SEO can be complicated, especially with all the terminology you have to get familiar with. Keywords, as an example. What are long-tail, medium-tail, and short-tail keywords? What’s the difference and what do they do? We have simplified these terms for you to help you understand more about each one.

Short-Tail Keywords

Short-tail keywords are the most broad category of keywords and have much higher search volume. They also have much higher levels of competition. Short-tailed keywords are usually one or two words that cover a broader subject, like ”coffee”. Many users may be searching this term on Google, but not all for the same reason.

Short-tail keywords can fit just about anywhere in your content and are likely to end up in your medium and long-tail keywords regardless.

 Medium-Tail Keywords

Medium-tail keywords are somewhere in between short and long-tail keywords. They are a little more specific than short-tail keywords, but still broader than long-tail keywords. For example; ”organic coffee shop”. You know these users are searching for organic coffee shops, but not whether they are interested in visiting one or merely curious about what they are.

Medium-tail keywords work best in headers and even the slugs in URLs. They’re also great in page titles and, in some cases, may even be great business or website names. “The Organic Coffee Shop” may not sound very creative, but you can bet it will be at the top of search results when users are searching for organic coffee shops.

Long-Tail Keywords

Long-tail keywords have the lowest search volume, but that doesn’t make them any less worth your consideration! Long-tail keywords are very specific and represent a user that is more committed to the idea of making a purchase or fulfilling some other conversion you may be looking for. For example; ”best organic coffee shops near me”. They are specifically searching for highly rated coffee shops located nearby them, which is a pretty strong indicator they are interested in visiting one of these coffee shops.

Long-tail keywords can work in h1 headers, but work best in h2 or h3 headers as well as in the body text of your content.

Don’t worry if all the terms and details related to SEO still go over your head a bit at first. It takes time and experience to really get a better understanding of how everything works. Still need help with your SEO? Contact the experts at Frontline Consulting today and book a FREE consultation!

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An often-overlooked aspect of SEO is backlinking. Backlinks can either boost your website’s position to the top of search results or claw it back to the shadows of page six on Google. Since you want your website to see the light of day, let’s take a look at what backlinks are and what you can do to improve your backlink profile.

What Are Backlinks?

Backlinks are links from other domains that direct traffic to your website. Think of it like a recommendation; one store makes a recommendation to a potential customer about another store that may meet their needs. Backlinks are a source of traffic, but they also help build your authority score on Google. The more quality backlinks you have, the more Google sees how good your website is.

Backlink Audit & Toxicity

Knowing what domains are linking to your own domain is incredibly helpful for a couple of reasons. For one, you want to learn more about where your audience is coming from. Secondly, you want to look for more backlinking opportunities. Lastly, you want to make sure your backlink profile isn’t full of toxic backlinks.

Toxic backlinks are linking domains or pages that contain any number of red flags, such as malicious software, spam, or paid backlinks. These backlinks are ‘toxic’ and can harm your SEO.

To find out what your backlink profile looks like, you can use tools such as Semrush, or Google Search Console.

Removing Toxic Backlinks

Removing a toxic backlink is a quick process, but not always a totally straightforward one. One way to remove a toxic backlink is to reach out to the owner of the linking domain and politely ask them to remove the link to your website. But if time passes and you either don’t get a response or the link isn’t removed, what do you do then?

Disavowing backlinks requires the use of Google’s ‘disavow tool’. The disavow tool tells Google and its users that you do not recognize the backlink as valid and don’t associate yourself with it. Using the tool requires submitting a TXT file with specific formatting.

Building Better Backlinks

The only way to build a better backlink profile—other than removing or disavowing toxic backlinks—is to take the time to do so. Backlink outreach is a lot of work, but it will improve your website’s position considerably.

The easiest way to start building a bigger backlink profile is to search for instances where your website or business is mentioned but is not linked. Reach out to the owner of the website and politely ask about adding a link in their article or page to your website where they mention you.

The other, more difficult method of building your backlink profile is to reach out to other, relevant websites that may have some content that relates to your website or business. Be sure that you aren’t reaching out to a competitor, but rather a blogger, or a website that is closely related to your topic but could easily defer to your website.

Backlinking takes a lot of time and it’s a lot of work, but it is so worth it. That’s why you can count on Frontline Consulting to take those extra steps for you as we delve into your backlink profile and take the necessary steps to improve your SEO. Contant us today for and book a free consultation!

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When I began writing for SEO for my local non-profit organization, I found that its specific topics could make it difficult to get its website to rank on Google. That’s because the keywords for it didn’t have as many results or as much traffic as mainstream content. But what if I told you that there’s a way to make SEO work for your local niche interest business, no matter how obscure it is?

Here’s how you can get your unique content to rank on Google.

Related Keywords

When finding keywords for your content, what might be an obvious term for you may be outside of another’s scope of knowledge. For example; let’s say you have a page about ‘bird fanciers’, people who breed and show birds. Those within that community will know what a ‘fancier’ is, but most would know them as ‘bird breeders’. So, instead of trying to rank for ‘bird fancier’, you would want to try for keywords such as ‘bird breeders’ or ‘parrot breeders’.

Keywords From Parallel Topics

Let’s say that you are still having trouble finding keywords directly related to your topic. Even if you aren’t, there’s still another trick you can use to make sure the right audience finds your content. Search for keywords from parallel topics, topics that may not be directly about your topic, but are still indirectly related to your topic. For example; instead of only ranking for ‘bird breeders’, you may have an easier time ranking for ‘pet birds’, or even just pets in general.

Niche Backlinks

A very powerful SEO tool is backlinking. Finding other entities that relate to your niche can present you with an opportunity to get more traffic to your unique content through a link from another creator’s content. For example; let’s say there’s a content creator who has published a resource on the best places to get pet birds in your area. This is your chance to reach out to the creator and offer your own content about bird breeders as a helpful item to include in their content. This way, those looking for compiled information on where to get a pet bird will find that other creator’s content, and in turn will find yours.

SEO, especially for unique or newer hobbies and products, is hard work. It also takes a lot of time. If you are in need of local SEO services, Frontline Consulting is up for the task! Let’s get your wonderfully unique content seen!

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Instead of spreading your efforts too thinly, focus on a few of the most important local ranking factors, first. As experienced digital marketing consultants, we have narrowed the list down to just a few of the top local SEO ranking factors to help get you started.

Keywords

Keywords on their own aren’t a ranking factor, but how they’re used is. But before you can use them, you need to know what they are. Keywords are search terms or phrases that users enter in a search bar to find something they’re looking for. For example; if you are looking for shoes, you might type the word “shoes” into Google. If you are specifically looking to purchase a pair of black sandals online, then you might type “black sandals for sale online”.

Think about what your business is offering and find or come up with keywords that relate to it. Put yourself into your customers’ shoes (no pun intended); what would you type into Google to help you find your services or products? If you have a product or service that sells well, then you might like to focus on terms related to them.

There are many tools out there for researching keywords, such as SEMRush or WordStream. These can help you find out more about how often these keywords are used and how tough the competition is for those keywords.

Another quick and clever way to find more unique keywords is to type in one of your keywords into Google, then scroll to the bottom of the results and see the section called ‘Related Searches’. These are searches people have used that are similar to yours.

Website Content

Now that you know what keywords are and how to find yours, you can use them on your website to rank better. But there is more to your website than keywords. Google’s search engine will prioritize websites that have relevant, quality content. This one can be a bit of a balancing act. You want to include your business’ best keywords in your content so that your site shows up in searches involving those search terms. At the same time, you want your content to be informative and easy to read.

It may be tempting to cram as many of your keywords as possible into your pages, but this won’t help you rank better. Would-be customers will ‘bounce’ from your website, and this can harm your ranking instead.

Remember who your website is for; your customers. Write your content for your customers first and worry about Google after.

Reviews

Potential customers are more likely to check out a business that has reviews, versus a business that has none. They are also more likely to visit a business with 4.8 stars and several hundred reviews than a business with a 5 star rating that only has ten reviews. People like to be informed about how a business is doing, and for that, they like to see a larger sample size of data, even if they’re only skimming it.

If your business isn’t getting reviews, the best way to encourage them is to politely ask your customers if they would like to leave you a review about their experience with your product or service. Make it easy for them to do so by linking directly to your review section.

Don’t be afraid of negative feedback! Treat this as an opportunity to improve your business, and you can start by responding to negative reviews, letting them know that you value their feedback and that you want to improve their experience. When other people come across the review and see your response, they will see that you care.

There is only one way to get better reviews; provide a quality experience for your customers.

Google Business Profile

This is the most important local ranking factor you should work on, and it’s thankfully the easiest. People will trust a complete Google Business Profile more than an empty one, or none at all. That, and Google will prioritize the more informative profiles using relevant categories. The elements contributing to your rank the most include your business name, primary category, and location.

If your business name contains a keyword related to your service, you are more likely to show up closer to the top of searches. However, it is against Google Policy to add any extra information or words to your business name in your profile that isn’t truly part of your business name. If you haven’t settled on a business name yet, consider adding a keyword to it to help people find your business. For example; if you sell shoes, you might name your business “Zappy’s Shoe Store”, instead of just “Zappy’s”.

Make sure to choose the business category that matches what you offer. This is a very simple step, but an important one, as this will determine what users will see your business in searches. If you list yourself as a ‘shoe shining service’, but you don’t actually perform this service, then it doesn’t matter that it’s related to shoes; users are looking for shoe shining, not shoes themselves. You want to show up for users who are in the market for your products.

Your location itself isn’t something you can control, but you can optimize your local SEO by focussing your efforts on the area you are in, rather than trying to encompass the other areas around you. If there is a business like yours in the neighbouring city, they are going to rank higher than you for that area, regardless of what you do. Focus your SEO efforts on your area.

With Google’s new Local Services Ads, it’s going to be more important than ever to get your local SEO down pat. Need more help with your local SEO? Contact Frontline Consulting today to book a free consultation, or explore more of the services we offer!

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To make a great visitor experience on your website, remember this; your website is not for you. It is in the sense that it represents you and that it is meant to draw visitors to your business or cause, but the content itself should be made with your visitors in mind.

Who is the (target) audience?

To serve a website, you need an audience to serve it to. Many who are new to websites end up with a kind of personal archive. Do a little bit of research into your topic or business and find out who is most likely to be interested in what you offer. If you are selling water bottles, then your audience likely includes physically active individuals or those taking part in sports.

What are they looking for?

Create content that will be interesting or relevant to your audience. If your audience consists of sports fans, they may be interested in teams that are currently playing. Do not shy away from descriptiveness; if you are a sports fan and your audience are sports fans, then it is safe to assume that they understand sports related concepts and lingo.

Why are they looking for it?

If content is king, then context is queen. Going hand-in-hand with the previous point, make sure that you understand why someone may be looking for the content found on your website. In the case of selling water bottles; look into some of the search terms that visitors may be using. Are they looking for gifts for their sporty friend? Are they looking for team specific bottles to take to the upcoming game? Use this knowledge to create a website and content that is useful to your visitors.

Now that you have a better understanding of your audience and what they are looking for, you can begin to design and write your website to draw visitors to your site. Keep in mind that the more visitors must navigate to find what they need, the more likely they are to leave before doing so. Only include relevant pages with necessary information.

Are you looking to start up your first website? Do you need help writing content? Contact us to find out more about our website and content services!

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If you want the information to be as accessible as possible, you’ll have to dial down the Greek, and think like an educator.

Sometimes, the simplest solution is also the best solution; use fourth grade writing. If you find yourself opening a new tab and searching “fourth grade writing prompts”, then allow this guide to save you the trouble with three, simple tips!

Guide To Writing for Any Reading Level

1. Understand Your Audience

Who are you writing for? It might make sense to use complicated language when writing a physics report to your peers, but your followers on social media are going to have a harder time grasping the material.

2. Put The Thesaurus Away

For some, this is a habit from the early years of grade school, when learning to use different words to avoid repetition. For others, it’s simply too tempting to show the reader an impressive vocabulary. Casually including “antidisestablishmentarianism” in your content might feel good, but it’s also a dyslexic’s nightmare (and you probably had to re-read it a few times or skipped over it entirely).

Don’t be afraid of repeating the same word a few times, if it means your content is easier to understand.

3. Utilize Common Knowledge

What constitutes as ‘common’ knowledge is sometimes up for debate, but if a fourth-grade student can grasp the general idea, then you’re on the right track.

This isn’t limited to topics either; you can use commonly understood concepts to bridge the gap of understanding between basic and complex. For example; “search engine optimization” can be described as making it easier for users to find your website when they search for something online.

In a word; simplify.

Everyone likes to feel intelligent, and nobody likes to feel unintelligent. Write so that your audience can understand in a way that won’t alienate them. This is especially important in the realm of marketing when you want to convince your audience to take some sort of action.

It might be helpful to think of it like this; you are writing a cookbook, and your audience is in the fourth grade. You can’t list to a fourth-grade student the ingredients to make a New York cheesecake and expect them to understand what they need to do. At the same time, too much detail and technical language will confuse them. You need to take them step by step, using basic language, and explaining each step as it comes up.

For users, your content should feel like a learning experience, not a frustrating one. If they can already get something out of just reading your content, they’ll feel more inclined to follow up on your call-to-action.

Did you know we’re on Facebook and Instagram? For more of OUR content and marketing tips like this, visit us HERE.

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Originally considered as strictly an art, then also as a social science over time, the technical definition for “marketing” has evolved over the years, and fairly frequently, just as marketing itself does. It is at this ‘speed of marketing’ that you will learn a slice of its history, starting from the development of its latest forms and ending on its earliest.

The term ‘digital marketing’ hadn’t become vocabulary until the 1990’s, but digital marketing has been in development since as far back as the 1980’s. Back then, businesses employed ‘database marketing’, using databases and analysis to track customer information and send potentially relevant promotional materials. This could be by email, telephone, or physical material.

Both during and before the digital age and computers, the primary method of marketing was ‘direct marketing’. Born in 1920, advertising executive Lester Wunderman is considered the “father of direct marketing”, having defined it in 1967.

Having said this, direct marketing as a practice has existed since at least as far back as the 15^th century, typically in the form of catalogues, sent by mail. Starting in the late 1660’s, mail order catalogues became a popular form of advertising, and were commonly used by merchants to advertise lists of available seeds and their prices to farmers.

Still in use to this day, there are many sub-categories that fall under direct marketing, including telemarketing, email marketing, newspaper, radio, and television.

One particularly notable example that dates even further back is that of a catalogue of books, printed by Aldine Press founder Aldus Manutius (also the creator of the italics typeface), mailed out in 1498. This is also called ‘print marketing’, or ‘print advertising’. Print is possibly the oldest known form of non-verbal marketing.

The oldest known marketing campaign came from a time when the art of writing was considered divine. Sometime in ancient Egypt, a fabrics seller hired a scribe to send out papyrus offering a reward of one gold piece to anyone who would return his escaped slave to him. In this papyrus, he included a decidedly favourable description of his wares.

Below is a translation of this papyrus, by James Playstead Wood.

“The man-slave, Shem, having run away from his good master, Hapu the Weaver, all good citizens of Thebes are enjoined to help return him.

He is a Hittite, short, of ruddy complexion and brown eyes. For news of his whereabouts, half a gold coin is offered. And for his return to the shop of Hapu the Weaver, where the best cloth is woven to your desires, a whole gold coin is offered.” — Hapu

While the slave was apparently never found (probably a good thing), this clever- albeit archaic- marketing campaign was enough to secure the success of the fabric seller who was able to expand their business.

That was over 5,000 years ago, the papyrus itself dating back to 3,000 BC.

Marketing may be young in name, but it is quite ancient as a practice. For as long as there has been a need or want, there is marketing; ready to lead consumers and businesses alike to the right place, the right product, the right people, and at the right time.

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Giveaways and contests on Instagram are a great way to get more followers, build an engaged audience, and grow your brand. But with so much content on the platform, it can be difficult to stand out.

So, before you start a contest, you’ll want to review these helpful tips on how to run a contest on Instagram that delivers!

1.   Review Instagram’s Contest Rules

The first thing to do before you launch your giveaway is to take a few minutes to learn the rules for Instagram contests. For example, contests must include rules, terms, and eligibility requirements. You also have to make it clear that your contest is not sponsored or associated with Instagram

2. Use a Branded Hashtag

Every contest you run should have a branded hashtag to go with it , as this will help you track entries and conversations about the giveaway.

Make sure it’s a specific branded hashtag. Generic and common hashtags like #giveaway or #contest will be nearly impossible to track or measure, as there are millions of posts using those same hashtags.

At the same time, you do still want to include those generic hashtags in your caption so that your contest will show up when people search for them.

3. Have an Amazing Photo or Video to Promote Your Contest

Instagram is all about being visual, so ensure that your contest graphic is engaging and eye-catching! Create a design theme or template so that when you promote your Instagram contest on your website or other social networks, the branding is consistent.

4. Make It Easy to Enter

The more user-friendly you can make the contest, the higher rates of engagement you’re likely to have. Having several ways to enter the contest will be confusing for your audience, plus it will make it more difficult to track. The rules and regulations should also be clearly stated and easily accessible. You can include guidelines in the caption or have a dedicated page on your website where all the information is listed. This will make you compliant with Instagram, as well.

5. Encourage User Generated Content

When it comes to entries, you have a couple of different options for how people will enter your contest. Some brands prefer to have users reply to a post, while others will require you to have a photo or repost a picture. 

Generally speaking, the less you ask people to do, the more entries you’ll get. However, getting people to perform a certain action, such as posting a photo or tagging your brand, will generate more engagement and build your following. User Generated Content has also been shown to be more memorable and more trusted than other types of media, so take advantage of that power to promote your brand!

The photos that participants submit should be directly related to your brand somehow, such as including a branded hashtags, tags, products or your logo. This fills your Instagram feed with self-promotional posts and lets your audience market your brand for you.

6. Consider the Timing

How long should an Instagram contest last? There isn’t a “right” answer, but generally speaking, most Instagram giveaways should last around a week. This allows enough time for people to discover and enter your contest.

The problem with running your contest too long is that there isn’t a sense of urgency; they may procrastinate or forget to enter altogether. Make sure your start and end dates are clearly stated so users don’t flood your comment section with questions about when to enter.

7. Promote Your Contest on Your Profile

If you post regularly, your contest post will get buried very quickly, and you can’t trust the algorithm to deliver your contest post to user’s feeds. To combat this, include a sentence or two about your current contest in your profile. Some reminder posts as the closing date of your contest nears would also be a good idea.

8. Use the Right Tools

Managing a contest on Instagram can be very difficult. You have to do everything manually, including finding the entries, tracking votes, and monitoring the conversations. Thankfully, there are tools out there to make your life easier. Be thorough to ensure you’re covered.

Ready to Launch?

We hope these tips will put you ahead of the competition when it comes to your Instagram contests! When done correctly, it can be much more than a way for people to get free stuff. It can also be an effective marketing tool to grow your brand and build a stronger community online.

Are you currently struggling with maintaining a presence on social media channels? Is it difficult to find time to post regularly? Frontline Web Consulting can help. Contact us today to discuss our social media marketing services. 780-760-6922.

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