The Holy Grail of Internet Marketing: Owning the Whole SERP

Photo from drp.
Used under Creative Commons license.

In many ways, taking charge of your search engine results page is like answering the age-old philosophical question, “Who am I” — but for your business. You may still be in the dark about what motivates some of your personal actions, but if you’re a business owner, I’m pretty certain you know exactly what your business is all about. That’s the first step. Now you need to translate that into Google results. Sound easy? Didn’t think so. It’s a bit like trying to reel in Nessy with a  Pocket Fisherman. But all hope is not lost. You can – and should — take ownership of your SERP (Search Engine Results Page), and there are more ways than ever to do just that.

Integrated search has been a thorny issue for marketers since it came out, and the issue is only getting pricklier.  Local maps, the Knowledge Graph, one-boxes scraped from Wikipedia, and the various tools Google provides based on user searches have combined with ever-increasing screen real estate for paid advertising. The results are often chaotic, and have left some siding with Microsoft’s FairSearch rallying cry of “anti-competitive.” Certainly, online marketing on Google is getting more complex and difficult, but even a part-time marketer such as an SMB owner can use paid, organic, and social techniques to reach the zenith of comprehensive search engine marketing: showing in each of the parts of Google’s SERPs.

For the part-time marketer who is not focused on a number-one rank for every relevant keyword, the biggest goal is to allow a brand-aware user to find the business’s official site by name. Verifying word-of-mouth with anonymous reviews, strengthening the deeper pages on the site, and surfacing real news about the business are all important to ensuring that a new brand-aware customer comes in the door.

Branded AdWords Campaign

The first step for any small business to clearly own the SERP is to start a branded AdWords campaign. By tightly controlling keyword choice with exact and phrase match types, a marketer keeps costs low, avoids brand squatters without filing for a trademark, and strengthens the brand’s appearance on the Google SERP.

It may seem crazy to pay for clicks to your site, especially if your site shows up in the first position organically, but the data shows that having both the first and “zeroth” positions increases clicks by up to 89%. Furthermore, by using phrase and exact match in your keyword set, you limit your ad from showing on less-related keywords, keeping your cost-per-clicks low and manageable. Finally, the naturally high quality score the ad will have for the brand name allows a wide variety of ad extensions to show, expanding both the size and the trust factor of the ad.

Branded Organic Results

Slightly more difficult than showing ads for your brand is to ensure your site shows prominently in organic rankings. While domain name plays a role, the stronger signals come from, as you might expect, links. The easiest way to do this without trying is to get links from news sources and local blogs by doing newsworthy things as a business. Short of getting natural links, posting press releases about truly meaningful company news can be picked up by news sources; and there’s no worry about PR links not working, as was preemptively reported by some outlets.

As important to organic’s role in owning the results pages is managing how the site’s snippet shows. Promoting and demoting sitelinks via webmaster tools allows branded searchers to find deeper, more meaningful pages on the site without refining their search. Authorship provides a face to the name, increasing trust compared to a blank set of search results. Review pages with Schema or hReview markup show that your existing customers love you, and other semantic markup like breadcrumbs makes the content on the page clear before your analytics platform show a bounce.

Google+ & Local Optimization

Authorship has been mentioned before, but Google+ pages have become so much more than a Facebook competitor. By merging Google+ with Local results, it’s become imperative that a marketer set up a Google+ page. Reviews, both on and off Google, +1s by friends, and accurate hours provide a wide variety of information that shows in the Knowledge Graph area above any poorer ads that might be running on your brand name. Linking your Google+ to your site with rel=publisher allows you to combine whatever +1s come to your site with your Google+

But Google+ isn’t a cure-all. Expanding a consistent business profile to Yelp and other, more mundane business directories helps ensure that your Maps listing is strong in its own right, and provides more owned and “rented” content to show for your brand search. Keeping a strong and consistent local presence also helps with the real Holy Grail: non-branded SERP domination.

Convincingly showing up on Google for your own brand name is great, and honestly not too difficult, but there is yet one more major hurdle for the intrepid internet marketer: non-branded search. Getting all these things right is hard enough, but to have to compete with others who have a reasonable reason to show for a given keyword forces you to take all the lessons from brand-level marketing and push it to the limit. The too-short answer is to turn your branded marketing efforts up to 11 while simultaneously shifting gears to target more general terms. Non-branded AdWords requires a well-optimized campaign, a manageable level of competition in your area, and a relevant landing page that ensures high quality scores and comparably low costs-per-click. Again, judicious use of match types can keep the budget-focused marketer from wasting an entire day’s budget on one click.

Consider reaching out for descriptive anchor text, often found in appositives, instead of linking your brand name to help your organic search visibility. The same strategies of outreach and re-publishable content creation will allow your business to reach for the stars in organic search.

Finally, making your social and local efforts relevant to unbranded search queries is the final straw to break Google’s back. Accurately categorizing your business on Google+ Local and Facebook provides on-page factors that make it more likely to show up in SERPs. Likewise, review sites such as Yelp or DealerRater are further strengthened by the natural location and keyword data provided in organic reviews; these, when strengthened by links from your site and others, have a high chance of showing up for “money” keywords.

The trick for the non-branded ranking domination is to scale your content and linking in a way that focuses not on your business name, but on your business’s services — a logical move to pull in customers who don’t know of your business’s existence. Using “rented” space on other platforms allows you to have a variety of domains showing in the ranking pages that funnels new business to your website.

Owning the SERP is a far-reaching goal for most SEO campaigns, but a little bit of work can assure your business is considered by Google to be the answer to a keyword query. With a well-managed strategy, a business can dominate search results, letting all roads lead to the Rome of your site.

Opinions expressed in the article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land.

Related Topics: All Things SEO | Google | How To | How To: SEO | SEO - Search Engine Optimization

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The Dark Side Of The Internet: A Search Engine That Finds Unsecured Routers, Servers & A Whole Lot More

Developed by John Matherly, Shodan is a search engine designed to help users find certain pieces of software, determine which applications are most popular, identify anonymous FTP servers, or investigate new vulnerabilities and what hosts they could infect.

It also serves as a window into millions of unsecured online connections.

According to an article on CNN Money, Shodan runs nonstop, collecting data from approximately 500 million connected devices and services each month. Through a simple search on Shodan, a user can identify a number of systems that either have no security measures in place or generic passwords that can be hacked easily, leaving countless organizations open to hazardous attacks.

During last year’s DEF CON 20, independent security penetration tester Dan Tentler confirmed a number of unsecured systems he located using Shodan, including a car wash that could be turned on and off remotely, a hockey rink in Denmark that could be defrosted with a click of his mouse, and a traffic control system for an unnamed city that could be put in “test mode” with one command entry.

The biggest security flaw, says Matherly, is that many of these systems should not be connected to the Web, “Of course there’s no security on these things. They don’t belong on the Internet in the first place.” Citing that many systems can be controlled by a computer, IT departments will hook them up to a server, unintentionally making systems and devices available to anyone with an Internet connection.

The most common users on Shodan include security professionals, academic researches and law enforcement agencies. Users without a Shodan account will retrieve up to ten results per search, while account users get 50 results per search. To see everything Shodan can serve up, users are required to give more information about what they want to find and pay a fee.

Matherly admits to CNN Money that Shodan could be used for criminal purposes, but says most cybercriminals have access to botnets that achieve the same results.

Related Topics: Legal: Crawling & Indexing | Legal: Privacy | Legal: Security | Search & Society | Search Engines | Search Engines: Meta Search Engines | Search Features: Safety

About The Author: Amy Gesenhues is Third Door Media's General Assignment Correspondent, and reports on the latest news and updates for Marketing Land and Search Engine Land. From 2009 to 2012, she was an award-winning syndicated columnist for a number of daily newspapers from New York to Texas. With more than ten years of marketing management experience, she has contributed to a variety of traditional and online publications, including MarketingProfs.com, SoftwareCEO.com, and Sales and Marketing Management Magazine. Read more of Amy's articles. See more articles by Amy Gesenhues

Connect with the author via: Email | Twitter | Google+ | LinkedIn

This post was made using the Auto Blogging Software from WebMagnates.org This line will not appear when posts are made after activating the software to full version.

New Eyewear For the Whole family from Crocs

The Grundig family lives in Crocs in the summer, and since school got out officially today, I’m considering it summer.  I was so happy to hear that our favorite summer shoe brand has just come out with a new eyewear collection for the whole family.

As a mom with a young boy and girl, I have a hard time keeping their eyes safe.  While they’ll happily wear bug repellent and sunscreen, they aren’t too excited about wearing sunglasses.  So I need sunglasses that are not only high-quality, but are also lightweight and easy to wear.  The new Crocs eyewear line is perfect.  The glasses are stylish and fun, with interchangeable hinges for some style changes.  But, they are also a nice size – covering the whole eye.  And, they are lightweight so they aren’t too heavy for my kids to wear.

To learn more about the new Crocs eyewear line, visit their website.

Disclosure: I received samples at no cost for review.

Tagged as: crocs, sunglasses

View the original article here

Inspiration for the Whole Family With Papersalt

Despite my love of the electronic world, I’m still a sucker for the written word.  I like to touch and feel the paper in my hand, and give paper as gifts.  So when Papersalt, a Seattle-based company, asked me to review some of their family books, I was excited to receive them.

Papersalt’s products are all written and researched by them, and produced in Seattle.  They have a fun, professional appearance, and look great in any office.  The books are all inspirational and educational, and make great gifts.  They are wire-bound and produced on high-quality paper – with cool-looking rounded corners and stylish fonts.

My personal favorite of the books is the “me” book – a thick, wire-bound book where you are inspired to answer such questions as “These things make me happy” and “These women inspire me”.  I also love the “being a girl – the things mom wants you to remember” book.  It includes advice such as “Be the best YOU that you can be.  Sometimes others will be good at different things than you.  That’s okay.”  I was so thrilled to give this book to my daughter, because she can learn so much from it.

They also offer books for high school graduates, new drivers, and families.

Visit Papersalt online for more information.

Win it!  Win a copy of the “me” book and the “being a girl” OR the “being a boy” book (winner’s choice).  Enter via the Rafflecopter.

Disclosure: I received samples from Papersalt at no cost for review.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tagged as: graduation gifts, paper products

View the original article here

New Eyewear For the Whole family from Crocs

The Grundig family lives in Crocs in the summer, and since school got out officially today, I’m considering it summer.  I was so happy to hear that our favorite summer shoe brand has just come out with a new eyewear collection for the whole family.

As a mom with a young boy and girl, I have a hard time keeping their eyes safe.  While they’ll happily wear bug repellent and sunscreen, they aren’t too excited about wearing sunglasses.  So I need sunglasses that are not only high-quality, but are also lightweight and easy to wear.  The new Crocs eyewear line is perfect.  The glasses are stylish and fun, with interchangeable hinges for some style changes.  But, they are also a nice size – covering the whole eye.  And, they are lightweight so they aren’t too heavy for my kids to wear.

To learn more about the new Crocs eyewear line, visit their website.

Disclosure: I received samples at no cost for review.

Tagged as: crocs, sunglasses

View the original article here

Inspiration for the Whole Family With Papersalt

Despite my love of the electronic world, I’m still a sucker for the written word.  I like to touch and feel the paper in my hand, and give paper as gifts.  So when Papersalt, a Seattle-based company, asked me to review some of their family books, I was excited to receive them.

Papersalt’s products are all written and researched by them, and produced in Seattle.  They have a fun, professional appearance, and look great in any office.  The books are all inspirational and educational, and make great gifts.  They are wire-bound and produced on high-quality paper – with cool-looking rounded corners and stylish fonts.

My personal favorite of the books is the “me” book – a thick, wire-bound book where you are inspired to answer such questions as “These things make me happy” and “These women inspire me”.  I also love the “being a girl – the things mom wants you to remember” book.  It includes advice such as “Be the best YOU that you can be.  Sometimes others will be good at different things than you.  That’s okay.”  I was so thrilled to give this book to my daughter, because she can learn so much from it.

They also offer books for high school graduates, new drivers, and families.

Visit Papersalt online for more information.

Win it!  Win a copy of the “me” book and the “being a girl” OR the “being a boy” book (winner’s choice).  Enter via the Rafflecopter.

Disclosure: I received samples from Papersalt at no cost for review.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tagged as: graduation gifts, paper products

View the original article here

New Eyewear For the Whole family from Crocs

The Grundig family lives in Crocs in the summer, and since school got out officially today, I’m considering it summer.  I was so happy to hear that our favorite summer shoe brand has just come out with a new eyewear collection for the whole family.

As a mom with a young boy and girl, I have a hard time keeping their eyes safe.  While they’ll happily wear bug repellent and sunscreen, they aren’t too excited about wearing sunglasses.  So I need sunglasses that are not only high-quality, but are also lightweight and easy to wear.  The new Crocs eyewear line is perfect.  The glasses are stylish and fun, with interchangeable hinges for some style changes.  But, they are also a nice size – covering the whole eye.  And, they are lightweight so they aren’t too heavy for my kids to wear.

To learn more about the new Crocs eyewear line, visit their website.

Disclosure: I received samples at no cost for review.

Tagged as: crocs, sunglasses

View the original article here

Inspiration for the Whole Family With Papersalt

Despite my love of the electronic world, I’m still a sucker for the written word.  I like to touch and feel the paper in my hand, and give paper as gifts.  So when Papersalt, a Seattle-based company, asked me to review some of their family books, I was excited to receive them.

Papersalt’s products are all written and researched by them, and produced in Seattle.  They have a fun, professional appearance, and look great in any office.  The books are all inspirational and educational, and make great gifts.  They are wire-bound and produced on high-quality paper – with cool-looking rounded corners and stylish fonts.

My personal favorite of the books is the “me” book – a thick, wire-bound book where you are inspired to answer such questions as “These things make me happy” and “These women inspire me”.  I also love the “being a girl – the things mom wants you to remember” book.  It includes advice such as “Be the best YOU that you can be.  Sometimes others will be good at different things than you.  That’s okay.”  I was so thrilled to give this book to my daughter, because she can learn so much from it.

They also offer books for high school graduates, new drivers, and families.

Visit Papersalt online for more information.

Win it!  Win a copy of the “me” book and the “being a girl” OR the “being a boy” book (winner’s choice).  Enter via the Rafflecopter.

Disclosure: I received samples from Papersalt at no cost for review.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tagged as: graduation gifts, paper products

View the original article here

Patient satisfaction surveys don’t tell the whole story about health care quality

The following is a guest post by Harold DeMonaco, one of our expert editors for HealthNewsReview.org and director of the Innovation Support Center at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

————————————————————

A recent study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine is turning a few heads in the health policy arena.  The cost of satisfaction: A national study of patient satisfaction, health care utilization, expenditures and mortality  study examined the records of more than 34,000 adults for 4 years.  The results are a surprise to say the least.

For years, patients, insurers and government programs have pushed hard for improvement in the level of satisfaction of patients receiving healthcare.  The most recent push involves the development of Accountable Care Organization (ACO)  initiated by the Centers for Medicare  and Medicaid Services(CMS).  ACO’s link the quality and cost of healthcare directly to the reimbursement to providers.  Quality, as defined by CMS, is measured in five domains: patient/caregiver experience, care coordination, patient safety, preventative health, and at-risk population/frail elderly health.

The study in The Archives came to some interesting conclusions:

The most satisfied patients had an 8% lower rate of visits to the emergency room compared to the least satisfiedThe most satisfied patients had a 12% higher hospital inpatient admission rate.The most satisfied patients had a 9% higher prescription and total healthcare costsAND a 26% higher mortality.

I will apologize up front for providing only relative and not absolute numbers.  Absolute numbers are not provided in the article.  I get the lower ER visits but the rest comes as a surprise especially the higher mortality rate.  The least satisfied patients differed from the most satisfied at baseline in several ways.  The least satisfied tended to have poorer self rated health and there were more smokers.  But even after controlling for confounders, the authors concluded, “The association between higher patient satisfaction and mortality remained significant in an analysis that excluded patients with poor self rated health and three or more chronic diseases.”

A brief report published last September provided the results of a survey of primary care physicians on the topic of appropriate care.  Forty two percent of those responding thought that their patients were receiving too much care.  Only 6% thought that their patients did not receive enough. The reasons for over treatment remain a mystery but likely lie in both the clinicians and patient/family hands.

The Archives paper may suggest how great is the challenge of educating American health care consumers that “More Is Not Always Better.”  And it also suggests – once again – that patient satisfaction surveys don’t tell the whole story of quality health care.

View the original article here

Patient satisfaction surveys don’t tell the whole story about health care quality

The following is a guest post by Harold DeMonaco, one of our expert editors for HealthNewsReview.org and director of the Innovation Support Center at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

————————————————————

A recent study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine is turning a few heads in the health policy arena.  The cost of satisfaction: A national study of patient satisfaction, health care utilization, expenditures and mortality  study examined the records of more than 34,000 adults for 4 years.  The results are a surprise to say the least.

For years, patients, insurers and government programs have pushed hard for improvement in the level of satisfaction of patients receiving healthcare.  The most recent push involves the development of Accountable Care Organization (ACO)  initiated by the Centers for Medicare  and Medicaid Services(CMS).  ACO’s link the quality and cost of healthcare directly to the reimbursement to providers.  Quality, as defined by CMS, is measured in five domains: patient/caregiver experience, care coordination, patient safety, preventative health, and at-risk population/frail elderly health.

The study in The Archives came to some interesting conclusions:

The most satisfied patients had an 8% lower rate of visits to the emergency room compared to the least satisfiedThe most satisfied patients had a 12% higher hospital inpatient admission rate.The most satisfied patients had a 9% higher prescription and total healthcare costsAND a 26% higher mortality.

I will apologize up front for providing only relative and not absolute numbers.  Absolute numbers are not provided in the article.  I get the lower ER visits but the rest comes as a surprise especially the higher mortality rate.  The least satisfied patients differed from the most satisfied at baseline in several ways.  The least satisfied tended to have poorer self rated health and there were more smokers.  But even after controlling for confounders, the authors concluded, “The association between higher patient satisfaction and mortality remained significant in an analysis that excluded patients with poor self rated health and three or more chronic diseases.”

A brief report published last September provided the results of a survey of primary care physicians on the topic of appropriate care.  Forty two percent of those responding thought that their patients were receiving too much care.  Only 6% thought that their patients did not receive enough. The reasons for over treatment remain a mystery but likely lie in both the clinicians and patient/family hands.

The Archives paper may suggest how great is the challenge of educating American health care consumers that “More Is Not Always Better.”  And it also suggests – once again – that patient satisfaction surveys don’t tell the whole story of quality health care.

View the original article here

Patient satisfaction surveys don’t tell the whole story about health care quality

The following is a guest post by Harold DeMonaco, one of our expert editors for HealthNewsReview.org and director of the Innovation Support Center at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

————————————————————

A recent study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine is turning a few heads in the health policy arena.  The cost of satisfaction: A national study of patient satisfaction, health care utilization, expenditures and mortality  study examined the records of more than 34,000 adults for 4 years.  The results are a surprise to say the least.

For years, patients, insurers and government programs have pushed hard for improvement in the level of satisfaction of patients receiving healthcare.  The most recent push involves the development of Accountable Care Organization (ACO)  initiated by the Centers for Medicare  and Medicaid Services(CMS).  ACO’s link the quality and cost of healthcare directly to the reimbursement to providers.  Quality, as defined by CMS, is measured in five domains: patient/caregiver experience, care coordination, patient safety, preventative health, and at-risk population/frail elderly health.

The study in The Archives came to some interesting conclusions:

The most satisfied patients had an 8% lower rate of visits to the emergency room compared to the least satisfiedThe most satisfied patients had a 12% higher hospital inpatient admission rate.The most satisfied patients had a 9% higher prescription and total healthcare costsAND a 26% higher mortality.

I will apologize up front for providing only relative and not absolute numbers.  Absolute numbers are not provided in the article.  I get the lower ER visits but the rest comes as a surprise especially the higher mortality rate.  The least satisfied patients differed from the most satisfied at baseline in several ways.  The least satisfied tended to have poorer self rated health and there were more smokers.  But even after controlling for confounders, the authors concluded, “The association between higher patient satisfaction and mortality remained significant in an analysis that excluded patients with poor self rated health and three or more chronic diseases.”

A brief report published last September provided the results of a survey of primary care physicians on the topic of appropriate care.  Forty two percent of those responding thought that their patients were receiving too much care.  Only 6% thought that their patients did not receive enough. The reasons for over treatment remain a mystery but likely lie in both the clinicians and patient/family hands.

The Archives paper may suggest how great is the challenge of educating American health care consumers that “More Is Not Always Better.”  And it also suggests – once again – that patient satisfaction surveys don’t tell the whole story of quality health care.

View the original article here