SEO Strategy

The Strategic Aspect of Search Engine Optimisation

One phrase you may be hearing a lot these days is Search Engine optimisation or SEO for short. This refers to the methods used to make web sites (or web pages) prominent on the organic or non-paid search results on search engines such as Google when userssearch for keywords or search phrases.  Perhaps it is more productive to consider SEO to be about positioning your product or service at the fingertips of the interested user who will adopt it in some way.

No quick fix

SEO is often perceived to be a quick fix for “free traffic” it has great appeal in difficult economic times. Although you can make great improvements with a one-time effort for most  sites it is usually well worth taking a long term view. In any case, the challenge is not only to get your site to the all-important top ten result list in Google for the desired key word or search phrase but to keep it there in the face of fierce competition.

Patience is a virtue

As we will SEO is about dealing with evolving circumstances. SEO can indeed be a cost effective method of online marketing if done correctly but you will often find that it requires fundamental changes to your site and your online PR and marketing so often it will require investment over time to reap substantial rewards. Indeed, patience is really the key virtue when it comes to SEO.

SEO is just one part of online marketing

SEO is sometimes confused with Search Engine Marketing (SEM) which refers to paid advertising on Search Engines such as Google, Yahoo! or MSN. A detailed discussion of SEM is out of scope for this article but many of the points raised here are relevant to SEM as well.

It is worth noting that both SEM and SEO can be considered a part of Online Marketing which is an umbrella term for various online marketing activities such as Banner Advertising, SEM, SEO, E-mail Campaigns, Interactive Games, and Web Sites to name just a few. In turn, Online Marketing has become a part of the overall marketing or communication mix that organisations use to achieve their Marketing or Public Relations goals.

Define success before you set out

Just like Online Marketing in general, SEO should aim to contribute directly to the bottom line or enable the organisation to achieve some kind of  measurable goal. Traffic should be measured, of course, but measuring something that contributes to the bottom line is a lot more relevant. Indeed, you can consider online traffic to be a cost as it requires infrastructure to service it. If your Online Marketing effort only generates irrelevant traffic its usefulness can be doubted.

Make sure SEO is contributing to the bottom line

Before embarking on SEO it should be decided on how success should be measured. In the jargon the thing measured is called Key Performance Indicator (KPI). This can be sales of product to users who came to site through online organic search, the number of videos downloaded by such users or whatever. A sale or a download or any other desired action by a user is often referred to as a Conversion. KPIs can also be measured by keywords or search engines, user locations, time of day or whatever for comparison. The Return on Investment  (ROI) with other Online and Offline Marketing efforts should be measured and compared.

Online Marketing and SEO requires web analytics software that provide you with the relevant facts. Online marketers are spoilt for choice in that area and a discussion of how to choose a web analytics software and what to measure is out of the scope of this article.

Keep a close eye on your Page Rank

Keep a close eye on the Page rank that Google gives your site. This indicates how important your site is in relation to other sites. The number of links to your site will increase your Page Rank and help to move your site upwards in search results. One tip is that if your subpages do not have a page rank but your front-page does than Google may not be able to index your subpages for some reason. The Algorithm that Google uses to rank web sites is a closely guarded secret and is constantly being tweaked. SEO is, therefore, in many ways an evolving profession that requires practitioners to be constantly revising their tactics and strategy.

Be in tune with other online and offline activity

Effective SEO can only achieved by aligning it carefully with other marketing activity. So in the first steps of a SEO effort it makes sense to look at who your audience is and what messages are being used in the organisation in other offline or online media. This may sound  obvious but sometimes online marketers are preoccupied with the clever technologies they want to use rather than fine-tuning keywords or considering the people they are trying to reach. And marketers who are working on “traditional offline media” often forget the potential of the web to amplify or even measure their advertising or PR activity. Never mind that online marketing in general is in some ways displacing offline marketing altogether.

Choose your keywords carefully

The list of factors affecting key word selection is quite extensive and only a few examples can be given here. The keywords selected must reflect the phrases that are felt to be relevant to and used by the target audience. For successful SEO you need to have a clear idea of your target audience. Remember that you more than often trying to hit a moving target. Interest in products or services often evolves through the product lifecycle. At the beginning early adopters look for the product. When it goes mainstream the more casual consumer uses different terminology in her search for the product or service.

As for the competition, incumbents may have honed their sites for given keywords so that they may become near impossible to dislodge. Be creative and try to find new keywords or search phrases relevant to your audience and your product or service. Often it pays to look for keywords and phrases that have not been adopted by your competitors. You may want to outflank them rather then leading a frontal assault.

Brands are important online

Yet another factor is the strength of your brand. Sites for strong established brands will have an easier time online. One reason may be that they have more direct traffic based on brand familiarity. It is rumoured that Google considers traffic for its Page Ranking. Another reason is that established sites will have more links to them than other site. With careful preparation, however, it may be possible to push established sites out of the way.

This author was involved in a project where a financial web site for a new brand was launched in a major European market and was able to reach top ten the local Google site for the most contended key word on the launch day of the site. This required extensive code optimisation before launch and the generation of a strong media interest in the site and the brand. Keeping the site in the top ten was a challenge as competitors vied for the coveted top ten spots. We managed to defend and then enhance our position. I have also experienced that optimising a site will not show an instant result. The cause for this may be that Google does only index sites occasionally.

So what do SEO practitioners actually do?

We have considered the strategic side of SEO and the importance of underpinning that strategy with careful keyword selection. The tactical day to day activity is quite extensive and involves all aspects of Web Management. Successful SEO cannot be achieved without the correct technical set-up of your servers, appropriate and relevant content, internal links, links from other sites, correct use of rich media (including Flash, Silverlight and Java), PDF files, effective online PR activities, careful selection of URLs, the correct set up of HTML and CSS code, online database and search engine registration, link building, monitoring of traffic and conversion rates, the appropriate use of page titles, page descriptions, tagging of images etc.

The bonus of SEO is that if it is implemented your site will not only be accessible for Search Engines. It will also be easy to use for humans, including disabled users.

What the future holds

New dimensions of complexity and challenges are emerging in the form of the exponential increase in search on mobile device and the rise of the social web sites such as Facebook, Digg, MySpace and Linked-in (just to name a few). You must also consider whether you wish to aim for good results on other search engines than Google which currently dominates the search market.

In-house or outsourcing of SEO

To add to the complexity you must choose from outsourcing SEO work or dedicate resources within your company. No matter how you play it just make sure the people handling your SEO have the experience, the patience, the passion and the skill to master this complex profession. They should also have clear lines of communications to your web editors, PR people, marketers, copy-writers, graphic-designers, programmers and technical administrators so the important tasks for SEO actually get implemented. Make sure that these people understand why SOE is important and what they are expected to contribute.

Sell SEO to management

None of this will matter however if you do not attain the support of management for SEO. As I have already mentioned SEO will entail investment in terms of money, human resources and will affect other Web Development or IT projects. Ensure that managers understand and support SEO in the long term. Using analysis of online traffic and conversion rates along with ROI numbers for different methods of marketing may be your best argument since it can be an extremely effective form of online marketing. Not adopting it is a big mistake if you aim to succeed online.

Be wary of the black-hat

The final warning is to urge you to be wary of fraudsters who will try to convince you to use dishonest means of manipulating search results. These employ so called “Black hat” methods to fool search engines. Search engines such as Google will find out and may take action. Just consider the example of the German car manufacturer BMW who was blacklisted by Google for search result manipulation.

About the author:
Jon Heidar Thorsteinsson has been in the IT industry since 1999. He has extensive experience as an electronic business consultant. He was Web Editor and Head of Web Department at Iceland Telecom from 2001-2005. Since 2005 he has worked as a Specialist in Corporate Online Banking at Kaupthing Bank and its successor. In 2008 Jon was the Head of Web Development for Kaupthing Edge, the international deposit product. Since November 2008 he has been a Specialist in Online Banking for SME customers at New Kaupthing Bank.

He has also worked as a print, internet and a radio journalist and as a Public Relations consultant in Iceland and in the UK.

Tags: Search Engine Optimisation, SEO, SEO Strategy, Strategy