Google Offers: Screwed Again! Groupon & Adwords Advertisers Take It On The Chin

Posted on February 21, 2012 by Michael Kern

So, if you are an AdWords manager and or sell AdWords services like myself, Google has just made your job harder. They’re competing heavily with your PPC customers by running ads about their own new product, “Google Offers”.

I was coming up number two for a search with basically no competition, and a 3.00 cpc bid. So I used the preview tool to find out who the new-comer in my space might be. See for your-self below. It’s Google!

Google Offers Screen Shot

CLICK TO ENLARGE

I don’t understand how they can legally push my paid ads down to promote their product! The beauty of AdWords was that the little guy could compete with the big guys, but with Google them-selves driving up the cost of paid search for every and any keyword, I may have to direct clients to other mediums. It is not fair!

Google Offers is basically Groupon with the Google name!

OK regulatory commission, rip Google’s frigan head off! I’m so serious, they want to monopolize advertising, and have. I believe Google has been begging for a smack down for a while and with this move in to the online coupon game, they have gone to far.

I loved Groupon from day one, there marketing strategy should have been on the TV show “The Big Idea” (maybe it was?), it was brilliant twist on couponing. Their only weakness in my opinion was this scenario, someone in the advertising space with a strong brand name copying the idea.

If there is a Groupon Stock I will be shorting it till it is dead dead dead! In all fairness any big marketing brand could have stolen the groupon cheese (Refrence: Who Moved My Cheese – Book). I mean any other marketing giant could have branded there own version of groupon and bought ads on the paid serps. But Google doesn’t need to spend the billions of dollars the others would have had to for the keywords.

The headline of this article could have easily been different, but “Google Offers: Screwed Again! Groupon & Adwords Advertisers Take It On The Chin ” seems to put the hammer on the nail. I apologies to my none American readers for all the colloquialisms, “but if the shoe fits?”

Google has been pushing down the natural results hurting the SEO industry, and now they’re pushing down the paid search ads with just one more of their own ads. I can’t wait to see serp results: ad #1 Google Offers (I almost called it Groupon Offers), and #2 ad 75 dollars of AdWords, # 3 ad who ever, cause I’m just sick to my stomach.

Thx for reading and please tell me what you think in the comments.

Posted in Google Related | Leave a comment

3 Easy Ways To Increase Local Traffic And Convert It

Posted on February 9, 2012 by Michael Kern

Lets look at some ways to get more traffic to a local business website, by optimizing the webpages, and entice more of your traffic to call your business.

Google Local Results

Many local businesses will show up in the local listings if you do a search for their type of service and add the name of their town in the search. (example: Boston + Web Design).

If you have accomplished the sometimes tough task of showing up in Google Local results for your main Keyword + your-town searches, and would like to show up for the same keyword in neighboring towns. Add those towns to your page in the form of text.

Example:

Service Area:

Boston, MA | Woburn, MA, | Cambridge, MA | ETC…

If you have a blog on your site, and you want to rank well for a specific neighboring town, write a post about a memorable job you did there.

How to get more calls from website visitors

More and more people are using smart phones to surf the internet and to find local products and services. I assume you know if your website is mobile friendly, meaning it loads fast etc… Visit http://www.howtogomo.com/en/#homepage to test your website.

But, is your phone number above the fold? Is it clickable from mobile devices?

You want a clickable phone number at the top of every service page, to make it easy for mobile user to “click to call”. 15-25% of your online search maybe coming from mobile.

I can’t tell you how many small business websites I have seen with no phone number on the page, and if there is one, it’s in a photo so users have to find a pen, a piece of paper, write it down, type it into their phone. When all you had to do is put a clickable version on your site.

If you have emergency services like a locksmith, or towing businesses, this is a must!

Lowering bounce rates will lead to more conversions

You need to have pertinent information above the fold. People do not want to work to find what they’re looking for, and if you make it so a user has to scroll to find information, a lot of them will bounce (leave the page immediately).

Having a message that tells your visitor they have found the right page as soon as they land, or a message that promises to answer there questions in a catchy title at the top of the page will cut down on the number of people who bounce.

Just consider the keywords they typed into the search engine to find your page, and craft a message that will entice them to continue reading or to call you right away.

Summary:

Adding a clickable phone number and local geographic keywords to your webpage in text format, will help you to rank better for more local customers and get you more phone calls from this new traffic.

Written by Michael Kern

Posted in SEO Tips | Tagged local online advertising, Local seo, seo | Comments Off

Quality Score – AdWords Optimization

Posted on January 17, 2012 by Michael Kern
Quality Score - Adwords Optimization

Serve Better Ads

To make the paid ads more relevant in search results, Google implemented the AdWords Quality Score Attribute / algorithm. No longer is the number 1 ad position given to the highest bidder for a specific keyword / phrase.

It might be possible Google was also trying to cut down on the practice of brand name keyword arbitrage. Because you can basically bid on any keyword, but are not allowed to use Trademark names in your ads, Your QS goes into the toilet, dragging your whole campaign with it, keyword cost go up discouraging this practice.

Quality score can be driven down by different variables, even when your doing everything right! Of course a seasoned AdWords manager can quickly observe CTR for a given keyword, and check the bounce rate for the same keyword in Google Analytics to determine the true quality of a keyword.

Lets quickly define doing everything right:

Keyword your bidding on appears in the ad copy on the first or second line, the keyword is in your landing page title, and on the landing page a few times, you know the ad is good because your CTR is good, and people who visit the page for that keyword via paid search don’t bounce, or your bounce rate is under X%.

If you doing everything right but your Quality Score is in the 3 and 4 range don’t panic, but check to see if you:

  • Have any other campaigns in your account with low keyword scores like; 2′s or 3′s. Your keywords have to match the ad copy and landing page, that goes for singular versions and plural. Either make changes to your ads, tittle… or move keyword to a new ad group.
  • Make sure your CTR are good… Low CTR’s will negatively affect your QS. Try testing a new ad to improve CTR’s.

Quality Score Ranking Factors Include:

  • CTR
  • Ad copy relevance
  • Landing page relevance
  • Current and historical Account keyword quality Score / performance.

CTR – Ad Copy Relationship

We talked about how to improve CTR by trying or testing new / more compelling ad copy. Ad copy has to stand out – few corporate PPC management techs will bother to do this check- They know the best headline to use, compelling tag line… the problem is- so does everyone else, so you look at a SERP for your keyword and all the headlines match. Try reading Seth Godins book “Purple Cow” or check out his blog Seth Godin for ideas about how to stand out.

Make sure you use the ad preview tool under the tools and analysis tab in the campaign management software to check on ad copy, no need to lower your own CTR’s!! New customers are so blow away by their name being on the first page of the SERP’s they constantly perform searches, try to discourage this. But no matter what you say, they will do searches, and most will even click their ad costing themselves money just to prove it’s working.

Ad Copy

Ad copy relevance we discussed, and is simple, use the words in you copy – plural or singular, think about putting all singular keywords in their own ad group. Be original -

Landing Page Relevance

Again we talked about this already, but as Anthony Robbins always says “repetition is the mother of skill”… And I can expand a bit…Make sure keywords are in the first three words of the page tittle, on the page at least three times (top, middle, and bottom). Put keyword in an image alt field, and bold the keyword text once on the page. Sounds a lot like On-page SEO, hmmm.

If you are not in charge of the webdesign or SEO too – you may run into some headwinds from other departments. I hope for your sake there is someone with a wide view managing the SEM and integrating all elements into a cohesive strategy.

One last thought – Don’t expect to see immediate results after optimizing your campaign and landing page, which brings me to my next point.

Historical Account Performance

Once everything is cleaned up and your campaigns are optimized you will have to wait. Google wants to see better performance before they bump up your keyword quality score rankings.

Myth: By bidding a lot of money to be first on the SERP it will improve your CTR and improve your quality scores. This is a bogus myth, probably started by Google, but definitely propagated by people that don’t know what they are talking about.

If you made it this far, please share in the comments, and follow me on twitter @Inform_Local

Written by Michael Kern

Posted in PPC - Adwords | Tagged advice, adwords, help, how to, info, information, optimization, quality, quality score, score, tips | Comments Off

SEO Tip – Get Website Traffic By Choosing The Right Business Name

Posted on January 9, 2012 by Michael Kern

The closer your business name matches a search people are doing anyway, the better. Most businesses tend to rank well for their own name, and good rankings mean more eyeballs will see your business, more eyeballs means more customers and traffic.

If your in a local service business, you may want to include the town you are located in, into your business name. People searching online will add the town or state where they live into their query. If someone living in Boston is looking for a local mechanic to fix their car, they will type something like: “Boston mechanic” “mechanic Boston” & “Auto repair Boston”.

Businesses That Begin With A/Number/Symbol

In the past, the yellow pages were the main source for people looking for a local service. Businesses listed with a symbol were listed first, then businesses listed with a number, and then it was alphabetical. So to be the first business option in the book, business owners used to named their company something like: AAA Auto Repair, or Acme Tire Shop, #1 Auto Repair, you get the idea.

Nowadays businesses are listed on search engines by relevance. Every website is crawled by search engine bots and ranked for the words on their page(s). But there is still an advantage to having an A/number/symbol as the first character of your business name.

Every link on a webpage passes link juice or ranking juice if you prefer to the site it links to, and the links that are at the top of a page pass more juice than the links lower on the page. Online directories group companies into categories, and then all the companies are listed alphabetically, and the ones at the top of the page, all your A companies, 123 companies, and # companies will get the most rank juice passed to them.

When naming your local business, remember to do a little research with Google’s keyword tool (just search for [Google keyword tool]), to discover what people are searching for the most in your area, that is keeping with your service, and if you name your business after that phrase, you will be on the road to success.

Written by Michael Kern

Posted in SEO Tips | Tagged business name, seo, seo tip | Comments Off

Google’s Greed

Posted on January 5, 2012 by Michael Kern

Google Get Your Greedy Hands Off My Client

Google has been reviewing all new AdWords accounts, or at least accounts that redeem a coupon for a free $100.00 of AdWords spend. Then an “AdWords Expert” will email the new client, telling them they looked over their new account and seen “potential for improvements”, and that they can help, essentially saying it looks like the campaign you just paid someone set up for you, should be optimized by a “real expert”, and that your agency is apparently doing something wrong!

Letter Sent To My Client From Google AdWords Team

adwords letter to my new client

In football jargon this is a major C’on Man!

How can Google make suggestions and point out “potential” improvements without understanding the clients goals? I believe I am fulfilling a much needed service to very small businesses, that would be better off leaving their PPC campaign for me to run.

Could very small businesses get more leads if they spent more money? Of course, but some are selling services with tight margins, and looking for maximum return on investment.

Client Goals For Paid Search

Not concerned with growing brand, only attracting potential clients close to his location that are ready to hire. Looking for maximum return on investment.

AdWords Client Campaign Set-up

We targeted keywords deep in the buying cycle, targeting a 25 mile radius around clients Geo-graphical area, negative keywords include: how to, videos, instructions, employment, etc… Ad copy also tends to discourage the do-it-your-selfers (DIY), and information seekers from clicking the ads.

Google interprets low volume and especially low click through rates as a failure.

There is of course plenty of DIY information on the website for seo purposes, but I don’t want my client paying for traffic that is unlikely to convert. We could of course design content to convert information seekers and the DIY, but with a small budget I feel obligated to go after the lower hanging fruit – which is of course people ready to hire my client.

Thank you Google, but three views and zero clicks is exactly the look I’m going for, put plainly I’m cherry picking!

Do Low Click Through Rates Sound The Death Rattle Of The Inexperienced PPC Manager?

To a customer who doesn’t know the difference between CTR and QS, I believe it looks like they have tied their wagon up to a dead horse. After all, who should know more about Google than Google?

I’m A Skeptic Turned Cynic

I personally believe in the long run it would be in Google’s best interest to keep me (AdWords Management Agency) out there convincing people to try AdWords, and helping clients be successful, than to encourage people to go it alone.

Google must believe more money will be made by people – trying AdWords – failing – and quitting, than by building a successful campaign where the client is successful and continues to spend money on ads. Why else would they undermine their affiliates (I am a sad member of their Google Engage program).

I once believed in Google, thought it was great company, but the shine has come off the apple, and I see them for what they are – Responsible stock holders looking out for them-selves alone.

Written by Michael Kern

Posted in PPC - Adwords | Tagged adwords, google, Google greed, Pay-Per-Click, ppc | Comments Off

Simple Marketing Message

Posted on December 28, 2011 by Michael Kern

Marketing message - Don't beat a dead horse cartoon - By- <a href=
Don’t Beat A Dead Horse Cartoon By- Jack Kern

Posted in Small Business Advertising | Tagged cartoon, gif, horse, marketing | Comments Off

Local Marketing With Google

Posted on December 15, 2011 by Michael Kern
Originally posted on December 23, 2010 by Michael Kern

Google’s Algorithm Is Changing To Supply Searchers With What They’re Really Looking For … Local Results

Google is supplying much more local data on their organic SERP’s (search engine results pages), in response to user demand for more local services. This increases opportunity for local businesses to get to the top of Google’s organic SERP’s. If, they have the skills to optimize their local listing, and beat the competition.

While this change is being rolled out, it seems Google is experimenting with there algorithm for Google Places. This is where Google draws local business data for its SERP’s. Google Places has clearly replace the Yellow Pages as the local directory of choice, and with an added opportunity to get listed on the top of the #1 search engine, Google Places will remain the directory of choice for quite a while.

Even if your business has never signed up for Google Places (formally Google Maps), you may be listed. It is important to claim your listing and update your companies information. Surly businesses that have verified their information will be listed on the SERP,s, above those who have not verified their listing.

To find out if your company is listed, Google your company name, include your town and state. If your business does show, follow the link next to your listing. If your not listed, go here and sign up: Google Places. Note: If you have more than one listing, be sure to claim one and delete the others!

Google Quality Guidelines

Be sure to give their quality guidelines a thorough reading. Google’s algorithm is sure to weed out businesses that do not strictly adhere to their rules (eventually). You will be able to place better on the SERP’s, once all the spammers have been eliminated, or penalized for improperly listing their service. To read their Quality Guidelines, go here: Google Quality Guidelines.

Getting Listed and Getting Good Position

Being listed and getting to the top of the directory are two different things. Google guidelines contain several subtle nuances, and it is easy to get penalized through ignorance. There are also many ways to optimize your local directory listing that are not published, and only known by companies like mine, who work with these directories every day. Check back or sign up for our rss feed, to learn best practices for optimizing your local business Listing

Written by Michael Kern

Posted in Small Business Advertising | Tagged local directory, local online advertising, small business advertising | Comments Off

Webpage Rank – Boxing Analogy

Posted on December 15, 2011 by Michael Kern

Page 1 – On The Top Of Google – Boxing Page-Rank Analogy

Originally Posted on January 25, 2011 by Michael Kern

In order to be positioned well on the search engines, to get on the top of Google’s page 1 results. Your webpage has to be the most relevant of all webpages for a given keyword or phrase (relevance as determined by Google). this requires some SEO (search engine optimization) work.

One of the major indicators used by Google to determine the relevance of a webpage are inbound links (a link to your webpage from somewhere else). The ideal link will have the keyword or words you want as anchor-text (the highlighted words in a link are called anchor text), the link will come from a website in your vertical (genre), and that website will have a high page rank (pr).

If you imagine your website as professional boxer, how would you know if he is any good? With a boxer you would look at their record, look at the quality of their opponents. Who have they been fighting? Just like Google looks at who is linking to you.

If you discover your boxer has been fighting no-name losers with poor fight records, what does that tell you about them as a boxer? Nothing! Now, what if your boxer has beaten Mike Tyson, and Evander Holyfield? This says you need to respect him as a boxer. They have earned a high level of respect/rank – even if they have only had two fights.

What if your website only has two links coming to it? Even with only two inbound links, if they came from websites with a really high rank, it would say a lot about your website, like our boxer who has beaten Tyson and Holyfield. Links from proven websites says your proven too.

If you have links to your websites from other websites with no page rank, they have no authority to pass on, like our boxer who wins fighting losers. In order to rank well your goal should be to acquire back-links from websites in your vertical with a pr5 or higher.

Quick Note About Personae Links:

Google, Twitter, and Facebook have been tracking us via our “likes”, our tweets, our webpages, blogs, books we bought, and know us pretty good by now. If my online marketing company got a link from Rand Fishkin, that said “online Marketing company”, it would pass along some authority. I mention this to give you an idea of how important social marketing will become to SEO in the near future (*Cough – NOW!).

Written by Michael Kern

Posted in SEO | Tagged anchor text, google, inbound links, page rank, personae, search engine optimization, search engines, seo search engine optimization | Comments Off

Local Online Advertising

Posted on December 14, 2011 by Michael Kern

Local Pay-Per-Click Advertising With Google Adwords

Pay Per Click is a great way to advertise in your local area. It puts your company, and advertising message on the top of the search engines immediately. No waiting like with organic advertising.

Customers searching for your products and services will have instant access to your company message right at the top of the search engine results pages, or next to relevant content in the local online newspaper.

Geo-Targeting Example

If you only want your ads to be seen by people who are searching from within a 2 mile radius from the North End of Boston, your campaign can be structured this way. You determine what neighborhoods have access to your message, and which don’t.

There are Two Ways to Set Up a “Local” PPC Campaign

  1. Determine a geographical area at the campaign level, so people outside your target zone will never see your ads, so they can’t waste your money.
  2. Run a national campaign but only use keywords with local modifiers. EXAMPLE: If you are a dentist in Boston Massachusetts add keywords near your practice; boston dentist, dentist boston, dentist boston ma, dentist in boston, dentist near boston etc…(You do not need to capitalize keywords)

When you begin to add all the towns around your area, you may end up with a keyword list of 500-1000 words and phrases. Setting up an account and optimizing it with hundreds or thousands of long tail keywords, spread across many campaigns, with many ads, in multiple ad groups is more work than most PPC management companies ever do.

Search Engine Optimization For Local Businesses

Optimizing Webpages for Local Search

Optimizing a web page for local search, means being careful to include geographical identifiers in your web page content. If your a boston dentist, make sure you have these keywords in your content. Also include synonyms for your keywords and rearrange them.

Local Optimization Tips

  1. Be sure to use keywords naturally in your content, do not stuff keywords onto a page. But, do make sure they are also in your; Title, H-tags, and URL if possible.
  2. Include your physical location on every page of your companies website.
  3. Link to Your Google Maps page.

Local Town Directories

Most cities across the United States have a local town directory, or some sort of county directory. I would not pay for placement in these resources, but when you can get a link to your website, and some free local publicity and traffic, why not?

Press Releases

Issuing a Well Written Timely Press Release Is A Great Way to Promote New Local Services

Alerting the local media when your company is offering a promotion, or is helping a local charity, is a great way to promote your business in the community and build a little brand awareness.

Adding geographical keywords to your press release will help it to get picked up by local news companies, and properly indexed in the search engines. Always be sure add your address, and cover; who, what, why, and when.

Press releases have a chance to go viral, meaning, if your story is good enough it will be seen by many, who pass it along to many more, the story grows exponentially. When its all done and said you may have a great local reputation, Brand awareness, and tons of links all over the web that routinely direct traffic to your humble little website. Free-Press-Release.com is a great site, I recommend going for the 1 dollar upgrade so you can ad a link.

The Best Free Lunch On The Internet For Local Search

directory and press release example

Click Image For Larger View

Be sure to claim your free business listing at Google Places, most businesses on the top of the search engines are listed in their free directory. The United States most heavily trafficked search engine is Google, they own like 80% of all search traffic. Did I mention it is free?

Other Major Directories

Bing Local  and Yahoo Local are also worth mentioning as well as Local.com, Yelp, Merchant Circle and Whofish. All these directories are free at this time. Of course they all offer upgraded services, but I have tried them and did not find them worth the expense.

These are the places your neighbors are searching for local products and services, you have probably been on one of these sites your-self in the past.

Video Tagged With Local Modifiers & Keywords

A simple little video hosted on your own  YouTube channel is an extremely powerful way to promote your location, services and or products. Be sure to have keywords + town and state in the title, description as well as the tags section. Most new cell phones can capture the video, and the YouTube account is of course free to set-up.

So there you have it, many ways to advertise in your local town and surrounding area. For more tips and advice follow me on twitter @Inform_Local.

Written by Michael Kern

Posted in Small Business Advertising | Tagged geographical area, local search, optimization tips, pay per click advertising, search engine optimization | Comments Off

All You Need Is A Website – Baloney -BS

Posted on December 13, 2011 by Michael Kern

Web hosting companies are advertising on television a lot more lately. This is a sure sign I am watching way to much boob-tube. But, the latest commercial I saw from 1and1.com said “All you need is a website and you will be found everywhere”. What a complete load of crap!

Most online marketers know that a website is just like a tv commercial that never gets aired. I maybe actually stealing that line from someone. hmm, anyway, unless you optimize your website some, or do something to market your website, online or off, it is exactly like a tv commercial that never plays. Looks good, sells nothing.

Google has teamed up with Intuit and other partners, they are going through the states offering all business a free website, hosting and domain name for one year. See examples here: http://www.newyorkgetonline.com/ and http://www.ohiogetonline.com/, which is where I got / stole the idea for http://informlocal.com/blog/lowell-get-online/, try not to notice similar graphics.

I looked over the Intuit website builder software and found it lacking. Google want them to sell AdWords to all the new sign ups. The one difference between 1and1.com and the deal from Google is, Google is offering free events where they train people on how to market there websites *Cough – with Google products.

A website is a great place to begin, but if you pay for one without a further marketing plan and budget, I would probably have to say to save your money! What an outrageous claim from 1and1 though.

You don’t have to take my word for how outrageous a claim it is, just ask anyone who has actively tried to get on the first page of the search engines, never mind the top spot on the page. I guess 1and1.com could use a fresh course on business ethics. Hey, if it weren’t for them though, what would I write about? Probably Fear Factor or House (these are television shows for the uninitiated).

Written by Michael Kern

Posted in Small Business Advertising | Tagged business ethics, free website, tv commercial, web hosting companies | Comments Off