Dear Valued Customer,

You were warned, Richmond business owners, under an abundance of care,
That the Traveling Marketers would appear again, though we didn’t know where.
The crew has been spotted: the gypsies, fortune tellers, and RankMaster in tow,
Word is they’ll be appearing September 23rd, at the Biz Link Tradeshow.

From 9 until 4, they’ll be haunting the Richmond International Raceway,
At the NetSearch Direct booth is where they’re rumored to stay.
Business fortunes will be read and search engine ranks will be put to the test,
Marketing efforts will be proven, and some hopefully laid to rest.

For the RankMaster spares no mercy when it comes to website promotion,
But fear not, gentle business owner, the Marketers know the magic potion.
Whether it’s traffic you’re after; or its leads, clicks, or competition-sizing,
The Traveling Marketers have the right strategies for your online advertising.

So come one, come all! Business owners large and small,
And bring your wildest goals.
For across many miles the Traveling Marketers have come to roam.
Now’s your chance to learn what will make your profits soar,
But act quickly, for who knows when the Traveling Marketers will be back to the 804.

Safety in Numbers: Why Keywords Travel Best in Groups

One member of our staff, we won’t name names, appreciates organization a little too much. She thinks that gifting closet organizing systems, decorative bins, and colorful fabric cubes is at the top of everyone’s favorite things. We won’t even get started on her labeling system, or the fact that she has a file folder for everything. Instead, she brings a good PPC quality to light – organization, particularly, keyword organization.

Ever sit down to think about the products or services that you’re selling? Chances are you can come up with a good list of 25 keywords within just a few minutes, and even more than that if you’re given some serious alone time to think. The first keywords you come up with are likely your core keywords – key phrases that your business constantly targets because they reflect the services and products that you sell. Once you step back from that short list and read through the rest, you’ll probably see natural groupings of keywords as your thought process developed. Some may be seasonal, some may be geared towards manufacturers who search for your products using specific names or model numbers, and some may be geared towards bargain shoppers. What you’ve just done is an exercise in keyword organization; one of the fundamental PPC skills that can literally make or break a campaign.

When it comes to web development and search engine optimization you’d think that the two would go hand in hand, right? The two couldn’t be more polar opposites. Yet, we’re never surprised when new clients come to us on the heels of a “SEO” campaign launched by their web developer, jaded and angry. The only thing we hate about seeing this type of customer is that we know this could have been avoided if web developers were up front about their exact skill set. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case, especially in a tight economy where the promise of even the slightest amount of extra profit sounds like music to web developing ears.

Now, there may be a few qualified web developers or development firms out there who truly can carry a search engine optimization campaign for your business. We applaud legit businesses that exist first to serve a customer’s need instead of filling their greedy pockets. Call us crazy, but we understand that websites are critical to a business’ heartbeat and we make each SEO campaign’s success our ultimate goal. In fact, with 106 billion websites up and running the wrong SEO campaign will demolish any chances of your online business success. More than that, a few quick-fixes or less than honest SEO strategies employed to get your website ranking highly could get your site blacklisted from search engines. Think of the implications that can have for your business and for your business’ brand.

National Statistics

Brace Yourself: Is Search Changing?

There’s been a bit of a “through the looking glass” theme to this month’s newsletter. With business predictions from Traveling Marketers, behavioral trend spotting in PPC keywords, and a holiday advertising article we can’t wait to get our hands around the next frontier. And it could be a big one. Search, as we know it, could be changing.

For some time now rumblings have been bubbling about Semantic Web, or Web 3.0 – the next frontier in search. The overall message is that user searches are getting more social. Often blog content, user-generated business reviews, and consumer product experiences are being sought out in addition to manufacturer or company information. Consumers want to know what to expect “straight from the horse’s mouth”. Search engines are even beginning to return social media updates and profiles mixed in with regular search results. It’s a way of testing the waters. If user-generated, social-type search results become more favored over what was normally returned, we may be witnessing search engine algorithm change in the making!