What is the purpose of repurposing content ?

WHAT IS THE VALUE OF RE-PURPOSING YOUR EXISTING ONLINE CONTENT.

The topic of re-purposing content is coming up a lot these days,  and this recent post by  +Neal Schaffer  is just one example.

Most folks do not realize the SEO benefits of re-purposing your online content, and the value that this adds to your #SEMANTICFOOTPRINT

The term re-purposing is also just another way of saying that you are doing content marketing.....   just saying that words are confusing to folks who are not willing to understand the context of conversations.

Your original content is already within the online environment, and re-purposing your content allows you to do all the basic SEO tricks such as but not limited to

• CONTENT MARKETING
• CROSS MEDIA MARKETING
• SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING
• LINK BUILDING
• SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING
• SEMANTIC MARKETING

Most online marketing folks use a host of tricks and big words to confuse management and business owners into believing their version of online marketing is different and has more value than others.  These are quite often the same  folks that use the phrase "SEO IS DEAD"  and similar attention grabbing or click bait tactics to enforce their new version of online marketing where Search Engine Optimization is vilified and   made to appear as irrelevant or irrational.

SEO or Search Engine Optimization has evolved from a links and keywords only issue, way back in the late 1990's,  into a vast complex set of issues that are all interconnected and impact on each other through strange and mysterious relationships within the semantic environments of the inter-webs.

Re-purposing your content and linking the new work to the original content in a manner that it expands the conversation,  in different platforms,  is not a difficult task, and the powerful influence of this within the semantic marketing space, where the depth of your semantic footprint is the issue at stake, must never be underestimated.

Search Engines are now using these issues in complex algorithms, to determine the intent of your online content,  so that they may match this intent with the intent of search queries.  This  matching of intent  is a very complex issue, but one that has become essential due to the vast amount of data and information available within the interwebs.  It thus follows that re-purposing your online content and linking the different aspects of the conversation around the actual intent of the original piece of content is very benificial to your SERPs or Search Engine Results pages.

This re-purposing will also give you more than one avenue of getting discovered in the search engine, as each piece of content will have an opportunity to feature within the SERP's, and if your marketing is done well,  you will dominate the Search Engine Rankings for your desired set of keywords and semantically related topics, with many different platforms featuring within the SERP's. 

Folks will be able to find your content within the different platforms, using the internal search engine features of each separate platform,   and if you have ensured that your social media marketing is within the public environment, then you will also have multiple listings in search engines,  making your brand, company or business seem much more important.  Multiple listings in the SERP's will elevate your marketing to unimaginable heights.  

Re-purposing your content has been around for quite some time, never being  spoken of as re-purposing but as content marketing, social media marketing and other confusing terms, specifically to make the folks who use these tactics, seem more important than they are.   SEO or Search engine Optimization, is in reality just a very complex integration of all your online marketing efforts into a single well managed online marketing effort.

I have been using the term #FUFISM or Functional User Friendly Integrated Social Media   for some time now, and am thus greatful to all them online marketing folks who are now begining to move away from the idea of marketing silos where each marketing platform is seen as a stand alone platform to the apparently new concept of #INTEGRATEDMARKETING

Do you use the social media as a link building tool within your SEO strategies?

Link building as an SEO tool

Well I advise everybody to document everything they do, but *UNFORTUNATELY* I do not practice what I preach...

I do need to start doing this myself, as when the smelly stuff collides with the wind making machine, and your rankings go south at a great rate of knots, and you have not been keeping good records of what is done, what is not done, and who is responsible for the different pieces of your SEO then you have *REALLY BIG PROBLEMS*

Keeping checklists for tasks, and who is responsible to ensure that the task is integrated into your total marketing plan can be a real pain in the wrong spot, but it sure helps when problems decide to show their true colours and your online rankings take a tumble.

Most marketing managers, and especially those within the *SOCIAL MEDIA ARENA* do not fully comprehend the needs to integrate all your marketing both online and off line into a single marketing plan, where SEO and related\matters take the steering wheel and control many of the marketing issues in a well managed and efficient manner, that pushes your online content closer to the top of the SERP's  (Search engine Results ages) in many strange and devious ways.

Social media is the biggest and (currently) most powerful link building platform that we have ever experienced.  How you use the social media to create powerful link building opportunities for your online work is not well understood, and then there are them folks that tell you *LINK BUILDING IS DEAD* who confuse many, and cause a vast array of different problems within the SEO Industry.

Links are still one of the most  vital parts of your SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) efforts and their value must not be underestimated.

That being said, one must also not underestimate the damage that can be caused by link farms and other bad link building tactics.  How you conduct your link-building practices does need to be  clearly defined  and documented as part of your SEO policy.  Then you also need to keep records of all social media posts that are part and parcel of your  link building activities.

Your company link building policy document, which is a sub-document in your SEO policy  must be shared across all marketing platforms, both online and off line, as every marketing effort has some impact on your SEO.  This could be in the way that you influence your target market audience to use specific key words in their search queries or how you influence your copy writer to frame certain issues, or any number of other seemingly UN-important issues.

Social media managers need to be on top of the issues that impact on your SEO, and use these intelligently when passing  instructions to  others  like, but not limited to the list below. :

• what to promote, 
• how to promote specific issues,
• where and when to promote your other online efforts.
• what links to use within specific social media posts
• how to frame social media posts that link to other social media profiles
• how to ensure that the author of specific articles gets credits for their online works

 If you are not using the social media as a link building tool for your bog and your web site, then you are loosing out an a great opportunity.  From a #FUFISM based\perspective the social media is the powerhouse of you link building strategy, and this needs great care and lots of *SPECIAL ATTENTION* to details as supplied by your SEO team.

Those who tell you that link building is dead, need to be viewed as suspect, and their intentions need to be evaluated carefully.  You need to have an honest discussion with them about the value of social media in general, and what impacts the social media has on your SERP's. (Search Engine Results Pages)  If they tell you that the use of SOCIAL MEDIA improves your SERP's, then you need to ask them to explain exactly how this is done, and if this can be achieved without linking to your online content from your social media posts at all.

listen carefully to their explanations, and ask questions!!!!

Evaluate and then decide which way, because many have been ill advised that link building is dead, and these people may be acting on that advice, which is very dangerous.

Remember that there is plenty of bad advice online, so take your time and evaluate all advice carefully,  before accepting or rejecting any advice.

See these links to expand the conversation on the value of link building...

http://4ubrand.blogspot.com/2014/04/social-media-issues-and-serps.html (Social media and SERP's)
http://4ubrand.blogspot.com/2012/09/is-seo-dead.html  (Is SEO DEAD?)
http://4ubrand.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_4.html    (Issues with Link building)
http://4ubrand.blogspot.com/2014/07/what-is-value-of-link-in-2014.html  (what is the value of a link)
http://4ubrand.blogspot.com/2014/08/what-link-building-tactics-do-you-use.html (what link building tactics do you use)
http://4ubrand.blogspot.com/p/blog-page.html  (what is SEO)

Just in case you need to know more specifics about any component of your SEO policy,  remember that you can use our internal search tool to search for specific subjects within the SEO field.   Look in the top right of the screen when using a laptop or PC...  If you do not find what you are looking for when using our search tool, then leave a comment and our team will try and help you out as best we can.  If we can not help you directly we will refer you to and expert who can.

key words versus query: what is the difference?

Key words versus query : what is the difference?

This topic comes up quite a bit within the search industry, and is actually rather irritating in my mind.  The reason,  at least in my minds eye,  is that those who are asking this question have no clue as to the meaning of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and even less understanding of the terms #IPSEO  #OPSEO   (edited and added new term) #OLSEO

First I do believe we need to clarify what exactly is SEO or Search Engine Optimisation, as there are so many different definitions for Search Engine Optimisation, with many being worded specifically so that a certain biased view is highlighted.  this leaves many people confused, as they do not get exposed to other ideas, and are stuck with a biased view of what Search Engine Optimization truly is, and what it can achieve.

From my perspective,  I like to think of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) as all the work done by your entire marketing team, as well as all their partners to ensure that your online work is discovered by your intended target market audience,  when they search online for anything related to your products, services or other  online content.

SEO or search engine optimisation has three separate objectives that need to be achieved to be declared successful, and the last objective has two components.  these objectives are

1) your online content must be indexed by a search engine

2) your online content must appear in the SERP's (Search Engine Results Pages)

3) Your selected target market audience must select your result in the SERP (Search Engine Result Page) then follow through by clicking on your desired CTA (Call To  Action) within your online content.

Failure in any one of these three objectives means that your SEO (search Engine Optimisation) has failed.

SEO is divided into  two main parts, the first is #IPSEO or In Page search Engine Optimisation and the second is #OPSEO or Off Page search engine optimisation, which has a NEW subdivision called #OLSEO

IPSEO is the primary part of your SEO strategy, and is dependent on your target market and the associated target market research, along with topic and key word research.  There are also a host of IPSEO issues that are not connected to keywords in any way, which are also of extreme importance.  These are things like the visual appeal, the navigation structure, in page images, in page audio, in page video, content structure, meta tags and HTML mark up as well as  many others.

OPSEO is all the stuff that happens of page and includes things like but not limited to

relationship building
link building
social media marketing

OLSEO is where you do all the off line stuff like

radio marketing
print media marketing   (news papers, flyers and bill boards)
road shows and Public relations issues

These off line media are the spaces  where you psychologically attack your intended target market in subtle ways to get your keywords stuck within their thinking patterns so that they will use these key words when they formulate their online search queries.  You basically plant semantic seeds in this zone, that will be nurtured and fertilized within the online environment to grow from semantic seeds to become search queries.

Key words are those words that your copy writer and associated staff will use during content creation.

Queries are what an end user of a search engine type into the query box when looking for your online content.

It thus follows that you use keywords and selected topics within the make up and design of your online content, and your intended target market constructs queries (hopefully using your selected keywords|) which they then type into the query box when searching online.

If you have done  your OPSEO or Off Page Search Engine Optimisation a properly, then your intended target market audience will use your selected key words when they construct their query.  


This is an awful lot more difficult than I have alluded to here, and the OPSEO work covers many more areas than I discussed here, but each is in place to ensure that your intended Target use your selected key words when searching, and that search engines understand the intent of your online efforts. 

If you have done your #IPSEO or In Page Search Engine Optimisation properly then the search engine will match a search query to your online content  by understanding the intent of both your online content and your intended  target market audience when they are looking for your content.

Key words are used by the design staff during the page creation process, and queries are used by your intended target market audience to surface your online content.

Queries are constructed using what ever words are in your target markets current thought processes, so your OPSEO or Off page Search Engine Optimisation and the related OLSEO or Off Line Search Engine Optimisation, must in some way influence the thinking patterns and thought processes of your intended target market audience to be successful. 

Your IPSEO  must  cater to the search engines algorithms,  and influence the semantic footprint of your online content to reflect the intent of your online content in the most appropriate way to search engines 

Your OPSEO must cater for both search engines and your intended target market. Your OPSEO must influence the thinking patterns of your intended target market to ensure that they will use your key words in search queries.  Your OPSEO must also allow search engines to interpret and act on the intent of your online content as well as the meaning and related semantics of your online content.

Your OLSEO must impact on the thinking processes and thought patterns of your intended target audience and influence this group to use your selected key words as search queries.

What impact does SEO have on your conversion issues

During the writing of my book on #FUFISM  the question of the impact of SEO on conversion and marketing funnels and how your two separate SEO teams need to collaborate and co-ordinate their efforts in a manner that best impacts on your SERP's (Search Engine Results Pages)  came up in a few different areas, so needs to be addressed.

I would like to share this preliminary quote from the book with you and solicit some conversation around these issues so that I may have a deeper understanding of how technical I need to make this small section, which will be about three, perhaps four pages in the book.

FUFISM is a marketing philosophy where the social media is the primary driver of your link building campaign and plays a major role in your SEO policy and all marketing strategies, both online and off line.   to read more about FUFISM read here

Start Quote

One of the biggest issues within the SEO INDUSTRY is for the copy writer and associated visual content creators to understand which portion of the sales funnel or conversion funnel that they are working on, when they work on the content of any specific page.

Each visual content creator as well as the copy write, r and every member of your IPSEO (In Page Search Engine Optimisation) TEAM,  as well as all others who work on your In Page Search Engine Optimisation issues,  need to receive their own individual marketing brief.

You also need to ensure that these individual efforts and related issues,  are  properly documented,  showing purpose, aims and objectives, so that those who will be doing your OPSEO or Off Page Search Engine Optimisation can properly understand the specific target market and primary CTA or call to action which the public relations team and associated marketing management  have laid out, and documented in their marketing action plan., which they expect the OPSEO (Off Page Search Engine Optimisation), implementation team to follow through with.

If these contributors to either your IPSEO (In Page Search Engine Optimisation) or OPSEO  (Off Page Search Engine Optimisation) for your online content get things wrong you can end up in real trouble real soon as far as your SERP’s (Search Engine Results Pages) are concerned. The issue is that these have very significant impacts on your bounce rate when a page is opened from the SERP’s or Search Engine Results Page, then closed or not viewed. 

Viewers (your target audience) will quickly close the page in question or go back to the SERP’s, if what they see is not what they are looking for. This action by your intended target audience will result in the search engine giving the page in question a poor bounce rate and associated trust factor signals.  This will soon start to have an impact  on the SERP’s for this particular page, and it will slowly drop out of the SERP’s as soon as the so called QPFS or Query page freshenes score,  starts to wane with age. Remember that a fresh page always has a big boost in the SERP’s due to this QPFS which is a significant SEOVI (Search Engine Optimisation Value Indicator) that looses value over time on a logarithmic scale.  Many SEO practitioners do not take this into account and very few ever tell this to their client base.

This slow drop in the SERP’s is not serious at first, but as the associated trust factors start to filter through into your page’s semantic foot print over a week or so, this suddenly starts to impact on a wide variety of other issues, such as page rank, site rank as well as many different author and publisher  related SEOVI (Search Engine Optimisation Value Indicators) that are connected to trust factor issues, which makes this a very serious site wide issue.

If your web site has other such pages where the bounce rate is unduly high, these issues become ever more important to understand and fix. We will not discuss actual conversion processes or sales funnel techniques here, but this section is just to advise you that these things need to be taken into consideration, and as your specific target market for your SEO varies according the the product, service,  information, or specific online content that you want your intended target market to be exposed to, and what the primary call to action statement within that comment is, needs to be evaluated very closely when doing SEO for any specific online content..

It thus follows that knowing about specific issues associated with conversion rates and sales funnels need to be understood by your marketing team, and also documented in the over all marketing action plan.  This is essential so that one has the tools and the necessary documentation to fix any errors that may creep in and have a negative impact on your total SEO STRATEGY.

Your Social Media marketing team who are the primary OPSEO (Off Page Search Engine Optimisation) drivers need to use the documentation associated with target research and associated point within your marketing / sales funnel to do their job right, as this will give them a deeper understanding of the copy and associated links that they will insert into their social media posts. Here the sequence of events leading up to that specific point in the conversion process must be clearly understood, so as to ensure the highest possible conversion rate for that page in terms of clicks on page so as to have excellent bounce rates.

It must also be noted that pages with higher conversion rates tend to climb higher in the SERP's as the trust factor signals associated with the page in question grow to a favorable bounce rate.

End quote

Leaving your comment here or in a social media post using the hash-tag #FUFISM will be truly appreciated. I use the the mention social media marketing tool to keep track of these issues, and should respond within 24 to 48 hours

A work in progress needs a mind map

Create your own mind maps at MindMeister

FUFISM EXPLAINED

#FUFISM   or Functional User Friendly Integrated Social Media is a marketing philosophy where the social media is used as the primary communication tool  to bind all your marketing both online and offline into one single well managed and properly  integrated marketing effort.

This is no easy task  and requires many different people working in very diverse fields  to co-operate and work together as a team, sharing  a vast amount of data, in a variety of formats, so that those in each separate discipline can understand, interpret,  then make good use of the data supplied by the other disciplines in a manner that improves the many different  #SEOVI  (Search Engine Optimisation Value Indicators) associated with their personal efforts, and allow for these SEOVI to be carried forward to other areas where a search engine may use these variables,  to determine the value of other connected and interrelated SEOVI.

It should be noted here, and remembered further that Google professes to use in excess of 250 different SEOVI when determining their SERP’s (Search Engine Results Pages) and that each of these many different SEOVI adds some value to your online work in the eyes of a search engine, and every tiny piece of value counts when you are dealing with highly  competitive search terms

Management issues associated with a FUFISM based marketing Strategy

A FUFISM based marketing strategy is no easy task and it requires a great deal of management of many diverse factors as well as a large team of professionals from a  variety of very different backgrounds. These professionals will all need to be re-educated as to the value of SEO and where SEO fits into the current online marketing world.

Many things changed when the Google Hummingbird algorithm was introduced in September / October 2013 and most marketing professionals have not yet been informed of the impact of these changes on the online search industry with most having no clue or very little knowledge of SEMANTIC SEARCH

This lack of knowledge about SEMANTIC search and the Google Hummingbird algorithm is a very big issue and I have personally found a great deal of resistance to the cooperative working environment where large volumes of  information that was previously held in separate *SILOS* by different company departments, now needs to be shared across all company departments in an open and transparent manner.

In the past most departments did their own research and the web site design team was often left out in the cold, doing their own  research into a number of different fields that was duplicated by

• the blogging team
• social media team
• print media team
• radio marketing team
• public relations management team
• product development team

When implementing a FUFISM based marketing Strategy,  the SEO team needs to be involved in all marketing strategies as the most important part of any SEO strategy is the large volume of #OPSEO or Off Page Search Engine Optimisation that takes place through many different channels where the social media is the one that has the highest levels of influence on your SERP's through the link building and associated semantic foot prints as well as the semantic linkages with their associated trust factors

IPSEO - Topic targeteting for SEO

SEO or Search Engine Optimisation is divided into two major sections the first is #IPSEO or In Page Search Engine Optimisation and the second is #OPSEO or Off Page Search Engine Optimisation.  These two sections are both important, with Off Page Search Engine Optimisation caring more weight than In page Search Engine Optimisation, how ever the In page stuff needs to be done first, and needs to be done correctly and with intent on ensuring that the correct set of key words and related information flow patterns around these selected key words is actually in-place, to suit the purpose, aims and objectives of the page in question.

Key word targeting is not an easy task, as there are so many surrounding issues that need to be considered, and the subject matter needs to be clearly understood along with where in the sales / marketing funnel the page in question is considered to be.  Here questions  around the following issues, amongst many others,   need to be addressed.  You will know what these other issues are once you take the time to document and understand the purpose, aims and objectives of the page in question.

• What is the purpose, aims and objectives of the page in question
• is this a general information page
• is this page near the top of the marketing / sales funnel
• is this page near the bottom end of the sales / marketing funnel
• how many in page CTA's (Call to action) are important for the sales / marketing funnel's next stage
• is this page connected to a Google community (or other social media community) information drive
• what is the theme of the page in question, and where does it sit in the total marketing strategy
• issues that come up during key word research and target market matching
• copy writing  issues connected to target market and keyword matching 
• Who are your target audience, and why is this group considered to be your target audience.
• is this page part of your network building strategy
• is this page part of your link building strategy, and if so how does this fit in with other in-page issues

 Key word targeting is subservient to the issues around topic targeting, which is determined by the purpose, aims and objectives of the page in question along with the marketing / sales funnel stage and related relationship building activities.  When a page has a clearly defined topic then key word selection is an awful lot easier, and copy writing will also be simpler.

Defining a topic for your page is not as easy as one would think, and there are many different issues that come to play, with copy-writing, and the core subject matter as well as the intentions of the page being a very big parts of the long term planning of every page in your site or blog.  Copy writing for a specific topic is an awful lot easier than writing for a whole bunch of different topics that have a similar focus area.

Understanding the intentions of the page in question will help in defining the topic for the page, and that will then define the criteria to be used for your key word selection process.  Topic targeting is not very well understood, as most people within the SEO industry only talk of keyword targeting, but do not inform people of the methods involved in determining the criteria that one has put in place, or *should have put in place* to manage your keyword selection process.  Selecting an appropriate topic that defines the intentions of the page in question is very helpful, and this should be considered when defining the tile of the page within the title tag in the head section.  The title tag in your head section should have a very clear and obvious connection to the topic of the page, as well as the description and key words listed in the meta tags of your page.

Many will tell you that the key words as well as titles and descriptions of your page are not needed in the meta tags of your page. Ignore these people, and use these very powerful #SEOVI (Search Engine Optimisation Value Indicators) which Google Humming bird uses within their semantic foot print and trust factor evaluations of your web site.  The META TAGS in the head section carry an awful lot more weight than most SEO practitioners will tell you, but many now ignore these powerful SEOVI because they have heard rumors that these tags are dead.

These very powerful meta tags that reside in the *HEAD SECTION* of your HTML 5 CODE should not be sneezed at, and you should be very weary and not easily trust those who tell you that these high level SEOVI are worthless.  They are used in many new places since the Google Humming Bird Algorithm has been introduced.  These SEOVI (Search Engine Optimisation Value Indicators) that are hidden within the *HEAD SECTION* of your web site or blog are an awful lot more powerful than you think, and they are directly connected to the in-page trust issues, so use them wisely and do not spam or misuse these great opportunities to get deeper penetration within the SERP's (Search Engine Optimisation Results pages)

Using the page title, page description or key words lists within the head section of your web site or blog to spam the search engines, or attempting to mislead the search engines through inappropriate use of these HTML 5 META TAGS will backfire and cause your page, as well as your domain some considerable harm.

Ensuring that the META TAGS within the HEAD SECTION of your web site reflect the*TOPIC OF YOUR PAGE* is essential for good SERP's and should be done as part of your basic SEO practices that you implement for your site.

Once again taking a #FUFISM based marketing view of things is very helpful, as this will give you the tools and thinking patterns needed to be able to select relevant topics, as well as page titles, page descriptions and related key words to be used in your copy writing. These issues associated with topic selection for your pages are not easy and require quite a bit of input from others in your team.  The topic of your page does need to be brainstormed by your marketing team, after everybody has read the marketing brief which should contain the intentions, purpose aims and objectives of the page in question.


This post has been written around a post by +Cyrus Shepard  of +Moz  Visiting this page will help you expand the ideas generated in this post.


http://moz.com/blog/on-page-topic-seo?utm_source=google_plus&utm_medium=social&utm_content=on_page_topic_targeting&utm_campaign=blog_post

Content Marketing Essentials

Content marketing is a complicated business that is mistakenly separated from the SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) component of your online marketing strategy, which is a big mistake.  

Content marketing is a division of your SEO

 

Once you realise that Content Marketing is one of the primary components of your SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and take this very seriously, then you are onto the right track and will begin to understand the essential components of content marketing.  The biggest issue is to define your intended target market audience, and determine how best to write for this group in a manner that best suits your intended purpose of the content that you wish to put in front of their eyes.

Those who tell you that content marketing is not a sub division of your SEO need to be treated with caution.

Many SEO experts will try to convince you that content marketing does not fall under the management umbrella of your Search Engine Optimisation manager, but these people are very mistaken, and in my personal opinion need to be shown the way to your back door, then asked to leave very quietly, and told to never set foot in your office again.  Take a minute or two and think about content marketing and the purpose that you as an individual  would want to do any content marketing.  Next do the same for SEO and write down (document these issues clearly)  the similarities and differences.  compare this then evaluate your decision to separate SEO and Content marketing or keep them connected.

Usually the purpose of content marketing is to ensure that your content gets better traction with your target audience, but every business will have a slightly different perspective of the purpose of content marketing.  With out a clear well defined purpose for your content marketing you have no way of understanding the potential impacts of content marketing, or even  the intended aims and objectives of your content marketing.

Content marketing is not an add on issue, but is something that needs to be considered early in the content design stages. 

 

When defining the purpose of your content marketing you should be using the following documents as guide lines and references.

1. the purpose of your online marketing
2. the aims and objectives of your  online marketing plan
3. the aims and objectives of you web site if you have one
4. the aims and objectives of your blog if you have one
5. the aims and objectives of your social media policy if you have one
6. the purpose, aims and objectives  of the specific content that you will be marketing

These documents along with the documentation supplied discussing the intended target market groups, as well as related marketing campaigns that have already been run and those that are either currently being run or planned for the near future will dictate the way forward within any specific content marketing campaign.

Your SEO (Search Engine Optimisation)  has the same identical target audience but is mostly focused on ensuring that

1) your content is located within the SERP's (Search Engine Results Pages)
2) your target audience will select your link in the SERP's
3) those who clicked on your result in the SERP's actually clicks on a CTA (Call To Action) within the page that they chose to open.  (note that links in your navigation structure are also considered as CTA's)

If your content marketing was poorly done, then step (2) and (3) in the above list of essential steps may perhaps  not  be completed, as your viewers may be expecting different information or not be pleased at what they are exposed to within the page, because they have been mislead by your content marketing.  It thus follows that content marketing is a very essential and critical part of the SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) process, and that your content marketing needs to be aligned with, and integrated into your SEO process.

Failure here will lead to many interconnected and related issues that impact on your over all success within your online marketing efforts. Things like BOUNCE RATES, conversion rates,  market share retention,  customer satisfaction as well as many others are at stake.  This means that CONTENT MARKETING is a very big issue and that you need to pay careful attention to detail during this process.

The essential elements that need to be considered when doing content marketing are

1. target market research and understanding the various target market groups needs, desires and aspirations as well as cultural and language  issues
2. product / service research
3.  platform research
4. key word and general information management
5. content management issues specific to platform
6. co-operation with other marketing divisions including but not limited to:

• SEO team
• copy writing team
• image development team
• blogging team
• web site design team
• print media team
• digital media team
• social media teams for each platform
• public relations team

Content marketing can not be done in isolation as many content marketing folks are currently trying to do, purely because they do not understand that content marketing is subservient to SEO (Search Engine Optimisation).  Once one takes the #FUFISM (Functional User Friendly Integrated Social Media) approach to online marketing then the many different #SEOVI  ( Search Engine Optimisation Value Indicators) that need to be considered will be included within the content marketing stages of preparing your online content.

FUFISM or Functional User Friendly Integrated Social Media is a new marketing philosophy where the social media forms the core communication element that binds all your marketing both online and off line into one single well balance marketing effort.

This article was written after reading articles by    +Ryan Hanley     
see   1) http://www.ryanhanley.com/7-ways-to-fail-at-content-marketing/  
2) http://www.ryanhanley.com/does-content-marketing-work/

These articles did not stress that content marketing is subservient to your SEO but I am sure that Ryan understands this, as he is very involved within the SEO industry.  Ryan is one of the few guys that is upfront and blunt when he describes what it is that you need to know, and why he believes that this is important.

Please leave a comment below...

Understanding the term FUFISM and its implications for search.

My conversation on Google plus  (with John Kelden) has prompted this post discussing the issues of understanding FUFISM (Functional User Friendly Integrated Social Media)

What is Google's view on guest blogging for links?

This is a lot bigger than you think



In recent months the issues around guest blogging have changed considerably, and the advent of the #hummingbirdupdate have made these issues more important to get right.

So lets just explain the Humming bird issue a bit, then you will have a better insight into what I am trying to say.  Open this infographic in a seperate window / browser and go over it briefly.

Note in the sections labeled SOLUTIONS and PRESUMPTIONS the issue of quality and keywords are mentioned and this is of extreme importance, as you want your guest blogger to supply high quality, unique content that is written specifically for your site if you are the site owner.

On the other hand this implies by default that if you are going to be guest blogging for somebody else, your content should be written with the host sites audience in mind, and that you should not be regurgitating stuff that you have plastered all over the web in as many places as you can get your words to be displayed.

These issues are also very relevant to your authorship value and add a great deal of high quality SEOVI (Search Engine Optimisation Value Indicators)  to all your related work. The new Humming bird algorithm looks at the author quality and examines other posts and articles that have been written by the same author and looks for rehashed work, or duplicate posts in many different locations.  The big G machine has ways and means of detecting these things, and evaluates your work accordingly. If you write the same old stuff again and again in different platforms Google will begin to see you as a spammer, and if you are not careful your work will begin to be devalued in many different ways, as you will acquire the negative points that go along with spamming.  These negative points may not be very significant at first, but as they slowly begin to accumulate, and the pattern of regurgitating the same work over and over again emerges in multiple cases you will soon find your work dropping out of the SERP's (Search Engine Results Pages) and you will be scratching your pip and saying to your self "what do I need to do to rank better"

The solution is simple, but you will not get it because you will not be thinking of yourself as a "SPAMMER"  Always consider where else you have written an article on the same subject and try to quote that article in your work instead of rehashing the work. When guest blogging this can be difficult, but the new humming bird algorithm is the issue to consider, as humming bird likes these kinds of referrals, and uses them to build your author value and add the necessary SEOVI (Search Engine Optimisation Value Indicators) to a variety of areas including for the publisher (rel = publisher) the author (rel = author)  and the content meaning identification factors. So if you are a blog owner and have others posting guest articles consider these factors, and if you are guest blogging for others write them a short email discussing this and asking for the blog owners opinion.

This request for clarity on cross linking and related issues will put you as a guest blogger in a different light with the publisher where your post will be published as a guest post. Some may at first find this offensive as it is counter to the past rules of guest blogging where the blog owner did not want you to link out all over the place as this would perhaps lead the reader astray.   But the SEOVI (Search Engine Optimisation Value Indicators) associated with this behavior may well be worth it as the impact on the SERP's (Search Engine Optimisation Pages) will be significant.

Like I said in the first line of this post... this is a lot bigger than you think.

With Humming bird in the picture guest blogging is an awful lot more important than it ever was, and the quality of the work is so much more important for your author value.  The SEOVI associated with guest blogging is tremendous, and so is the associated punishment of negative values when you do sloppy work and rehash what you have already written else where.
   

Guest blogging has just got so much more complicated  and we need to get to grips with the true impacts of the humming bird algorithm.  As Google gathers more data and more people realise the value of the HTML 5 meta tags of   rel = me, rel = author and rel = publisher  these things will become clearer and those who take the time to use them will be well rewarded, as those who abuse them will be punished.

My personal opinion is that you had better ensure that you have done the G+ author thing and get to grips with understanding the many issues around G+ pages and publisher rights as viewed by Google.  those who do not do this will soon be slipping up on their marketing when their SERP's (Search Engine Results Pages) start to be less impressive than they would like.

See this article by Gina Fiedel for a different perspective.

Is SEO SPAM ? an answer from Matt Cutts

Well the truth is SEO is Search Engine Optimisation and that is the art of ensuring that search engines find your pages, and hopefully place them high in the SERP (Search Engine Ranking pages). SEO is not SPAM at all, though some BHSOET's (Black Hat Search Engine Optimisation Technicians) do use very dirty tricks to get their pages on your screens.

These BHSOET's have given the whole SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) industry a bad name. View this short video by Google with Matt Cutts discussing the question "Is SEO SPAM"



Thanx for your time, please book mark our blog and pass comments on our posts so we can know if our efforts are helping you understand whether our efforts to inform you of SEO issues and how SEO can be integrated into your whole marketing is helpful.

 If you want a specific SEO topic to be discussed ask for it in a comment on a post and we will do a little research on the subject and try to discuss your request looking forward to hearing from you in a reply or comment.

 Regards Frank
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a health check for your site in Google SERP's

Google's Matt Cutts discusses your web sites SEO health and quality issues and why Google does not give your site a health certificate.

What is the purpose of social media in marketing?

What is the purpose of social media in marketing? This is a question that is seldom asked and never discussed with any clarity.

Social media marketing does not generate direct sales, it drives customers and interested parties to your web site where all online business should be conducted.

Brand awareness is only part of the issue, and social is social not business. Social media is used by the public to get personal and social with their various groups of friends. Us as marketers are intruders in this space and should remember this at all times.

The many social media platforms are a source of prospects and a place to create brand awareness, not sales. Social media platforms have been hijacked by marketers and it does not take the public long to realise this and ignore your company page once the social edge wears thin and the marketing edge starts to shine through.




Being on the social media pages that your potential customers use is all about brand awareness and implementing the SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) strategies which your marketing team should have in place that ensure your customers use the correct key words and key word phrases when searching for your services, products or events in all the major search engines.

It thus follows that you may have many thousands of likes, followers, G+'s  and other social signals, but little direct business from your social media pages. So once you understand clearly that the purpose of social media pages within the online marketing arena is to create brand awareness and SEO points for your company pages which funnel interested and focused buyers to your company site, then you will be alright, and get the results from the organic search results in search engines like BING,  YAHOO and GOOGLE with your targeted key words and keyword phrases showing up at the TOP of SERP's (Search Engine Results Pages)

Read this interesting article "How has Social media changed our marketing landscape"

SEO and what it really means

 SEO - Search Engine Optimisation - has changed over the years, and some how the meaning of the term SEO has been lost. SEO could be described as discussed in the post Search engine optimisation and your social media marketing strategies: SEO and what it really means  where I use this definition of SEO to try and get people into the right frame of mind when discussing SEO

A definition of SEO : The techniques and methods used in generating good copy written with the intended target market in mind and the related subsequent online promotion of the copy once it is placed within the desired platform so as to ensure good SERP's (Search Engine Results Positions) within that specific platform. 

SEO involves the whole marketing team, as well as every other aspect of the company and should adopt an integrated approach when properly done. The most important part of any SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) effort is to ensure that the target market is clearly defined, because all subsequent efforts are really in place to ensure that this specific target market finds the material concerned and actually clicks on the link provided by the search provider.

This means that the SEO technician needs to be consulted / instructed with the desired end result in mind, with a clear road map showing all the target market groups  and the associated   marketing strategies which include but is not limited to:

• all social media platforms including but not limited to :
• facebook
• twitter
• pinterest
• news platforms and forums
• all blogs and associated news letters (online or offline)
• any other online marketing associated with the project at hand
•  all related marketing avenues

The related subsequent online promotion is the big issue as it involves the  generation of quality back-links and these should come from as wide a variety of sources as is possible and include the above listed sources. This means that

• the company blogger
• the different social media platform managers
• the company media consultant
• the company publicist
• the marketing manager 
• other affected departments within the company

All need to be part of the SEO team and each needs to supply the SEO technical team with reports detailing their online activities showing how, and where they place links  to the company web site. These reports need to be analyzed and followed up with feed back, specifying words to be used in copy as well as specific pages with associated links that should be used within their subsequent online promotion of the desired pages within the company website through the medium that they use.

That means that

• the Facebook team must discuss and link to specified landing pages
• the twitter team must tweet specifeid words with links to these same landing pages
• the pinterest team must pin images from these specified landing pages and add comments with specified keywords
• Linked in team must discuss specified product / service and link to specified landing pages
• G+ team must follow similar guidlines
• Company blogs must follow similar guidelines and link to specified landing pages

 These actions need to be integrated and each team should ensure cross referencing is done in an organised and structured manner with each platform referring to all other platforms with the prime focus placed on the call to action pages in the company website where sales will be the main focus.

 I recently watched this video about how to convince the top management to spend money on social media marketing, and was quite shocked, because it highlighted an important issue for me. this issue is that SEO is not understood by marketing people, as it is perceived to be separate from marketing!!!!!

SEO is the prime marketing tool that will ensure your online efforts - be they in the social media, on blogs, in news casts or web pages - are found by your intended target market. once again an overview of what SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is

A definition of SEO : The techniques and methods used in generating good copy written with the intended target market in mind and the related subsequent online promotion of the copy once it is placed within the desired platform so as to ensure good SERP's (Search Engine Results Positions) within that specific platform. 

the value of out bound links for your SEO

When we talk SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and links most people forget about the true value of an out bound link, and hardly anybody optimises their out bound links.

This is a BIG MISTAKE as your out bound links are used to determine your authority and willingness to share data. Very often linking your pages directly to your oppositions pages pushes your pages right to the top of the pile within the SERPs (Search Engine Results Positions /Pages)

Why? well the answer is simple, search engines are there to make sharing of information easier and better, those that help get rewarded, those that hide their stuff get punished. its that simple.

The search engines use your out bound links in strange and sneaky ways, giving points for a variety of things in your links. Some of them are included in the list below, but this is very incomplete as search engines gaurd their algos (Algorithms) with great security and many traps.

Info for hard core SEO Specialists that worry about fractions of points . follows..
value of out bound links are influenced by 

• Where they originate in  your page
• how the content around the position of your out bound link in your page corresponds with the key words listed in the META tags of the site where the link is pointed to, if they even have a keyword list in their meta tags.
• How deep into the linked site your link will land
• How deep into your site the out going link comes from, often deeper links score much better and have more influence on a variety of related search issues connected with your site as a whole.
• does your link have a book mark attached, if it does you will be surprised at the extra score it gives your site as a whole. links with bookmarks are very uncommon, but do amazing things for your site, coz it shows that you have visited the target site and followed their internal links to specific points within the target site. search engines like it when you use bookmarks, even internal links with book marks add to your score considerably.
• what extra attribute you have given your out bound link within the <a href> tags such as <title> <purpose|> and others that are exceptionally sneaky and not always recognized or supported. careful how and where they are used. avoid black hat tactics at all costs here....  remember to nest these very securely, try these on pages of your testing domain so if the search engines get upset you have not lost too much, just your time and evaluation efforts.
• each out bound link adds value to an accumulative total for your site as a whole, this influences your site score, which is used in the search engines algo (algorithm) to determine your individual page score, which again influences your word score that is used to calculate your site score. so a small change can have a big impact as the algo is repeated (reiterated) till it settles out at a value as determined by the strange mathematical equation that uses a wide variety of techniques including calculus and binary combinations with cut off levels and direction switching pointers that have impacts on other parts of the algo.
• The various meta tags on the page where your link originates have an impact on the values associated with individual words within the content section near to where your link originates, which impact on the score of your site as a whole, not just the page where the link originates, as these scores are fed into strange algos as mentioned above.

The points you get for  out bound links are critical when it comes to words that compete for position in search results. An example is the word "accommodation" as used in the holiday and tourism websites that offer accommodation packages of various types for the city of Durban South Africa. Every fraction of a point is critical, as a search in Google for "accommodation" done at 14 h 49 on 12 July 2012 revealed that there were about  423,000,000 results. Getting to the top of that pile will take some serious effort and the points scored for out bound links will make a big difference to your pages position in SERPS (Search Engine Results pages)

Tip  for good SEO : --
1) optimise your out bound links with more care and you will get better SERP's (Search Engine Results Positions)
2) use the KEY WORDS META TAG it helps build your SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) points in other areas that REALLY COUNT.
3) be careful of who you listen to, and do some personal testing to verify what others tell you. see this video http://www.metatags.org/google_ignores_meta_tags_in_ranking  and think!!!

read this post http://4ubrand.blogspot.com/2012/07/meta-tag-confusion.html