Digital Marketing: The Beginners Guide To SEO

Why do small business owners need to research their keywords? It's because they understand that competing with the 'big boys' of the corporate world to appear at the top of Google is probably a waste of time (and definitely a waste of money). If you can't compete with big spending companies, you just need to understand how keywords operate and why some very simple research can help you build a great long term SEO strategy. This lecture includes fictional example business 'Mike's Organic Chocolate Treats' - find out why Mike should look for keywords with a high search volume, low competition and relevance to his website content.

Find out why this fictional hotel in Brighton has reached the #1 spot in Google for entirely the wrong reason. It's an example of what happens when you don't think about your customer needs and start to use keywords that are irrelevant to your main business goals. By not taking your keyword research and content planning seriously, you risk attracting customers who are searching for something else.

In a follow up example to 'Sally's Budget Hotel' we take a look at Mike who hand crafts his own cashmere jumpers to sell online. Find out how Mike's lack of keyword research means he is attracted the wrong type of person online. Despite ranking in a very high position for 'cashmere' Mike isn't making any sales. A quick dive into what his keyword strategy should be will allow Mike to attract the right type of person online, and therefore make more sales.

The Long Tail was popularised by Chris Anderson and it tells us that instead of prioritising a few very popular keywords, businesses should focus on using a collection of less popular keywords otherwise known as 'The Long Tail'. In this lecture we'll have a look at the basic overview of The Long Tail and later in the course you'll see an example of The Long Tail in action, as Marcus Sheridan saved his company River Pools & Spas during the last great recession in the US.

In this extract from a Breaking Biz interview you will hear the founder of innovation agency 10x, Hew Leith. Hew explains why he chose to spend his company money on Social Media tool 'Buffer' ahead of their competitors. This example will help you understand why a business needs to know EXACTLY who their customer is (this is why keyword research is so important) and what happens when a business creates genuinely helpful content (hint: they make money)!

In another extract from my Breaking Biz interview with 10x founder Hew Leith, we hear about Marcus Sheridan (aka 'The Sales Lion') who realised that creating content with a high SEO value would save them over 200K of their ad spend and keep the company booming even during the recession. The audio clip is a clear explanation into how Search Engine Optimisation is ALL ABOUT content.

Following on from our audio clip about Marcus Sheridan, we take a look at his example and see what happened when he decided to stop competiting with the big boys and instead identify what his 'long tail' keywords were. This is a strategy that everyone talks about now, but when Marcus did it, it was seriously innovative thinking and represents one of the best SEO focused practices you can do for your own business. Amazingly, River Pools saved $230,000 on the online ad spend whilst still making $4 million in sales! Even more amazing, is the fact that this happened during the recession. It's truly an example of SEO saving a business during tough times.

Despite learning about the advantages of keyword research and using 'long tail' keywords, it's really important to remember that visitors do NOT want to read blog posts that are stuffed with an unusually high amount of keywords to the point where it's obvious you're just trying to get as high up in Google as you can. The value of your content is so crucial and it's important you don't sacrifice its quality just for the sake of including as many keywords as you can. Furthermore, your website can be penalised if Google or others think that you're employing underhand tactics to boost your search ranking.

Something you won't hear that often is the fact that a lot (if not most) of online content is being ignored. Typically you'll find posts about boosting your content and how to make 'killer' content but it's almost like some people would never wish to admit how tough it can be when you're competing with a handful of 'big dogs' that are getting all the links and shares! We'll take a look at some research conducting by Moz and BuzzSumo to learn more about the realities of online content.

Although it's tempting to churn out different forms of content at lightning speed, you won't be doing yourself any favours unless this content has a high production value. Nowadays your audience are much fussier when it comes to the overall quality, and if you're not producing images, videos or infographics of a high standard, then someone else will be.

Not everyone feels comfortable having a strong opinion, or risking getting into a heated discussion online, but how can it help your overall SEO ranking? In this lecture we'll cover this subject and take a look at how putting yourself out there as an authority for you industry can actually help you accumulate links and shares.

Is it worth writing articles over 2000 words? It seems like everyone is creating little bite size pieces of content these days so surely that's the only way to go? Find out why long form content is coming back into fashion with a vengeance, and here what a senior Google employee has to say about it's value to the search engine. When you think about, high quality long form content continues to work for your website years after it's been posted, whereas that might not be the case for a quick quiz or amusing image. The media always seem to say we have no attention span anymore......but they're wrong!

Why are humans drawn to lists, and how can they help your SEO ranking?

We seem them everywhere, but how do these 'lighter' pieces of content help boost our overall SEO value? We'll look at how Google and Bing treat Social Media and whether it's worth investing in creating images and infographics with a high production value as opposed to churning them out quickly.