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Author: Search Influence Alumni

From Search With Love, 007 New Influencers Are On The Case!

Search Influence looks forward to continued growth in 2015! As February comes to an end, we’re excited to welcome our newest Influencers.

Adrienne Myers – Junior Account Associate

Adrienne recently graduated from Mississippi State University, where she studied marketing and French. She is originally from Covington, but she spent some time working as a District Sales Leader Intern for Frito-Lay in Jackson, MS. Adrienne enjoys traveling, baking, and spending time with family and friends.

Anthony Armstrong – Junior Account Associate

Anthony is from New Orleans and has lived here all his life. He loves music and spends most of his free time writing acoustic songs. He sings and plays guitar for a post-hardcore/metal band called Eye for an Eye. He also thoroughly enjoys reading and creative writing.

Chris Roberts – Software Developer

Chris was born and raised in San Jose, California. Years later, he graduated with a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of New Orleans. Chris arrived in Louisiana nearly a decade ago, and he has been an avid programmer ever since. Chris enjoys playing guitar and attending various festivals in his free time.

Cory Agular – Junior Internet Marketing Associate

Cory was born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana. He graduated from Tulane University with a B.A. in English. Prior to accepting the position at Search Influence, he did freelance writing, and his articles have been published by Tulane’s athletic department and the NCAA’s official website. In his spare time, he loves to catch live music and sporting events. He looks forward to working at SI.

Jason Vermaelen – Junior Account Associate

Jason is a fun-loving, quick-witted karaoke superstar. He is also a brown belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and has been training for almost nine years. He is from Baton Rouge, and he graduated from Southeastern Louisiana University in marketing with a concentration in advertising this past December. Jason is looking forward to starting his career at Search Influence and meeting everyone!

Mikel Pak – PR & Marketing Manager

As the daughter of an Air Force pilot, Mikel Pak has lived everywhere from Oklahoma to Kentucky and Idaho to Texas and beyond. She brings more than eight years of experience as a public relations professional and journalist to her post at Search Influence. Her expertise spans media relations, marketing, social media, crisis, and political communications. As a journalist, she got her start in the newspaper business covering health care, technology, higher education, and real estate, among other industries. You can follow her on Twitter @MikelPak.

Serena Hirasawa – Account Associate

Spending almost all of her life in Richmond, VA—from preschool to college at Virginia Commonwealth University—Serena needed a change of scenery, but with a river still close by. Prior to Search Influence, Serena’s professional life included appearances in higher education and the transportation industry, but she’s finally ready to put her Communications degree to good use. Serena recently arrived in New Orleans and is looking forward to warm winter months, crawfish season, and playing roller derby with the Big Easy Rollergirls.

Join us in welcoming Serena, Chris, Mikel, Adrienne, Cory, Jason, and Anthony. We’re very lucky to have all of you on board!

February 25, 2015
4 Internet Marketing Mistakes You Might Be Making

There is nothing more frustrating than putting all your money and effort into your site’s content only to see a conflicting ROI. Many companies and businesses rely on Internet marketing to increase their profits, but some make simple and even unpredictable mistakes as they go about it. Feeling frustrated or annoyed with your results? You’re not alone.

WAIT! Don’t break your computer just yet—we’re here to point out some mistakes you might be making.

1.) Every part of your content concentrates on sales.

Everyone wants to make sales and increase profits. That’s the whole point of your Internet marketing campaign, right? But new users who visit your site may not purchase your product or service right away. Smart buyers want to research your product, learn more about your brand, see what you offer, and compare your prices to the prices of your competitors. Your potential customers likely won’t have the compulsion to commit to a purchase right away unless you are a well-known company like Amazon. Don’t try to sell your product outright; rather, tell a story with your content. Ease your customer in slowly to make them believe in what you are selling.

To do this, avoid making your content too product-specific. Let’s say you sell garden hoses, and garden hoses are all you know. You don’t want to talk about just garden hoses all the time; you’ll lose customer interest. And let’s face it—you can’t talk specifically about garden hoses non-stop while keeping your content interesting. So make sure you expand your content beyond your specific product. On certain pages of your site, spill expert gardening secrets, discuss ways to keep your lawn fresh, or start an FAQ section on popular gardening techniques. Always expand on your product and related topics to keep the customer engaged!

2.) You’re using social media sites…incorrectly.

One of the biggest components of any company’s campaign is the strategic use of social media. Coordinating posts on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social media platforms can take up exorbitant amounts of time and effort. Concentrating too much or too little on certain posts or topics can lead to fewer followers on a specific page, and no one wants to see multiple, random posts appear on their newsfeed every single day. Creating posts and utilizing social media should be a strategic and intelligent endeavor, not a disorganized, chaotic mess.

Plan ahead by understanding the goals of your social media strategy. Do you want to drive traffic to your site? Generate more sales? Enhance your email list? Work toward brand awareness? Know your brand and, most importantly, know your customers! You don’t need to use every social media outlet; just figure out which channels your customers use most. If you’re not sure which media sites your customers prefer, just ask! It’s important to learn as much as you can about your clients, their social activity, and how to appeal to them. Absorb yourself in the community’s conversation and interact with your clients. Marketing 101: customer service and knowledge is the number one driving component to any business.

3.) Your content is SEO-heavy.

SEO is essential to any marketing campaign. You want Google to find your specific keywords and phrases to generate more traffic. SEO helps human users know you exist within their area!

While all that is true, you do not want to write all of your content specifically for search engines. No one wants to read website content that has keywords stuffed into every sentence; content needs to be well-written and unique! When creating pages for your visitors, you want the writing to be memorable and easy to read. Once you start to write your content, all of the information you have about your product will flow out naturally, and the content will optimize itself: users will be more likely to share your content through social media, blogs, or websites when the writing is more natural. And if you want to give your content greater authority, be sure to link to other credible websites within your industry.

4.) You aren’t calling your clients to action.

You caught the fish, and now you have to reel them in.

It is a very common misunderstanding that if you drive traffic, you will automatically increase sales. Maybe your new customers aren’t making purchases, and even your old customers who have been following your site and posts since the beginning of time still aren’t biting. Personally, I have followed many company sites without ever buying their products. Why is that?

Creating an easily accessible path to your product is crucial. You want clients to have a simple conversion from viewing/visiting to buying. By embedding relevant calls to action within your text, you can ensure that content on your site gets potential customers deeply involved with your product. Every page for your products should have a link to sign up for your site, email list, or newsletter in three places: on the sidebar, below the article, and underneath the header.

Don’t leave your customers to ponder what to do after reading your page. Send them along the right path!

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February 24, 2015
Five for Friday: Pay for Twitter Verification, Snapchat Goes Local, and More!

1. If You Want to Be Verified on Twitter, All You’ll Have to Do Is Pay! – Mashable

If you’ve ever tried, you know that getting verified on Twitter is a lengthy process. Twitter does not accept requests for verification, so users just have to wait until the site feels that your page should be verified—and the process can take an extremely long time. But not anymore: Twitter is considering letting people pay to get that little blue check mark symbol. Hopefully, if this change is adopted, the days of waiting for verification will be gone!

2. Google Answers the Question “Is Link Building Good?” – Search Engine Round Table

In any discussion about link building, the conversation usually turns into a debate about whether the strategy is good or bad for a website. If you’ve been searching for the answer, you may finally have it: in a recent Google+ hangout, Google’s John Mueller was asked to answer this common question. Ultimately, Mueller stated that he would “try to avoid” link building in general, but he also gave helpful tips on how to allow others to link to your site.

3. Snapchat Wants to Show You What’s Happening in Your City – Tech Crunch

Have you ever ignored a Snap from Team Snapchat because it relates to an event taking place in a different state or even a different country? Well, Snapchat has caught on. The company is currently experimenting with regional Our Stories, which will add content that will be visible only to locals within a specific area. Keep an eye out for these relevant Our Stories!

4. 4 SEO Landmines to Avoid if You’re Updating Your Website – Search Engine Watch

From time to time, it becomes necessary for all of us to update our websites—but how do we manage the change without losing the authority our sites have built up? Whenever you update your website, you may leave yourself vulnerable to changes in domain authority and search engine indexing. If you’re thinking about changing your website, a few tips from this recent Search Engine Watch article can teach you what to avoid in order to keep your SEO intact.

5. Facebook Will Be Revealing the Relevance Score of Your Ad – Marketing Land

Ever wonder how Facebook chooses which ads to show? The company uses a combination of bid price and relevance scoring to decide which ads will make an appearance, but the process might seem confusing. Well, Facebook has begun to allow marketers to see the relevance score of their ads. In doing this, Facebook hopes to incentivize the creation of better ads that are more relevant to target audiences.

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All You Have To Do Is Pay

February 20, 2015
Five for Friday: The Analytics Glitch, Google’s Beginnings, Mardi Gras Madness, & More!

1. Google Analytics Data Drops Off On Monday, February 9th – SEO Roundtable

Did you notice that all of your customers suddenly decided to boycott your website this past Monday? You’re not the only one. Luckily, this is not an issue with your website or your business; it’s actually a brief glitch in the data of Google Analytics. This problem appears to have affected thousands of websites. Though Google has yet to give an official statement on the matter, they have assured us that they are looking into the problem.

2. Your Guide to Everything Mardi Gras – New Orleans Online

Mardi Gras celebrations are in full swing this week, and New Orleans Online has released an infographic to help us navigate and understand the chaos! Filled with tidbits on the history of Mardi Gras as well as helpful hints for making the most of this year’s events, this infographic can guide both newbies and veterans through the Carnival season in New Orleans.

3. Lessons Learned from the Early Days of Google – Matt Cutts

Today, we know Google as the wooly mammoth of the Internet—large and in charge. Whether we are aware of it or not, no company has had a greater impact on how we navigate the World Wide Web. But it wasn’t always that way. Google, like all huge companies today, had humble beginnings, with a lot of blunders and a lot of lessons learned. Matt Cutts revealed all in his presentation at UNC Chapel Hill last month.

4. Is Yahoo Stealing Mobile Search Share from Bing? – Marketing Land

Yahoo is beginning to make its first divergence from its search alliance deal with Microsoft. The search engine has its eyes set on the mobile market, a segment that was not part of the search alliance deal made five years ago. The search engine has gained traction on mobile devices not at the expense of Google, but at the expense of its ally Microsoft.

5. 8 Sure-Fire Ways to Beat Out Your Top PPC Competitors – Hanapin Marketing

Yesterday, Jamie Smith and Cassie Oumedian of Hanapin Marketing presented a webinar on the eight ways to beat out your top PPC competitors. Some of the expert tips included competitive intelligence and monitoring insights, why location targeting is a must, and bid strategies to outrank your competitors. If you weren’t able to catch the webinar live, you can go to the Hanapin Marketing website to get the full recap.

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February 13, 2015
They Don’t Call it Fat Tuesday For Nothing!

How much king cake has your office consumed since the start of the new year? Those who don’t live or work in Louisiana will respond to that question with a forlorn “zero,” but at Search Influence, the answer is probably somewhere between “not enough” and “infinite.”

King cake season is a prime opportunity for the office to bond over our uncontrollable gluttony, but it also has something to teach us about paying it forward and supporting our coworkers. In addition to having the Mardi Gras spirit baked into every buttery bite, king cake is a great office snack because it is self-replenishing. Depending on how thinly you slice it, one king cake can feed 15-20 people in your office, and by the time the last crumb has been devoured by a ravenous coworker, the provider of tomorrow’s king cake has already been chosen by the plastic baby of fate.

For the uninitiated, the individual that discovers the baby hidden in their king cake slice is obligated to bring in the next one for everyone to share. In other words, the responsibility of providing this seasonal pastry to the entire office is continually passed from person to person, allowing everyone to enjoy infinite king cake without having to buy infinite king cake. By continuing this chain of goodwill and endless baked goods, you are paying it forward to the entire office.

Fortunately for your cholesterol, this strategy of passing the torch and spreading the wealth doesn’t have to end with king cake. When individuals take turns bringing in snacks, giving out thank you notes, taking the lead for projects, and volunteering for office chores, the entire office feels the benefits.

Don’t wait to find the fake baby surreptitiously hiding in your food to pay it forward king-cake style. Try one of these pay it forward ideas in your office today.

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King Cake Meme

February 6, 2015
SEO for 2015: Meet the New Boss, Same as the Old Boss

The world of SEO is constantly changing. Google, the big prize for search engine ranking, may change its search algorithms from 500 to 600 times a year, and major updates like Panda, Penguin, and Pigeon are rolled out on a fairly regular basis. And while your business can’t shift SEO strategies daily to incorporate every change Google unveils, it makes sense to take a fresh look at your SEO approach at least annually—or does it?

The answer is yes, and no. While there are some aspects of SEO that can and should be refreshed or updated to keep up with changing algorithms and your audience’s needs and tastes, the good news for online marketers is that the basic SEO strategies you’re already familiar with will continue to be effective—in 2015 and beyond.

Here’s a look at what will change in the SEO landscape for 2015 and what will remain the same.

Sticking to the basics still works

Best practices for SEO strategies have always revolved around delivering high-quality, targeted, and useful content with a few well-chosen, naturally incorporated keywords—and for 2015, that won’t change. Google-sanctioned “white hat” SEO tactics continue to be the most effective strategies for driving SEO and boosting search engine rankings.

Another basic element of SEO that will remain the same is the need for both on-page (what you say about yourself) and off-page (what others say about you) factors. Successful SEO includes creative, useful, and engaging content creation for your website, social media, and other online channels, along with promotion that drives off-page SEO by attracting links to your content from other authoritative sites.

Going mobile will be an imperative

By now, most companies are aware that a responsive, mobile-friendly website is essential for attracting and retaining customers—but mobile SEO is more important than ever when it comes to Google. Responsive site design will be a crucial aspect of ranking high on Google, since the search engine now reports whether or not a site is mobile-friendly to both users and webmasters.

If you’re not sure whether your business website is mobile-friendly enough, Google offers a free online testing tool, along with a link to information about their mobile-friendly criteria and how it may affect your search engine results.

For small business, local SEO will be king

In 2015, it will be important for businesses—especially small businesses—to make sure their websites are optimized for local area searches. Google and other search engines are giving more attention to local directories and citations, including hyperlocal content (relevant content authored by local experts within their geographic areas).

One effective SEO strategy for optimizing local search is to make sure your phone numbers, addresses, and location pages are consistent with off-page directory listings. If you haven’t done so already, check out third-party business directory and review websites such as Yelp, Google+, and Yahoo Business to ensure that your local information is correct.

Thinking like a publisher will benefit your SEO

As search engine algorithms continue to shift weight away from obvious marketing and promotional content and toward contextual relevance, individuals are becoming more important than companies with regard to search engine rank. To take advantage for SEO improvement, more companies are transferring authorship credit to individuals—including text article writers, infographic designers, and video and podcast producers. Giving content creators their own voice will lend your content more weight with search engines.

Links and keywords will lose center stage

For a long time, keywords and links have been the cornerstones of SEO. But with a massive shift toward contextual search and high-value content, these primary factors no longer carry the same weight. Inbound and outbound links still matter for search, but their importance has been dwindling as more algorithms place relevance over popularity and authority.

The same shift is apparently underway with keywords. While a few well-chosen and well-placed keywords still serve to help search engines determine the overall meaning of a page or piece of content, it’s more important that your content answers the right user questions and remains useful and engaging.

If you’ve been sticking to SEO best practices, your strategy for 2015 is likely to only require minor changes in order to remain effective for the coming year and beyond.

February 3, 2015
Three New Influencers to Start Off the New Year!

Sarah Felton – Account Coordinator

Sarah is a native to New Orleans and an enthusiastic pet lover (Three cats and one dog that she frequently plays dress up with). She received her bachelor’s degree from Louisiana State University, where she still attends football games in the student section every fall. Her work experience is mainly in the hospitality field, as Sarah worked for Caesar’s Entertainment from 2007–2013 here in New Orleans and also in Las Vegas and Biloxi.

Kim Koelling – Junior Graphic Designer

Kim was born and raised in Dallas, Texas. She received her degree in Graphic Design from the University of Kansas. Shortly after, she was accepted into the U.S. Peace Corps and hopped on a plane to Cameroon in West Africa, where she lived for 27 months. She taught computer science and English at her village high school, and she worked closely with a local women’s cooperative on marketing. She now lives in New Orleans and is very excited to be joining the Search Influence team!

Brenna Benson – Operations MBA Intern

Born in Tampa but raised in Gainesville, Brenna is a native Floridian who managed to eventually find her way to New Orleans. Brenna graduated with a degree in Public Policy Studies from Duke University and is currently pursuing an MBA at the Freeman School of Business at Tulane University. She welcomed her first son in December 2014 and (like any New Orleans mom) is excited to introduce her son to king cake (although we may need to wait until next year). She’s also very excited to kick off the new year with the Search Influence team as an Operations Intern!

Join us in welcoming Sarah, Kim, and Brenna to the Search Influence team. We’re glad to have you on board!

January 27, 2015
6 Methods For Healthcare Providers To Turn Great Service Into Great Reviews
As society continues to evolve into a highly mobile culture, we see how heavily online reviews influence the selection of a practice or practitioner. In fact, among patients who look for online reviews of doctors, an estimated one-third reported choosing a physician based on good ratings, according to a national survey published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Most people trust an online review just as much as they trust a personal referral from a close friend or family member. Maintaining a positive online reputation is essential, because while your healthcare practice cannot control what patients write, you can control your response to their reviews.

The medical industry is highly competitive, so the more positive reviews your business obtains, the more likely it is that your business will be found online. The success of your business heavily weighs on online reviews, so you’ll need to learn how to effectively ask for reviews from your customers. Here are six methods to encourage your customers to leave reviews.

Make Writing Reviews Simple For Everyone

Most people, unless they have a negative experience to share, will not make the extra effort to leave your practice a review. You need to make it as easy as possible for your patients to leave a review for your company, and you can do this by adding links to your review profiles in multiple places, such as in a follow-up email, on a thank-you page, etc.

Get Listed On The Top Business Review Sites

Everyone has their preferred review sites, so it is necessary to have a strong online presence across the most popular ones. All profiles and listings need to be consistent and include as much current information about the practice as you can squeeze in (photos, certifications, awards, degrees, etc.).

Healthcare providers should have a listing on the following directories:
1. Yelp
2. Healthgrades
3. Google+ Local
4. Vitals
5. RealSelf
6. RateMDs
7. Facebook
8. Twitter
9. LinkedIn
Ask customers to leave a review on their favorite site—never pressure them to write reviews on multiple sites.

Be Genuine While Asking For Reviews

Let your customers know that you would appreciate it if they could take a few moments of their time to share their experience on one of your company’s review sites, as their opinion matters not only to the company, but also to other customers. You can do this by saying something as simple as, “Do you read online reviews? We do, and so do other customers. That’s why we’d love it if you would take a few moments to review your experience.” Just be honest; the worst answer you will get is a “no.”

Never Pressure A Patient For Reviews

You should always request that patients rate their experiences, but never make them feel pressured to leave a review. Even if a customer is extremely satisfied with your services, writing an online review may be the last thing on their mind. However, if a client had a great experience with your business, they will probably be happy to share their thoughts when prompted. The best approach is to simply ask your most satisfied customers to add their positive feedback to one of your business review sites.

Consider Your Customers

If your customers are millennials, consider yourself lucky! Most millennials are already comfortable with sites that allow users to share experiences online, and they will likely be happy to share their thoughts on your business without much prompting. Bombarding customers under the age of 25 with requests to post a review will probably push them away. However, if you have older or less social media-savvy customers, they may require direct prompting.

Software Advice, a company that reviews practice management software, conducted a study to better understand online reviews and the processes of researching and writing these reviews. This study found that the largest age group of patients using online reviews ranges from ages 25–34, with males being 25% more likely to leave a review than females.

Don’t Ignore Negative Reviews

While your overall goal is to gather good reviews, unsatisfied reviewers will inevitably make their way online to air their bad experiences. Bad reviews aren’t necessarily a business-killer; it’s how you handle the negative review or situation that defines the impact it will have on your business.

Take note of negative reviews and respond to the criticism in a non-defensive manner. This can be done with a standard, generic reply that thanks the reviewer for the comment. Always ask the complaining patient to contact you directly so that you can further resolve his or her dissatisfaction offline.

Take a negative review as an opportunity to better your customer service and your facility. Many negative patient reviews involve simple issues that can easily be resolved: long waiting times, issues with billing practices, lack of parking spaces, etc. If your complaints are targeting things that can easily be fixed, take advantage of this useful feedback to better your practice.

Provide And Deliver Top-Quality Customer Service

At the end of the day, the best path to having great reviews is to offer a great product and customer experience. If you’re doing everything you can to create a remarkable experience for your customers, there’s no harm in reminding them about the importance of sharing reviews.

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Most Used and Most Trusted Reviews Chart and Patients Using Online Reviews By Age Graph

People Hate Us on Yelp
January 22, 2015
You Talk Pretty Today: Drop Crutch Words To Improve Your Communication Skills
You know, talking to clients and colleagues can be really, like, intimidating, right? That’s why, like, crutch words are sometimes used by, um, people who are nervous or, like, looking for the right words to use.

Although the above sentence looks odd written out, almost everyone is guilty of using crutch words in everyday speaking. Whether you are caught up in your words when speaking to a client on the phone or nervous about speaking in front of a group, you’ve probably heard yourself using crutch words as you speak. Follow the tips below to break the habit!

What are crutch words?

Everyone has different words that they use in conversation when they need time to gather their thoughts. These words, called crutch words, include placeholders such as um, like, definitely, really, uh, etc. While you wouldn’t normally use these words in writing, people tend to rely on them more heavily when speaking.

Crutch words are most commonly used when people are thinking of the best or most appropriate answer to a question. However, using these words can be distracting to your listener, and it can also make you seem less knowledgeable. Clients may not trust what you’re saying because the crutch words can make it seem as though you’re not confident about what you have to contribute. There are much better alternatives to using like, um, uh, etc. when pulling your thoughts together.

Break the Habit

What is our #1 tip for getting rid of your crutch word habit? Take a breath and pause before speaking! Quickly go over what you want to say in your head, take a breath, and then speak confidently. Your thoughts will come across much more clearly to your audience than they would if you stumble over your words and sound shaky or unsure.

Practice this habit of pausing in your everyday life. Once it becomes a habit at home, you will be able to use it much more naturally at work in situations where you would normally use a crutch word while you gather your thoughts.

Still stuck on a question? If the pause is a bit long, say something like, “That’s a great question…” before continuing. This tactic gives you a few more moments to think of an appropriate answer to the question at hand.

More Useful Tips to Improve Your Spoken Communication
- Use voice inflections. This conveys what is important in your message, and it also helps keep your listener more engaged. No one wants to hear a monotonous speaker who puts no inflection on the important aspects of what they have to say.
- Avoid using casual language. Exclamations like “awesome!” or “totally!” can make you sound young and less authoritative to your audience. Although these words may be in your everyday vocabulary, work on limiting your use of them in a professional setting.
- Avoid using ma’am or sir (to a client or colleague). This is a Southern staple (thanks, Louisiana!), but try to avoid using these words to address clients or coworkers. It can make you seem young and inexperienced, rather than an equal to your peers. Still use it when you go see grandma and grandpa, though!
- Avoid over-explaining. We tend to try to explain things over and over again, continuing around the same circle while the question at hand has been long answered. Answer the question as best as you can without backtracking and wait for feedback from your listener. If they need more clarification, they will let you know.
- Know your audience. Are you speaking with the decision-maker of the company, or are you speaking to a secretary? Your communication will differ based on the person you’re communicating with. The CEO of a company will want to hear about the bottom line, while a secretary might want more detailed information to pass along to whomever she’s reporting to.
Effective communication is an important skill to learn, regardless of what industry you work in. We hope these tips help you improve your spoken communication and break the crutch word habit!

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January 19, 2015
Five for Friday: Beef Up Your Local SEO, Twitter Welcomes Newbies, and More

1. Google’s Domain Registration Service Now Open To All US Residents – Search Engine Journal

Google now has a proprietary domain registration service! What’s great about this service is that, like most Google products, it’s fully integrated with Gmail forwarding as well as other goodies provided by Google’s partners – Squarespace, Weebly, Wix, and Blogger. Streamlined and familiar, domain registration starts at $12, with additional add-ons available. For more information about this service in different countries, you can sign up to a mailing list.

2. A Step-By-Step Introduction to Amazon Product Ads – PPC Hero

Amazon has always been kind enough to direct customers to your product, and it sometimes even directs them straight to your website. With Amazon Product Ads, the company helps you become better at selling your wares the right way – with the consumer in mind, but the seller at heart. This article details the step-by-step process on how to utilize APAs to the fullest, and it educates you on the nuances of selling products online.

3. How to Have a Successful Local SEO Campaign in 2015 – Moz

These tips are typically a no-brainer for us optimizers, but as evinced by our recent SI Conference, there are nuances to local SEO, and SEO in general, that we sometimes just don’t see right off the bat. With the new Google updates, optimizing is getting more personal and organic than ever. Check out the interesting click map to see just how organic SERPs are becoming.

4. The Big List: 80 Of The Hottest SEO, Social Media & Digital Analytics Tools For Marketers – Marketing Land

Note: this is not a ranked list of SEO tools, but rather a running total of great tools out there at the moment. Perhaps we will see some of these in our near future as employees of Search Influence. It’s nice to see kind things said about the tools we currently use, if not only to solidify the reasons why we chose the ones we did.

5. Report: Twitter Planning New Home Page For Logged-Out Visitors – Marketing Land

As an avid Twitter user, I’ve always been concerned with the esoteric universe that is Twitter’s inner sanctum. What’s in a homepage, you ask? Well, currently Twitter leaves a lot to be desired (a marketing ploy perhaps); there’s no indication of what the user interface even remotely looks like based on their homepage. Reports indicate that, unlike many social media home pages, Twitter may give in to human curiosity and allow potential users to glimpse its inner workings.

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January 16, 2015