Category: News

For the full story: https://www.otbsports.com/american-football/college-football-classic-economic-hit-1068218

On a weekend where the Aer Lingus College Football Classic was due to take place in Dublin’s Aviva Stadium, OTB’s Saturday Panel including our own MD Kevin Moore, considered the negative impact the absence of a game has had on the Irish economy.

In a year where the uncertain spread of coronavirus quickly put a halt to sporting activity the world over, the cancellation of the Aer Lingus College Football Classic was one sporting casualty among many.

An event that sees two of America’s College football teams play out a competitive tie in Dublin’s Aviva Stadium, the scheduled game in 2020 between Notre Dame and Navy was set to be the first in a multi-game series.

Although that is now set to be put back one year where the players and fans of Nebraska and Illinois will travel to Dublin, Padraic O’Kane, one of the key organisers behind the College Football Classic, admitted to Off The Ball that without a vaccine even this game in 2021 will be in jeopardy.

With the sheer number of people it attracts to Ireland, however, the absence of this game of American football played on Irish soil will have a telling economic impact.

“There are various estimates that would float around,” remarked Kevin Moore MD of Legacy Communications about the financial boost that the game brings to the Irish economy. “But the benefit to the economy of that Navy vs Notre Dame game [in 2012] was around €100 million. “

In 2014 (Penn State vs UCF) and 2016 (Boston College vs Georgia Tech) two further games took place in Dublin.

Although the main event is carried out over a short period of time, Moore explained that their seriousness to American football fans has great auxiliary benefits.

“It would have been a very wealthy set of Americans who had traveled over and they holidayed around Ireland,” he remarked of the crowd that follows these games.

“In terms of the auxiliary benefits around the game, it was huge. It really is events like this that will help the country get back on track. Everybody is losing out really.”

In a lengthy discussion about the impact of no College Football Classic in 2020, you can watch back Padraic O’Kane and Kevin Moore explain it all in detail here.

Foreward: As an SEO I’ve got a real interest in SEO for Tech/SAAS companies and try to share as much value as I can for people in this industry.

Most of the content I publish for tech companies is around search marketing, but I thought it would be interesting to provide value in a different way for a change.

With this in mind, I was delighted to accept this guest post from Gempool, a specialist tech recruitment agency, on Diversity in a tech workplace.

 

Growing Importance of Diversity within a Tech Workplace

As an employer, especially in today’s market, you want to be known for your all-inclusive approach and perspective when it comes to your tech team. In order to attain equality and cultural diversity within tech, there is a lot of work that still needs to be done.

Companies that do not specifically focus on diversity don’t realise the talent pools they are missing out on and the benefits they carry. It has been proven time and again that an inclusive workforce delivers better outcomes and results.

Today, your entire recruitment process can be impacted based on your approach to diversity. The vast majority of individuals in the market are looking for companies that are aware of the inequality that exists in the industry and are trying to make an effort to bridge this gap.

Along with an improved recruitment process using tools such as Linkedin Recruiter, companies have a greater room for innovation when employing a diverse workforce, as you’re able to engage with individuals with different backgrounds and experiences.

This variety of these perspectives adds unmatched value to a company’s growth. Additionally, an inclusive work environment has led to better engagement and retention rates within organisations.

A culturally diverse workforce adds to the organisation’s success on various levels and any organisation that does not acknowledge its importance is going to be missing out!

 

How can you as a tech employer create a diverse workforce?

• Voice your support on diversity and deliver

While applying for jobs all potential candidates are looking for a promising stand from their potential employer regarding diversity. It is key to address this from the very beginning via a job description that not only states the company’s commitment to diversity but voices it through all the points.

Show your potential talent pool that you’re a welcoming, collaborative, and friendly workplace who appoints individuals based on the skills they are able to bring to the table over any other factor.

Download our guide on writing a gender-diverse job description to help with your recruitment efforts.

• Make way for training

One of the biggest barriers that create inequality within the workforce is the confidence gap that exists between individuals. The best way to overcome this issue is by providing candidates with the opportunity to learn and develop their skills.

For example: In our own personal recruitment process we decided to shine a light on the training provided which encouraged more people to apply. Outlining the ability to learn on the job broke the confidence barrier that people generally tend to have while entering a new field of work, which in-turn widened the pool of candidates available to us.

• Ensure equal pay

Providing both men and women with the same opportunity should be the norm for any company. As an employer, if you’re able to demonstrate that you are trying to eliminate this gap and present your employees with similar pay and benefits, the level of talent you’ll be able to attract will grow.

While looking for work, people tend to look into the company brand and the associations attached to it since they look for qualities they resonate with. So, as an employer to be successful in today’s recruitment market it would be essential to get the right associations, and to be known as the employer supporting equal pay. This would essentially make you the employer of choice.

• Root out unconscious bias

Unconscious bias exists within everyone and is far more difficult to root out as it is predominantly based on the previous experiences of individuals.

As an employer, there are many ways you can eliminate these issues. A few examples to get you started are:

• Developing training programs
• Using Artificial Intelligence for your recruitment efforts
• Arranging ongoing sessions to discuss issues and deal with them consistently
• Understand your biases and make a conscious effort to overcome them

• Encourage returners

Be more receptive towards those individuals who took a career break, but still have an exceptional skill set, apt background, and the knowledge to get the work done.

We see many times within tech that women often take a career break, but look to return after a point. As an employer dipping into this pool of talent can only help you reach a winder candidate network that can benefit your organisation in the long run.

Leave no stone unturned, look for talent from all walks of life. The more inclusive atmosphere you can create within your organisation, the great levels of success you will be able to achieve.

We understand that the big changes cannot happen overnight, rather it is a series of steps. The main takeaway from this should be that you need to start now because diversity and inclusion are quickly becoming the focus within the tech recruitment industry. There’s a huge pool of talent for you as an employer to tap into.

If you would like any further information regarding the current tech market insights, we would be happy to share our knowledge with you. You can get in touch by emailing us at info@gempool.ie.

 

Although it’s a million miles from the truth, I recently ranked myself as the “best looking guy in Ireland”, the “most handsome man in Ireland” and many more variants. In the below video tutorial I take you through all the steps I took to rank in Google images:

Full tutorial can be viewed here: How To Rank Images In Google Search – YouTube

 

Who is the most handsome man in Ireland?

Mícheál Brennan is the most handsome man in Ireland (at least in his own imagination anyway). Forget the likes of Colin Farrell, Michael Fassbender, Cillian Murphy & Barry Keoghan, Mícheal Brennan is without a doubt the best looking man in Ireland. A legend in his own underpants, he’s got it all, intelligence, wit, charm, height, great natural hair, a jawline that looks like it was chiselled by Michelangelo himself (or so he thinks, but leave him off, he’s harmless enough).

In this experiment I’m going to try and rank myself in Google images as the most handsome man in the entire country using white hat SEO. I’m not going to reveal exactly how I did it just yet, at this stage I’m just going to prove that I can do it.

Across the world, Irish men are known for being tall and good looking. I’m neither of which! Actors like Jonathan Rhys-Myers, Michael Fassbender, Colin Farrell et al literally have women (and men) falling at their feet. But I’m going to prove that I’m better looking than all of them. I mean if google says it, it must be true!

 

Handsome Irish Men

So there I am, without doubt, one of the most handsome Irish men on the planet.

5 foot 9, thinning hair, skinny wrists, a crooked smile and a head the size of an Easter Island statue… What’s not to love?

This picture is from nearly 4 years ago, so don’t worry ladies, I’ve lost plenty of hair and gained plenty of weight since then!

But who cares, I’m one of the most handsome men in Ireland, and Google is going to prove it! I might even do a Jimmy Kimmel on it and start a Handsome men’s club for other handsome Irish guys just like me.

 

Good looking Irish Men

Did you know that I also top the list of good looking Irish men? So not only am I one of the most handsome Irish Men, I’m also part of an elite clique of good looking Irish men.

You think when someone Google’s “good looking Irish guy”, they had Mícheál Brennan in mind? I doubt it very much!

But never the less Google is going to go ahead and cut me some slack by putting me at the top of the first page when someone searches for Good looking Irish Men

I mean when you think of good looking Irish guys, you would be forgiven for thinking lads like Rob Sheehan, Jamie Dornan or maybe even Liam Neeson would be topping the image results.

And maybe they will be, but the best part is that with this experiment, I’ll be right in there with them.

Some really good looking Irish men, and me among them, a seriously, good looking man from Ireland! Haha!

 

Best looking Irish Man

Did you know that I’m also the best looking Irish man? This might come as a surprise to many (including my wife), but she is married to the best looking man in Ireland.

I mean, how lucky is she? Nearly 6 million people on the Island of Ireland, not sure how many of them are men, but if it’s 50/50, then that’s 3 million Irish lads, and she is lucky enough to be married to the best looking Irish man!

The best looking man on the island of Ireland. What a catch! All 185 lb’s of me!

Literally the best looking man on the island of Ireland, Google doesn’t get these things wrong. Wonder how many people are going to slide into my DM’s now.

 

Handsome Irish Men Club. Population – 1. Founder & Chairman:

 

A Gallery Of The Most Handsome Man In Ireland, Wearing Variations Of The Same Style Shirt!

Over 60 million businesses in the world have Facebook pages. Of these 60 million, 4 million are actively advertising on the platform, and that number continues to rise with each passing day.

But what is a little more difficult to decipher is how many of those businesses are marketing effectively on the platform. In order to utilize Facebook to its fullest potential, having a finely tuned marketing funnel is a must. But how do you set one up? How do you implement it? That is the focus of this blog.

Here we share the most important elements of a Facebook advertising funnel that brings ROI and gets your customers taking action.

The Pixel is Paramount
A Facebook Pixel is a tool that allows you to measure the effectiveness of your advertising. Without it, measuring the impact of your marketing efforts becomes much more tedious and much less definitive. Your Pixel allows you to see how many people interact with your ads at each point along your funnel, and also allows you to group these people into categories that you can later retarget with additional advertisements. For more information about how to set up a Facebook Pixel, see this article from Facebook.

Value-Added Content

Once your Facebook Pixel is set up, it is time to start thinking about what you can offer to potential customers. What can you share with your audience that will benefit them and strengthen their trust in your brand? Remember, this content shouldn’t promote the ultimate sales offer you want to make. This content is purely educational or entertaining, with no obligation or commitment required. All you want is your audience to engage with this content so that their information is gathered by your Pixel. Once that information is collected, you can then begin targeting this audience specifically with further content. Some great ideas for value-added content are:

• How-To Guides
• White Papers
• Free Webinars
• E-Books
• Informative Videos
• Free resources

Whatever form of content you choose, its primary purpose should be to educate, inform, and raise awareness amongst your target audience. Avoid making these initial pieces of content too “sales-y”. Now is not the time to sell. Now is the time to warm up your cold audience, expose them to your brand, and gently introduce the solutions you offer.

Nourish Your Pixel

When your content is finalized and you are happy with how it represents your business, it’s time to share it. It is recommended to share this content with your warm audience first (people who like your Facebook page, your client list, etc.) but you can also send it out to a targeted audience based on your ideal customer. For example, if you are a business that sells infant clothing, you could promote your content to women from the ages of 21 to 40 who are parents of new-borns.

At this stage, it is important to split-test your Facebook ads, showing them to various target audiences. This is essential because it will allow you to find which audience takes the most action. You may discover that 40 per cent of your sales come from young mothers aged 21 to 30. In this case, it would make more sense to drive your advertisements to this group.

But that’s not it! Once you have narrowed down your highest converting audience, you can then build a Lookalike Audience.

Pull quote: “Facebook’s Lookalike Audiences feature allows you to find more customers who share the same traits as your most valuable current customers.”

A Lookalike Audience is one of the most powerful ways to reach new customers who are already likely to buy from you. By targeting these people with more value-added content, you get them into your funnel – exactly where you want them to be.

From Interested to Opt-In

This is a crucial step in your Facebook marketing strategy. It isn’t enough to simply pull quality leads into your funnel; you have to motivate them to act. How do you that? You make them a special offer that they can take advantage of in exchange for minimal commitment. The latter part of that sentence is critical. Your audience, while aware of your brand, may not be ready to invest all of their trust in your brand or make a purchase. So, you want to make your offer easily attainable, with as few barriers as possible. If you present these potential clients with long forms to complete or multiple steps to take, they will likely close out of their browser. Make it simple!

One of the easiest opt-in steps is entering an email address. For example, you could offer a limited edition E-book to your audience, requesting only that they enter their email to receive the download link. This is what is referred to as a micro-commitment; a small step that your audience takes that moves them closer to your brand.

Take time to determine what your opt-in offer will be. What is a small issue that you can solve for your target audience? What will they find most valuable? What is the simplest way to offer it to them?

Re-establish Trust

Not everyone who initially entered your funnel will opt-in right away. But there are steps you can take to increase the likelihood of your audience taking the next step. The most impactful way of all is to re-establish trust with those who have interacted with your content in the past.

How do you do this? The possibilities are endless. One method is to share testimonials from satisfied clients or share statistics about the success you have seen thus far. This reaffirms your brand with your warm audience, establishing credibility and providing tangible evidence they can use to base their buying decision on.

Creating ads with these confirming elements and targeting them at the people who have not yet opted in to your offer is one of the most fruitful ways to move potential customers further into your funnel.

Play Hard Ball

Now that you have ran several retargeting ads and nourished your Pixel with a substantial amount of data, it’s time to do what you set out to do from the beginning: sell. This is the time to make your core offer. Build captivating ads with conversion-focused copy, and begin sending them out to your funnel.

Your Pixel will capture the information of anyone who makes it to this step. If an audience member completes this step (whether its registering for a webinar, purchasing a product, or contacting your business), they are now a part of your client list! A valuable list of people whose information you have collected (including phone number, email address, profile and more).

If the user completes the action to take advantage of your core offer, they move into your customer funnel.

If the user does not complete the action, you continue with your efforts to convince them to act.

Sweeten the Pot

You will have users who visit your core offer page but do not act on it. That is okay! There are several ways to motivate these users to return to complete the action, including:

• Offering an additional benefit – For example: Book within the next 3 days and receive a promo code for 10% off the price.
• Retargeting with client-focused ads: For example: We noticed that you did not complete your registration. Don’t miss out on this informative class! Register today.
• Entering these users into an email drip campaign follow up and continue exposing them to your products and brand.
• Offer a free trial of your product for a limited time.

There are an unlimited number of creative ways to entice people to return and act upon your offer. The most important thing is that you continue to track them, targeting specifically to those who have not yet acted.

To learn more about how to exclude people who have acted on your offer to ensure you only advertise to those who have not, see this article by MuteSix.

Mind Your Manners

Your mother probably told you to always say thank you. All these years later, you should still be listening to her! One of the most counterproductive mistakes you can make in your Facebook marketing funnel is to lead people through your entire funnel, only to forget to show your appreciation!

Sending a thank-you email or having a thank-you landing page can turn your customers into brand ambassadors for your company. If customers feel valued and respected by you, they are more likely to share their positive experience, and since customer reviews are the most influential pieces of marketing material you can have, you want this to happen!

After you have made your customers feel appreciated, it is the perfect time to ask them to share their experience. You can ask them to:

• Leave a Google Review of your business
• Rate your business on Facebook
• Like your Facebook page
• Follow you on other social media accounts
• Share your offer with their friends
• And more!

Keep Your Audiences Organized

For each action that an audience can take, a custom audience should be created. For example, if one of the steps within your Facebook funnel is for people to subscribe to your blog, a custom Facebook audience should be created called “Blog Subscribers”. If one of the actions you want your audience to take is to visit a specific page on your website, a custom audience should be created called “People who have visit (insert web page link here)”.

Check out this article from Adspresso for a fantastic straight-forward guide to creating custom audiences.

You’ll be thankful when you move on to your next advertising campaign that all of your custom audiences are saved neatly within Facebook and that you can target ads to them with just a simple click!

Put Your Results to Good Use

The benefit of a dynamic Facebook funnel like the one we’ve described is that it allows you to follow your customers through each step of the buying process and determine where your successes are, and what parts need to be improved on. Because your funnel is laid out, your Pixels are set up, and your funnel path is clear, you no longer have to guess where you lost a potential buyer or what is preventing people from opting in.

The more you use your funnel, the more you can fine-tune it for optimum conversion. And the best part? You can use your funnel structure for years to come! All that is required to begin a new campaign to your target audience is switching out the content.

Facebook offers a variety of tools so you can monitor your advertising efforts. We recommend using the following:

• Ads Reporting
• Audience Outcomes
• Cross-publisher reach reporting
• Conversion Reporting
• Conversion Lift
• Brand Lift

Facebook has a page dedicated to these tools and how to utilize them. It goes without saying that the more conclusive data you draw from running your funnel, the better oiled your marketing machine becomes. Without monitoring, it is difficult to know which parts of your funnel you can trim, which parts you should build upon, or when to adjust your direction.

BONUS TIP 1:

Eventually, when your Facebook funnel has been optimized to its fullest potential, you can implement Facebook Automated Rules. This advanced advertising feature from Facebook allows your funnels to run the way you want them to, without your constant oversight!

By setting automated rules, you can:

• Turn off adverts, ad sets or campaigns at a specific time or date
• Send a notification (but not take any action)
• Adjust the budget up or down
• Adjust the manual bid up or down
• And more!

This provides businesses with a safety net when it comes to advertising on the Facebook platform, an especially beneficial bonus for businesses that run multiple funnels and advertising campaigns at a time.

You can even have multiple rule sets for one campaign! For example, if you wanted to increase the bid amount for ad sets that are performing well, while simultaneously lowering the big amount for ad sets that are under performing, and also pause ads that aren’t converting, you add each of these rules into your rule set and they would all be applied.

With a perfected funnel and carefully automated rules, the potential is endless. It’s not impossible that you could sit back and watch customers move through your funnel, all while being hands off.

Bonus Tip 2:

You can use free and inexpensive tools to create your ads. Websites like Pikwizard offer thousands of royalty free images that are completely free to download and use in your ads. If you are creating image ads on a budget, freemium tools like Design Wizard can help you create awesome professional images to use in your ads, you can even choose a free image that you like from Pikwizard and edit it in Design Wizard.

We’ll stop this article here, since you’re probably day-dreaming about all the things you could do with the time you’d save!

 

Google has never been more powerful than it is now. Its algorithm is complicated, yet sophisticated and refined, allowing the major search engine to weed out spam, organize data, and rank websites with an unprecedented efficiency. Unfortunately, each time Google improves its algorithm, it becomes harder for business owners to rank their websites and secure the traffic they need. So, how do you crack the code?

One of the most common misconceptions about SEO is that it is a one-time fix. SEO is not a one-size-fits-all checklist that business owners can complete and immediately see results. Much like a sailboat must constantly adjust to the wind, SEO requires consistent monitoring and tuning to produce ideal results. Google rewards businesses that repeatedly optimize their sites, proving their credibility and building a longstanding history of “doing the right thing”.

There are an endless number of things Google considers when validating your business. From link-building to HTML code corrections to content development. But how do business owners determine which techniques will create tangible results and result in more hard conversions? This blog aims to answer that question.

1. Website Structure

When websites are in the conception phase, it can be tempting to want to build pages and create content that appeals to every possible user that may come to your site. However, if the scope of your site is too broad, it can work against you. When search engines like Google crawl through a website, they want to find the most relevant information as quickly as possible. Websites optimized for search engines need to be constructed in a specific way for this to happen. There are two ways to achieve this:

Physical Silos

A physical silo is a pre-determined content hierarchy for your site. The highest point in the hierarchy should always be the homepage. From the homepage, users should be directed to your key silo categories. For example, if you own a carpet cleaning company, your key silo categories might be “Residential”, “Commercial”, “Restoration”, “About Us” and “Blog”. Once your silo categories are determined, you then begin building content-rich pages under each category that search engines will be able to easily locate. The more specific and keyword dense these pages are, the more favourably Google and other search engines will see them.

Link-based Silos

How you link pages together within your website can either help Google find the content it needs, or hinder it. If pages that are relevant to one another are linked appropriately, creating a consistent flow of information, search engines will find what they need to rank your website well. However, if crawlers go through your site only to be directed to dead-end links, or to sub-pages that do not support their category, your rankings will suffer.

It can be time consuming to restructure your website, fix broken links, or create additional content for link building, but in the long run your analytics will show the benefits. Bounce rates will lessen, conversion rates will increase, and your rankings will improve. Link based silo’s can be essential for ecommerce SEO because it’s unlikely that you are going to be able to get someone to link directly to one of your product pages, without violating Google’s Guidelines. Creating great content that naturally attracts links is the way to go, because you can then link to your own product pages from these heavily linked content pages and funnel the authority all the way through so that your product pages rank on page one.

2. Quality Links

If you own a business that relies heavily on the function of your website, you have probably heard of backlinks. Backlinks are links from other locations on the internet that bring users to your website. For example, if your business is featured in an online article from a local newspaper and they link to your website, that is a backlink for your business.

It is common for marketing agencies or business owners to pay for backlinks. However, Google explicitly states that buying backlinks to improve your online rankings goes against their guidelines.

This is why creating quality content on your website that gains attention organically is the best way to build backlinks. How do you do that? There are several ways:

Link Roundups
Many bloggers and content creators on the Internet will post “link roundup” articles on their sites. They may do this each month or each week, depending on how frequently they post. In these articles, they will link out to all of their favourite articles, resources, and websites so their readers can check them out. If you produce quality content that is of value to the publisher of a link roundup, they may include your link! You can search for link roundup articles on the web and then look for the contact information of the person who shared it. They may be looking for something to share and you could be it!

Guest Posting
Many blogs and websites invite others to write for them, this is referred to as a guest post. This is a fantastic way to get your name out there! Look for websites that are active within your niche and then see if they offer writing opportunities. Be sure to approach sites with an article or pitch already in mind, and always send a few links to other articles you have written. If they find your content valuable, they should have no problem a link back to your site in the post.

Claiming Unlinked Mentions
You could have backlink opportunities that already exist and not know it. It is not uncommon for websites, blogs, and social media accounts to share your content without linking back to your site. This isn’t typically intentional; they just may not have known your URL or where the original content came from. You can find these unclaimed mentions using tools like Google Alerts to track your name and brand online. When you appear, reach out to whoever shared your content and politely request that they link back to your site. Most people are more than happy to make the adjustment!

3. Word Count

Did you know that the average word count for all of Google’s top-ranking websites is 1,980 words? Content matters, and the more high-quality, focused content you have, the more likely your website is to appear at the top of search engines.

When you write longer content about a specific topic on your website, the more likely you are to include relevant keywords and information that your audience is looking for. What does this mean for you? Google likes information that users find helpful. The more targeted and fine-tuned your content is, the more people will find it and read it, and the more Google will recognize it.

Not sure how to focus your content and include keywords that are pertinent to your audience? Try using keyword generator sites like www.lsigraph.com or www.moz.com/explorer. Simply type in a phrase that appears in your website frequently, like “carpet cleaning”. Then watch as common keywords related to your search appear! It’s that easy.

AI copy writing tools can also help you achieve to desired word count. to be honest, some of them have gotten so good that you don’t even need to edit them, check out this review of Closersopy vs Jarvis to get a full rundown of the best tools.

4. Mobile Optimization

One of Google’s most recent algorithm updates made sure that websites that are optimized for mobile users saw a boost in rankings when searched for from a mobile device. With mobile searches steadily increasing year over year for Google, the search engine giant wants to ensure that websites that are making the effort to be mobile-friendly are easily located for those using the platform.

How can you make sure your website is optimized for mobile use? Invest in responsive design. Google has several tools for testing the responsiveness of websites and the more you have, the more power Google will give your site.

Below are some of the responsive elements Google looks for when ranking your site:

• Flash – Many mobile browsers are not flash compatible. Google wants to see websites using more up-to-date technology for video content.
• Font size – If your website does not automatically scale the size of the font on your website, users must zoom in and out. Google sees this as an inconvenience for your viewers.
• Touch elements – If buttons, links, etc on your website are too close to one another, people will find it difficult to click on them without accidentally clicking on another element. Google wants all clickable elements on your page to be distinct and distanced from one another for optimum user experience.
• Pop-ups – Full screen pop ups are an inconvenience to mobile users. They slow down loading speeds and create a barrier between your viewer and the content they are looking to find. Google penalizes mobile sites with frequent pop-ups.

Optimizing your site to adhere to these guidelines will increase your ranking performance for mobile searchers and result in more mobile users finding your site. An excellent way to gain new visitors and reach your target audiences while they are on the move!

Did you know that you can also do mobile keyword research? It’s true. Desktop keywords and mobile keywords differ, and knowing the difference could make all the difference for your website. The more you implement mobile keywords into your website, the more your site will appear at the top of mobile searches.

So how are mobile keywords different from desktop keywords?

• Mobile keywords are shorter – People have less time to type when they are on the go. Your mobile keywords should always be less than three words. For example, on a desktop computer a user might search “Full service nail salons in Boston”, but from their mobile device might only type “Nail salons Boston”. To think mobile, you should always think concise.
• Mobile keywords include location – Since users are often on the move when they search from their phone, they are usually looking for businesses that are close to them. Apps like Google Maps are used frequently on mobile devices, so including keywords that let people know where you are located is always beneficial. For example, you might want to optimize your site for “Coffee shop in West Toronto” or “Coffee shop on 97th Street”.
• Mobile keywords include voice searches – When people use their cell phones, they often use voice software like Siri or Cortana to search. However, people speak differently when they speak than when they type. For example, questions are much more common from mobile devices than desktop. People frequently say things like “Siri, where is the nearest gas station?” rather than “Gas station”. You may want to consider adding questions to your keywords to optimize for mobile!

5. Video Integration

Video is one of the fastest growing online content forms, and there is no sign of it slowing anytime soon. If you aren’t already using video on your website, you may want to start developing a strategy. Videos account for 62 per cent of all Google searches, according to Marketing Land. That’s a huge portion of the Google pie!

When you record a video for your website, following these simple steps will boost your ranking results:

• Upload your video to YouTube – This is one way to guarantee that Google will index your video, since YouTube is owned by Google.
• Embed your video on your site – Since users who watch your video on YouTube won’t necessarily visit your website, you want to include your video on your site. When someone watches the video on your website, Google sees those views and includes them in the total tally of views on your video. Of course, the higher your views, the more credit Google gives your site!
• Make your title searchable – Google considers your headline above all else when it comes to what terms are being used to find your video. Use long-tail keywords if possible, then always make sure your video title and description match those keywords.
  Again, SEO is an ever-evolving strategy that requires steady, continuous monitoring. What works today may not necessarily work tomorrow. However, building a strong SEO foundation for your website by applying the tips above will mean you have more to build upon when further tactics are required.

The goal of every business should be to send as many positive indicators to Google and other search engines as possible. The longer your site is operating with a high number of indications working in it’s favor, the more it will gain momentum and yield positive results. When Google changes its algorithm, some of your indicators may turn off, but your business will still be in a better position to repair these hits than websites that have not yet implemented these steps.

Which leads us to our bonus tip! Always track your analytics closely. Watch how your keywords are performing, check bounce rates and click-through rates. When you make changes, set goals that will indicate how well your methods are working. Keep up to date with Google changes and keep your ear to the ground. Sometimes, there are valid reasons for dips in performance. Other times, the reasons will not be as clear. The only way to know for certain is to keep close tabs on your numbers.

At Legacy Communications, we focus on driving traffic to your website. But unfortunately, traffic alone isn’t enough to help your business grow. For example, if your website isn’t mobile optimized, 60% of mobile users will leave without contacting you and they’ll move on to your competitors. To take advantage of your website traffic, you need to focus on making it easy for your website visitors to convert into leads or sales for your business. This process is called conversion rate optimization or CRO for short and the building blocks for CRO are 100% rooted in the design. A nice user focused design will help your website visitors easily understand what your website is about, it will guide them along a path which ultimately ends with them converting into a lead or a sale depending on your business. Creating a good user experience or UX, will mean that your website visitors are happy to give you their contact details, so you can call them with more information about your service. In E-commerce it will mean that they have all of the information they need, to go ahead and buy from your site. Not all of us are designers, but that doesn’t mean we can’t think like designers to help improve our websites user experience. To help you think like a designer, we wanted to share this awesome infographic from Brighton Based Web Design Agency Major Digital. The infographic itself is beautifully designed (which is a good indication as to their credentials) and it covers the 5 key stages of design thinking: Empathy, Define, Ideate, Prototype & Test. Check it out below and feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments section.

“I’ve set up my business, I’ve set up a professional email address, I’ve built my website and I post new articles regularly. I’m active on social media. And, I’m trying to keep up with SEO best practices. Why don’t I see any result?”

There’s many reasons that you need to have a digital marketing plan for your small business, in fact here’s 10 reasons you must use digital marketing. But in spite of this a lot of the small business owners we talk to feel that, in spite of their efforts, the needle doesn’t seem to be moving. The problem in most cases is that they don’t have a clear plan of action. They have a vague idea of what they want to achieve (more customers, more sales, or more engagement,) they know what tactics they need (blog content, social media posts, search engine optimization) but they don’t have a tactical plan.

According to a recent study, 46% of companies don’t have a defined digital marketing strategy while 16% of them have a strategy but have yet to implement it into their marketing activities.

Here’s the thing: whether you are a local maid service or multi million dollar company, if you don’t have a clear plan in place, then how can you expect to grow. Without a strategy, you’re just throwing darts in the dark hoping that something will stick. This approach is not only time-consuming but also extremely ineffective.

So, here’s how to create a digital marketing strategy blueprint for your small business.

Let’s roll!

 

Develop Buyer Personas

Whether your business is online or offline, the first thing you need to establish is who you are selling to. A lot of small business owners treat this aspect superficially and only have a generalized profile of their target audience. But, the best online marketing strategies are built upon detailed buyer personas.

A buyer persona is a representation of your ideal customer. You can create these detailed profiles by surveying, researching, and interviewing your audience. The advantage, businesses that use buyer personas have is clear: every action they take is based on precise, accurate data instead of just making assumptions about what prospects want.

Here is some of the key information you need to focus on to create buyer personas:

Demographic Information

• Location: Use Google Analytics to identify where most of your traffic is coming from;
• Age: This variable is not always relevant. Gather data from your existing customer database to identify any relevant trends;
• Income: This information will help you come up with a better pricing strategy;

Psychographic Information

• Goals: Depending on the problem your product/service is solving, you probably have an idea of the goals your audience is trying to achieve. However, it’s better to cement your hypothesis by speaking to customers;
• Challenges: Determine the challenges your audience faces when trying to accomplish their goals;
• Interests: Knowing your customers’ hobbies, you can create content that sparks their interest;

 

Establish Your Goals & Identify the Tools You’ll Need to Achieve Them

One of the main reasons small businesses struggle to grow is that they don’t have clear marketing goals. They have an idealistic vision of what they want to achieve, but no plan of getting there.

Keep in mind that your marketing goals must be aligned with your business ones. For example, if your business goal is to increase online revenue by 25%, your marketing goal should be to generate 50% more leads via your website or e-commerce store.

Another great tip for an effective digital marketing strategy is to ensure that your goals are SMART – specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and timely.

 

Determine What Differentiates You

Understanding who your audience and competition are is one thing. Figuring out how to connect with your audience and differentiate yourself from your competition is an entirely different story.

While your sales reps might know how to approach prospects and send the right message to them, is your online marketing team able to do the same with content?

Analyze, practice, and document the ways you can position your content to engage with prospects online and make it clear to them why they should choose you instead of your competition.

Here are some of the main questions you should ask yourself in this process:

• What type of consumers are you targeting?
• Who is the decision maker? (for example, sippy cups are for kids, but the buyer is the parent)
• What are the challenges they face that you can help them solve?
• What benefits can they enjoy from choosing you?
• How is your solution different from your competitors?

Find out Where Your Audience Lives Online

You know who your audience is and what type of content you need to create to connect with them. Now, the obvious question should be: where do you publish this content?

Look at everything from blogs and websites to social media and forums. Create a list of potential places where your audience might be. Then, focus your attention on these mediums.

For example, it would be a waste of time, money, and energy to create content for Twitter when the majority of your audience is active on Instagram.

Create a Content Calendar

One of the biggest errors small business owners make is that they jump into content creation without creating a plan first. Most of them rush into this step because it makes them feel as if they’ve accomplished something. However, the results will be insignificant if you haven’t dedicated the proper time to do your research.

Look at your goals and establish the appropriate course of action that could help you achieve them.

Let’s say that your marketing goal is to get 50 qualified leads per month. Now, ask yourself: how many articles do I need to write to make this happen? How many lead generation offers, such as whitepapers and e-books should I use?

Another important aspect you should analyze is the best time for publishing your content and the ideal length for your article.

Create a “Promotions Plan”

Your job isn’t ready the moment you hit the “Publish” button. Now, it’s time to focus on promoting your content.

More than two million blog posts are written every day, so you need to help your target audience find you. Share your content on social media to drive them to your site and persuade them to sign up or buy your products. Create videos that drive engagement and capture your audiences attention. It’s a great idea to create a storyboard for your video, Design Wizard has a nifty storyboard creator that makes it really easy. For the offline audience, use custom QR codes to take them online and direct them to your site to boost traffic.

Implement a task management system

A task management system can help your team remain more productive and get stuff done much quicker. With a solid task management system in place, you never have the excuse that “I didn’t know you needed me to do that” or “that’s not my job”, because task management software will show everyone on the team the exact task that they need to complete and the date they need to complete it by. Nifty has put together a really great list of the best task management systems for small businesses that is well worth checking out, to help you find the best system for you.

In a Nutshell

Phew! Finally, you’ve got to the end. There’s a lot of work you need to do if you want to set yourself up for success. So, keep these key points in mind when you’re building your digital marketing strategy.

How To Set Up Google AdWords Campaigns In 2023 With 10 Easy Steps [Infographic] + Step-By-Step Guide

If you run a business, you understand that it lives and dies by it’s ability to attract new customers. One tried and tested way of attracting new customers is through Google AdWords. Unlike an SEO campaign which can be slow to gain traction, an AdWords campaign can bring results pretty much instantly.

But there is many things to learn to make sure your AdWords campaign is attracting relevant traffic and not just tossing your entire budget down the drain. In this article we have put together the steps we take when setting up a new Google AdWords campaign and we have summarized it in an infographic, but on top of that we have also included a more detailed step by step guide using the example of a lawyer based in Manchester, New Hampshire. We hope that you enjoy this article and that it teaches you how to set up Google AdWords campaigns in 10 easy steps!

 

If you have never created an AdWords campaign before, then the first thing you are going to want to do is go over to adwords.google.com and sign up for an account.

Once you have signed up for your account you will be greeted by the following screen prompting you to create your first campaign.

You are going to want to skip this part so that you can do your keyword research and give yourself the best possible chance of creating a great campaign. For the keyword research you will use google’s keyword planner tool. At the top of the screen click on “tools” and then click on keyword planner. This tool is really great as it allows you to find out how many people search for the keywords that you think of yourself as well as suggesting other keywords that are highly searched.

In the keyword planner tool you will want to choose “search for new keywords using a phrase, website or category.”

At this stage when I’m creating a new campaign, I try and think of keywords that I would Google myself when searching for the service or product on offer, so bearing in mind that this campaign is for a general law firm in Manchester, New Hampshire, here are some of the keywords that I would probably google when searching for legal services in Manchester.

Attorney Manchester

Manchester attorney

Manchester lawyer

Lawyer Manchester

Family lawyer Manchester

Elder law attorney Manchester

Personal injury lawyer Manchester

Personal injury attorney Manchester

Wills lawyer Manchester

Business lawyer Manchester

Tax lawyer Manchester

Construction lawyer Manchester

Criminal lawyer Manchester

Criminal law attorney Manchester

Family law attorney Manchester

Immigration law attorney Manchester

Patent attorney Manchester

Real estate lawyer Manchester

Real estate attorney Manchester.

Trust lawyer Manchester

Estate attorney Manchester

If your firm specializes in one area of the law then you would only search for keywords related to that area, so for example if you were a real estate lawyer then the keywords would all be real estate related like “real estate attorney” “real estate lawyer” etc. The reason the keywords I have chosen are so broad is because my fictitious law firm practice in all areas of the law and want to attract clients from all of these areas.

I will paste my keywords into the “your product or service” field and choose the geographical area I am targeting (Manchester, NH) . Then click “get ideas

When you click on get ideas you will be greeted with ad group idea’s, I usually switch to “keyword ideas” as it gives me an idea of how many people search for the individual keywords I came up with myself, as well as suggesting other keywords.

Now I can see how many monthly searches there are in Manchester for my own keywords.

And the tool will also suggest similar keywords that I may not have thought of to use in my campaign. The reason you want to do this is simple, You might come up with your own list of keywords, but if no-one is searching for them then you will never drive traffic to your website, so it’s best to know from the beginning, the highest searched keywords so that you can get your law firm in front of more prospective clients on google.

You can download the entire list of suggested keywords by clicking on download and choose excel csv.

On the excel spreadsheet that downloads there are some columns that I view as important and some that I like to get rid of. The columns I like to keep are “keywords” “average monthly search” “competition” and “suggested bids”.

At this point I will delete the other columns so that my spreadsheet looks like this:

Then I will sort the spreadsheet, by highlighting the average monthly search volume column and sorting it from largest to smallest, so that I can see the highest searched keywords. You can see what the excel sheet looks like at this stage by clicking on “Keyword Planner after sorting largest to smallest” (Downloads my excel file). Not every word in this excel spreadsheet is good for a law firm to use so now I sift through the list and delete anything that isn’t relevant. It’s possible that there are more time effective ways of doing this, but this is how I like to do it as I feel that it leaves no stone unturned. At this stage I simply look through the entire list, eyeball it and highlight any keywords that are relevant so that I can use them in my campaign. This will leave me with an excel sheet looking like this:

I’ll then go through and delete the rows that I haven’t selected for my campaign so that I am left with the keywords for my campaign. You can view my excel sheet by clicking on this link Keyword Planner after sorting so that it is only relevant keywords now (downloads my excel)

Now what an amateur would probably do at this stage is just throw all of these keywords into one campaign with one adgroup, but you want to create adgroups with relevant keywords so that you can get a higher quality score and pay less per click. (You can learn more ways to lower your cost per click here) In other words keywords related to family law would have their own adgroup, as would keywords related to personal injury and so on and so forth. Again there is probably a more time effective way of doing this but I like to organise them into my adgroups on the excel spread sheet, so I physically drag the keywords into relevant groups. After sorting I have now got some specific adgroups with really great long tail keywords. Here are the adgroups I’ve created in this campaign:

Manchester Lawyers

Manchester Attorneys

Manchester Law Firms

Personal injury attorneys

Personal injury lawyers

Immigration lawyers

Divorce lawyers

Family lawyers

Divorce attorney

Estate planning attorney

Employment law

Manchester Legal services

Real estate lawyer

Real estate attorney

And you can download my list by clicking on this link – Keyword Planner after sorting into ad groups (Downloads my excel file)

The reason you split your keywords into relevant ad groups is so that the ads you create for each ad group are more relevant to what the person searches for, which will increase your chance of getting a click for that keyword. To give you an example, if someone googles “personal injury attorney Manchester” they are much more likely to click on an ad that contains the words “personal injury attorney Manchester”, rather than an ad that talks about a family law attorney in Manchester. Having relevant ad groups will also improve your quality score meaning that you can show up higher on the page and pay less per click than your competitors will.

Now that I have completed my keyword research I will go ahead and create my campaign. To do this click on “campaigns at the top of the screen and you will be greeted by this screen.

Click on create your first campaign and then you will see this screen.

The type of campaign you want to create is “search network only” and you should select “all features” rather than standard. Name your campaign and start setting up the campaign by first of all choosing the location you want to target with your ads.

For bid strategy choose “I’ll manually set bids for my clicks” and enter your default bid, your daily budget should be your monthly budget divided by 30.4, so if I wanted to spend $1,000 a month on AdWords, my daily budget would be $32.89 ($1,000 divided by 30.4) from here skip the other options and scroll down and click “save and continue.”

The next screen will prompt you to create your first ad group and you will use the keywords and ad groups you created earlier to build your campaign. In this case I am going to start with Manchester Attorney’s. This guide will help you come up with idea’s to write great ad’s that resonate with your prospective clients, in this case I’m going to keep it simple yet relevant to the ad group. It’s important that the ad is relevant to the keywords in the ad group as this will increase your chance of getting clicks. It’s important to choose a relevant landing page for the ad’s so for example if your ad is about personal injuries then direct the visitor to a page on your website that talks about personal injuries and so on and so forth. If you want to learn more about landing pages and why they are so crucial to PPC campaigns then click here

At this stage is where the amateurs are separated from the pro’s because all of the keywords I have added at this stage are “broad match keywords” and broad match keywords in a search campaign are a recipe for eating up your budget. This article explains keyword match types in more detail, but as a general rule, I never use broad match keywords. They will eat your budget alive with irrelevant clicks. To quickly change the match type of all the keywords, go to the ad group, select all keywords, click “edit” then click on change match types, change broad match keywords to phrase match keywords and hit make changes.

I like to use at least 2 ads per adgroup, in some cases I will add 3 or even 4 ads per adgroup. This way I can test ad copy for clicks and optimise my campaign by learning which ad copy attracts more clicks. To add more ad’s click on ads and then click on the red button “+ad”

Go ahead and add all of the other ad groups that you have created in your earlier keyword research and write relevant ad copy for the ads in each ad group. Then go to your campaign settings and set the ads to “rotate evenly over 90 days and then optimise” or else choose “rotate indefinitely”

Make sure that when you have created all of your ad groups, that all keywords are either phrase match, exact match or broad modifiers. You will now want to go ahead and create some ad extensions so that your ads will really stand out.

At the very least you should add

Sitelink extensions – sitelink extensions explained

Callout extensions – Callout extensions explained

Call extensions – Call extensions explained

Location extensions – Location extensions explained

You can learn more about extensions in this guide

Something else that the pros will do from the offset is add negative keywords to the campaign from the beginning so that your ad doesn’t show up for keywords that won’t bring you any new business, you can click here to download our General Negative Keywords (excel download) and this article details how to add negative keywords to your campaign and why you should add them.

And that’s pretty much it to begin with! If you set your AdWords campaign up in this manner you should get off to really great start and you can be sure that your PPC campaign will be a success! If you want to know how to optimize your campaign going forward, check out our infographic detailing 50 ways to optimize your AdWords campaign.

If you are a lawyer who found this post and want to know how you can improve your AdWords campaign once it’s been set up, then be sure to check out this awesome step by step checklist to generating more leads for your law firm.

What most people don’t realise about Online marketing is that its mostly about traffic. You can design a great site, you can run CRO experiments all day, but your site is nothing without traffic/visitors. One of the most profitable ways of driving traffic to your site is through Google Adwords. You can also drive traffic, with a great SEO service or through social media, but SEO results tend to be much slower to provide an ROI and organic reach from social media is dwindling every day.

If you are new to Google Adwords Management and want to improve account performance, then this infographic is the perfect Adwords optimization bible for you! Once you’ve set up your adwords account, you are going to need to use some of the smartest strategies in the business to optimize it for better results. In the adwords optimization infographic we show you 50 ways that you can optimize your Adwords account, to help you increase Adwords account performance and ultimately get more leads.

From the simple stuff like adding negative keywords, all the way up to more advanced strategies such as “day parting” your bids and “SKAG’s”, this infographic covers some of the very best ways to optimize your campaign performance. But you don’t want to hear any more of my drivel, so check out the infographic below. If you would like to share it with anyone, be sure to shoot us an email and we’ll be happy to send you the original file. Happy optimizing!