I bet you thought that once you graduated school that you were done with having to worry about people evaluating and grading your writing. Well, think again! Google evaluates and classifies the reading level for each of your pages into one of the following three buckets:

• Basic
• Intermediate
• Advanced

The classifications are intended to describe the level of reading comprehension needed to understand the content on the page. For example, scientific research papers would be more likely to end up classified as Advanced, while you would expect a website targeted at kids to be classified as Basic.

Google does this for many reasons, but the main purpose, like most of the things Google does, is to better serve its users. By being able to evaluate reading level, Google can better identify poor quality content and filter out spammy low quality content from their search results.

In addition, they can allow user to search for things based on reading level. For example, lets say you just bought a new iPad and you were looking for a tutorial. You could search for “ipad tutorial” and filter sites that contain basic reading levels to ensure that the tutorials you review are easy to read and understand. Not sure how to do this? Don’t worry, just keep reading.

Filter Your Search Results By Reading Level

Here is a step-by-step guide to filtering your search results by reading level – it is actually quite easy!

Step 1

Enter your search query in the Google search box as usual. Then click the “Show search tools” link in the bottom of the lefthand sidebar. In this example, we will search for iPad tutorials.

Step 2

After clicking “Show search tools” the menu expands. Under the “All Results” menu, click “reading level.”

Step 3

After clicking the “reading level” the search results should refresh and you see a chart that lists the percentage of sites that fall into each reading level. In addition, the reading level is displayed for each individual search result.

Step 4

The last and final step is to click the reading level that you want to filter the results so that only sites that match that reading level are shown. That’s it, you did it!

In the example below I clicked on the Basic reading level. To revert back to normal search settings simply click on the “x” in the upper right hand corner of the reading level box.

Reading Level and SEO

Although the reading level can be very helpful for users, it can also be a valuable resource for optimizing content and improving your SEO. Generally speaking, you want to write content that is consistent with the reading level used on the majority of sites that discuss the particular subject matter in question.

For example, 71% of the sites that write about iPad tutorials have content that is at the Intermediate reading level, while only 8% have content that is at an Advanced reading level. This means that in the eyes of Google, an Intermediate reading level is more “normal” and appropriate for this subject matter.

And as a result, Google may favor this type of content in the results because it believes that it better suits the audience and provides a better user experience for the user – or so the theory goes?

If you think about this logically, it actually makes sense. iPad tutorials shouldn’t be at an advanced reading level. You don’t want tutorials to be like research papers; using long sentence structures, a large vocabulary, and requiring advanced reading levels to comprehend the subject matter.

You want tutorials to be written so that your readers can easily understand the material; short sentence structures and simple vocabulary (basic reading level). However, the iPad itself is a technical device and by nature some of the jargon and vocabulary used to understand it is probably above the basic reading level, which is why the majority of sites are classified as Intermediate.

By doing this research ahead of time you’d know the reading level you want to achieve (Intermediate in this case) and the reading level you most likely wnat to avoid (Advanced in this example). In addition, after you’ve written and published the article you can see how Google classifies it and then make the necessary modifications to get the desired result.

Reviewing reading level for keyword targets is not a game changer, but it can help you write better content and it can be an effective and useful tool in an SEO analyst’s bag of tricks.

Five Steps to Optimizing Local Search Marketing to Secure and Promote Your Brand

Yesterday we covered the first two steps of what a single location business can do to make their business stand out against a franchise operation with multiple outlets.

3. On Site Optimization

So now you have claimed all your local search listings, and optimized them to take full advantage of how their fields influence the local search results pages in search engines. Great! It’s time to do some high-level optimization to your own web page to appear clear and concise in the organic search results.

Write the homepage <title> and <meta> description so they both appear as complete thoughts instead of being cut off in mid-sentence. If the user is searching with the intent of going to your website, they will skip the local listings completely. In the search results page, your website needs to clear, concise, and grab the attention of the user. Most search engines allow a maximum of 60 characters for the title, and 160 characters for the description.

4. Paid Search and Competitor Terms

Other companies are allowed to bid on your brand name, however, they are not allowed to falsely represent themselves as your company.

Advertisers often use DKI (dynamic keyword insertion) in the titles of their ads as a way to increase the perceived relevance of an ad to the search query. This gets tricky when the search query is a branded term that fits in the ad title parameters.

In the ProFlowers.com AdWords account, a search for “University Flower Shop” would trigger a broad match hit of the keyphrase “Flower Shower”. Using DKI though, University Flower shop would appear as the ad title (because it fits in the 25 character parameter), meaning that people could click the ad wrongly thinking it would direct them to University Flower Shop.

DKI Ad Example: {KeyWord: Flower Shop}

When it comes to branded terms, competitors are not allowed to use your brand name in their ad title. Because of this, using DKI on competitor terms often gets advertisers into trouble. If you own a business and someone is using your business name in the title of their ad, you can contact the advertiser directly or send a trademark grievance to Google.

But there is more! If your brand name is too vague (as the business name “University Flower Shop” is above), it is okay for a competitor to use your brand name in an ad title. Because there are dozens of stores across the US named University Flower Shop, ProFlowers is not overstepping their bounds.

5. Bonus! Free Listing of Local “Offers” and “Deals” to Stand Out

Especially if your business is in a very competitive market, and everyone has optimized their local pages, it can be difficult to stand out. A new feature in both Google Places and Yelp is the ability to promote offers for (i.e. “Three free balloons with purchase of bouquet!”).

These are free to post, and give your listing more precious real estate on the search results page. And in Google Places & Google Maps, it puts a green star next to your listing which immediately attracts the searcher’s attention and makes you stand out from the others. An example of what the green star looks like next to Paid and Places ads can be seen in the image below.

This makes you more noticeable, attracts attention, and increases your chance of a click (since people love saving money). A definite Win-Win situation.

Five Steps to Optimizing Local Search Marketing to Secure and Promote Your Brand

Running a small business is tough stuff, and complicated even more when large national brands begin throwing their weight around and engage in questionable practices. Small business owners are left wondering what is and is not legal when it comes to aspects of online marketing. If you’re a small business owner, here’s what you can do to protect and promote your brand, and to help you recognize when another business has overstepped their bounds online.

Here’s the kind of thing that could happen. Last week I spoke with University Flower Shop of Ann Arbor, who were vexed that a national competitor of theirs, ProFlowers.com, had done some very questionable and shady marketing tactics to attain new business, at their expense.

ProFlowers.com claimed the Google Places page of UFSAA, and changed the phone number to their own. Because of this, anyone who tried to call UFSAA ended up talking to the customer service department at ProFlowers. This was shady indeed.

ProFlowers was also showing up in the AdWords listings for University Flower Shop terms. Again, UFSAA worried that they were losing business because of unfair advertising methods.

So as a small business, what can you do to protect and promote your brand, and what is unauthorized when it comes to aggressively competing on the search results page?

1. Secure Your Local Listings (Before Others Do)

The easiest way to prevent others from wrongly claiming your local listings is to beat them to it. Google Places makes it difficult to claim a listing that is not yours, however there are loopholes that shady-savvy marketers have discovered, as UFSAA found out.

Below I’ve segmented the local search sites into three levels of decreasing importance. When claiming your local listings, I suggest fully optimizing each tier (see Tip 2, below) before moving on to the next level, as they will have the greatest impact in creating better visibility for your brand on the search results page.

Tier 1: Google Places & Yelp.

Tier 2: Facebook, Yahoo Local, Bing Local

Tier 3: Yellow Pages, Localeze, Superpages, CitySearch, Yellowbook, and MapQuest.

2. Optimize Your Local Listings to Bolster Local SEO

Each interface has different fields to populate. As an example, I am focusing here on the options Google Places provides, and the significance of each.

Very simply, the more complete your Places page is, the more prominently it appears on the search results page, and the more likely the user is to find the information they were seeking. Including all this additional information and claiming your local listings bolsters your local SEO strategy, allowing you to dominate the organic search listings for highly relevant traffic.

Company, Address, Phone: These fields are the essence of local; alerting the search algorithm that you are indeed relevant and within the local radius of the search.
Note: Phone number is especially important in this instance, because local searches are much more likely to be done from a mobile device, and these users have a high propensity to call you.

Email & Website: Not essential, but including these fields allows the user to learn more information about your brand, and gives them an alternate means of contacting you.

Description: 200 characters are given to sum up your business. Depending on how well known your brand is, you may wish to write your slogan, give important details of your company (locally owned since 1985!), or attract users with short marketing copy (Lowest prices on flowers, guaranteed).

Categories: Five categories are given, and I recommend using them all. This helps both the search algorithm and the user understand your expertise better.

Photos & Videos: Boom! One of the biggest things you can do to increase your real estate on the search results page, and attract a users attention is to add photos (up to 10) and videos (up to 5) to the local listings page. Often times businesses do not include any good multimedia with their listings, making those that do stand out amongst the pack.

Hours of Operations: One of the main reasons people use local search is to find out if/when businesses are open. This is an optional field, but a very important one.

Payment Options: Letting the user know ahead of time what is accepted as payment is a good business practice. You’re a restaurant that doesn’t accept American Express? Please let me know so I’m not out of luck after ordering dinner.

Additional Details: This section is reserved for other details customers should know about your business. Do you validate parking? Include that. You have student discounts every Thursday? Include that. Accept competitors’ coupons or interesting trades? Include it!

Stay tuned for the other three tips… coming tomorrow!

At the end of the day, the goal of SEO is to establish your website as an authoritative “subject matter expert” on the topics and keyphrases you want to target; at least in the eyes of the search engines.  To this end, I wanted to share an excellent analogy I heard to help crystalize this notion.

In the early days of the Internet, webpages were conceived of much like academic publications (such as dissertations or journal articles), with descriptive titles and abstracts, deeply informative body content, and references to other authoritative work on the subject.  Translated to a webpage, these correspond quite nicely to the <title>, meta description, <body>, and links to related content.  At a very fundamental level, sites and pages continue to be thought of in this fashion by search engines.

Using this analogy is helpful to understand how a website might be viewed by a search engine as an “expert” on the topic(s) it covers (and thus be rewarded with higher rankings).  Expressed in academic terms, subject matter “expertness” is derived from two basic elements: the size of the body of work on the topic (i.e. the number of pages your website contains dedicated to that topic), and the degree to which that body of work is cited by other relevant, authoritative sources (i.e. links from other high-quality webpages on the subject – both internal and external).

Pretty cool, huh?  Now get out there and act like an expert!  Start fueling your SEO campaign with some high-quality, link-worthy content!

On August 16, 2011 Google announced the newest version of sitelinks. Sitelinks are links to pages on a website that are displayed below the link description on the search results page. Google explains that often times a broad search term is used even though a specific action is intended. If you search for a local pizza shop, your intention may be to order online. You enter “Ann Arbor pizza” as your query. The local pizza parlor shows up with a sitelink reading “Order Online.” You click the sitelink and go directly to their online ordering system. Now that cheesy goodness can get to your house in fewer clicks!

How do sitelinks work? Google first must determine that there is a strong likelihood that you are searching for a specific site. Say you enter “the met” as your search query. Google assumes you are trying to get information about The Metropolitan Museum of Art. It will then display several sitelinks referring to The Met. The more confident Google is that you are searching for that specific site, the more sitelinks they will display. Currently sitelinks are automatically populated by Google. You can influence which pages on your site show up as sitelinks but Google will have the final say.

So what does this mean for your site? Say there is space for ten organic results in Google’s search results page. If someone searches for the name of your company, Google may show links from your site in the top eight results. With the new sitelinks, Google could now take several of those results and include them within their two column sitelinks. Now you have the top result, six sitelinks, and then one more organic link below the sitelinks (equaling the original eight). This now creates more space for other results such as news articles or other mentions of your company on the first page of results.

It is now even more important to monitor what results are showing up for your company’s branded terms. Results that had a lower ranking may now be displayed on the first page of results. Monitoring blogs and news results is one way to keep an eye on what pages may be displayed. Make sure your company is actively sharing and promoting good press and reviews. This can help ensure your company has a positive presence on page one.

The recent news that Yahoo! is shutting down its popular Yahoo! Site Explorer tool has those of us in the SEO world consider alternatives for backlink research. Yahoo! Site Explorer has long been a handy resource – it’s been reliable and provides great data for informing SEO strategy.

Yahoo! Site Explorer allowed for quick and easy referencing of backlink info.  It helped SEO professionals understand the composition of a site’s backlink profile in a meaningful way.  And, although Yahoo! Site Explorer isn’t the only resource around for this information, it is known for having one of the larger and more reliable link data sets available.

So, what’s an SEO pro to do without Yahoo! Site Explorer?  Some tools worth checking out include the SEOmoz Open Site Explorer and the Majestic SEO Link Index.  Both of these tools have pros and cons, but we recommend playing around with each to help you determine which one best suits your needs.

One final thought on this news of Yahoo! Site Explorer closing down: It’s always smart to understand all of the potential professional resources available.  Taking time to get to know, even at a high level, several tools to help you perform SEO well makes the transition from one to another — depending on a market factor, like Yahoo!’s, or a client need — a simple task versus a complicated transition.

We’re excited that our competitive intelligence toolbox just got better.  We recently began using Bright Edge, a tool that automates our performance tracking and reporting capabilities, while offering a wealth of competitive intelligence tools that help our search engine optimization campaigns.  Combined with our analysts’ industry-leading expertise, Bright Edge will help Pure Visibility clients Own Page One™ more effectively and efficiently than ever before!

Bright Edge supports our own analysts’ abilities by delivering a wide range of insightful reports, expediting the mechanics of routine campaign monitoring. With this new tool, our analysts can get to a deeper level of insight more quickly than ever before.  Understanding our clients’ performance in the context of their competitors, we can formulate and adapt our SEO strategies in a far more informed fashion, for the greatest ultimate success.

Bright Edge also enables us to develop custom dashboards for our clients.  These dashboards are similar to the ones used by Google Analytics, and allow us to slice and dice specific intelligence by business unit, product type, or semantic group — a real bonus to our diverse, global clients.

Tools like these take our SEO practice yet another step beyond typical SEO best practices. Pure Visibility is again outpacing our competitors…while helping our clients do the same.

Last month, the Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO) released its 2011 State of Search Marketing Report. In conjunction with EConsultancy, SEMPO had more than 900 companies and agencies in 66 countries participate in a global online survey to determine the future of search marketing.

Taking a detailed approach, SEMPO’s annual survey evaluated spending trends within SEO, PPC and social media.  Respondents ranged from various business sectors and types of agencies.

According to SEMPO’s findings, the North American SEM industry will grow 16% in 2011, an increase of $19.3B, up from $16.6B in 2010. 2010 saw an increase of 14% from 2009. These  results are due from a large portion of companies increasing their investment in paid search and SEO as well as continued growth from Google and Microsoft-Yahoo.

The research shows a rise in the use of mobile Internet as having the highest impact on SEO. Local Search also contributed, with 43% of agencies citing this as a highly significant trend. In addition, the increased use in social networks has helped fuel this growth. More than half of companies are outsourcing their SEO and Social Media management and 54% of the companies surveyed said they expect to increase their SEO spend in 2011.

The 133 page State of Search Marketing 2011 Report can be downloaded by SEMPO members.

Generally speaking, search engines look at blog posts similarly to the way they evaluate web pages. So, everything you worry about for a normal web page (title tag, linking strategy, etc.) should be taken into consideration for each blog post (If you’re a newcomer to SEO or need just want a general refresher, we recommend you review this on page optimization post by SEOMOZ). In addition, blogs offer two additional elements, which we will focus on today, that can be used to enhance your optimization – categories and tags.

Categories

Creating categories on a blog is a way to organize each blog post into similarly related topics. This helps search engines understand what your blog posts are about through their association with other, related content. When creating categories, define them fairly broadly so that similarly themed posts can be placed within the same category. Each blog post should be assigned as few categories as possible – ideally only one.

Tags

Tags are similar to categories in the sense that they offer the ability to group together similar blog posts. However, post tags tend to be much more granular in nature, describing the various aspects of your posts in greater detail then a category might. Each new blog post can use existing tags that have already been created, or create new ones that more accurately describe the post’s subject matter. Each blog post should be tagged with a handful of descriptive tags.

Where Do I Create Categories and Post Tags?

Each blogging platform is different, but for WordPress (which is what we use) the categories and tags can be found on the right hand side of the “add new/edit post” screen. We’ve provided a quick screen shot below for your reference. The category area is highlighted in red, while the tag area is highlighted in blue.

Creating categories for your blog and tagging each post with relevant keyphrases is a great way to help achieve your optimization goals. It only takes a few additional minutes to do and is well worth your time so get in the habit of doing this before you publish each and every post.

Good luck and happy tagging!

Last week I spent 3 days working with builders and contractors at seminars held by Wimsatt Building Materials to help them grow their business online. One theme emerged as we travelled from city to city teaching new groups – many business owners were unaware of Google Places and its power to get them better visibility in Google with this simple, free tool.

Google Places is relatively new in the grand scheme of SEO, but its impact is growing larger by the day. Google is actively changing search results for place-based business — businesses that have a geographically defined trade area. Google Places is just as critical to our national franchise and real estate clients as it is to local roofing companies. Why?

In traditional search results, aggregators often won through their sheer volume of content and links, frequently pushing actual businesses out of the opportunity to appear on page one. This effectively forced businesses to purchase ads with the aggregators to be found.

Now Google tends to favor listings for single, physical, locations in searches that are geographically oriented. If you’re lucky, Google has already created one of these listings for you that you simply need to “claim” and update. If they haven’t, you can easily create a listing. Either way, your next step is to visit Google Places and optimize your listing!

If you’re beginning the process of optimizing your places page, the key things to focus on are:

• building out your listing with keywords. Notice who shows up in competitive searches and how the keywords from your search are bolded in the places results. That’s what you want to happen for your business! Don’t go overboard, though, or you stand to violate Google’s quality guidelines. In particular, don’t pack keywords into your business title unless they belong their naturally (don’t put “Jim’s West Side Plumbing – Ann Arbor, MI” if the name your company goes by is is just “Jim’s West Side Plumbing”).  The description is really the best places to deliver those juicy keywords.
• building out your listing with content. Ultimately you want your places page to be “lived in” – full of relevant information, pictures, videos, etc. In some lines of business your places page may be the only page your customer visits before making a decision to call you. Make sure your first impression is a good one – remember your competition is always as close as one click of the back button!
• cultivating reviews. You’ll see in many searches that locations with reviews show up closer to the top of the list. The algorithm isn’t that simple of course, but more reviews are a great place to focus your time and attention because they help your ranking AND they ultimately help your potential customers make a decision. Having more reviews also draws attention to your listing in cases where Google shows star rankings, increasing your odds of getting clicked on and giving you the opportunity to showcase why you’re the best choice for that consumer.

Good luck with your Google Places listing!