If you follow us on Twitter, ‘like’ us on Facebook, read our blog or subscribe to our newsletter, then you may already be aware that Google has probably made more changes in the last 12-18 months than it has in the previous 3-4 years! In its efforts to constantly punish those who have been ‘cheating’, and in getting rid of the sites using dodgy methods, Google has also devalued most links – even the good stuff we’ve always done.
Nowadays, you need regular, fresh content on your site and you need to mix it up – news pieces, feature articles, video, infographics (you can see some of our samples here) – and, if you don’t already have an audience with which to share it, you need to promote it using social media.
On Friday 27th September, Google officially announced its latest algorithm update, named ‘Hummingbird’ this time, and it has already started to take effect. Again, the main focus of Hummingbird is to re-emphasise content, but this time it’s more about its relevance, the long-tail of searches (i.e. how people are being much more specific in their searches nowadays) and looking at the different types of content being providing on websites. We’ve been covering Hummingbird in more detail on our blog.
With all this in mind, we’ve launched our new online marketing service, which we are now running instead of traditional ‘SEO’, and also our exciting new content product Pressroom, aimed at the client who needs flexibility and high quality content for their site.
What this means for you
Such changes mean a good digital marketing service has to include a whole host of activities now – and the emphasis should be on content. Online marketing should include the usual SEO technical stuff, but a site should also include relevant content. This could be feature articles, news pieces and extras like online quizzes, infographics, polls and competitions.
Some social media intervention is probably necessary too. We say ‘social media intervention’ because our input can include full social media management, or just the bare minimum you need to help build some traction on the right social media channels and then share the content we’ve generated. Some clients want us to do it all; others like to share the social workload, but we do strongly recommend all our clients now have a social presence.
Whether you use an agency or do everything yourself, such activity should be pre-planned in a calendar to suit your seasons or the cycle of your business, so you’ll know exactly what sort of activity will be taking place and when. Again, we can put together a suggested plan for you, so there will be minimal work for you to do; you can simply approve it or you can get involved and help ensure we understand what’s most relevant to your business and target audience.
Sounds expensive?
In many cases, we can do a lot with the old SEO budgets because we don’t need to use a highly skilled technical developer for as much of it. What we are using more of, however, is the services of our journalist-trained editors and our social media team.
The Launch of Readyroom
With all this going on, we’re also launching Readyroom. The name pays homage to the old aircraft term where pilots would be on ‘standby’ – and also gets mentioned in Star Trek as the captain’s briefing room, but of course we mean the aircraft term ; )
Readyroom is an area in which our clients can see what’s happening as we steer their digital marketing campaign. Regular reports will all be stored safely in your Readyroom. Clients can also log in and check their current content brief, ask their project manager to call to discuss an amendment and, as and when we do any new activities, their details will also be stored here.
The Launch of FranchiseXcel
This month, we are also launching our FranchiseXcel product. This is online marketing in much the same way as described above, but modelled specifically for franchisors and their franchisees. We will be exhibiting at the National Franchise Exhibition at the NEC on Friday 4th and Saturday 5th October. If you will be attending, or are considering doing so, then please do visit us on stand G150 where we’ll also be giving away a Google Nexus 7 as part of a stand competition.
- WANTED – Web Content Editor - May 1, 2024
- Wanted: SEO Executive - October 13, 2023
- Wanted: Business Development Executive - September 20, 2022
