Search Engine Optimization Archives

The Top Thing You’ll Need for SEO Success in 2020

posted on: January 9, 2020

SEO rules change, seemingly, day to day. So what will a business need for SEO success in 2020, at least as it stands today?

Reliable content should be the first and foremost priority for any business owner when considering their website. And with the new(ish) Google rules, this goes far beyond just making sure your website copy is factually correct. These factors should also play a role:

Content sources.
When you’re linking to other content on the web within your content, you need to make sure it’s a credible source. Otherwise, their low rank could pull your site down with them. There are a variety of tools available to help you with this, if you’re not trusting your SEO to a professional.
Author expertise.
Google explicitly says in their Quality Rater Guidelines that they want to feature content written by experts in their field, and they may be using an updated form of Google Authorship to determine who wrote the content as well as their level of expertise in the subject matter. This boils down to three choices for business owners. (1) Write the content themselves and include their credentials with the copy. (2) Hire an expert in the field to write the copy. Or (3) hire a ghostwriter to write the copy, but have it attributed to someone with the proper expertise. (And yes, the Quality Rater Guidelines go on to say that they expect information about the author to be on the site.)
Backlinks/getting cited by others.
When you’re an expert in your field, you don’t have to proclaim it; others will do that for you. Getting cited in others’ content will be one of the most important pieces of SEO in 2020. This includes not only backlinks to your content, but also mere mentions in others’ website content.

As always, there are a million other factors that can and will determine SEO success. This is merely what many in the field are deeming the #1 consideration this year. If you’re ready to take your organic ranking to the next level, give us a shout and let our SEO team get to work for you!

What Does it Mean to be a Marketing and Communications Agency?

posted on: December 12, 2019

At Asterisk Creative, we pride ourselves on being an award-winning marketing and communications agency. But what exactly does that mean?

Bascially, a marketing and communications agency takes a full-service approach. We understand that no matter the set up, marketing must work with public relations which must work with digital and so on and so forth. It’s best for all involved when all of those entities can be under one roof.

At Asterisk Creative, we have teams that are segmented by specialty. However, we all work together to offer you a holistic approach. Whether you’re in need of branding, public relations, SEO, social media management, marketing materials, web design and development, or some combination thereof, our teams work together to make sure your messaging is cohesive and your overall goals are met. All of your campaigns are multi-faceted, and all facets are designed to work together. Your marketing communications are custom-designed to speak to your company and each of its target audiences. What you get in return is a higher lead generation count which ups your potential to increase sales. This is exactly what you should expect from a marketing and communications agency worth its salt.

If this sounds like the type of help you need – or that you’ll be looking for in the new year – give us a shout. We’d love to add you to our client roster and get your business going gangbusters!

Is SEO a One and Done Service?

posted on: October 16, 2019

Most people understand the basics of search engine optimization. They understand that there are various elements of a website that need to be updated in a way that is “readable” by the search engines, even if they don’t know which elements those are or what the proper way of updating them is. But a lot of folks ask: Is SEO a one-and-done service? Once a site is optimized, is that all there is to it? Or is SEO maintenance necessary?

The short answer is no, SEO is not a one-and-done service.

Having all of the proper elements of a site optimized is only one part of SEO. The search engines’ algorithms also look at how recently websites – and their individual pages – were optimized. So if you look at SEO as a one-and-done service, you will likely get a bump in the immediate time after making the changes. But as soon as one competitor…and the next…and the next update their sites, you lose your edge. The older your changes become, the less effective they are.

SEO maintenance is all but required these days. The work is not nearly as in-depth as the initial optimization. And not all pages need re-optimization at once. One tactic is to take a look at your Google Analytics, see which pages have a high number of impressions but a low click-through rate, then prioritize those for your SEO maintenance efforts to try and get the click-through rate higher. Another way to perform SEO maintenance is to look at queries driving traffic to your site, compare that to your bounce rate, then optimize existing pages or create new pages around those terms. In any case, you’re killing multiple SEO birds with one stone – fresh content built around targeted queries, a better user experience based on fresh, targeted content, and all the little pieces the algorithms look for in a site.

The SEO team at Asterisk Creative understands SEO maintenance first hand. They spend their days putting SEO best practices in place, and staying on top of changes made to the algorithms. This keeps our clients’ optimization efforts and SEO maintenance plans can also be on point. Ready to take your optimization efforts to the next level? Give us a shout today!

Is SEO Important…Really?

posted on: July 18, 2019

Internet results pages can be a cutthroat place. Everyone wants their business to show in the #1 spot for all queries related to their goods and services. Even as unlikely an outcome as that is, many business owners are willing to try anything to get as close as possible. So with this mentality, is SEO important in reality? The short answer is yes. Here’s why.

1. If you are running pay-per-click ads, you can optimize the other elements of each page around the same keywords you’re targeting in your paid campaign. This increases your chances of showing up in the organic section of the search results, as well as the paid/ad section. The benefits of this are twofold. One, the more spots you take up on a page, the fewer there are left for your competitors. And two, studies have shown that the more spots you take up in the search results pages (SERPs), the more trustworthy and knowledgeable searchers view your company.

2. Speaking of competitors…Search engine optimization is important in getting ahead of them. If your competitors aren’t optimizing their sites at all but you are, you’ve got a real leg up! If they’re also in on the SEO game, though, you may have to up the ante to win, but it is possible. And in this case, it’s even more important.

3. Most searchers click on the first five results in the SERPs. Without optimizing the various elements of each page on your site for popular queries related to your business – and that page’s topic – you’re not likely to show in those spots, so you’re not likely to gain those searchers’ business.

4. The search engine algorithms don’t just focus on matching a keyword on a page to what a user searched for. Factors like how long they stay on the landing page and how many pages they interact with on the site as a whole also figure in to where you rank on the SERPs. So proper SEO also makes the user experience with your site, as well as its usability, top notch.

At Asterisk Creative, we understand the importance of SEO for businesses of all sizes, and we have an expert team in place to get your website optimized properly. When your strategy pairs our SEO team with our social media team, using social media for SEO can take your business even further! Don’t let your competition spend another day getting ahead of you online. Give us a shout and let’s jumpstart things!

Social Media for SEO

posted on: April 23, 2019

Social media outlets have changed the way people interact with each other and with businesses. In addition, they’ve also changed the way search engine optimization works, to an extent. Here’s how the search engines use social media for SEO.

For starters, it’s worth noting that all of the search engines do not treat social media outlets the same when it comes to SEO and organic rankings. Bing, for example, takes a company’s presence on each social media outlet directly into account when figuring organic rankings. The larger the presence, the more likely a company’s page is to receive a high organic ranking for that outlet.

On the other hand, Google has stated outright that social media doesn’t directly play into ranking considerations. However, studies of Google searches have shown a seeming correlation between larger presences on social media and higher organic rankings in search results.

In the end, it all comes down to links. While Google doesn’t count followers, its algorithm does take into account the links leading to a business’ website. Additionally, Google takes into account how often those links are clicked. For Google, this includes links posted on social media sites.

Basically, as more folks share your links, it positively affects your organic rankings, no matter the search engine. So build your social media strategy around writing website content that people find interesting and useful and, as a result, want to share. When people consider your link relevant and share it, the search engine algorithms take notice. In turn, they bump your website up the organic rankings.

If you need assistance with building your social media strategy, SEO strategy, content marketing, or in making them all work together, give Asterisk Creative a call! Our team is well-versed in results-driven strategies to help your business grow!

Is Image Alt Data Really Important for SEO?

posted on: March 7, 2019

When it comes to search engine optimization, there are several elements that should – no, NEED to – be optimized. Most people with a general knowledge of SEO know that the on-page content should include keywords you’d like the page to show for in the search results. With a little deeper understanding of SEO, you learn that title tags are among the first places the search engines look for information about the page and that each page needs its own unique, keyword-rich meta description – for the benefit of the search engines and for searchers. But an element that many overlook or underestimate is the image alt data. Is image alt data really important for SEO?

If your images are properly optimized with titles and/or alt data that includes relevant keywords, they will be more likely to show up in an image search for those terms. This has the potential to increase the visibility of, and the amount of traffic to, your website. In turn, it has the potential to generate leads and ultimately sales for your business, particularly if your website design is built with the best practices for conversion in place.

More than likely, this will not be a huge increase. But this effort only takes few minutes per image, in general. If that turns into just one more sale per month, the effort will likely end up paying for itself multiple times over.

Our SEO team is well-versed in image optimization, as well as other on-page SEO techniques. And our website design team knows how to built sites meant to convert. When you’re ready to take your website to the next level, give Asterisk Creative a call!

Email Marketing + SEO = A Winning Combination

posted on: November 7, 2018

As most business owners and marketers know, tying your marketing efforts together makes for a successful overall strategy. An old adage said that consumers needed to see a marketing message three times to remember it. In recent years, as digital marketing has grown and attention spans have lessened, that adage has changed to be that consumers need to see a message seven to 10 times. This is part of why email marketing and SEO make such a great combination!

For starters, email subscribers tend to be more engaged with a company than the average website visitor. Since your email newsletters should contain links to your website, those that receive your emails and click your links are more likely to be engaged with your website. This equates to higher numbers of site visits, lower bounce rates for pages visited, etc. More website engagement signals to the search engines that your website content should be seen more. In turn, this potentially increases your organic rankings.

In addition, most email providers such as MailChimp, Constant Contact, iContact, and others offer links to each of your email newsletters. Adding a “newsletter archive” page to your site can benefit you in multiple ways. Site visitors can see what your email blasts are like before subscribing. This increases your chances of gaining subscribers that actually WANT to receive and engage with your emails. On top of that, each time you add your latest newsletter link to your newsletter archive page, the search engines potentially see that as an update to the page. With fresh website content being a premium for search engine indexing, these updates count as updated/new content. This, in turn, increases the likelihood of keeping your site ranking well in the organic results.

Are you ready to take your email marketing and search engine optimization further? Asterisk Creative can help! Give us a shout and let’s get the ball rolling!

An SEO Primer for Business Owners

posted on: October 2, 2018

SEO, or search engine optimization, helps your website get found by the search engines for appropriate search queries. And it’s not just for the overall site – it’s for each page of the site, too! This SEO primer gives you the elements where you’ll need to focus to get your optimization efforts started.

Keyword Research
Start with the Google Analytics and Google Search Console available for your site. Look at what pages are visited most often and what searchers are typing in to get there. If the queries are good matches, you’re off to a good start. If not, you have a bit more work to do, but it’s not impossible to fix. After that, use the Google Keyword Tool to take a peek at what other queries people are using to find your goods or services. Edit this list to fit your business, and you’ve got a great start on your SEO.
Title Tags
This is the first place the search engines look to determine what the page is about. Your title tags should be keyword-rich and descriptive without going overboard into keyword stuffing.
Meta Descriptions
Each page should have a unique meta description. This is the information about the page that shows in the search engine results pages (SERPs). In addition to using your keywords for the search engines’ benefit, you’ll also need to make the content read well to the human eye. This ensures searchers want to click through to your site.
On-Page Content
There is a specific percentage of times the search engines look for your keywords within your overall copy on each page. Though the search engines won’t release what exactly that percentage is, most SEO practitioners and SEO plugins have an educated guess. This is your keyword concentration. You risk not being indexed for terms you want to be found for when you fall below this percentage. If you go above this percentage, you risk being “punished” for keyword stuffing.
Image Alt Data
This piece is often overlooked. While it’s not necessarily the most important piece of the SEO puzzle, it tells the search engines what they’re “seeing” in your images. When your image is indexed for a particular keyword, the page it’s associated with on your site is also indexed. This helps pages within your site be found for even more terms.

At Asterisk Creative, our SEO team stays on top of SEO best practices and changes to the search engines’ algorithms, so we know how to implement these items in the manner that will best help your business. Seem like too much to take on for yourself? We get it! Contact us for SEO help today!

Take Advantage of Local SEO

posted on: August 30, 2018

For medium and small businesses, it may seem a daunting task to take on large corporations when it comes to SEO. But with the increase in local-based searches, the search engines’ algorithms have adjusted to provide the best results. Here’s how to take advantage of local SEO.

Verify your Google My Business page.
The verification process is pretty painless, and it gives you ultimate control of information being fed directly to Google. Anyone can submit edits to Google on business pages – including your competitors. When you verify your pages, the edits have to be approved by YOU before they publish to the internet. Conversely, edits to unverified pages just need to be approved by Google. If your page is unverified and someone marks your business as closed, if Google decides to publish that, your business will show as closed to anyone who searches for your business or your services. Is not verifying you page really worth that risk?
Make sure your physical address is on your website, preferably in the header and/or footer.
When searches include a neighborhood name, a zip code, or the phrase “near me”, the search engines do their best to find results that actually fit that parameter. As a result, having your physical address on your site provides indexable data to make your site match appropriately. Without that information on your site, you are probably missing out on showing to potential customers.
Include your neighborhood name or locale in your title tags, meta descriptions, image alt data, and on-page copy.
The principle behind this is the same as including your physical address on your site. Having this data included in indexable areas that show to searchers and site visitors similarly increases the likelihood that your site will show in the search results, will garner a click-through, and convert into a lead and/or customer.

Does this sound like too much to take on all on your own? We get it. Trust your SEO to Asterisk Creative today.

What Does Mobile Search Mean for Website Design?

posted on: August 13, 2018

Back in the day (like, 7 years ago or so), websites showed on computers and phones were just…phones. With the advent of internet-enabled phones and then smartphones, all of that started to change. Websites didn’t render properly on these smaller devices, so changes had to be made. So what does the rise in mobile searches mean for website design?

The initial reaction by website designers was to create, in essence, two sites – one that would load when a search came from a laptop or desktop computer, one that would load when the search came from a mobile device. This is still a recognized practice, though it’s fallen a bit out of favor. The search engines tend to see the sites as two separate sites, one with duplicate content of the other, and this tends to hurt your organic rankings.

With mobiles searches increasingly on the rise, the search engines – and Google, in particular – are moving toward mobile-first indexing. This means they’re focusing more on how sites load on mobile devices than on computers. To keep up and maintain organic rankings, website designers and webmasters need to shift their focus as well. Moving to responsive web designs is a great place to start. Responsive website designs adjust automatically to fit the screen on which the searcher/visitor is viewing the site. This eliminates the problem of separate sites/duplicate content while creating a better user experience across the board.

Mobile searches are also more likely to include the phrase “near me” in the queries. Website designers and SEO practitioners alike should ensure elements like a business’ address and/or neighborhood are clearly listed in multiple places on a website to match these queries appropriately.

Website design for mobile searches is important. Make sure your website is mobile-friendly. Contact Asterisk Creative for website design help today.