NOTE: THIS BLOG IS MEANT FOR INFORMATION ONLY
It was not too long ago that many people had no internet, much less an e-mail address. But the internet brought in a new era that is full of unlimited information. The internet gave birth to electronic mail, more popularly known as e-mail. E-mail opened new avenues to the world of communication. In the beginning e-mail was only used as another means of communicating with other people for personal or business related matters.
Now people of every age group have an e-mail address. But, since the past few years have gone by, its potential for marketing has been exploited to its maximum both in good and bad ways. At the same time, who can disregard the services of direct mail which have been operating for nearly two centuries? It is still the preferred method of communication for many people.
E-mail is the cheapest method of communicating in mass quantities available as of this date. The advantage with email is that you can send email to many people at the same time just with the click of a mouse, where as in the case of direct mails one has to go through putting letters in envelopes for each and every person, make different address labels, mail it and also have to bear the cost of mailing. Time is money and e-mail marketing saves a lot of time.
While e-mail marketing might look easy, if you compare the net result, the story is totally different. When you are marketing through e-mail you want to make sure that you are e-mailing the right person, otherwise the e-mail would end up going to a junk folder. Also you got to be careful that you don’t miss the subject or the body of the e-mail, otherwise the net result would be same. In this age of spamming, spammers use a variety of subjects.
Studies show that direct mail is more efficient and has better success than e-mail. First, it is not as easy to block direct mail as junk e-mail and secondly the process of blocking mails itself is not automated like e-mail. The other reason why people hate e-mail marketing is due to constant bombarding of e-mails from spammers and illegal marketers from Nigerian money scams to porn to online prescription drugs to stock quotes to what not. In addition to that, you also get promotional offers from big companies and who can ignore phishing these days.
Many people have developed a negative perception about e-mail marketing and they simply delete or spam the e-mail if they do not identify it as their regular e-mail. In contrast direct mail is seen with respect and people pick their mail as a daily routine and open them with a priority.
Direct mail has a personal feel attached to it, one of the reasons why people prefer mail greetings over an electronic greeting. It takes time to personalize a direct mail where as an e-mail is instant and the fate of e-mail is also instant i.e. immediate deletion. Researchers are constantly puzzled by the mystery surrounding why people are so enthusiastic about direct mail.
But no worries, this is only good news for the marketers that they have something in their tool kit that works. So marketers have the mailing list of potential customers handy and send some nicely composed letters to them about your company and its products.
Snail mail has a potential of going through the hands of gatekeepers and administrative assistants before actually going to their boss which can end up being thrown in trash. The survival chances are rare unless its subject is business oriented and has some important information. But e-mail wins in this regard, as it reaches directly the person to which it is intended to go, after that its fate is left to the person whether to read or send it to spam folder.
A more scientific explanation of why direct mail is dearer to people than e-mail is the sensory perception of people. A direct mail uses three of the four senses of a person i.e. visual, verbal, listening and touching where as e-mail does not use sense of listening and touching. But this can be achieved by adding appealing graphics, text reading ability and streaming audio to the e-mail.
The statistics show that direct mail has not died and in fact the volume has grown by leaps and bounds in past few decades. A typical example is the fact that we receive more magazines, journals, mails from universities, DVDs etc. than we used to receive few years ago. This leaves the marketers with a dilemma about which method to use. The answer is simple, use email to contact only those people who you know and use direct mail for the people who don’t know you.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Internal Linking Strategies for Effective SEO
If you are putting your website together and want to ensure it has a good chance of ranking highly in the search engines then you need to think about your internal linking strategy. Firstly your internal links are those links that take you from one page of your website to another and enable people to navigate around your website.
When considering how to link your web pages together it is important to consider how the search engines will move around your site and how they will find your content. However it is important to point out at this stage that search engines will put some importance on how easy it is for visitors of your site to navigate around your website. So when deciding how to put your website together remember to consider your visitors first, how easy is it for users to find information. If you get this right it will put you a long way towards good rankings with the search engines.
It is important to point out at this stage that internal linking is only part of the battle in achieving that elusive first page on Google. Everybody looking to embark on an SEO campaign will be all too aware of the importance of links coming into their website, however you can also improve things with a good internal linking strategy.
Below you will find a list of tips and things to think about when linking your website to make it optimized for search engines.
1. Use text links in menu bars
Many web designers like to use images in menu bars as there is a much wider variety of fonts and you can get a great look. However the problem with this is that search engines cannot follow the links in these menu bars. We would always recommend using text links in the menu bars and footers of your website. This will enable search engines to read and follow the links on your site and will make no difference to the user experience.
So remember, if you want a search engine to index a page on your site make sure you include a text link to that site to ensure it can be found.
2. Use descriptive text in your links
Search engines will read the text in any links on your site and use it to rank your website. So if you sell pink dresses then it will be useful to have a link to that page where the text in the link is "Pink Dresses". However try and be as specific as possible so the text link "Affordable Pink Dresses" may have more of an impact. Search engines will read this text and will then rank your website for the search term that is in the text.
When considering how to link your web pages together it is important to consider how the search engines will move around your site and how they will find your content. However it is important to point out at this stage that search engines will put some importance on how easy it is for visitors of your site to navigate around your website. So when deciding how to put your website together remember to consider your visitors first, how easy is it for users to find information. If you get this right it will put you a long way towards good rankings with the search engines.
It is important to point out at this stage that internal linking is only part of the battle in achieving that elusive first page on Google. Everybody looking to embark on an SEO campaign will be all too aware of the importance of links coming into their website, however you can also improve things with a good internal linking strategy.
Below you will find a list of tips and things to think about when linking your website to make it optimized for search engines.
1. Use text links in menu bars
Many web designers like to use images in menu bars as there is a much wider variety of fonts and you can get a great look. However the problem with this is that search engines cannot follow the links in these menu bars. We would always recommend using text links in the menu bars and footers of your website. This will enable search engines to read and follow the links on your site and will make no difference to the user experience.
So remember, if you want a search engine to index a page on your site make sure you include a text link to that site to ensure it can be found.
2. Use descriptive text in your links
Search engines will read the text in any links on your site and use it to rank your website. So if you sell pink dresses then it will be useful to have a link to that page where the text in the link is "Pink Dresses". However try and be as specific as possible so the text link "Affordable Pink Dresses" may have more of an impact. Search engines will read this text and will then rank your website for the search term that is in the text.
How Google AdWords Works
AdWords is Google’s Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising system which if used will reach approximately 80% of all internet users. The PPC adverts are those that appear on Google search results as "Sponsored Links" down the right hand side. Your advert will also be distributed to Google’s "Content Network". This means you will appear on search engines that relate to Google as well as websites targeted for your audience.
I would imagine you are asking ‘how do I get started?’ It is very simple really, once you have set up an account you will need to select your keywords and phrase (Google has a great tool to help you with this). Try and make sure you select specific keywords or phrases - these will normally consist of more than one word. The more generic your keywords the lower your click through rate will be and the lower your conversions. Always remember your goal is to target your advert to the right audience for your product or service.
Once you have your keywords sorted you will need to write your ad which will consist of a title of 25 characters and 2 lines of 35 characters each. This is quite a small ad to get your information in and there are some important things to remember when writing it. Firstly make sure you include a call to action, it may seem unnecessary but they work and will increase your click through rate.
Secondly, include your keywords in your ad title and text if possible. This leads us on to another vital point, the size of your keyword list. It is a good idea to keep your keywords for a particular ad group as small as possible, 2-4 words or phrases that are related. For your campaign you can have as many ad groups as you would like. This means that you could have 10 ad groups each with 3 keywords, so you get 30 keywords covered, but each 3 words have a different advert. This will allow you to target your advert more effectively increasing both your click through rate and your conversion rate.
On the point of conversion rates, you can get some code from Google to add into the code for your site which will show you the conversions you get for each keyword. This will allow you to monitor performance levels and drop those keywords that do not give you the performance you are looking for. In addition to this, in order to improve your conversions it is vital you send your visitors to the correct lading page. If you are selling terracotta tiles and when someone clicks on your advert they go to your home page and have to search for what they are looking for they will probably not hang around to find them. However if they go straight to the page for ordering the tiles you will probably get a much higher conversion rate.
Once you have selected your keywords and written your advert you will need to select how you would like your keywords to be matched and you will have 4 options:
1.Broad Match: This is the Google default setting and means that searchers can enter your keywords in any order and your ad will appear. This is obviously the least targeted.
2.Phrase Match: Your keywords must appear in the exact order for your ads to appear. This is more targeted than Broad Match.
3.Exact Match: The searcher must type in your key-phrase exactly for your ads to appear. This is the most targeted option.
4.Negative Match: You choose words you don't want your ads to appear for when searched upon. For example, typing in the word "-cheap" would stop your ads from appearing if someone typed that word before your keyword.
I would imagine you are asking ‘how do I get started?’ It is very simple really, once you have set up an account you will need to select your keywords and phrase (Google has a great tool to help you with this). Try and make sure you select specific keywords or phrases - these will normally consist of more than one word. The more generic your keywords the lower your click through rate will be and the lower your conversions. Always remember your goal is to target your advert to the right audience for your product or service.
Once you have your keywords sorted you will need to write your ad which will consist of a title of 25 characters and 2 lines of 35 characters each. This is quite a small ad to get your information in and there are some important things to remember when writing it. Firstly make sure you include a call to action, it may seem unnecessary but they work and will increase your click through rate.
Secondly, include your keywords in your ad title and text if possible. This leads us on to another vital point, the size of your keyword list. It is a good idea to keep your keywords for a particular ad group as small as possible, 2-4 words or phrases that are related. For your campaign you can have as many ad groups as you would like. This means that you could have 10 ad groups each with 3 keywords, so you get 30 keywords covered, but each 3 words have a different advert. This will allow you to target your advert more effectively increasing both your click through rate and your conversion rate.
On the point of conversion rates, you can get some code from Google to add into the code for your site which will show you the conversions you get for each keyword. This will allow you to monitor performance levels and drop those keywords that do not give you the performance you are looking for. In addition to this, in order to improve your conversions it is vital you send your visitors to the correct lading page. If you are selling terracotta tiles and when someone clicks on your advert they go to your home page and have to search for what they are looking for they will probably not hang around to find them. However if they go straight to the page for ordering the tiles you will probably get a much higher conversion rate.
Once you have selected your keywords and written your advert you will need to select how you would like your keywords to be matched and you will have 4 options:
1.Broad Match: This is the Google default setting and means that searchers can enter your keywords in any order and your ad will appear. This is obviously the least targeted.
2.Phrase Match: Your keywords must appear in the exact order for your ads to appear. This is more targeted than Broad Match.
3.Exact Match: The searcher must type in your key-phrase exactly for your ads to appear. This is the most targeted option.
4.Negative Match: You choose words you don't want your ads to appear for when searched upon. For example, typing in the word "-cheap" would stop your ads from appearing if someone typed that word before your keyword.