Today, we’re releasing a new eBook in our growing stable of Insights reports (read them all here). Titled, “10 Free, Must-Have SEO Tools,” the report outlines our top picks for the best free SEO tools and resources marketers can use to identify target keywords, audit and troubleshoot onsite SEO issues and gain competitive intelligence.

Below is a snippet of the many useful insights you’ll find inside the eBook. Download your free copy to find more.

Download the Free eBook

Performance in organic search engine marketing requires an investment. Depending on the goals of a search engine optimization campaign, that investment can be quite substantial. Budget often must be allocated strategically in order to stretch it enough for success.

Part of the investment in any SEO campaign goes toward tools that help brands analyze data, strategize and track results. To do so, marketers need a bevy of tools and resources.

This is an area in which marketers can be frugal, if necessary. There are hundreds of great paid search marketing tools that will help generate a strong return from an SEO campaign. If budget must be used sparingly, however, there are ways around paying for high-end tools.

This report analyzes the best free tools marketers can use to track and measure the success of their SEO campaigns, troubleshoot problems, gain important competitive intelligence and plan for future SEO success.

Key Takeaways

1. Using a free tool or combination of free tools can often eliminate the need to invest in a paid search marketing or SEO tool.
2. SEO tools are important in selecting the right keywords to target in an SEO campaign.
3. Troubleshooting on-site SEO issues becomes much easier with access to the right tools.
4. Competitive intelligence tools can be a great asset for building a successful SEO strategy.

Download the Free eBook

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Today, we released a new eBook on content marketing. Titled, “Content Marketing Like a Pro,” the report outlines the key pillars to content marketing and advises marketers on best practices for crafting and executing successful content marketing programs.

Download the eBook

This eBook also provides a framework marketers can use to improve their brand’s SEO and generate leads via a content marketing program.

When consumers first encounter a brand digitally it’s not always the brand’s website that makes the first impression. What makes the greatest impression is the authority of the brand’s website measured by where it ranks when a consumer searches.

Content marketing is a method to build this authority and rank.

Learn how to use content marketing to generate leads and improve your brand’s SEO with MediaWhiz’s new eBook, “Content Marketing Like a Pro.”

Key Takeaways

1. Content marketing can drive leads directly and indirectly. Direct click-throughs can be created from content marketing pieces to a website for lead-generation purposes. Leads can also be generated indirectly by impacting the performance of other channels, such as SEO.
2. Focus on the audience. Even if content marketing efforts are utilized with the goal of improving SEO, it is important to focus on how the content will benefit consumers. By defining the target audience and performing the research necessary to understand what that audience values, content can be created to provide value to the consumer that will in turn lead to engagement and success.
3. Measure results. There is a great deal of learning that comes from each content marketing campaign. By tracking and analyzing key performance indicators associated with the efforts, this data can be leveraged to improve future campaigns and understand the types of content that resonate most with the target consumer.

Download the eBook

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Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt of an op-ed that was originally published in Search Engine Land.  

There is little doubt that mobile search is the hot topic in the SEO world at the moment. Some brands are now finding that more than 30 percent of all searches come from mobile devices,according to Mobile Marketer. It’s fair to say that mobile search is quickly moving out of the Stone Age and into the digital age.

That’s the premise of a new insight paper, Mobile SEO Best Practices, published recently by my company, MediaWhiz (disclosure: I lead MediaWhiz’s search marketing and digital strategy divisions). In addition to a list of our top-10 tips for effective mobile SEO, the paper offers marketers a step-by-step guide to delivering effective mobile search campaigns.

The tips range from the simple (e.g., understanding the differences in how people search on mobile devices compared to their searches on desktops) to the complex, such as best practices to ensure a site’s mobile content can be properly viewed and crawled by search engines.

Below are my top-10 tips for effective mobile SEO. What are yours? Share your tips in the comments section.

1.  Be A Search Psychologist

Searchers using mobile devices enter keyword queries differently than they do with desktop applications. They use shorter tail phrases.

 Often, their searches are more local in nature and more prone to rely on Google’s Autocomplete feature complete a query. When optimizing meta title and descriptions, it is important to optimize for these shorter tail queries.

2.  Think Social-first, Mobile-second

Mobile users tend to want to be “entertained,” and in many instances, they are connected 24/7 to their social media networks via apps. Content displayed for mobile users should be “entertaining.” When developing online content, think social-first, mobile-second.

Mobile sites should have social media links embedded on every page, as many smartphone users are connected to their social networks 24/7. Doing so will increase exposure, traffic and engagement by ensuring content is easily shared across social networks.

The examples below from Macy’s and Tiffany’s show how a social-first, mobile-second mindset with site design leads to more visually appealing mobile sites.

Read the full op-ed in Search Engine Land. 

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Mobile SEO isn’t your grandfather’s SEO.

Mobile SEO is one of the fastest-growing sectors of digital marketing.

Mobile SEO is hot. It is one of the fastest-growing sectors in digital media and marketing. It is also a huge growth opportunity for brands and marketers — if they know how to properly optimize their mobile campaigns. Mobile SEO best practices are no longer a nice-to-have; they are essential to any effective digital marketing campaign. 

The steep rise of consumers accessing the Web and performing searches on their mobile devices has generated a significant demand on mobile-device-friendly Web content. Search engines are indexing this mobile content and deciding when it is most appropriate to serve it to consumers, depending on the device they are using. At this time, Google and Bing have had conflicting recommendations for Web developers with respect to how their search engines index and serve up this influx of mobile-friendly content.

While the debate continues for search engines, MediaWhiz believes that best practices will evolve and, eventually, an industry-wide standard will form.

It’s with this in mind that MediaWhiz is proud to release its new insights paper, “Mobile SEO Best Practices.” This informative paper was unveiled this week in the Search Engine Land newsletter. It presents our point of view on the best practices for digital and mobile marketers, helping them ensure their mobile marketing campaigns are SEO-effective.

This insight paper will help marketers:

• Develop successful mobile-search campaigns
• Create mobile-friendly Web pages and content that attracts consumers’ attention
• Understand new technologies that help brands rank first in mobile searches

The mobile marketing space is fragmented. Cut through the clutter with insight from integrated digital media agency MediaWhiz. Let us know how we can help you solve your mobile search and SEO needs. Contact our sales team for a consultation.

Download Now >

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We’re big fans of the semi-annual industry confab known as LeadsCon. For this summer’s event, LeadsCon East, we’re hosting a special workshop aimed at helping marketers garner better value and more leads from their digital marketing campaigns.

On Wednesday, July 25, our workshop, titled, “Guaranteeing ROI and Accountability: The Benefits of Online Channel Integration,” will help marketers understand how they can effectively utilize online channel integration to generate results in an accountable and measurable fashion. It’s about more than just placing an ad across various online channels. Our panel of experts will discuss how they utilize multichannel integration to keep the leads coming in while ensuring real ROI for their brands.

We’re excited to host this workshop and invite all who will be attending LeadsCon East to attend. Session details are below.

For more information or to schedule a private meeting with our sales team while at LeadsCon East, please contact Keith Trivitt at ktrivitt@mediawhiz.com or 646.264.0144

Be sure to check out the MediaWhiz booth at LeadsCon. Visit booth #111 for cool giveaways and to chat with our friendly sales team.

MediaWhiz LeadsCon Session Details

Session:              Guaranteeing ROI and Accountability: The Benefits of Online Channel Integration

Date:                     Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Time:                    9–9:45 a.m.                   

Room:                   Rendezvous Trianon, Hilton New York

Session Description

The holy grail of digital marketing is a guarantee of results for brands. In this informative session, MediaWhiz and its clients discuss how marketers can utilize performance marketing to deliver actionable and quantifiable results while maintaining brand integrity and ensuring compliance in an increasingly litigious online environment.

Speakers

• Moderator: Jeremy Leonard, Senior Vice President, Strategy & Operations, Mediawhiz
• Mike Venables, Group Planning Director, Neo@Ogilvy
• Scott Kaufman, Vice President, Marketing, The Lasik Vision Institute
• Sung Kim, Chief Technology Officer, TriAd Media Solutions

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The search marketing landscape has changed dramatically in recent years. Gone are the days of a walled garden between a company’s organic and paid search programs and the rest of its online marketing strategy. Now, there is a recognition by marketers that search, like any form of marketing, must be engaged in a holistic, interconnected manner. It must create measurable results that tie into the whole of a company’s marketing campaign, rather than being off in its own universe.

With that in mind, MediaWhiz has collected the best of its insight and perspective on search marketing for a new, informative white paper, which we unveiled this week in the eMarketer newsletter. It presents 10 new ideas for enhancing your brand’s search strategy. Each comes from MediaWhiz’s stable of search marketing experts. Each represents a new way of thinking about online search and an innovative way to grow your business.

Learn five trends for navigating the modern search landscape. Explore how your brand can convert online traffic into franchise foot traffic. Discover how to incorporate Quality Score into your brand’s search campaign. All that and more can be found in MediaWhiz’s new white paper, “10 New Ideas for Enhancing Your Brand’s Search Strategy.”

Download your copy today.

Because with the marketer’s world showing no signs of getting any easier, we could all use a little advice from the experts. 

Below is an excerpt from MediaWhiz’s new search marketing white paper.

Five Trends for Navigating the Modern Search Landscape

1. Search is not just for online retailers; it’s for everyone. Online searches influence offline purchases. Forrester Research estimates that more than $1.1 trillion of retail sales in 2011 were “Web-influenced” versus $173 billion actual online sales. This is especially true for considered purchases such as autos, financial services, education, furniture, etc. For example, JD Power estimates 90 percent of potential car purchasers research their purchase online before going to a dealer.
2. Search means more than Google. It is important to diversify your company’s paid search (PPC) efforts. Google attracts the majority of paid search but Bing and Yahoo are gaining share. Similarly, Facebook appears intent on charging into the search market. But search audiences at Bing and Yahoo differ from Google. In 2010, click-through rates for small and medium-sized businesses grew 109 percent for Bing, 123 percent for Yahoo, but only 32 percent for Google. As Facebook emerges, targeting and response rates will likely vary from the other providers. Search success will require the ability to manage all four platforms successfully.
3. Local and mobile search will explode. Local results are increasingly dominating search results pages. Businesses must maintain local registrations with the search engines to ensure presence in local search results, maps and geolocation queries. Segmenting customers through geotargeting with paid search also helps focus the right ads to the right customers. Use of mobile devices to conduct searches is exploding. Search on Android devices grew 300 percent in the first half of 2010. Like registering your locations, configuring your website for mobile compatibility is paramount.

Want more insight like this? Download the new MediaWhiz white paper, “10 New Ideas for Enhancing Your Brand’s Search Strategy.” 

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