Natural Search Tactics for the Retailer Ken Jurina, President, Epiar

1. Natural Search Tactics for the Retailer Ken Jurina, President, Epiar Jenny Schlueter, Global Online Search Manager, Dell Stephan Spencer, President, Netconcepts Ian McAnerin, CEO, McAnerin International

2. Keyword Research The Do’s and Don’ts You Need to Know About Ken Jurina President, Epiar Inc. ken@epiar.com 1-888-428-5545

3. Who is Epiar? Founded in 2002, international Experts in SEO/SEM. SEO/SEM Services Driven by Internet Marketing Research & Proprietary Applications. Have Spoken at International Online Marketing Conferences Since 2001 International Clients Include SME to Microsoft. 11th Fastest Growing Company In Alberta (AB Venture Feb ‘07). 2007 Business Owner of the Year Award (Edm, AB ‘07). Saving Companies 20% to 40% on their PPC Spend!

4. Agenda • Don’t Assume • Do Mine Multiple Keyword Sources • Don’t Just Depend on Tools • Do Determine Keyword Difficulty • Do Think Beyond SEO/SEM • Don’t Be Greedy (Keyword Theme)

5. DON’T: Assume …that you know the correct keywords to optimize your site with. • Instead discover how your target market searches for your products/services. • You want customers not visitors to your site • If you fail in determining the correct keywords to optimize your website with all your other SEO efforts may be in vein.

6. Keyword Research - what it should be… • Data mining all possible keyword search behavior around your online offering targeting hundreds of thousands of phrases from multiple sources. • Eliminating skewed results including inconsistencies, non-seasonal irregularities, and obvious data flaws. • Identifying core relevance / irrelevance of phrases by demographic, geographic, usage & other defining target market parameters. • Identifying opportunities for both search and other marketing media...

7. Keyword Research - what it should be… • Effective Keyword Research equals: • = Effective Online Market Research • = Search Informed Marketing • Meaning!

8. DO: Mine Multiple Keyword Sources • Don’t just depend on one keyword source! • Eliminate any skewed results in your data • Correct for rank-checking distortions • Look for realistic phrase variations in your data • Sort sources alphabetically in Excel • Rarely is long tail searched more than the head • Use common sense!

9. DO: Mine Multiple Keyword Sources Red = in only one Datasource Note:Huge # Differences

10. Google Insights for Search • Comparative data on phrases • Identify phrases by topic/brand/category you might want to rank on • Breakout tool shows fast rising phrases on a topic • Geo target where to sell your products • Identify product seasonlity • Identify if news stories relate to spikes in searches • Leverage top 100 Google “Hot” trends • Updated multiple times/day • Past history helps determine product popularity

15. Keyword Research Tools • WordTracker • Yahoo Panama Keyword Tool • Google Keyword Tool • MSN Keyword Forecast • Trellian Keyword Discovery • Google Webmaster Tools • Wordze • Google Suggest • Google Traffic Estimator • Google Trends • Hitwise • NicheBOT • SEO Book Keyword Tool • GoodKeywords.com

16. Don’t: Just Depend on Tools • Track phrases being searched within your internal site search (Do you have one?) • Mine your log files (split organic and paid phrases) • Analytics? Which paid phrases convert, are you ranking organically? • PPC broad match “head” of phrase to identify “tail” • Eg: “women’s shoes”, identifies “Jimmy Choo classy women’s shoes” • Talk to your Front Line Employees • What phrases in questions are being used/asked?

17. DO: Determine Keyword Difficulty • Set yourself up for success  • Manage expectations on what phrases you can win on! Search in Google for: • womens shoes 12,300,000 (Results in Google) • “womens shoes” 1,920,000 • allintitle: womens shoes 381,000 • allintitle: “womens shoes” 105,000 • allinurl: “womens shoes” 99,400 • allinanchor: “womens shoes” 61,200 • SEOmoz.org Keyword Difficulty Tool • We Build Pages “Cool SEO Tool” • KEI from Trellian or Wordtracker

18. SEOmoz.org - Keyword Difficulty Tool

20. Trellian - Keyword Effectiveness Indicator

21. Trellian - Historical Data

22. Trellian - Competitive Intelligence

23. DO: Think Beyond SEO/SEM Identify new opportunities via keyword research • Business Research • Product Research • Brand Equity • Competitive Intelligence • New Market & Product Opportunity Identification • Consumer Feedback • Social Research • Political Topics • Public Issues • Celebrity Brand

24. Product Segmentation Top 15 Topics in Online Searches Surrounding:Televisions

25. What Brands to Sell? Top 15 Topics in Online Searches Surrounding:Television Brands

26. Get New Product Ideas Top 15 Topics in Online Searches Surrounding:Wholesale Candles

27. Consumer Feedback Top 15 Topics in Online Searches Surrounding:Auto Brands: EGR & PCV Valves

28. Consumer Feedback Top 15 Topics in Online Searches Surrounding:Ford: EGR & PCV Valves

29. DON’T: Be Greedy • Yay! You’ve got your keywords…no don’t go stuffing them everywhere on your site. • Isolate targeted phrase groups • Select and optimize 2-3 phrase per page • Results in targeted traffic to targeted pages = $$$ • Very competitive phrase? Optimize that one phrase on one page…don’t keyword stuff.

30. Thank You! Ken JurinaPresident, Epiar Inc. ken@epiar.com1.888.428.5545 Presentations from shop.org & previous speaking engagements online at: http://www.epiar.com/seo-presentations

31. Optimizing Your Content Jenny Schlueter Dell Inc.

32. Optimize the Right Pages • Decide which page is most relevant for each keyword (or group of words) • Consider which pages are already search friendly • Create a “link library” of keywords to page urls

33. Keyword Density Browser Title- Include Keywords & Relevant Variations URL Naming – Include Targeted Keywords Page Title- Use Targeted Keywords Content- Sprinkle keywords throughout the page to increase density (target 3-10%) Contextual Links – Never say “click here”…

34. Images Do Matter • Relevant tags on images help your page rank • Plus image search and universal search is growing signficiant – 2x in 2006! • High Brand Benefit / Lower Conversion

35. Focus on the Right Meta Content Meta Title- Descriptive title. ~80 characters max Meta Description- Descriptive language that summarizes page’s content. ~200 characters max.

36. Track Improvement • Track search rank, traffic, keyword density and links over time Keywords for Country A Month 1 Month 2 Change Tools: www.SEOchat.com www.SEOmoz.com www.keyworddensity.com www.seotoolset.com www.keyworddiscovery.com

37. The Impact of Content • Simple terminology, localization changes and keyword density can have a large impact • Jan 2006 Dell moved from just “notebooks” to “laptops & notebooks” • Result: Instantly moved to page 2 of Google for “laptop”

38. Set Yourself Up to Win • SEO can be tactical • Establish operational process to implement & maintain SEO • SEO can be scientific • Hire a SEO firm to help with strategy, technical & future SEO • SEO can be a art • Implement, Test, Learn, Adjust….then do it again…

39. Make It Easy for Marketers • Everyone owns SEO! • Education / Training for Marketers • Part of the Content Process – Checklist, Signoff, Audits • Corporate Styleguide • Marketer ToolKit Corporate Styleguide

40. ….And Make It Exciting • Get your marketers excited! Hold a learning summit, invite expert speakers and make it fun. • Dell Search Summit, January 2008. Lead by Mark Jarvis, Dell CMO. • John Battelle, Federated Media – Why Search Matters • Matt Kain, 24/7 Real Media – How Marketers Influence Search • Wendy Kano, Intuit - Case Study on Search Lessons Learned • Penry Price, Google – Best Practices on the Power of Search • And much more….

41. Participate In YourOnline Community • Tips: • Be part of the conversation • Provide Help • Positive reputation Management • Results: • Help customers fix their problem • Bonus: Rank at the top for product or service issues

42. Prepare For Linking • Distribute your link library to all marketing teams • Successful press release with LINKS!

43. Link Building Tactics for the Retailer Stephan Spencer President, Netconcepts sspencer@netconcepts.com (608) 285-6600

44. Build More, Better Links • Inbound links play a key role in determining rankings • It’s not just about quantity (“link popularity”); it’s about quality (importance of the page, topically relevant/authoritative)

45. Check Link Popularity • To a page • Google’s and Yahoo’s link: query operator • To your site • Google Webmaster Central, Live Search Webmaster Center, Yahoo Site Explorer & Yahoo’s linkdomain: query operator • Subtract sites from the results (Yahoo only) • E.g. linkdomain:www.yoursite.com -site:yoursite.com -site:yourothersite.com • Google’s link: query operator displays only a sampling of backlinks (to foil SEOs)

46. Checking Link Popularity • Tools: • Yahoo’s Site Explorer (siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com) • Netconcepts’ Link Checker (www.netconcepts.com/linkcheck) • Back Link Analyzer (tools.seobook.com/backlink-analyzer/) • Thumbshots Ranking tool (ranking.thumbshots.com) • TouchGraph GoogleBrowser (www.touchgraph.com)

47. Yahoo’s Site Explorer

48. Thumbshots Ranking tool

49. PageRank • PageRank™ – Google’s algorithm for measuring a page’s importance; Yahoo & MSN have similar measures • Each web page (not site) has its own PageRank score • PageRank scores from 0 to 10; logarithmic scale • Who’s at the top of the PageRank food chain? • 10: Google, Apple, NSF, FirstGov; 9: Yahoo, MSN, Stanford • Sites with higher PageRank get crawled earlier, faster, and deeper by Googlebot

50. Check PageRank • Google Toolbar for IE or Firefox • Download it from toolbar.google.com • Google Directory (directory.google.com) • Only works for pages that are listed in DMOZ (e.g. your home page) • Listings are ranked in order of PageRank • Get historical PageRank scores w/ Wayback Machine (www.archive.org) • Google Webmaster Central