problem is a lack of trust

The leadership team are clearly not daft people, and yet there's no trust in management, trust…

Mobile email marketing popularity statistics

Thanks to Mark Brownlow to alerting us to this via Twitter. As Mark says "However you measure it, mobile email is growing fast".  I thought I'd share the chart since it persuasively makes the case that your email design should work on mobile and you should think about what you're trying achieve through the communications - creating awareness and encouraging later action become more important.

% Emails opened on different access platforms 2011

The source of the data is Sydney-based Email Service provider Campaign Monitor - it's based on 3 billion emails delivered for it's clients in 2011.

% Emails opened on different mobile platforms

The Campaign Monitor data also shows data for different mobile platforms: There's a clear message here - iOS dominates, so ensure your…

How do you act on the different SEO ranking factors?

Did you see the recent guide to SEO ranking factors from Search Engine Land? It prompted me to think of search slightly differently & highlighted 3 areas that business often get wrong. Checkout the graphic below and overlay your own thoughts, experiences & how your SEO plan relates. Are you on-top of the +3 (highest rated factors) and avoiding any negatives or violations? * Click image for larger version

Mistake # 1 - Not enough emphasis on Content

This is the biggest mistake I see in the running of search engine optimisation by far. Obsession about all the data & myriad of tools usually end means quality content generation is forgotten or taken on half heartedly. Out of the 30 factors (positive & negative) mentioned above, content relates to all of them in…

Which approaches work best to take your traffic to the next level?

What should you do once you have your inbound marketing up and running? The scenario is that you're creating or maybe curating great new material on your corporate, brand or business blog, you're in the content marketing curve and all's well in the world, the content feels right and peer feedback is generally great too. Yet traffic from your blog seems to be a tad slow, or simply not growing like you thought it might based on the size of your market and the blogging competition, maybe you're getting the wrong traffic and the page bounce rate seems high? Most of us have been here, are currently here, and will be here again - so don't worry! Whether you're improving SEO, social media marketing or content creation and content marketing, it's a process and so improvement never stops, neither does the…

The use of Net Promoter® (NPS) score as a way to collect customer feedback has been available for years although it's perhaps better known and applied more widely in the US. We're always interested to find more about new methods to better understand customers, so wanted to alert you to another tool. CustomerGauge, surveys customers continuously and provides the necessary reporting analytics to tie the feedback back to your process improvements. At the same time, I thought it could be useful to explain some of the principles of NPS since it's not known so well in the UK. Robert Kerner of Customer Gauge is in a good position to help here. Rob has worked in process improvement for the last 15 years in various business functions: finance, marketing and sales. I…

Our review of SEO Spider from Screaming Frog

Hi! In this post I wanted to introduce you to a great new tool for SEO specialists and web content managers.  My fellow Smart Insights commentator Dan Barker introduced me to this and recommends it. It's a tool that has really built on the features available in the Xenu Link Sleuth and taken them to a new level for people involved with Search Engine Optimisation. Those familiar with Xenu will know how difficult it is to find similar software, especially if like me you use a Macbook. If you don't know Xenu, there's an excellent review by Tom Critchlow of how to use Xenu for SEO. So, onto my review...

Introducing - Screaming Frog SEO Spider

Key differences to Xenu

Mac friendly :-) The tool really makes use of the crawl data to give you relevant on-site optimisation advice & alerts - problems you need to look…

Including mobile advertising popularity

A short update looking at the variation of online advertising in Europe which I hope will be interesting for marketers working across different markets. These chars are taken from a new report from IAB Europe on European online advertising.

Online advertising variation

This chart shows significant variation in the popularity of display advertising across Europe:

Mobile advertising popularity

This is the main reason I thought it would be worth sharing this new research - it's the first compilation I've seen of mobile advertising popularity. Despite the hype about mobile Internet usage overtaking desktop usage , mobile is still a small proportion of overall ad spend overall.

It's around 2-5% in most countries, but > 10% in Finland which perhaps gives an indication of future trends.…

Facebook rated the most important marketing channel

With the increasing range of channels available to reach our audiences, it's increasingly difficult to know where to focus investment in marketing communications techniques. Most marketers will rightly argue that the techniques that works best in their market is what really counts, so researching their audience adoption of new digital channels and running trials for these new marketing channels is most effective to get an idea on what's effective. But it's also good to have a steer from what others have found before you implement trials, so I have created this post to share research published on what other marketers have found to be the most effective marketing approach.

1 Merchant Circle Small and Medium Business Marketing Survey

This is the recent research that prompted me to write this post, shockingly Facebook is rated more popular than Google - this wasn't the case a year ago! The…