Tag Archive for: Search Engine Optimization

Search engine optimization

Simple SEO Tactics To Improve Your Site

When it comes to Search Engine Optimization, we all know it can be very time-consuming. But it doesn’t all have to be hard work. Here are some simple SEO wins to help you get ahead of the game.

Remove outdated and low-quality content

 You may be reluctant to remove low-quality or out of date content but it can negatively effect your ranking. You should start by first identifying the pages you want to prune. Using software like Screaming Frog will help you with this by crawling your site and identifying a list of URLs with their position on Google and impressions. You don’t just have to delete pages, however. Most of the content you’re removing can be redirected to a stronger higher quality page. Although if you can’t find a relevant page, you should let the pages go to a 404 – page not found.

Tip: utilize your 404 (Page Not Found) page by adding a search option.

Improve content

You don’t have to get rid of every low scoring page. Building upon what’s already there is an easy way to improve ranking. You can use your previous Google history and develop it. Review your Screaming Frog results and use the pages that rank anywhere from position 5 to 30. You can improve content by ensuring pages have 300+ words, are useful and well written. Using a plugin like Yoast will give you a readability score which you can use to improve content. Make sure you answer frequently asked questions and include long-tail keywords you want to rank for. Adding media to your page will encourage viewers to stay on the page longer, thus improving ranking.

Update internal links

You should review and identify your internal links from time to time to ensure they are still relevant. Using a site like Screaming Frog will help identify any redirect chains.

Page load speed

You may have heard the words ‘page load speed’ but not be sure what they mean in terms of SEO. Simply put, if your webpage takes too long to load, potential customers will likely leave your site. Though these improvements require an element of technical skills, the results will cause a significant improvement.

You can help by upgrading from a budget web hosting site. Cheaper web hosts can be overwhelmed with traffic. By investing in a higher quality web host, you’ll be surprised what it does for your site speed.

Optimize

Optimizing images and media files will increase the swiftness of your site. You can reduce the file size by resizing, making sure the image is saved in the correct format (JPEGs are best for photos whilst PNG files are best for images with solid areas of colour) and compressing the file. WordPress has some great plugins for compressing images.

Don’t worry you can leave the JavaScript/ CSS weird complicated stuff to us.

We know that SEO can seem a bit daunting. You don’t have to worry as we’re here at Cloud9 Marketing to help with all your SEO needs. Want to see how your site’s performing? Book a free consultation or a site audit!

 

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SSL Certificates Are Simply a Must for 2018

If you have a website, you’ve probably heard of SSL certificates, but are you actually aware of what they are and why they are important?

If not, keep reading…

SSL is an acronym for secure sockets layer. SSL certificates are the backbone of website security, and are vital for any business with an online presence, especially in 2018. SSL certificates allow someone’s browser to bridge a secure connection to your server, ensuring that the information is securely transferred.

You can tell if a website is SSL secure by looking at the URL structure. If a website’s URL starts out with “http,” it is not SSL secure. If it starts with “https,” then it is secure. Some browsers will also display a small lock icon to indicate you are browsing a secure website.

Here are a few reasons why all of this is important.

1. Stops Information Theft

When information is submitted on a website, it usually goes through a channel of computers before it reaches the intended party. So the chances of that information being stolen along the way are higher if SSL is not applied. SSL encrypts the information so that it’s readable only to the party it is intended for. It does this by adding random characters to the submitted information, which can only be accessed with an encryption key. The information is useless to anyone who doesn’t have that key.

With identity theft on the rise, information security is more important than ever. SSL ensures you keep everyone’s information safe, which builds confidence in people who are visiting your site.

2. Provides a Sense of Security to People Visiting Your Website

With identity theft on the rise, information security is more important than ever. SSL ensures you keep everyone’s information safe, which builds confidence in people who are visiting your site.

3. A Necessity for Online Payments

An SSL certificate is a requirement for any website that accepts payments with an encryption of at least 128-bit. So, if you have an ecommerce site, you have to have an SSL certificate installed if you plan on taking credit card payments.

4. It’s Mandatory in 2018

To ensure safer browsing in 2018, Google flagged any website that doesn’t have SSL certification by the end of 2017. It’s important to note that this change will affect all websites and not just ecommerce sites. So, if you’re a restaurant owner, lawyer, dentist, realtor or consultant, don’t fall into the trap of thinking that this change doesn’t apply to you. It does.

Now that January 1st has passed, when people try to access a website without a SSL certification, a ‘Not Secure’ message will appear, which will more often times than not prompt them to leave.

Maintaining an online presence can be tough, so don’t make it any harder for yourself than it already is. If you don’t already have an SSL certificate on your website, NOW is the time to do so. If you would like to speak with a Cloud9 hosting specialist about making your website secure, contact us today.

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pay per click advertising
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Pay Per Click Advertising, Demystified

If you’ve been looking into increasing your web presence as a company you’ve probably encountered the phrase “pay per click.” Well this very vague title is exactly what we are going to explore in this blog post. What exactly is this so-called “Pay Per Click Advertising” and how does it work? Lets find out.

 

What is it?

Pay per click advertising is a form of web based adverting that helps with search engine optimization. Search engines like Google and Bing have designated spots on their search result pages, usually along the side or in the first 1-3 search result lines. These prime locations are reserved for paying clients who have pay per click advertising with key words relative to the search. Every time someone uses the ad by clicking on it, the paying client is charged, because it has proven to be a successful advertisement placement and search result combination.

 

How does it work?  

First things first, you’ll have to choose a keyword or phrase that you’d like your page to be associated. The process of determining which keywords you should apply to your business page requires a thought out approach. You’ll need to consider how generic or specific you’d like your results to be. Keep in mind what phrases your competitors might be using and always remember your target audience. Lucky you for, Cloud9 has marketing gurus available that do exactly that. We can help you determine what keywords would benefit your business, reach your target audience and achieve web presence goals. Working with a budget in pay per click advertising can work multiple ways. Sometimes it is a bidding war on the price per a click for a desired spot and search combination. Whoever is willing to pay the most per a click gets the spot. You may want to top out at a certain budget each month or after achieving a certain result. Almost all web presence goals can easily be reached by utilizing per click advertising as it increases traffic to your page, or even a sub pages of your website. Each click will take the searcher exactly where you’d like to be on your website. It’s the most ideal way for getting a searcher to find your page rather than your competitors and increase over all SEO.

 

Is it right for me?  

Sounds pretty peachy so far doesn’t it? Well the truth is, pay per click advertising is phenomenal; it is an incredible tool for your webpage. There aren’t many drawbacks for pay per click advertising unless the keywords and target audience don’t match. As mentioned before, this is a crucial step and needs some serious brainstorming. It can also be expressive and competitive to land your page in the top results section. If you’re considering using pay per a click, give us a call at Cloud9 and we can weight out the pros and cons for your company specifically and decide on the right marketing combination for your business. Pay per click isn’t for everyone or every business, but when it is fully understood and used correctly it can take your SEO to a whole new level.

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mobile friendly digital marketing
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Is Mobilegeddon Upon Us?

 

If you haven’t made a priority of making your website mobile friendly, you might want to start thinking about changing that.

It could cost you your ranking on Google. (Cue the horror film screams.)

What Happened

In mid-April, Google announced that they were developing a new mobile-friendly ranking algorithm. The idea was that mobile-friendly sites would, in theory, appear higher in search engine results when users were conducting their searches on a mobile phone.

To a lot of people, this wasn’t just some small change: this was “Mobilegeddon”. Businesses began to panic about the mobile-friendliness of their websites (what took you so long?), with many opting to expedite the process before the algorithm change took effect.

On April 21st, the world of SEO held its collective breath as it waited to see Mobilegeddon unfold. It wasn’t unlike the moment the clock struck midnight on December 31, 1999. And just as our wild fears of the Y2K bug were all for nothing, it turns out that the fuss behind Mobilegeddon may have been a little bit excessive.

For now, at least.

What Could Happen

It turned out that the change in the algorithm didn’t have as severe an impact as many had expected. It took a week to fully roll out, but even after that week, the changes weren’t as drastic as anticipated.

This is thought to be generally attributable to a few factors.

First, and perhaps most importantly, the update was implemented, but not all websites have been reindexed. As these websites’ scores become updated, it could potentially affect the rankings in mobile search. (Read more here.)

Second, the fact that many companies decided to take action on making their website mobile friendly prior to the launch of the update could have lessened the impact of the update. In theory, the update is supposed to make mobile friendly sites appear higher than non-mobile friendly sites in mobile searches; if the site is, indeed, mobile friendly, then it should remain roughly where it is in desktop searches, assuming competing sites have taken similar action.

Third, many note that the update was said to be one factor that affects search engine results. That doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s the only factor, or the “be all or end all” factor. Other factors could take priority in the ranking, making the effects not as noticeable as people expected.

Time will tell how much impact this change has really caused, but for now, it’s safe to say that the so called “Mobilegeddon” was an overreaction.

What Should I Do?

Algorithm update or not, you really should have a mobile friendly website. If your site looks bad on mobile devices, you’re going to lose out on the audience that is visiting you from those sources—and you probably know that more and more people are using mobile devices to do their internet searches.

To find out whether Google considers your website to be mobile-friendly or not, just enter the web address into this site.

You want it to say “Awesome! This page is mobile friendly” after you complete your analysis. If it doesn’t say that, you have some work to do.

Cloud9 Marketing can help you bring your website up to mobile-friendly standards, preventing you from losing out on potential business and on your mobile search engine results ranking. Contact us, and we’ll set up a plan for

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SEO website analytics on a tablet
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SEO Isn’t Dead: It’s Evolved

“Here’s the mental model you need to understand why Google does what it does in the search results: we want to return really good search results to users so that they’re happy, so that they’ll keep coming back. That’s basically it: happy users are loyal users.”

These words of wisdom come from the mouth of Matt Cutts, head of Google’s Webspam team. They tell the ‘secret’ behind Google’s attitude towards search engine optimization, or SEO.

SEO: Dead or Alive?

SEO has been a hot topic over the past few years—and more recently, the conversation has turned towards the death of SEO. There are plenty of headlines predicting the death of SEO, but these posts don’t provide very convincing evidence that SEO is, in fact, on its way out.

Our opinion? SEO isn’t dead; it’s simply evolving.

Back to Basics

SEO is a multifaceted and often multi-channel support method intended to improve a website’s online presence. For example, SEO will help your website rank higher in Google searches that use keywords relevant to your website.

Coming back to our opening quote, Google wants to please its customers: when a customer types a few words into the search engine, Google wants to provide them with the best matches possible so that the customers find what they’re looking for.

SEO works with Google to make sure that it can deliver to its customers. SEO means building strong websites that offer a great user experience. So, if a customer Googles keywords that match up with your site’s content, they’ll be happy if Google coughs up your name first.

Google is our Friend

Note that we said working WITH Google. SEO isn’t about tricking Google—after all, if someone is searching a topic that has nothing to do with your website and you “trick” them into coming to your website, they’ll probably just leave. They’ll be annoyed at you, and they’ll be annoyed at Google for not giving them what they want.

SEO is about helping companies like Google do their job—while helping the website owners improve their web pages and the user experience. Happy users like to stick around.

The Evolution of SEO

Why do people think that SEO is a dying field? Probably because SEO algorithms and techniques are constantly changing. SEO strategies that worked a year ago might be stale now, meaning Google has changed the way it decides how a site will be ranked.

Since SEO involves lots of moving pieces — including traditional methods like improved meta data, keyword and key phrase research, and proper tag usage—there’s a lot going on at once. It might be accurate to say that some parts of SEO are dying, but in their place, newer, more effective SEO methods are popping up. SEO isn’t dying; it’s regenerating.

Smart SEO

There are thousands of factors that play into SEO, with dozens of changes happening every month. That’s a lot to keep up with, which is why it’s important to ensure that your SEO guru is up to snuff. SEO is serious business—ignoring it altogether can harm you. If your website unintentionally is poorly formatted for SEO, it can actually be penalized in search engine results. Yikes.

The key to good SEO is a good SEO person who adapts to changes as SEO evolves. Psst… we can help with that!

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