It is common knowledge in the Digital Marketing world (or to any search users) how much Google changes – and how important it is to keep up with them.

About a month ago, Google announced the plan for their upcoming algorithm changes – different than the Panda updates of the past.  In this initiative, the search engine stated they would begin to punish websites that are “over-optimized” or “over-SEO’d.” They have since back-pedaled on their statements to push the focus of this campaign to webspam, but nonetheless, “over-optimization” is a component to watch for.

The update, dubbed “Penguin,” officially rolled out on April 24. The Penguin update is looking to penalize websites that utilize some of the following:

• Aggressive keyword targeting (over-optimization)
• Overuse of keyword domains (over-optimization)
• Low quality article marketing (spam)
• Keyword stuffing in links (spam)

Google aims to bring searchers the most natural results they can, first and foremost. This update is aimed toward giving the Google user the most positive experience and most relevant results.

So, what can you do to help your website? Keep things natural and relevant! When writing your landing page content or your blogging content, make sure that your content is driven by topics and information that would be useful to your customers and/or prospects. You can keep your content topic-driven without losing any of your keyword optimization.

For example, if you’re writing a blog post on some updates in health insurance legislature in your area, you can easily integrate any specific health insurance keywords you have without throwing them in the reader’s face – it’s all about natural integration and keeping the post topic-driven. If your post is about a legislative update, make sure you stay on topic and give the reader all of the information needed. If your health insurance keyword only naturally fits one time in the post without sacrificing the message, then so be it. It’s important now, more than ever, that Google and the other search engines see that your content is high quality and useful to the reader – not just a 500-word post stuffed with keywords you want to be found for.

You should use the same principles in your link building as well – keep it natural. For example, if you are writing a guest post on a local community blog and you’re trying to bring visitors to your website for a health insurance term, make sure you can integrate it without sacrificing the content quality or spamming the reader. Make sure your post is relevant to the topic of the keyword and don’t squeeze in numerous links. The best practice with using keywords in links it to keep it simple – post one link back to your website using your term and only if it fits into the content without disrupting the reader. If you have a blog on your website and you’re linking to other pages within the site, use the same principles; keep keyword links minimal, simple, and non-disruptive.

There are already reports of websites seeing negative effects as a result of the Penguin update, as well as sites see positive results, such as higher keyword rankings, better traffic, etc. As long as you are utilizing best practices and ensuring your internet marketing strategies are in line with what Google is looking for in a high quality website, you should eventually see the fruits of your labor. Think of how you feel when you visit a website that spams you, whether it’s through low quality content, excessive links, or obvious keyword stuffing. Enacting a high-quality SEO strategy takes time – these are long-term strategies. But, at the end of the day, you’ll thank your internet marketing team, representatives, or even yourself for sticking it out and taking the “righteous” path in your SEO strategy.

How is your website responding to the Penguin update? Tweet me @astonish_shawna with any Penguin stories or suggestions!

In the wake of recent Google algorithm updates and other search trend changes, you may be asking yourself – how can I help my SEO strategy?

There are 3 things that you can easily do to help compliment a quality SEO strategy.

When asking how you can help, consider the following:

It’s important to make sure that your SEO and content efforts are in line with the ever-changing guidelines of the major search engines and the Google updates especially. It is expected that such updates will continue on a monthly or bi-monthly basis. This is a good thing – these updates are done to ensure that spammy sites and content farms don’t beat you in the search rankings.

Have any additional ideas on how to help your SEO strategy? Tweet them to me @Astonish_Shawna.

Conducting your own keyword research can be difficult enough – it’s important that you’re not overlooking small tweaks that can really make a difference in the success of your strategy.

When it comes to keyword research, make sure you’re not doing the following:

• Using broad match data instead of exact match dataSearch volume and competition rates are two very important metrics to consider in your keyword research. While a keyword may look amazing in the broad match data view, that’s really not the case. Broad match keywords tend to have a lot more traffic than exact match, but this won’t help your strategy. The catch with broad match keywords is that you cannot guarantee what combination of the words within each keyword phrase people are searching for – there is no precise science to broad match keyword phrases.The number for exact match keywords tells you how many people are looking for that exact keyword phrase on a monthly basis. Using this data in your strategy will ensure that you know exactly what you’re getting into in terms of what the traffic and competition rates are for your keywords.No tool is 100% accurate in reporting search volume data, but with exact match, you can get the best data available – this will help you decided which keywords are right to target.
• Having Unrealistic Expectations
  This is big point. You cannot be unrealistic in your expectations of your strategy. Keywords with high search volume are definitely terms you want to include in your strategy – but not at the cost of competition. If a keyword has a high search volume and a really high competition rate, then chances are that’s not a good keyword for you. Sometimes, you have to sacrifice a little search volume in order to get keywords that you can actually compete for. Volume is a one of the most important factors in creating a strategy – but it’s not everything.
• Researching Keywords Without Variation
  Search engines, Google especially, are placing a lot more importance these days on humanizing content and keywords. You really have to consider both the user who will be reading your site and pleasing the search engines when you’re building a strategy. In this regard, it’s important to make sure you explore all variations of a keyword. For example, someone who is searching for auto insurance could actually be looking for a number of things, such as an auto insurance quote, auto insurance rates, etc. Same goes for plurality as well – i.e. California insurance agents versus California insurance agent. It’s important to humanize your data and research as much as possible and make sure the context of your keywords is correct.

There’s a lot that goes into keyword research and building a solid SEO strategy, but sometimes remember the “little” details can really help. Are you performing any of your own keyword research? Share your tips and tricks with me on Twitter, @Astonish_Shawna.

Feedback from your customers can be one of the most valuable tools in your internet marketing strategy. By way of the “old school testimonial,” the local SEO review takes it to the next level. At this point, your agency has probably gathered a plethora of testimonials from your customers. You should have even put them on your website. Now ask yourself – how can I make testimonials have an even bigger impact for my agency? The answer is simple; ask your customers for local SEO reviews!

What is a local SEO review? Basically, it is a testimonial that a customer leaves on your local search listings – i.e. Google local, Yahoo maps, etc. It’s important to get authentic reviews on your local listings – this will not only boost consumer confidence in your agency, but it can also push you higher in the local SEO listing results. If your agency’s local listing is not only well optimized, but also has 10 5-star reviews, you’re going to rank higher in the local results than an agency with no reviews.

So how do you get local reviews? Just ask! It really is as simple as that. In the same way that you ask customers for testimonials, you can ask them to leave reviews on your local listings. You can send your customers a link to your local listing, whether it is Google or Yahoo, and ask them to leave their testimonial there.

Here are some examples on how to ask:

• “I’m glad you’re happy with your new auto insurance quote. Would you mind leaving your feedback in a review on our local listing? Here is the link.” Or “You can find it here.”
• “Thank you for your testimonial. Would you mind leaving this as a review on our local listing too? Here is the link.”
• “It was our pleasure getting this claim worked out for you so quickly. Would you mind leaving a review of our service on our local listing? You can find it here.”

Do you have reviews on your local listings yet? Get started as soon as possible – start asking your customers for their feedback today. Have any creative ideas on how to ask your customers to leave authentic reviews to your local listings? Shout them out on Twitter, @Astonish_Shawna.  Just remember – all you have to do is ASK; if you do that, then you’re headed in the right direction!

I know what you’re thinking – “how can an employee of the month contest help my social media efforts?” Too often we overlook the little things in the larger scheme of our internet marketing strategies. Social media is a key tool in personalizing your agency and business efforts. There are many different ways you can achieve such personalization, and your employees are integral to the process.

Agencies often focus so much on their brand in social media that they forget about the actual social aspect. Clients and potential customers can have a hard time putting real faces to your business name. Holding internal contests, like an Employee of the Month program, can help to meet that goal of showing the consumer your agency is full of real people, just like them. Speaking as the recent winner of the Astonish Results Employee of the Month vote, I can tell you first hand that this actually works. The point of social media is to get social with your audience and your clientele. Check out what happened when Astonish announced the Employee of the Month:

Both our employees and our clients were engaged in the posting. We also shared it on Twitter:

After we sent out this Tweet, my professional twitter account (noted in the Tweet) received a plethora of additional followers from our insurance agency partners.

Sharing this type of information is not only fun for your social media manager (or you) to do, but it also meets the goal of personalizing your business to employees and consumers alike. Culture is everything – your employees need to feel it and your customers need to feel it. Not only are you rewarding your employees with such a contest, but you’re also giving your customers a glimpse inside your company and its office culture. You’d be surprised how seemingly little things such as this boost consumer confidence in your brand and your business.

What are you doing within your agency that could work to personalize your social media? Do you hold similar internal contests? Share your feedback with me on Twitter, @Astonish_Shawna.

Backlinks are essential to your SEO strategy – there’s no doubt about that. But with linking can come confusion and questions. Is this site trustworthy for link exchanging? What keywords do I use for my links? How many links is best? We could go on and on.

A recent SEOMoz community posts on backlinks got me to thinking – what are the linking mistakes that people are most likely to make? With that, the best question to ask about your backlink strategy is: are you making these linking mistakes?

Linking Mistake 1: Building Links with Only 1 Keyword Phrase
Using your keywords in your backlink strategy is extremely important; otherwise, how would it fully aid in your SEO strategy? However, you want to be careful not to zone in on only one keyword – give your keywords equal love in your backlinking. One of the keys to a successful linking campaign is to make sure it looks natural. Acquiring 1,000 links to your site all at once using the same keyword looks fishy. You don’t want to do anything in your link building that makes your site look spammy to the search engines. And you don’t just have to stop at your product keywords – you can use your brand name for building effective backlinks as well.

Linking Mistake 2: Only Linking to Your Homepage
You want to attract links to various pages of your website, not just the homepage. Why? Because this will build a good overall linking structure which can lead to a better overall page rank and will strengthen the authority of all the pages. Building links to just your homepage will only build up authority on your homepage – you want all of your pages to come up in the SERPs for an effective SEO strategy. You also want to drive your user to the right relevant link – i.e. if you’re linking with an auto insurance keyword, link to the auto page.

Linking Mistake 3: Trying to Obtain a Ridiculous Number of Links
The number of backlinks you obtain is definitely important to your overall linking strategy, but you don’t want it to overcome you. Too many times people get so caught up in getting the highest number of links possible that the quality of links suffers. Take your time when building links – make sure you always choose quality over quantity.

Linking Mistake 4: Don’t Judge a Page by Its Page Rank
Although page rank is a popular metric for determining a site’s clout, it’s not very clear on how a site’s page rank ultimately affects SERP positions. Page authority is really what you want to be judging sites by when looking for places to distribute or exchange links. Many SEO tools are already incorporating page authority into their link metrics. For example, SEOMoz has created two helpful metrics in measuring a site’s authority – mozRank and mozTrust. The importance of knowing a site’s page authority is growing quickly; you want to make sure you are placing links with a trustworthy, relevant, and authoritative site. If something looks fishy about the site right off the bat, then it’s time to walk away. Also, make sure the content on the site is relevant to your link needs and to its readers, just as you would with your own site content.

These are a handful of mistakes SEO-ers and their clients tend to make when starting or continuing a link building campaign. Even though gaining links to your site is important, it’s also crucial that you take a step back and carefully evaluate the way you’re linking and the sites you want to link with. What are you doing to ensure a successful and quality link building campaign? Any other ideas on what not to do in the basics of building backlinks? Tweet me @Astonish_Shawna!

In my last couple of posts, I’ve discussed some of the numerous ways you can promote your blog and increase traffic.  This week, I want to outline one more very important piece to the blog promotion puzzle: social media.

Social media promotions can be a lot more powerful than you think – and it’s not just Twitter and Facebook. You can also promote your blog through online community sites, blogging sites, etc. Social media can be a great gateway to both your blog site and your website. Let’s look at the different ways you can use social media to your advantage when promoting your blog:

How do you use social media and guest blogging to your advantage? Do you have any success stories? If so, share them with me on Twitter, @Astonish_Shawna. Until then, happy blogging!

In my last post, I discussed one of the ways you can promote your blog and increase traffic – blog appearance. While the appearance is an important piece to the puzzle, it’s not the only solution to the never-ending need for blog promotion and increasing traffic. Search engine optimization (SEO) and email marketing are two very important aspects in creating a comprehensive blog promotion plan.

Having an effective SEO strategy for your blog can be easier than you think. Once you have your SEO focus (i.e. a list of target keywords), you simply need to integrate that focus into your blog without impairing its effectiveness or usefulness to the reader. Here are some ways you can do this:

Another, perhaps underutilized, way to promote your blog is through email marketing. While you don’t want to spam strangers with links to your blog, you can promote your blog to your current list of clients and prospects. Building an email campaign around your blog is an easy way to get more readers, engagement, and visitors. The folks at Encharter Insurance are using this practice to full advantage. They have implemented a monthly social media newsletter that blasts out through email. This newsletter not only promotes their seven insurance blogs, but it also promotes their Facebook, Twitter, and other social media accounts. The newsletter they have created basically serves as an email marketing campaign for their blogs and social media accounts.

As I said in my last post, it is important to engage visitors on your blog, but it is also important to bring them to the blog in a way that is relevant to what they need. Someone might be searching for auto insurance in your area and find your blog – the information you provide them could make or break a new policy. It’s important to make sure you’re posting relevant and useful content.

What are you doing to promote your blog through SEO and email marketing? Tweet me @Astonish_Shawna and shout out your practices and ideas!

Your business’ offsite blog can be one of the most advantageous sources of traffic to your website – but how do you effectively promote it and increase traffic? Our friends at Search Engine Journal recently outlined some useful ways of boosting your blog performance.

The first avenue, although seemingly obvious, is your blog appearance. The look and feel of your blog really can make or break its performance. If your blog theme contains harsh colors and the layout is confusing, visitors will bounce right off of it – this not only raises your blog’s bounce rate, but your time-on-site and traffic rates also suffer. There are three important things to consider with your blog appearance:

A great blog that encompasses all of these qualities is the St. Louis Insurance Blog from ABS Insurance Group. ABS has incorporated the color theme from their website (red, white, grey) but also added a cool color (blue) to soothe the reader. They also added a local touch with a picture of St. Louis in their blog header. The blog navigation is clearly outlined, showing the different pages under the header, social media links boxed to the right, as well as categories and blog rolls to the right in designated sections. This blog shows the user that it’s local, easy to navigate, and no trouble to read.

Remember, as with your website or Virtual Insurance Office, it is important to engage visitors on your blog, showing them you have the information they need to keep visiting. Do you have more ideas for effective blog themes, layouts, and general appearance? Tweet me @Astonish_Shawna and let me know!

I get a lot of questions from insurance agents regarding keywords for their local towns and cities. While it’s good to have local keywords represented on your website, they’re usually not the best keywords to track for performance.

Local insurance keywords, such as “Bonita Springs insurance” or “Beaumont Insurance” can be great for your site on a local search level. The problem is, the people searching for those keywords can be so few that optimizing your site only for these local terms will drive little to no traffic. Our goal is to take your business to the next level and bring in more business, even if it’s from farther away than your immediate area. If you want your site to gain traffic through the search engine results pages, the broader more state-wide terms are the ones you want to target. You may be asking yourself, well what’s the difference? Local town and city insurance keywords don’t typically get a lot of search traffic each month. These keywords are better suited for Google Local and/or Google Places. It can be easy to rank for local keywords because there’s not a lot of competition for them. However, there are fewer opportunities for conversions when you’re getting less traffic.

So why not track the performance of local insurance keywords? The answer is simple; traffic leads to conversions, rank leads to notoriety. We want to track the keywords that you can not only rank for, but that will also send you converting traffic. The Astonish SEO team gets this question all the time; we understand that this can get quite confusing. While gaining notoriety through ranking for local terms can be great for brand and community building, it doesn’t always equate to search traffic and conversions to your website or Virtual Insurance Office. It’s better to track your performance for the keywords with higher traffic/conversions rates so that we can see where your VIO is performing best and what types of keywords need a boost to get more conversions and hits.

Here’s an example from our friends at Encharter Insurance:

Encharter ranks #3 in the local results and #1 in the search engine results page for the term “Lexington MA insurance.” However, they did not get any visits for that term in the last month. The term gets less than 10 search visits a month; this makes it hard to get actual converting traffic for the term. Because of this, the performance of this keyword is not being tracked in Encharter’s SEO reporting. Instead, the Astonish SEO team found broader keywords to help generate more traffic from a larger radius. If you want to grow your business, you’ll want to focus on a larger geographic region as well.

Just remember, the SEO team makes all decisions in your best interest – we want you to get the traffic you need for conversions and leads. Do you still have questions on local versus state-wide insurance keywords? Talk to me on Twitter @Astonish_Shawna. I’ll be happy to entertain any and all of your keyword questions!