Search Engine Optimization

A few months ago I tweeted a complex (and tedious) Excel formula on how to classify keywords: For the #seo who insists on completing their keyword/intent research in excel Philosophy: keyword intent is not absolute so it won't fall neatly into an assigned bucket. For this reason a keyword can live under multiple conversion funnels since we can't be 100% certain. pic.twitter.com/JcTl9P11mC — Christopher Yee (@Eeysirhc) April 24, 2019 I then ended it with: ...

I stumbled upon an interesting poll last week… SEO folks. When you reference “a long tail query” do you mean: (Trying again - deleted last poll as I phrased it ambiguously. Sorry.) — Will Critchlow (@willcritchlow) May 14, 2019 …and was amazed by the sheer number of incorrect responses. Ever the skeptic, I wanted to make sure this was a real phenomenon despite the 1.2K survey responses. Using Monte Carlo simulation we find there is a 100% chance the polling differences between the three groups are statistically significant (see notes for conjugate priors). ...

I’ve been preoccupied this month with my recent job change so I don’t have anything insightful to share. However, that doesn’t mean cool things aren’t happening on other websites! Below are my top five favorite blog posts for the month. Web Analytics Consulting: A Simple Framework For Smarter Decisions Avinash does an incredible job detailing the different components of consulting as a web analyst. I’ve always clumped the three aspects together but his framework has helped identify my strengths/weaknesses and what clients I should take on in the future. That being said, I believe every SEO should be competent in data analysis (DA). ...

I love optimizing websites for search engines so much I regularly do consulting work on the side. But what I love more than THAT is showing clients the amazing year-over-year results of a successful SEO campaign. The data from the images below come from an eCommerce website in an extremely competitive niche. When I first started in April 2011, they received an average of 80 visits per day; that number jumped to ~200 visits per day - a 150% increase! ...

Wow - this blog is officially ONE YEAR OLD! I have learned a lot about the art and science of search engine optimization since my journey began and I must admit it has been quite an experience. Below are some of the lessons learned these past 12 months in no particular order of importance. Want to propose an SEO change? Justify it with numbers. People search for the darn-est things. Reading a book (or blog post) written by an industry leader is different than actually doing it yourself. ...

I was conducting some basic research for a prospective client yesterday using Google Insights and went off on a small tangent which lead me to write this blog post. By the way, Insights is a great SEO tool to help visualize search volume throughout the year by category, geographic location and specific years. In any case, I was curious to know what the search volume is for “porn” in the good ol’ United States of America. Here’s a graph that shows the gradual increase in search volume since 2004. ...

You’ve finally taken a big step in admitting that your website needs to be optimized for search and compiled a list of SEO agencies in your area. Now all you need to do is call and ask them countless boring questions about how they’re different. Well guess what? They already know what you’re going to ask and have the answers ready. Don’t believe me? Perform a search on Google for how to hire an SEO company and you’ll find more than ten million results. All those articles out there telling people how to choose an SEO consultant coupled with the negative attention the industry already receives, you better believe these companies will have trained employees who at least know how to read from a script. ...

I had a conversation with a friend the other day regarding my freelance SEO work. What he doesn’t understand is why I’m doing everything on a volunteer basis and not charging these business owners market rate for my consulting work - or at least at a discounted rate. I guess he doesn’t want to see me do all that work and get nothing in return. Truth of the matter is I AM getting something in return - experience, testimonials and referrals. My hands on experience puts SEO theory to practice; written testimonials instill a sense of trust in prospective clients; and referrals show other business owners that I know what I’m doing. ...