Slides presented by Simon Sanders to PROI Workshop in Istanbul October 2010. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – The importance of search results for reputation management • How Google works - all about optimising • Paid search - and its role in PR • Applying SEO to PR - steps you can take

1. 1
Social media
How you
find people
Search
How people
find you

2. 2
Search engines are most visited websites (UK)

3. 3
Google > 90% of search in UK

4. 4
Q: How can you get visibility?
A: SEO – optimising content for search engines
the process of improving
the volume or quality of traffic
to a web site from search engines
via natural search results
Wikipedia

5. 5
How do we find info / websites?
Type in the URL? Google it?

6. 6
We Google it – whether area of interest or brand

7. 7
“Your reputation lives
on Google’s
results page”

8. 8
Look what happened
Old news got
republished
by mistake
on a US
media
website and
then got
republished
by
Bloomberg
Share price
fell 75% -
$1bn wiped
off - when
Google
indexed the
story

9. 9
Natural search results
Natural search

10. 10
Natural v paid search

11. 11
Paid search results
Paid search

12. 12
Natural v paid
Paid search
Sponsored
Pay per click
Natural search
Organic
SEO

13. 13
Speed of results: SEO v paid search

14. 14
Paid search = instant, guaranteed placement

15. 15
When should you use paid
search?
Crisis
One-off
Seasonal
Tactical

16. 16
Google’s mission?
“Organise the world’s information and
make it universally accessible and useful”

17. 17

18. 18
Blended
results

19. 19
It matches what users want…
according to how a page matches…
…and its relative reputation
…with what is available.
How does Google work?

20. 20
SEO - the task
Best practice’ guidelines apply – rules and algorithms change often
TASK WHICH MEANS… HOW?
Understand what users
are looking for
You need to
understand the
keywords people type
Use keyword research to know
what users are looking for
Increase your use of
these keywords
You can respond to
what people are
looking for
Use keywords in titles (pages,
headings) tags (meta, images,
video), links (external, internal)
and copy (releases, articles,
reports)
Increase the number and
quality of links to your site
Creating content to
fill in content gaps
Earn ‘human’ attention, visits,
recommendations and links –
and earn more attention from
Google

21. 21
e.g. SEO basics: <title> and <description> tags

22. 22
e.g. bad use of <descriptions> should be unique for
each page

23. 23
Sample tips: good <title> and <description> tags
> 66 – 70 characters max
> Be accurate
> Decide the purpose
> Put the keywords first
> Mention your brand name
> Keep page title and brand name
separate
> Write attractive <title> tags
> Write unique <title> tags for every
page
> 155 characters max
> Use keywords you want to score
with for that page
> Don’t create false expectations
> Think about your target audience
> Tell the user what to expect
> Write properly!
> Don’t repeat the page title
> Don’t just pull in first words of
content
> Unique <description> for every
page

24. 24
Plenty of blogs on every aspect of optimisation –
images, video, meta data etc.

25. 25
SEO for PR – eight things you can do
> Generate content
> Optimise for your keywords
> Promote via social media
> Develop your online newsroom
> Use wire services
> Ask mainstream media
> Use paid search
> Measure the value

26. 26
Eight things you can do – SEO for PR
> Remember this simple rule: if Google can search it, find it and index it…then it’s worth creating content for it
> So…news releases, reports, white papers, images, videos, FAQs, newsletters, blogs and more
> Don’t just create all this quality content – you optimise it and promote it to earn links as well as traffic
> Use keyword research e.g. Google’s Adwords Keyword Tool or Insights for Search to discover the terms that users search for and trends
> Also ask for summaries of client’s / other agency PPC reports to inform what keywords are converting
> Google Analytics insight from the webmaster about which search terms are being used and from which sources are also invaluable
> When you have your keywords in mind – use them to tag appropriate content
> In press releases use keywords in body copy of releases as well as titles and subheads
> Write for humans and don’t stuff keywords too heavily (e.g. one or two phrases used 3-4 times max)
> Work with clients / webmasters to ensure that the site is crawlable
> e.g. avoid pages built in Flash, esnure you have an XML site map
> Use keywords in title tags, page titles, section headings, body copy, link text, image alt text, navigation text and footer text
> Create an online newsroom as part of main website
> a blog-based system can be very easy to content manage and has in-built SEO benefits
> create keyword-rich categories that will help users as well as search engines
> Promote this content via mainstream / social media
> Use media relations / social media networks / outreach
> Add book-markng / sharing tools to make it easy for users to save / forward / share your content
> Create and post alternative formats of the release (Word, PDF)
> Don’t just post the release into your online newsroom – also blog / tweet the release and link to the press release
> If budget allows, use wire services – can create extra links and news visibility
> Where possible ask media to include the links you want and link text you want them to use
> Use pay-per-click for short-term / quick response visibility.
> e.g. time-sensitive / crisis / seasonal / reactive use can produce visibility in minutes
> providing alternative content for negative listings in search results.
> can use it to attract attention to news stories and then turn off when required e.g. after pick-up by media.
> Measure the value
> e.g. use unique tracking URLs in releases that link to specific landing pages
> monitor release rankings, news visibility, social mentions, traffic & outcomes

27. 27
Social media
How you
find people
Search
How people
find you
Increasing importance of social media for search
Who talk about you,
link to you
and drive traffic
Which gets noticed
by search engines

28. 28
SMO = Social media optimisation
> Google loves blogs - > easy to index -> regularly updated -> themed content
> You Tube / Flickr – video and images
> Facebook and LinkedIn results rank highly for individuals
> Tweets being indexed and ranked prominently in results
> Provide quality content -> Build relationships / networks -> increasing traffic
> Social media relationships -> Make friends, help out, give advice
> Make it easy for people to find your content / share your content
> ‘Like’ buttons, ‘Tweet this’ buttons

29. 29
Remember: optimise for your audience

30. 30
Remember: focus on your keywords

31. 31
Keywords
What do people search for about ‘my issue’?

32. 32
Example using ‘public affairs’ as base keyword of
how other relevant terms can be researched
Most efficient: Click through rate = impressions / clicks. ‘Long-tail’ terms that are very valuable to know!
Most effective: What produces most clicks? And at what cost?
Most volume: What words / terms are most searched for?

33. 33
Google Insights – into what people search for…

34. 34
Google Insights – do people think of ‘spill’ or ‘leak’?

35. 35
Learnings from Google Adwords and Insights?
Keywords are not always what you expect!
There can be big differences between…
…words and terms we think people use and what they do use
(implications for content generation > URLs, titles, descriptions, tags)
i.e. ‘most-searched’ AND ‘most clicked’ words / terms
(implications for natural search > the words you choose to use)
i.e. ‘most-clicked’ AND ‘most cost-effective’ words
(implications for paid search too > which words are ‘action’ words to buy)

36. 36
What can you discover from paid search?
Which keywords and terms work best
What to recycle in tags, descriptions and
content
Where long-tail content gains can be

37. 37
Eight things you can do – SEO for PR
> Remember this simple rule: if Google can search it, find it and index it…then it’s worth creating content for it
> So…news releases, reports, white papers, images, videos, FAQs, newsletters, blogs and more
> Don’t just create all this quality content – you optimise it and promote it to earn links as well as traffic
> Use keyword research e.g. Google’s Adwords Keyword Tool or Insights for Search to discover the terms that users search for and trends
> Also ask for summaries of client’s / other agency PPC reports to inform what keywords are converting
> Google Analytics insight from the webmaster about which search terms are being used and from which sources are also invaluable
> When you have your keywords in mind – use them to tag appropriate content
> In press releases use keywords in body copy of releases as well as titles and subheads
> Write for humans and don’t stuff keywords too heavily (e.g. one or two phrases used 3-4 times max)
> Work with clients / webmasters to ensure that the site is crawlable
> e.g. avoid pages built in Flash, esnure you have an XML site map
> Use keywords in title tags, page titles, section headings, body copy, link text, image alt text, navigation text and footer text
> Create an online newsroom as part of main website
> a blog-based system can be very easy to content manage and has in-built SEO benefits
> create keyword-rich categories that will help users as well as search engines
> Promote this content via mainstream / social media
> Use media relations / social media networks / outreach
> Add book-markng / sharing tools to make it easy for users to save / forward / share your content
> Create and post alternative formats of the release (Word, PDF)
> Don’t just post the release into your online newsroom – also blog / tweet the release and link to the press release
> If budget allows, use wire services – can create extra links and news visibility
> Where possible ask media to include the links you want and link text you want them to use
> Use pay-per-click for short-term / quick response visibility.
> e.g. time-sensitive / crisis / seasonal / reactive use can produce visibility in minutes
> providing alternative content for negative listings in search results.
> can use it to attract attention to news stories and then turn off when required e.g. after pick-up by media.
> Measure the value
> e.g. use unique tracking URLs in releases that link to specific landing pages
> monitor release rankings, news visibility, social mentions, traffic & outcomes