Category Archives: Small Business Marketing

Semantic Search, Is It The Future Of SEO?

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Entity search can be defined as an ‘answer engine’ and works by using ‘entities’ on a web page that are recognised by search engines to provide specific and well-defined queries. So, is it the future of SEO?

The Hummingbird Update

google-hummingbirdIn September 26, Google had taken a step towards in becoming an ‘answer engine’ as the Hummingbird update came into play. Google is quickly implementing a semantic Web technology through updates, whilst still maintaining the main parts of its old algorithm, which is how Google plans to evolve from text links to answers. Google are not making huge changes overnight, but are gradually putting in place the ‘answer engine’ and will display more specific results for the user in order to give web users a better and improved experience.

The steps taken so far by Google to progress in this direction: the Knowledge Graph, the Voice Search and Google Now. These three ‘updates’ each provide answers for users and can even sometimes anticipate users questions due to the ‘entities’ used by Google as opposed to ‘keywords’.

Unstructured Vs. Structured Data

The previous two decades has been witness to the Internet, search engines, and Web users all being classed as unstructured data; meaning that the data gathered by search engines has been unorganised and/or unclassified. Therefore, only patterns within WebPages were able to be recognised (keywords), without any meaning attached to the pages.

This leads to structured data and semantic search:

semantic searchSemantic Search is a way of classifying data gathered and searched for, through labelling every piece of information as an ‘entity’ — this can also be referred to as structured data.

Structured data provides very accurate product data, which is not only beneficial to the user, but also the retailers. The way this works is that search engines classify, understand and link the structured data aspects together to provide a targeted search result. Additionally, Semantic search will not only optimise retail products.

Have a look at schema types, which is the technical language that’s required when creating a structured Web of data and in which case becomes machine-readable.

An example of how semantic search data is used to identify and provide a more specific answer:

Mrs. Keller → subject → an entity

Algebra → object → an entity

Is teaching → predicate or relationship → links the entities

Links to Answers

When this logic is expanded in terms of technology being structured, using schema, which has the ability to answer our specific questions and queries without using keywords or anchor text links, web designers, SEO professionals and so on, have to get ahead of the game by making sure they implement these practices for their clients and for themselves. Ignoring these semantic updates will surely damage a website in terms of search results, as they will be simply left behind and then find it very difficult to catch up again, if at all.

Understanding vs. Indexing Data

Structured data will significantly improve a search engine’s capability to “understand” rather than pick out ‘keywords’ relevant to a users search query ‘index data’. This will provide a big breakthrough in terms of being able to receive accurate answers to questions when ‘asking’ a search engine.

Making Your Business Data & Content Visible With Semantic Markup

Using semantic markup now will enable a business’s data and even digital content (rich media video etc) to become very easily readable and accessible to search engines, which by the way will stand you in good stead. The changes are happening now and will continue, which will give businesses a head start in terms of being higher ranked within search engines, now and in the future.

Lisa Pollitt, the author of this article is an expert in the SEO field and has several years experience gaining vast knowledge in the industry and on white-hat SEO techniques.

The Effects Of Social Media On Communication

Business Tech, Small Business Marketing, Social Media Marketing, ,

social media and communicationSocial media has become so deeply entrenched in our society that it’s almost impossible to remember a time where we weren’t checking Facebook every ten minutes or posting all of our dinners to Instagram. Social media has (in theory) brought us all closer together and has made our world a significantly smaller and more convenient place. But has it improved how we communicate with one another or has it distanced us from each other in a strange and profound way? Making communication via social media almost a surrogate for real, face-to-face conversation? There are two schools of thought on the matter and in this article we intend to explore both of them.

The Positives

Always available – Considering more than half of the western world now owns a smart phone or tablet, nearly all of us are constantly ‘on’, which means we’re always available and within reach. For most of us this is a good thing.

Workplace convenience – Social media in the workplace will make it far easier for employees to form friendships with one another and make lasting bonds with their clients.

Everything in its right place – The majority of social media platforms will now include options for collating all of your other social media profiles into one place so that communication between all platforms (email, SMS messaging, Facebook, Linked In etc. etc.) is seemless and convenient. Certain ‘apps’ such as the incredibly popular ‘WhatsApp’ also allow users to open ‘group conversations’, which means that creating separate groups for your friends, family and work colleagues is as simple as filling in a few boxes.

Connection – The sheer convenience of being able to link to information and access it in an instant is one of the primary reasons why social media has really taken off in the last ten years. Of course many might decry this constant connection as a negative point as could make it harder to distance ones self from their work lives when at home and vice verse. But the great thing about laptops, smartphones and tablets is that they can always be switched off!

Visuals – It has been proven that we respond more actively and positively to visual stimulus and sites such as ‘Flick R’ and ‘Instagram’ rely specifically on images to relate a message. The instantaneous nature of these sites can only be a good thing as it cuts through a lot of the ‘noise’ and gets to the point in an immediate and cathartic way.

Getting to the point – Especially with sites such as Twitter, which limit the amount of characters available per message, social media has made us all ‘get to the point’ with our communication. This means there is less pointless, protracted ‘small talk’ in modern communication in general.

Teaching – As a teaching tool, social media is still flexing its muscles but the potential is unmistakable.

The Negatives

Cyber bullying – A genuine problem that is endemic amongst all social media platforms and has resulted in a genuinely shocking amount of teenage suicides. Ten, even five years ago, schoolyard bullying generally began and ended just there, in the schoolyard. But social media has given vindictive, shallow minded and hateful children the platform to make the bullying a perpetual problem that follows victims home after school and into the weekend.

Quantity over quality – The amount of ‘spam’ advertisements that seep through social media platforms on a daily basis is infuriating but necessary as it’s this spam that keeps the sites free to use. However being bombarded with so much information makes it more difficult for us to see the wood for the trees so to speak and we can end up being pulled into a spiral of links that can bleed hours out of our lives.

Innocence – The internet in general is stealing the innocence from our children and social media is one of the primary facilitators of this loss. Twenty years ago, it would have been almost impossible for our young children to gain access to excessively violent material or hardcore pornography but in the 21st century, any child with even a cursory amount of internet savvy will be able to access stomach turning, potentially mind altering material with next to no hassle at all and social media provides a perfect platform from which to spread such inappropriate material.

Who are we talking to? – Social media allows its users to hide behind a veil of illusion which they can decide to stay behind indefinitely is they so choose. This is potentially damaging as it could cause certain individuals to grow more introverted and isolated as they delve further into these fantasy ‘personas’.

Conclusions

Ultimately, whether or not social media has improved or detracted from how and why we communicate with one another depends very much on your own opinions and your own experiences. It is irrefutably here to stay though, so on whichever side of the fence you choose to sit, you better get comfortable!

Because of social media we are much more connected which can be a blessing and a curse. It is important to allow people privacy and not abuse it, if you’d like to find more information please visit Insignia. 

Interaction Is The Key To Getting More Twitter Followers

Small Business Marketing, Social Media Marketing, Twitter Marketing, ,

Twitter followers, how to jump start your campaignWhen using Twitter, you want to get as many quality followers as you can and the best way to do that is through interaction. You can’t create a business account, post a few tweets and expect people to follow you automatically. There are too many people using this social networking site for that to happen.

Instead, you have to put time and effort into it before you’ll see results. Here are three ways that you can interact with others on Twitter to help you build a loyal fan base.

Stay Active

Many people go through the effort of starting an account and then, for whatever reason, they don’t bother to post regular tweets. It could be that they don’t see immediate results so they lose interest quickly or it might be due to lack of time. Whatever the reason is for not staying active on your site the results are always the same. The followers that you do have will lose interest and they will look for someone else to follow.

If you’re slacking in this department, make some changes. Post several tweets every day, answer questions left by your fans and comment on important issues that are relevant to your business. Staying active will help you gain more followers.

Retweet Relevant Messages

When you see tweets from others that you find interesting and they are relevant to your business in some way, retweet them. When you retweet on Twitter, it can help to increase your fan base because the followers of the person you retweeted will see you and any comments that you leave.

It also encourages the person to retweet some of your posts. This makes retweeting a great way to interact with your followers and other professionals within your niche. When tweeting, keep your posts as brief as possible and it will be easy for others to retweet the messages they find interesting.

Become a Follower

When you follow people in your niche, many of them will follow you back. This actually has two benefits. One is that you’ll increase your fan base with quality followers. You’ll also have the opportunity to create a good business relationship with other professionals and that’s always good for business.

Do choose who you follow carefully because you don’t want to waste your time following someone that has absolutely nothing to do with your niche. Even if they follow you back they wouldn’t have anything to discuss that would be beneficial to your business, so read the bio’s and learn a little something about the person or company before you follow them and it will help you generate more quality followers.

If you’re having a hard time getting started, you can always invest in fake twitter fans. This will help generate an interest in your company from real users because people have a tendency of following businesses that already have a lot of followers.

Increasing your fan base will help build up your social media presence and interacting with your fans and other professionals in your niche, will help you increase the number of followers you have.

Author Bio: Judy Collins has years of experience using Twitter that she would like to share with you to help your business attract more quality fans.

5 Ways To Vary Your Content Marketing Campaigns

content marketing, SEO, Small Business Marketing, Social Media Marketing,

Most businesses post regular blogs and articles to their website to attract traffic and create authority. But content is about more than just copy. Content covers a whole range of different disciplines, and professional marketers can achieve great results by deviating from the industry norm.

So how can you vary content marketing and develop a more holistic strategy? Here are five ideas that work well no matter what your industry.

1. Involve Your Audience

As you build a following on your blog, you’ll have plenty of opportunity to ask for feedback and comments. In marketing, closing that feedback loop is a great way to develop a campaign.

Try writing a white paper, surveying your readers or using their comments as inspiration for new content.

2. Create Video Blogs

Some marketers are a little daunted by video content because it seems like a complex undertaking, but video’s easier to create than ever. Modern video editing tools make video easy to put together, and faster hardware means editing is less arduous. That means it’s really easy to create a video blog for a site.

Try Camtasia Studio for straightforward video blogs, or WeVideo for web and mobile video creation.

3. Make an Infographic

Blog posts that are heavy with data are difficult to read and digest. Why not create an infographic instead? Infographics give your blog a new dimension, and you can pair them with content for a complete solution to your content marketing needs. Google will index the content, and your readers will enjoy the visuals alongside the article.

Making a really good infographic means engaging a content writer, a researcher and a graphic designer. But it’s worth doing properly. Don’t skimp on the details: a poor infographic won’t attract the likes and shares you’re looking for. Invest time and money in getting everything spot on.

4. Create Mini Marketing Videos

With Vine, Twitter brought short video to social networking and placed it front and centre in many marketing campaigns. The short format and innovative app has breathed new life into marketing campaigns: Vine looks easy, and it is, but you have to plan meticulously to make something really special with such a short amount of time.

If you’re not familiar with the Vine app, the latest version of Instagram offers similar features.

5. Make a Podcast

Podcasting is still a great way to reinforce your brand and promote authority, so it’s a great fit for a marketing assignment. Creating a podcast is easy: you can record audio using an inexpensive USB mic, and distribution is free using RSS feeds and iTunes.

Podcasting is a great way to expand on written content and invite prominent speakers to add their input.

The Value of Content

When it comes to Google search results, written content and quality articles should spearhead any marketing campaign. In your marketing job, you can also vary content to keep your audience engaged. Armed with these tips and suggestions, you can approach your clients with fresh new ideas that’ll promote their brand and give them the edge.

By Sam Wright, a journalist writing on behalf of Brand Republic.