SEO Writing 101

Are SEM Salaries Too High, Too Low, Or Just Right?

by Mark Simon , Monday, March 10, 2008

AS I’VE MENTIONED PREVIOUSLY IN this column, acquiring and retaining talented people is one of the biggest long-term problems the SEM industry has. In my view, while automation is crucial, so are people, and employees — whether they work for in-house teams or at agencies — have to be paid fairly and treated well, or they’ll walk across the street to a competitor. So imagine my shocked surprise when I read the following posting on a popular job Web site:

Major company looking for a hard working, talented person. Responsibilities include leveraging social networks, content creation and editing, e-mail marketing, creating online press releases, SEO, Paid Search, plus learning how to set up podcasts and online videos.

That’s quite a demanding job with a lot of responsibility requiring a very well-rounded skill set. But guess what the pay for this job was — $35K? $45K? $60K?

Nope — more like zero! Incredibly, this listing was for an unpaid intern position (although it did mention that “pay was possible after an evaluation period”). Just as disturbing is that this firm’s management clearly doesn’t regard SEO and search marketing as mission-critical activities, but as mere line items on a laundry list of marketing tasks. This kind of attitude is a recipe for mediocre, under-performing online campaigns, plus a guarantee of employee burnout (if you’ve ever had to juggle e-mail marketing, SEO, PPC, and podcasting production tasks, you know exactly what I mean).

Fortunately, there are few companies out there that are as stingy with their SEM staff budget as the company above. The overwhelming majority seem to agree that these people should be fairly paid. According to SEMPO, which published its 2008 SEM Salary Survey in January, two-thirds of survey respondents with 0-3 years of experience reported making less than $40K per year, which is a fair wage (unless you’re attempting to live in Manhattan or Silicon Valley). Among staffers with 5-7 years of experience, none made less than $40K per year.

These salaries might not be very competitive in terms of the larger technology industry, but they’re high enough to ensure a continuing supply of young professionals into the field, which is essential if we’re going to avoid the kind of rampant salary inflation characteristic of the last tech bubble. Interestingly, in-house SEM teams are handling more money than ever. One third of respondents report managing accounts over $200K per month. This figure was unexpectedly high (SEMPO expected the figure to be only $100K per month).

Far less is known about compensation at SEM agencies, which may skew higher than in-house salaries given that there’s more job specialization (many in-house SEM staffs share other non-search marketing assignments, which just doesn’t happen at SEM agencies). SEMPO is trying hard to fill this knowledge gap; in late February, it launched its First Search Engine Marketing Agency Salary Survey, which can be filled out online at http://www.sempo.org/news/sempo_agency_salary_survey/. The results will be announced at ad:tech San Francisco (April 15-17).

If you’re employed at an SEM agency or know someone who is, contributing 12 minutes to SEMPO’s salary survey is a worthwhile use of your time. While it sometimes seems that the SEM profession has been here forever, it’s really a brand-new field. Getting some good hard data on salary numbers can give you a good sense of whether you’re being overpaid, underpaid, or whether your compensation package is just right.

Mark Simon is vice president of industry relations at Didit, an agency for search engine marketing and auctioned media management based in New York. You can reach Mark at msimon@didit.com.

by Lisa Weinberger

I attended a conference in San Jose, Cali in November hosted by Simon Leung and met a great group of Internet Marketers. The light bulb went on last night, (yes a few months later), and I realized I met Mr. JV, Rod Beckwith who has some amazing software programs to help with SEO. From article spinners, automatic submittal programs and more!

It is one thing to purchase a product from someone you have never met but I actually met Rod and he’s a great guy. He actually knows what he is talking about and not just some hyped up sales letter on a squeeze page. We both presented at the workshop so I was able to actually learn from the creator of these different programs.

The submittal process of articles and press releases can take hours and Rod has taken his experiences with his own online businesses and created some great “helpers.” When managing online marketing campaigns, it never hurts to use software programs specifically designed for the purpose of giving your clients the best service with the best results.

Happy SEOing!

by Lisa Weinberger

I am not sure how many people realize that when they are conducting a Google, Yahoo or MSN search, they are logged into their account. If you have a gmail account, when you do a Google search, do you realize that Google knows where you are located and structures the search for that area?

For example, if I am signed into my gmail account and do a search for “Pet Sitters,” the results that pop up are usually ones located in Arizona though I never used the word Arizona or AZ in my keyword search.

For anyone providing SEO services, there are different markets to consider when creating an SEO campaign for your clients Websites. Some SEO’s will use state or city sub-domain names so when particular individuals in a specific area are searching for services or products, their site will come up in the results.

Ah, how tricky the top search engines can be!

by Anna Schibrowsky, Wednesday, March 5, 2008 9:00 AM CST

My client’s website ranks in the top ten on relevant keyword searches.
The strong calls-to-action on every page convert traffic to phone calls.
His site gets huge ROI and generates most of his business.
Now what?

I’ve started thinking about the people who are looking for the results he provides, but don’t know the “right” keywords. What are they typing into search engines? I’ve identified three kinds of keywords that I’d like to see reaching the site that fall outside the scope of the service description:
—Problems my client’s service resolves.
—Results the service provides.
—Competitors’ services.

Now how can I get those keywords into my content?

Competitors’ services sound like the hardest to get onto your site, but I’ve found them to be the easiest. In the business’s monthly email newsletter, which I also post to the website’s News section, I’ve expanded the scope to include competing services and service providers. I always put them in a positive light, running top-ten and best-of lists, though I do like to note that my client’s service is local and less expensive.

Problems the service resolves are tougher, just because there are so many of them. I haven’t taken action yet, but my plan is to focus on specific conditions that experience and research have shown the service helps. I’ll need to scatter them throughout the website to keep the keyword density high.

Results will be the most difficult, and it’s a task I’m dreading, because descriptions of results can be even more vague than problem keywords. For this I’m going to make a list of all the outcomes I can think of, and then check AdWords to see which phrases are getting the most traffic.

Wish me luck! Hopefully this gave you some ideas for additional keywords to increase your websites’ search engine traffic.

Learn more about Anna at http://www.banoonoo.com.

As I do not know if this book has been written or in the works, I have decided to share a small part of my knowledge about SEO. If you are doing a search and you type in your Website name to search, you SHOULD show up in the search engine results. If you don’t show up, then you need to contact your online marketing firm or contact us to take over the campaign.

The real achievement is if your Website shows up in the search results when certain keywords or phrases are searched. Think about it, how many people are really searching for your name? I mean besides maybe old friends or ex’s, who else honestly would be searching for Lisa Weinberger?

Do you get the point? You want search results to draw potential clients to your Website and hope your site will convert the visitor into a new client or sale. A Website is only a strong tool if it can be found by potential clients. Online marketing and SEO copy needs to be performed and executed and the minimum amount of time to start seeing results is three (3) months.

by Anna Schibrowsky, Friday, Feb 8, 2008 11:00 AM CST

The conclusion of the 3-part series.

Part 3: Complete Sentences

Your grade school teachers demanded that you always use complete sentences.  No sentence fragments were allowed!

The kids popped open the fruit punch.  They splashed it into their glasses.

Traditional marketing copywriters say go for the attention-getting words.  Leave out the fillers.  Create a sensation and an emotion.

Pop! Splash. Slurp. Mmm. Acme Tutti Frutti Juice Drink. 100% juice. 100% fun.

Complete sentences may pack in more words, but your SEO copy needs to be high conversion copy too.  The headlines that work in print will work on the web.  And people don’t read online copy – they scan it.  Break your copy into bullet points and short sentences.

Tutti Frutti Juice Drink.  Fruit Punch flavor. 100% juice.  8 oz. bottles.  Buy now!

Winner: Traditional marketing copywriters!

That concludes our 3-part series with traditional marketing copywriters winning 2:1.  If you can think of any other teachers vs. writers examples, continue the battle in the Comments section!

by Anna Schibrowsky, Wednesday, Feb 6, 2008 9:00 AM CST

On to Part 2 of our little 3-part series.

Part 2: Pronouns

As a youngster you were taught to use pronouns to avoid repetition and save space for new ideas.  (And your teacher didn’t want you completing half your 500-word essay just by writing the same words over and over.)

The boys drank their fruit punch quickly, and then they put down their glasses.

Hopefully as a marketing writer you were taught to use pronouns less frequently and repeat the product name as often as possible in a radio or TV spot to increase recall.

Acme Juice is delicious.  Acme Juice has nutrients.  Look for Acme Juice today!

In SEO, you want to pack your copy with potential search strings.  Replacing pronouns with synonyms helps you do this and lets you squeeze in more influential adjectives.

Acme Tutti Frutti Juice Drink is 100% juice.  Acme Juice has Fruit Punch flavor.

Winner: Traditional marketing copywriters!

by Anna Schibrowsky, Monday, Feb 4, 2008 7:00 AM CST

Wow! There are some great SEO white paper type articles going up here. (I’m really looking forward to the article Lisa promised on keyword placement.) I hope my little SEO 101 posts are still helpful!

This week I have a fun little 3-part series (with some delightfully cheesy examples) that asks, “Who knows more about SEO writing? Grade school teachers or traditional marketing copywriters?” Check back for the final winner!

Part 1: Variety vs. Consistency

Your grade school teachers advised you to use a variety of words to describe something, to add interest and avoid repetition.

Billy poured a glass of fruit punch. The drink was red. The juice tasted good.

Then you learned to write for marketing, and the rules changed. You were told to be consistent in order to avoid confusing the customer.

Our fruit punch was ranked the best fruit punch, with the most fruit punch flavor.

SEO demands variety so every possible search string is included. But at the same time, you don’t want to confuse consumers. Phrases like “also known as” or “sometimes called” can help you here.

Kids just say “juice,” but our Fruit Punch is now called Tutti Frutti Juice Drink.

Winner: Grade school teachers!

by Rob Garner , Wednesday, January 30, 2008 Whether you believe Google bombing  still works or not, the fact is that more conventional SEM tactics such as SEO and PPC are alive and well in their power to increase the search engine visibility for various types of digital assets.  While Google’s January 2007 publicity effort around a specific algorithm to neutralize link bombs caused many online activists to give up on linking initiatives, many others have branched out to new search tactics, including SEO, tagging, blogging, social media optimization and Google Earth.   Noted Google bombers like OpenLeft’s Chris Bowers are also starting to sing the praises of another quick path to number one: Google Adwords.

The most famous case of activism in the search engines is the Google bombing campaign for the phrase “miserable failure.” This was a targeted effort by thousands of bloggers and Web masters to point as many links as possible to President George W. Bush’s bio page on Whitehouse.gov, so that the page would rank #1 in Google for the phrase.  In what was likely the first act of “presidential SEO,” the White House responded with a page redirect.  From Search Engine Land:

“The Bush Administration almost certainly tried to alter Google results itself through a change it made to the White House Web site in September 2006. It redirected the Bush bio page to a general page about all U.S. presidents. [That] move would likely have condemned future U.S. presidents to also be ranked for the term.”

Others have become targets of “miserable failure” link bombs as well, including Michael Moore and Jimmy Carter, whose pages catapulted to the top of the SERPs.   At this writing, the presidential bio page site is still ranked at #3 in MSN, and #1 in Yahoo (for more, read Danny Sullivan’s recent post on the first anniversary of the Google bomb diffusion).

Going beyond the Google bomb

In order to better understand how various other tactics have been used in the search engines, here are some examples that display a particular social, political, or consumer activist goal:

Adwordsbombing in Ohio.  Chris Bowers details an aggressive paid search stacking campaign by his group, Blogpac, in which Google Adwords ads were placed on the term “Bob Latta”, a candidate in a special election for Ohio’s 5th District Congressional seat in December 2007.

Operation Clambake.  Anti-Scientology Web site Xenu.net ranked highly for Church of Scientology-related search terms and phrases in Google, resulting in one of the first publicized hand edits, though engineers later reversed it.  The Church of Scientology continues to be the target of a group called Anonymous, which is using Google bombs and YouTube as its tools of choice.

The Martin Luther King link bomb.  Blogger Tim Hoffman led a campaign to get an anti-MLK site out of the MLK keyword space, even enlisting Robert Scoble for the cause.

Jeff Jarvis and his computer warranty woes.  Blogger Jeff Jarvis was not happy about how he was treated by his computer manufacturer’s customer service department, so much so that he punctuated one high-ranking blog entry with this consumer search activist tinged comment: “Put that in your Google and smoke it.”

Appeal for a jailed blogger, via Adwords activism.  Jon Garfunkel used Adwords to help assist a detained Egyptian blogger.

Amazonbombing.  If you buy into the notion that Amazon is a vertical search engine for books (I do), then here is an example of tagging activism.

David Berkowitz, consumer search activist.  Fellow Search Insider David Berkowitz recently used natural search to alert unsuspecting buyers to a Craigslist scammer.

Google Earth Activism.  Wall Street Journal reporter Kevin Delaney writes about how environmental group Appalachian Voices is using Google Earth and Maps to show how mountain tops have been razed for their natural resources.

Ethan Zuckerman on “Why Genocide Is Worth At least A Buck A Click.”  Zuckerman used Adwords to create attention for conflicts in Africa, and is also mining the data for analysis.  He details his campaign analysis in another sobering post, entitled, “Famine, $0.45 per click and rising. Genocide, down $0.03 per click to $0.28.”

With the increased use of a variety of tactics in the noncommercial keyword space, I think we are seeing the beginnings of a much bigger trend in search that defies simple categorization as “link bombing,” or even “search marketing” or “search advertising.”  Over the next two columns, I will continue to explore some of the elements and motivations of online activist’s search campaigns, and how these campaigns shed light on the value of search engines — value that is often overlooked in commercial SEM.

by Anna Schibrowsky, Friday, Jan 25, 2008 8:00 PM CST

CSS to separate layout from content, text-heavy content (instead of images or Flash) and alt tags on images all play nice with search engine spiders and increase your rankings. Plus these same design and content best practices are good for everyone, especially for mobile device and screen reader users.

Just when website designers thought it was safe to assume viewers had broadband connections and video plug-ins, along came web-capable cell phones and PDAs. These devices are on “dial-up” connections and many don’t display graphics. Even on the ones that do display graphics, the tiny screen makes it impossible to appreciate them. Like the old days of 14.4 modems, text content is king.

Computer users with visual disabilities use screen reader software that reads text aloud to them. Screen readers can’t interpret images, so text links instead of graphics and descriptive alt tags on images and video are critical for this audience. Screen readers also stumble over inline layout code, so separating your layout into a separate CSS document helps too.