You’ve probably received dozens of unsolicited emails and phone calls from so called SEO experts promising to get you the first position in Google. But just what is good and bad SEO in 2019?

WHAT IS SEO?

SEO is Search Engine Optimisation. It’s the practice of improving your chances of ranking well in the search engines and because Google is the most used search engine in Australia, that’s the one I’ll be talking about today.

We put a lot of thought into it, but it only takes Google machines a nano-second to decide which website to put at the top.

Google want relevance because they want you to be happy with the results they serve up to you. If you’re not happy, you’ll eventually switch to a different search engine.

Google don’t really comment much on SEO or on how to rank well, as they don’t really like people to “manipulate” the search results.

In the past they’ve made huge changes to their algorithms to stop people doing just that. This is good and bad.

It’s good if you’re doing everything right (read on to find out what that means), but it can be bad if in the past you’ve implemented what Google (now) say to be “bad”.

The biggest change happened early in 2011 with Google’s Panda update. This update affected many low-quality websites, including directory websites.

Google realised people were leaving in droves because the search results were full of sales page websites and directories. Annoying right?

People come to Google with a problem to solve and they want it solved with a few clicks.

BAD SEO

Bad SEO can cause big problems for your ranking in Google and for your business.

Poor Google ranking equals little to no leads coming from your website. We have a joke about this – Where’s the best place to hide a body? On the second page of Google, because no one ever goes there (boom-tish).

But it’s no joke if you’ve invested good money on a website and you don’t get a return on it. It can end up being, at best, just a digital brochure that only gets seen by your mum and people you send the link to.

Worst scenario – your website is just nowhere to be found on Google. Or it’s on page 33…if you have the patience to click through that far.

This is often referred to as a “Google Penalty”.

The best way to know if Google has penalised your website is to see what happens when you type your website name into the Google search bar, with spaces and without .com.au and you may need to type your suburb in too if you’re in a competitive business.

If there’s another business higher up than yours, there’s a good chance your website has been penalised by Google.

HOW DID YOU GET BAD SEO?

If you have ever used an SEO company that was cheap and cheerful and offered lots of backlinks, then that’s probably how you ended up with bad SEO. A backlink, by the way, is just what it says it is, a link from one website back to your website.

Mostly these SEO companies do low quality backlinking from “link farms” or sites setup just to house backlinks. Usually there’s little to no content, and what little content there is never relates to your business or industry.

These link farms are generally not in Australia and are very often not English. Other low-quality links are to comments added to blogs. Usually, it’s not at all related to your business or industry and the comment is either broken English or just garbled words that make no sense at all.

But, of course, a low Google ranking doesn’t always mean your site has been penalised. It could just be you’ve never put the time or money into making sure your website ranks well.

Or, conversely, you might be one of the lucky ones – in a sought-after niche that’s not very competitive. Sadly, that’s rarely the case. Most of us need to actively nurture and improve our websites so we stay front and centre for our ideal client and make the most of the ever-changing online world.

WHAT GOOGLE WANTS (GOOD SEO)

SEO in 2019 has to be quality because Google machine learning and AI is getting better and better. You can read more about AI & Machine Learning in my blog post here.

The Google AI machine knows a quality link from a bad link, it knows where the website (or blog) is, what language it is in and what the subject or purpose of it is.

And, most importantly, it’s making a judgement of YOUR website too based on the quality of the sites linking back to you AND it’s making this judgment in a split second each and every time someone searches for a service or product like yours.

DIFFERENT TYPES OF SEO.

SEO falls into two main categories:

• On Page SEO
• Off Page SEO

On Page SEO.
As the name suggests, it’s the SEO on your website (or page/s). The most important things to get right are:

• structure (this is a big one)
• relevance
• keywords
• meta data
• grammar and spelling
• word count
• readability
• images
• speed (another big one)
• internal and external linking
• User Experience (UX)
• your address (this is critical if you are a local business), and
• much more besides.

Off Page SEO.

This is the stuff that happens off your website, backlinks are an important component of off page SEO. Good quality backlinks will have a positive impact on your website (just like bad links have a negative impact).

There are many things that can be done off page to help Google understand (and like) your offering and, in turn, help potential clients find your website.

• Strategic content marketing and blogging (this is a big one).
• Guest posts on high quality blogs or news sites (think Flying Solo, Buzzfeed, Huffington Post). Start small and build up.
• Have influencers in your niche mention you and link back to your website – but you have to build the relationship first.
• Get positive media.
• Contribute to quality forums on subjects related to your niche.
• List your business on relevant, quality directories – free and paid.
• Optimise your Google My Business (GMB) listing with more text, images, video etc…
• Strategic social media linking back to your website.
• Rinse and repeat – over and over.

How do you know if an SEO “expert” is legit or not?

• Do they have a real email address – ending with an actual domain name, or is it @gmail, @hotmail or @someotherfreeemailservice? This is a real giveaway – if they don’t have a real email address, then send it straight to spam.
• If they do have a real email address from a real domain – Google search it, DO NOT click on any links (just to be sure).
• What happens when you do Google search their name? Does it appear at the top? Does it appear at all?
• Are they based in Australia? Do they have an actual business presence in Australia?
• Do they offer a strategy session so they can learn about your needs and your business?
• Are they even interested in what you do and how you do it?
• Are they cheap and cheerful? Good SEO is not cheap. If you are not sure, then divide their monthly fee by 30 and ask yourself if you can buy any other service, with that amount of money per day.

Online Influence can help you with “good” SEO. We can also help fix your “bad” SEO. Take advantage of our free strategy session by filling in the form above, or give us a call today and we’ll have a chat about how we can help you.

Why do you need a Google Maps listing?

The other day I needed to contact a local Computer repair shop that I had visited last week about repairing my laptop, but I couldn’t find the card he gave me with their phone number, so I started looking for them on Google – as I always do. I didn’t even think to look for it in any other way, because well, why would I? Google is much quicker and I can actually read the font on my monitor, unlike the tiny fonts in the phone book  – I’m from the baby-boomer era and well, I need reading glasses for most things these days.

I actually do own a Yellow pages, but it’s propping up monitor (good use for it) and I didn’t want to drag it out from there – and to be quite honest, I didn’t even think of doing that.

What a journey it was. I searched for it for ages, typing in every term I could think of related to “Computer Repair business Richmond NSW”. I live in a semi-rural area and it’s a 20min drive to town so it was worth persevering. So after 15mins I had a brain wave (sometimes that happens) and decided to go to Google “street view” to see if I could see the name of the business and try Googling that. I was in luck! The phone number was printed on the window so I zoomed in and got the number.

You wouldn’t think it would be that hard would you? I mean don’t all businesses have some sort of “online presence”? I guess I must live in a bubble because clearly they don’t! And you know what? Not many people would go to the lengths I did to find a business, they would just go to the first one that popped up in Google, I usually do too, but sometimes I’m like a dog with a bone – I don’t give up very easily.

So after finally finding the phone number, I called them and the owner answered the phone so I told him about my difficulties finding him on Google and he said “well that’s because they want me to pay and I’m not going to do that”. I was gob-smacked! Lost for words (and that doesn’t happen very often). So I asked him the question about my laptop and promptly hung up.

Now there are a few things going on here for this guy;

• Firstly he doesn’t know that a Google Places listing is FREE – yep, zero, zip, nothing. Now I understand that lots of business owners don’t know that, but I would expect a geek that owns a computer repair business to know this.
• It begs the question – What else is he behind in? What else doesn’t he know that he should know?
• Secondly, What’s wrong with paying to get customers? Did he really think that all he had to do was pay  some rent in the main street and instantly customers would come flocking in? If you put an ad in the local paper, isn’t that paying to get customers? An ad in the Yellow pages, isn’t that paying to get customers? BUT refer back to my first point – Google Places listings are FREE.
• If you really don’t know how to do anything online, you might want to pay someone (like us) to do it for you, but if you are a bit tech-savvy you should be able to do it yourself. Of course there are lots of little hints and tips that a professional could help you with, but the listing is FREE.

So what’s so great about a Google Places listing? Here’s a screenshot of a search I did for “Plumber Parramatta” The listings with A, B, C etc on the right, are Google maps/places listings.

These businesses are all on the FIRST PAGE of Google with their Places listing – these listings have a website linked to their listing, but it’s not necessary, if they didn’t have a website they would just have their Google Maps listing. The searcher doesn’t care if they have a website or not – they just want a Plumber!

So how does it work? Several things are at play when you type something into the Google search box;

• Google knows where your computer is (perhaps not exactly but they have an approximate location). Now don’t start with the whole “Big Brother” thing – it’s just the way it is now.
• When you type a suburb at the end of your query, Google will “serve up” the local businesses in that suburb (as in the above search), if you just type in “Plumber” you will get a more broad result – in this case we got Plumbers in Sydney (below). Most people who use Google for finding local businesses know this and will usually put the suburb on the end.

So, how many people use Google search to find local businesses? Last month (Oct 12) there was approximately 400 people searching for “Plumber Parramatta” – now think about it – someone going to Google and typing this in is most probably looking for a plumber NOW.

That’s the big difference between putting Google and ANY other medium. Let me explain, you would usually only search Google for a plumber (or any local business) when you actually need them, like in my computer repair shop example above.
So in our Plumber example, that’s 4,800 potential new customers each year searching for a Plumber in Parramatta – not bad at all.

I wonder how many new customers you are missing out on each year?

Because many companies and consultants today are offering search optimization services, it is important for a business owner to carefully choose the right expert with whom to work. Here are the top seven things to look for in an SEO company before deciding to use its services:

Because things change regularly in the world of SEO – this article has been edited to reflect Google’s ongoing updates (see 7a – d & 8 below). I will come back and edit this regularly, if you like our Facebook page  you will keep up with the the latest in the world of SEO. 

1. Good track record. It is always more preferable to work with an SEO company which has a good reputation for delivering high quality services and positive results. A business owner should also ensure that the SEO firm does not have a record of employing black hat search engine tactics.

2. Depth of knowledge. Depth of knowledge should also be considered because consultants who fail to deliver tend to disappear when they don’t deliver results. Working with a consultant who can demonstrate up to the minute knowledge of current trends is important.

3. Availability of customer/technical support whenever needed. It is always preferable to work with an SEO company which has a quick system for assisting customer needs and technical concerns. Help should be available when needed so that possible glitches and issues can be given instant attention.

4. List of satisfied clients. Looking at the list of clients of an SEO firm will give assurance to a business owner that the company he wants to work with is a stable one. Very often, an SEO firm will showcase their services by letting potential clients know who they have worked with in the past. In the event that this information is not available, a business owner should do some research regarding the SEO company using online and offline sources.

5. Overwhelming amount of unsolicited positive reviews and testimonials. Social proof is a strong indicator that a company is strong, stable, and well-known for delivering top notch services. Testimonials and unbiased positive reviews can easily be searched for online.

6. Great value on a starter package. Different SEO companies offer different SEO starter packages. The business owner should carefully evaluate the various SEO starter packages offered and must choose the one that fits current business needs. An ideal starter package should contain content production services, keyword research, online distribution, and basic website optimization.

7. Wide range of SEO services. Aside from a good starter package, an SEO company should be able to provide other search engine optimization services such as building backlinks, website re-structuring, and recommending other search engine marketing solutions to clients.

a. Check out the SEO company’s website. If they have broken links (links that land on a “404 Page not Found” page) and and poor navigation etc, it could mean they don’t really understand the importance of “on-page” SEO. If the Google bots are confused & frustrated by hitting dead ends, they will (rightly) assume the readers are too and will not rank the site well.

b. Check out the URL’s – are they easy to read? URL’s are important in the world of SEO if they are clean & concise, they help the Google bots and the reader to work out where they are & what the subject is. E.g. URL’s with numbers in them, or words like index.php etc? (URL is the address of each page on a website – you find them at the top of your browser).

c. Check out the “About” page. Do they tell you who they are and where they are?  Is there any photos of the business owners and their staff? If not, why not? If an SEO company doesn’t want you to know who they really are or where they are located, don’t do business with them. The same goes for any business online. This is part of the social proof we all want online – it helps to build the “know, like & trust”. You can’t know, like or trust a business that won’t say who they are or where they are.

d. Is the website slow to load and giving you mixed messages? Like “page not found” and  “your shopping cart is empty” (when you didn’t even know they had one) and flash images and old outdated technology, like moving images that take ages to display or move.

8. Finally, do they keep you up to date with the latest changes from Google? Are they willing to educate their clients with workshops and/or online training? I know not everyone wants to know the nitty gritty of SEO, but you should be given the option of doing some it yourself if you wish to.

If you want to increase your rankings in Google get in touch with Trish and the team on 1300 199 757 or email us here

Many offline business owners hesitate to hire the services of an SEO expert because of a preconceived notion that search engine optimization is expensive and time consuming. But the truth is that SEO allows an offline business to promote with lesser cost and quicker results than traditional marketing methods. Here are the benefits and advantages of hiring a professional search engine marketer:

• Hiring an SEO expert provides ultimate leverage for the business owner. Because the average offline entrepreneur does not possess savvy internet promotion skills, it is better to outsource the task to someone who is more familiar with implementing SEO campaigns. Various tasks such as keyword research, website structuring, on-page and off-page optimization, and content distribution, may seem overwhelming to an offline business owner. On the other hand, a consultant who is skilled in search engine optimization can fulfill those tasks on an ongoing basis to generate more traffic for a business.

• SEO consultants are able to provide strategies for overcoming the competition. The main advantage of implementing SEO strategies is that only a small percentage of offline businesses are using search engine marketing techniques to promote their products or services. This presents an opportunity for companies who implement SEO because it will give them an edge over their competitors. If many websites within a particular industry are competing for the top spot in Google, an SEO expert can also present solutions and recommendations for beating the competition.

• SEO experts help provide regular organic traffic to a company website. The term “organic traffic” means that website visitors are naturally finding their way to a business website by using particular search phrases. SEO consultants are highly skilled at generating organic traffic. They know which keyword phrases are being searched for by their target market. They know how to build a website in such a way that the search engines can find it rapidly to be included in top search results. In the long run, customers who are generated from SEO campaigns tend to be more loyal and determined buyers than those generated from other means.

The professional fee of an SEO expert can be game-changing investment for businesses, big and small. It could take a novice months, even years, to learn the internet marketing techniques needed to accomplish online traffic results, but hiring a professional SEO consultant will help a business owner experience measurable results reflected in sales and profit.

One of the main misconceptions about search engine optimisation is that it is merely a strategy for internet based businesses. The truth is, there are many opportunities for offline businesses in specific cities to get local customers through the use of effective SEO. Penrith, for example, is a big city full of potential clients for any business, in any industry. If a particular business is located in Penrith, launching an SEO Penrith campaign targeted towards the people living there may be a good strategy for building brand awareness and encouraging repeat store visits.

Through proper use of SEO, Penrith residents can easily find the location of a business or enterprise, be it a restaurant, dental clinic, coffee shop, or local bar. Business offices which are located in obscure streets can now be accessed conveniently by potential customers as they surf online and type the right search keywords. Here are some ways by which local businesses can reach prospects in their area through search engine marketing:

1. Make use of nearby city landmarks to reach potential prospects. If the business establishment is located near a famous city landmark like the Nepean River, a good SEO strategy for a cafe would be to use a keyword such as “coffee shops near Nepean River” in an online search engine marketing campaign. This way, tourists and local residents who are looking for coffee shops in that specific area can easily find the company information online.

2. Discover what people in a specific city are searching for online. For more effective SEO, Penrith based entrepreneurs should perform keyword research to find out what keywords are being searched for by their target market. Free keyword research tools, like the Google Keyword Tool, generate keyword suggestions and give insight to the marketer about the monthly search volume of a particular keyword. By simply typing a popular local keyword in the Google Keyword Tool, such as “restaurants in Penrith” or “Penrith dental clinics”, a marketer or business owner will be able to see other related keyword suggestions pertaining to the local market.

3. Hire the services of a local SEO Sydney consultant or firm. Often it is better to leverage the expertise of people who specialise in search engine optimisation. This way, a business owner can focus on important management tasks and maintaining day to day business operations, instead of spending a lot of time on link building, structuring a website, and producing content. When it comes to SEO, Penrith based businesses should hire a reliable SEO consultant or expert to gain more market exposure.

One of the biggest challenges faced by local businesses is promoting their products or services to a targeted group of people within a specific area. In an effort to reach potential customers, most business owners usually resort to traditional advertising, such as print, radio, and word of mouth. However, the internet presents a better alternative for promoting a local business, and it is through search engine optimization. Sydney based businesses can now create their own company website and then optimize it for search engines such as Google or Yahoo.

Through search engine optimization, Sydney residents and potential customers can easily be targeted in a marketing campaign. This provides more opportunities for local offline businesses to penetrate the market within their nearby vicinity, without paying for expensive advertising and marketing campaigns.

Here are some of the top reasons why search engine optimization is more cost-effective and convenient compared to the more traditional advertising methods:

• Wider Reach. Businesses with search engine optimized websites have the potential to reach more customers in their market, compared to those who still rely on outdated marketing tactics and advertising practices.

• Easier Customer Access To Business Information. Buyers and shoppers tend to compare prices and quality of products by “shopping” around and looking for possible items to buy. Instead of physically going to malls and stores to compare brands and prices, a consumer can instead browse the web and type search phrases like “best jewellery store in Sydney”. If there is a business website optimized for that search phrase, it will appear in search results and will easily be accessed by the consumer.

• Long-Term Results. Traditional advertising usually offers a fixed timeframe for promotion. But with search engine optimization, Sydney based business websites can receive a regular stream of traffic for many months and years to come. SEO is a “set and forget” strategy which allows business owners to leverage the power of search engines in order to attract more customers.

Through effective implementation of search engine optimization, Sydney business owners can increase the number of people who are familiar with their products or services.

There are two ways by which a local business owner can start implementing SEO campaigns.

The first is to personally learn search engine marketing techniques. This can be time consuming because of the learning curve involved; the second way is to hire the services of an SEO consultant to professionally and immediately implement search engine optimization strategies for an offline business.

Hiring an SEO service provides a lot of advantages for offline business owners who do not have advanced internet marketing experience. First, firms who provide search engine optimization services take care of all the details related to running a successful SEO campaign. This helps the offline business owner focus on other important things – their core competencies – while new customers are generated on a daily basis.

Here’s how the typical process works when an offline business owner chooses to use the services of an SEO company:

• The SEO service provider critiques and restructures a business’ existing website. To better optimize a business website for the search engines, an SEO provider gives recommendations for changing the structure of a website, inserting main keyword phrases, and changing page titles. This increases the chances of a website to get higher rankings on the search engines.

• The provider creates the seed content for distribution. “Seed” content refers to original articles which may eventually be rewritten and distributed through key internet marketing channels. Usually this is done by creating five to ten original articles which are rich in keyword phrases related to a chosen niche or industry. SEO formatting is crucial for these articles to obtain maximum results and traffic after distribution.

• Seed content is rewritten and ‘spun’ in order to create many versions. The SEO service takes the seed content and then rewrites it in order to create many versions. This is crucial in the entire SEO process because Google values original content. Both human rewrites and article spinning are used in order to generate as many versions of the same article as necessary.

• The article versions are distributed systematically on the web. SEO companies, after creating and rewriting content, proceed to distribute the articles throughout the web by using various manual and automated tools. The exact method will depend on which SEO company is doing the service. However, the goal of content distribution is the same for all SEO firms: to generate hundreds of quality incoming links for a website, resulting in ongoing search engine traffic.

• The SEO provider performs other manual tasks which are vital for generating organic traffic. Other tasks are done by an SEO service such as commenting on blogs, reposting article link locations, repurposing articles into other forms of content (such as audio and video), and broadcasting content through RSS feeds. This may seem a bit complicated for those with limited online marketing experience, but reliable SEO companies make this entire process easier for business owners.

Offline and online business owners usually ask, “How does a website get on the top of search engine results”? The answer to this question is that Google has a search algorithm which determines which websites should appear on top, and which ones should be listed last. Based on the criteria of this complex algorithm, Google ranks all websites (search engine optimized websites). If many websites are competing for the top spot, the one which meets the search algorithm criteria the most will appear on top.

The problem for business owners who want to start a search engine marketing campaign is that Google keeps the exact details of its search algorithm confidential. This is a preventive measure to keep so- called “black hat” marketers from manipulating the Google ranking system. Fortunately, there are known guidelines for increasing the chances of a website to appear on the first page of Google search results, and possibly be listed on the top spot. Here are some factors that affect the way Google places SEO websites on their ranking and indexing system:

Relevance

Google was originally built to connect users to appropriate websites which contain relevant information.

• Because of this, the Google team takes website content relevance very seriously because they want to enable their users to find the information that they are looking for in as few clicks as possible.

• However, because the Google crawler cannot really comprehend sentences and paragraphs like humans do, the only way it measures relevance is by looking for certain keywords within the title, tags, and content of a website.

• If the keywords in a website match the exact search phrases that internet users typed on Google, the website will have higher chances of getting higher rankings.

There are many ways through which a website can increase its relevance to popular search keywords in a given industry, and this is the subject of a more detailed search engine optimization study.

Website Structure

When it comes to website structure, Google gives more preference to websites which have higher functionality and easier navigability:

• Functionality refers to the ability of a website to give its visitors a convenient way to find the information they are looking for.

• Navigability refers to ease of browsing through availability of navigation bars, hyperlinks, and appropriate page titles.

These two factors of website structure affect the way Google places SEO websites in its indexing and ranking system. This is the main reason why business owners should hire an SEO expert when it comes to building and structuring a website.

In this age of modern communication, the internet is becoming a standard marketing medium for businesses. Even if a business is considered’traditional’ or ‘offline’, the potential for reaching more customers through online means should not be ignored. One of the ways through which an offline business can start tapping into the power of the internet is by hiring an SEO consultant.

Why Hire An SEO Consultant?

1. Search engine optimization is an effective way of giving exposure to a business website to gain an audience of potentially millions of people. In the past, local businesses like restaurants and coffee shops promoted their products and services through sheer word of mouth. Today, a great percentage of consumers go to the internet before they decide to purchase or before they choose a store from which to buy. Reaching these types of customers can greatly increase the profit of a business.

2. SEO consultants are able perform all the complicated tasks related to search engine optimization. This is important because trying to learn all the processes involved in SEO will probably take a business owner months and years of training. But with the services of an SEO consultant, a business owner can start implementing search engine marketing techniques without having to personally go through the hard task of learning it all from scratch.

3. Search engine marketing provides an opportunity for businesses to generate a growing following online. Local stores can now surpass the boundaries of their local area and enjoy the privilege of attracting tourists and people from distant locations. The possibility of striking a joint venture with other business owners in an industry becomes likely because of the wide exposure gained from search engine optimization. A reliable SEO consultant can make these things happen for a business.

How To Get Started

Before launching an online campaign and getting into search engine marketing, it is advisable for a business owner to at least learn the basics of SEO. This way, he will have background knowledge of how SEO works, what are its aims, and what it does for a business.

Without having a basic understanding of search engine marketing, a business owner cannot fully appreciate the services of an SEO consultant. Being knowledgeable about basic SEO will also help a business owner avoid scammers, rip-offs, and fake gurus who are trying to post as internet marketing consultants, when in fact, they are only looking for a quick buck without delivering any genuine results.