Category: SEO & Brand Management

SEO and online branding walk hand in hand when it comes to web-based marketing. This group of articles addresses key components of the challenge, including the how-tos of well written rich content and metadata, to deploying strategies based on owning your brand while engaging your audience in ways that meet their needs and expectations.

Simple Ways to Boost SEO without Blowing Out Your Marketing Budget

Skyscraper Smear, Chicago, Illinois, USA © Laura Mauney

Beyond the often exorbitant costs, the complex bells and whistles offered by SEO marketing companies can seem bewildering and financially risky to small and mid-sized business owners who just want to maintain a niche presence in their local marketplace.

Business information sites, blog sites, and promotional sites really don’t need much SEO to remain viable at Google and Bing.

SEO is about structure, comprehension, and ease of connectivity, and only that. The most effective SEO occurs across the public web space (how visitors find you) and at the Meta and content level (in the HTML).

Taking a little time to learn how to use the some simple rules and tools will improve the chances of your site and brand being found quickly by the people looking for what you have to offer.

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Seven Classic Rules of Writing that Apply to SEO

Sign Insanity, Tallahassee, Florida, USA © Laura Mauney

Back in the day of newsprint, when the information superhighway was just a gleam in the eyes of physicists, writing and editorial jobs were pretty much restricted to – yes – genuine, well trained writers and editors, meaning those who actually knew the rules of the trade, had a natural flare for expression in language, and knew how to break the rules without sounding ignorant of the same.
These days, in the modern weboverse of six bazillion blog posts telling us six different ways to do the same six things that the last six thousand blog posts talked about, one iota of truth shines through the overload of undercooked web content:

-Garbled messaging can stop internet searchers from clicking through to a website.
-Garbled or nonsensical meta information may induce click-throughs, but is unlikely to improve bounce rates, or result in new customers.

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A Few Words about Keywords, Words, Words, Words, and Repetitive Repetitions of Keywords

Flowers with Architecture, Chicago, Illinois, USA © Laura Mauney

Think about it: For no charge at all, Google and Bing offer organic placement in search results, about 70 characters for page titles and about 150 characters for page descriptions; a little less for mobile results….
So, why would anyone waste all that complimentary ad space, and block thousands of potential search combinations, by repeating the same word repeatedly on a web page and in the metadata?
Why would anyone not use the opportunity to write concise, truthful, information-rich, and vocabulary-rich copy designed to:
-Function like an advertisement.
-Capture the widest audience possible.
-Communicate site content intelligently.
-Brand a product or service across the full scope of its niche.
-Elucidate a complex subject or new idea.

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