A collection of 101 tips and tricks for gaining a competitive edge in Internet marketing and beyond. This presentation covers five areas: design, development, search, social and sales and is aimed at enterprise marketers and small businesses alike. This content was originally presented in March, at the 2014 Matchmaker's Conference.

1. information design
101
SEOcial
MUSTS
FOR 2014
display advertising
rule of thirds
domain names
authenticity
branding
development
infographics
backlinks
search engine optimization
social media
social posturing
press releases
directories
testimonials
®
testimonials
guest blogging
local search
algorithms data structures
youtube
twitter
facebook
linkedin
slideshare
meetup
meetup
quora
referrals
conversion optimization
analytics
demographics
market segments
pay per acquisition
pay per click
adwords
adsense
bing
pagerank
trustrank
bounce rate
pageviewsunique visits
caching
security
hosting
nginx
yandex
mysql
api
html
google
site speed
internal linking
obl
lead generation
breadcrumbs
blog outreach
haro
gzip
predictive analysis
captology
semantic web
keyword research
intellectual property
yahoo
duck duck go
psychographics
wordpress
ecommerce
progressive loading
responsive design
adaptive design
php
node.js
ruby on rails
mvc
baidu
heat maps
jquery
javascript
sitemaps
crawlers
bots
htaccess
redirection
broken links
call to action
semantic markup
quality content
webmaster tools
stumbleupon
promoted tweets
google+
data mining
rewards
surveys
polls
rdf
semantic ontology
#hashtag
graceful degradation
progressive enhancement
cross-browser compatibility
traffic
education marketing
fixed elements
sphere of influence
business cards
email scheduling
landing page
affiliates free events
if this then that
google alerts
scheduled emails
email marketing
list building
memes
virality
reddit
org dev
pipeline
cdn
testing
campaign optimization
guerrilla marketing
copywriting
business plan
podcasts
content
list building
opt in
guttenberg model

2. I. Design
Put your best foot forward,
digitally speaking.

3. Memes
Design
Simply write
humorous content
on the topic of your
niche.
USE MEMES TO GET ATTENTION
S E O C I A L
®
#101

4. Memes
Design
Minimalism works to guide the eyes.
It’s okay to have white space!
LESS IS MORE
S E O C I A L
®
#100

5. Memes
Design
Generic stock photos
seem inauthentic and
communicate a lack of
credibility.
NO GENERIC STOCK PHOTOS
generic
authentic
S E O C I A L
®
#99

6. Memes
Design
DON’T USE OUTDATED MOTIFS
S E O C I A L
®
#98

7. Memes
Design
Infographics are a great
way to communicate a
complex point.
INFOGRAPHICS
S E O C I A L
®
#97

8. Memes
Design
Remember to
keep it simple
and memorable.
REVISIT YOUR LOGO
S E O C I A L
®
#96

9. Memes
Design
A logo and initial
statement near the top
left and a call to action on
the bottom right of a
screen converts best.
FOLLOW THE GUTENBERG MODEL
primary optical area strong fallow area
weak fallow area terminal area
reading gravity
S E O C I A L
®
#95

10. Design
Remember the rule of thirds
from photography: place focal
elements along lines that would
divide the image into thirds
(both horizontally and
vertically).
REMEMBER THE RULE OF THIRDS
S E O C I A L
®
#94

11. II. Development
Some aspects of your online presence
may seem foreign and daunting, but
they don’t have to be!

12. Memes
Development
There are plenty of
CMS’s out there, as
well as snippets of
code you can “plug-
and-play” to achieve
your goals.
CUSTOM CODE
S E O C I A L
®
#93

13. Memes
Development
Wordpress is
flexible,
widespread,
extensible and
boasts a massive
community.
WORDPRESS
S E O C I A L
®
#92

14. Memes
Development
Watch what users do on
your site by using tools like
Google Analytics, Google
Tag Manager and Crazy Egg.
MEASURE WHAT MATTERS
S E O C I A L
®
#91

15. Memes
Development
Responsive web
design allows your
site to rearrange its
elements according
to the screen size
it’s being viewed on.
BUILD RESPONSIVELY
S E O C I A L
®
#90

16. Memes
Development
You can control the image
and description that
appears when your page is
posted to Facebook or
Linkedin by anyone.
OPEN GRAPH DATA
S E O C I A L
®
#89

17. Memes
Development
In Wordpress, you can
install a plugin and
easily generate a site
map (for humans and
search engines alike!).
PUBLISH A SITE MAP
S E O C I A L
®
#88

18. Memes
Development
If your site’s loading slowly you can
find out why at GTmetrix.com.
If you use Wordpress a caching
plugin will speed it up.
OPTIMIZE LOAD TIME
S E O C I A L
®
#87

19. Memes
Development
Usually things don’t go wrong. But in case
they do it pays to back up your site regularly
(and automatically).
BACKUP REGULARLY
S E O C I A L
®
#86

20. Memes
Development
CMS’s have become very
popular, and as an unfortunate
effect they’ve been the target of
malicious attacks.
KEEP YOUR CMS SECURE
S E O C I A L
®
#85

21. Memes
Development
Progressive
Enhancement
CROSS BROWSER COMPATIBILITY
Graceful
Degradation
Your web developer can follow one of two paradigms:
(start simple and
work up)
(start complex
and work down)
S E O C I A L
®
#84

22. Memes
Development
When new sites are created developers
ignore links to previously existing pages,
which leads to a lot of lost link juice.
CLEAR 404 ERRORS
S E O C I A L
®
#83

23. III. Search
Search marketing is the easiest way to
consistently attract passive traffic to your
website.

24. Search
On-page: Think of this as a destination and a map.
Off-page: think of this as fuel.
UNDERSTAND THE BASICS
Destination Search Engine
Results Page (SERP) Ranking
Currently enough “fuel” from links
(“link juice”) to get this far
Straight line
indicates good
keyword
research and
on-page
optimization
S E O C I A L
®
#82

25. Memes
Search
An SEO plugin that
takes care of many
(but not all) aspects of
on page SEO for you.
AUTOMATE WITH AN SEO PLUGIN
S E O C I A L
®
#81

26. Memes
Search
Don’t be afraid to ask for help,
but be cautious: the world of SEO
is littered with professionals who
parrot unverified information.
EMBRACE THE UNKNOWN
(we recommend)
S E O C I A L
®
#80

27. Memes
Search
PageRank is a good indicator, but it’s a little dated.
Moz’s “Domain Authority” and “Page Authority” provide
good measures of how powerful a page really is.
GAUGE AUTHORITY OF PAGES
S E O C I A L
®
#79

28. Memes
Search
Check to see who’s
ranking right now for
the keywords you
have in mind.
Use the MozBar to get
an idea of a SERP’s
competitiveness.
BE REALISTIC ABOUT KEYWORDS
S E O C I A L
®
#78

29. Memes
Search
The beginning of your page title is the most
important place to include a keyword.
PUT YOUR KEYWORDS IN KEY PLACES
★ Page title
★ H1 - H6 tags
★ Meta description
★ Main text
★ Anchor text of links
from other sites
S E O C I A L
®
#77

30. Memes
Search
Use PRLog.com to
get a free press
release online.
For additional
syndication, try
PR Web.
FREE (AND PAID) PRESS LINKS
S E O C I A L
®
#76

31. Memes
Search
Submit your website to relevant online directories.
DIRECTORY LINKS
S E O C I A L
®
#75

32. Memes
Search
One of the best ways to build links is to acquire the same
links that your competitors have.
CHECK YOUR COMPETITORS’ LINKS
S E O C I A L
®
#74

33. Memes
Search
List out every product or service that you use
—literally everything you can think of!
Then, email those companies with a
testimonial. Include a link to your website.
BUILD LINKS WITH TESTIMONIALS
S E O C I A L
®
#73

34. Memes
Search
The internet is everywhere, so chances are more of
your friends have blogs and websites than you think.
LINKS WITH FRIENDS
S E O C I A L
®
#72

35. Memes
Search
Sometimes your local business associations
will link to member-companies.
LINKS FROM ASSOCIATIONS
S E O C I A L
®
#71

36. Memes
Search
You can rank quickly
across a lot of Google
properties when you
produce different kinds
of content (images,
videos, news).
BLENDED SEARCH
S E O C I A L
®
#70

37. Memes
Search
People often forget that Youtube is a major search
engine in its own right—don’t be one of them.
YOUTUBE OPPORTUNITIES
S E O C I A L
®
#69

38. Memes
Search
Quora and Yahoo Answers links can really
boost your website and build up your expertise.
USE Q&A SITES FOR LINKS
S E O C I A L
®
#68

39. Memes
Search
Find bloggers in your niche,
cultivate a relationship and
ask them to link to you on
their blogroll or resource
page.
Offer to guest blog!
BLOGGER OUTREACH & GUEST BLOGGING
S E O C I A L
®
#67

40. Memes
Search
Search for petitions
online where you can
sign your name to a
cause and include a
link to your website.
PETITION POWER
S E O C I A L
®
#66

41. Memes
Search
Find the sites that are sending
the most referral traffic. Then
find other sites that are similar
and suggest they link to you too.
WHO ALREADY LINKS TO YOU?
S E O C I A L
®
#65

42. Memes
Search
You need to work
on creating and
promoting content
at a regular
interval.
KEEP AT IT. CONSISTENTLY.
S E O C I A L
®
#64

43. Memes
Search
Make sure your URLs make sense!
They should be readable and reflect the
title of the page or post.
MAKE URL’S NATURAL
http://www.example.com/?page=022&cat=vid
http://www.example.com/how-to-tie-a-tie-022
✗
✓
S E O C I A L
®
#63

44. Memes
Search
Answer reporters’
questions via emails
and interviews and
get featured on
major sites with
HARO’s help!
HELP A REPORTER OUT! (HARO)
S E O C I A L
®
#62

45. Memes
Search
Control what shows
up in search engines
and what doesn’t!
Robots.txt are files
that help search
engines understand
how to access your
content.
SET UP ROBOTS.TXT
S E O C I A L
®
#61

46. Memes
Search
Look for broken links throughout
your site.
FIX BROKEN LINKS ON YOUR SITE
You don’t want to leave a visitor or a search crawler hanging.
S E O C I A L
®
#60

47. Memes
Search
Each piece of content
should be focused on
one keyword phrase.
FOCUS YOUR CONTENT
S E O C I A L
®
#59

48. Memes
Search
You don’t want to throw up junk content.
Make sure your pages have useful
information designed to help your readers.
QUALITY > QUANTITY
S E O C I A L
®
#58

49. Search
The more pages you have, the more likely you are to rank
(just make sure your content is great!)
..ALTHOUGH QUANTITY HELPS TOO
S E O C I A L
®
#57

50. Search
Google wants to know it’s “you” writing your content.
Hook your Google+ up to your blog to get rich snippets.
AUTHORSHIP
S E O C I A L
®
#56

51. Search
Google and Bing both have
webmaster tools interfaces that
allow you to register your site and
receive useful insights.
SET UP WEBMASTER TOOLS
S E O C I A L
®
#55

52. Search
Connect Google Webmaster Tools and Google
Analytics and get your keyword data back!
WEBMASTER TOOLS + GOOGLE ANALYTICS
S E O C I A L
®
#54

53. Search
Teach the web what kind of
content you’re publishing.
USE STRUCTURED DATA
S E O C I A L
®
#53

54. Search
Describe what your images and links
are so that search engines know.
ALT TAGGING
<img src=”clouds.jpg” alt=”photo of cumulus clouds” />
<a href=”/clouds” alt=”more information on clouds” />anchor text</a>
S E O C I A L
®
#52

55. Search
Imagine picking up the New York Times
if there were no headlines!
STRUCTURE YOUR CONTENT WITH HEADINGS
S E O C I A L
®
#51

56. Search
Get more information about how your ads are performing,
which should eventually result in cheaper ads.
CONNECT ANALYTICS & ADWORDS
S E O C I A L
®
#50

57. Search
In Adwords, a higher quality score
will yield a lower cost per click.
FOCUS ON QUALITY SCORE
S E O C I A L
®
#49
QUALITY
SCORE
(out of 10)ad relevance
quality of landing page click-through rate
historical performance

58. IV. Social
The internet is not a one way conversation.
Get online and get talking with these social
media tips.

59. Social
Include an engaging picture (photos work best)
as well as your contact information.
FACEBOOK COVER PHOTOS
S E O C I A L
®
#48

60. Social
If one of your Facebook
posts is doing very well,
don’t be afraid to pay for a
boost.
BOOSTED POSTS ON FACEBOOK
S E O C I A L
®
#47

61. Social
If you’re not that funny yourself, don’t be afraid
to enlist the help of a comedic friend. Seriously!
HUMOR WORKS
S E O C I A L
®
#46

62. Social
This lesser
known social
discovery
network drives
more traffic to
websites than
Facebook.
STUMBLEUPON
S E O C I A L
®
#45

63. Social
Use Followerwonk.com to find people in your
niche that have a high number of followers.
TWITTER POWER USERS
S E O C I A L
®
#44

64. Social
If you have something informative
or especially interesting to tweet,
don’t be afraid to pay for play.
PROMOTING TWEETS
S E O C I A L
®
#43

65. Social
Build a following on your company page
by inviting your connections and
distribute appropriate content.
LINKEDIN CONTENT PLAN
S E O C I A L
®
#42

66. Social
Find active groups in your niche and
extend your influence.
LINKEDIN CONTENT PLAN
S E O C I A L
®
#41

67. Social
Quickly grow your network with Open Networking Groups.
These groups allow you to connect with anyone who is a
part of them.
OPEN NETWORKING GROUPS
S E O C I A L
®
#40

68. Social
Google + is easy
to ignore, but it’s
the real deal.
GOOGLE +
S E O C I A L
®
#39

69. Social
Don’t be afraid to
message your close
Facebook contacts
asking if they know
anyone who can
use your services.
You’ll be surprised
at what you find!
GET A LITTLE HELP FROM FRIENDS
S E O C I A L
®
#38

70. Social
Twitter and Google+ have powerful search
features. Use them to find relevant
conversations to contribute to.
JOIN CONVERSATIONS
S E O C I A L
®
#37

71. Social
Use FollowerWonk and Buffer to
determine when you should post
status updates for the best response.
SCHEDULE YOUR UPDATES
S E O C I A L
®
#36

72. Social
Hashtags are great.
But don’t
#overdoit.
HASHTAGS
S E O C I A L
®
#35

73. Social
Social media works best when
you act like it’s real life.
Be polite.
Be friendly.
And be genuinely helpful.
SOCIAL MEDIA ETIQUETTE
S E O C I A L
®
#34

74. Social
SlideShare is a great social network that is
very under-used. It’s easy to repurpose
content into slideshow format.
SLIDESHARE
S E O C I A L
®
#33

75. Social
Don’t be afraid to share old posts
or follow up on articles that were
written a few months ago.
KEEP THE CONVERSATION GOING
S E O C I A L
®
#32

76. Social
Polls and poll results also make
great website and social content!
POLLS AND SURVEYS
✔
S E O C I A L
®
#31

77. Social
Focus on developing a couple
key relationships at a time.
KNOW YOUR BESTIES
S E O C I A L
®
#30

78. Social
There are tons of
plugins make it
easy for readers to
share your content
with their friends
and follow your
channels.
INSTALL SOCIAL BUTTONS
S E O C I A L
®
#29

79. Social
Stay objective,
keep melodrama
to a minimum
(unless it’s part of
your strategy).
BE POSITIVE
S E O C I A L
®
#28

80. Social
Check out which channels are driving traffic to
your website and keep focusing on what works.
MEASURE SOCIAL TRAFFIC
S E O C I A L
®
#27

81. Social
Meetup.com works:
grow your network
and find real leads
in real life.
MINGLE WITH MEETUP.COM
S E O C I A L
®
#26

82. Social
Embed calls to action right in
your Facebook cover photo.
EMBED CALLS TO ACTION IN YOUR COVER
S E O C I A L
®
#25

83. Social
Don’t miss these dedicated spaces
for making special offers.
CUSTOMIZE FACEBOOK APP TABS
S E O C I A L
®
#24

84. Social
EMBED MESSAGES IN YOUR TWITTER BACKGROUND
S E O C I A L
®
#23

85. Social
Keep them
engaging
with your
content
after the
video is
done.
ANNOTATIONS IN YOUTUBE VIDEOS
S E O C I A L
®
#22

86. Social
Connect your Youtube channel
to Facebook, Twitter, Google+.
YOUTUBE CHANNEL LINKS TO OTHER NETWORKS
S E O C I A L
®
#21

87. Social
ADVERTISING ON SOCIAL MEDIA
★ Linkedin is expensive, but
worth it for some markets.
★ Get your feet wet with
Twitter: promote your best
tweets.
★ Facebook ads offer superior
targeting options.
S E O C I A L
®
#20

88. Social
KEYS TO A STRONG FACEBOOK AD
Ad height
★ Make ads short by using
landscape (wide) images
and minimal ad copy.
★ Don’t let campaigns end
at the end of a month.
★ Use many different
images for your
campaign.
S E O C I A L
®
#19

89. Social
Make your channels all look different by
releasing the same content, but varying
the order per channel.
DISTRIBUTE VIA CHANNELS IN DIFFERENT ORDER
S E O C I A L
®
#18

90. Social
We trust and respect the people and
companies that teach us things.
EDUCATE WITH YOUR CONTENT
S E O C I A L
®
#17

91. Social
The Facebook algorithm gives your posts more reach
if you don’t neglect any post type.
If you’ve been posting a lot of links lately, be sure to
even things out with images and plain text.
POST IMAGES, LINKS & STATUSES ON FACEBOOK
S E O C I A L
®
#16

92. Social
As of March 2014, Facebook posts will reach the audience of
your brand and any other brand you mention.
MENTION BIG BRANDS IN YOUR FACEBOOK
S E O C I A L
®
#15

93. IV. Sales
By making every interaction sales-focused
you can always be moving toward greater
profitability.

94. Sales
Make a list of your top
25 referring clients.
Then ask if they know
anybody that can use
your help this week.
YOUR TOP 25
S E O C I A L
®
#14

95. Whether it is landing pages, shopping carts,
email subject lines or sales scripts the best
online sellers are always testing.
SPLIT TEST EVERYTHING
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#13

96. They’re a great way to
beef up your landing
page and work
especially well when
you have photos to
accompany them.
GET TESTIMONIALS
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#12

97. They’re like photo-testimonials on steroids.
AND A FEW VIDEO TESTIMONIALS
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#11

98. Fixed elements
move with you
and really convert.
Visit Hellobar.com
to get started.
BOOST CONVERSIONS WITH “FIXED” ELEMENTS
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#10

99. Work out referral
arrangements
with people and
products you like.
AFFILIATES AND JOINT VENTURES
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#9

100. Everybody
naturally looks at
you for expertise.
Try co-organizing
or hosting a
Meetup to get
started.
HOST (FREE) EVENTS
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#8

101. Always make sure your audience has an action to
take when they’re done engaging with your content.
DON’T FORGET THE CALL TO ACTION
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#7

102. Hand them out
everywhere you
go and at every
opportunity.
Bonus points if
your card
visually
communicates
what you do!
BUSINESS CARDS
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#6

103. Focus landing pages
on capturing visitor
contact information.
Try having users
“opt-in” and receive
additional content.
SQUEEZE INFORMATION
Get access
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#5

104. Try Boomerang for Gmail and
time all your emails strategically.
SCHEDULE EMAILS
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#4

105. Make the value box bigger than the price box
in the customer’s perspective.
VALUE VS. PRICE
Sales
value price
S E O C I A L
®
#3

106. Social
DRIP YOUR EMAIL CAMPAIGNS
Don’t flood inboxes.
Instead, leverage your list
by controlling the tap.
Sales
S E O C I A L
®
#2

107. tweet
@SEOcial
and we’ll send you the
#1 marketing must
— for 2014 —
http://SEOcial.ly