What is SEO and search marketing?

1. Jake Aull
What is
Search Engine Optimization?
The differences between SEO, Local SEO & PPC

2. What is SEO…
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• SEO (search engine optimization) is “making your
business come up in Google” (& other search engines –
organically)
• What does that mean?
• Consumers are looking for something - they need
something - a solution to a problem.
• How do they attempt to solve it? With info - by going to
Google - or Bing - or Yahoo.
• They enter their search terms - their question - their
problem.

3. Sample SERP (search engine results page)
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4. What is SEO…
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• Web users enter their search terms - their question - their problem.
• And up comes the SERP (search engine results page) - listings of results and links per their query.
• The “organic” or “SEO” listings are the majority of listings on the page - they are regular listings that are
not ads (ads typically are separated at top, bottom and/or side - with an indicator such as the word “Ad”
shown).
Organic
(SEO) listings
Display ads

5. What is SEO…
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• The goal here is to get consumers to see and click on listings for some specific action - a company-
desired landing page, promotion or general content. (example of a web landing page below – such as
from an ad campaign)

6. What is SEO…
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• Going deeper, for the business and/or marketer, the SEO-specific goals are:
• To communicate with search engines and solve errors the search engines find on websites (these
errors happen all too often)
• To adapt and respond to search engine updates (i.e., Google Penguin, Panda, and Hummingbird
algorithm updates)
• To identify the keyword phrases that prospects and customers search for
• To come up on the first page of search engines for many of those keyword searches
• To consume more SERP “real estate,” with a variety of listings for same keyword searches
• To achieve more visible listings on the SERP, such as local/maps results or images, or with rich
content, such as video or news results
• To expand the brand’s overall digital footprint, for brand awareness results
• To continually grow visitor traffic (such as first-time visitors coming to the website)
• To identify and capitalize on primary traffic drivers to the website (such as back links or social
media)
• To adapt and harness new content (such as blog posts), with optimization, for ongoing traffic
growth and search engine results (note that blog posts should typically be on your own website -
social media results can also be considered “organic,” but they represent separate tactical effort
than SEO).
• To continually monitor website analytics for all above results (and errors), tweak, improve and
achieve more growth in positive results!

7. Sample SERP (search engine
results page), with maps
and news rich content
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Rich content
news listings
Maps/local
results listings
PPC/GoogleAds

8. What is SEO…
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• Ultimately – the goal is to connect good company content with target consumers seeking answers - the
“answers” are the right match of company services for consumer problem-solving.
• Some of the biggest contributors I’ve noticed to SEO results include a high amount of content (such as
pages and/or blog posts), and longevity of domain ownership (less controllable - based on the question
of how long have you owned your business domain name?).
• SEO is marketing. It’s website coding. It’s copywriting. It’s all of the above. It’s all of that for you and
your best customers.
• So, why do SEO and/or ads? First of all, which listings do you, as an individual web user, which listings do
you usually click on from the SERP? If you said organic/SEO, you’re in good company with the majority
of web users. But this doesn’t mean there’s no role for search engine advertising.

9. Sample SEO Analytics
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10. What is PPC…
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• Digital paid ads can achieve things that SEO can’t, such as:
• Let’s say you are a startup company with no digital presence and a brand new website - PPC (pay-
per-click advertising) can get you visibility on the SERP that you can’t get right off the bat with
SEO.
• Digital advertising is a good way to achieve more visibility (via multiple listings) on the same SERP
- incentivizing web users to click on one or the other of your listings.
• Digital advertising/PPC is a good way to “buy” keyword phrases you can’t come up for organically
no matter how hard you try (e.g., “head” keywords such as “book” or “television” - as opposed to
good organic niche/“long tail” keywords such as “children’s book about three-legged elephants”
or “buy used American-brand 60-inch HDTV flat screen cheap”).
• Digital advertising is a good way to target highly specific web users, such as “men in Birmingham,
AL between 40-50 years old.”
• Digital advertising/PPC is also great at demonstrating highly specific analytics (such as the above
for website clicks)
• And digital advertising is great for “immediate gratification;” while SEO is more of a long-term
benefit, PPC starts and stops the minute you start and stop paying for it.

11. “Head” or “Short-tail” keyword phrases in PPC advertising (“e-books”)
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PPC/digital ads
PPC/digital ads

12. Google Ads Advertising Campaign Setup
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13. Google Keyword Research
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14. Local SEO/directory search channel
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15. Search Analytics, Trending and Alternative Search Engines
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16. Analytics Showing Social Media-Driven Traffic to Website
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Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn are successfully driving traffic to the website.

17. Thank You!
Jake Aull