The continuing rise of voice search and how you can adapt to it

Google’s I/O developer conference brought several huge announcements about Google’s future direction and projects, including two new technologies which demonstrate just how important voice search and natural language processing are to the company’s future development.

The first, Google Assistant, is a voice-activated digital assistant which builds on “all [Google’s] years of investment in deeply understanding users’ questions”, as Google’s blog declared. It takes Google’s voice search and natural language capabilities to the next level, while also allowing users to carry out everyday tasks like booking cinema tickets or restaurant reservations.

The second is Google Home, Google’s long-awaited smart home hub to rival the Amazon Echo, which comes with Assistant built in. Google Home – which will be “unmatched in far-field voice recognition”, according to VP of Product Management Mario Quieroz – will give users access to Google’s powerful search capabilities in answering their questions as well as linking together smart devices all over their home.

It’s no surprise that Google is focusing heavily on voice search and natural language going forward when you consider that in 2015 alone, voice search rose from “statistical zero” to make up 10% of all searches globally, according to Timothy Tuttle of the voice interface specialist MindMeld. That’s an estimated 50 billion searches per month.

Indeed, Google CEO Sundar Pichai revealed in his keynote speech at I/O that 1 in every 5 searches made with the Google Android app in the US is a voice query. Bing produced a similar statistic earlier this month when it announced that a quarter of all searches on the Windows 10 taskbar using Bing are voice searches. And statistics like these are only like to increase further as search engines, apps and developers respond to this trend.

Digital assistants: The agents of voice search

Siri. Cortana. Google Now. Alexa. Google Assistant. These are only the names of the most well-known digital assistants from the major technology companies; a search for “digital assistant” on the iOS or Android app store shows just how many different varieties of these voice-controlled AIs there are.

Digital assistants are overwhelmingly the medium through which we interact with voice search and carry out natural language queries, so it makes sense that they, too, are on the rise as companies compete for the biggest share of this rapidly expanding market.

The figures show just how recent much of this uptake of voice search is. Late last year, MindMeld published a study of smartphone users in the U.S. and their use of voice search and voice commands. It found that 60% of smartphone users who used voice search had begun using it within the past year, with 41% of survey respondents having only begun to use voice search in the past 6 months.

Image: MindMeld

With that said, digital assistants are not just confined to smartphones any more, increasingly integrated into devices like smart home hubs and game consoles. And the more that we speak to and interact with assistants, pushing the limits of what they’re capable of, the more sophisticated they become.

The newest generation of digital assistants, including Google Assistant and Viv, a new AI from the creators of Siri, are capable of interpreting and responding to long, multi-part and highly specific queries. For example, during a public demonstration in New York, Viv showed off its ability to accurately respond to queries like, “Was it raining in Seattle three Thursdays ago?” and “Will it be warmer than 70 degrees near the Golden Gate Bridge after 5PM the day after tomorrow?”

At the demonstration of Google Assistant at Google’s I/O conference, Sundar Pichai made much of the fact that you can pose follow-up queries to Assistant without needing to restate context. That is, you can ask a question like, “Who directed the Revenant?” and then follow up by saying, “Show me his awards,” and Assistant will know that you are still referring to director Alejandro Iñárritu in the second query. (It’s worth noting, though, that Bing’s web search has been able to do this for a while).

Continuing the conversation: Google’s Assistant can now handle follow-up questions to a previous query without needing to hear the subject again

How voice queries are changing search

So how is this upswing in voice queries and technology’s increasing ability to respond to them changing the way that users search?

We don’t search with voice the same way that we search with a keyboard. Computer users have evolved a specific set of habits and expectations for web search based on its limitations and capabilities. So we would start off by typing a quite generalised, keyword-based search query like “SEO tips”, see what comes back, and progressively narrow down through trial and error with longer search terms like “SEO tips for m-commerce” or “SEO tips for beginners”.

Or if we were looking to buy a pair of red shoes, we might search for “red shoes” and then navigate to a specific website, browse through their shoes and use the site interface to narrow down by style, size and designer.

Whereas now, with the advanced capabilities of search engines to understand longer, more specialised searches and the advent of voice search making natural language queries more common, we might start off by searching, “Quick SEO tips for complete beginners”, or, “Show me wide-fit ladies’ red shoes for under £50.”

We search differently with a keyboard to the way we search with voice

The increasing rise of voice search brings with it a wealth of new data on user intent, habits and preferences. From the first query about SEO, a site owner can see that the searcher is not just a novice but a complete novice, and is not looking to spend a lot of time researching in-depth SEO guides; they want a list that’s easy to digest and quick to implement.

From the second query, a shop owner can tell exactly what type of shoes the consumer is looking for, down to the fit and colour. The price range indicates a budget and an intent to buy.

When mobile users are conducting voice search with location enabled, site owners and business owners can also gain valuable location data. Often, the voice query will contain the important phrase “near me”, which shows that the searcher is looking for local businesses. Mobile voice searches are three times more likely to be local than text, so optimising for local search and mobile will also help you to rank for many voice searches.

With the growth of voice search, we can expect to see more and more long-tail search keywords and natural language queries, which give increasing amounts of contextual information and useful data about searcher intent. The addition of voice assistants to smart home hubs like Amazon’s Echo and Google Home (Apple is also reported to be developing its own smart hub with Siri built in) will also give the companies behind them access to untold amounts of data on users’ daily life and habits, purchases, interests and more, opening up new avenues for marketing.

How can you capitalise on voice search?

With all of that in mind, what practical things can website owners do to take advantage of this new search frontier?

Look out for natural language queries in your site analytics

At the moment, there’s no way to tell outright which users are reaching your site through voice search, though Google is rumoured to be developing this feature for Google Analytics. But by looking out for natural language queries in your search traffic reports, you can start to get a feel for what users might be asking to find your site, learn from it and use it to inform your SEO strategy.

Think about how people are likely to phrase queries aloud

We need to start moving our approach from thinking of endless variations on different keywords to thinking about different types of questions and phrases that users might search. Ask yourself which questions might bring a user to your site, and how they will speak them aloud. What are the extra words, the ones that wouldn’t appear in a regular keyword search, and what information do they give you about the user’s intent on your site?

Make sure your site is set up to answer searchers’ questions

Once you’ve considered the types of questions a user might be asking, consider whether your site will satisfy those queries. Rob Kerry, in a presentation on the future of search at Ayima Insights, advised website owners to start integrating Q&A-style content into their sites in order to rank better for natural language searches and better satisfy the needs of users who are asking those questions.

Q&A-style content can also be excellent material for featured snippets, which is another great way to gain visibility on the search results page.

Develop content with a conversational tone

Because natural language queries reflect the way that people speak, they aren’t just longer but more colloquial. So consider if there are ways that you can create and incorporate content with a more conversational tone, to match this.

Use voice search!

One of the best ways to understand voice search, how it works and what kind of results it returns is to use it yourself. Search the questions you think might bring people to your site and see what currently ranks top, to get a sense of what works for others. Are there questions that aren’t being addressed, or answered very well? You can take this into account when creating content that is geared towards voice search.

from https://searchenginewatch.com/2016/05/31/the-continuing-rise-of-voice-search-and-how-you-can-adapt-to-it/

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/145207660419

The most expensive 100 Google Adwords keywords in the US

Google is on track to make more than $70bn in revenue in 2016, and the lion’s share of that number will be generated by its insanely successful advertising business.

As I’m sure you know, advertisers pay a fee every time somebody clicks on a link in one of their ads. Some of the costs per click being paid are absolutely staggering, though they must be worth it, from the advertiser’s perspective.

Last month I analysed a large chunk of Google Adwords data from SEMrush to discover the most expensive keywords in the UK. Today, I’m releasing the same research for the US. The old adage suggests that everything is bigger in the States, and that certainly seems to apply to advertising expenditure.

So, here are the top 100 terms, based on a massive dataset of 80m keywords…

As you can see, the legal sector dominates, with the most expensive term closing in on a truly incredible $1,000 per click. It sounds insane, but consider that the average mesothelioma settlement is in excess of $1m and it starts to make a lot of sense. Legal terms account for 78% of the top 100, and nine of the top 10.

Water damage is another big ticket item, with clicks costing more than $250 for the top terms. Repair costs and associated claims for water damage into the tens of thousands, so again, it figures.

The other sectors that need to spend big to make an impression include Finance (largely focused on insurance), B2B (typically around the provision of business telephony) and Health (the top terms being linked to rehab).

One of the most obvious difference between the UK and US research is the total absence of any terms related to gambling in the latter country, where it remains illegal to gamble online. Gambling terms account for 77% of the UK’s top 100 terms, with the most expensive cost per click coming in at around $220.

The other thing is the lack of typos. In the UK advertisers are quite happy to seek out people who cannot spell, something that makes the eyes narrow when those terms are linked to gambling.

Sector by sector

Here’s a sector-specific breakdown of the top five most expensive terms in the US. Note that I’ve adjusted the scale for each one, such is the variance in click costs between industries.

You can share these charts individually, should you wish to do so.

As Google continues to turn the screw towards a fully fledged pay-to-play model my bet is that we’ll see even more keyword inflation over the next few years, though ultimately there may be a point at which things start to plateau.

What do you think? Are you surprised by the amount being spent by advertisers? Do leave a comment below…

from https://searchenginewatch.com/2016/05/31/the-most-expensive-100-google-adwords-keywords-in-the-us/

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/145207660614

7 Types of Emails to Send Customers to Keep Them Coming Back

As everyone says…

You need to build an email list.

Email marketing provides the highest ROI for most businesses at $40 for every $1 spent (on average).

I’m sure you see a ton of content on a regular basis that shows you different ways to build that email list. Great.

But how much do you see that tells you how to interact with that list effectively?

I think it’s safe to guess not much.

I wouldn’t be surprised if you had questions such as:

• What do I send my subscribers?
• How do I keep open rates high?
• How do I make my emails exciting?

While I can’t show you all of that in a single post, I’m going to show you 7 different types of emails that most businesses can send.

These types of emails are emails that your subscribers and customers will enjoy getting, will interact with, and will help you build strong relationships. 

1. Exclusive offers make subscribers feel special (but which kinds are best?)

It’s nice when someone, whether a close friend or a relative stranger, goes out of their way to do something nice for you.

As a website owner with an email list, you’re hopefully somewhere in the middle of that friend-stranger spectrum in the eyes of your subscribers.

If you can do something for your subscribers that they really appreciate, it will do many important things:

• Make them think more highly of you
• Make them more loyal (to stay a subscriber and to buy in the future)
• Make them more willing to reciprocate (if you ask for a share, referral, or something else).

The question then is: what can you give them?

For most businesses, an exclusive offer is the best thing they can give.

Let’s go through a few real examples and then some more general situations.

First, you can offer a live event that only your subscribers are invited to. Not only will the event be valuable because it’s live, but it will also be well attended because it’s exclusive.

Bryan Harris often does this, so it must work well for him. For example, here is an email with an offer to attend a private mastermind:

He sends a few emails leading up to the event and one or two at the last minute. They aren’t complicated—just a brief description of what to expect in the event.

What else can you offer subscribers? Another thing of value that doesn’t cost you much, if anything, is early access.

Matthew Barby created a WordPress plugin and sent this email to his subscribers, giving them free access to it:

That’s a pretty sweet offer. In reality, Matthew is also gaining his first group of users, which is another win for him.

If you’re launching any big guides or tools, consider getting early feedback from your subscribers.

What else can you offer?

• Discounts
• Secret products (like limited one-on-one consulting)
• Webinars
• A sneak peak at original research
• Free samples

Be creative. If you can think of any other ideas, tell me about them in a comment at the end of the article.

2. Give subscribers the gift of convenience

Take care of your subscribers because your list is one of the most valuable assets you own.

You can give value in many ways. Some may be big gestures (email type #1), but even small things go a long way.

If someone is on your list, that means they’ve already told you that they like your content (if they signed up from a blog post, for example).

However, just because they want to hear your thoughts and advice doesn’t mean all your subscribers want it in the same way.

Typically, you’ll email all your subscribers about any new content you create. When you do this, consider giving them alternative ways to consume the content. Make it as convenient as you can.

For example, Tim Urban created a long post about SpaceX. He then sent out this email to subscribers:

On top of the regular link that he had already sent his subscribers, he sent this email with two other options: a PDF version and an audio version.

It takes a fraction of the time to re-create the original content in a different form, but it adds a lot of extra value.

Nathan Barry offers another way to make your content more convenient.

After he hosts a webinar, he uploads it to YouTube and sends an email with a link to all his subscribers.

It’s something that I know most subscribers really appreciate, and it also exposes his webinar to those subscribers who forgot to sign up for the event.

Convenience typically comes in the form of different mediums of content.

If you wrote a blog post, particularly a long one, consider emailing it to your subscribers with more than one version:

• PDF
• a cheat sheet
• audio version
• video summary

Or if you created a video, reformat that into:

• an e-book
• an MP3 download
• a video download
•  a cheat sheet/summary

You don’t need to create all the formats. Just think about which ones your subscribers would like most and which make sense for the content you made.

3. Short value emails can be a nice change of pace

Think about your subscribers’ email boxes.

Day after day, they get several emails from friends, families, and businesses they like.

What do most of the business emails consist of?

• “Read our content”
• “Buy our stuff”

About 90% of business emails fall into these two categories.

And it’s not that those types of emails aren’t valuable to your subscribers—because they are, but some subscribers will get fatigued by them.

If you’re looking to maximize your subscriber happiness as much as possible, consider sending emails that focus on nothing but teaching something interesting to your subscribers.

No links to your content or anyone’s website.

No asking for replies—just a clear show of value.

Bernadette Jiwa is known for her story-telling talent.

She sends out this exact type of email I’m talking about on a regular basis. Sometimes her emails have links underneath, and sometimes they don’t.

Here’s an example of such an email (yes, that’s the whole thing):

It’s short but gives her subscribers an interesting thing to ponder, which helps them tell better stories (their goal).

It’s a nice break from overwhelming amounts of content (which I may be guilty of myself).

4. Highlights need to be interesting

Email newsletters are nothing new.

Any email sent out on a regular basis that summarizes what’s been happening on a site can be considered an email newsletter.

They’re supposed to consist of highlights.

But like the name implies, they need to consist of the very best of your site.

Whether you have user-generated content or content produced by your writing team, highlight emails are an option.

However, make sure you’re not including everything. But don’t select content randomly either.

You should be giving previews of the most popular content on your site for that particular time period.

For example, Quora (the question and answer site), regularly sends users the most upvoted questions from their feeds.

Here’s what it looks like:

I would guess that these are automatically generated by the most upvoted questions during the week.

5. One way to show that you really respect subscribers

One goal that every email marketer should have is to form deeper relationships with subscribers.

Admittedly, this is difficult. It’s tough to break down that barrier over email only. You’ve probably never met your subscribers, and by default, they think of you as just another business.

Even if they like your business, most subscribers will still be skeptical about your claim that you care about them and not just their money.

One thing I encourage businesses to do is find employees through their email list.

I’ve done it before, as have many others. Here’s an example of Ramit Sethi sending an email to his list while looking to hire for more than 10 positions:

When you do this, you make it clear that you think of them as people whom you respect and who you believe have valuable skills.

And it’s good business too. Your subscribers likely have an in-depth understanding of your business and obviously think in similar to you ways (since they like you).

Even if someone doesn’t apply or doesn’t get hired, it’s clear to them that you’re looking to develop partnerships and relationships with people on your list.

It’s one way to break down that barrier a bit and become more than “just another business.”

6. Don’t fall victim to the “curse of knowledge” (deliver your best stuff)

Many bloggers suffer from the “curse of knowledge.”

The curse of knowledge is a fairly old concept. It basically states that it’s hard to understand what lesser-informed people are thinking.

If you’re an expert in math, it would be hard for you to even fathom that someone doesn’t understand something like basic calculus.

It’s the reason why some people are geniuses but absolutely awful teachers. Conversely, someone who just learned something can often teach it best because they understand the perspective of someone who doesn’t know it.

Let’s apply this to your subscribers and content.

Over the years, you might write hundreds of pieces of content. At that point (possibly present day), you’re naturally going to assume that your average new subscriber is more informed than they used to be.

For me, as an example, it’s easy to assume that every new subscriber understands on-page and off-page SEO as well as concepts such as white-hat and black-hat link building.

From that perspective, it’s hard for me to send them my advanced guide to SEO because I’m assuming they already know everything in it.

Chances are, though, your average new subscriber won’t change much over time.

And it’s very likely that my average new subscriber could benefit from more general SEO knowledge before I get to the specific tactics I currently write about.

The autoresponder “crash course”: If you think that this is a problem, one way to fix it is with an autoresponder sequence.

Think of what an average subscriber knew even a year or two ago, and make a list of what they need to learn to get up to speed with the rest of your content.

Then, put together an autoresponder sequence that you send to all new subscribers, where you showcase your old content that teaches these basic concepts.

For example, if you sign up for Wordstream’s list, a PPC optimization business, you’ll get a few emails like this:

The guides are all older content, and the field may have advanced since it was written, but the fundamentals hold true, and new subscribers will greatly appreciate learning them.

The takeaway from the “curse of knowledge” is that you’re probably giving subscribers a bit too much credit. Don’t assume they’ve read every single post you’ve ever written—because they haven’t.

Don’t be afraid to send emails featuring the best of your older content.

7. Preview big events that subscribers will be interested in (be your own hype man)

You need to give subscribers incentives to open that next email.

There are many ways to do this, but one way is to build hype in advance.

Think about any popular TV show. They show previews for the next episode in commercials and at the end of episodes.

These get you excited, and you make sure you watch the next episode.

Brian Dean does a similar thing really well, but for content.

For example, he sent this email to subscribers:

In that email, he shared his story about struggling and then finally succeeding with SEO.

It’s an interesting story that draws you in and makes you curious about the specifics of his success (building hype).

At the bottom of the email, he teases subscribers with bullet points that outline what he’s going to show them over the next few emails:

Right at the end, after building that hype, he tells them to watch out for his next email in which he’ll send the first post about how to succeed with SEO like he did.

You’d better believe that he had a fantastic open rate on that email.

You can do the same. When you’re planning to publish a big piece of content or a new tool, first send an email that focuses on the benefits of it.

If possible, tie it into an entertaining story to suck in your subscriber even more. That will only add to the anticipation.

Conclusion

It’s not enough just to build an email list—you have to use it effectively.

Emails are a great personal way to communicate with subscribers and customers.

Use as many of these 7 types of emails (where they make sense) to start building more meaningful relationships.

If you’re having trouble deciding exactly what to send to your subscribers, just fill me in on your situation in a comment below, and I’ll point you in the right direction.

from http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Quicksprout/~3/q5Z5HBaSyuc/

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/145016568129

Manage Your Site Without Affecting Your Analytics

It’s SEO that may lead traffic to the site and help it reach a higher position on SERPs, but it’s UX that will determine whether the traffic can be maintained and converted into the set goals.

from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHJ6xNGipgo

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/145016017224

Five most interesting search marketing news stories of the week

Welcome to our weekly round-up of all the latest news and research from around the world of search marketing and beyond.

This week we have a round of very exciting changes to AdWords and some stats about the intolerability of video ad formats.

Google AdWords launches new features for mobile ads and maps

As Sophie Loras reported last week, Google has “introduced new tools and features to AdWords to specifically address the consumer shift towards mobile.”

These include:

Expanded text ads for a mobile

Headlines in AdWords will increase from one 25-character header, to two 30-character headers, giving advertisers more room to explain their products and services.

The description line will also increase from two 35-character description lines to one 80-character description line.

Responsive display ads

These are designed to help advertisers with the many different content shapes and sizes across the more than two million publisher sites and apps on the Google Display Network (GDN).

Bid adjustments for device types

AdWords will soon allow advertisers to set individual bid adjustments for each device type (mobile, desktop and tablet).

Connect online and offline with mobile

Google is introducing new local search ads across Google.com and Google Maps to reach consumers as they search for physical business locations.

New ad formats on Google Maps

To make it easier for users to find businesses around them Google Maps will offer promoted pins as well the ability to include details for one off special offers or sales.

You can now tie-up all your web properties together in Search Console

As I reported a few days ago, you can now track the combined search visibility of all your managed web properties.

So all the separate platforms you operate for one single brand – websites, mobile sites, apps – you’ll be able to treat as a single entity. You can even add HTTP or HTTPS versions of the same site and combine multiple apps.

The aggregated data from your properties will be found in the Search Analytics of Search Console and you’ll be able to check everything from clicks, to impressions to CTR, as you would normally with single properties.

Silent ads for the win

Latest research from Wibbitz on the state of video advertising reveal some fascinating – if not obvious – home truths on our tolerance for video ad formats.

45% of people said that muted ads are more tolerable than targeted, autoplay or interactive ad formats.

Also, the survey found that 70% of people won’t watch an ad longer than 10 seconds, 61% admit they always skip video ads and 42% disapprove of autoplay ads.

Bing’s share of the search market is growing faster than Google’s

According to comScore, in April 2016, Bing’s share of the search market rose by 0.2% while Google’s dropped by 0.2%.

Also according to SEJ, “Google’s total share of the US desktop search market has dipped below its previous 64% to 63.8%. Microsoft’s share of desktop search is now sitting at 21.6%.”

Google’s new title and description lengths: ‘it’s just a test’

Google has been experimenting with a variety of expanded title tag and meta description lengths in its SERPs over the last few weeks.

However, as we all expected, Google’s John Muller has this to say about Google’s constant honing of the look of its search results…

@JulianMHoffmann@methode We’re always experimenting, so I’d have a tough time saying “new” to any particular change.

— John Mueller (@JohnMu) May 24, 2016

So yeah, don’t get too excited.

from https://searchenginewatch.com/2016/05/27/five-most-interesting-search-marketing-news-stories-of-the-week/

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/145012717929

Five ways UX blends with SEO to improve a site’s performance

For many years there has been a debate on whether UX and SEO can really go hand in hand, but this is not the case anymore. Today we’re examining how UX and SEO can make the perfect match.

There’s no need to question nowadays the need to blend UX with SEO when building a website, as none of these two can stand on its own.

User Experience (UX) focuses on target groups of people and usually bases decisions on their design preferences, as well as the industry’s trends, while SEO tends to focus more on the actual site and its data, in order to increase the content’s visibility in search engines.

However, there is a spot that these two meet…

Google made it very clear in its Webmaster Guidelines that even in SEO optimisation, users should be the centre of attention:

Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines.

And this is only a reminder on why SEO cannot work in isolation from other factors that affect a site’s performance, especially when the focus of the old days on keyword-stuffed topics is long gone.

Here are five points that remind us how UX can blend with SEO to improve a site’s performance:

1. Creating content for the user

Both UX and SEO should focus on the user and despite the older perception that SEO’s effectiveness depends on keyword and page optimisation, Google keeps reminding us to also think of the users when creating content.

It’s the human element that both users and search engines appreciate, as it indicates that the main goal is to satisfy the user, rather than the engine, although the latter will also favour the specific page in the ranking.

Whether it’s design or optimisation, the emphasis on the users’ needs help a page improve its performance and the audience will reward this effort with an increased time spent on the site.

2. Readability

Content should aim at relevance, quality and engagement, in order to become appealing and thus, convince the users to spend more time on it.

UX can enhance the appeal and the readability of a page and this may boost SEO, as the quality of the content is favouring a site’s crawlability from search engines.

Readability in SEO is the optimisation of the content in order to be clear, relevant, and informative, covering a topic as much as possible, in order to increase the page’s authority for search engines.

What’s more, keywords and on-page optimisation (even with the simplest steps) favour a post’s readability, providing that they are properly applied to enhance the browsing (and crawling) experience.

There’s no need to focus on target keywords anymore to increase the page’s ranking on SERPs, especially if it affects the quality of the content and its readability, as neither search engines, nor users will appreciate it.

Readability for UX is all about pleasing the users that access a page, ensuring that their first impressions will be positive.

A clear structure and a functional page, which works for all devices and browsers, contribute to an improved user experience and increase the chances of creating an engaged audience.

It’s the concise, legible, functional and properly formatted content that defines readability both for SEO and UX, with the combination of the two making a great match that users will enjoy.

3. Visual appeal

Visual content may contribute to the appeal of a page and both UX and SEO focus on its optimisation.

As human beings process visual elements faster than written information, images, videos and any other types of visual content are becoming important to the user experience.

In terms of SEO, visual content can be optimised to help search engines discover it and provide another way of leading traffic to your page through the rise of visual search engines.

User experience understands the importance of including visual content to a page, in order to increase its effectiveness, although it is very important to maintain the right balance, as visual content should not replace the actual text.

Moreover, both SEO and UX advocates agree that large images may affect the browsing experience, as they may disrupt the layout of a page and increase its load time.

Thus, always optimise your visual content, while keeping in mind the different devices, favouring both the desktop and the mobile experience.

4. Usability

It’s not just the design, but also the functionality of a page that affects the user experience.

An easy navigation allows users to further explore a page and and a proper menu functionality, internal link structure and clear navigation labels contribute to the time the users spend on a page and most importantly, they affect whether they will find what they’re looking for, which was the reason they initially clicked on the page.

What’s more, sitemaps are useful both for users and search engines, as they help the indexing, the navigation and the crawling of a site, which both SEO and UX want.

SEO and UX also agree on the importance of maintaining the right page speed, ensuring that heavy images, ads and faulty functionality won’t affect the time it takes to load a page. As users are becoming impatient with the loading speed of a site, it is critical to measure and improve the page speed, in order to keep the bounce rate as low as possible.

It is also important to test a page’s performance in all the browsers and the devices, aiming for a seamless experience for each user, with an additional focus on mobile users that keep increasing.

Furthermore, accessibility is also significant, both for SEO and UX, and it can be enhanced by ensuring that all pages are useful for readers with visual impairments, for example,  who use screen readers to navigate a page.

Is your content descriptive? Is the navigation checked? Are your images captioned?

5. Retain users

UX aims to provide the site experience that helps users browse and find relevant and informative content and the right navigation pattern can guide them to the next steps in an easy and simple way that seems effortless to them.

Navigation and user paths may ensure that you retain users on your site, and by the time this is achieved, it’s time to think about conversion.

Both SEO and UX should have the idea of conversion in mind, either by turning visitors into loyal users, by encouraging them to subscribe to an email newsletter, or by turning them into clients.

Don’t be afraid to create calls to action that will help the users know what you expect from them. After all, users prefer to have clear guidance, rather than being exposed to multiple options that may paralyse them.

You don’t have to create content by simply having the idea of conversion in mind, but still, it’s the ultimate goal to understand what your audience wants and blend a great browsing experience with your business goals.

How UX and SEO optimisation may enhance a site’s performance

It’s not necessarily complicated to blend SEO and UX to improve a site’s performance, and it’s even more important to understand why these two cannot work independently anymore, at least not with the same effectiveness.

It’s SEO that may lead traffic to the site and help it reach a higher position on SERPs, but it’s UX that will determine whether the traffic can be maintained and converted into the set goals.

Thus, every site trying to improve its performance through UX and SEO should offer:

• Quality, informative, and relevant content
• Easy to use structure and simple and effective navigation
• Optimisation of text and images to please both users and search engines
• Appealing design that focuses on accessibility
• Clear call-to-action, both around the users’ next clicks, but also around the desired conversion

from https://searchenginewatch.com/2016/05/27/five-ways-ux-blends-with-seo-to-improve-a-sites-performance/

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/145012717504

Winners and losers of Google’s latest mobile friendly update: USA

Last week, Google’s John Mueller confirmed on Twitter that Google’s latest, stronger Mobile Friendly Update has been fully rolled out.

FYI The mobile changes mentioned here are now fully rolled out. https://t.co/fTB3ia6LJ2

— John Mueller (@JohnMu) May 12, 2016

This update is supposed to give an even more powerful boost to mobile-friendly pages.

When we try to figure out the winners and losers of this, it’s actually much easier to identify the losers. This has to do with Google using the same index for both desktop- and mobile-searches.

This means that a small positive change, caused by the website’s SEO or webmaster, can actually improve the visibility of both the desktop and mobile results.

This makes it quite difficult to figure out the if the ‘Mobile Friendly Update #2’ was the cause for the increase.

Nonetheless, I will show you some examples for websites where the update is the most likely cause for success.

As far as the losing websites are concerned, we are able to check for all the problems that Google said webmasters should look out for, when it comes to mobile.

We looked at the mobile visibility for 200 domains for the time frame between April 25th and May 16th, 2016. We only took those domains into account which had a visibility score of at least 3 points for the Mobile Visibility Index.

Here are the most interesting cases:

Losers

1) Instructables.com

Instructables.com crashed from 44.9 points to 12.2 points in the Mobile Visibility Index (a decrease of -70.56%)

This case is very interesting as we can use the new Google Mobile Friendly Tool to analyse their mobile version.

For many URLs there are up to five resources that are blocked to the Googlebot. Some of these blocked resources are from advertisement platforms, but just blocking the resources does not mean that Googlebot might not still see the following during their crawl…

When I visited the website from my iPhone, or using the Google Chrome browser, I was shown some annoying advertisements and there are also some interstitials.

As Googlebot will obviously ignore cookies, it is very likely that Googlebot gets to see these interstitials every time it visits the site. The crash may be caused by either problem.

It not only lost visibility in the USA but also in UK and ES (they also have content in Spanish that ranks on Google.es)

2) Moveflat.com

Moveflat.com went from a visibility score of 3.272 to 1.929 (a decrease of -41.05%)

This is a very simple case: moveflat.com is simply not showing their mobile website to mobile users, by default. The user must actively click on a link. This makes them a good example when we consider John Müller’s statement:

“The intent of the search query is still a very strong signal – so even if a page with high quality content is not mobile-friendly, it could still rank well if it has great, relevant content“

It seems that this website does not belong to the above category.

3) Hipmunk.com

Hipmunk.com went from a visibility score of 13.593 to 9.770 (a decrease of -28.13%)

While the people at Hipmunk.com seem very likeable with their chipmunk mascot, they also have some technical problems.

If we run the site through Google’s Mobile Friendly Test, we notice that Google will analyse the desktop version of the page. The sad part is that, if I open the website with my smartphone, I am shown a mobile version of the page.

If you do not have an appropriate mobile version of your website, or if Google cannot find/access it, you will have problems trying to rank well for mobile searches.

In the next chart you can see the historic ranking data for the desktop and mobile results for hipmunk.com for the keywords “cheapest flights.”

The red line shows the desktop positions while the blue line shows mobile rankings.

We can see that in the desktop-search they have been ranking in the top 10 for this keyword for a long time, while for mobile they only managed to crack the top 10 results three times, which is actually a pretty good summary of what is happening with the mobile friendly Google update.

Winners

As I said before, it is easier to identify the losers than the winners. While the winners could be where they are because they benefited from Google’s latest mobile friendly update, they could also show an increase because of positive SEO changes.

1) Boardgamegeek.com

Boardgamegeek.com managed to increase their visibility from 5.774 points to 10.024 (an increase of +73.60%)

This case is interesting as we see a decrease in desktop visibility while the mobile-visibility is on the rise. The amazing thing is that they actually do not have a mobile version at all!

This will likely come back to Jon Mueller’s statement from before that: “even if a page with high quality content is not mobile-friendly, it could still rank well if it has great, relevant content.”

This could definitely be the case for Boardgamegeek, a domain that is already 16 years old, has a massive community of users and a lot of relevant content for the more than 77.000 games they cover.

2) Brainpop.com

Brainpop.com went from a visibility Index score of 8.973 to 12.950 (an increase of +44.32%)

The target audience for this educational website are young adults, who – as we all know – live glued to their smartphones. In the above chart we can nicely see how they break their negative trend after the update went live.

This shows that the same URL (the mobile update works on a URL level) has a better ranking for mobile than desktop for the keyword “electric circuits.”

3) Reuters.com

Reuters.com managed to increase its visibility score from 19.315 to 27.311 (an increase of +41.40%)

In many countries we see news portals sporting a higher desktop visibility, while here we see the mobile visibility come out on top.

If we look at the ranking history below, for the keyword “indian temple”, we see the desktop rankings in red and mobile in blue. In the past, neither ranked very high, but after the update, the mobile version jumped into the top 10.

It is very likely that the domain was then able to create positive user signals through their mobile results, which then also helped the desktop ranking. This very much makes sense once we consider that Google only has one index for mobile and desktop.

Juan González is the SEO and Country Manager from Sistrix.

from https://searchenginewatch.com/2016/05/27/winners-and-losers-of-googles-last-mobile-friendly-update-usa/

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/145012717744

Why ecommerce sites should use both SEM and SEO for acquisition

It is well-known that in order to get a good return on investment in terms of marketing, online retailers need to be constantly in front of their customers. However, with the rise of online users, it is important these retailers adopt a multichannel approach.

Despite being similar in that SEM and SEO both aim to improve visibility through rankings on search engines, they do have significant differences.

SEM is a pay-per-click (PPC) service, while SEO improves ranking organically and does not involve paying for search results.

However, with Adobe’s recent Q4 Digital Advertising Report explaining that not only are CPCs in decline in Europe, but click-through rates are on the rise, all signs are pointing to a Paid Search orientated strategy.

Are retailers better off investing their money in SEM or their time in SEO? Let’s explore the arguments for each technique.

Why should ecommerce retailers use SEM?

Quick results

With SEM, results can be achieved relatively quickly. Of course, you will be required to make changes in the AdWords interface, however once this has been done, you can see results almost instantly.

With SEO on the other hand, you will need to implement a longer-term strategy and it can take time to reap the rewards of your efforts.

Better conversion rates

According to New Media Campaigns, PPC holds a slight edge in conversion rates as paid search results are 1.5 times more likely to convert click-throughs from the search engine.

Direct control over your visibility

Even with a significant amount of time invested into SEO, there is no guarantee that you will ever appear in the top spots on search results pages. While the same can almost be said for PPC, bidding plays a huge role in paid search campaigns and increasing your budget can take you so far in improving your visibility on search engines.

Few website optimisations

Although good website structure helps to improve your PPC ranking, it is not incremental to do so to achieve good paid search results. SEO on the other hand, requires that your website’s structure and content are optimised to achieve good results

Why use SEO as well as SEM?

While there are many arguments that may convince online retailers to rely on Paid Search, there are also many benefits to using SEO as well as SEM in their multi-channel strategies.

No direct additional costs

Besides your time and effort, SEO allows you to achieve results without any direct additional costs. SEM on the other hand, can obviously require a significant amount of investment, particularly for competitive keywords.

Organic results more likely to be clicked on

According to the same study by New Media Campaigns, organic results are 8.5 times more likely to be clicked on than paid search results!

Improve brand awareness

With organic results more likely to be clicked on, it is a no-brainer to invest in an SEO strategy. However, another added benefit is the possibility to improve brand awareness.

Presuming that you are able to successfully place your ads in paid search results, also appearing in organic results will help to reinforce your message and improve the visibility of your brand. Over time, the more your brand awareness increases, the more likely consumers are to trust your brand name.

A long-term strategy

It will take time and effort to properly optimise your website for search engines, but in the long term it will help bring you continuous website traffic for free.

Of course, you will need to be sure to keep up-to-date with the latest guidelines to ensure that you are not penalised and your efforts don’t end up going down the drain.

As you can see, there are many advantages to both SEO and SEM, however what is important to take away is that they are complementary techniques. Online retailers are generally encouraged to start by adopting both strategies.

For newly-launched businesses, SEM will accelerate brand awareness, as users start to recognise and trust your brand name. As a first step, it is wise to invest more into SEM while your SEO efforts get off the ground. You can then balance your investments once your organic visibility increases.

Mark Haupt is UK Sales Director at Twenga Solutions and a contributor to Search Engine Watch.

from https://searchenginewatch.com/2016/05/26/why-ecommerce-sites-should-use-both-sem-and-seo-for-acquisition/

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/144966368319

Three tips to improve your mobile marketing from Nick Wilsdon, Vodafone

While marketers realise the importance of mobile, many of them have yet to catch up with consumer expectations, or realise how SEO and mobile work together.

Everybody knows that it’s the year of mobile (again). Everybody knows that smartphones are behind more and more internet searches. But still, not everybody connects the two.

This winter, experience management platform Sitecore and UK market research company Vanson Bourne surveyed brand marketers all over the world about mobile marketing. While 97% of them agreed that a good mobile experience impacts customer loyalty, only 59% have a solid mobile strategy in place.

Part of that is because purchases haven’t caught up just yet. According to Google research, mobile commerce is particularly prevalent in countries like Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa, where at least 60% of consumers regularly make purchases with their phones. But in many Western nations – including the US, the UK, Belgium, France and Germany – that figure is less than 10.

Nick Wilsdon, lead SEO for the Vodafone Group, believes there’s a symbiotic relationship between mobile SEO and mobile commerce. He believes that marketers excelling at the former will see more of the latter.

“[Too many marketers] haven’t been thinking about their site through mobile and not testing it enough. They don’t function in mobile; the buttons are too small,” said Wilsdon at Shift London. “The mobile web is broken right now. Very few people get it right, but there are a few champions in the area.”

1. Mobile and SEO

Last year, Google famously changed up its algorithm to favour mobile-friendly sites. The search giant has since launched the Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) initiative, which was designed to speed up mobile content.

More than three-quarters of people will abandon a site that doesn’t load in five seconds; 40% will X out after three. “Mobilegeddon” was born with consumer behavior in mind and brands that don’t follow along are penalised.

Still, 39% of the marketers surveyed by Sitecore don’t have mobile optimised websites in place. Wilsdon doesn’t believe they realise the kind of effect SEO has on mobile.

“This impacts massively on SEO because Google will give us a ranking benefit for having a fast website. We’ll then get more exposure and then get more traffic,” said Wilsdon. “It dovetails with everything that happens in performance.”

2. The ascension of apps

In the UK and Ireland, the Domino’s app now accounts for nearly half its orders. Wilsdon believes that case study is something marketers should aspire to, as mobile internet activity is increasingly happening in-app.

As a result, Google has been pushing its fast-loading Progressive Web Apps concept for most of the last year.

“We can cache parts of it and do push notifications, and basically make our webpages act more like apps,” said Wilsdon.

Analyzing data from 52 million Android smartphones, Paris-based Cheetah Ad Platform compared app engagement from around the world. Engaging with an average of 53 apps each month, Brazilians have the world’s most competitive app market.

For marketers looking to replicate Brazil’s app engagement, Wilsdon recommends smart app banners, which bridge the gap between the mobile web and apps; and native code, which bridges the gap between marketers and consumers.

“Native code actually interacts with your phone and knows whether you have the app installed already. This goes into app deep linking, which is a massive game changer for the web, which we can now link to specific functionality in apps from SERPs,” he said.

3. The seamless factor

Vodafone pushes Indian consumers toward the app when it’s time to pay their bills. That reduces the number of steps in process, as the app already knows who they are.

The strategy there fits in with a larger theme of seamlessness. Making the experience easier is ultimately going to increase customer satisfaction. About 90% of people don’t want to create a new login on a website or stay on a mobile site if they get their login wrong on the first try.

Push notifications are another good – but under-utilised, in Wilsdon’s opinion – strategy for retaining customers and making their lives easier. For example, your website can send alerts to users even when their browser isn’t open, reminding them that they have an item in their cart.

“Previously, we thought of mobile as something to bolt onto our sites. That’s not the case anymore. We have to retool the entire way we’re creating content,” said Wilsdon. “The mobile web is open for business; we now have the tools to make it work.”

This was our inaugural Shift event. Our next one will take place in San Francisco this August – see you there!

from https://searchenginewatch.com/2016/05/26/three-tips-to-improve-your-mobile-marketing-from-nick-wilsdon-vodafone/

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/144966368134

Is content marketing really working? Advice and insight from #ClickZChat

We talk a lot about content. How to make it, what makes it work, how to measure it’s effects, if there’s too much of it and more. The fact that we’re a good few years into the content marketing revolution but we’re still having these conversations is telling in itself.

Despite many, many assertions to the contrary, a number of people and organisations simply do not believe that content works.

We took to Twitter to find out why this myth persisted, and what we could do about it in this week’s #ClickZChat.

As always, we asked three questions in one hour. Here’s the insight and advice from our witter followers:

As always – one hour, three questions. Please use A1, A2 or A3 and the #ClickZChat hashtag in your answer. pic.twitter.com/gyP1R3aUHc

— ClickZ (@ClickZ) May 18, 2016

Q1: Do you think the C-Suite *really* believe in the value of content marketing Why or why not?

Q1: Do you think the C-Suite *really* believe in the value of #contentmarketing? Why or why not? #ClickZChat pic.twitter.com/Se6P9ZlkFb

— ClickZ (@ClickZ) May 18, 2016

Many felt that we were still relatively early in the content marketing adoption cycle, and that this view would change given time (and proof of data)

@sewatch industry recognition (and investment) will come as the quality of brand-inspired content rises #ClickZChat

— DigitasLBi U.S. (@Digitas) May 18, 2016

However, when it came to companies already doing it, metrics were often a sticking point.

Q1: I think a lot of orgs struggle to recognise value, because for all the talk, we’re still looking for one-step conversion #ClickZChat

— Matt Owen (@lexx2099) May 18, 2016

Last-click conversion was still being used in many cases, which made it harder to show genuine dollar value

A1) Content is only king if its got ROI to back up the talk. Managers see value in content, but need a$$urance. #ClickZChat @sewatch @ClickZ

— Chicago Style SEO (@chicagostyleseo) May 18, 2016

A1: Ultimately the c-suite only care about money. The cash upshot needs to be made clear to them. #ClickZChat pic.twitter.com/AWfpA7Hn8j

— Andrew Warren-Payne (@agwp) May 18, 2016

It is worth mentioning that there are plenty of trackable numbers out there, some of which may not fall under the traditional ‘marketing’ banner. Search was a popular measure of success

A1: I would have thought the value of content is self-evident, esp when it comes to SEO. But I’m not a C-suite manager, so… #ClickZChat

— Bex Sentance (@rainbowbex) May 18, 2016

@sewatch The best thing they could do is show them the benefits of doing it, but it’s really hard to make someone understand #ClickZChat

— Jonathan Nuñez (@JohnNunez2905) May 18, 2016

And ultimately we may just need a little faith and patience. Not something we all have the luxury of unfortunately

do #contentmarketing for helping the customers , money will follow you later. have patience #ClickZChat https://t.co/zLAmWtStyL

— bhola prasad (@b_prasad26) May 18, 2016

So, how are marketers measuring ROI from content? Next up, we asked or followers for personal tips and examples…

Q2 How do YOU measure ROI from Content Marketing?

Q2: How do YOU measure ROI from Content Marketing? #ClickZChat Tools, metrics and tips please! pic.twitter.com/hsjbfRex9m

— Search Engine Watch (@sewatch) May 18, 2016

Starting with the basics. Having analytics in place, but also tracking human responses to content:

A2) #GoogleAnalytics ofc but also peep #socialmedia engagement. Whats the point of quality content w/o the ? #ClickZChat @sewatch @ClickZ

— Chicago Style SEO (@chicagostyleseo) May 18, 2016

It’s also important to have clear goals to begin with. Success looks very different from company to company

@sewatch It really depends on what you want to achieve with your content, do you want more SM followers? email subscribers? #ClickZChat

— Jonathan Nuñez (@JohnNunez2905) May 18, 2016

Raj mentioned that simple actions could lead to larger results. It’s important to consider which action you are driving, and at what stage it sits in your sales funnel

A2. If it’s content downloads or webinar registrations, use hubspot landing pgs & tie to salesforce crm #ClickZChat https://t.co/AcdD6TEoHT

— Raj Nijjer (@rajnijjer) May 18, 2016

With this in mind, it’s important to remember that it may not have to make ANY money. Content could reduce paid media costs, or work as a lead generation machine that does not convert directly

A2: For B2B, it’s a cost per lead thing unless you have data that ties all the way to sale. #ClickZchat pic.twitter.com/SkkIXJhpEZ

— Andrew Warren-Payne (@agwp) May 18, 2016

Q3: Which roles would you have as part of your content marketing dream team?

Q3 Our final question today – which roles would you have as part of your content marketing dream team? #ClickZChat pic.twitter.com/2p1SVxtfvi

— ClickZ (@ClickZ) May 18, 2016

Initially, the focus was very much on creation, with lots of votes for key roles like designers, writers and editors:

@sewatch A3 : Copywriter(s), editor(s), design studio #ClickZChat

— John Watton (@jwatton) May 18, 2016

As mentioned earlier though, once you have created something, you need to have it seen by the right people

Q3 Titles differ, but need writing skills, design, and a distribution supercharger (Growth hacker, social manager etc) #ClickZChat

— Matt Owen (@lexx2099) May 18, 2016

it’s also worth pointing out that editorial and creative should have a strategic structure, rather than just concentrating on standalone pieces of content

A3. A kick-ass Editorial/Journalist skillset with ability to tell stories for prospects and customers #ClickZChat https://t.co/VlfbqbEgsf

— Raj Nijjer (@rajnijjer) May 18, 2016

A3. Depends on the org.
Definitely get the internal team involved with thought leadership content.
Analytics team to measure.#ClickZChat

— Jason Stockwell (@jj_stockwell) May 18, 2016

And needs to know the brand and the audience intimately

@ClickZ A3: Not a role, but I think wit is really underrated. A funny voice is something brands w the best content tend to have in common.

— Mike O’Brien (@MikeO13rien) May 18, 2016

And we received this remarkably thorough answer from Chris Lake which highlights the crossover between roles very nicely:

A3 I know @lakey from @empiricalproof has previously mapped out his content dream team #ClickZChat pic.twitter.com/r4R8wiUWsf

— Andrew Warren-Payne (@agwp) May 18, 2016

Overall it seems that marketers are convinced by the ability of content to go beyond push marketing and create measures like engagement which are more valuable over time, but currently many of us are lagging when it comes to proper planning and measurement techniques. Hopefully the continuing advance of digital transformation will see this change for the better.

If you’d like to know more about content marketing, check out this useful Content Marketing Strategy Documentation Map.

Thanks as always for all your fantastic answers. Join us over on twitter every Wednesday for the next #ClickZChat

Here’s a new content marketing strategy documentation map

from https://searchenginewatch.com/2016/05/25/is-content-marketing-really-working-advice-and-insight-from-clickzchat/

source http://kateninablog.tumblr.com/post/144966367504