Inbound Marketing and SEO – Insights from the Moz Blog

<p>Introduction 1</p>
<p>SEO Is Changing 2</p>
<p>From SEO to Inbound Marketing 2</p>
<p>Inbound Marketing 3</p>
<p>Investing in Inbound Marketing for the Long Term 4</p>
<p>Why Read Th is Book? 4</p>
<p>PART I: SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION 5</p>
<p>The Birth of SEO 5</p>
<p>Life Aft er Google 6</p>
<p>Cracking Down 6</p>
<p>How Search Engines Make Money 7</p>
<p>Tactics Th at Never Stop Working 8</p>
<p>The Future of Search 8</p>
<p>Chapter 1: White Hat SEO: It Works 9</p>
<p>Some Points on Kris Post 11</p>
<p>Black Hat SEO 15</p>
<p>Why We Can t Ignore Black Hat Entirely 17</p>
<p>Why White Hat Is Always Better 18</p>
<p>Chapter 2: Schema.org: Why You re Behind If You re Not Using It 23</p>
<p>Myth: Schema.org Markup Doesn t Get Rich Snippets! 24</p>
<p>Schema.org Is Not a Language 25</p>
<p>Five Underused Schema.org Applications 26</p>
<p>#1 Events 26</p>
<p>#2 Jobs 27</p>
<p>#3 Reputation Management 28</p>
<p>#4 News Sites 29</p>
<p>#5 Ecommerce 29</p>
<p>Wrap–Up 29</p>
<p>Chapter 3: Perfecting Keyword Targeting and On–Page Optimization 31</p>
<p>Best Practices for Optimizing Pages 33</p>
<p>HTML Head Tags 33</p>
<p>URLs 34</p>
<p>Body Tags 35</p>
<p>Internal Links and Location in Site Architecture 36</p>
<p>Page Architecture 36</p>
<p>Why Don t We Always Obey These Rules? 37</p>
<p>Best Practices for Ranking #1 37</p>
<p>Chapter 4: Duplicate Content in a Post–Panda World 39</p>
<p>What Is Duplicate Content? 40</p>
<p>Why Do Duplicates Matter? 40</p>
<p>The Supplemental Index 40</p>
<p>The Crawl Budget 41</p>
<p>The Indexation Cap 41</p>
<p>The Penalty Debate 41</p>
<p>The Panda Update 42</p>
<p>Three Kinds of Duplicates 42</p>
<p>True Duplicates 42</p>
<p>Near Duplicates 42</p>
<p>Cross–domain Duplicates 43</p>
<p>Tools for Fixing Duplicates 43</p>
<p>404 (Not Found) 43</p>
<p>301–Redirect 43</p>
<p>Robots.txt 44</p>
<p>Meta Robots 44</p>
<p>Rel=Canonical 45</p>
<p>Google URL Removal 46</p>
<p>Google Parameter Blocking 46</p>
<p>Bing URL Removal 47</p>
<p>Bing Parameter Blocking 47</p>
<p>Rel=Prev and Rel=Next 48</p>
<p>Internal Linking 49</p>
<p>Don t Do Anything 49</p>
<p>Rel= alternate hrefl ang= x 49</p>
<p>Examples of Duplicate Content 49</p>
<p>www versus Non–www 50</p>
<p>Staging Servers 50</p>
<p>Trailing Slashes ( / ) 51</p>
<p>Secure (https) Pages 51</p>
<p>Home page Duplicates 51</p>
<p>Session IDs 52</p>
<p>Affiliate Tracking 52</p>
<p>Duplicate Paths 53</p>
<p>Functional Parameters 53</p>
<p>International Duplicates 54</p>
<p>Search Sorts 54</p>
<p>Search Filters 55</p>
<p>Search Pagination 55</p>
<p>Product Variations 56</p>
<p>Geo–keyword Variations 56</p>
<p>Other Thin Content 57</p>
<p>Syndicated Content 57</p>
<p>Scraped Content 57</p>
<p>Cross–ccTLD Duplicates 58</p>
<p>Which URL Is Canonical? 58</p>
<p>Tools for Diagnosing Duplicates 59</p>
<p>Google Webmaster Tools 59</p>
<p>Google s Site: Command 60</p>
<p>Your Own Brain 61</p>
<p>I Hope That Covers It 61</p>
<p>Chapter 5: Freshness Factor: 10 Illustrations on How Fresh Content Can Influence Rankings 63</p>
<p>How Google Scores Fresh Content 64</p>
<p>1. Freshness by Inception Date 65</p>
<p>2. How Much a Document Changes Influences Freshness 66</p>
<p>3. The Rate of Document Change (How Often) Impacts Freshness 66</p>
<p>4. Freshness Influenced by New Page Creation 67</p>
<p>5. Changes to Important Content Matter More 68</p>
<p>6. Rate of New Link Growth Signals Freshness 69</p>
<p>7. Links from Fresh Sites Pass Fresh Value 69</p>
<p>8. Changes in Anchor Text Signals May Devalue Links 70</p>
<p>9. User Behavior Indicates Freshness 71</p>
<p>10. Older Documents Still Win Certain Queries 72</p>
<p>Conclusion 73</p>
<p>Chapter 6: All Links Are Not Created Equal: 10 Illustrations of Search Engines Valuation of Links 75</p>
<p>Principle #1: Links Higher Up in HTML Code</p>
<p>Cast More Powerful Votes 77</p>
<p>Principle #2: External Links Are More</p>
<p>Influential Than Internal Links 78</p>
<p>Principle #3: Links From Unique Domains Matter</p>
<p>More Than Links From Previously Linking Sites 79</p>
<p>Principle #4: Links From Sites Closer to a Trusted</p>
<p>Seed Set Pass More Value 80</p>
<p>Principle #5: Links From Inside Unique</p>
<p>Content Pass More Value Than Those From</p>
<p>Header/Footer/Sidebar Navigation Do 81</p>
<p>Principle #6: Keywords in HTML Text Pass More Value</p>
<p>Than Those in Alt Attributes of Linked Images 82</p>
<p>Principle #7: Links From More Important, Popular, Trusted Sites Pass More Value 82</p>
<p>Principle #8: Links Contained Within Noscript Tags Pass Low, If Any, Value 83</p>
<p>Principle #9: A Burst of New Links May Enable a Document to Outrank Stronger Competition 83</p>
<p>Principle #10: Legitimate Links on Pages Th at Also Link to Web Spam May Be Devalued 84</p>
<p>Conclusion 85</p>
<p>Chapter 7: The Responsibilities of SEO Have Been Upgraded 87</p>
<p>PART II: CONTENT 91</p>
<p>History of Content within SEO 91</p>
<p>Types of Content 92</p>
<p>Turning Challenges into Opportunities 93</p>
<p>Video Content 93</p>
<p>High–Quality Content 93</p>
<p>Producing Content on Budget 94</p>
<p>Content at Scale 94</p>
<p>The Future of Content 95</p>
<p>Chapter 8: Beyond Blog Posts: A Guide to Innovative Content Types 97</p>
<p>Q&amp;A Content 98</p>
<p>Presentations 99</p>
<p>Curated Content 100</p>
<p>Magazine and Long–Form Content 102</p>
<p>Imagery and Photojournalism 102</p>
<p>Video 103</p>
<p>Interactive Infographics 105</p>
<p>Product Marketplaces 105</p>
<p>Facebook Notes 106</p>
<p>Why Everyone Needs a Marketing Oracle for Their Content Platform 107</p>
<p>Chapter 9: Scaling White Hat Link Building Scaling Content 109</p>
<p>Scalable Content 110</p>
<p>Cost 111</p>
<p>Scale 111</p>
<p>Quality 111</p>
<p>What s This All Have to Do with Link Building? 112</p>
<p>Great Content? 112</p>
<p>Use Only Great Writers 113</p>
<p>Quality Control 113</p>
<p>Automation 113</p>
<p>Filling the Hopper with Good Content 114</p>
<p>Scaling 114</p>
<p>Do We Have All Th is Stuff ? 115</p>
<p>Chapter 10: 10 Super Easy SEO Copywriting Tips for Improved Link Building 117</p>
<p>1. Write for Power Skimmers 118</p>
<p>2. Why Headline Formulas Work 119</p>
<p>3. Get 20% More with Numbers 119</p>
<p>4. Free and Easy Power Words 120</p>
<p>5. A Picture Is Worth 1,000 Clicks 120</p>
<p>6. Use Sub–Headlines or Die Trying 121</p>
<p>7. When in Doubt, List It Out 121</p>
<p>8. Quotes 122</p>
<p>9. The Bold and the Italic 122</p>
<p>10. Be Honest 122</p>
<p>PART III: SOCIAL MEDIA 123</p>
<p>Social Media Marketing: The Early Years 123</p>
<p>Social Media Awakening: It s Not Just About Me, It s About You 124</p>
<p>Example 1 124</p>
<p>Example 2 125</p>
<p>Social Media Management: The Online Community Manager Is Born 125</p>
<p>Social Media Strategy: A Part of the Team 125</p>
<p>Social Media: What Does the Future Hold? 126</p>
<p>Chapter 11: The Rich Get Richer: True in SEO, Social, and All Organic Marketing 127</p>
<p>Chapter 12: Life Aft er Google Is Now: 9 Pieces of Advice on How a New Site Can Succeed Without Search 131</p>
<p>What Does Designing For Social Mean? 132</p>
<p>1. Only the Best Goes Online 132</p>
<p>2. Twitter Is for the Insider s View 132</p>
<p>3. Facebook Is for Debate 132</p>
<p>4. It s All One Product Concept = Better Use of Time and Energy 133</p>
<p>What We Learned 133</p>
<p>5. Do More of What Is Successful 133</p>
<p>6. Not Everything Succeeds 133</p>
<p>7. Jump on Every Opportunity 133</p>
<p>8. Partnerships = Win–Win 134</p>
<p>9. Tools Help 134</p>
<p>In Conclusion 135</p>
<p>Chapter 13: Tracking the KPIs of Social Media 137</p>
<p>Why and Where Social Matters 138</p>
<p>Which Social Metrics to Track 140</p>
<p>Facebook 141</p>
<p>Twitter 142</p>
<p>LinkedIn 146</p>
<p>Google+ 149</p>
<p>Reddit, StumbleUpon, Quora, Yelp, Flickr, and YouTube 152</p>
<p>Blogs and Forums 152</p>
<p>Tools for Measuring Social Media Metrics 153</p>
<p>Chapter 14: Everyone Should Hire Social Media Experts 157</p>
<p>Chapter 15: A Peek Under the Hood: How We Manage the Moz Community 163</p>
<p>Who Are We? 164</p>
<p>Keri Morgret 164</p>
<p>Erica McGillivray 165</p>
<p>Megan Singley 165</p>
<p>Lindsay Wassell 166</p>
<p>Christy Correll 166</p>
<p>Melissa Fach 167</p>
<p>Miriam Ellis 167</p>
<p>Jen Lopez 168</p>
<p>Community Doesn t Stop There 168</p>
<p>Ashley Tate 169</p>
<p>Peter Meyers (aka Dr. Pete) 169</p>
<p>Mozzers 169</p>
<p>What Do We Do? 170</p>
<p>Blog 170</p>
<p>YouMoz 172</p>
<p>Q&amp;A 173</p>
<p>Social Community 175</p>
<p>Twitter 175</p>
<p>Facebook 177</p>
<p>Google+ 180</p>
<p>LinkedIn 181</p>
<p>Whew. 183</p>
<p>PART IV: OUTREACH 185</p>
<p>Why Outreach Is Important 185</p>
<p>Good Outreach versus Bad Outreach 186</p>
<p>How Outreach Has Changed 186</p>
<p>The Dangers of Buying Links 187</p>
<p>The Challenges of Outreach 188</p>
<p>The Importance of Exceptional Content 188</p>
<p>Chapter 16: Th row Away Your Form Letters (or 5 Principles to Better Outreach Link Building) 189</p>
<p>1. Talk to People Like People (Th row Out Your Form Letters) 190</p>
<p>Opening 191</p>
<p>Sustaining 193</p>
<p>Closing 195</p>
<p>2. Stand out in the Inbox 197</p>
<p>3. Do Your Research 198</p>
<p>4. Off er Value 199</p>
<p>5. Maintain the Rapport 199</p>
<p>Conclusion 200</p>
<p>Chapter 17: A Link Builder s Gmail Productivity Setup (with Outreach Emails from 4 Industry Link Builders) 203</p>
<p>Gmail Tools and Tips 204</p>
<p>Gmail Shortcuts 204</p>
<p>Canned Responses 205</p>
<p>Rapportive 206</p>
<p>Boomerang 207</p>
<p>Undo Send 208</p>
<p>Send and Archive 208</p>
<p>Link Building Email Templates from Industry Link Builders 209</p>
<p>Broken Link Building 209</p>
<p>Guest Posting 210</p>
<p>PR 210</p>
<p>Push Content 211</p>
<p>Exchange for a Link (But Not a Link Exchange) 212</p>
<p>Incentivized Reviews for Ecommerce 213</p>
<p>Chapter 18: Putting Guest Post Outreach Theories to the Test [With Some Real–World Data] 215</p>
<p>Theory #1: Being a Woman Will Get You More Links 216</p>
<p>Battle of the Sexes: Who Performed Better? 216</p>
<p>Theory #2: Job Title Matters 217</p>
<p>Theory #3: Timing Is Important 218</p>
<p>Theory #4: Personalisation Is Worth It (or Is It?) 219</p>
<p>The Results 219</p>
<p>What Did We Learn? 220</p>
<p>Theory #5: The Style of Outreach Email Has an Impact 221</p>
<p>Theory #6: Persistence Pays Off 221</p>
<p>What s the Perfect Combination? 222</p>
<p>PART V: CONVERSION RATE OPTIMIZATION 223</p>
<p>The Evolution of CRO 224</p>
<p>Testing and CRO 225</p>
<p>The Future of CRO 226</p>
<p>Chapter 19: An Illustrated Guide to the Science of Influence and Persuasion 227</p>
<p>#1 Reciprocation 228</p>
<p>#2 Commitment and Consistency 229</p>
<p>#3 Social Proof 231</p>
<p>#4 Liking 232</p>
<p>#5 Authority 233</p>
<p>#6 Scarcity 234</p>
<p>Chapter 20: The 12–Step Landing Page Rehab Program 237</p>
<p>Establishing a Conversion Baseline The Conversion Scorecard 239</p>
<p>Scoring Your Page 239</p>
<p>Step 1: Use a Separate Landing Page for Each Inbound Traffi c Source 239</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 240</p>
<p>Step 2: A/B Test Your Landing Pages 240</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 241</p>
<p>Step 3: Match Your Landing Page Message to the Upstream Ad 241</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 241</p>
<p>Step 4: Context of Use 242</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 242</p>
<p>Step 5: Use Videos to Increase Engagement and Conversions 242</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 243</p>
<p>Step 6: Use Directional Cues to Lead the Way 243</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 245</p>
<p>Step 7: Find the Optimal Balance of Data versus Conversion Rate 245</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 245</p>
<p>Step 8: Be Honest About Your Writing and Edit Ruthlessly 246</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 246</p>
<p>Step 9: Make It Desirable to Share 246</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 246</p>
<p>Step 10: Leverage Social Proof and Trust Devices 247</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 247</p>
<p>Step 11: One Page, One Purpose 247</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 248</p>
<p>Step 12: Post–Conversion Marketing 248</p>
<p>Sponsor s Advice 249</p>
<p>What Now? 249</p>
<p>Chapter 21: Lessons Learned from 21 Case Studies in Conversion Rate Optimization 251</p>
<p>The Role of Design 252</p>
<p>The Role of Social Proof 254</p>
<p>The Role of Headline and Copy 258</p>
<p>The Role of Call–to–Action 260</p>
<p>Your Role 262</p>
<p>Chapter 22: An Illustrated Guide to Web Experiments 263</p>
<p>A/B or MVT 264</p>
<p>MVT Face–off : Full Factorial versus Fractional Factorial 265</p>
<p>Testing the Test Environment with the A/A Test 266</p>
<p>Statistical Significance 267</p>
<p>Pro Tip: Ramp Up Traffi c to Experimental Conditions Gradually 268</p>
<p>PART VI: ANALYTICS 269</p>
<p>Ecommerce Budget Allocation Decision 270</p>
<p>Burning Question 270</p>
<p>Data Needs 270</p>
<p>Analysis 270</p>
<p>Paul s Grief Over His Lack of Blogging Success 271</p>
<p>Burning Question 271</p>
<p>Data Needs 271</p>
<p>Analysis 271</p>
<p>Naoki s Obsession with Being #1 272</p>
<p>Burning Question 273</p>
<p>Data Needs 273</p>
<p>Analysis 273</p>
<p>To Shoot or Not to Shoot; Th at Is the Question 273</p>
<p>Burning Question 274</p>
<p>Data Needs 274</p>
<p>Analysis 274</p>
<p>Chapter 23: 11 Google Analytics Tricks to Use for Your Website 275</p>
<p>1. Set Up Your Analytics Goals 276</p>
<p>2. Connect Your Google Webmaster Tools Account 277</p>
<p>3. Leverage Site Speed Reporting 278</p>
<p>4. Enable Site Search 280</p>
<p>5. Track Events 280</p>
<p>6. Real–Time Reporting 282</p>
<p>7. Multi–Channel Funnels 283</p>
<p>8. Use Custom Campaign Tracking 283</p>
<p>9. Plot Rows 284</p>
<p>10. Custom Dashboards 285</p>
<p>11. Flow Visualization 286</p>
<p>Visitors Flow 287</p>
<p>Goal Flow 287</p>
<p>Conclusion 287</p>
<p>Chapter 24: Eye–Tracking Google SERPs 5 Tales of Pizza 289</p>
<p>The Equipment and Methodology 290</p>
<p>Local #1: best pizza in Chicago 290</p>
<p>Local #2: pizza 292</p>
<p>Video Thumbnails: how to make a pizza 293</p>
<p>Product Images: pizza cutters 294</p>
<p>Expanded Site Links: Pizza Hut 295</p>
<p>Some General Implications 296</p>
<p>Chapter 25: Calculating and Improving Your Twitter Click–Th rough Rate 297</p>
<p>Q: Do My Wordier Tweets Earn Higher CTR? 300</p>
<p>Q: Do My Shorter Tweets Perform Better? 300</p>
<p>Q: Do On/Off –Topic Tweets Aff ect My CTR? 301</p>
<p>Q: Is My CTR Improving Over Time? 302</p>
<p>PART VII: CONCLUSION 305</p>
<p>Chapter 26: Launching a New Website: 18 Steps to Successful Metrics and Marketing 307</p>
<p>#1: Install Visitor Analytics 308</p>
<p>#2: Set Up Google and Bing Webmaster Tools Accounts 308</p>
<p>#3: Run a Crawl Simulation of Your Site 310</p>
<p>#4: Test Your Design with Browser Emulators 310</p>
<p>#5: Set Up RSS Feed Analytics 311</p>
<p>#6: Tag the Actions Th at Matter 312</p>
<p>#7: Conduct an Online Usability/Branding Test 312</p>
<p>#8: Establish a KPI Dashboard 313</p>
<p>#9: Build an Email List of Friends and Business Contacts for Launch 313</p>
<p>#10: Create Your Google Alerts 314</p>
<p>#11: Bookmark Brand Tracking Queries 314</p>
<p>#12: Make Email Signup/Subscription Available 315</p>
<p>#13: Create Your Site/Brand s Social Accounts 316</p>
<p>#14: Connect Your Social Accounts 317</p>
<p>#15: Make a List of Outreach Contacts 317</p>
<p>#16: Build a List of Keywords to Target in Search Engines 318</p>
<p>#17: Set Targets for the Next 12 Months 318</p>
<p>#18: Plug into Moz Analytics 319</p>
<p>Meet the Authors 321</p>
<p>Index 325</p>