1. Advanced SEO Strategies 2012
Tim Grice
Head of Search, Branded3

2. High Value, Natural Link Signals
• Why in Content?
• Anchor Text Variation
• „News‟ Strategy
• Freshness
• Developing Natural Signals

3. In Content Links Work Better
• More defendable
• Less likely to be devalued
• Compliment Outreach
• More relevant

4. Anchor Text Variation
• Old advice but still under used
• Use „related searches‟ + Google Suggest
• Avoids filters and adds value

5. News Strategy
Regular Content Agree on Re-write Content
Updates Commentary
Push Story to Publish through Incorporate
Sourced Blogs news sites Brand
Spread Story Monitor Alerts for
Syndication Through Social Link
Media Opportunities

6. Why it works…
• Mimic‟s the natural spread of content around
the web
• Creates a natural link spike
• Brand signals work
• A natural spread of authority

7. „Fresh Rank‟
• Google wants up to date content
• A page can be deemed „fresh‟ through inbound links
• Links placed in „crawled‟ content have low value

8. Freshness Test

9. Developing Natural Signals
• Google improving link analysis
• Anchor text variation and brand
• Location of links
• Authority spread of incoming links
• Justify your links
• Targeting „high‟ metrics only, is a mistake

10. Protecting Your Site
Variation = Filter Protection

11. Anchor Text
• Decide on 10 – 15 keywords per page
• Use „Brand‟ and „Noise‟ signals
• Use the Google Keyword tool/Suggest/Related
Searches
• Helps understand the true SEO value of a page

12. Variation in Action!

13. Link Types
“It‟s not all about metrics”

14. Paid Link Profile

15. Google Panda
• Biggest Offences
> Internal duplicated content
> Cross domain duplication
> Pagination issues
> Thin pages
• SEO teams need be involved in every site update
• Panda is not a link based algorithm

16. International SEO + hreflang
• Google has issues with duplicated content across
international sites
• Consolidate page signals using the language tag
• Canonical link same language sites back to the
master domain (.com, .ie, .co.uk, .ca etc…)
• All sites benefit from the authority of the canonical
domain

17. Competitor Strategies
6 Questions to ask:
• What type of links are they?
• What is the spread of authority?
• Which countries do the come from?
• Which sites do they publish content on?
• At what rate are they building links?
• What is their overall PR/Social Strategy?

18. The Links
• Editorial links
• Text links/Paid Links
• Banner image links
• Link Spam
• Infographics / Social Links
• Bookmarking & Forums
Always pick the better links to copy, these are the
ones with the most longevity.

19. Open Site Explorer

20. Authority Spread

21. Link Location
http://blekko.com/

22. Majestic SEO
• How aggressive are competitors?
• Can you overtake them?

23. Infographics
• Use Image Search to find linking sites

24. Social Link Strategy
• What news are they syndicating?
• What link bait ideas worked & who linked
to them?
• Where do they guest blog?

25. Search Metrics
• What content works best?

26. ROI + SEO
• Much more difficult than Paid Search
• Rarely develop ROI on a keyword basis
• You need to understand where your biggest
opportunities are
• Best to measure ROI on a page basis

27. Cumulative SEO Benefit
• Decide on target keywords per page
• Estimate cumulative traffic
• Use average conversion data to estimate value
• Expect to wait 12 months to break even

28. Opportunity Analysis
Conversion
Rate
Opportunity
Potential
Ranking
Traffic

29. Opportunity Analysis
• Look for relevant keywords ranking
between 12 – 20
• Estimate potential traffic
• Factor in average conversion rate
• Quickest avenue to ROI
• Can use multiple API‟s to automatically process

30. Attack + Defend Strategy
• High value keywords need maintaining
• Attack terms can be moved into defence once
rankings achieved
• Less effort needed to defend keywords
• Allows you to target more terms without
increasing budgets

31. Learning more…
• Read SEOwizz.net & Blogstorm.co.uk
• Email tim.grice@branded3.com for free SEO advice
or connect on Twitter @tim_grice
• Visit our website www.branded3.com