SEO Best PracticesThe Low Hanging Fruit for Immediate ResultsKyle Jamesjameskm03@gmail.comtwitter.com/kylejameslinkedin.com/in/jameskm03kyle-james.comdoteduguru.comhubspot.comnuCloud.com

No Need To Take Notesdoteduguru.comdoteduguru.com/seo

Why Am I Talking to You??

What I Do?

If a tree falls in a forest and noone is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

If people can’t find it,does it matter?

Outbound Marketing

Outbound Marketing is Broken800-555-1234AnnoyingSalesperson

Inbound Marketing

Inbound Marketing ProcessTools Content Mgmt Blogging Social Media SEO Offers / CTAs Landing Pages Emails Lead Intel AnalyticsProcess Publish Optimize Promote Target Capture Nurture Test Analyze Repeat

Content Mgmt

Blogging

Social Media

SEO

Offers / CTAs

Landing Pages

Emails

Lead Intel

Analytics

Publish

Optimize

Promote

Target

Capture

Nurture

Test

Analyze

Repeat

What SEO is NOT

SEO is Usability and Accessibility

Search Engine Crawlers are your blindest usersYahooMicrosoftGoogle

By the Numbers (on one site)30% of traffic is delivered by Search Engines82% of that traffic is delivered by GoogleOn a large college website w/ 1,000,000 visits per month that is 300,000 visitors

Search Engine Optimization3,000 searches per second Publish more content Optimize your content Promote your content

Publish more content

Optimize your content

Promote your content

Are you optimized to get that traffic?

It All Starts With Keywords“It’s NOT about what you want or what you call it, it is about what people are actually looking for.”“Nobody cares about your products (except you)” – David Meerman Scott

Keyword Research

Adwords Keyword Toolhttps://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Google Insighthttp://www.google.com/insights/search/

Thesaurushttp://thesaurus.reference.com/

Powerful Keyword Tools

Long Tail KeywordsInternet Marketing Software SolutionInternet Marketing Software ToolsInternet Marketing SoftwareInternet Marketing ToolsInternet Marketing

Two Parts of SEOOn-PageOff-Page

On-Page OptimizationPageTitleURLMetaDescriptionHeadersMetaKeywords

Page TitleDescribe The PageInclude Keywords70 Character LimitPageTitle

URLDescribe The PageInclude KeywordsA Dynamic URL is hard to understandWhat are the following two pages about?http://tomahawktake.com/2009/04/11/game-no-5-recap-braves-5-nationals-3/http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090411&content_id=4225972&vkey=recap&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlbURL

HeadersSemantic MarkupInclude KeywordsDescribe sections of the PageHeaders

Example: UsingHeaders in Word

Meta Description & KeywordsMetaKeywordsUnique for Each PageOnly Viewable in SourceMeta Description limit 150 charactersMeta Keyword limit 10 keywords maxMetaDescription

Off-Page OptimizationWe’ve all heard Content is King, so Links must be the Queen?

Off-Page OptimizationInbound LinksSite AuthorityAnchor Text

Inbound LinksContent Creation Strategy“If You Build It, They Will Come”

Publish Content Worth Sharing

Videos & Slideshowshttp://www.wofford.edu/sightsandsounds/

Audiohttp://itunes.stanford.edu/

Student Blogshttp://www3.imperial.ac.uk/campus_life/studentblogs

Interactive Campus Tourshttp://uscupstate.edu/map/

Social Newshttp://engineering.tamu.edu/news/

RSS & Calendarhttp://www.allegheny.edu/news/feeds.php http://www.utk.edu/events/events/

Site Authority

Anchor Text Count!

What are those buildings called?

What are people looking for?

What are people looking for?

Getting Ranked

Search Call To ActionsPage TitleMeta DescriptionPage Title and Meta Description are all you get in search results. Make sure that they count.

Content is More Important than Design!

Importance of RelevanceBeing able to easily update content is more important than flashy complicated graphics

Navigation Helps SEOUsabilityCross Linking ContentSitemapFooter

Web Analytics Helps SEO

Internal Site SearchSEO also helps with your Internal Site Searchand good for Keyword Research

Visits By KeywordsKnow what keywords you are already getting search traffic from

Web Analytics Helps SEOQuickly make sure your page titles are optimized

Web Analytics Helps SEOScan referral sources to see where you are getting links from

404 Pages404 Reporting tells you where you are failing to better optimize your site

301 Redirects(Almost) Always use 301 Redirects because they pass search authorityhttp://delicious.com/jameskm03/301redirects

URL CanonicalizationAvoid “Double Vision”Every page on your site becomes duplicate

Splash Screens

Flash WebsitesFlash should add not dominateSearch Engines aren’t very good at reading flash

SEO Tools

The Lynx Browserhttp://bit.ly/lynx

SEOmoz Toolshttp://www.seomoz.org/tools

SEO Book ToolbarThe Only Firefox Toolbar you will need for SEOCompetitive ResearchKeyword ResearchLink InformationRank CheckerPage X-RayMore…http://tools.seobook.com/seo-toolbar/

Free Website Grader Reporthttp://website.grader.com/

CreateOptimizeLink

Final Thoughts

SEO is NOT a sprint… it’s a Marathon

Help People FindYour Buried Treasure

Additional Readingwww.seomoz.org/blogsphinn.comsearchengineguide.comsearchengineland.com

SEO Best Practices: The Low Hanging Fruit for Immediate ResultsQuestions?Kyle Jamesjameskm03@gmail.comtwitter.com/kylejameslinkedin.com/in/jameskm03kyle-james.comdoteduguru.comhubspot.comnuCloud.com