SEO Guides, Tips & More!

In the mid 1990’s, there was this commercial that ran on television in Chicago on a regular basis. It was an ad for a table top oven known as the Ronco Rotisserie Oven. It was an oven that could fit two turkeys and could cook them in a quick period. The slogan for this product was “set it and forget it”. The idea was it was so easy to use that you could literally forget the turkey (or the other food) was cooking. I mention this here because many marketers become confused and think that once they optimize their website, they can “set it and forget it”. Unfortunately, what works for the Ronco Rotisserie Oven is not going to work in your SEO strategy. Managing an SEO strategy, whether for an accounting firm or automotive repair center, requires maintenance and ongoing attention. It is like growing tomatoes in your garden— you can’t just plant the seed, water once per month, and expect to enjoy juicy tomatoes. There needs to be a maintenance plan to ensure the right things are happening at the right times. To help our clients, prospects, and others understand important maintenance steps, I have outlined the more common ones we regularly implement for clients.

• Assessing Inbound Links – It is important to know that Google evaluates your site not only on what websites you are linking to, but also those that link to you. Anyone who has attempted to execute a link building strategy understands this concept. Google evaluates your site by who associates with it. Association is determined by the type of websites that link to you. When they are desirable sites like media outlets such as CNN, they view your site as more authoritative (or why would CNN link to you?). However, the reverse is also true. If several Russian sites link to yours, or those that have no connection to your business, Google may see this as a reason to reduce authority. As a result, it is important to regularly check the websites linking to you. Google Search Console has a tool that provides this information. I suggest doing this quarterly to ensure no undesirables appear.
• Keyword Research – This is an absolute for a successful SEO program. Most marketers know the services and industries in which the firm focuses and wants to rank well for popular keyword terms. The first step is to do the necessary research to identify the most relevant terms and those that are well searched. From experience, I can tell you this is often more of an art form than an exact science. There will be terms that are too broad, not completely relevant, or those that lack geographical context. So, when conducting this exercise, it is a good idea to run a series of several queries to see what combinations make the most sense for your firm. As an example, your firm may want to be well ranked for outsourced accounting related terms. There will literally be 1,000 options returned (if you use moz.com) and often about 25 will be relevant and useful to your efforts. So be ready to delete the non-essential options and drill down to a manageable list.
• Keyword Research to Drive Content – As mentioned above, keyword research returns many results that may not all be relevant. However, that doesn’t mean you will not have a use for them. Be careful to identify those terms which can be fodder for blog posts. As an example, I recently conducted research for a client on the term employee benefit plan audit. The list of possible options was staggering but listed in the results were terms such as “when is a benefit plan audit required”, “when does a plan need to have an audit”, and “what is the 80/120 rule”. Now, these terms are not relevant for the service page I was looking to optimize, but I suspect they would make great blog posts. So, as you conduct keyword research be mindful to use related terms to drive content when appropriate.
• Keyword Tracking – Using the information uncovered in keyword research efforts, it is important to track (monthly) where the firm ranks for selected terms. Obviously, you will want to know if your strategy is yielding gains or if changes need to be made. Monthly tracking using a service such a moz.com or SEMrush will allow you to stay ahead of the game. The other reason to do this is to identify trends. If the website rank is continually dropping, then you can act to stop it from reaching a critical point.

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There are many more steps to a SEO maintenance plan than can be shared in a single blog post. If you are interested in learning more about keeping your SEO plan well-tuned or need assistance with your SEO strategy, FlashPoint Marketing can help.