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Getting a Google Knowledge Panel

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Are you interested in getting a knowledge panel for your brand, but not sure where to get started? 

I’ve outlined the areas you’ll need to focus on below, but ultimately this is a feature that Google rewards to entities that it recognizes as a brand.

Google will think of you as a brand if you are searched for by sonsumers, are mentioned in the press, are a publicly held company that trades on the stock market or are a part of some other notable list of successful brands. However, the specific details about how to exactly generate the “brand signals” Google favors are a bit of a black box.

But let’s get started with what we DO know.

What is a Knowledge Panel?

They first rolled out in 2012 and they look like this on desktop search:

Google describes how and why they display Knowledge Panels:

Google Search also delivers structured search experiences that respond to different user search intents—or types of queries. These responses range from lists of results for list-seeking queries to clustered facts for specific entity queries. For example…an entity query for a movie like “Interstellar” can result in content grouped around that entity to encourage deeper exploration, such as showing critic review snippets from various sites
— Google’s developer guide

What triggers the Knowledge Panels to appear?

Generally, Google needs to recognize your brand as an entity.  It has to have a variety of trust and verification signs. You can see if your brand is currently considered an entity by searching the Knowledge Graph API database.

I’ve provided those instructions below:

Google’s Knowledge Graph Search API
The Knowledge Graph Search API can be accessed via the Google API Explorer homepage.

Visit https://developers.google.com/apis-explorer/#p/ and search for Knowledge Graph.

Then click on the Knowledge Graph Search API which will then take you to the following page:

Click on the item above which will take you to the Search Entities Page, here: https://developers.google.com/apis-explorer/#p/kgsearch/v1/kgsearch.entities.search

On the Search Entities Page, you will see a variety of query parameters. To learn about these parameters click here.

However, you do not need to use all the parameters to conduct a search query, just simply use the “query” field. As outlined in the image above, enter a keyword, phrase or name into the query field and click on the execute button. For this example, I searched for my name “Katherine Watier Ong” and here are the results.

And when I do the same search for “CreativeDrive” you’ll notice that I get a blank result:

It’s important to note the score of the results as the higher the number, the more relevant you are if you are competing with other companies/people who also have your name. Another interesting thing to note is the @id (MID: machine-generated identifier) which is originated from Freebase.com. My results highlight the MID /m/0015c2pw.

There are different types of Knowledge Panels

Sometimes Google will display a brand Knowledge Panel or a local Knowledge Panel based on what was searched. The Knowledge Panels above are brand Knowledge Panels.

Below is an example of a local Knowledge Panel which is pulled from the brand’s Google My Business (maps) listing:

And it looks like this on mobile:

A local Knowledge Panel is triggered by brand searches that Google thinks is just a local business. Here’s more from Google about its local business panel.

It helps if you mark up your site as a local business. Here’s Google’s documentation on how to markup your site to potentially appear with a local business knowledge card.

Keep in mind that it is unlikely that even if you had a strong brand that you will be able to replace your local Knowledge Panel with your Brand Knowledge Panel across all searches, as Google pivots the results based on the searcher’s intent.

Where does Google get its data for Knowledge Panels?

Knowledge Panels (aka results from the Knowledge Graph), like Knowledge Cards, extract semantic data from a number of sources including human-edited sources like WikiData, data extracted from the Google index, and private data partnerships. All Knowledge Panel results are either based on human-edited data or appear as a result of data agreements with partners. For these reasons, sometimes getting a Knowledge Panel is not possible for some sites. 

What is not a Knowledge Box/Panel?

There are a variety of other enhanced search elements that could get confused with a Knowledge Box. 

Featured Snippets

These usually appear on the top of search results as an instant answer to a question and are pulled from the text on one of the URLs that are ranking on the first page of Google:

 

Sitelinks:

Sitelinks appear when someone searches for an exact domain (suggesting clear brand intent).

In this case, Google may display an expanded pack of up to 10 site links if the site is using structured data markup, has clear breadcrumbs, or there is a clear user pattern of searching and clicking on those subpages.

How do I work on proactively getting a Knowledge Panel?

There are some  signals that indicate to Google that it makes sense to show a brand Knowledge Panel for users searching for your brand:

    1. Be a brand and get mentions from where Google pulls its data
      The first step: Claim the brand name for your corporate headquarters and all locations across the major social media platforms. This includes claiming, creating and optimizing a Google+ brand page and associated YouTube channel, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest, Vimeo, Slideshare, etc.You should claim profiles on Glassdoor and other recruiting sites and any local business directories that make sense for your particular business.  Additionally, Google often pulls its data from Wikidata and Wikipedia, so having a listing there is essential. If you need a Wikidata entry or Wikipedia page, ping me and I can introduce you to my Wikipedia editor.Finally, take note of your competitors and which queries trigger their brand Knowledge Panels vs Local Knowledge Panels. Check to see where those competitors are listed (Wikipedia, Google+, Twitter, etc) as well as what industry lists your competitors are being mentioned on, and try to get mentions/links on those lists for your brand.
    2. Have a mobile-friendly website without any major technical issues so that it loads quickly
      If you’re a multi-location business, make sure each site has its own unique location page optimized for structured data as mentioned below. These pages are essential to search engines, particularly Google, and are valuable to your visitors.
    3. Create search demand for your brand
      You need to engage your audience with larger marketing campaigns and use tools like Google my Business posts on your local office’s Google My Business pages to draw searcher’s in. Google Posts allow businesses to publish offers, promote events, make reservations or allow customers to buy a product or service, learn more or sign up all from the first page of search results or from the Google maps listing.
    4. Implement Structured Data Markup on your site
      At a bare minimum, Google will be looking for “Organization” and “sameas” markup on your homepage or contact page.Google outlines the details around how to use this markup in their help article, but here are the big takeaways.The Markup should include an Organization record that includes a URL (the URL of your official website) and “sameas” (the URL of your official social media profile pages). Here’s an example of what that markup looks like. It should be placed on your homepage or your about page.If you’re on WordPress, you can implement this markup (and others) by using the SchemaApp plugin.Other markups you might want to consider include your Organization Contact number, and your corporate logo.

      If you have a multi-location business, you should add “sameas” markup for every business you own on the homepage for each business location, or on each contact page that lists each office location. There’s a great article here with more information on how to implement that markup correctly.

Once you get a Knowledge Panel, how do you get more features displayed?

The Knowledge Panel will become more in-depth the stronger your brand becomes. Google takes signals from your social media activity, social engagement, the number of Google searches for your name and mentions across the web.

How long does it take for me to get a Knowledge Panel after I fix everything?

Knowledge Panels can take weeks or months to show up.  Sometimes they don’t show up at all, especially if the website isn’t old enough or if there are not enough signals to tell Google your organization is important.

It’s worthwhile to put in the work to help Google understand that you are a brand and that brand stands for certain things. Even if you are not immediately rewarded with a  Knowledge Panel, this effort will help search engines better present you in search results.

Like everything in organic search, however, keep in mind that you’re competing for visibility with other brands. Is your website as comprehensive and as user-friendly as competitors? If you’re having trouble getting a Knowledge Panel, check to see if you’ve tackled all of the best practices and then check per keyword to see what insights you can glean about why other competitors are getting a Knowledge Panel and you are not.

What has been your experience working to get a Knowledge Panel for your brand? I’d love to hear. Leave a comment below!

Filed Under: SEO

Please call it social media: Social media UTM tracking gone awry

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Ok. Let’s talk social media UTM tracking.  If you’re unfamiliar with what UTM tracking is in Google Analytics, please read this first.

Now that we’re all on the same page – it’s time for a Public Service Announcement.

I am seeing clients getting way too creative with their UTM tagging and as a result, they are limiting the usefulness of their Google Analytics reporting.

If you are seeing a category called “other” in your Google Analytics channel grouping reports, your UTM tracking might be off and there might be a very simple reason why. 

Here’s the type of thing you DON’T want to see and that should lead you to take another look at your UTM tracking:

Google Analytics - other in Channel reports

In many cases, the channel grouping report is not capturing all the social media traffic coming to a site because the UTM tracking is re-assigning the creatively tagged social media traffic, rendering it unreadable by Google. Those visits get put into the “other” traffic bucket in your acquisition reporting.

In order for Google Analytics to recognize and properly file social media traffic appropriately in the “social” channel in the reporting, the medium (tag) needs to be one of the following labels:

social, social-network, social-media, sm, social network, social media

All other label variations, including [brand]socialmedia for example, will automatically be reassigned to the “other” channel.

If you are interested in tracking just your site’s social media posts and how successful they are in driving traffic to the website, you should modify the UTM campaign content variable, NOT the medium (see above).

In UTM tracking,

The campaign name:

Should be the name of your overall marketing campaign push. For example,  you could use the campaign variable fall2018ask which you will then push out to your audience via multiple channels.

In UTM tracking,

The source:

This is the platform the link is pushed out onto – for example, Facebook, Google, newsletter, etc.

It’s best to track all of your tracked links that have UTM tagging in them, and Annie Cushing has a great UTM tracking spreadsheet that you can use to organize your tagging efforts.

The campaign content:

Can be whatever you like. It’s often used for differentiating two types of display ads, but it can also be used to track content that you put paid promotion behind on social media (for example) vs something that you just post and see how it performs organically.

What’s the impact of clean channel reporting?

It powers these powerful reports that help you make decisions about which marketing effort is delivering the most ROI:

Multi-Channel Funnel Grouping Assisted Conversions:

Google Analytics Assisted Conversion Reports

Top conversion paths:

And conversion model comparison reporting:

So, if you are creating UTM tags, make sure to use the default labels that Google can read for “medium” to ensure the reporting is clean and accurate. You can find a full list of what those default labels are in Google Analytics’ help files here.

Happy measuring!

Time Saving Keyword Research Tools I’m using in 2018

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I’ve been digging deeper into keyword research for a few clients over the last month or so – focusing on trying to find the heart or seed keyword that they can use for their optimization plans. Along the way, I’ve found a few really interesting (and new to me) tools that I thought I would share – in some cases I’ve created a few videos to show you how the tools work.

Keyword Research Brainstorming
AnswerthePublic.com is a tool that I thought everyone had heard of, but I brought it up in conversation the other day and it seems as though not everyone has tried it. It helps you visualize keywords in a new industry. I open up this tool in the early stages of keyword brainstorming.

I also use Google Adwords Keyword Planner and put on the site to see what terms it will surface.

Google Keyword Planner screenshot

I also ask the client about their competitors (SEO Quake’s Chrome plugin is great for scraping the terms from competitor pages. I am also a fan of Ahref’s content gap report and Keyword Everywhere’s Chrome plugin), industry magazines, journals, and conferences. Simply check what terms your competitor’s sites or industry sites use and see if you can capitalize on those terms.

Google Trends
When you search for a term on Google Trends, you can then pivot to just US queries and then check out the “related terms” to see if there are any additional terms you may have missed. Here is an example.

Focusing on terms with volume
Ahrefs & Moz – both have great keyword data sets. I tend to use Ahrefs more now since it has surfaces keywords with lower volume. I don’t use Google Adwords Keyword Tool anymore as it’s data is unreliable.

Also, SEMRush now has keyword research functionality as well that I’m testing out. [affiliate link] You should check them out. They have great data on keyword volume per keyword overtime which I think is really useful:

SEMRush-screenshot-keywordresearch

Brainstorming with keyword suggestions
Keywords Everywhere is a great tool that overlays Google Suggest terms while you’re searching and in your Google Analytics reports. It also has a database that will pull YouTube and Amazon searches for you. I have a “how to” video here:

Eliminating keywords based on searcher’s intent
I’ve seen across many clients that you can achieve top rankings without having the most backlinks if you really nail the searcher’s intent for the keyword. Not sure how to get started with searcher’s intent? Check out my blog post here.

Mapping keywords to pages that are ranking & finding gaps
You can pull reports from Google Search Console.

Alternatively, you can use SEMRush or Ahrefs to quickly give you a list of pages that are ranking for target keywords. You can then compare your target keyword list and see where you have gaps. Then, you can use Google to find a page that is close to ranking for the term to optimize first instead of starting from scratch.

If you happen to have Tableau, this approach is amazing: this article related to visualizing keyword research, but for most folks tableau is pretty cost restrictive.

Helping you group keywords topically
Most folks I talk to do this manually, but I like to speed up my work with tools as much as possible. Along those lines, I found the following tools that I’m trying:

https://topvisor.com/
https://www.wordstream.com/keyword-grouper
https://trevorfox.com/keyword-visualization-tool/
https://mazen-app.com/keyword-research-stop-wasting-time-digging-keyword-suggestion-tools-excel/

Creating a writing brief per keyword
After the keyword grouping phase, I then distill the information into a brief that highlights all of the competitive and searcher’s intent data per keyword. This provides clear guidelines for writers to follow (including supportive keywords) before they start writing on the topic. I provide a complimentary copy of my writing brief to site members here.

A side note about YouTube keyword research
Keywords being used by searchers on YouTube are different, and I’m currently trialing these two tools to find appropriate keywords for a client:

KeywordTool.io:

https://vidiq.com/
https://www.tubebuddy.com/

Do you have tools that you love to use for keyword research?

Let me know in the comments!

Filed Under: SEO

Supporting Girls and Tech

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Here at WO Strategies, we are committed to #givingback to our community each month. It’s something that we take seriously as a family and as a business. I was raised with these values and it’s impossible to ignore the responsibility of giving back personally and professionally to the community.

In December, we found a family friendly volunteer activity at a nonprofit we’ve volunteered with previously. Food and Friends is a group that focuses on the critically ill in our area and ensures that they have good quality food that is delicious and nutritious.

Food and Friends

We assisted with food delivery to their clients and our toddler really enjoyed helping with food delivery and brought smiles to quite a few faces!

#GiveBack

During the month of January, we worked hard to find a volunteer opportunity that was family friendly, especially on MLK day. However, we discovered the events that would have allowed us to volunteer as a family (including 2 small children) were either huge overwhelming events or outside in the cold.

So, we decided to donate this month, inspired by my daughter’s interest in space.

See, last month my daughter got the best care package. My sister-in-law met the Deputy Director of NASA’s Langley Research Center, Clayton Turner , when he was speaking at a Washington DC area alumni event for the Rochester Institute of Technology. By the way, the Langley Research Center is where the movie “Hidden Figures” was set, my daughter’s favorite movie.

Hidden Figures

She happened to tell him how excited my daughter was about space. So he went back to the center, packed up a box, and sent it to my daughter. This surprise package that arrived in the mail had an impressive amount of NASA swag. It was absolutely perfect.

It’s so important to encourage young girls especially about the importance of science, math, and technology. Inspired by Clayton’s generosity, we have donated this month to the Space Foundation, which advocates for continued space research.

When I was 13, my mom gave me a Commodore 64 which my brother and I coded on for hours – getting the computer to make cat or cow sounds. That curiosity around digging into the code is something that I still use today. I’m sure her curiosity around space launches and how astronauts are able to live in zero gravity supported by complex computer systems will have similiar payoffs.

If you have a desire to support STEM and space education then you can donate to the Space Foundation here!

SEO for Voice Search

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Do you need to worry about optimizing for voice search queries?
I think every future focused marketer does. Below I’ll cover the rapid growth of people using voice search and walk through how you can get started with your own strategy for capturing people searching via using their voice.

Here’s a quick history of voice search’s growth and impact:
Just four short years ago, the state of voice search indicated that 55% of teenagers and 45% of adults used voice search daily. This was in a study from 2014 before the advent of Alexa and Google Home became the go-to holiday gift for the tech-adoring American family. These percentages have certainly gone up.

Today, according to a Consumer Electronics Report published on January 9, 2018,  over half of those who own a voice assistant use it every single day. Moreover, 22% of users surveyed said they make purchases with voice commands.

What was the future prediction for voice search in 2016?
Mary Meeker predicted that by 2020,  50% of all searches would be made by voice. It appears that she was onto something.

@KPC8 Internet Trends 2016

 

Her hypothesis was that with an error rate (at the time) of only 8%, humans speak at a rate of 150 words per minute vs. an average typing speed of 40 words per minute, search was going to get better, be more efficient, and start to understand variances in human speech (like accent, dialect, and post-dental anesthetic mumblings).

Based on the TV ad spend over the holidays for home devices with voice recognition built in I think Mary Meeker undershot her prediction by guessing only half by 2020.

What is the reality today?
Mary Meeker was closer than she thought, and it happened faster than she suspected. As of December 2017, the Pew Research Center concluded that 46% of US adults use apps that interact vocally with smartphones and other devices. That’s nearly two years ahead of Meeker’s predictions.

With data collected just prior to the holiday rush (June-November 2017), Comscore reported 49% of households in the United States owned a smart speaker.

Canalys estimates and forecasts, Smart Speaker Analysis, December 2017
Canalys estimates and forecasts, Smart Speaker Analysis, December 2017

And then came the 2017 holiday season and impressive sales for the products:

Smart speakers such as Alexa and Echo Dot are becoming major players in the voice search landscape Tulsaworld.com reported that sales of these speakers in the United States have leaped three-fold just this year.

25 million voice search speakers were sold in 2017.
This trend is obviously not going away.  As people become more accustomed to asking a Google or Alexa to help with tasks and search, the rules of the SEO game will most certainly evolve to keep up.

Voice Search Adoption is driven by ease of use and increased accuracy of results
Here are the top reasons your audience uses voice search:

  • 43% say it’s quicker than using a website/app
  • 42% use voice because they can use it while driving
  • 38% say it’s more fun than using other search methods
  • 38% suggest it’s easier than using a website or app
  • 28% prefer it because it seems like a more accurate way of searching
  • 21% don’t like typing on their phone
  • 1% said simply, “other.”

And from a marketing perspective, it’s more personal to the user.
Voice search results sound like a radio ad being read to your customer

In the latest version of the Google Search App for iOS and Android, the search ap can speak your answer right back to you. Google Home, one of the bigger players in the voice search and home assistant game will read featured snippets to the users if the query triggers one. It’s like Google endorsing your business.  So if that doesn’t influence you to up your SEO game and earn a featured snippet, I’m not sure what will!

Users speak their queries differently

  1. The queries are longer and have more questions. They are usually more transparent about their intent.Number of words used with voice searchImage Credit: Purna Virji, citing Bing data

 

When typing a search manually on a desktop, we are more likely to type “weather Paris” (spelling intentional).  However, with voice search, we are more likely to ask, “What’s the weather like in Paris?”

Fast Company looked at exactly this discrepancy in search in an article published on January 5th, 2018. They posit based on new data released by Google this week that 41% of more than 1600 voice assistant users admitted that taking to these systems feel like they are talking to a friend, or at the very least, another human being.

“People are engaging with their voice-activated speakers as if they were human,” Google wrote in a blog post about the research. “They’re saying ‘please,’ ‘thank-you,’ and even ‘sorry.’ People perceive the devices as more than just an electronic toy, they’re more akin to another person or friend.

  1. They are more likely to be focused on locally driven actions
Search Engine Land: SMX Voice Search Presentation Data
Search Engine Land: SMX Voice Search Presentation Data

Some keywords are used more on mobile devices (and often are voice search queries). Like…

https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/data-gallery/detail/near-me-search-trends-by-device/
Trends by Device by ThinkWithGoogle.com

 

if you run a business with local offices and you haven’t yet claimed your Google My Business listing yet, you should. Most local queries are top heavy with Google map results, which are drivenbym Google My business listings. Here’s a great guide to Claiming and optimizing Google My Business

I know some of you are going to ask:

Can I just pay to have a voice search assistant/phone just read my ad?

Unfortunately, no. Ads are currently *not* being served for voice queries. However, Google is thinking about it.

Here’s more from Google:

“I think it can range from being purely transactional meaning we make it convenient for you to fulfill a transaction with this assistance or it can involve promotion” but that his team “are keeping an open mind about the kind of monetization opportunity that there is going to be.”
-Google’s SVP of advertising and commerce, Sridhar Ramaswamy

So here’s how you should get started modifying your SEO strategy to capture users searching via voice:

First, you should ask yourself these questions:

  1. Is your website ready? Does it load fast?
  2. Is it mobile friendly?
  3. Do you have structured data in place?
  4. Have you selected keywords that are good candidates for voice search?
  5. Are you up to speed on how to structure your content to be considered for a Featured Snippet? (If not, there’s a great guide here).

If your website is fast loading, mobile friendly, and you can easily add structured data markup then you’re ready to come up with a content plan.

Here’s how to start with a voice search content plan:

 

Here are a few questions to guide your research:

  • “Is there anything about my brand that someone might be interested in while on the go?”
  • Do I currently have content that is ranking as a Featured Snippet (or could?). 80% of Google voice “answers” are Featured Snippets (though not the ones with tables). New to featured snippets? Check out the great guide here.
  • Am I currently seeing voice search queries?
    • Look for voice search queries in your keyword research. Question words at the beginning of the keyword phrase are clear signs (who, what, when, where and how).
    • Do some research with Answer the Public.

      AnswerthePublic.com queries
      Queries from AnswerthePublic.com
    • Look for signs of voice queries in your GSC search query reports. While voice search queries are not separate from desktop and mobile queries in your Search Analytics reports, you can often find signs like this to indicate that they are voice search driven:
    • Though Google is aware that SEOs want more visibility into voice search queries driving traffic to their sites – and want that data surfaced in Google Search Console.

Evaluate your current content:

  • Have you mapped which content is already appearing in rich snippets? Ahrefs has the following feature to help you determine where you are already appearing:
  • For the areas where you have voice search opportunity but are not already ranking, do have content you could leverage to answer those questions?
  • Do you have an FAQ section of your website that you could easily leverage and optimize for voice search?

Start editing pages that could potentially capture a voice search query.
When you’ve selected a specific page to improve, ask yourself these questions:

  1. What questions should this particular page answer for visitors?
  2. Is it currently answering those questions? Not sure if the content you have matches the query? Does it make sense to do a quick review of how the Google Raters are being trained to assess the quality of the speech drive search results?
  3. Does it offer complete information? In other words, would someone return to the search results after checking this page?
  4. In what contexts do people search for a page like this?
  5. Is the page ready for mobile search?
  6. Is the content approachable and easy to read?  What will it sound like if the content was read back to the user?

Add schema markup to the page
If you’re a local business, take a look at marking up your data with actions as well – allowing your searchers to order or reserve via Google search.

Make sure that your markup and associated page meets Google’s markup requirements and that the markup is accurate by testing it with the Structured Data Testing Tool.

It seems like quite a bit of work, but I always encourage my clients to try to future proof their online marketing strategies, and based on your industry, that means you need to start planning for capturing voice search queries today.

Tackling Local SEO: An Approach and Checklist

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Are you looking to get into doing local SEO for a client? Here’s a comprehensive overview of how to tackle that type of SEO challenge. All of the quality aspects of brand SEO applies, but then you have to think about and optimize a bunch of other stuff to send the correct signals to Google.

This is a long post, so if you’d like a .pdf of this checklist to download later, grab a copy in my free resource library.

But first, can you take advantage of local SEO?

To qualify for a local business listing, MOZ Local states your business must meet the following four criteria:

  • Have a business name or DBA
  • Have a local phone number that matches your city of location
  • Have a dedicated physical street address
  • Make face-to-face contact with customers

Let’s orient to how local SEO is different.

Here are the ranking factors for local SEO:

2017 Moz Local Pack and Local Organic Ranking Factors

Here are the ranking factors from Moz’s recent research:

Moz's local ranking factors
Specific local SEO steps = local pack rankings

Implementing local SEO best-practices may be just as important than traditional or broader SEO approaches for ranking in geographically local queries (or in some cases, even more important). For example, have a look at the image below which highlights results from a study that captured eye-tracking data to determine that end users gravitate towards Google Places listings over organic listings:

Local SEO eye tracking study
Local SEO eye tracking study

 

To rank in the below types of Google map listings:

Google Map listings

You will need to rely less on the traditional SEO factors and more on:

Below we’ll go into the best practices for each of the above tactics.

Google My Business Signals

If you haven’t already, you’ll need to claim your Google My Business page. Here are instructions.

Once you’ve set it up, you should include the following:

  • A long, unique description that’s formatted correctly and includes links.
  • The correct categories for your business.
  • As many photos as possible.
  • A local phone number to your listing.
  • Your business address that’s consistent with that on your website and local directories.
  • A high-resolution profile image and cover photo.
  • Your opening times/days (if relevant).
  • Real reviews from customers on your GMB listing

Citations are one of the foundation or cornerstone pieces of any effective local SEO campaign. It’s important to keep in mind that NAP needs to be consistent across the web and across the site.

Here’s a list of places you can get offsite NAP citations:

1) Local Search Engines

2) The Big 4 (Data Aggregators)

I will tell you from experience that claiming these by hand are a pain and time consuming and paying for a service like BrightLocal, Moz Local, or WhiteSpark (affiliate link), would be worth the money.

3) Social Media & Local Blogs

  • Make sure to have your NAP listed on all your social profiles. (Pro Tip: use the service Knowem to snag your name for all major social networks and web services)
  • To find the top blogs in your local region, go to Google and search for “[your city] blog” to get the best candidates, as since they show up at the top of the SERP, they’ll be well-indexed by search engines

4) Local Directories & Newspapers

  • Search for either “[your city] + business listings” or “[your city] + directory” to get results, and be sure to get on your city’s Chamber of Commerce website.

Finding the Best Local Citations for You or Your Client

To help you better understand what the best local citation is for your business by category and city, Moz Local teamed up with Whitespark (a citation search tool) to come up with an impressive number of resources with helping you be on target. Here’s the list.

If you need to build citations internationally, Bright Local has some great lists to get you started. For example, here’s their list for citation sites in Canada.

Local Reviews

Local reviews have a direct impact on local search rankings, and therefore it’s important to develop a review acquisition process.

Here’s an outline of how to develop a review process:

1. Determine which review sites will work best for your client.

To determine that, simply start by going to Google and doing the following search, “[Industry] + reviews” and see which sites pop-up on the first page.

Or you can mouse over the leading search results and you’ll see two arrows pop-up which enables you to open up what Google refers to as the “Knowledge Panel” for that business and look at the sites listed under “more reviews.”
Keep in mind that some review sites syndicate them to other sites. You can see that relationship here.

2. Understand the review guidelines for some of the most critical review platforms:

3. Create handouts for your client’s customers

The handout will provide clear-cut instructions on how they could leave you a review on Google,  by using this “Review Handout Generator” by Whitespark and Phil Rozek.

4. Create print materials that list all the different sites customers can review you

5. Train staff (and yourself) on how to ask for reviews. 

If you’re new to this, read Constant Contact’s short guide on asking for referrals.

6. Request a “Find Us on Yelp Sticker,” if you haven’t gotten their “People Love Us On Yelp” sticker.

7. Getting in touch with your existing customer base and see if they’d be interested in leaving you a review. You could incentivize them for their time (maybe a discount, etc.).

8. Create a page on your website that gives instructions to your customers on exactly how they can review your business (i.e. yourwebsite.com/review-us/).

9. Put links to review sites In your email signatures.

10. Set up Google Alerts and a client process related to how to handle negative reviews.

Local link building:

To be ranked for a local search query, it’s important to have geographically local inbound links to your website. They don’t need to be the highest links (related to Domain Authority), it’s more important that they are relevant and from other local websites and sources.

Here’s a list of ideas about how to generate those local links:

  • Go to Meetup.com and search for a list of local events relevant to your industry. Find those that have websites and contact them about sponsorship (most of the time you’ll only need to put on a lunch for them). If they accept, you’ll get a link from their website (local to you) and their Meetup.com page (highly authoritative, local link). Here’s an example.
  • Create a local resource from public data (here’s 30 different data sources) and reach out to local press to get coverage. That’s exactly what Krystian Szastok did and he got some amazing results (you really should read this case study).
  • Run your own local meetup or event and bring links from the local event page.
  • Sign up to press request services or sign up for HARO to get quoted in local publications (huge potential for high authority, local links).
  • Run an AMA on Reddit (within a relevant subreddit to your industry) and within other local communities.
  • Line up interviews and columns within relevant online publications.
  • Give a discount to local organizations for your products/services in exchange for a linked mention on their website.
  • Enter local awards (or start your own if there aren’t any!).
  • Spend time dedicated to local PR outreach to get online and offline coverage in local news.
  • Run regular competitive link research and capitalize on any new opportunities that your competitors have gained.
  • Offer scholarships (you get links from local universities) or offer jobs to students (you can get links from their careers pages).
  • Get links from resources pages for your relevant content
  • Set up use If This Then That (IFTTT) to send me an SMS when an email comes through from HARO/ResponseSource that mentions any of the keywords I’ve specified. This is perfect for quick responses.

Local link building by increasing local press mentions

This strategy focused around developing a contact at your client’s business that could be seen as a thought leader for local publications. This could be due to their experience, knowledge around a specific topic, existing reputation, etc.

Once you have identified someone who is willing to fill that role, here’s how you optimize their visibility for locally driven links:

  1. Optimize their LinkedIn profile to reflect the image/messaging for how they should be perceived as a thought leader.  This could involve tweaking their job title, descriptions, projects they’ve worked on, gathering recommendations, updating their profile image (if it isn’t professional enough), publishing on LinkedIn, and helping them build up their connections.
  2. Develop guidelines on social sharing and ( if approved) full social media management across their accounts (this depends on the preference of the individual). This allows you to ensure that they are engaging with the right people and sharing the right content to reflect their new thought leadership role.
  3. Build out their personal profile on the client’s website and create some content on the blog (if present) under their name that can be used as content references for editors.
  4. If you feel that it warrants it, set up a personal blog for them in order to build their name in the industry.
  5. Generate press mentions around the individual that mention some of the work they have been involved in, etc. This is particularly important within B2B industries.
  6. Draft up some content pitch ideas that will relate to a few of the different target sites/media outlets that you’ve identified. You’ll want to work with the individual around these ideas to make sure that they’re the right fit for the industry.
  7. Get in touch with your press targets with some pitch ideas under the email of the individual and ask about the possibility of becoming a columnist. Don’t mention links or the word guest blog at all, and don’t rush into making contact with your targets. Make sure that you’ve got everything ready and in place first because you may only have one shot at this.

 

On-Site/On-Page Factors

Here are the on-page or on-site ranking factors that are specific to local SEO:

  • One URL/landing page per office or local geo content. That page should include your business hours, local staff bios, NAP and other useful information to the searcher (services offered, parking/metro, etc).
  • City, state in landing page title. You will want to ensure you clearly indicate the service, location, and brand in the page titles. Here’s an example of a perfectly optimized local landing page.
  • Click-through rate from search results. This highlights the importance of relevance and a well-optimized title + meta description.
  • Topical keyword relevance of domain content.
  • Embedded Google map
  • Product/service keyword in landing page title. This is a no-brainer, and the page should be titled for the big terms we want to rank for.
  • Page authority of landing page URL. Some authority will be inherited from the site, but often it takes some direct link-building to this page to help move the dial — so the better the page, the easier it is to build those links.
  • City, state in landing page H1/H2 tags.
    HTML name, address and phone number (NAP)  on every page matching location NAP. Marked up with local business schema, there’s a great tool here.
  • Load time of landing page. Ideally less than 2 seconds. You can check that here.
  • Link to your review profiles on your website
  • Geographic (city/neighborhood) keyword relevance of domain content.
  • Specific elements to illustrate credibility: testimonials, accreditations and external reviews

And finally, here are some up-to-date resources on local SEO ranking factors:

http://www.slideshare.net/DistilledSEO/searchlove-boston-2016-mary-bowling-local-search-experience-optimization
http://www.slideshare.net/DistilledSEO/searchlove-boston-2016-greg-gifford-x-marks-the-spot (Starting on slide 51)
http://www.localseoguide.com/guides/2016-local-seo-ranking-factors/

So how are you feeling? Are you ready to tackle local SEO for your site or clients? Drop me a note in the comments below.

Tracking your Featured Snippet Visibility

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So you’ve decided that you want to start working on getting a Google featured snippet for your client or site as they are ranking in the top 4 for a particular keyword, and you think that they are well positioned to earn those rankings. How do you actually track and report on that work?

It turns out that some of the rank trackers will report (in general) if the SERP for that keyword is generating a rich snippet, but won’t actually track YOUR client or site is ranking for those terms.

Here are the tools that I found that can help you with this issue.

Moz

Not surprisingly Moz has the ability to track your appearance in featured snippets (especially considering their advocacy to the SEO world that we think beyond the top 10 blue links, and work to rank #0).

Once you set up your campaign, you can find that under “SERP Features” in the Ranking section:

Ahrefs 

If you set up your rank tracking in Ahrefs, they also display whether or not your site appears in ranking #0 for your target keywords, though it’s easiest to see in an export of your data:

Ahrefs Ranking Zero reporting

GetStat

Get stat tracks “Rank” where #0 is actually tracked as #1, and also a “base rank” where 1 is the top organic listing. It will also pull through the type of featured snippet you’ve claimed (list, paragraph, etc). More about their tracking is here.  Their data is also exportable.

 

PS: Thanks for taking the time out to read my post and geek out about SEO with me!  I get my inspiration for post topics from other SEOs and in-house marketers struggling with SEO strategy and implementation questions, so if you like this post, please…
1) Leave a comment
2.) Share it with your network
3.) Follow me for future posts

New SEO training and nonprofit focus for the month

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Wow! The month has just flown by!

I’ve been deep in keyword research and SEO audits for clients and have trained folks this month in how to execute on technical SEO.

If that wasn’t enough, I also beta launched my SEO Bootcamp class. You can actually register today to learn how to create a rock solid SEO strategy.

Students in the class will soon have online access to my technical SEO training materials (which will help you communicate with Google on its own terms) and will you learn how to ensure that your site has the basics in place to make it easy for Google to highlight your content.

While it’s been extremely hectic businesswise, I have been focused on giving back to a nonprofit once a month. As a business and a family, I feel it’s critical to give back help others in a tangible way. We might be busy, but it’s important to find time to help others.

So without further ado – the #GiveBack Nonprofit for the Month – Greater DC Diaper Bank

As I had mentioned last month, I have over ten years of nonprofit work experience and really value volunteering. Both of my parents were Presidential Volunteer Service Award recipients. So monthly I give back to a nonprofit either through donated SEO services or through direct volunteer service. This month my family and I volunteered at the DC Diaper Bank.

DC Diaper Bank Volunteering
The Ong kids packaging diapers at the DC Diaper Bank.

 

While our littlest one was in a Byron, the toddler actually helped us package diapers to be distributed to families who need them. It was a perfect opportunity to get the kids engaged in volunteering around an issue they could understand. I’m sure the families who receive them will find it cute that the package was signed by someone still learning to sign her name.

If you’re looking for a way to give back this season, the Greater DC Diaper Bank always needs donations. They provide diapers and other items like baby gear and food. These items are really important and can go a long way to help a family in need.

Or as an alternative, my hometown food pantry (which my mom runs) is always looking for donations and you can donate here.

Or if you want to use your SEO skills, ping me and I can help you get “matched” with a nonprofit who could use your assistance.

And if you have a nonprofit that you think I should volunteer for in the months ahead, drop me a note.

OK. Back to those technical audits and SEO recommendations…

Happy Thanksgiving!

Katherine

PS: Thanks for taking the time out to read my post and geek out about SEO with me!  I get my inspiration for post topics from other SEOs and in-house marketers struggling with SEO strategy and implementation questions, so if you like this post, please…
1) Leave a comment
2.) Share it with your network
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Want to conduct your first SEO Audit?

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Then my upcoming workshop in November is for you! And today is the last day for early bird pricing, so you should register today.

During the workshop we will walk through how to access site based on Google’s best practices, it’s target audience and competitors, and create a plan for SEO improvement and growth.

If you’re confused about how to check your site’s:

  • Page speed
  • Mobile friendliness
  • Crawlability
  • Percentage of pages indexed
  • Whether high-quality pages are indexed
  • If you’ve been hit by a Google algorithm update
  • If you have a thin content problem
  • How to determine if duplicate content is an issue

You should register.

Here’s a little secret:

I LOVE conducting SEO audits.

I did a live, quick SEO audit of NIRS.org’s site at the DC/MD/VA Search Marketing Meetup this month as a part of my #giveback for the month, and you can view the slide deck here:

And I want to share that passion with you!

If you missed last month’s free workshop or if you want to go more in-depth and learn more about how I found the issues, what tools I used etc, then this workshop is for you!

We will cover those issues and much more. There will be plenty of time for questions.

Register today.

Thanks for reading!

Katherine

PS: Thanks for taking the time out to read my post and geek out about SEO with me!  I get my inspiration for post topics from other SEOs and in-house marketers struggling with SEO strategy and implementation questions, so if you like this post, please…
1) Leave a comment
2.) Share it with your network
4) Follow me for future posts

 

 

Nonprofit SEO Site Audit at the next DC Search Marketing Meetup

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Are you a nonprofit wondering if SEO is for you? Or wondering how and if you can increase the amount of free Google traffic your website is getting?

Then you should come out to our next DC/MD/VA Search Marketing Meetup on October 19th. At that Meetup, I will focus on giving back to a local nonprofit, the Nuclear Information and Research Service.

NIRS

You might not know, but I spent a decade in the nonprofit sector, and have created nonprofit SEO strategies for Environmental Working Group, the Points of Light Foundation, Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, and others.

At that Meetup, I’ll be conducting a live SEO site audit for nirs.org and my colleague, Emily Patterson (BeeMeasure.com), will be giving them user research tips as well.

If you’re in the area and want to learn more about nonprofit SEO, or how to conduct an SEO audit of a site or see a live digital marketing consult, you should join us!

Here are the details:
Date: Thursday, October 19th, 2017
Time: 6-9pm
Location: Canvas 1203 19th Street, NW Washington, DC.

Free! Just RSVP here: https://www.meetup.com/seo-72/

Of course, there will also be a chance to network with other nonprofit digital marketers, learn about nonprofit SEO, and get your SEO and data analysis questions answered.

If you can’t make this free event or you are interested in a much deeper look at how to implement a full SEO audit for your site (or a client’s site), check out my Technical SEO Training in November! Tickets are available here:  https://www.eventbrite.com/e/technical-seo-training-tickets-38114098294

Thanks for reading!

Katherine

PS: Thanks for taking the time out to read my post and geek out about SEO with me!  I get my inspiration for post topics from other SEOs and in-house marketers struggling with SEO strategy and implementation questions, so if you like this post, please…
1) Leave a comment
2.) Share it with your network
4) Follow me for future posts

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