Black History

his summer, I conducted empathy interviews a bunch of our clients and prospects to understand their content marketing challenges. One big pain point: SEO.

SEO remains a huge part of content marketing, as it should be. High-ranking content creates long-term value for your brand. It’s a key part of what Tomasz Tunguz calls the compounding returns of content marketing.

When you invest in content and a strong SEO strategy, you drive more and more valuable traffic to your site over time, resulting in compounding returns on your content marketing investment.



The problem with SEO is that many companies’ content SEO strategy looks like this:

Step 1: The content team creates a pretty good article.

Step 2: They pass it off to the SEO team, who stuff the piece with a bunch of keywords that make it nearly unreadable and press publish.

Step 3: The content team cries, and the piece doesn’t perform well against search anyway BECAUSE THAT’S NOT HOW SEO WORKS ANYMORE.

Even in 2020, I see this same mistake made over and over again. Instead, marketers should:

A) Factor a target keyword into content planning and production from the beginning, so that it’s naturally integrated into the piece. Since Google has shifted to semantic search, you want to focus on long-tail keywords associated with a question that someone’s trying to answer. (i.e., “What makes good content marketing,” “content marketing tips”). By answering the question at hand, you build SEO into the editorial process and avoid keyword stuffing.



B) Prioritize quality over everything else. Nowadays, Google prioritizes backlinks and E-A-T (Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) ratings in their rankings. The easiest way to drive both of those up is to create interesting content with original research and reporting related to your industry. You need to create content that inspires people to link, share, and spend time on page. And you need Google to see you as an expert in the core topics you’re covering.

In 2020, this is what matters. Traditional keyword stuffing is now terrible for your SEO. And mediocre content that won’t earn links is essentially worthless. Focus on publishing original research and reporting that helps answer your audience’s big questions. Focus on quality over quantity. Bring your SEO team in at the beginning of the content planning process—and then politely kick them out of the editing room. If you do that, I promise: You’ll see greater SEO results this year.

While search engine rank is ultimately based hundreds of factors, it rests on three main characteristics: relevance, trust (impacted by technical and social factors), and authority (based on backlinks and other factors like domain age).

Complete SEO analysis and optimization - RyteThe core element of SEO is content; no amount of technical excellence or high-quality backlinks will help thin, low-quality, or irrelevant content rank well. The best content is highly relevant to its target keyword phrase (and therefore to corresponding searches), well-written, and easily digestible.



Though the broader practice of SEO has evolved over time (as detailed in SEO: The Movie), relevance and “digestibility” still form the basis of on-page SEO. Just as elements like a table of contents, chapter titles, and an index make a book easier to read, so on-page SEO makes web pages easier for both search engines to evaluate and human readers to absorb.

This interactive graphic illustrates 14 vital components of on-page SEO best practices. It uses The 26 Best All-in-One SEO Tool Suites as an example. That post has recently ranked between the first and third spots on Google for the phrases “best all in one SEO tools” and “best SEO tool suites.” Hover over any of the arrows to see the details.



As this interactive graphic demonstrates, on-page SEO involves optimizing a number of technical, navigational, and design aspects. But the practice is most commonly thought of in terms of how and where target keyword phrases are used in posts and pages. Among the important places to include your target keyword phase are:

In the meta title tag: This is possibly the single most important place to use your target keyword phrase, and preferably at the beginning. Using that keyword phrase in the meta description tag is optional, as that text doesn’t really impact ranking–it’s more about “selling the click” when your page does appear in search.

In the on-page (H1) headline: It’s helpful (and logical) to use your target keyword phrase in the visible title of your page content.

In the body text: Use your keyword phrase, within the first 100 words if possible, and at least a few times (depending on word count) in your page content. Also use synonyms. Use these terms naturally though; your text should flow logically, and there’s no need to “keyword stuff” your writing (that can actually backfire).

Is there an intersection between content marketing and local SEO for B2B businesses? That’s what we want to explore in this piece. Google and Bing have leaned a lot into local SEO on their search engine results pages. It’s become a lot easier for local businesses to get a high placement on SERPs than in the past.

At first glance, local SEO might only seem like a B2C thing. The point of local search is to help the public find things nearby that relate to their interests. For instance, if someone is hungry they can look for restaurants on their phones and get results based on their location.

But the stereotype for B2B is different. It’s all done through phones and emails, not someone walking up to a storefront. Business decisions aren’t decided in an instant either, unlike deciding to look for some food. So why would a B2B business even want to look at local SEO techniques?



Local Content and Search Advantages for B2B Businesses

There are plenty of tactics that you can use in the quest to raise brand awareness. Some choose to use paid advertising, others want to pay for billboards, and still others engage in email campaigns. Local content is another tactic. Local content is content that talks about something relevant to the local business area.

This kind of content is great for improving local SEO results because it gives search engines the confidence that your business is located in a region. “It really comes down to one question: would you advertise locally to acquire new clients? If yes, then you can utilize local content. If no, local content probably doesn’t make sense for you,” says Crazy Egg.




The process of creating local promotional content is very similar to creating content for a national brand.

A catering company for business events might write something like “Top 5 convention centers in Spokane,” assuming they were in the Spokane area. Local content goes above and beyond general articles to provide information relevant to that area. Articles about local festivals and events, weather conditions, and the like are all possibilities.

When it comes to digital marketing for startups, SEO has the best ROI of all efforts you can possibly engage in. The only thing that comes close is going viral on social media, but that is not nearly as predictable and nowhere near as sustainable or scalable.

Building a company requires playing the long game, and SEO is a perfect complement to that mindset. Organic search optimization allows you to drive traffic to your website you would otherwise be paying for. If done right, you can sustain that traffic for years or more. Here’s how to get it done right.

Research the Right Keyword Opportunities

SEO isn’t just about generating more website traffic, it’s about attracting the right kinds of visitors. Focus on “buyer keywords,” which are keywords that have the highest potential to turn into a customer, as they are the types of words and phrases your prospects are most likely to use when searching.



With SEO, it’s possible to get 1,000 visits and generate no leads/customers, or get 100 visitors and generate 10 leads, depending on the type of keywords that are getting the traffic. Start your research by talking to your actual customers (ideally) or least to customer-facing staff in sales and support functions.

As an example, if you’re selling a sales CRM platform, a keyword phrase like “tips for sales people” might be good, but a term like “tools to increase sales productivity” might be better. The best one to target is of probably “best CRM for sales” (though that is likely to be difficult to rank for due to high competition).



Many companies don’t have the budget to launch a full-scale digital marketing campaign. Startups and small businesses have to be clever enough to stay lean and still find ways to scale their business growth.

How to use SEO in our digital marketing programThat’s no easy task, and it requires a lot of sweat equity investment from the team—though not necessarily a lot of spending. Here’s how to use search engine optimization (SEO) and other digital marketing tactics to grow your business without a huge chunk of capital.

Is there an intersection between content marketing and local SEO for B2B businesses? That’s what we want to explore in this piece. Google and Bing have leaned a lot into local SEO on their search engine results pages. It’s become a lot easier for local businesses to get a high placement on SERPs than in the past.

At first glance, local SEO might only seem like a B2C thing. The point of local search is to help the public find things nearby that relate to their interests. For instance, if someone is hungry they can look for restaurants on their phones and get results based on their location.

But the stereotype for B2B is different. It’s all done through phones and emails, not someone walking up to a storefront. Business decisions aren’t decided in an instant either, unlike deciding to look for some food. So why would a B2B business even want to look at local SEO techniques?



Quick Takeaways:

Know how Google defines a local business and what characteristics you share with one.
Doing Local SEO right gives you a lot of visibility on search engines.
Give a local flavor to your content, wherever you have or want to build brand presence.

Local Content and Search Advantages for B2B Businesses

There are plenty of tactics that you can use in the quest to raise brand awareness. Some choose to use paid advertising, others want to pay for billboards, and still others engage in email campaigns. Local content is another tactic. Local content is content that talks about something relevant to the local business area.

This kind of content is great for improving local SEO results because it gives search engines the confidence that your business is located in a region. “It really comes down to one question: would you advertise locally to acquire new clients? If yes, then you can utilize local content. If no, local content probably doesn’t make sense for you,” says Crazy Egg.

The process of creating local promotional content is very similar to creating content for a national brand.



Find something which resonates with your local residents
Create a piece of content that encompasses that + is better than what you’ve encountered up until then
Promote that piece of content using social media channels and platforms.

After assessing the results, repeat the process.

A catering company for business events might write something like “Top 5 convention centers in Spokane,” assuming they were in the Spokane area. Local content goes above and beyond general articles to provide information relevant to that area. Articles about local festivals and events, weather conditions, and the like are all possibilities.

Have you read sales pages that scream, “You don’t need to know SEO! Our software does it all!”

Solving your SEO writing woes with software sounds so easy. You wouldn’t have to worry about keyphrase usage, penning the perfect title length, or structuring links. Just feed in your copy and poof! instant optimization help! In fact, the sales copy for one SEO plug-in even says, “We walk you through every step: no need to hire or be an SEO expert.”

Sounds wonderful, doesn’t it? Here’s the question: do you even need to know SEO if a plug-in can do it all? In other words—can you trust SEO writing tools, or do writers still need to know SEO? Here’s how to think about it.



Machines can’t replace humans (yet!)

SEO tools are extremely helpful and save marketers time. We rely on them every day. But their recommendations are just that: recommendations. The writer (or SEO) makes the final optimization call. Sometimes, it makes sense to follow the recommendations, and sometimes, it doesn’t.

For instance, I’ve received emails from my writing students asking, “The Yoast SEO for WordPress plug-in is telling me to [fill in the blank]. Should I do it even if it doesn’t quite work with the page?” The plug-in was telling them one thing, while their writing experience was telling them another.

Please know that I love and highly recommend Yoast’s SEO for WordPress plug-in and many other SEO experts do too. It’s a nice plug-in that handles a lot of the geeky SEO stuff behind-the-scenes. Plus, it allows you to preview the title and description, check your readability, and more. Heck, I use it on my own site!

But other than a quick check, I don’t follow Yoast’s checklist recommendations as gospel. Why? Sometimes, following the recommendations would mess with the copywriting flow. There may be a reason that I’m not using the focus keyword in the title or that I don’t include the focus keyword in the first paragraph. Or I choose to link a certain way.

I may not follow every recommendation, but I know the page’s SEO strategy is still sound.

At the end of the day, good SEO writing connects with the reader and converts. It’s not because it ticks off various “here’s how to optimize everything perfectly” boxes. Even Yoast admits it’s “nearly impossible” to get a “green bullet” for every checklist item.

Plus, some tools still use keyword density as a scoring item. This means writers are still matching the keyphrase exactly multiple times in order to satisfy a mythical keyword density. They don’t know any better. They’re just doing what the tool tells them to do.

Considering more than  90% of online purchases start with a search engine, and nearly 60% of B2B marketers say organic search generates more leads than any other marketing tactics, your number one digital marketing goal should be getting your site onto the front page of search engines.

7 tips for hiring an SEO consultant people should be able to find your blog or website with just a few clicks. Search engine optimization (SEO) practices have changed significantly over the years, but remain at the core of digital strategy.

Between Google’s history of algorithm updates and increased competition, running an SEO campaign by yourself can be harder than you think. That’s why many people seek the help of an SEO expert. But finding an SEO specialist with the right mix of writing ability, technical skill, and industry knowledge to get your website on the front page may not be easy.



You have to make sure you are on the same page (so to speak) and share the same view. Marketing agencies bring a diverse mix of talent, though they can end up charging a small fortune. If you run or manage marketing for a small to midisized business, an SEO freelancer might be the best answer for you.

But with the abundance of freelancers on the market, how can you make sure you find the right fit? Here are seven tips that can help you make the right decision.

Be Specific with Your Requests and Deadlines

Before beginning your search for the perfect SEO match, get as specific as possible about what you are looking for. Coming up with a description for your project will help the freelancer build a proposal for discussion.

Most freelance websites that connect employers with specialists allow you to put together a description of the project and let freelancers submit proposals you can choose from. A description should give information about your business, expectations, and deadline. Drawing up a clear description of your request will ease the communication between you and the freelancer and help you find the best match.

Get to Know the Person You Will Be Working With

Working with a person you just met online can be frightening, especially in today’s world. Giving access to your website can expose you to all sorts of issues. The online world sadly includes scams and frauds as well as legitimate service providers.

A reputable SEO expert should be able to answer your questions in a simple, straightforward manner. If you have any suspicions, you can conduct a background check to find more about the person, before sealing the deal. Some red flags might include asking for payment before the work is completed, not delivering original content or— if you contracted them through a platform—asking for money offsite.

Ask for References from Past Clients

An experienced SEO specialist should have no problem giving you a short list of clients they’ve worked with. Do a Google search on those clients, with specific keywords, and see if they show up on the first page. Don’t hesitate to contact them and ask for a reference.

Great SEO can get sites to the top of organic search rankings, provide valuable traffic from long-tail or high-traffic keywords and play a crucial role in driving growth to your company. However, there is one pitfall to all the hard work that goes into ranking at the top organically. That pitfall is paid search. With pretty minimal effort and investment, competitors can start driving traffic from the same keywords you spent months attempting to rank for. That’s why the best digital marketers supplement SEO tactics with targeted PPC to yield top results.

How to make SEO and PPC efforts work together it's always important to remember that no matter how good your rankings, the top 2 or 3 or even 4 results are likely to be search or shopping ads. They will inevitably cut into the click-through rates of top-ranking pages.



SEO and PPC Work Best Together — Here’s Why

SEO strategies are often thought of as long-term and sustainable approaches to digital marketing. Fast advancements in rankings and increases in traffic are hard to come by. Strategies take months and often years of commitment in order to yield results. PPC management efforts, in contrast, can yield results almost immediately—but are costly in the long term. Balancing both long-term and short-term strategies is ideal.

Stopping the Competition:

No matter your ranking, it is likely that paid ads appear above your organic results. If you want to fully capitalize on search results, it is a good idea to supplement keywords of value with targeted PPC ads.

In addition, some companies love to implement “conquest” campaigns in which you pay for keywords that include your competitor’s brand in them. These can be costly, but potentially quite effective. Thankfully, protecting your own brand with PPC is relatively inexpensive, but then again, you’re spending extra money on something you probably rank for.

Actionable Tip: If you’re on a tight budget, or you have a client concerned with branded campaigns, drop the maximum cost-per-click significantly lower. AdWords likely won’t tell you how low you can go, and will suggest much higher, but because this is your brand and there is likely a much higher relevance to your ads and landing pages, you can significantly reduce costs without losing your position. Make sure to test this out to find the right balance and determine your optimal standing.



Keyword Research/Testing:

Use PPC results to determine the best opportunities for organic, long-term approach (this includes PPC tests for headlines, ad copy, landing pages and keyword optimization).

PPC campaigns can be a great way to test the potential value of creating content that can organically rank for the same keywords. Maybe there is significant volume, but if no one converts, PPC can help determine that.

If competitors are paying for keywords, it is likely that they have determined that those keywords have value. Checking competitors’ campaigns can give great insight into new keywords to target, as well as language that best converts.

B2B companies are doubling down on social media and it’s paying off. Many social media marketers feel like social media is an important part of their overall marketing strategy, and they’re employing the latest trends and available options. After all, Content Marketing Institute reported that 61 percent of B2B marketers increased their use social media for content marketing purposes compared with one year ago.

Decision-makers are using social media for business and for personal use, and it’s important to reach them whenever they’re online. When sharing a relevant message, they’re more likely to pay attention and consider your brands products and services.

Below are some examples of actual B2B companies on social media and what they’re doing right to connect with their audience and leverage social media in the right way.



B2B companies are doubling down on social media and it’s paying off. Many social media marketers feel like social media is an important part of their overall marketing strategy, and they’re employing the latest trends and available options. After all, Content Marketing Institute reported that 61 percent of B2B marketers increased their use social media for content marketing purposes compared with one year ago.

Decision-makers are using social media for business and for personal use, and it’s important to reach them whenever they’re online. When sharing a relevant message, they’re more likely to pay attention and consider your brands products and services.

Below are some examples of actual B2B companies on social media and what they’re doing right to connect with their audience and leverage social media in the right way.

Custom Images

TripAdvisor has a Twitter account that’s just for their hotel partners that have listings on their site. Not only do they do a great job serving the community of hotel owners and managers that want to connect with them, but they also have a very visually appealing Twitter profile. Almost all of the images they share or retweet are branded with their logo and “Certificate of Excellence” that reminds anyone viewing their feed that they represent the B2B side of TripAdvisor.

Oftentimes, these types of images aren’t difficult to create.

TripAdvisor created images for the winners using a photo from their hotel and then placed their logo and a few graphic elements that match their brand colors on top of it. This cohesive feel leads to a more professional appearance and also plays into the idea that they represent the highest quality hotels around the world.

As a hotel owner, it would be difficult to turn down the opportunity to be listed on TripAdvisor. The brand aesthetic (with actual photos from hotels on TripAdvisor) represents hotel quality and professionalism, something that any hotel owner or manager would be proud to be known for.

Social media success isn’t nearly as random as it can seem. Most successful pages and brands have had a great deal of work put into them over time, along with solid decision-making in terms of content, post frequency, and who or what they tag. Though it’s a challenge, there’s no magical force keeping you from reaching your social media goals.

Why you need a social media audit
Photo by rawpixel on Unsplash

To reach your destination, you first need to know how to steer your ship. That’s difficult if you don’t know where you are in the first place. To establish that, begin with a social media audit.



What Is a Social Media Audit?

This post will cover the basic elements. You may want to consult other sources for further details about the process. A social media audit generally looks into the following:

The results of your posts and overall engagement, including metrics such as likes, number of comments, the overall reach for reach post, mentions, shares, and more. If it can be measured, it probably should be measured.
How your posts perform in both short term and long term. While most social media content doesn’t have a long shelf life, sometimes a piece of content can go viral after the fact. A good audit helps you figure out why.

Comparison of similar posts to see how the differences between them affect success.
Both your top performing posts and your worst posts, in-depth, in order to help you adjust strategies for the future.

The alignment between your social media campaign and your brand / company goals and stated values. There shouldn’t be dissonance here.
Your expenditures and an analysis of whether the current outreach used is the most cost-effective option.

The audit will use the data collected to help your team analyze the interests of your audience and take demographics into consideration, maximizing future engagement.

As noted, you can absolutely add or remove elements depending on your business needs. What is important to note is that it is a holistic process. For this to be effective, you must look at everything. A missing (but important) factor can potentially take the whole audit off course.

To perform an audit, we recommend using social media monitoring tools so your time isn’t wasted gathering data (a task a program can do nearly instantly). Which tools to use is up to you, but try to pick a service that will keep all your data together for easier analysis, as well as one that won’t try to keep additional data behind paywalls.

The Information to Develop a Clear Strategy

A proper social media audit will provide all the information you need to develop a clear strategy and goals for the future. It will help identify which platforms to focus on for success, develop a solid posting strategy, and even help optimize post timing and scheduling.

Are you trying to gain new business for your cryptocurrency business?

If so, you need to remember that you’re not in a business that everyone understands. Even if you know why others need to have cryptocurrency, you have to be able to sell the “why” to others.

That’s why marketing for a cryptocurrency business is pertinent for you to survive. Content needs to inform and help your potential clients realize why they need to work with you.



1.You Have to Be on Social Media

If you’re a cryptocurrency business in 2018, you have to be on social media. There’s no way around this. Without it, you don’t look like you know what’s going on.

On social media, you should be posting regular updates about the cryptocurrency business, responding to others who are talking about it, and using it for your own personal knowledge.

Keep in mind that it’s not enough to be on social media. You need to make sure you’re picking the sites that your target audience is on. Otherwise, it will be a waste of time.

Also, make sure you post on a regular basis. Inactive social media does more harm than no social media at all.

2.Content, Content, Content

The days of odd television segments and annoying radio speakers are over. The average customer is too smart to fall for simple advertisements before they come to your business.

Instead, customers want to see inbound marketing, and most don’t even know what it’s called! Inbound marketing is marketing that they find on their own because they want it.

Some common examples of inbound marketing are social media posts, blogs, and videos. These pieces of marketing content don’t advertise directly. Instead, they help their potential clients learn something.

As a cryptocurrency business, consider posting blogs about cryptocurrency tools like 3Commas. You could also create videos telling users what to expect in the upcoming weeks.

Educating your potential clients will make them feel appreciated, and they’ll know how to use your product for their benefit. Because cryptocurrency is complex, make sure you don’t skip out on this step of your marketing strategy.

Did you know that 15 percent of state surveys miss actual harm and jeopardy nursing home residents are facing?

When these cases come to light, these people need legal representation. If they don’t know about your law firm, they won’t be able to contact you. The ability for people to be able to find your business is why you need an effective digital marketing campaign.

In this article, we are going to talk about marketing a law practice and how you can use the internet to get in front of your target market.



Launching a Successful Digital Marketing Campaign

As you are learning more about launching your firm’s campaign, your goal should be getting your firm in front of your ideal customer. While wide-reaching approach type marketing plans may be the norm, you don’t want normal. When you have a well-planned campaign, you will be able to pass your competition with smart law firm marketing ideas.

When you become a lawyer, you probably didn’t expect to need to learn digital marketing skills for your business. While you may not have gone to school for marketing, you’ll need to get good at it if you want to bring in a steady stream of clients.



Focus on UX (User Experience)

User experience should be the center of your marketing efforts. Your website should allow potential clients to find what they need easily.

Setting up your site’s navigation in a common-sense way will make it easier for people to use the site. Keep visible options to a minimum so extra buttons don’t distract users from taking desired actions. Important call to actions should be positioned strategically.

Use YouTube to Get in Front of Potential Clients

Video marketing is a powerful way to get your message in front of your target market. When people watch your videos, it is easier for them to connect with your image than words on a page.

When you use video marketing, do keyword research to find terms you want to rank. You might want to rank for terms in your local area, such as lawyer in your city or attorney in your city. Optimizing your videos for certain terms helps your videos show up in the right places.

Make Sure Your Website Is up to Speed

Most legal professionals haven’t checked their website’s speed performance. If your website loads slow, you are likely losing website traffic. Websites that take more than a few seconds to load don’t satisfy visitors’ need for instant gratification.

Downsizing images or using fewer images on a page helps reduce loading times. Remove complicated scripts and any elements you don’t need from your site. If you use the CMS WordPress, make sure you aren’t using any plugins that you don’t need.