Web Marketing - Archive - SEO Houston Experts & Search Engine Optimization Consultants

The Importance Of SSL Certificate For Your Website

November 16, 2022 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

Why do you need an SSL Certificate?

If you’re a website owner, it’s important to know whether you need an SSL certificate for your site. If you’re asking people to submit personal information through your website, it’s even more essential to use an SSL certificate. This is because search engines like Google are cracking down on websites perceived as ‘non-secure’. Browsers have started to warn users when they’re visiting a site without an SSL certificate. Also, Google recently made SSL a ranking signal.

What is an SSL Certificate?

An SSL Certificate is a digital certificate that authenticates a website. It uses public key cryptography to encrypt all web traffic between a web server and a browser. It prevents malicious parties from reading sensitive data. It is typically used for credit card transactions, data transfers, and logins. It is also used to secure browsing on social media websites.

An SSL certificate contains key information about a website and its owner. It includes the issuer’s public key and a digital signature. These details help make your website more secure for your customers. It is important to check if the certificate is valid before entering sensitive information on your website. If you do not have the necessary certification, you can purchase one online.

An SSL certificate is vital for any website. However, it is important to consider what level of security you need. The EV SSL certificate is the most secure, but it can be quite expensive. It is best for high-profile websites that handle sensitive information.

What is a Server?

A server is a computer that provides services to other programs and devices. This type of computer architecture is known as client-server architecture. There are many types of servers. For example, a website uses a website server. Another common example is a database. A server keeps all the data in a database.

A server is a computer system that receives, stores, and sends data. It also allows users to access data and other resources on the Internet. A server can be a hardware device or a software program. A server provides services in a variety of ways, but its main purpose is to transmit data from one computer to another.

A server can be any computer that runs the appropriate software. However, a built-for-purpose server is preferred for reliability. Servers are designed to be constantly active and respond to requests. In many cases, one server can service multiple clients at once.

How does SSL work?

SSL is a protocol that helps secure data on the Internet. This protocol uses public and private encrypted key exchange to prevent the wrong use of data. This encryption works like a rubber stamp to ensure that the information passing between systems is authentic. The server sends the CSR, or Certificate Signing Request, to the browser to verify the server’s SSL certificate. The browser then checks the certificate, and if it matches, it sends an encrypted message.

SSL uses a centralized certificate issuance system where certificate authorities generate and store certificates for their customers. Using self-signed certificates is not recommended, as browsers do not trust these certificates. Certificates are stored in trust stores, and the websites that use them are signed by trusted certificate authorities. This process helps secure your site from hackers since they can’t decrypt an email without a valid key.

SSLs work by using a public key infrastructure (PKI). In other words, they use two cryptographic keys, a public, and a private key. A public key is used to encrypt the information sent to and from the client. The public key is sent to a certificate authority, which is an independent body that validates websites and issues certificates. SSL server sends a message to the user’s web browser using these public keys.

Types of SSL Certificates

There are several different types of SSL certificates for websites, and it’s important to know which one will work best for your site. Different types of SSL offer different levels of encryption. Some are more appropriate for a single domain, while others are best for multiple domains or subdomains. There are also different levels of validation.

Different SSL certificates are validated by different organizations. These validation levels vary based on what type of website you run. The lowest level of validation is domain validation, which means that you have to provide proof of ownership of your domain. This level of validation is a good option for smaller websites without online sales.

OV SSL certificates are similar to EV SSLs, but they require more validation from an outside authority. These certificates are often required for public and commercial websites. OV SSLs also display the name of the website owner in the address bar. Regardless of the type of website, you need to make sure it’s secure for your visitors to feel safe.

Which SSL Certificate do you need?

There are several different kinds of SSL certificates. Domain validation is the most basic, while organization validation provides the highest level of security. Having one will give your visitors a sense of trust in your site. Regardless of what type of website you own, you should have a secure connection between your site and visitors.

When choosing an SSL Certificate for your site, you should choose a type that matches your business’s needs. The least secure is the domain-validated certificate, which is ideal for websites that do not handle sensitive data, such as credit card numbers. These types of certificates will also display a warning message next to the URL if a site is not authentic. A higher validation level is recommended for e-commerce websites and sites with personal information.

Another type of website that needs SSL protection is a website that contains a login form. Without an SSL certificate, passwords are sent in plain text and can be intercepted anywhere along the way. Other types of information that could be compromised are credit card information and social security numbers.

Does SSL increase SEO?

Many people are concerned about the security of their personal information on the internet. Thankfully, SSL certificates help protect the information you share online. Google is increasingly demanding that all websites have an SSL certificate. This secures sensitive information and is an effective way to increase your search engine ranking. However, there are some risks involved in migrating to HTTPS.

One of the biggest risks is that SSL may slow down your website. While the security benefits are undeniable, it could reduce your website’s speed. There’s no guarantee that it will help your SEO ranking, but it will help you increase your site’s security. And it can also increase your visitors’ trust in your website.

SSL certifications also improve user experience. They reduce page bounce rates, which are high on websites that aren’t secure. People tend to exit unsafe websites without even browsing through the content. Google notices this behavior and demotes websites with high bounce rates. This means fewer traffic views, which means fewer opportunities to get backlinks and improve engagement rates.

How to get an SSL Certificate?

An SSL certificate can help protect your website from fraudulent activities. However, you have to understand how the process works before you can get one. First, you need to determine which type of SSL certificate is best for your website. There are two main types, organization-validated and domain-validated. Organization-validated certificates require verification that your website is owned by the organization listed in the certificate.

An SSL certificate encrypts data with a private and public key. This ensures that the data being transmitted is confidential. This is particularly important if your website is an eCommerce site. Additionally, an SSL certificate increases the search engine ranking of your website. If your website isn’t using an SSL certificate, you’ll be warned by Google by having a “Not Secure” label appear in the search results.

Contact us or call us today for the help you need with your Digital Marketing. Visit our blog for more tricks and tips for SEO!

The Importance Of High-Quality Website Content

May 16, 2022 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

What Is High-Quality Website Content?

There are different forms of website content. High-quality content is important to attract potential visitors to your website and convert them to paying customers. Here are different forms of web content:

Blog posts
Images
Case studies
Infographics
Press releases
Whitepapers
Video
Testimonials and reviews

Even though anyone can create content, high-quality content should be well-researched, planned out, and strategically created. It should be relevant to what the user searches for and motivate the visitor to stay longer on your site. You should aim to create the type of content that answers the queries of your visitor. The best way to create user-friendly content is to know your user’s pain points and answer them. High-quality content plays a crucial role in content marketing. In fact, content marketing goes hand in hand with search engine optimization or SEO. Your SEO efforts won’t reach their fullest potential without great content.

Search Engine Optimization Or SEO?

SEO or search engine optimization is the process of increasing the traffic flow to a website by optimizing the website for search engines including on-page, technical, and off-page SEO. Your SEO and content strategy should be planned together by appraising three important elements such as keywords, backlinks, and the quality of the piece of content you create.

The Importance Of High-Quality Website Content

The creation of high-quality content should be the cornerstone of the structure of your website. Make sure you strategically use relevant key phrases across all forms of content. It will help attract the right audience to your website, engage them, and make them take the right action on your site. If the user thinks that your content is valuable, he or she is more likely to share it. In fact, high-quality content not only benefits the visitor but the ranking of your site in the search engines.

Quality content helps generate high CTRs or click-through rates as well as backlinks. The more visitors come to your website and click on your content, the better for your site. Google will definitely notice this and increase the rankings of your site. In fact, user engagement is a ranking factor with Google. On the other hand, content that’s designed to answer the questions of the visitor is beneficial for backlinking. It improves your website’s overall performance in SERPs. Creating backlinks to external sites will help the user get a better idea of the topic that you intend to cover.

The Benefits Of High-Quality Content For SEO

People should easily find your content in order for it to be effective and get the desired results. Content cannot be found without effective search engine optimization. SEO includes the use of relevant keywords, internet & external links, alt text, and more. Here are some of the benefits of high-quality content for SEO:

Improved site scores
Finding your content easily
Good rankings for your site
Improved user experience
Reach the right target audience

Get in touch with one of our SEO experts and get started with your SEO campaign to dominate your market! Visit our blog for more tips and tricks on successful SEO tactics!

Web Design In Houston: How Valuable It Is? Pt 2

August 12, 2021 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

The Importance Of Web Design

Part 2

(Continuation)Contrarily, an outdated and unattractive website will make your business look uninviting. If people feel like your business isn’t valuing them enough to put in an effort to give a good first impression, then they will avoid your business.

You should treat your website design and the digital face of your business. If you put yourself in the customers’ shoes, you’d obviously want to meet a friendly face that makes you feel welcome. In this case, an updated and appealing web design takes the place of that friendly customer service agent.

4. It Establishes Trust With Your Audience

Consumers don’t trust websites that are poorly designed. If your website has a poor design or the information available looks outdated, then your website will be deemed untrustworthy. They might view your website as shady and unprofessional since it doesn’t have an updated web design.

Consider a person that is looking to make a bulk purchase with a manufacturing company. Since they will be spending a hefty amount of cash, they will be very careful with the company that they choose. If they get the impression that your site is untrustworthy, then will pass on your company.

However, with a professional-grade website, your audience will be more trusting of your business. They will stick around longer to learn more.

5. Your Competitors Are Already Doing It

If you aren’t yet convinced about the importance of web design, then this point will surely do. Your competitors are already using web design. Therefore, if you haven’t yet invested in web design, then you will be left in the dust.

You should look to make your website unique from your competition. However, with an old, outdated, and poor-quality website, you risk being outranked. A properly designed website will rank better than your website.

Essentially, you will be losing leads to your competitors. They’ll gain more leads since their website is far more appealing.

Your website design offers you the perfect opportunity to differentiate yourself from your competition. Businesses that you are competing with are offering the same services and at similar prices. Thus, you need to establish that one thing that makes your business unique.

6. It Creates Consistency

When trying to generate more leads for your business, you need to grow your brand. You need to make your audience more familiar with your brand so that they can easily recognize your brand and choose it when they are finally ready to convert. Online web designs are essential since they help in creating consistency across your page.

It is important to have the same exact fonts, layouts, and styles throughout every page of your site. Having different designs on different pages makes your site seem unprofessional. Building brand awareness will become more difficult since your audience won’t know the colors to associate with your brand.

When you lack consistency in your website design, customers will quickly move from your website to another one that looks more professional. When you create consistency on your site, your leads will remain longer on your site and they will become more familiar with your brand.

If you are looking to create your perfect website, then you should get in touch with us to talk to a strategist. Visit our blog for more tips and tricks on successful SEO tactics! Click here for the first article in this series.

Web Design In Houston: How Valuable It Is? Pt 1

August 12, 2021 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

The Importance Of Web Design

Part 1

When provided with just 15 minutes to consume content, 66% of the demographic will insist on viewing something that is visually appealing instead of something that is just plain and simple. When it comes to internet marketing, your website’s design is crucial. In order to build a superior website for your business, it is important to first understand the importance of web design.

Here, we will take a look at the various reasons why website design is important and give you seven essential elements for your website.

If you are considering rebuilding your site, then you might be wondering why is website design really important? What impact will it have on your business and audience? Here are five reasons why web design is important:

1. It Sets the First Impression

When customers click on your website, what they see will give them the first impression of your business. Within the first few seconds of visiting your site, they will form a particular perception of your business. Hence, you definitely want your customers to have a good impression of your business within the first few seconds.

In case your website is visually unappealing and appears outdated, then your audience will judge your business negatively. If your website doesn’t offer a good user experience, then your site will have a high bounce rate. You will miss out on leads since they will be leaving your site for those of your competitors.

Web design is crucial since it affects the customer perception of your brand. The impression that they have about your site and business will determine if they remain on your site and find out more about your business or leave your page and go to your competitors. With proper web design, you will be able to keep your leads on your page.

2. It Contributes To Your SEO Strategy

A lot of web design elements and techniques affect the way you publish content on your site, which consequently influences how search engine spiders crawl and index your site.

This is one of those areas that you cannot afford to skimp on. In case your on-page SEO basics aren’t decent, then you will be facing a monumental task trying to increase your online visibility from the onset.

Apart from affecting how content is published on your site, various web design element

s directly impact SEO in and of themselves. It can be hard to understand web design if you don’t know how it works. But basically, your code should be SEO-friendly.

3. It Gives The Impression For Customer Service

Just by looking at your website, people can be able to determine how you will treat them. Your website’s design offers them an insight into how your business operates and how it views its customers. If your audience gets the impression that you aren’t putting any effort into your website, then will rightfully assume you won’t put any effort in catering to your needs.

Your site doubles as your customer service rep. When you have a bright, updated, and welcoming website, then your audience will feel that they are cared for. They will get the impression that your business is open and welcoming to everyone who visits your site.

Feel free to get in touch with the best SEO agency in Houston by contacting us today or giving us a call now! Visit our blog for more tips and tricks on successful SEO tactics! Click here for the second article in this series.

Is Hiring A Houston SEO Company Worth It In 2019?

June 11, 2019 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

The Great Worth Of SEO Services In Houston In 2019

Is investing in SEO worth it in 2019? Does it pay to invest time and money in ranking high naturally given that Google’s algorithms keep changing and paid advertising yields much quicker results? There are numerous advertisers that have claimed that SEO is on its deathbed if it is not already dead. However, to determine whether SEO is still worth it, you should consider what it is that you are trying to achieve with SEO.

SEO, for the most, is a misunderstood product. It is not static nor is it a magical answer to all your marketing needs or problems. In many regards, SEO is a science and an art that continuously evolves. It requires SEO continuously study and notice the trends, patterns, and potential changes.

With this in mind, this read will help you determine whether SEO is worth the time and money. There are 3 main qualitative elements to consider in order to determine if SEO is, indeed a worthy investment.

What Can SEO Do & Achieve For Your Business?

You must have heard that SEO will help shore up your bottom-line. That is true, but only when all the stars align well. It is important to note that SEO is a direct factor in increasing your business’ revenue; sales are the direct cause of bottom line improvement. SEO is nor the end-all-be-all. Instead, it is a strong indirect factor that can shore up your revenue opportunities.

So, What Will SEO Do For You?

SEO will improve your overall ranking in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs), thereby increasing the organic traffic you get, and improve the experience you give your traffic. User experience has long been an important ranking factor. However, it is increasing in importance given Google’s recent direction of making speed a ranking factor.

For your SEO effort to improve your overall profitability, your website should handle the organic traffic efficiently and funnel them to a sale effectively. No contact information displayed? No call to action? SEO will do very little to help your bottom-line.

SEO simply sends organic free-of-charge traffic to your website.

Which Is Better – Organic Or Paid Traffic?

First things first, you need to define “better”. There are people who consider quicker traffic as better. Other business owners consider quality traffic as better. Other business owners classify cheaper traffic as better.

As such, it all boils down to 3 categories:

Speed of the traffic to your site (sooner = better)
The quality of traffic (more conversions = better)
The cost of traffic (cheaper = better)

SEO = Slower Traffic Than PPC Traffic

If you are prioritizing the speed of result – essentially how fast you can generate traffic, then SEO is not a good marketing route to go. SEO is slow to mature and yield results. Performing SEO is basically trying to earn your website popularity. When your website goes online, it is one in a million websites to be launched that very same day! As such, SEO is slow to yield traffic

If speed is of the essence, you are better of going the PPC route.

SEO Delivers Higher-Quality Traffic Than PPC

The vast majority of search engine users do not trust ads. Ad-blindness is a real phenomenon and an ever-growing one for that matter judging by the growing list of ad blockers. People are fed up with the ads. You cannot even go to a local fast-food drive through without being lied to. How many times can you recall your burger look like anything like the pictures? See what I mean.

Over 70% of search engines users will scroll right past the ads section and go to the organic traffic section. They perceive the organic results to be more trustworthy and better. As such, when you rank higher, the visitors know that you earned your ranking rather than buying it.

As such, as long you target high-quality keywords and provide high-quality valuable content for your visitors, your conversions will be higher from organic ranking than PPC.

In this regard, if you are after quality visitors, you need to convey a sense of trust. You need to leverage SEO.

SEO Is More Cost-Effective Than PPC

PPC stands for “Pay Per Click” and is indicative of the form of acquisition you get from it. You pay for every click on your link. When you run an ad on Google, LinkedIn, Facebook, or Twitter, and someone clicks your ad, you have to pay for the click. The CPC – cost-per-click – will vary depending on the quality of your ad and the completion in your space.

You might spend $0.50 per click or $70 per click when you use PPC.

SEO, on the other hand, is not a per-click marketing model. Once you are ranked on the first page/top 10 on Google, you will continuously receive organic clicks. Importantly, you do not have to pay for every click.

SEO can eventually allow you to get the amount of traffic you get from your PPC budget, say $3,000, all for free.

As such, in the case of SEO, it delivers lower cost-per-acquisition in the long run. If you are interested in lower long-term costs, SEO is perfect for you.

How Much Will SEO Cost?

For you to get the proper picture, it is far better to consider SEO as an investment in your business rather than a cost. When you pay for SEO services, you are building an asset that involves building a website and creating content that will last as long as you need them to. Every dollar you invest in SEO will deliver results that stick with your business. As for PPC, you gain leads fasters but your leads disappear the moment you stop running the ads.

SEO Is A Long-term Investment.

So, now the question becomes, how much is the appropriate amount to invest in SEO?

The amount you invest in SEO will depend on the agency you use given that agency cost vary. It will also depend on your industry. However, you can expect to pay anything from $300 to $500 for local, low-competition SEO services involving a single location.

On the other hand, for national and multi-location with stronger competition, SEO will cost you anything from $1000 to $6000 per month. As such, the appropriate investment for your business will depend on your business goals, the lifetime value of your customers, and your budget.

Is SEO Worth It From A Time & Money Investment Point Of View?

If you have the budget for it, you should begin doing SEO as soon as possible. In SEO, time is a valuable asset. The longer you delay in investing in SEO, the longer it will take to get traction on SERPs ranking and the longer it will take to get the free traffic.

This is the case in one-person shops. In fact, investing in SEO makes more sense for small business operations. You can even take the DIY route rather than hiring an agency.

If you are interested in doing SEO as a DIY project, here are the 4 most important SEO tasks to do!

In a nutshell, SEO is a valuable investment. It is a worthy investment. Given that you are building assets for your company, SEO is an investment with long-term benefits.

What Are Your Thoughts?

Tell us what you think in the comment section. Do you feel SEO is worth it? Has SEO reduced your customer acquisition? Has SEO improved or lowered the quality of traffic you get?

You can go a step further by getting a personalized digital marketing plan to see the benefits you stand to get from SEO.

Please feel free to get in touch with the best SEO agency in Houston by contacting us today or giving us a call now! Visit our blog for more tips and tricks on successful SEO tactics!

Lead Generation Tips From SEO Experts SEO Houston Pros

March 18, 2019 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT LEAD GENERATION

Part 3

Modern-day search engines are engineered to recognize and reward top-quality content posted on optimized websites. As such, it is not only important to craft content but the content must be of high-quality. To ensure you meet these targets, you can organize a content audit intended to give you insights as to the distribution between leadership and promotional themes.

With regards to thought leadership content, the content must be compelling, insightful, and substantial. It is not just a matter of developing content for the sake of it. Ensure that the content prioritizes content quality and not just quantity. Your content should not just promote you or your products, it needs to be useful.

Moreover, you should promote your content, both visual and non-visual contents, on your social channels. This is especially important for your high-quality and engaging content. As the content continues to engage with the audience and improving viewership/readership, Google and other search engines will consider your content as being valuable content. As a reward for producing high-quality content, they will rank you higher. Additionally, the natural links that you get from your promotional efforts tend to be more valuable than other links. Therefore, make a point of developing useful and informative content.

Website

For all your marketing efforts, you need a place to carry out all your conversions. A well-optimized website is the best place to do this. Endeavors such as convincing prospective customers and or clients to sign up to your newsletter or enter promotions are most effective when done on websites. Importantly, such endeavors help you convert visitors to leads. However, you need to get the content, the layout, the forms, the designs, and Call-to-Action (CTA) right.

Blog

The blog provides the best space for you to foster trust with your potential customers and clients. For starters, the blog is accessible via various internet channels, which makes it search engine optimized.

That being said, you should note that not everyone is readily willing to sign up for a demo or give their email to sign up for the newsletter. The best course of action is to clearly and ask the blog traffic to follow you on the various social media channels you are active. While they follow you on social media, you can use highly engaging content to capture their interest bringing them back to your blog. When they visit your blog several times, they will naturally explore your entire website. This makes your blog an important conversion tool.

Social Media

Social media has been growing tremendously in the recent past resulting in an explosion of information. These days, buyers are using social channels to get reviews of certain products and services, especially through the eyes of influencers and their peers. As such, you can use social networks for branding and exposure, you can use it for lead generation also. Therefore, you should aim to be easily accessible of social media channels such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, etc. wherein you can build trust.

Outbound Marketing

While the main interest in marketing has been inbound marketing, the prudent approach is to blend both inbound marketing and outbound marketing. Inbound marketing will unboundedly yield lead generation activities, you still need outbound marketing to bolster your inbound marketing efforts and streamline the target audience.

Inbound marketing is the use of outbound channels to get your content and message to an audience of potential customers and buyers. These efforts are typically made through rented attention, instead of your own attention channels.
On the other hand, when dealing with outbound techniques, you have to make our audience know about you without having met you. As such, the outbound methods are designed to wow your audience, giving your company a stellar image. The massaging in outbound marketing is highly streamlined and it is accompanied by a compelling call-to-action.

This makes outbound marketing very effective; it can push a lead through a funnel very fast to the intended conversion, whether a purchase, a newsletter sign up, or any other end-goal. By combining both inbound marketing and outbound marketing, you can provide the leads with the extra urge to go down the funnel much faster.

The perfect blend of inbound marketing and outbound marketing can potentially skyrocket the number of shares and views you generate. Importantly, this increases the number of potential buyers accessing your message and content.

Email Marketing

Email is another important marketing tool. It is the most popular lead generation tactic that marketers use given its stellar ability to grab the attention of prospects. As such, you should use emails as one of your main communications channels. This will allow you to get your content and message directly to your audience, prospects, and leads.

Display Ads

The main advantage of display ads is the potential to directly reach out to a specific demographic or target a certain behavioral action. However, this means of lead generation allows you to target a specific location or even a specific online publication.

You can also use re-targeting ads which track your leads pattern of behavior on your website. With re-targeting ads, your visitors can be cookied, allowing you to display your ads to them even they visit other websites.

When done properly, display ads can drive leads, pass your message to your target audience, and educate your potential leads. In fact, displayed ads can and are used in every stage of the conversion funnel. You can use display ads to build your audience and brand at the upper stages of the funnel. It can help evaluate and educate your leads in the mid-section of the funnel. Finally, it can improve drive conversion at the bottom of the funnel.

Pay-per-Click Ads

Pay-per-Click better known as PPC is the ads that you are charged with each click of the ad. This model of marketing is usually deployed by search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo on search results pages or even on third-party websites.

On search engine results pages, the PPC ads are displayed in the sponsored section of your results, which is typically located in the top section of the page. Therefore, you can use PPC to grab more attention to website and company. Importantly, you can use PPC to generate high-quality leads. By use relevant and targeted keywords in your ads, your ads will be displayed when your audience search for the keywords.

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! Click here for the fourth installment of this article!

Lead Generation Tips From SEO Experts SEO Houston Pros

March 11, 2019 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT LEAD GENERATION

Part 2

To be successful at lead generation, a lead must be willing to invest in lead nurturing and facets of Middle of Funnel (MOFU) techniques. The MOFU techniques are designed to nurture the already established relationship and create and grow trust by providing high-quality engaging content. Importantly, the techniques should gently guide the lead to making a purchasing.

In recent times, to be successful in lead generation, you have to combine TOFU and MOFU techniques and approaches effectively into a holistic marketing philosophy. Only then can you efficiently convert your leads into paying customers and or clients.

Lead Generation Research

Lead generation tactics are an important part of lead generation. Increasingly, companies are now spending a lot of money to diversify the creative means they can capture their audience’s attention despite all the noise that exists.

Lead Generation Budget Observed Trends

In recent times, we have observed the rise in the net spending on lead generation by marketers. The money is typically used in SEO, website optimization, and social media.

CMO Lead Generation Focus

MarketingSherpa reckons that senior-level marketing executives and CMOs are prioritizing increasing or getting measurable ROI from their marketing efforts. Moreover, they are prioritizing the optimization of marketing and sales funnel over in their lead generation. As such, CMOs are focusing on finding viable methods of improving the quality of the leads generated from their marketing efforts and investments.

Top Lead Generation Challenges

As mentioned above, lead quality is the main priority for marketing executives across the board. However, lead quality is a significant challenge that marketers have to deal with. An IDG study revealed that 61% of the marketers in the study find generating high-quality leads to be a huge challenge.

That being said, marketing executives have to contend with inadequate resources. They have to operate with inadequate budgetary resources, staffing, and inadequate data (both quality and quantity-wise) while still trying to generate quality leads.

Most Effective And Efficient Lead Generation Tactics

Another IDG survey dubbed The B2B Lead Generation Marketing Trends Survey revealed email marketing, corporate websites, tradeshows, and conferences are the most effective and popular lead generation tactics in use today. Conversely, direct mail and print advertising have been identified as the least effective lead generation tactics.

Fundamentals of Lead Generation

To get the fundamental of lead generation right, you need to appreciate that defining a lead is a subjective matter. It all depends on the company involved. Typically, the definition of a lead will depend on a company’s sales cycle. However, a lead is generally defined as a qualified potential buyer who offers a certain level of interest in buying your goods or services. It is important to note that every lead that submits details with you gets something in return; this might be additional information on the products or a convincing offer.

Generally, there are two types of lead generation – inbound and outbound. Nonetheless, the basic principles of recognizing, nurturing, and customer retention remain part and parcel of a comprehensive strategy.

Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing entails assisting potential customers and/or clients learn about or locate your company, typically before they consider making a purchase. In doing this, you convert this early audience into having a preference for your brand, eventually turning them to a lead and revenue.

In a market where customers are immensely empowered by having ample choices, marketers cannot rely on trade shows, advertisements, cold calling, and other outbound marketing tactics only. Today’s consumers are educated and knowledgeable, and, therefore, require a lot of information. As a marketer, you work is find innovative and creative ways of standing out in the crowd and catching the attention of the audience. To achieve this, you need a good grasp of inbound marketing.

You can achieve this by providing a blend of informative, relevant, and entertaining contents. The goal is to create a relationship with your audience who are also your potential clients. That said, note that creating content is not enough. You need to avail the content to your audience through channels your potential clients use.

We will delve into some of the most effective inbound leads generation:

SEO and Content

Your inbound marketing efforts will quickly hit a brick wall if you do not generate and use the right content. Content marketing, therefore, is a cornerstone to inbound leads generation. Content marketing is at its core creating and disseminating in-depth and useful content in an effort to capture the attention of a well-defined target audience and engage with the audience with the end goal being helping the audience take profitable customer actions.

Email marketing, social media marketing, and other types of marketing thrive on content. Having the right content can get you right in front of the buyers, helping you to gain their trust.

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! Click here for the third installment of this article!

Houston SEO Experts Prioritize Based On Impact

January 11, 2019 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

Prioritizing SEO Tasks Based On Impact Pt1

How can you really know if the content and SEO changes that you are making to your website will actually benefit it? In this article, we will be looking at various ways that your resources can be prioritized so that your bottom line is impacted and your business objectives are supported.

“What needs to be done to optimize our website?”

Every search engine optimization (SEO) expert is faced with this question, but unfortunately, there is no easy answer to it. After all, there has never been a website that only needs one single thing.

That is the problem with search engine optimization. It is comprised of numerous things so that when you are faced with that all-important question of what needs to be done, we tend to provide too many recommendations. Most teams, unfortunately, are not equipped with the necessary knowledge or resources for handling them and end up getting very little or nothing is done, instead of everything that needs to be completed.

So how can we guarantee that the necessary changes are being made by our teams in order to drive a successful outcome?

Throughout my career, I have faced this challenging time and time again, and fortunately, I have learned a couple of different ways to handle this. So let’s take a look at some of them.

Prioritize According To Impact

There are only so many hours in the day, meaning that you often can’t get everything done. So, if there are only one to two things that we can get to on our list, then we need to make sure we select the recommendations that will have the greatest impact on the overall website.

For example, let’s examine the technical SEO audit. With a technical audit, some of the things that we may recommend include image compression, heading tags, redirect updates, canonicalization, and 15 other different things. If a development team is bogged down already with their regular daily tasks, it won’t be able to fit all of these things in.

In order to ensure that something gets done, we need to look at what is actually holding the website back. Title tags might not appear to be the world’s highest priority, but if your website doesn’t have them, then just making that change could lead to some fairly significant improvements for your site.

When recommendations are being made, teams need to understand where they need to begin and what things can wait until later. Not everything will be a top priority.

Prioritize according to resources

When it comes to resource the exact same thing applies.

We recommended last year that a client transition their website over to HTTPS from HTTP. They were excited and completely on board, but then we realized the client didn’t have anybody for managing this process.

It is no small task to move a website to HTTPs. Errors can be made, it may be a difficult process, and several times now I have seen it result in the loss of significant amounts of organic traffic (thanks a lot, Google). We were unable to take on that risk. For nearly a year we held onto the recommendation until the right personnel was in place to guarantee a smooth transition. Now everything has been switched over properly, and the website is enjoying a nice increase in traffic.

Here is another example to look at. Other clients of ours needed help with writing content. However, they didn’t have anybody to approve, edit or manage the process, which would result in a backlog of blog posts that went unpublished. Unpublished blog posts help absolutely no one.

We decided instead to switch over to blog refreshes. What we did is identified some older blog posts that could use an update and began updating the content. It wasn’t necessary to have an extensive review for this, and we were able to implement these changes. It resulted in an increase in blog traffic, and improvements were made without having to have any new content.

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! Click here for the second article in this series.

Houston Seo Experts On Link Building

December 20, 2018 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

Link Building and Houston SEO: What You Need to Know

There have been many changes in strategies in the world of search engine optimization, but there is one constant that has remained, and this is the importance of high-quality link building on search engine rankings and increasing brand recognition. If you run a small business or even a startup, you will need to have a Houston SEO campaign that includes inbound link building;

What is it?

In simple terms, inbound links are those links that are placed on external websites and they link back to your website. This can link to a specific page or a blog post.
It is one of the factors used in ranking, and this is why search engines will look at the inbound links of your website. It will use this information to determine how you are going to rank. But is not where they stop. They will go ahead and do an evaluation of the relevance and authority of the website linking to yours. Is the external website authoritative? Is the website trustworthy? Is it relevant in the industry it is in? In short, the website that you are using to link to yours must be of high-quality before it can have any impact on your Houston SEO.

What Are the Benefits?

What can you expect when you have effectively used inbound link building as part of the campaign?
Some of the benefits you can expect to get include:
Brand visibility: The brand name of the company will be used and this will help in improving your brand visibility.
Improve rankings: Links from external sites will help in boosting the domain authority of your website, and this will lead to improved rankings.
Long-term value: The impact it will have strengthens with time, and this means you can see the benefits for a long time to come.

Facts on Inbound Link Building

There is no doubt of the role played by inbound link building in your SEO plan. But this area can be a little confusing. It is not like the other SEO concepts such as picking specific keywords and publishing informative content, it is not a straightforward process.
Another fact that tends to confuse many people is that it will take some time before you see results. Even businesses using some of the best SEO link building strategies are not able to get immediate results. Inbound links will help in providing tremendous benefits both in building the domain authority of your website and improvement in rankings. Linking will be the backbone of your SEO plan.

Inbound Link Building Solutions With Houston SEO Experts

The volume of links you are able to get from an authoritative site will have a direct impact on your rankings. Give us a call because we are an experienced Houston SEO company ready to help you out with your campaign.

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!

Houston SEO Service On Voice Searching & SEO

December 20, 2018 By SEO Houston Pros Leave a Comment

Voice Search and SEO: What You Need to Know

Voice-activated search was once thought as being a joke, but the growth it has been having in the recent months has proved otherwise. There are many experts who were surprised by this increase, and this has shown that voice search is not something that can be overlooked when it comes to Houston SEO strategies and web design.
Why has it become popular?

Users loved voice assistant when they first came out, but most of the results were a hit and miss thing. There were very few responses that were making sense. AI technology has become even more sophisticated, and this has led to improved accuracy. Google report showed that the accuracy of voice recognition had grown to 95 percent by 2017.

Many players in the industry such as Microsoft’s Cortana, Amazon Alexa, and Google assistant started to release them because of the increased accuracy. Many mobile devices started coming with inbuilt voice activation, which added to the numbers.

What does it mean for SEO?

It is common for people to use it for things such as making calls, but it has started to be used by many people to search for things. What does the growth of voice search mean for Houston marketing strategy?

There was a recent survey done which showed that asking for directions was the most common voice request both in adults and teens. Some other information high on the list includes the location and store hours.

It also showed an increase in voice recognition searches for inquiries related to business, like customer support, sales and deals, and upcoming events. It is important to think about voice during your Houston SEO and web design plan.

What makes it Different?

Google has continued to do improvements on their algorithm so as to get rid of non-relevant results and filter out any spam. They have guidelines and penalties that ensure that the most accurate results are displayed. The area of voice search is still in its infancy, so it is not the same because the refined processes aren’t there yet.

People tend to use voice search in a different way than they would do text. With voice, people are more likely to use short questions and phrase inquires. You will need to use a different approach when optimizing for voice.

Why is Now the Best Time for Voice SEO?

Experts believe there will come a time when voice will overtake text. Time will tell, but the number of people using voice has been increasing fast. Many mobile phones are coming with voice assistants, and this has lead voice assistants to reach 420 million. Voice search should be part and parcel of any Houston SEO and web design.

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!