Archive for the ‘Organic Search Marketing’ Category
Monday, December 15th, 2008 |
For Immediate Release:
DH Country Music has entered the next stage of its’ own evolution by creating a user-based country music community for both artists and fans. In contrast to many other country music sites, DH allows users to submit and vote for their favorite up and coming artists long before the artist joins a major record label or get featured on a major network or radio conglomerate. And unlike other social networking sites, DH focuses on just country music! No rap, hip-hop, dance or mariachi music to muddle through to get to your home-grown favorites! This means that independent artists can gain greater exposure, reviews and press to help promote themselves, and fans can build a direct connection to those artists!
The DH Country Music Family is, and always will be free to join. Members can upload their own music, videos, pictures, blogs and country music concert tour information. And to celebrate their new community the first 500 members to join will be entered into a raffle for special prizes including new cd’s, apparel, and many other exciting gifts! Once you’ve joined, be sure to invite your friends or visit the badges page to help spread the word! DH encourages all new members to explore the site and use these tools to help bring your favorite artists to light for the rest of the country music community!
DH Country Music began as a simple user forum called Drunken Hillbilly, a leading resource for underground country music. It has since grown into a network of country music sites offering the latest in country music news, country music concerts and country music community services.
bUmp News Contact:
bUmp Interactive - Internet Marketing
Posted in Arizona Internet Marketing Showcase, Organic Search Marketing, Portfolio, social networking | No Comments »
Friday, October 10th, 2008 |
Justifying the benefits and even necessity of a quality organic search engine optimization campaign is something that I find myself doing to the point of exhaustion with almost every new client. SEO is often seen as over-priced with little tangible product to those who are not fluent in its’ practice so the first step to any strong SEO pitch is to educate the client on why organic search engine optimization provides the best ROI (return on investment) of any marketing campaign online or off.
Search Engine Marketing vs. Search Engine Optimization
Search Engine Marketing began as the practice of promoting a website’s visibility through higher natural search engine results listings (achieved through SEO) and paid ad placement and directory inclusions. Over time the organic and paid campaigns have each branched into separate industries of their own, with experts on each side. Both are extremely beneficial and have their pros and cons, so where to invest your online marketing dollar really depends on the goals of the individual client.
Search Engine Marketing as a service focuses more on cost-per-click and paid inclusion campaigns which require ongoing maintenance in order to continue receiving traffic or sales leads. PPC campaigns are competitive and ad placement through ad brokering services are negotiated for set periods of time (ie monthly, quarterly, annually, etc ) before having to be renegotiated. Each normally involves paying a set dollar amount for each click or lead generated through that advertising model and unless properly managed can quickly exhaust a marketing budget.
Search Engine Optimization focuses on using the content and structure of the website itself to be its own advertising engine while avoiding the ongoing cost of an SEM campaign. A quality SEO campaign begins with identifying what the highest volume and most profitable relevant keywords are that individuals would use to find your product or service. The SEO professional will then create content and code to include in your site that will best align your website with those profitable search terms, causing your site to appear at the top of search engine listings. Beyond just achieving the desired search engine placement, quality content will also assist in converting visitors from just traffic into sales or leads.
How is Organic SEO Valuable?
Statistical Value:
Organic search traffic accounts for anywhere between 65-80% of all traffic to a website. From these searches, at least 60% of users only click on results found within the first page before making a purchase or changing their search terms. What this means is that the majority of visitors a website receives are a result of a person using relevant key words in a search engine query that returns that website in the top ten. The best aspect of a quality SEO campaign is that there is no end to the amount of traffic that can be garnered from natural search engine placement. Unlike a PPC campaign, you are not continually having to pay to receive these visitors.
Perceived Value:
While high search engine placement has the statistical benefit of increased visibility and traffic, a well optimized site also provides strength to your brand image. With search engines placing higher penalties on low-quality sites, a site that naturally lands at the top of search engine results has a greater perceived “authority” than it’s paid counterparts. And because proper market segment research was performed and applied in the campaign this transforms each site visitor into a more qualified potential sales lead. Above all else, organic search engine optimization is built into the site from the onset of the project and can be modified at any time to meet changing consumer trends with very minimal effort.
How do I express the benefits of organic SEO to my client?
Increased awareness – SEO’s intention is to broaden the search terms that apply to the the client’s web properties in order to gain more traffic to prospective clients. This will include more in-depth content and strategically placed keywords that have a naturally high volume of traffic each month.
Increased qualified sales leads – All content will be written in such a way that it encourages readers to contact the sales team to gain more information without being offensively sales-pitchy. This request for contact can be in the form of a call, visit, or email, but often works best when the design team prepares a custom inquiry form on the site that is open to the public. The more accessible information is to the potential customer, the easier and more convenient the entire experience will be.
Increased ongoing sales effort opportunities – Through the increased visibility, traffic, and customer contact, it will be easier for the sales team to identify upcoming date opportunities, events that could garner new business, and trends in the consumer market. They will also have a fast-growing list of pre-qualified contacts for future promotions.
The end result?
The end goal of an organic search engine optimization campaign is to increase conversions through inbound inquiries, while decreasing both the outbound sales effort costs and ongoing online marketing expenses.
Posted in Arizona Internet Marketing Showcase, Organic Search Marketing, SEO Advice | No Comments »
Thursday, February 21st, 2008 |
Description: CMOT is committed to bringing you the hottest country music stars when they come to your town. At Country Music On Tour, you can find concert tour tickets and information from some of your favorite artists like Trisha Yearwood, Brad Paisley, George Strait, Carrie Underwood, Tim McGraw, Keith Urban, Rascal Flatts, Kenny Chesney, Alan Jackson and much much more!
Objective: CMOT is an education in several aspects of web marketing. All textual content and alt tags are optimized to a minimum keyword density to monitor how search engines are weighing this attribute. The site is optimized for off-the-beaten-path key phrases but seems to do well in more obvious search terms due to the nature of the content. And finally, the site is a test of the profitability behind building an entire website around a single affiliate program.
Monetization: Ticketmaster Affiliate Program (managed by buy.at )
Posted in Organic Search Marketing, Portfolio | No Comments »
Wednesday, December 26th, 2007 |
Description: DrunkenHillbilly is the web’s home for underground unsigned and independent country music. DH provides artist interviews, music reviews, and networking tools for tomorrow’s stars.
Objective: DH was created at first as a simply a hobby / special interest site by the founders of bUmp Interactive. With all of us being deeply involved in the independent music scene, it only made sense that our first foray into the web-world would be in promotion of that scene. Now in it’s 3rd reincarnation of the site, DH has taken us through the inner workings of everything from your basic hand-coded HTML, to DotNetNuke, and now on to a complimentary blend of CSS, PHP, and wordpress at it’s finest. Unfortunately as a labor of love with a very limited amount of internet interest, DH remains nothing more than a hobby.
Monetization: Google AdSense and Commission Junction
Posted in Organic Search Marketing, Portfolio | No Comments »
Tuesday, December 25th, 2007 |
Description: CMNB feeds you the latest in hot country news from all around the web. From Trace Adkins to Leanne Rimes and everyone in between. Nashville’s hottest stars!
Objective: CMNB was created to demonstrate the ability to dominate search engine results without a heavy use of repetitive keywords which often drive away readers. By focusing on a particular interest group, in this case country music fans, we are able to naturally and even conversationally stay within a predetermined grouping of key terms and phrases without commercializing the content. As a result we have seen a higher rate of loyal readers, and a steady stream of feedback through reader comments. We have also seen a rapid rise of pagerank based primarily on content alone (without the assistance of linkbaiting or high-ranked backlinks).
Monetization: Google AdSense - Due to the familial-style grouping of relevant keywords and phrases, AdSense has proved extremely successful (based on average clickthrough rate compared to other sites in the bUmp portfolio) for this particular site . The ads are well-aligned to our target readers, and there seems to be a large variety of advertisers to match this market.
Posted in Organic Search Marketing, Portfolio | No Comments »
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