Which Houston Digital Marketing Strategy Is The Best

October 9, 2020 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

Top 4 Effective Digital Marketing Strategies In Houston

Does your business currently need a digital marketing plan? Perhaps you have one that is outdated or ill-organized. Whether you need to create a new digital marketing strategy or revamp an existing one, it is essential that you get on top of the matter if you want your business to succeed. Here are some great ways to begin:

1. Search Engine Marketing

Search engine marketing involves both search engine optimization, SEO, as well as pay-per-click (PPC). Each of these methods depends on bringing more traffic to your site via search engines such as Google. You will utilize methods such as choosing and using relevant keywords in order to increase your site visibility. Each of these strategies is quite effective.

These are vital tools to have in your marketing arsenal due to their high rates of effectiveness. Virtually everyone today takes advantage of internet searches prior to making purchases of any sort.

2. Content Marketing

Quite often, content marketing is intricately woven with search engine optimization techniques. It involves giving your potential consumers vital information as they travel through your sales funnel. Users will begin to trust your brand and become familiar with your logo. There are multiple types of content that can be used for this process, including case studies. Additionally, eBooks, blogs, and infographics are considered important content marketing techniques.

The beginning of your sales funnel is the ideal time to use these techniques. When a user visits your site, they will determine whether or not they are interested in your brand rather quickly. Offering fantastic information helps to show that you are an expert in your field. As buyers continue moving through your sales funnel, additional content catering to the consumer should be implemented.

3. Social Media Marketing

This particular marketing style is less expensive than some of the others you will need. Utilizing social media in order to gain a greater audience gives increased credibility in your field. Very similar in some regards to search engine optimization, these marketing techniques include creating original posts with the right content for your business page. Additionally, sponsored ads on these sites will boost your visibility.

Social media is an integral part of most marketing plans today. It is ideal for showcasing new products and services. Additionally, it can put your brand in front of people as they scroll through their feed. Link it to your official site in order to drive content in both directions.

4. Email Marketing

For more than twenty years email has been used as a means of communication. Today, virtually everyone has at least one email address. Laypersons and professionals alike take advantage of emails in order to communicate quickly and effectively with others. To make the most of your email marketing campaigns, it is essential to create letters that cater to the audience.

There are several ways to break up your email list so that you can do this. For instance, you might want to use special messages directed differently toward those who found your signup through a social media post versus those who found you via search engine results.

Another way to use email marketing is to announce sales, new shipments, and other important messages. It is also useful for telling consumers about other products and services available that they might be interested in.

All of these marketing tools are effective means of reaching out to potential consumers.

Call or contact SEO Houston Pros today for any help you need with your digital marketing campaign. Visit our blog for more tricks and tips for Houston SEO!

What Is A Public Blog Network?

April 8, 2019 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

Comprehensive Guide To Private Blog Networks

In this comprehensive guide, we will be taking a very close look at private blog networks.

Beginning with the absolute basics, we will guide you through the process of how to set up, use, and manage a private blog network in 2019

With thousands of words of step-by-step training, even advanced and intermediate SEO can learn something new from our guide.

Let’s get started.

What is a Private Blog Network?

A Private Blog Network (PBN) refers to a network of authoritative, established websites that are used for building backlinks to your money website(s) to rank higher within the major search engines like Google.

A money website is s site you are intending on ranking. It is the one that will earn money for you. These sites are also sometimes referred to as the client website.

PBSNS is short for a PBN Site, which refers to a website that is part of a private blog network.

There is one very important detail to note, which is each of the individual PBN websites is not linked in any way to each other. The concept behind a private blog network is these websites appear to be unrelated to one another, so that links appear to be natural ones, instead of somebody linking to their own websites from other websites that they own.

Is this against Google’s guidelines?

Yes, absolutely.

The only time that Google will tell you exactly what you need to do to rank is when they advise you to use Google AdWords. However, for ranking in the organic results, Google is the worst possible source for information.

If I were them I would do the same thing. Why tell people how to rank for free, when instead you can earn over $40 billion a year from your ad revenues?

Does this work?

If it did not work, then I am sure that Google would not be trying to target PBNs and trying to scare people away from using this strategy.

Yes, it is basically just a scare tactic, but there are people still continuing to build networks and are ranking just as easily as they ever have.

Why does this work?

The top ranking factor is links.

When Matt Cutts was asked about backlink relevancy being excluded from the algorithm, he replied that although there is lots of spam and some noise, it turns out that backlinks are still a very big win when it comes to the quality of the organic search results.

What makes the strategy so effective is that the websites that make up a PBN are considered to be authoritative by Google. You are not getting links from a spammy, untrustworthy site, or a brand new one. Instead, you are getting backlinks from a popular website that is loved by Google’s algorithm.

Here is an illustrative example to help you understand how it works.

In 2011 there was an initiative that was launched to help clean up Chicago’s streets. They set up a website under the name of cleanchicagostreets.com.

This initiative got a lot of publicity. It was featured on local news websites and local government websites.

Enough money and publicity were raised to follow through with the plan. They did so within one year.

Now that they no longer need the website, it has become an unnecessary cost to renew their domain and hosting. So they just let it expire.

The domain has links from local news websites and local government websites. And because the site has links from highly trustworthy websites, Google assumes this is a trustworthy website as well.

Fast forward to the present, and this domain is found by an SEO. The person can look up the site’s metrics to see how authoritative and trustworthy it is perceived to be, and the buy it from a domain registrar and use it as part of their PBN.

That is basically how domains are located.

Every day, 30,000 to 50,000 domains expire, with many of them having good metrics to use as a PBN site.

Introducing Metrics

There are four major metrics that can be used to measure domains. All of them can be used at the same time, however often 1 or 2 is sufficient.

They are:

Citation Flow (CF) by Majestic.com
Trust Flow (TF) by Majestic.com
Page Authority (PA) by Moz.com
Domain Authority (DA) by Moz.com

I don’t have enough technical knowledge to know exactly how they all work. However, here are the basics:

CF measures the power of a website’s links
TF measure the authority and trustworthiness of a website’s links.
PA measures how authoritative one page on a site is, based on its links. It is influenced as well by the website’s DA.
DA measures the authority of the entire domain, based on its links.

The following is a quick guide on what you should look for:

CF – 15+
TF – 13+
DA – 18+

I have purchased weaker domains than this many times, but it is the general guideline that I try to follow. You don’t have to worry about following this guide exactly.

The metrics represent the domain’s power that you are reviewing. However, there are a couple of more things that you should check before you buy a domain.

Referring Domains – This metric shows how many websites are linking to the domain that you are researching. Anything over 30 will be good enough.

Backlinks – This is how many links that a website has. If a website links to another site 2 times, that is 3 backlinks but just 1 referring domain. So be sure to check them before you buy a domain.

Anchor Text – The text that is used by people when linking to their website. See if a brand name is contained (which is normal), but avoid sites that heavily target keywords or have large brand names frequently associated with selling counterfeit goods, and some other obvious things such as adult-themed or viagra.

Metrics Checking Tool I recommend:

Ahrefs – Biggest and more reliable live backlinks index.

The only important metrics in 2019

Is Domain Authority BS? Is Trust Flow BS? Those comments have been trending within our community for quite some tie now, but who can you believe?

The real answer is:

What Google thinks is all that matters. Not Ahrefs, Mox, Majestic or anybody else.

From the time that Google announced that they didn’t have any plans to do more updates to PageRank, there hasn’t been any way of knowing precisely how domain quality is measured by Google.

This is where the metrics above come into play. They are not ideal, but they are third-party algorithms that measure domain quality, that are based on the tool’s theories of what Google considers to be important.

At times they provide great analysis, while at other times they are inaccurate.

Manually checking the backlinks is the most important thing you need to do. If the backlinks come from mainly directory listings, thousands of different blog comments, Chinese anchor text, or an automated backlink building tool, then that is not a good domain.

To take things further, the following is break down of metric checking:

Do the metrics meet your requirements?
(If no) Are there any links coming from super authority domains. Those may be worth buying anyway sometimes. I.e. BBC.co.uk backlinks
(If yes) Are the site’s backlinks low quality or spammy?
(If no) Is it indicated by the Wayback Machine that the domain was used for spam?

Using the Wayback Machine enables you to see precisely how the website looked in the past so that you can verify whether it has been used for spam.

Where To Locate Domains

Knowing what you should look for in a domain is just one part of the game. You also need to know where you can find them.

Before we discuss that, it is important for you to understand the kinds of domains that can be found.

Expiring Vs Expired Domains

Expired Domain – This is a domain that has been fully dropped and can be registered at any registrar at the standard registration cost for a domain.
Expiring Domain – This is a domain that has reached its expiration date but the registrar has held onto for selling or auctioning off. Those domains retain their age. So, for example, if the domain was registered 5 years ago by its previous owners, then it is still considered to be a domain that has been registered for 5 years.

There isn’t any conclusive data on which kind of domain does better. There are some individuals who think that more power is provided by expiring domains. However, many of them are biased due to the fact that they sell expiring domains.

The only thing that I can tell you for sure is that both kinds of work. However, you are a lot more likely to find an expiring domain that has high metrics, than you are an expired one. However, you will also have to pay for that privilege.

In terms of finding domains, there are several different strategies that can be used;
Locate a broker – Easy
Scraping – Not viable any longer
Auctions – Easy and Time-Consuming
Backordering – Advance and Time-Consuming

1. Find a Broker

The following are several broker websites that you can purchase domains from, either in bulk or 1 at a time.

Note that I haven’t used all of the brokers myself, but I’ve at least heard some good things about them from others.

TBSolutions
HighPADomains
PureQualityDomains

Lion Zeal Market Place – join this 4,000+ person FB group for purchasing and selling SEO-related items

2. Use Auction Websites

Most people used to purchase domains from auctions before scraping became popular. They are expiring domains that keep their age since the registrar is selling the domain off because the owner did not renew it.

Usually, you can find domains that are more powerful at auctions compared to scraping since the dropped (expired) domains are picked up quickly by the competition – if they are not bought already during the auction stages. The drawback to auction is you have to pay extra in order to get first dibs.

The following are some auction sites that you can check out:

NameCheap Auctions – Has thousands of domains available in its marketplace
GoDaddy Auctions – In the past was THE place for purchasing PBN domains
NameJet – Good potential for finding high-quality domains

3. Backordering

The last strategy for buying domains is the most advanced one. However, for the cost, it is the best domains that you can buy.

A back ordering company is a service that you pay to grab a domain for you as soon as its registration is dropped.

We discussed this early when we said that whenever a domain expires it actually does not expire. The registrar frequently keeps it, sometimes it is sold or auctioned, and usually isn’t dropped for about 2 months.

Scraping tools look for really old websites and try to purchase domains that are missed by individuals who are back ordering. However, the advent of selling and scraping domains as a type of business, and with the industry buying millions of dollars in domains each year, it is really hard to scrape high-quality domains these days.

However, with backorder, you can ask for domains that are expired but not yet dropped by using a backorder service. They check repeated to see if a domain may be registered yet. When it can be, they will try registering it for you. That is referred to as drop-catching.

How successful you are will depend on your competition ultimately. If everybody is attempting to get the domain, you might miss out. Also, some of these services are of high quality than others.

In order to increase your odds, it is possible to use multiple services to backorder, depending on how much you want a certain domain.

If somebody else has back ordered a domain using the same service, and this service catches it, then it will go into auction between the other person and you – and that can get expensive.
The following are some of the top back ordering services you can use:

Pheenix
NameJet
SnapNames
DropCatch

Many of the services above will give you a pending delete list, which is a list of domains about to drop that can be back ordered.

The following are some links that can help you:

SnapNames
NameJet
Dynadot
ExpiredDomains

This strategy is for advanced users and is definitely not simple. Also, you will need to have some tools to check the metrics of the domains in the above list to check their quality. However, that is the way you should do if you want to buy the best-expired domains.

Important Things To Be Aware Of When Buying Domains

The first word of PBN is Private.

You cannot hide from Google, and you will need them to crawl your websites in order to see the links and then pass the power on. However, you do need to ensure that there are no associated between your websites. They need to appear to be independently owned.

Whenever you are purchasing domains, that means you should mix up your registration dates and domain registrars. Don’t purchase from the same one all of the time. And don’t have your information and name in Whois on all of your domains.

You can try out the following domain registrars:

GoDaddy (beware of expensive renewal fees)
Dynadot (they show your name even when you buy whois protection)
Name
Internet.bs
NameCheap

How To Find Hosting For Your Domains

Once you have a domain(s) in your possession, hosting will need to be set up so that your websites can go live.

In order to avoid Google (or anybody else) knowing that you own all of the websites, they each need to be placed on different hosting accounts.

If you host them all on the same server, then it will be obvious that they are associated with one another.

The need for having separate hosting providers is what fueled the popularity of using SEO hosting services.

However, the problem that “SEO hosts” have is most of them come with footprints that show all of them are the same provider.

The best thing that you can do is hide them all in plain sight.

The way to do that is to use popular hosting services that real websites use.

The following are some examples:

Incapsula
CloudFlare
Amazon Web Services (technical)
DigitalOcean (technical)
HawkHost
GreenGeeks
HostGator
BlueHost
ASmallOrange
Premium Shared Hosts

When compared to cheap shared hosts or SEO hosts, most of them are expensive, but it is worth it to reduce the risk of losing your entire PBN network.

Fortunately, there is a less expensive option that is available.

My friend Kevin has purchased reseller accounts from all of the leading shared hosting companies and will host all of your PBN websites on them at a much lower rate (starting at just $1.82/month per website).

Learn more about the services offered by Kevin here

There are costs associated with getting all of this setup, and for beginners can be scary. However, the overall ROI to having top rankings for multiple websites can justify the costs easily.

Later in this guide, I will be covering clustering, which is an advanced strategy. That will enable you to host multiple PBN websites on the same hosting account without any risk. However, you can only do this if it is allowed by your hosting plan. So be sure to purchase packages that allow MySQL databases and multiple domains.

For now, just realize that the safest method is to just host 1 website on each host, and to always use high-quality hosts.

Call us or contact us today for your free consultation. Visit our blog for more related articles on how to execute the best SEO in Houston!

How To Gain Google’s Trust So Youre SEO Houston Company Can Rank Higher

April 6, 2018 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

How To Use SEO To Prove Your Websites Worth To Google

An Introduction To SEO

Search engine optimization isn’t anything mystical. You may have heard about SEO before and some discussion about the way it works within the Google Algorithm. Basically, it is a repeatable and measurable process that send the search engines signals to demonstrate that your pages are worthy of being displayed in Google’s index.

A complex mathematical formula is basically used by Google. It is referred to an algorithm, and it provides every website with a score and all searches that are done on Google by people in order to determine which website should rank on top for what individuals are searching for. The algorithm can be thought of as a set of empty buckets. When it comes to SEO, your task is filling up more algorithm buckets compared to all of the other websites that you are competing with. You can help to affect the search engine rankings of your website by achieving the highest scores for your website’s quality, authority and being the most trusted store when people are looking for what you have to offer. If you need help with this, you can search for an SEO company Houston to assist you.

Some buckets are given more weight compared to other ones. There are three major buckets you need to thoroughly understand when it comes to search rankings. Those buckets are an authority, trust, and quality. In terms of quality, the thing that Google is attempting to measure when it is trying to determine which websites should rank is those that offer something interesting, unique, or valuable to Google searchers. One example of this is good content. So if you sell t-shirts, and you use the same exact description that all of the other t-shirt sellers use on their sites, then you aren’t providing anything that is unique for the searchers on Google. Although your t-shirts may look cool, you have the same exact content that all of the other sites have. So what you need to offer instead is interesting content that people will enjoy. For example, you can make it possible for people to personalize their shirts. Provide people with valuable information. You can get even more creative than that. Having people take pictures of themselves wearing your t-shirt is one great idea. Get a community created by individuals who love your products. Have a celebrity wear one of your t-shirts and get them to share photos online. Try to do something that is unique or something that is different. If you are able to show Google that your company is unique and interesting then it will start to be reflected in your search engine rankings.

Does Google Trust your Site?

Another very important bucket is trust. You need to be sure that you thoroughly understand this when you are attempting to rank your site in Google’s search results. Google really doesn’t want to display just any old website to their searchers. Instead, they would like to show searchers the best website, and Google needs to know your site is trustworthy in order to show it. Google had indicated that one thing it does is penalize companies or stores or websites that get poor reviews on a consistent basis. So if you have lots of poor reviews, sooner or later Google will stop showing your website within their search results since it doesn’t like showing their searchers those kinds of sites. So prove to the Google algorithm that your website is trustworthy. Find some authoritative websites that will link back to your site. Get industry links, newspaper links, have trusted websites link to your site: happy customers, vendors, business partners – have them link back to your site so that you can demonstrate that you are highly trustworthy and credible.

The final important bucket that you need to be aware of is an authority. Google likes displaying popular websites. If the most popular of all t-shirt websites can be shown to individuals searching for t-shirts online to buy, then that is the website that Google wants to show to its searchers. You need to convince Google by sending them signals that your website is the most popular one die the type of t-shirts you are selling. Build a strong fan base. Get a social network built. Have people link to your site, have people share pages from your website on their social networks. Get as many people as you can to show photos of themselves using or wearing your products, get them to leave testimonials and make connections with them. Get a fan base created and ga e they rally behind you to talk about your company and link to your site. Prove to Google how authoritative and trustworthy you are.

If you really think about it, SEO is simply the process if providing the search engines with proof that your website is the best, the most interesting and unique site, the most trusted, the most authoritative, that their customer – the search – can be offered. Do everything that you can to get customers to talk about your products and your company, and produce lots of great content, get links. If you do all of that Google will have more confidence that your website provides the best result that can be offered to their searchers, and your website will start to rank on Google’s first page.

To get started, call us or contact SEO Houston Pros. We invite you to visit our blog for more SEO tips and tricks!

Scan or Spam: Free Website Audit Emails

July 10, 2017 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

How You Can Determine Whether Or Not A Free Audit Solicitation Email Is Legitimate

It can be difficult to determine whether or not a ‘no obligation’ audit email is really legitimate. Our SEO firm in Houston is here to provide you with some tips on how scams can be identified and how you can get free basic website audit information on your own.

We had a small business client of ours forward one of their emails, asking us whether they should accept a no-obligation audit.

We definitely stand behind all of our work, so I don’t have any issues when a client of ours wants to use reports or tools from other firms to find out how their websites are stacking up to their competitors.

However, in this case, when I saw the email I immediately thought, “no don’t don’t it!” So why is that? Because it was a scam/spam-type of email.

I receive these kinds of emails from my clients regularly, so I was thinking it would be a good idea to break down how fast you can recognize a scam email. Also, I will be showing you how easy it is to find the audit report information you are looking for on your own, through using the Search Console.

The ‘No Obligation’ Free Audit Scam

The email looks like it is coming from a real individual: John Doe, Marketing Consultant. He tells my client that there are tons of errors on his website and that they can all be fixed by the consultant’s large design team.

There are three easy clues in the email that can help you spot that this is really a scam and not legitimate:

Clue No. 1: Gmail “from” address

Here is a dead giveaway: The last name of Doe doesn’t match with the Gmail address, which is something you should take note of immediately.

If John was really a marketing consultant professional, then instead of using a Gmail address he would have a domain name of his own.

Clue No. 2 Domain name within the salutation

Their email is addressed impersonally to “business owner of [domain name].” Also, the To: field has the email address that is listed on their website instead of my client’s name. What that means is the scam artist is sending bulk emails to addresses that bots have scraped from various websites.

Clue No. 3: Lacking in any other credible or identifiable information

There is no information on what firm John works with, and there is no website link or phone number or any other information.

How You Can Find Free Audit Information On Your Own From Google

A lot of the information that the “no obligation” audit promises to you is available – with no strings attached and absolutely free – right from the Google Search Console.

So many of the small business clients that we work with either don’t understand how Google Search Console works or are unaware that it exists. Search Console is officially a free service that Google offers that helps you maintain and monitor the presence of your website within the Google search results.

So you don’t need to have anyone give you an audit report since Google gives it to you directly. Search Console offers plenty of information on how your website is viewed by the search engine – from issues on meta and title description tags to 404-page errors and malware that “Google has found.

In order to find this information, you need to do the following:

Step 1: Go to the Google Search Console and verify your website there

You need to verify your website first before this information can be accessed. You can verify your website within Search Console in just a couple of minutes if you have your Google Analytics admin login. The help pages for Google Search Console have a video and instructions for you to follow.

Step 2: Review all relevant reports

After logging into the Google Search Console, do a bit of exploring. For any small manufacturing clients working with my SEO firm Houston, Huff Industrial Marketing, we offer a custom monthly dashboard and it includes Search Console information pertaining to indexing status, site health, and other important information.

Improving HTML For Search Appearance

When you’re provided with these reports they will generally tell if you have an issue with your titles or meta description tags and if those tags are too long or too short and when you have duplicate tags or tags that are missing.

Special Note: You’ll need to understand that those reports are generated by spiders and they’re unable to tell if your title tags are not optimized properly. These spiders can see if there is a description or title and the character count they have but it can’t tell you if those tags are optimized or if they have the right keywords in them. As an example, in one instance the spiders indicated that there were no problems and yet there were numerous issues with the tags. In this example, they had ‘Company Name – Home’. Get the online marketing Houston help you need with a professional SEO expert.

Manual Actions For Search Traffic

If Google finds that you’re doing something that breaches their rules they will contact you in some instances and let you know. Usually, if you’re using whitehat techniques this won’t be an issue but it is something you should keep a check on just in case.

Mobile Friendliness For Search Traffic

This is how you find out how well optimized your site is for mobile. If there are any errors with usability then Google reports it here. Mobile is an increasingly important factor for search engine rankings. If you need help with your online marketing Houston, call us.

Index Status With Google

This is where you come to find how many pages Google has indexed of your site. Unless you’re adding or removing lots of pages every month then this will usually stay flatlined. If you suddenly have any decrease in the pages that are indexed then it could be an indication that there are some problems somewhere.

Crawl Errors

Here you will find if you have any 404 error pages or pages that are not found. It’s not uncommon that a scammer will contact you saying they can fix your 404 errors but you can easily check to see if you’re having any problems from this report by Google. In most cases, if you have a new page to replace one that’s being removed, you should do a permanent redirect but if you don’t then, of course, having a 404 page is correct.

404 errors will not have any direct effect on your search engine rankings but if you are not sure how to make redirects or to fix inbound links, then it’s recommended that you work with an SEO expert who can walk you through the process or do it for you.

Sitemap

On this report, we want to know if Google is showing any warnings or indicating that certain pages can’t be crawled. Once you see a warning from Google on this matter you should work with a quality SEO person who can help you to walk through the process of fixing it. Sometimes these issues can be a bit tricky and for that reason, they require advanced knowledge.

One example of a client for whom we did a site-wide audit, had warnings from Google about 403 errors. The programmer found that the hosting company had added some code to the .htaccess file. The code was the problem as it was blocking scrapers and spiders including those from Google.

Security

If your site has any type of malware this is where Google will report that information. It’s extremely necessary to keep wordpress plugins and its basic installation up-to-date to prevent malware from easily being able to find its way on your site.

Tip: It’s necessary to keep your login information private. When someone contacts you offering to give a free audit that has no obligation to it, they will still need your login and your password. If you don’t know this person it’s a risk to give them that information.

Once someone has the information to access your Google Analytics or your website, it’s extremely easy for that person to do things that they shouldn’t do. For this reason, it’s highly recommended that you only give that information to someone you truly trust. Otherwise, they could do anything from putting malware on your site to even removing your access to your own website.

They could set things up so that they’re able to use your site for spamming and other things that might be difficult to recover from. If you do have to give them access, make it restricted or limited access and give them a separate login while maintaining your own with full administrative rights.

Conclusion

For a small startup or one man show, it can often be quite difficult to know if an offer to give a free audit for your website is legitimate or not. Very often you’re busy with other aspects of your business and if you get an email saying there are problems on your website then, of course, you’re going to worry about it. But before you jump the gun and respond, take the time to look the email over and see if it’s professional and if they provide you with direct contact information. If you have even the slightest concern then you should not have any contact with that company or respond to the email.

Contact or call SEO Houston Pros today if you have any more questions regarding the free audit email you have received. Keep in mind that although you are provided with tools to run a very limited audit on your website, we are able to address every facet of your website and provide a well-rounded audit and an appropriate plan of action to increase your online exposure.

PPC Is Getting A New Wardrobe in 2017

July 10, 2017 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

The Most Significant Changes in PPC for 2017

From changes in targeting to the latest products available, following are the need-to-know changes in PPC this year from your expert SEO company in Houston.

2016 was the year that brought mobile advertising to a new level when it surpassed the searches completed from desktops and increased search spend by $6 Billion. Since we know that mobile will be even more important this year, let’s take a closer look at the most significant news, trends, and launches seen from Google AdWords and Bing Ads. We’ll begin with this key: Machine Learning.

Machine Learning

Frederick Vallaeys, the former Google technician and founder of Optimyzer mentioned in his column, Adwords 201 is all about dealing with an artificial intelligence. Today machine learning is behind every significant revolution in search marketing.

One good example would be the earlier announcements for smart display campaigns from Google. These specialized campaigns depend on the capacity for machine learning to automate each feature of the campaign.

In March 2017, there was another important development on the machine learning frontier. Google has announced that it will be expanding the meaning of “close variants” for exact matches. In the future, word order will be ignored and functions words in exact matches can be added or ignored as necessity demands.

Here is a short story about how this industry will be such a great place to be right now. This all happened on a Friday before the SMX West was launched. I had the pleasure of hosting a last-minute conference session with fellow moderators Matt Van Wagner and Brad Geddes. The previous night we were wondering if we would spend the session talking amongst ourselves, but at 7:55 on the following morning the conference hall filled and we were the center of a lively discussion filled with important questions and tips, you can hear parts of the conference in this podcast. Sometime after the conference, I learned that an important project manager from Google had also arrived to hear about feedback. The feedback showed that over 100 people had risen early to talk shop and cross-cultivate many ideas a true testament to the nature of this important industry.

In May, there was an important update made for the AD Rank thresholds that works to determine the context of a query, for example, if this relates to a recent news article or a specific product.

Conversion Tracking & Attribution

Another important event in the first half of the year was the advent of AdWords Converted Clicks and the initial presentation of Google Attribution. This was the biggest product launch mentioned at Google Marketing Next. Search marketers have had some experience with Google attribution data in the Analytics and Adwords, but the latest introduction pulls in more data from across different channels and makes this essential data available for bespoke bidding strategies.

Another important addition was that of the Maximize Conversions tools that were added to the suite of automated strategies sometime near the end of May. If you regularly use the offline conversions tools you can schedule these Adwords imports today.

These new releases and tools have a host of different advantages to lend. Google can now track and provide reports on visits made to store that come in from a large selection of YouTube campaigns.

Google launched another important pilot and dubbed it “Ads Added by AdWords”. Over 2000 accounts were invited to participate in the campaign that adds ads which are tested in each different ad group.

The green outline featured in the Google ad label became an official symbol at the end of February. Those interested can see the entire history of the Google ad labeling at his exclusive trip down memory lane.

Then in March, expanded text ads can begin receiving support through Dynamic Search Ad very own page feeds. This means that headlines can now be generated in a dynamic way, and the extra characters are all available to the advertisers in a unique type of description.

Not long back Google decided to test a second description line for text ads. So far it’s only a limited test. Price extensions are available on all devices. You’ll find those extensions in carousels that are swipeable on mobile. Google is in experimental mode with that format and experiments include the extensions found in a carousel.

There’ve been a number of announcements by Google concerning call ads. Headlines for the call only ads where the default and the extensions are set at the account level. These are the kind of issues that a quality local SEO Houston service can help out with.

Ads with AMP are ramping up and Google is testing AMP enabled landing pages. Mr. Vallaeys recently wrote a column expressing the value of using AMP landing pages. That column was entitled ‘The Best Kept Adwords Secret: AMP and your landing pages.’ An e-commerce company has decided to develop a full AMP experience for their audiences on mobile search. They made the decision to do so after testing the landing pages orf mobile using AMP. You can find where I profiled about that test case.

In mid-May Google open things up so that when someone buys from PLA’s they can do so faster. In addition to that, they also added extensions for automated calling and those additions are rolling out to more and more advertisers. For those advertisers that don’t have call extension set up, Google actually pulls their phone numbers into the ads. These actions came after Google had announced that they would automatically display any local phone numbers instead of using a central number.

Audiences

From this year forward targeting specific audiences will be a major action. During the first half of 2017 Market audiences for search and shopping became available in AdWords. Bing ads followed up by allowing marketers to exclude list and their retargeting campaigns and is testing custom audiences.

Shopping

Bing ads can now query reports for products. It’s also added promotions for shopping in the US and now allows merchants to show special offers in any product Ads they have. Anyone who is not able to do so can fill out a form and apply. It’s now possible to find shopping ads on the Display Network And Google is experimenting with home design and fashion sites to show shopping on display.

Google made the choice to include all advertisers in that test program. Any advertiser who wants can opt out but it’s not possible to set up any type of separate shopping campaign because the volume is still low. Google shopping was also the main reason for the record fines applied against Google by the EU for being in breach of antitrust laws. It’s my opinion that the ruling against Google is outrageous. If you’re interested you can read more at Crealytics.

UI Changes

It is now finally possible to view a company’s historical quality score information inside of Adwords. You’ll also find that the interface for bidding inside the UI will show suggestions for bids and a variety of page positions. Adwords Next is rolling out, and recently a million advertisers gained access to the new interface. It is scheduled to be released to everyone before the end of the year.

Bing ads now have more device targeting. This allows advertisers to create mobile-only campaigns. All advertisers on the Bing Network now have access to the new ads editor for Mac. When you need help with these changes you can contact your local SEO Houston expert to get the help you need.

Let Our Team Handle Your Online Marketing On Every Outlet

July 5, 2017 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

Marketing Automation Is Thriving And Growing But Often Misunderstood

Many people have the misconception in 2017 that marketing automation is declining when in fact, it’s a growing trend for businesses and will continue to be so going forward. The biggest issue with marketing concepts is the misunderstandings related to automation and how to use it effectively. If you have been using marketing automation or you are thinking about using it, you want to be aware of the ways in which it is often misunderstood. This is where a Search Engine Optimization Company Houston can help.

1. Only Marketers Use Marketing Automation

The fact is that marketing automation gets its best results when sales and marketing are used together as a tool. List building along with email marketing and nurturing those leads account for only half of what’s possible. The results that can come from the sales department using these tools to analyze prospective customers along with sending them messages that are specifically personalized to their behavior and with designing sales campaigns that are based on the information gathered are just some of the possibilities.

2. It’s Too Complicated

Many people get overwhelmed when they first see an automation process. But it’s not as difficult as it might first seem if you simply get some quality training and guidance when first learning the software. Anyone needing help can call on a Search Engine Optimization company Houston. Everything is customizable, from workflow options to email automation and even contacting leads. With a little practice, it’ll be simple.

3. Marketing Automation Is Just Another Name For Email Marketing

At first glance, they may appear to be the same but there is a considerable difference. The reason why so many people have this misconception is simply that it’s the only part of automation that they’re familiar with. The fact is, however, there are many moving parts that make this type of tool a substantial powerhouse that goes beyond just email marketing. Obviously, using email is an essential ingredient but there are other aspects such as tracking the behavior of your leads which allows you to personalize the emails by defining exactly who they are.

4. Is Marketing Automation Spam?

In no way is it spam and in fact, it is highly personalized email marketing. Tracking the behavior of leads allows you to see the best way to contact them and interact with them on your website. Some of these interactions can include the type of page that’s being viewed along with the time of day and even the date that they view it. For some of your leads, you will have information from forms that they filled out and from links that they clicked or videos that they watched.

All of that information can be used collectively to better understand your leads and make a very personal email campaign and workflow. You will get their attention because of the highly personalized messages in the email. It will resonate with them and they will begin to build trust in your company which increases the opportunities to change the lead into a customer.

Don’t Delay, Begin Your Marketing Automation Now!

Are you ready to grow your business using this powerful tool? If so, call or contact the SEO Houston Pros right now. Our team of dedicated staff will help with each step of the process. You get the platform setup along with email templates and the workflow process. Our business is to help your business thrive!