International Search Engine Marketing Blog

Recently, I have noticed an onslaught of SEO companies advertising to help prospects in specific industries such as the chiropractic field, automobile field, and many other trade groups that are looking to increase their marketing efforts using the internet. I applaud any SEO company that truly attempts to assist business owners in these industries. There is a definite need for doctors and automobile owners to have their websites marketed by a professional search engine marketing company.

Unfortunately, far too often I see these niche marketers charging exorbitant prices. I have heard stories of small dental practices shelling out $30,000 plus to have a website built and marketed online. The saddest part of the story is that even after spending all of that money, oftentimes their websites still do not appear anywhere within the top search engine results and little or no return on investment is ever realized.

That same small dental practice or chiropractic office has likely missed out on many new patients that the doctors could of helped. Essentially, the doctors’ offices are losing twice. Their first loss occurs when the office overpays for a web design or SEO service and the second loss realates to the opportunity cost involved with missing out on all the potential new patients that might have located their practice had they hired a different marketing company.

My best advice in this scenario is to start from scratch. Those who have yet to invest in a website should learn from the mistakes of others. When starting a new chiropractic or dental practice, owners should keep these ideas in mind when the inevitable bombarding of sales calls takes place. A marketing company does not have to focus solely on a specific industry in order to provide a better service than one that does. A common misconception is that a company which can list multiple dentists and chiropractors as clients has provided those clients a valuable service.

Many times the owners of a niche businesses, such as an automobile dealership or doctor’s office, are better off talking to a general web design firm or SEO company. Often these types of companies are staffed to handle such projects, can provide a superior level of service and expertise, and can do so for a price much lower than a company that markets solely to doctors or automobile dealers. A company that declares themselves as an expert in an industry is not necessarily one. Business owners in any industry should keep this in mind whether hiring a local web design firm or an international SEO company.

Usually, I do not use this blog to advertise our companies specials, but I am making an exception this one occasion since we are offering a limited time offer for new and existing clients. Agilis Marketing will obtain a top 10 search engine ranking for only $99 per month. There are no long term commitments or contracts. If you are not happy then simply let us know and you can cancel at any time. Simply go to our SEO special offer page to signup.

Why did we decide to make this offer? Even though I am against specials, the truth is that many people are gun shy when it comes to internet marketing. This is an opportunity for those companies or individuals to use our services for an extremely low price. Thus businesses are able to experience what our SEO company can achieve for a menial fee. Please note that this offer is available for both U.S. and international companies looking to improve the search engine marketing component of their advertising strategy.

I do want to emphasis that we are using this strategy as a loss leader. The only reason we are offering this price is to show companies our SEM abilities. Our company’s mission has not changed: to grow our business with the growth of our clients’ businesses. This offer is a way of showing the deep commitment we have towards that goal. Feel free to contact us with any questions at 1-877-SEO-1169 or go to our SEO special offer page to signup instantly.

Many people automatically assume that search engine marketers are hired purely by businesses, whether they are local or international, looking to profit selling products or services. While this is primarily the case, I wanted to explore another reason internet marketers and SEO professional are hired: to correct a perceived wrong.

Be warned that this method of internet marketing is sometimes used without warrant and for improper purposes. The flip side of the coin is that in many instances it is an extremely effective and relatively inexpensive way to relay facts to a number of consumers. Essentially the idea is for the page or website created to appear above or near the company’s own site; this way those who are considering transaction with the business are able to see another person’s perspective of the organization.

When approached by such prospects, I highly suggest that the pages created contain purely factual information. That way nothing on the page is construed as libelous and I further suggest that they may also wish to consult with an attorney beforehand.

Describing this method of internet marketing is easiest with an example; therefore I will use a personal example with a webpage that I recently created. One goal for this webpage:  http://www.agilismarketing.com/southeastern-virginia-bni/ is for it to appear at the top of the search results when people search either for Southeastern Virginia BNI or Tony Dziadul. That way others who might consider joining the organization have more facts to base their decision upon.

At one point in my career, as an employee of another company, I became a member of the Southeastern Virginia BNI (Business Networking International) chapter. My understanding is that one of this organization’s goals is to promote the growth of its members’ businesses. Unfortunately, I had an experience that led me to believe otherwise. Now, I simply want others to know of my experience and to formulate their own conclusions. As with any business or person I interact with, I have personal feelings about the Southeastern Virginia BNI chapter and their executive director Tony Dziadul. However, if you click on the links above notice that the point of such a page is not to relay personal feelings, but post factual information. For instance the page I created contains email communications with Tony Dziadul, thus other people are able to develop their own opinions.

One purpose of this post is to illustrate another method for which search engine optimization is utilized. As mentioned at the start of this article, SEO and SEM are  used mostly to promote a businesses products or services, but can also have many other purposes, such as that above. These outside the box marketing techniques are an ideal and cost effective way to show an international audience factual information about another firm, company, or individual.

Many people will check their websites’ Page Ranks (correctly written as the trademarked one word: PageRank) this Monday morning and see the first update in nearly half a year. Keep in mind that this will have little impact on any website’s search rankings, whether the site is an international one or based in the United States. However, the number does serve as Barometer that measures that value of external links pointing to a website and educated website owners should have concern if their site’s PageRank drops. That is why this morning; many people will smile, while others will frown.

The fact of the matter is that PageRank (PR) is updated on a continual basis. However, Google has increasingly lengthened the amount of time between updating the PR displayed on their toolbar. The basic reason is that Google derives little benefit from updating the PR shown to the public.

SEO and SEM firms find this number quite valuable as it is one piece of information they can use when attempting to increase a site’s rankings within the search results. All else equal a link from a page with a higher PR is worth more than a link from a page with a lower PageRank. The fastest and easiest way to determine a page’s value is to look at the PR displayed by Google’s toolbar.

Since Google does not like anyone influencing their search results and most certainly does not want to make it easier for someone to do so, I hypothesis that is the primary reason why Google updates the PR displayed on their toolbar less and less frequently.

Keep in mind, the toolbar PR number is simply the one displayed and not the value used by Google on a daily basis. That said, why do such a large number of people care about this all illusive number? One reason is that people do not realize that the PR number is not updated in real time and simply associate the value of a website by the number Google displays on their toolbar.

The other reason site owner’s place such a high importance on PageRank is that a website with a higher PR is viewed as more valuable to other webmaster’s and search engine optimization experts. Often, SEO experts are willing to work harder to obtain a link from a higher PR site than one with a lower ranking and as a result there is a symbiotic monetary value associated with a site’s PageRank.

Those who are in the business of obtaining SEO friendly links are those most impacted by this recent update. As mentioned previously, many people will smile, while other will frown. Those smiling will obviously be the owner’s of website’s that have a higher PageRank since a large portion of the web community will consider their site more valuable. The converse is true for those site owners who now have a lower PR.

G. Chen, kindly contributed to the following post:

Let’s take a look at the SEO formula one step at a time to solve the equation that consistently riddles many marketers and web designers: what are the elements needed to effectively harness the power of SEM? One major element of SEM is content, as it has a strong relationship to effective advertising and the success of any campaign, whether international or local.

We know that SEO is an important part of SEM, and it is important to utilize the proper keywords in order to achieve the highest possible return on a search engine marketing investment. The SEO piece is relatively simple with a local site, which has a limited number of phrases that a marketer wants to target. After the marketer has selected the website’s keywords, obtained relevant links, and achieved the desired rankings in the search engines, that SEO component of a search engine marketing project simply needs maintenance.

All that said, marketers all too often fail during the keyword selection process. People are continually utilizing the search engines more and their search terms become more specific. Fewer people simply type “cell phone reviews,” but rather search for a more specific phrase such as “cell phones with international GSM coverage and G3 network.” More than ever, selecting keywords that consumer actually type into a search engine box is critical to driving targeted, quality traffic to a website.

However, keyword selection and the other pieces involved in SEO are only part of a SEM project. Although offline, a picture can paint a thousand words, this is not always true online. For example, graphic intensive sites may look impressive, keeping a simple design with the content a person is look for is crucial. Web designers and marketers alike must strike a careful balance between text and graphics in order to create a website that delivers a high return on investment,

Utilizing an effective mix of content and graphics allows marketers to obtain a higher ROI for their websites. While top search rankings are always important it is vital to remember that at the end of the day all the top rankings in the world are meaningless if visitors who reach a site leave it immediately. The right mix of content and graphics, combined with the careful placement of both, can lead to a truly effective search engine marketing campaign. Properly balancing these factors is ultimately what separates a SEO company from a SEM company.

Search engine optimization and search engine marketing are not the same. Rather SEO is a one part of SEM. SEO focuses on top search rankings, which are certainly important in any internet marketing campaign whether local or international. However, SEM takes search engine optimization to the next level. Instead of focusing entirely on high search positions, a SEM campaign encourages individuals who click on a website’s link to then contact the website’s owner or purchase a product or service from the site.

Many website’s have top positions in the search engines, but still fail to achieve any meaningful return on the investment spent in obtaining these top rankings. The same companies or individuals who own these websites oftentimes hired a search engine optimization firm in order to achieve these results. Even after spending all that money, little or no return on investment is seen. 

Not surprisingly these marketers will call the SEO firm they hired and unfortunately a common response is, “We did our job. Take a look at the rankings, the rest is up to you” or “We have another package you may want to consider purchasing…” I cannot count the number of times a prospect has told me such a story or one analogous to this.

What is a webmaster or marketer to do? Fix it. It does not matter the size of your campaign or if your target demographic is local, national, or even international. The positive news is that anyone who already has top search rankings is one step closer to owning a profitable website. I suggest taking the next step and follow through on the efforts of the previous SEO company. Devote resources to take your site to the next level and start monetizing the traffic obtained from the high search position. This could include doing the work on your own or hiring a company such as the one I own to help with your efforts. Either way additional time is needed to make the site profitable. 

For those who have yet to hire a marketer or SEO company then my best advice is to learn from others who did and remember there is much more to internet advertising than a top listing in Google, Yahoo, or MSN. Search engine marketing takes into account these other considerations. 

Typically a search engine marketing campaign includes SEO. However, that is all that is in common. There is a reason most people visits the first page of a website then hit the back button on their browser. There are thousands of items to keep in mind regarding the design and content of a website, all of which influence whether a visitor will stay on the site or click away. One of the more common reasons visitors leave a website is that it lacks something to grabs the visitors’ attentions and there are no calls to action of any type. Another typical reason is that a page does not meet the visitors’ expectations.

Fortunately, marketers and webmasters do not have to guess. Installing a comprehensive analytics program is oftentimes a smart starting point. This way visitor browsing habits are tracked and marketers can modify a site based on data rather than assumptions. What one should modify based upon this data requires a whole new blog posting. One of the key takeaways from this post is to remember that while SEO is important, it is only part of a well thought out search engine marketing campaign.

How many get rich quick ideas or internet marketing schemes have you heard of? Likely, many more than you can count. How many of them have worked for you? I’d be amazed if you can name even one. Almost everyone who is not rich wants to become rich, quickly and in as little time as possible. The fact of the matter is that rarely happens. Wealth oftentimes takes time, perseverance, and savvy. The same is true with SEO and SEM.

Who wouldn’t want their website to appear as the number one listing in Google for a competitive phrase, with no wait time? An effective SEO campaign can achieve top search rankings, but in almost all instances, it will not happen overnight. Search engine optimization and marketing take time. As any internet advertiser knows, it takes time to develop a strategic outline, conduct proper research, perform the needed work, and then still more time is required before the results of all the above efforts are reflected in the search engines.

The positive news is that those who are patient can achieve wealth with a properly executed SEO campaign; simply do not expect it to happen instantly. Top search rankings can generate an enormous amount of traffic for a website and significantly increase a site’s revenues. Wealth and obtaining it through SEO can and does happen.

While this post is about SEO, please keep in mind that it is still only part of a search engine marketing campaign. Website owners who generate the highest levels of income realize this.