That's a grand claim and I bet you think it's not achievable. Don't people pay search companies big $$$ to do this sort of thing and isn't it supposed to take a hell ot a lot longer? Well yes and yes but I'll explain all that later. First take a look at the the proof and marvel over how the internet still allows us to do such things, all FREE of charge.

The proof's in the pudding

The trick is in finding the right longtail keywords that produce results. Check Google trends to see if your keyword/s are climbers or a falling out of style searches (the below example: "most professional stock photo sites" was the former case).

You'll notice the 17 minutes marked by Google (under result 1) and the amount of web sites Google finds for this very phrase: over 30 MILLION! You'll also see the site is actually a social video site, namely MY SPACE - so what's the deal there?

Well that's the power of social media marketing....

Nice, but is this stuff really legal?

It's legal alright, but this technique isn't as good as it used to be. Basically its all part of Google's new search formula that values novel content from sites with a high page rank (Google's website scorecard). Combined with the priority video get on search engines, we have a powerful SEO tool, if used in the right way. It isn't as good as it used to be because up until recently, ranks like this stuck a lot longer.

The good news is that quality content distributed over various avenues, like social media channels will have the net benefit of increasing your search presence in a short amount of time - but it's all about consistency, good content (we'll it helps) and distribution.

OK, but if its so good why don't I do for my own site?

Below's the pudding and that's one of the long-tail keywords mentioned in my last post - this one also brought up 78.8 Million sites for this search (not really as long-tail as I'd like)

So how can I do the same?

You'll need to sign up to a number of social video sites such as Viddler, YouTube, BlipTV, Revver, MySpace etc. Get your video ready, make sure you title the video using the longtail keyword you wish to target, add a link to your website in the description and hit upload. Grab a coffee, wait, enjoy your coffee, wait some more - then query Google...

If your not getting first page number 1, make sure you read the previous post: How to get 1000 hits per day with niche keywords. Try another longtail keyword.

Focus on 10 highly searched low competition keywords

But why 10?

To focus your efforts on a small and manageable amount of quality keywords – not a lot of keywords with inherent problems like:

1. Wrong audience: if people get to your site and get off straight away (called a bounce), these keywords don’t reflect your site content

2. Too competitive: keywords that everyone is targeting, so you’ll need to be very patient to get on the first page of Google

3. No one searches on this keyword: that’s a no brainer

In this example, I’ll search for “online marketing” (one of the most highly competitive search engine terms around!), see who’s performing well, take their keywords (view source and check meta keywords on the top of the source code) and use this as a base.

The number 1 site for this search gave me these meta keywords:

Web Development, Online Marketing, Web Design, SEO, Web Developer, Website Design, Website Services, Website Developers, Search Engine Optimisation, Web Designer, Web Development Company, SEM, SEO Company, Website Designers, Web Services, Internet Marketing, Web Solutions, Web Development Services, SEO Services, Web Design Company, Web Marketing, Search Engine Marketing, Web Design Services

These are very general terms but to make this work, I’ll need to find niches to capture some of those quality long tail searches. So first thing is to eliminate this by taking out all the irrelevant terms and industry related terms (that only people in the industry will use).

The cut down list:

Online Marketing,
Internet Marketing,
Web Marketing,
Search Engine Marketing
Search Engine Optimisation,

Now check search volumes and look for niche versions of these terms using http://tools.seobook.com/keyword-tools/seobook/ - it’s good and free (great combination).

We need to be on the look out for strange long tail terms that get searched but not yet capitalized on - example: “online marketing web page copywriting” gets a good daily volume and is not that competitive – you can find this out by clicking on the Google traffic estimator link for each keyword (if Google tells you: “Not enough data to give estimates”, you know few people bid on that keyword on paid search and it’s also likely not capitalized on in organic search either).

So here’s the 10 keywords / phrases that get average 30-100 searches a day and has nothing on the Google estimates – that means low competition, so getting to page 1 on these will be relatively painless:

online marketing web page copywriting
business home internet marketing online
free report on internet marketing tips for more
the best business model for internet marketing
holistic web page marketing
low cost web marketing
web marketing mystro
search engine marketing ardan michael blum
search engine marketing political website design
list of search engine marketing

To sum up, after following other techniques I’ll be posting about here about exactly how to implement and distribute your 10 terms (including on page tricks and easy social media distribution) - you’ve got a potential of up to 1000 hits per day (10 keywords X 100 daily searches = 1000). Stay tuned

Images courtesy of Photolibrary - Get creative with stock photos, stock footage & production music from photolibrary.com

Here's a recent example of an email marketing campaign that increased click through rates over 10 times the usual amount.

There's a lot of material on great subject lines to aid opening rates for emails (make them conversational, avoid spam-like titles, have something to grab attention etc). There's less however about what to do when you actually get people there. Below is an overview of a campaign that achieved 50-60% click-throughs - that's more that 10 times average click rates for standard emails blasts.

Here's some of the hard stats in different regions - AU: 60%, IN: 62%, UK: 54%, SG: 55%

The email is the wrapping and the click-through is the gift.

The aim of the email was to showcase some of the great stock footage content on Photolibrary's Oxford Scientific (OSF) brand.There could have been a lot of text rambling on about this - how awesome the stock footage is, maybe with links to some really nice example movies - but having done just this many times over, I knew it just wouldn't have the desired result.

The reason is overload. You don't want to clutter your emails with too much information - there needs to be a focus on just 1 main click to get the highest number of clicks. Make your whole email about this 1 click

A great analogy is imagining the email as the packaging of a gift. Think about all those packaging ideas that work in a toy store. The important thing is showing something, enough to create intrigue and the "I want" feeling, but not too much that you've revealed everything then and there - so there's not a lot of point going further.

Enough talking, I'm sure you want to see what happens when an egg explodes! The next step is the landing page.... (will discuss in Pixelalchemy's next post). 

Images courtesy of Photolibrary - Get creative with stock photos, stock footage & production music from photolibrary.com

Usability gurus like Jakob Neilson are ongoing proponents of the idea that websites are about getting information - a website is only as good as how effectively it transfers information to the user.

In the early 2000’s Neilson wrote:

Ultimately users visit your website for its content. Everything else is just the backdrop. The old analogy is somebody who goes to see a theatre performance: When they leave the theatre, you want them to be discussing how great the play was and not how great the costumes were.

Neilson’s approach comes from a user centered design model, more commonly called “usability”. Usability is concerned with how easy it is for users to complete the tasks a website is designed for. A website works when users get to where they want to go without hindrance or as Steven Krug has popularized: websites work when they “don’t make [you] think”. Thinking is obviously not the desired effect for good websites.

If we take this approach to its logical end, we might expect the internet to be intravenously injected straight into our minds – no unnecessary design or artistic fluff to get in the way of good content and certainly no thinking required!

To be fair though, Neilson and followers have done their bit to lead the mass exodus away from glossy brochure style sites (nice for billboards / magazines but almost useless for websites), and non-human designed sites like those attempting to fit a whole encyclopedia into one never ending long scrolling web page.

What is often left out of the usability debate is that the internet is not just a deliverer of external content, but has become more a medium in itself - with its own content and set of rules. The whole Web 2.0 phenomena makes use of and makes money out of this very fact.

It’s difficult to pin-point an exact definition of Web 2.0 but broadly speaking it describes sites that leverage the dynamic and collaborative nature of the internet. Sites like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter are populated with a constant flow of user-generated content. Static Web 1.0 sites have a 1 directional flow of information similar to traditional publishing models like newspapers and television. Web 2.0 is different by being able to offer information (and advertising) apparently more relevant to the user, based on how he / she interacts with and contributes to these sites.

So, how do we apply Neilson's premise to Web 2.0 websites?

Most people just want to get in, get it and get out... the web is not a goal in itself. It is a tool Neilson, 2007

The problem here is that a growing number of people are using the internet (especially social Web 2.0 sites) with vague intentions - not always looking for something specific. For instance we might be online to make conversation, browse with no particular goal in mind or just passing time when we're meant to be working.

If we need to determine a goal, we might just as well ask why is it we do anything social? A lot of people are just looking for a way to feel a part of something bigger - perhaps looking for a community of like-minded people to relate to in a safe and non-intrusive environment.

It's here where the a task-based usability model falls short (when specific tasks can't be so clearly defined). What is needed is a way of determining social engagement - how engaged are your users when online on your particular site? How well did the experience imitate real social interactions? etc. etc.

References

Steven Krug Don't Make Me Think! A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability http://www.amazon.com/Think-Common-Sense-Approach-Usability/dp/0789723107

Jakob Nielsen Designing Web Usability http://www.amazon.com/Designing-Usability-VOICES-Jakob-Nielsen/dp/156205810X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1242705058&sr=1-1

Jakob Nielsen Web 2.0 'neglecting good design' http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6653119.stm

Images courtesy of Photolibrary - Get creative with stock photos, stock footage & production music from photolibrary.com

One of the greatest feats of modern advertising is the ability to seep into every facet of our modern lives, no longer limited to traditional media like television and print, new media is the next frontier, with campaigns reaching deep into the latest tools we use to communicate. Email marketing floods the inbox, Facebook spits out targeted banners and clever viral apps, Twitter is bombarded by promotional "tweets" and soon just walking near a Starbucks will alert us to the free cookie we'll get with every coffee - the delights of GPS and new mobiles phones!

The point is advertising needs to continually re-invent itself to deal with its own self-made enemy: saturation. Futurelab recently presented this succinctly, saying:

People who live near train lines adjust to the noise. They do the same with advertising.Futurelab - Change Marketing

So even the most viral of ads, even the savviest of ad placements have the converse effect of educating us - meaning we get increasingly discerning and harder to convince.

The upside of this downside is we're going to see a lot less of those full-blown "cinematic" production ads - the slick sports car in surreal landscapes, cornering at torque speed; shiny happy people overcoming all obstacles in record time with the help of the gleaming new product.

Why? Because the formula is predictable and fails to convince as it once did - so backed into the corner, good marketing practice becomes more about finding and presenting what's authentic in a brand.

Take for example "content marketing" advocated by marketing expert David Meerman Scott, he throws out the ROI obsessions and aims to build genuine consumer trust. There's no real sales pitch either, it's about educating prospects with relevant, valuable and engaging content.

You've got to think in terms of spreading ideas, not generating leads. A World Wide Rave gets the word out to thousands or even millions of potential customers. But only if you make your content easy to find and consume David Meerman Scott - World Wide Rave

A good example is the recent Razorfish 2009 outlook document - because of its insightful content on digital marketing, it's hit my inbox a few times and if looking to refresh my digital strategies, Razorfish has positioned itself nicely as an authority and without any direct sales pitch (also spreading their message even further right here).

The catch-22 is that today's cynical consumers judge this type of marketing as authentic only when there's no underlying monetary agenda - but isn't ROI and actual sales why we market in the first place? Yes, but more importantly, if our marketing matches our product, there's not need for the marketing veneer - it already is authentic.

Great. But my product isn't cool - What can I do??? - Well, Frankly you're screwed.Futurelab - What's Next In Marketing & Advertising

So, what makes a product cool? If we take Seth Godin's approach - anything that creates meaning, a sense of identity and a connection to others builds a following (a tribe). If the tribe likes it - its cool. The communal spirit of the iPod garbed masses packed into subways and lining our streets is a classic example of how a product became not only cool, but an global phenomenon.

There's a real religious inkling to Godin's ideas on tribes, especially as religion for a lot of people is the ultimate path of seeking connection, authenticity and meaning.

It begs the question: Do brands need to become cultural gods, in order to survive? And if so, are their devotes the ultimate consumers? What are your thoughts...

References

David Meerman ScottWorld Wide Ravehttp://www.worldwiderave.com

FuturelabChange Marketinghttp://www.slideshare.net/Futurelab/change-marketing-v01-1452235

Seth GodinSeth's Bloghttp://sethgodin.typepad.com

Razorfish2009 Digital Outlook Reporthttp://digitaloutlook.razorfish.com/publication/?i=13617

DOUGLAS B. HOLTWhy Do Brands Cause Trouble? A Dialectical Theory of Consumer Culture and Brandinghttp://www.lombard-media.lu/pdf/0308_brands.pdf

Images courtesy of Photolibrary - Get creative with stock photos, stock footage & production music from photolibrary.com