Anthony Coraggio says, “Pay-per-click advertising generates vast amounts of data, which presents us with tremendous potential for optimization and success. However, this formidable sword cuts both ways—even skilled managers can quickly find themselves adrift if tests and changes are not carefully tracked. Here’s a quick, actionable guide to keeping order in your AdWords account with a simple and professional activity log. The philosophy of orderly management Good Adwords management is an exacting science—every tweak and change made should be for a specific reason, with a particular... [...]

Ryan Stewart says, “In my 28 years on this planet, I’ve come to accept two things as fact: The sun rises every morning. Marketers screw everything up. Because of fact No. 2, I had to stop selling SEO. Why? Here’s an interaction I used to have five times a day. *Phone rings* Me: “This is Ryan Stewart with WEBRIS. How can I help you?” Caller: “I’m looking for SEO for [domain.com]. I want to rank for [keyword terms x, y, and z]. Can you guys handle that?”“. Why I Stopped Selling SEO Services and You Should, Too MOZ Blog  [...]

John Hingley – Dasheroo says, “Search engine optimization can be one of the most important KPIs at a company, especially when online traffic is the number one source of new customers. The more customers that naturally find you on search engines, specifically Google, the less you have to spend advertising to get them in your door. And advertising can be an expensive way to get new customers, especially on search engines when you’re in a constant battle with the big boys. At my company, we dove into our own SEO KPIs and developed a strategy for gaining in the search results because... [...]

Rand Fishkin says, “It’s a near-universal experience for consultants and in-house SEOs who’ve worked on numerous organic search campaigns. The first 3–6 months (longer if the site is very large or complex) of any SEO effort is almost always exclusively dedicated to fixing mistakes, improving existing issues, tweaking and tuning the sub-optimal, and generally closing the gap between what exists now and current best practices. The beautiful part of SEO is that, once completed, these efforts can have ongoing and compounding benefits for months or years to come. The newly accessible... [...]

Nicole Rende says, “Most people see search engine optimization, or SEO, as having two parts: on-site optimization and off-site optimization. Both of these having to do with content, keywords, and links, but a lot of the time technical SEO gets overlooked. Many people are either not educated enough about the subject, or get nervous when they hear the word technical. So what is technical SEO? It is essentially the more involved optimization tweaks that help give your content the best chance it can have to rank for relevant keywords and phrases. Technical SEO allows you to focus on analyzing... [...]

John Hingley says, “Search engine optimization can be one of the most important KPIs at a company, especially when online traffic is the number one source of new customers. The more customers that naturally find you on search engines, specifically Google, the less you have to spend advertising to get them in your door. And advertising can be an expensive way to get new customers, especially on search engines when you’re in a constant battle with the big boys. At my company, we dove into our own SEO KPIs and developed a strategy for gaining in the search results because we’re... [...]

Trenton Greener says, “Google Analytics (GA) is a phenomenal tool that most of us, including myself, use in a very limited capacity. It’s not that we don’t want to use all of the functionality of this great product, but that we’re unaware of the potential opportunities available to us as marketers. Often times, when we do find that new and exciting feature, it astounds and astonishes us; I often find myself consumed by the possibilities. That’s how it felt when I first found GA’s “Data Import” feature. I had no idea that I could load not only my AdWords data... [...]

Patricio Robles says, “As rumored earlier this year, Google has announced Customer Match, a new ad targeting product that gives AdWords advertisers the ability to target their customers through Google Search, YouTube, and Gmail. Similar to Facebook Custom Audiences, Customer Match allows advertisers to upload a list of customer email addresses, which Google then matches against the logged in users on these properties for the purpose of delivering highly-targeted ads. For example, a company with a customer loyalty program can create and target Google ads specifically for members of the... [...]

Ben Davis says, “There are many companies reluctant to let their marketing execs have free reign with their owned and earned media. This is understandable where reputations are easily won and lost. It doesn’t pay to give just anybody the keys to your website, email builder or social media channels and ask them to go at it. Social media faux pas in particular are well documented. Whatever the benefits of managerial oversight, anyone who has worked at a digital agency or a big corporation will tell you the process of ‘sign-off’ from a director or sponsor can be torturous. A sign-off... [...]

Patricio Robles says, “As rumored earlier this year, Google has announced Customer Match, a new ad targeting product that gives AdWords advertisers the ability to target their customers through Google Search, YouTube, and Gmail. Similar to Facebook Custom Audiences, Customer Match allows advertisers to upload a list of customer email addresses, which Google then matches against the logged in users on these properties for the purpose of delivering highly-targeted ads. For example, a company with a customer loyalty program can create and target Google ads specifically for members of the... [...]