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11 Internet Marketing Strategies That Work

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Internet marketing can seem quite daunting and complicated. There are so many possibilities. But which strategies should you start with?

To help answer that, we’ve dissected internet marketing into its most basic strategies. We’ve also simplified them so you can get started right away.

In this article, we’ll cover 11 internet marketing strategies that work:

  1. Search engine optimization
  2. Content marketing
  3. PPC marketing
  4. Email marketing
  5. Affiliate marketing
  6. Influencer marketing
  7. Video marketing
  8. Social media marketing
  9. Podcasting
  10. Conversion rate optimization
  11. Reputation management

1. Search engine optimization

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the practice of optimizing a website or webpage to increase the quantity and quality of its traffic from a search engine’s organic results. When your pages rank high on the search engines and maintain their positions, you can get almost free, passive traffic to your website consistently.

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Line graph showing amount of monthly organic traffic to Ahrefs

The amount of monthly organic traffic coming to Ahrefs.

How to do it

If you want to rank high on search engines, you have to target topics that your audience is searching for. Finding what these topics are is a process known as keyword research, and the easiest way to begin is to use a keyword research tool like Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer.

Here’s how:

  1. Go to Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer
  2. Enter one or a few terms relevant to your website or niche (e.g., if you sell coffee equipment, then you may want to enter keywords like coffee, french press, cappuccino, etc)
  3. Go to the Matching terms report
List of keywords with corresponding data such as KD, volume, etcList of keywords with corresponding data such as KD, volume, etc

From here, you’ll want to look through the list and pick out relevant topics you wish to target. Generally speaking, the “ideal” keywords are those with high Traffic Potential (TP) and low Keyword Difficulty (KD).

You can use the filters to quickly narrow down such topics.

Keywords Explorer filtersKeywords Explorer filters

Then you’ll want to create a page that deserves to rank for that keyword. There are a few aspects to this process. But the most important part is to figure out why searchers are looking for that topic. This is known as search intent.

You can do this by looking at what’s currently ranking on the search engine results pages (SERPs) for your topic. For example, if we’re targeting the topic “best frying pans,” we’ll see that most of the top-ranking pages are blog posts about the best non-stick frying pans.

Google SERP for "best frying pans"Google SERP for "best frying pans"

If we want to rank for this keyword, we’ll likely have to follow suit.

Once you’ve created and published that page, you’ll have to build links because they’re an important Google ranking factor. There are many ways to get backlinks, so I recommend reading our guide to link building.

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Finally, you’ll want to make sure you get the technical aspects of your website right. (After all, if Google can’t find and index your pages, it can’t rank them on the SERPs.) The easiest way is to run an audit of your website with Ahrefs’ Site Audit. You can do this for free using Ahrefs Webmaster Tools.

Recommended reading: SEO: The Complete Guide for Beginners 

Content marketing is the process of creating and distributing content to attract and retain customers.

How to do it

To get started, fill in the content strategy canvas. Your goal is to answer five simple questions:

  1. Who are you creating content for?
  2. Why are you creating content?
  3. What type of content will you create?
  4. Where will you publish the content?
  5. How will you create the content?
A "content strategy canvas" table where the five questions are answered in detailA "content strategy canvas" table where the five questions are answered in detail

Completing the content strategy canvas should set you on the right path to creating content that will improve your business. However, don’t forget to promote your content too.

Promoting content means not waiting for your target audience to discover your content. Instead, it’s about actively putting the content in front of them. Follow the checklist in this post or this video to get more eyeballs on your content:

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoVYweKH4ck&ab_channel=Ahrefs

Recommended reading: Content Marketing: A Comprehensive Guide 

3. Pay-per-click marketing

Pay-per-click (PPC) marketing is a form of online advertising where advertisers pay a fee each time someone clicks their ad.

Search engine ads are the most common ad format in PPC marketing. Other formats include display ads on websites and social media ads, such as those you see on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.

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How to do it

You’ll first need to choose a platform you want to advertise on. You should only pay for ads on platforms where your audience exists. For example, if you’re selling enterprise software to C-level executives, you may not want to advertise on TikTok. (Of course, if you have data showing these execs in your industry are on TikTok often, then it makes sense to advertise there.)

After that, you should get familiar with the platform. Explore the ad platform by clicking around or take a course. These platforms typically offer educational resources to help you learn how to run ads (here’s one from Google).

Ads can succeed or fail based on your targeting, so make sure you have data to back up your targeting choices. For example, if you’re running search ads, you’ll need to do keyword research. You’ll need to know what people search for and then how much you’ll be paying for clicks on average.

Matching terms report results for term "espresso machine"Matching terms report results for term "espresso machine"

You should also make sure you’ve set up your tracking properly.

Budget-wise, decide on a daily budget that won’t make a big dent in your overall marketing budget and start with that. Monitor and optimize your campaigns regularly. Once you start getting solid results, you can increase your budget.

Finally, creatives and copy matter too in PPC marketing. Make sure you’re constantly experimenting with different images, videos, headlines, body copies, and more to see what resonates with your audience!

Recommended reading: PPC Marketing: Beginner’s Guide to Pay-Per-Click Ads 

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Email marketing is any kind of marketing messaging done through the channel of email.

How to do it

Email marketing doesn’t just involve sending emails. It also includes:

  • Building an email list.
  • Designing, writing, and sending emails to the subscribers on your list.
  • Segmenting the list.
  • Deciding when to send the email.
  • Monitoring the results.
  • Curating the email list.

To begin, you’ll need a list of email addresses to send messages to. The easiest way to build this list is to offer an incentive to website visitors in return for subscribing. For example, e-commerce stores tend to offer discount coupons, such as what Frank Body does:

Text field to fill in personal particulars to get discount coupons from Frank BodyText field to fill in personal particulars to get discount coupons from Frank Body

You’ll also need to decide what kind of emails you want to send to your subscribers. At the basic level, you should have a welcome email with the incentive you promised earlier. In Frank Body’s case, its first email features the 10% discount code.

But what should you send from that point onward? Unfortunately, there’s no clear-cut “right” answer. It’ll take a mix of intuition and experimentation to figure out what’s best.

For example, here’s an illustration of a potential email marketing workflow.

Flowchart of example email workflowFlowchart of example email workflow

Even this sample workflow is pretty complex. There are many elements to get right. For us at Ahrefs, we keep things simple—we promise a weekly newsletter, and that’s all we send:

Example of Ahrefs' weekly newsletterExample of Ahrefs' weekly newsletter

Recommended reading: The Ultimate Guide to Email Marketing 

Affiliate marketing is where other people promote your products in return for a commission. For example, if your product costs $100, you can pay an affiliate $10 for each sale they generate for you.

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How to do it

You’ll first need to create an affiliate program that people can sign up for. This gives them a unique link they can use to promote your product and track the sales they generate.

Then you’ll need to look for people who may want to promote your product.

The easiest way is to look for people who are already promoting competing products.

Here’s how:

  1. Go to Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
  2. Enter the domain of a competing product
  3. Go to the Backlinks report
  4. Look for an affiliate footprint in the URL

For example, many of the backlinks to bluehost.com go to URLs with /track/ in them:

List of referring pages List of referring pages

These are most likely affiliate links, so we can find all the websites promoting this product by filtering for backlinks with this footprint (/track/) in the target URL and toggling “One link per domain”:

Backlinks report with "One link per domain" filter appliedBacklinks report with "One link per domain" filter applied

Recommended reading: How to Create a Successful Affiliate Program for Your Business 

Influencers are people who have an active, sizable audience (usually on social media) and the ability to influence their audience to do something.

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Influencer marketing is the practice of working with influencers to promote your brand’s messages, products, or services.

How to do it

The easiest way to find influencers is to use existing third-party tools. And there are different tools for the different social media platforms. Here’s a list to look through:

  1. Followerwonk (Twitter)
  2. Influenx (YouTube)
  3. Heepsy (Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Twitch)
  4. inBeat (TikTok, Instagram)
  5. Intellifluence (Reddit, SoundCloud, podcasts, Amazon reviews, iOS and Android reviews, Twitch, LinkedIn, Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, TikTok)
  6. Grin (Twitch, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, TikTok)
  7. Influence.co (Facebook, Pinterest, Snapchat, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, blogs)
  8. HypeAuditor (Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Twitter, Twitch) 

When you’ve gathered a list of influencers, don’t reach out just yet. Since social platforms can be gameable, some of these influencers may have tons of fake followers. A certain percentage of fake followers is inevitable, but you don’t want them to be a significant percentage of those influencers’ following.

A quick way to check is to use a tool like SparkToro’s Fake Followers Audit (Twitter only) or HypeAuditor’s Instagram Audit.

Beyond the quantity of following, you’ll want to make sure the quality of engagement exists too. If an influencer has a lot of followers but barely gets any comments on their posts, it’s a potential red flag.

The absolute number of likes, comments, retweets, etc., doesn’t matter either. Quality does. Look out for genuine comments or conversations. If an influencer posts something and the comments look like these…

List of Instagram comments with the same few emojisList of Instagram comments with the same few emojis

… then that’s a potential red flag.

Once you’ve narrowed down the list to those influencers with the amount of reach and resonance you want and made sure that the influencers’ image and reputation represent your brand well, reach out and ask to collaborate.

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Recommended reading: Influencer Marketing: Definition, Examples, and Tactics 

Video marketing is using videos to promote and educate your target audience. It’s also used to increase brand awareness and social engagement, allowing you to reach new and bigger audiences.

How to do it

To begin, you need to know what kind of videos you want to create. There are three main objectives for video marketing: brand awareness, education, or entertainment.

If your goal is to create videos for brand awareness or entertainment, then the good and bad news is there is no template. It all boils down to your creativity.

If your goal is to create educational content, then you can do keyword research to see what kind of topics or questions people are searching for on YouTube.

Here’s how:

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  1. Go to Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer
  2. Switch the tab to YouTube
  3. Enter a relevant keyword or keywords
  4. Go to the Matching terms report
  5. Switch the tab to Questions

Matching terms report results Matching terms report results

Once you’ve picked out the topics you want to target, create a video that’ll rank for them on YouTube. Watch this video to learn how:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NY3y0V9UDwM&ab_channel=Ahrefs

Recommended reading: The Simple (But Complete) Guide to Video Marketing 

8. Social media marketing

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Social media marketing is the use of social media like Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn to market a company’s products or services.

Ahrefs' LinkedIn post of a blog article about homepage SEOAhrefs' LinkedIn post of a blog article about homepage SEO

How to do it

To begin, you’ll want to have a presence on major social platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn. Even if you’re not going to be active on those platforms, having a page or brand account offers legitimacy and also protects your brand account from potential squatters.

Social media is all about content. To build a following and gain engagement, you’ll need to post frequently. Understandably, being active on so many different social media platforms can be difficult if you are resource-stretched.

On a basic level, you should be active on the standard social networks: Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

So if you’re already creating content, you can always share those articles, videos, or podcasts on your social media pages. For example, all we do on our Facebook page is share our newly published content:

Ahrefs' Facebook post of a blog article about marketing automationAhrefs' Facebook post of a blog article about marketing automation

Furthermore, you can always repurpose content on social media. In fact, that’s what we do all the time.

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For example, this tweet is an image from our article on doing a content audit:

If there’s a platform you want to invest further in, consider creating custom content for it. Watch how other brands and influencers craft their content, and you’ll get an idea of what works and what doesn’t.

Experimentation is the name of the game. Following tried-and-tested formats is a good idea, but don’t be afraid to try new things.

That was how Wendy’s did it, with a completely different tone, format, and identity compared to other brands at that time. (If you see brand accounts being funny or sarcastic today, you can credit it to Wendy’s.)

Podcasting is a type of content marketing that focuses on producing audible content. It is great for brand-building and growing an audience.

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How to do it

There are two major strategies when it comes to podcasting:

  1. Start your own podcast
  2. Appear on someone else’s podcast

Starting a podcast is an entire topic on its own, so I’ll leave links to resources that you can consume:

At Ahrefs, we do have experience appearing on podcasts. In fact, our chief marketing officer, Tim Soulo, once set a goal to appear on 20 podcasts in a year and succeeded.

To appear on podcasts, you need a list of podcasts to be a guest on. Besides Googling for the top industry podcasts, one way to find them is to look for someone in your niche who’s already appearing on them.

Here’s how:

  1. Find someone notable in your niche who has been appearing on podcasts
  2. Enter their domain into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
  3. Set the mode to Exact URL
  4. Go to the Backlinks report
List of referring pages List of referring pages

Sift through the results for relevant podcasts in your niche. When you have a list, pitch to the shows.

Pitching is pretty straightforward. You either follow a show’s application process…

Excerpt of a podcast show's instructions regarding its application processExcerpt of a podcast show's instructions regarding its application process

… or reach out by email and pitch yourself as a guest. First, find the email address. Then in your pitch, try to cover the three Ws:

  • Who? Explain who you are, who you work for, etc
  • Why? Explain why you’ll be a good podcast guest, i.e., sell yourself
  • What? Explain what you want to talk about

Recommended reading: How to Use Podcasts for Link Building 

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10. Conversion rate optimization

A conversion is when a website visitor takes an action you want them to take on your website. So conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the process of optimizing your website or its pages to improve or encourage more of the actions you want visitors to take.

How to do it

Like SEO, CRO is not one and done. You can always optimize more. So rather than being one-off hacks you apply to your website, CRO is a systematic process informed by data.

As CRO expert Brian Massey puts it, CRO is “about meaningful tests backed by thorough conversion research and executed using a disciplined, step-by-step process.”

It involves understanding user psychology, user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) design, copywriting, persuasion, running A/B tests, statistics, understanding and analyzing data, and more.

Here’s a simplified example of what CRO may look like. Let’s say we want to improve the conversion rate of the Ahrefs Webmaster Tools page. That is, we want more people who visit the page to sign up for AWT.

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Excerpt of AWT's landing pageExcerpt of AWT's landing page

To do that, we may want to systematically A/B test things like:

  • The page design.
  • The headline.
  • The sub-headline.
  • The call-to-action (CTA) button.
  • Social proof (e.g., testimonials, case studies, etc.).

And more.

A note to bear in mind, though: For your A/B tests to be statistically significant (i.e., prove you can attribute any increase or decline to the change you made and that the change is not by chance), you’ll need a significant amount of traffic coming to your website.

So while CRO is important, it’s not something you do right from the get-go. Focus on using the other internet marketing strategies to drive more traffic to your website first before you even consider running split tests.

Recommended reading: Conversion Rate Optimization Guide by CXL

11. Reputation management

Online reputation management (ORM) is the practice of using digital marketing tactics and channels to help shape the public perception of a brand, an organization, or an individual online.

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How to do it

Reputation management includes many different activities. For example, it may involve using social media to jump in on conversations and tackle negative or unhappy comments about your company.

By acknowledging the source of unhappiness and listening to the customer, we were able to deflect anger and improve our relationship with him.

But it’s not just about social media. You can do reputation management in search engines too. For example, you may find articles ranking high on Google that speak negatively about your brand or perpetuate a misconception.

If it’s something you can correct, you should try to nip it in the bud.

Here’s how to find such articles:

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  1. Go to Ahrefs’ Content Explorer
  2. Search for your brand name and exclude your own site [-site:yourdomain.com]
  3. Set a Page traffic filter to something high (e.g., 1,000+ visits per month)
Excerpt of Content Explorer results Excerpt of Content Explorer results

For example, we found a post by HubSpot about the best digital marketing tools. Even though it is a huge compliment about our toolset (thanks, HubSpot!), it mentions something inaccurate about our data:

Excerpt of HubSpot's article about AhrefsExcerpt of HubSpot's article about Ahrefs

Instead of “150 million keywords” in the U.S, we actually have 4.4 billion keywords. And instead of 150 countries, we have more than 200.

Excerpt of Ahrefs' "big data" page showing key stats about our toolsetExcerpt of Ahrefs' "big data" page showing key stats about our toolset

Plus, the screenshot of our UI it featured is outdated.

We’re proud of our data, and the ones mentioned by HubSpot are way off from our current state. And it may set up wrong or different expectations from users who discover us via this article.

In this case, we can reach out and ask HubSpot or the author to update these metrics.

Recommended reading: A 5-Step Online Reputation Management Guide (That ANYONE Can Follow) 

Final thoughts

This list of internet marketing strategies is by no means exhaustive. But it should have educated you on some of the more popular and timeless ones.

When executed correctly, the strategies work and will continue to work.

Did I miss out on any important internet marketing strategies? Let me know on Twitter.

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Content Pruning: Why It Works, and How to Do It

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Content Pruning: Why It Works, and How to Do It

Content pruning sounds pretty appealing: delete a ton of content and see your organic traffic improve. But pruning has risks (like deleting useful pages and useful backlinks), and benefits are not guaranteed: So how does pruning actually work? And when

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8 Free SEO Reporting Tools

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8 Free SEO Reporting Tools

There’s no shortage of SEO reporting tools to choose from—but what are the core tools you need to put together an SEO report?

In this article, I’ll share eight of my favorite SEO reporting tools to help you create a comprehensive SEO report for free.

Price: Free

Google Search Console, often called GSC, is one of the most widely used tools to track important SEO metrics from Google Search.

Most common reporting use case

GSC has a ton of data to dive into, but the main performance indicator SEOs look at first in GSC is Clicks on the main Overview dashboard.

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As the data is from Google, SEOs consider it to be a good barometer for tracking organic search performance. As well as clicks data, you can also track the following from the Performance report:

  • Total Impressions
  • Average CTR
  • Average Position
gsc-performance-overviewgsc-performance-overview

Tip

If you’ve signed up for AWT using Google Search Console, you can view your GSC performance data in Ahrefs by clicking “GSC Performance” from the main dashboard.

But for most SEO reporting, GSC clicks data is exported into a spreadsheet and turned into a chart to visualize year-over-year performance.

organic-traffic-graph-showing-clicks-year-over-yearorganic-traffic-graph-showing-clicks-year-over-year

Favorite feature

One of my favorite reports in GSC is the Indexing report. It’s useful for SEO reporting because you can share the indexed to non-indexed pages ratio in your SEO report.

google-search-console-indexed-pages-reportgoogle-search-console-indexed-pages-report

If the website has a lot of non-indexed pages, then it’s worth reviewing the pages to understand why they haven’t been indexed.

Price: Free

Google Looker Studio (GLS), previously known as Google Data Studio (GDS), is a free tool that helps visualize data in shareable dashboards.

Most common reporting use case

Dashboards are an important part of SEO reporting, and GLS allows you to get a total view of search performance from multiple sources through its integrations.

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Out of the box, GLS allows you to connect to many different data sources.

Such as:

  • Marketing products – Google Ads, Google Analytics, Display & Video 360, Search Ads 360
  • Consumer products – Google Sheets, YouTube, and Google Search Console
  • Databases – BigQuery, MySQL, and PostgreSQL
  • Social media platformsFacebook, Reddit, and Twitter
  • Files – CSV file upload and Google Cloud Storage

Sidenote.

If you don’t have the time to create your own report manually, Ahrefs has three Google Looker Studio connectors that can help you create automated SEO reporting for any website in a few clicks

google-looker-studio-partner-connectorsgoogle-looker-studio-partner-connectors

Here’s what a dashboard in GLS looks like:

ahrefs-seo-audit-dashboardahrefs-seo-audit-dashboard
Ahrefs Google Looker Studio integration

With this type of dashboard, you share reports that are easy to understand with clients or other stakeholders.

Favorite feature

The ability to blend and filter data from different sources, like GA and GSC, means you can get a customized overview of your total search performance, tailored to your website.

Price: Free for 500 URLs

Screaming Frog is a website crawler that helps you audit your website.

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Screaming Frog’s free version of its crawler is perfect if you want to run a quick audit on a bunch of URLs. The free version is limited to 500 URLs—making it ideal for crawling smaller websites.

screaming-frog-user-interface-screenshotscreaming-frog-user-interface-screenshot

Most common reporting use case

When it comes to reporting, the Reports menu in Screaming Frog SEO Spider has a wealth of information you can look over that covers all the technical aspects of your website, such as analyzing, redirects, canonicals, pagination, hreflang, structured data, and more.

Once you’ve crawled your site, it’s just a matter of downloading the reports you need and working out the main issues to summarize in your SEO report.

Favorite feature

Screaming Frog can pull in data from other tools, including Ahrefs, using APIs. 

If you already had access to a few SEO tools’ APIs, you could pull data from all of them directly into Screaming Frog. This is useful if you want to combine crawl data with performance data or other 3rd party tools.

screaming-frog-api-accessscreaming-frog-api-access

Even if you’ve never configured an API, connecting other tools to Screaming Frog is straightforward.

Price: Free

Ahrefs has a large selection of free SEO tools to help you at every stage of your SEO campaign, and many of these can be used to provide insights for your SEO reporting.

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when-to-use-ahrefs-free-tools-across-the-seo-process-illustrationwhen-to-use-ahrefs-free-tools-across-the-seo-process-illustration

For example, you could use our:

Most common reporting use case

One of our most popular free SEO tools is Ahrefs Webmaster Tools (AWT), which you can use for your SEO reporting.

With AWT, you can:

  • Monitor your SEO health over time by setting up scheduled SEO audits
  • See the performance of your website
  • Check all known backlinks for your website
ahrefs-overviewahrefs-overview

Favorite feature

Of all the Ahrefs free tools, my favorite is AWT. Within it, site auditing is my favorite feature—once you’ve set it up, it’s a completely hands-free way to keep track of your website’s technical performance and monitor its health.

If you already have access to Google Search Console, it’s a no-brainer to set up a free AWT account and schedule a technical crawl of your website(s).

Price: Free

Ahrefs’ SEO Toolbar is a free Chrome and Firefox extension useful for diagnosing on-page technical issues and performing quick spot checks on your website’s pages.

Most common reporting use case

For SEO reporting, it’s useful to run an on-page check on your website’s top pages to ensure there aren’t any serious on-page issues.

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ahrefs-seo-toolbar-overviewahrefs-seo-toolbar-overview

With the free version, you get the following features:

  • On-page SEO report
  • Redirect tracer with HTTP Headers
  • Outgoing links report with link highlighter and broken link checker
  • SERP positions
  • Country changer for SERP

The SEO toolbar is excellent for spot-checking issues with pages on your website. If you are not confident with inspecting the code, it can also give you valuable pointers on what elements you need to include on your pages to make them search-friendly.

If anything is wrong with the page, the toolbar highlights it, with red indicating a critical issue.

severity-highlight-ahrefs-seo-toolbarseverity-highlight-ahrefs-seo-toolbar

Favorite feature

The section I use the most frequently in the SEO toolbar is the Indexability tab. In this section, you can see whether the page can be crawled and indexed by Google.

indexability-tab-ahrefs-seo-toolbarindexability-tab-ahrefs-seo-toolbar

Although you can do this by inspecting the code manually, using the toolbar is much faster.

Price: Free

Like GSC, Google Analytics is another tool you can use to track the performance of your website, tracking sessions and conversions and much more on your website.

google-analytics-screenshotgoogle-analytics-screenshot

Most common reporting use case

GA gives you a total view of website traffic from several different sources, such as direct, social, organic, paid traffic, and more.

Favorite feature

You can create and track up to 300 events and 30 conversions with GA4. Previously, with universal analytics, you could only track 20 conversions. This makes conversion and event tracking easier within GA4.

Price: Free

Google Slides is Google’s version of Microsoft PowerPoint. If you don’t have a dashboard set up to report on your SEO performance, the next best thing is to assemble a slide deck.

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Many SEO agencies present their report through dashboard insights and PowerPoint presentations. However, if you don’t have access to PowerPoint, then Google Slides is an excellent (free) alternative.

google-slides-screenshotgoogle-slides-screenshot

Most common reporting use cases

The most common use of Google Slides is to create a monthly SEO report. If you don’t know what to include in a monthly report, use our SEO report template.

Favorite feature

One of my favorite features is the ability to share your presentation on a video chat directly from Google Slides. You can do this by clicking the camera icon in the top right.

share-video-chat-google-slidesshare-video-chat-google-slides

This is useful if you are working with remote clients and makes sharing your reports easy.

Price: Free

Google Trends allows you to view a keyword’s popularity over time in any country. The data shown is the relative popularity ratio scaled from 0-100, not the direct volume of search queries.

Most common reporting use cases

Google Trends is useful for showing how the popularity of certain searches can increase or decrease over time. If you work with a website that often has trending products, services, or news, it can be useful to illustrate this visually in your SEO report.

Google Trends makes it easy to spot seasonal trends for product categories. For example, people want to buy BBQs when the weather is sunny.

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Using Google Trends, we can see that peak demand for BBQs usually happens in June-July every year.

bbq-google-trends-graphbbq-google-trends-graph

Using this data across the last five years, we could be fairly sure when the BBQ season would start and end.

Favorite feature

Comparing two or more search terms against each other over time is one of my favorite uses of Google Trends, as it can be used to tell its own story.

google-trends-comparison-examplegoogle-trends-comparison-example

Embellishing your report with trends data allows you to gain further insights into market trends.

You can even dig into trends at a regional level if you need to.

regional-trends-via-google-trendsregional-trends-via-google-trends

Final thoughts

These free tools will help you put together the foundations for a well-rounded SEO report.

The tools you use for SEO reporting don’t always have to be expensive—even large companies use many of the free tools mentioned to create insights for their client’s SEO reports.

Got more questions? Ping me on X 🙂

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Study Reveals Potential Disruption For Brands & SEO

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Study Reveals Potential Disruption For Brands & SEO

A new study by Authoritas suggests that Google’s AI-powered Search Generative Experience (SGE), currently being tested with a limited group of users, could adversely impact brand visibility and organic search traffic.

These findings include:

  • When an SGE box is expanded, the top organic result drops by over 1,200 pixels on average, significantly reducing visibility.
  • 62% of SGE links come from domains outside the top 10 organic results.
  • Ecommerce, electronics, and fashion-related searches saw the greatest disruption, though all verticals were somewhat impacted.

Adapting to generative search may require a shift in SEO strategies, focusing more on long-form content, expert insights, and multimedia formats.

As Google continues to invest in AI-powered search, the Authoritas study provides an early look at the potential challenges and opportunities ahead.

High Penetration Rate & Industry-Wide Effects

The study analyzed 2,900 brand and product-related keywords across 15 industry verticals and found that Google displays SGE results for 91.4% of all search queries.

The prevalence of SGE results indicates they impact a majority of websites across various industries.

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The research analyzed the typical composition of SGE results. On average, each SGE element contained between 10-11 links sourced from an average of four different domains.

This indicates brands may need to earn multiple links and listings within these AI-curated results to maintain visibility and traffic.

The research also suggests that larger, well-established websites like Quora and Reddit will likely perform better in SGE results than smaller websites and lesser-known brands.

Shifting Dynamics In Organic Search Results

With SGE results occupying the entire first page, websites that currently hold the top positions may experience a significant decrease in traffic and click-through rates.

When a user clicks to expand the SGE element, the study found that, on average, the #1 ranked organic result drops a sizeable 1,255 pixels down the page.

Even if a website ranks number one in organic search, it may effectively be pushed down to the second page due to the prominence of SGE results.

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New Competition From Unexpected Sources

The study revealed that SGE frequently surfaces links and content from websites that didn’t appear in the top organic rankings.

On average, only 20.1% of SGE links exactly matched a URL from the first page of Google search results.

An additional 17.9% of SGE links were from the same domains as page one results but linked to different pages. The remaining 62% of SGE links came from sources outside the top organic results.

Challenges For Brand Term Optimization & Local Search

The study reveals that SGE results for branded terms may include competitors’ websites alongside the brand’s own site, potentially leading to increased competition for brand visibility.

Laurence O’Toole, CEO and founder of Authoritas, states:

“Brands are not immune. These new types of generative results introduce more opportunities for third-party sites and even competitors to rank for your brand terms and related brand and product terms that you care about.”

Additionally, local businesses may face similar challenges, as SGE results could feature competing local brands even when users search for a specific brand in a regional context.

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Methodology & Limitations

To arrive at these insights, Authoritas analyzed a robust dataset of 2,900 search keywords across a spectrum of query types, including specific brand names, brand + generic terms, brand + product names, generic terms, and specific product names. The keywords were distributed across 15 industry verticals.

The study utilized a consistent desktop browser viewport to quantify pixel-based changes in the search results. Authoritas also developed proprietary “alignment scores” to measure the degree of overlap between traditional organic search results and the new SGE links.

While acknowledging some limitations, such as the keyword set needing to be fully representative of each vertical and the still-evolving nature of SGE, Authoritas maintains that the insights hold value in preparing brands for the new realities of an AI-powered search ecosystem.

Why We Care

The findings of the Authoritas study have implications for businesses, marketers, and SEO professionals. As Google’s SGE becomes more prevalent, it could disrupt traditional organic search rankings and traffic patterns.

Brands that have invested heavily in SEO and have achieved top rankings for key terms may find their visibility and click-through rates diminished by the prominence of SGE results.

SGE introduces new competition from unexpected sources, as most SGE links come from domains outside the top 10 organic results. This means businesses may need to compete not only with their traditional rivals but also with a broader range of websites that gain visibility through SGE.

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As Google is a primary source of traffic and leads for many businesses, any changes to its search results can impact visibility, brand awareness, and revenue.

How This Could Help You

While the rise of SGE presents challenges, it also offers opportunities.

Taking into account what we’ve learned from the Authoritas study, here are some actionable takeaways:

  • As SGE favors in-depth, informative content, businesses may benefit from investing in comprehensive, well-researched articles and guides that provide value to users.
  • Incorporating expert quotes, interviews, and authoritative sources within your content could increase the likelihood of being featured in SGE results.
  • Enriching your content with images, videos, and other multimedia elements may help capture the attention of both users and the SGE algorithm.
  • Building a strong brand presence across multiple channels, including social media, industry forums, and relevant websites, can increase your chances of appearing in SGE.
  • Creating a trustworthy brand and managing your online reputation will be crucial, as SGE may feature competitors alongside your website.

Looking Ahead

While the long-term impact of SGE will depend on user adoption and the perceived usefulness of results, this study’s findings serve as a valuable starting point for businesses and SEO professionals.

By proactively addressing the challenges and opportunities SGE presents, you can increase your chances of success in the new search environment.


Featured Image: BestForBest/Shutterstock

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