Search engine optimization beyond meta tags

Search
Beyond Engine
META Optimization
Tags

www.seocertification.org.in
Anand Saini

Objectives
 Move beyond META tags
 SEO in Higher Education
 Define terms
 Establish “The Factors”
 Keyword Research Techniques
 Discuss Google
 Keep in’ it real - practical
 Resources


The Rise of Search

Pew Internet and American Life Project
Search is the 2nd most popular online activity,
after email.
Percentage of net users who search on a typical
day grew 70% from 2002 to 2008


The Rise of Search


SEO = Search Engine Optimization

Definition
Using targeted keywords and phrases so a website’s
pages will rank high on SERPs.

SERP = Search Engine Results Page

Note that SEO also stands for Search Engine Optimizer


SEM = Search Engine Marketing
Definition
All endeavors that utilize search engines to promote
a web site, increase its traffic and/or stickiness, and
ultimately augment return on investment.

SEM methods include
SEO, paid placement, pay-per-click and paid
inclusion campaigns.


SPAM
"Dear google.com,
I visited your website and noticed that
you are not listed in most of the major
search engines and directories..."


It’s not a quick fix
SEO is a best practice
 Web developers
 Writers
 Editors in various departments
 Application developers
 Administration
 Vendors

Conversions
What is a highered conversion?
 Getting a sale = convert a prospective into a
confirmed
 Get students involved in activities
 Building school pride
 Provide audience for experts
 Allow faculty and research to publicize their
findings, discoveries which could lead to more
students, grants, funding, collaboration,
tenure
 Job postings

UG H!


Pay Per Click
Definition

Advertisers submit bids to search-
engine companies for words.

They pay each time the “sponsored link”
is clicked.


PPC Related Terms
Definitions

CPC – Cost-per-click
The cost to advertisers per click by a user.

CTR – Click through rate
The number of users who clicked on an ad divided by
the number of times the ad was delivered
(impressions). Usually seen as a percentage.


Pay Per Click
Competition
Universities and Colleges
Especially the online Universities with a
national/international presence such as Phoenix,
Capella, Walden etc…

Advertising Agencies & Online Directory Companies
Use PPC to draw Web searches to sites they use to find
prospective students, or "leads."

Examples
Petersons, OffToCollege.com, CollegeBoard.com, etc…


PPC

Weekend Biology Major
MBA


PPC
Growing in Cost

Prices for popular keywords…

• "associate's degree"
• "master's degree”
• "business program"

…on Yahoo have each about doubled in
the past two years. www.seocertification.org.in

Negative Key Word
“Online”

PPC
Growing in Competition

"It's both more expensive and less
effective because more people
are doing it."

Margee Ensign
Dean of the School of International Studies
University of the Pacific


PPC
Bidding Techniques

Start a campaign at the end of the day or the end
of the month

“It’s often possible to find popular keywords available
for lower prices at those times because other groups
have already spent their budgets.”


PPC
Bidding Techniques

Bid on less popular words/phrases

You’ll get less clicks, so it will cost you less.

Those who actually click will more likely lead
to a conversion = Quality Traffic


SERPs - Organic Listings


The Golden Triangle
Eye Tools Research

Pay Per Click
$$$

Organic = Free


Focus on Organic Listings
Metrics
Conversion Rates
Organic Listings 4.2%
Paid Listings 3.6%

Organic clicked 5x more than PPC
From “Marketing Sherpa” - Search Marketing Benchmark Survey 2005


Search Result Page
Average Participant
6.5 seconds to click
Read 4 to 5 listings.

Title Tags
Compelling and
Attractive TITLES
increase click-through!


Golden Triangle Statistics
85% click on organic

72% click the first link of interest

25% read all listings first, then click


Golden Triangle Statistics
Organic Search Results Viewed
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10


Web Search Market Share
August 2008
MSN
Google 71%
Yahoo 18%
Yahoo MSN 5%
Google
Ask 3%

Other 3%

PageRank
 One of the methods Google uses to determine a
page’s relevance or importance.
 Each web page - not site - has a PageRank score
 Developed by the founders of Google, Sergey Brin
and Larry Page
 It’s an algorithm which helps rank web pages based
on the probability that a random person surfing
the Internet will find a given page.


PageRank
 PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic
nature of the web by using its vast link
structure as an indicator of an individual page's
value.
 Google interprets a link from page A to page B
as a vote, by page A, for page B.
 Votes cast by "important" pages weigh more
heavily and help to make other pages
"important."

PageRank

View a page’s PageRank with Google Toolbar


PageRank

Most Higher Ed Rank 5-8
MIT, Harvard, Stanford = 9
Maria College = 5


PageRank


Google PageRank
Page Rank Today

 No longer the primary ranking factor
 PageRank is no longer recalculated on a 30 day
cycle
 Used to determine crawl frequency, crawl depth,
and database selection.


Authority & Reputation
Links are Key

Link Popularity / Authority
Links = “Votes”
Links from many pages signify an important page
Links from important pages carry more ‘weight’
Important pages rank higher

Link Reputation
Links from related pages enforce the theme
Links from related words pass on that theme
Strongly themed pages rank well for related queries


Links - Best Practices
Bad
 http://mysite.com
 http://www.mysite.com/index.html
 http://mysite.com/index.html

Good
 http://www.mysite.com/
 Use redirects and make all internal links point to
your domain using the
“http://www.mysite.com/”
 Always include trailing “/” on folders.


Link Best Practices
Search engines treat…
http://measuring-up.com/
and
http://www.measuring-up.com/

…as two different sites.


Link Text
4.4 Anchor Text of Inbound Link
3.1 Text Surrounding the Link

Avoid “click here”

SEO: Link nouns not verbs
View the course catalog.
View the course catalog.

How can I create a Google-friendly site?

Google Webmaster Help Center
 http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/
 http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=4034

Google on SEO
 http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.
py?answer=35291


“Department of Biology”


Off-The-Page SEO
AKA Link Building

Off page optimizations consist entirely
of link building strategies.

 Reciprocal linking

 RSS news feeds

 Linkbait = good topical content

 Digg, YouTube, Facebook

 Forums

The Factors


SEOmoz.org


Search Engine Ranking Factors V2
4.9 Keyword Use in Title Tag
4.4 Global Link Popularity of Site – “Weight” or “Authority”
4.1 Age of Site
4.0 Link Popularity within Internal Site Structure

3.7 Keyword Use in Body Text
3.5 Links to Quality/Relevant External Sites
3.4 Age of Document
3.3 Keyword Use in H1
3.2 Age of Link
3.1 Text Surrounding the Link www.seocertification.org.in

Factor 1: Page Title
The #1 important on-the-page ranking factor!

The title is your search results link. It should
be clear, sensible, and encourage a click.

Length: 70 characters or less
Google description uses 70
characters.

Use Keyphrases or Keywords
Also use it in beginning of page text.


Page Title Strategy

Page titles are for more than just SEO

•Bookmark text
•Answers question “Where am I”


4.9 Keyword Use in Title Tag
4.4 Global Link Popularity of Site – “Weight” or “Authority”
4.1 Age of Site
4.0 Link Popularity within Internal Site Structure

3.7 Keyword Use in Body Text
3.5 Links to Quality/Relevant External Sites
3.4 Age of Document
3.3 Keyword Use in H1
3.2 Age of Link
3.1 Text Surrounding the Link


2.8 Keyword Use in H2, H3 etc…
2.8 Keyword Use in Page URL
2.6 Keyword Use in ALT Tags
2.4 Frequency of Page Updates
2.0 Keyword Use in Meta Description Tag

1.4 HTML Validation
1.2 Keyword Use in Meta Keywords Tag


META Description

Keyword Use in Meta Description Tag

 70 words
 Sometimes shows up in Google SERP
 Page specific
 Includes main page keyphrases



2.8 Keyword Use in H2, H3 etc…Semantic markup
2.8 Keyword Use in Page URL
2.6 Keyword Use in ALT Tags
2.4 Frequency of Page Updates
2.0 Keyword Use in Meta Description Tag

1.4 HTML Validation


META Keywords

 Abused and discredited
 Stuff you don’t want in page text
 Misspellings
 Keyword “forks” – SUNY Albany
 5 to 10 phrases
 Do not repeat too much


Search Engine Indexing Limits
Page File Size
No more than 150 kilobytes
Before Images, CSS and other Attachments

Links Per Page
No more than 100 unique links per page

Title Tag
No more than 70 characters

Meta Description
No more than 155 characters


Search Engine Indexing Limits

Parameters in URL: No more than 2

Depth of URL: No more than 4

Bad Example
http://www.mysite.com/people/places/things/noun/danny/car

Best Practice
http://www.mysite.com/people/danny/


Avoid
Image Text

Iframes for displaying content

Flash, Silverlight or video for content
without text equivalents

AJAX – Avoid navigation that relies on
javascript
onClick="navigate('ajax.html#)


Keywords
Keywords are the foundation of SEO

Your institution, departments, offices etc… should
determine critical keywords

Research their potential value and effectiveness


Key phrase Research

1. Brainstorm
2. Bust out the tools
3. Finalize list
4. Implement
5. Rinse and repeat

Brain Storm
• What words would prospective students use?
• Avoid overly generic terms are difficult to rank
for and won't provide qualified traffic
• Check out competition and their Keywords
META tags if they use them
• Add location!
• Misspellings
• Break out sessions by category – department,
school, organization etc…

Number of keywords used
1 Word Query – 15% Admissions

2 Word Query – 32% UAlbany Admissions

3 Word Query – 27% SUNY Albany Admissions

4 Word Query – 15% UAlbany Admissions Campus Tour

5 Word Query – 11% University at Albany Admissions Tour

85% of searches online
are with 2 or more keywords
Source: Search Engine Watch 2007 Search Engine Watch 2007


Key phrase Combos

Word Game: Create a 3 or 4-Term Combo

1. Create as complete a sentence as possible
2. Specifically describe page content
3. Using strongest keywords and phrases
4. Avoid highly competitive phrases


Are visitors looking for
“Prospective Students”?
Search Volumes
“Prospective Students”=
6,500/month
“University Admissions”=
135,000/month

Use keywords in the navigation that
visitors use to find your site.

 Easier for visitors to navigate the site
 Improved rankings, search engines better understand
how your site is related to searches.


Keyword “Stemming”

Swim = Swimming = Swims

It’s all the same to the major
search engines


Key phrase Brainstorm
a. Fountain Day Fountain Countdown
b. School Spirit Campus Party
c. Celebration Campus Unity
d. Community Fountain Party
e. Campus Tradition College Rite of Spring
f. University Tradition Food fun and fountain
g. Alumni Memories Jump in Fountain
h. College Fountain
i. University Fountain Non-alcoholic event
j. Fountain Celebration Student Party
k. World Record College Student Party
l. SUNY Albany Fountain Fountain Day Drunk
m. Spring Celebration Fountain Day Drinking
n. Guinness World Record Fountain Day Mayhem
o. Pillow Fight Party School
p. Beach Balls SUNY Albany Party School

Key phrase Research

Determine the value of
keywords/phrases to increase
traffic to a page or site.


Key phrase
Tools


Utilize Internal Search Results
What are visitors using

Find out what words your visitors use
to get to your site.

Consult web analytics or Google
Webmaster Tools – Top Search
Queries


Keyword Research
“Head” vs. “Tail” Terms

What’s the difference?


Step 2 – Key phrase Research

Brand
Key Phrases
65%
of our queries


Keyword Research
Head Terms
– Dominated by Brand key phrases
– Drive most of your traffic
– Most expensive for PPC
– Most competitive
– Less relevant
– Shorter


Keyword Research
Long Tail
– Dominated by generic category key phrases
– Drives least amount of traffic per search
– Least expensive for PPC
– Less competitive and easier to win
– Drives less but more qualified traffic to website


Keyword Research
Long The combined effect of optimizing for many
Tail longer search terms will be to bring in a great deal
of highly qualified traffic

Optimization for the general terms will occur
naturally by their inclusion in these more specific
phrases


Key phrase Research Tools

 Assists with keyword/phrase
brainstorming

 Show how often search terms
are used

 Quantifies the effectiveness
of keywords/phrases

“Competition”

Less competition for a keyword/phrase
mean that it will be easier to reach the
top of SERPs.


Keyword/phrase Tools

1. Google AdWords
is the best free keyphrase tool
https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal
2. WordTracker
The industry standard, a subscription is
required – also has a free tool
3. Overture Database Search
No longer consistently available
4. Microsoft AdCenter
Not for Mac/Safari


Other Keyword Search Tools
 Trellian – Keyword Discovery
 Spyfu
 Nichebot
 Hitwise
 Trends
 Yahoo suggestion on search

Wordtracker
Uses Metacrawler Search Engines
Metacrawler and Dogpile
Metacrawler Search Engines
Queries several of the main search engines to
compile its own results - Google, Yahoo and
MSN

175 million searches each month

Wordtracker keeps the last two months of
search results in its database

KEI
Keyword Effectiveness Index
Higher the KEI, better the
keyword
Ratio of Two crucial variables
1. Popularity
Number of times a term is searched

2. Competition
Number of pages returned by search for a term


Wordtracker
KEI - Find a Niche - Opportunities

Example
Find a baseball card that is searched many times,
but has few page results.

Pete Rose baseball card
Searched 100 times daily found on 1,000 pages
Ratio is 1/10

Derek Jeter baseball card
Searched 1000 times daily found on 100,000
Ratio is 1/100


Google AdWords Keyword Tool

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

 Best free key phrase tool

 Helps with brainstorming

 Displays keyword/phrase effectiveness

 Finds opportunities


AdWords vs. Wordtracker
AdWords is a better free tool than the free
Wordtracker tool.

Full Wordtracker has more sophisticated tool
set and is the industry standard.

Wordtracker service keeps track of multiple
projects.

Wordtracker provides more precise
measurements for word/phrase effectiveness.

AdWords integrates well with Google Analytics.


Using AdWords for Keyphrase Research
The Process

 Begin with one general keyword
 Be sure to check the “Use synonyms” box
 Let the tool build a large list of keywords


Keyword Research
Building Lists
Scroll through the results list and add all terms appropriate to

the School of Business site.

When complete, download list into Excel or other tool.

Repeat the process as other terms become apparent and expand

those as well with the “Get more related keywords” button.

Continue building the list using all free tools available

 Don’t worry about adding duplicates at this point

 Keep looking for new terms that have been missed and

expand those

Keyword Strategy
Building Lists

Repeat the process using the “website
content” tool

on Google.
 Select the option “Include other
pages on my site linked from this
URL”


Keyword Strategy
Organizing and grouping lists

Create a full list of your
keywords
Keywords
best business school
best business schools
business college
Break out the list into categories
business education management school business school businee college mba
business management schools management school best business school business college mba degree
business school management schools best business schools business college course mba program
business school rankings business management schools business college degree mba programs
business schools business school business college degrees executive mba
business school rankings business college university
business schools mba business schools business colleges
business schools rank business schools mba top business college
executive mba business schools rank
graduate business school graduate business school
graduate business schools graduate business schools
international business schools
international business schools rankings business schools
management school top business school
management schools top business schools
mba degree undergraduate business schools
mba program university business schools
mba programs
rankings business schools
top business school
top business schools
undergraduate business schools
university business schools

Web Writing
 Write for the “inverted pyramid”.
 Make the visible text on a page "search-
friendly"
 Embed links in body copy
 Add <strong>tags</strong>
 Add captions with strong
keywords/phrases frequently


Optimizing Body Copy

YUCK!
Large blocks of text
without headlines
and subheadings

Bad for SEO
Bad for Visitors


Web Writing

Use keywords – a few times per page
Create AZ indexes for Department,
Organizations, College and Schools
Write more - at least 250 words per page
Add extra pages
Never sacrifice tone, feel or usability


Eye Tracking Studies Nov 2012

Poynter Institute

600 subjects in 4 cities

We have not lost our ability to read in depth


Eye Tracking Studies
Poynter Institute
Inverted Pyramid F Pattern



Poynter Institute

Attention spans have not shortened dramatically.

Readers are more selective about what they read.

We are more dependent on navigation, headings and
bulleted text

It helps us find info or identify what not to read



Poynter Institute

“Most surprising, they read further into stories
online than in print. That was true for stories
of all lengths.”


Metrics
Measuring Success

 Track ranking in SERPs – screenshots,

or excel files
 Follow traffic through web analytics


Black
Hat
SEO


Black Hat SEO
1. Evil trickery
2. Breaks search engine rules
3. Poor user experience
4. Google hacks


Social Media Optimization
Potential for organic traffic and quality backlinks

“Linkbait”


Google News Sitemap
1. News releases and other campus related
stories are packed with keywords

2. But they may be getting lost and not
recognized by Google in a timely way

3. Search for “Google News Sitemap”


Don’t let the tail wag the dog
SEO is a best practice

Write good content

Get everyone involved

Know the factors

Try out key phase research tools


Thank
You!

Anand Saini

Search engine optimization beyond meta tags

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