The 404 error page is a generic, browser-issued webpage that tells a visitor when a page they are looking for can’t be found. A custom 404 error page, on the other hand, is a specially designed page that delivers the same message but in a more helpful, user-friendly way.

It can tell the visitor what’s going on and what to do next. It can even help save a sale.

This post walks through the steps of how to add an IIS custom error 404 page if you’re a small business administering your own Microsoft IIS server either directly or through a hosting provider. In this post:

• How to identify your web server
• How to prepare custom 404 error pages in IIS 8.5
• How to prepare custom 404 error pages in IIS 10
• How to test your custom 404 error page
• Troubleshooting error pages in IIS 8.5 and 10.0

How to Identify Your Web Server

There are several popular (and many more besides) software programs used to store and host webpages, called servers. If you’re not sure which server you use, contact your web host and they’ll tell you.

If they say Apache — and it very well might be since it’s one of the most widely used servers on the web — leave this post and read How to Configure a Custom 404 Error Page — Apache Server Edition.

Not using Apache? There’s a high chance you’re using another very popular server, Microsoft IIS. Another way to tell that you’re using Microsoft IIS is if your website is programmed in .NET or another Microsoft stack, such as ASP.

So you’re using Microsoft IIS? Let’s begin.

Putting in place a custom 404 error page in Microsoft IIS takes four steps:

This post skips to Step 3. We assume you’ve already created a branded, custom 404 error page. We also assume you’ve put this page in the appropriate directory so that IIS has it available to serve. If that’s correct, then you’re in the right guide.

If you’d like a primer on how to do the first step, visit How to Design a 404 Error Page That Saves a Sale.

A Possible Microsoft IIS Complication

Before diving into the process, it’s important to note a potential complication regarding your IIS web server. If your website resides on a dedicated server (one that isn’t shared), you’re good to go with the steps below.

If your website lives on a shared server run by a third-party hosting provider, only the administrator is allowed to make changes to your server files. In other words, you will have to contact the hosting provider before you can gain access to the server and implement the changes outlined below. Unfortunately, this might take a while – but hopefully it’s a brief setback.

Another way to get administrative rights back in your power if you’re on a shared IIS server is to install an ISAPI_Rewrite plug-in into IIS. ISAPI stands for Internet Server Application Program Interface, and you can easily purchase this software from several places. Helicon Tech (www.isapirewrite.com) creates a good version of the software.

Ready to go? Here’s how to tell your server to replace a generic 404 error with your new and improved page.

How to Program Microsoft IIS to Deliver Your Custom Error Page

With administrative rights to make changes to your server files, you can now get in and make the changes. Exactly how to make those changes depends on the version of the software that you’re using.

Here’s a brief guide for IIS 8.5 followed by another set of instructions for IIS 10.0.

How to Prepare Custom 404 Error Pages in IIS 8.5

Step 1: Open the “Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager” tab. This is located on the Task Bar below “Server Manager,” and then underneath “Tools.”

Step 2: Identify website or application. Go to the “Connections” pane and click the plus sign (+) next to your server name to expand it. Then expand “Sites.” Next, find the site or application you want to set a custom error page for.

Step 3: Open “Error Pages.” You can do this by double-clicking “Error Pages,” located in the home pane.

Step 5: Enter the HTTP “Status Code.” When you see the dialog box “Add Custom Error Page,” enter “404” underneath “Status Code.”

Step 6: Select “Execute a URL on this site,” located in the same dialog box. This allows you to serve dynamic content, such as an asp file for the custom error page you’ve created.

Step 7: Enter the URL. Within the text box, “File path,” type the URL of the custom error page, and then click “OK.” Note: Make sure when selecting this option that the path is a relative path.

Once you hit “OK,” your custom 404 error page should be live and doing its job.

How to Prepare Custom 404 Error Pages in IIS 10

Step 1: Open the “Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager” tab. This is located on the Task Bar below “Server Manager,” and then underneath “Tools.”

Step 2: Identify website or application. Go to the “Connections” pane and click the plus sign (+) next to your server name to expand it. Then expand “Sites.” Next, go to the site or application you want to set a custom error page for.

Step 3: Open Error Pages. Double-click the “Error Pages” icon located in the home pane; click “Edit.”

Step 4: Enter the HTTP Status Code. When you see the dialog box “Edit Custom Error Page,” enter “404” underneath “Status Code.”

Step 6: Select “Execute a URL on this Site.” In the same dialog box, select “Execute a URL on this site” so that you can serve your custom page.

Step 7: Enter the URL. Within the text box “URL (relative to the site root),” type the URL of the custom error page and then click “OK.”

Step 8: Select “Edit Feature Settings.” Once you hit “OK,” right-click on the 404 error and select “Edit Feature Settings.”

Step 9: Choose “Custom Error Page,” and then click “OK.” After you click this last OK, your new page should be live and ready.

Test Your New and Improved Custom 404 Error Page

Whether you’re using IIS version 8.5 or 10.0, it’s time to check if your new page is working properly. The easiest way to test your new page is to visit a bogus page on your website. Go to your web browser and type in a fake page on the site, such as www.mywebsite.com/bogus-cheeseburgers.

If the new custom page comes up, congratulations! You’ve properly set up a custom 404 error page for the Microsoft IIS server.

If you’re still getting the generic 404 error page, it’s time to check a common problem and try again.

Troubleshooting in IIS 8.5 and 10.0

• Did you use an absolute path instead of a relative path? It has to be a relative path. This is a common issue that plagues both IIS 8.5 and 10.0. To fix this issue, simply go back to Step 6 and add a relative path. And test again. Hopefully this time you’ll find your custom page live and ready.

• Are you not seeing the admin menus described here? It may be that you don’t have administrative access. If for some reason you cannot get admin access, there is an alternative: you can configure your custom 404 page manually by editing the Web.config file or putting it in code. Here’s where Microsoft offers steps on how to do both.

Note: If your website is programmed in something other than C#, VB.NET, JavaScript or VBScript, you can still use the steps outlined above, but you’ll have to learn how to do it depending on your programming language/framework.

Simple Change, Big Results

No one enjoys getting a bite of something they don’t want. From a visitor’s point of view, coming across a 404 error page on your website is disappointing and confusing.

And depending on what they get instead of what they wanted, a visitor can lose their appetite. In fact, it’s not uncommon for a consumer who encounters a 404 error page to immediately click the back button and exit the site completely.

A sad ending to a potential conversion.

The good news is that a custom error 404 can save the day.

While it might not be the main course that your visitors are craving, a custom error page can serve as the amuse-bouche that opens their appetites and leads them to the final entrée.

Help your hungry visitors get over the disappointment of reaching a generic error by creating and setting up a custom 404 page.

Adding a custom 404 error page is just one of the best practices in SEO. There’s so much more to learn, and you can do just that through our official Bruce Clay SEO Training course. 

The post How to Configure a Custom 404 Error Page in Microsoft IIS Server appeared first on Bruce Clay, Inc..

• Keyword Suggestion tool
• Search Engine Optimization/KSP tool
• Single Page Analyzer
• SEO Multi-Page Information tool
• Check Server Page tool
• And an SEO Cloaking Checker

These free tools don’t require a login, credit card info, or software download. Use them as much as you like from the Free SEO Tools page on SEOToolSet.com.

To give you a chance to see in action how the data you get enhances your organic SEO efforts, this miniseries covers each of the free SEO tools. (See the whole miniseries here!) In this post, you meet a lightweight version of our most frequently used SEO tool, the Single Page Analyzer.

• Today’s free SEO tool: single page analyzer
• How to use it
• 5 ways to use this data
• How not to use this data
• How to Decode the Single Page Analyzer Report
• FAQ: What are the advantages of using SEO analysis tools in web optimization?

Today’s Free SEO Tool: Single Page Analyzer

Tool type: On-page content analysis, on-page optimization

What you’ll learn: When you submit a URL, the tool:

• Grades the optimization of page components (meta data, other tags and body content)
• Flags any SEO errors, and
• Provides suggestions on how to improve your web page optimization.

Why this matters: Proper page analysis is key to improving your web page optimization. Review this data for your own pages and for top-ranking competitors to discover what makes a web page rank high in the search engines for your industry and keywords.

Run the Single Page Analyzer:    

How to Use It

1. Enter a single URL and click Run Page Analyzer. You can enter your own web page or a competitor’s URL. The tool can analyze only one page at a time.
2. The Single Page Analyzer (SPA) produces data about various elements of a web page. This free version returns a report that’s separated into three sections:
   • The first category, Tag Information, examines the tags for a page.
   • The second category, Text Metrics and Readability, analyzes the content and scores the reading level of the text.
   • The final category, Word Phrase Usage, breaks down the most commonly used words and phrases used in various elements on the page.

How to get more from the SPA: The SPA tool featured here is a lightweight version of the tool, which means it’s not the full version. However, you can now access the complete version of this robust tool by signing up for the SEOToolSet. The full version of the Single Page Analyzer tool is available with a low-cost SEOToolSet subscription.

5 Ways to Use This Data

The point of running the SPA is to spot any SEO-related issues with the content on a web page. This tool in particular will show you any major errors, weak areas, as well as any elements that are missing from the page. You can use this information to fix those errors, strengthen weaknesses, and add the missing elements that are vital to the optimization of that page.

Our SEO analysts usually run this tool over and over again to see how the changes they’ve made meet SEO best practices and to learn from their competitors. Before we get into the specifics of how to use the tool and decode the reports, this is what you get from the Single Page Analyzer’s data analysis.

Here are five valuable ways you can use this data to enhance your search engine optimization strategy for a web page:

1. Improve the optimization of your meta tags. Is your meta description too long or too short? Because it matters. Are your tags in the right order? That matters, too. There are basic dos and don’ts to writing meta tags. Use the Tag Information report provided by the SPA to fix or strengthen your tags according to SEO best practices. If you find errors in red, fix them. If you discover that you’re missing any tags, add them. Once you’ve made the changes and have added the missing elements, you can then run the tool a second time to examine the recent changes.

2. Adjust the reading level of your text. High-quality web content has many characteristics, and an appropriate reading level is one of them. Content that is too simple or too complicated can lose the attention of your target audience and fail to bring conversions. So how do you know if your content is written in the appropriate reading level? The SPA will tell you.

Using the Text Metrics and Readability section of the report (outlined below), find out the reading level of your text. If it’s too high, consider adjusting it by reducing the number of three-syllable words and shortening your sentences.

While most web content should be simple to digest, certain industries or businesses require a higher reading level.

Tip: A good way to find out the appropriate reading level for your business or industry is to check out a competitor that is ranking high in the SERPs. Run the SPA on a competitor’s page and get a breakdown of their text. You can then emulate the same writing style and language accordingly.

3. Improve the keyword density on a page. As mentioned above, quality content has many features that set it apart from low-quality content. Does your text feature the keywords and phrases searchers use to find your products or services? Are these important words used in the right places and in the right frequency? The Single Page Analyzer can give you a great snapshot of the most commonly used words on the page and where they’re located. Find out whether you’re using the important words often enough and in the right locations and edit your content accordingly.

4. Locate opportunities. The reports provided by the SPA can help you spot opportunities you otherwise might not have noticed. The Tag Information section, for example, can help you pinpoint keywords that you’re not using in anchor text.

5. Research and learn from your competition. The Single Page Analyzer tool can be used to examine on-page elements of a competitor’s web page. You will want to choose a competitor who is ranking well in the search engines that is similar to your website (Wikipedia and Amazon are probably not the best competitors to examine). Submit a web page into the tool and get a report of everything they’re doing right or wrong. Both sets of information can help you improve your own SEO for a similar page. For example, if you notice that they don’t have any errors in the Tag Information tab, you can get an idea of properly crafted meta tags. On the other hand, if you spot any problems with the page, it could be a great opportunity to beat the competition by making sure your own web page is free of those errors.

How Not to Use this Data

Now that we’ve covered how to utilize the information in the Single Page Analyzer report to improve the optimization of a web page, here’s one way you shouldn’t use this data:

Without applying wisdom. Just because you see a red error message in the SPA report doesn’t mean you should fix it without thinking it through. For example, certain pages of BruceClay.com come up with red error messages when run through the SPA. However, these same pages may rank high in the search engines, so it’s always important to consider the bigger picture before making any changes to important elements on a web page.

How to Decode the Single Page Analyzer Report

Here’s a closer look at the data produced by this free SEO tool and how to read it.

Tag Information

This section is where you’ll find a breakdown of your tags and whether you’re crafting them according to SEO best practices. The Tag Information section examines the title, meta description, and keywords tags. For each tag, the report tells you the total word count (Word Count), Stop Words, Used Words (the number of stop words minus the Word Count), and the character length of the tag.

The Tag Information section also tells you if there are any issues with those tags. You will see any issues listed in red in the last column of the report (the Tag Contents column). In that same column you will also find suggestions on how to solve those problems to improve the SEO of the page. For example, if the SPA discovers that your meta description is too long, you will see two notes in the Tag Contents column: the first note will inform you that the tag is longer than desired, and the second note will tell you the preferred average length of the meta description according to SEO best practices.

Text Metrics and Readability

In the second section of the SPA report, you will see text-specific metrics that help examine the reading level of your content. Here you’ll find everything from how many sentences you have on each page to the average number of syllables per word in the body of the page. The first column shows the metrics, the second features the value, and the third provides a description of the value so that you can better understand the numbers you’re looking at.

Along with text statistics, the SPA produces reading scores based on three different formulas or readability tests. Each test has its own scoring system, so make sure to read the information in the Description column to find out where your content stands according to each test. (The three readability tests are the Fog Reading level, Flesch Reading Ease level, and Flesch-Kincaid Grade level, if you’re wondering.)

Word Phrase Usage

The SPA can help you examine the most commonly used words and phrases on the page and let you know whether you’re using them appropriately, in the right places and according to a frequency that’s common and natural for your industry.

In the Word Phrase Usage category of the SPA report you will see a list of the most commonly used keywords and phrases on that page, listed in order with the longest phrases first. This list is not necessarily your chosen keywords, but the phrases that are the most prominent on the page.

Next to each keyword you will find the number of times the word or phrase is used in various elements on the page, such as in the title, meta description, keywords tag, in the headings, and alt tags. The report also shows you how many times the words are used in the first 200 words of the page, in the body, and in all of the on-page elements combined.

So how do you read the errors? Pay attention to colors. Numbers in red mean that the keyword or phrase is not used often enough, while numbers in blue mean you’ve used them too often.

Note: A red zero appears when you have no instances of a keyword in an element; however, the red color means that it’s a best practice to include it there.  A dash also means there’s no keyword in the element, but you don’t have to add it. This happens often with alt image tags.

Discover More Free SEO Tools

Free and easy to use, the SPA is an advanced search engine optimization tool that provides a full page analysis of a webpage. You can use it to identify broken areas and key places on a page that need improvement. It’s a tool you can use to take small but effective steps to improve the optimization of each page. Finally, it’s a testing tool you can keep going back to reassess the enhancements and additions to the page.

Take the free, external SPA for a spin, but remember that this is just a taste of what the full SPA has to offer. Within the full SEOToolSet, you get a more robust SPA and many other tools that will help you better optimize your website for both search engines and human beings. It even includes our integrated Bruce Clay SEO plugin for WordPress!

For a more comprehensive look at the other free tools and techniques available to you, check out our SEO guide!

FAQ: What are the advantages of using SEO analysis tools in web optimization?

Web optimization is paramount for ensuring your online presence reaches its full potential. Integrating SEO analysis tools into your strategy will change the game, and as an expert in this field, I can vouch for their many advantages.

Website analytics provide invaluable insight into the performance of your website, providing invaluable data such as keyword rankings, organic traffic levels, and click-through rate analysis that enables you to make data-driven choices about website and content that will increase search engine ranking.

User experience is a cornerstone of successful web optimization, and SEO analysis tools play a pivotal role here. These tools help identify and rectify any issues that might deter visitors, such as slow loading times or broken links. Addressing these concerns promptly ensures a seamless and engaging user experience, a critical factor in retaining and converting visitors.

Moreover, SEO analysis tools empower you with competitive intelligence. They allow you to analyze your competitors’ strategies, unveiling their strong and weak points. With this knowledge, you can adapt and outmaneuver your rivals in the ever-competitive digital landscape.

Another often underestimated benefit is that SEO analysis tools keep you up to date with industry trends and algorithm changes. Search engines like Google frequently update their algorithms, and failing to adapt can lead to a drop in rankings. These tools send alerts, ensuring you’re always in the know and can promptly adjust your strategy.

Finally, time-saving is a significant advantage. SEO analysis tools automate many manual tasks, saving you precious hours and ensuring you can focus on the most critical aspects of your web optimization strategy.

The advantages of using SEO analysis tools in web optimization are clear and compelling. These tools offer valuable insights, enhance user experience, provide competitive intelligence, update you on industry trends, save time, and help keep pace with an ever-evolving digital landscape to maximize your online presence and stay at the top.

Step-by-Step Procedure: Leveraging SEO Analysis Tools for Web Optimization

1. Understand Your Goals: Clearly define your web optimization objectives, whether it’s increasing organic traffic, improving user experience, or boosting conversions.
2. Select the Right Tools: Research and choose the most appropriate SEO analysis tools based on your goals and budget.
3. Keyword Research: Use the tools to identify relevant keywords for your niche and target audience.
4. Website Audit: Conduct a comprehensive website audit to pinpoint areas for improvement.
5. On-Page Optimization: Implement on-page SEO recommendations, including optimizing meta tags, improving content, and fixing technical issues.
6. Competitive Analysis: Utilize the tools to analyze your competitors’ strategies and identify opportunities.
7. Content Strategy: Develop a content strategy based on keyword research and user intent.
8. User Experience Improvement: Address any issues revealed by the tools, such as slow loading times or broken links.
9. Regular Monitoring: Monitor your website’s performance and make data-driven adjustments.
10. Stay Informed: Subscribe to updates and alerts provided by the tools to stay informed about algorithm changes and industry trends.
11. Adapt and Evolve: Adjust your strategy to maintain and improve your website’s optimization.
12. Data-Driven Decision-Making: Use the insights from the tools to make informed decisions about your web optimization strategy.
13. Time Management: Benefit from the time-saving features of the tools to focus on high-impact tasks.
14. A/B Testing: Experiment with different strategies and analyze results with the tools.
15. Regular Reporting: Generate regular reports to track your progress and identify areas for further improvement.
16. Collaboration: Involve your team or stakeholders in the optimization process using collaborative features provided by the tools.
17. Training: Ensure your team is well-trained in using the tools effectively.
18. Continuous Improvement: Embrace a culture of continuous improvement and adaptation.
19. Benchmarking: Use the tools to set benchmarks and measure your progress against them.
20. Celebrate Success: Acknowledge and celebrate milestones and achievements in your web optimization journey.

The post Free SEO Tool Alert! On-Page Content Analyzer appeared first on Bruce Clay, Inc..

You know what’s also useful? Brief how-tos without fluff. To help you get the most out of our free tools, we’ve created the Free SEO Tool Alert series – short, easy-to-digest blog posts on the free SEO tools in our toolbox. Today’s free SEO tool is:

The SEO Cloaking Checker

Tool type: page analyzer, server health

What you’ll learn: The free SEO Cloaking Checker shows you if you’re cloaking, or featuring two different versions of the same URL – one for search engine robots and the other for human visitors.

Why this matters: Cloaking goes against Google’s Webmaster Guidelines and is considered a “deceptive” SEO technique. If you discover cloaking on your site while using this tool, you can dig deeper to fix the root issue(s), improve the health of your server, and improve your search engine rankings. You can resolve to be transparent.

This is the SEO Cloaking Checker; submit a URL to use the tool.

SEO Cloaking Checker

How to Use the Tool

1. Submit a URL into the SEO Cloaking Checker and press Check for Cloaking.
2. This free SEO tool shows you the SEOToolSet Page Cloaking Report, a straight-forward chart that features major search engines Google, Bing, Yahoo, as well as web browsers Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, and Opera.
3. Use the chart to see if the page you have submitted is cloaking according to each listed search engine and web browser.

Here is an example of a site, www.bruceclay.com, with a negative cloaking report:

A green check mark means there was no cloaking found; a red X means cloaking has been detected.

5 Ways to Use the Data

The SEO Cloaking Checker tool is a quick way to discover whether a web page is cloaking according to the search engines. Use the chart to:

1. See if major search engines and browsers detect cloaking on your web page. If you’ve run the complimentary SEO Cloaking Checker and received a report with one or more red “Xs,” the tool has discovered possible cloaking. Now what? While a positive cloaking report is not necessarily a good thing, knowing there is cloaking on your site gives you a starting point from where you can hunt down the issue and fix the problem. But before we dive into what comes after a Positive Cloaking Report, let’s take a break to learn how the tool works and what sets it apart from other cloak checkers.

Positive Cloaking Report

With a positive cloaking report in your hand, here’s what you need to do next:

2. Investigate the source of cloaking. A simple cloak checker will not tell you what the issue is, only that cloaking has been found. See a positive cloaking report as a red light, signaling you to stop and explore the possible cloaking issues that might be negatively affecting your rankings.

There are many different types of cloaking, some done on purpose to manipulate rankings, some that are not deceptive by nature but still show up as cloaking, some are pure accidents, and a host of practices fall in the grey area.  While checking your site for the source of cloaking you might even find that it was placed by a hacker.  Since not all cloaking is considered deceptive, it’s up to you to decide whether what the tool has found is something you want to fix or keep. Of course, this is when an experienced SEO comes in handy. With enough experience and wisdom, a manual check should lead to the discovery of a cloaking technique that’s affecting your site.

3. Fix cloaking issues found on your site. Once you’ve discovered the type of cloaking that is affecting your site, go to work to resolve the problem. The opportunity to take care of any cloaking issues ensures that you’re showing search engines exactly what you’re showing your users, and this type of transparency is rewarded by the search engines.

4.  Improve rankings.There’s a reason for a sudden drop in rankings or that manual spam report you received.  Learning that a search engine has found cloaking on your site means that you’ve found one possible reason it is not performing as well as it could be in the SERPs. Cloaking can result in the outright exclusion of your site from Google’s index, and when you fix the issue, there’s a great chance you will improve your rankings and make it easier for your customers to find you online.

In addition to finding a positive cloaking report – and using the information to identify the issue, fix the problem, and hopefully improve your rankings – you can use the information in the Page Cloaking Report to:

5. Discover that your site has no cloaking issues. You’ve submitted a URL into the SEO Cloaking Checker tool and received green check marks across the chart. Congratulations, the page you’ve entered has no cloaking issues. Interpret this data as a green light to move on to other monthly maintenance checks and server health procedures.

When to Use This Tool

The Free SEO Cloaking Checker is fast and easy way for you to find out if your site has cloaking issues. Making sure your site is free of cloaking ensures that it’s not running afoul of Google’s quality guidelines.

If you have the SEOToolSet Lite or Pro package, this free SEO tool gets run automatically each time you run the Single Page Analyzer, our robust on-page SEO analyzer tool.  But if you don’t own it yet, you can easily use this complimentary tool to check for cloaking as often as you want, including:

• During a regular maintenance check. Use the SEO Cloaking Checker on a monthly basis to ensure the overall health of your server.
• After a major change to a site. Whether it is a big server change or a back-end change to how the pages are rendered, run the cloaking check tool to make sure the page is working as it should.

10 Free SEO Tools

Bruce Clay, Inc. offers 10 Free SEO tools you can use right now without logging in. You don’t have to register or provide your credit card information. Although free, these tools are strong enough to improve your search engine optimization strategy today, starting with a quick check to find out whether your site is cloaking according to the search engines.

If you enjoyed learning and using this tool, then explore the rest. Our Free SEO Tools Series will then introduce you to each new tool, show you how to use them, and show you how to make sense of the information.

For even more in-depth information, check out our step-by-step SEO Guide!

The post Free SEO Tool: Maintain a Transparent Site with the SEO Cloaking Checker appeared first on Bruce Clay, Inc..

But some of the search marketing industry’s biggest stars were made in the ’90s and are still trending. On January 1, 2016, Bruce Clay, Inc. marked its  20th anniversary – 20 years that Bruce Clay has been steering the digital marketing industry with thought leadership, and proof that some 90s inventions are classics.

Bruce Clay, president of Bruce Clay, Inc., is one of a rare breed of digital marketers that got started in SEO in the 90s. Others include Stoney deGeyter of Pole Position Marketing, Christine Churchill of Key Relevance, Terry Van Horne of International Website Builders, and Kim Krause Berg of Creative Vision Web Consulting. Beyond their industry veteran status, there’s something else they have in common – and that’s valuable digital marketing wisdom gained from decades of perspective and experience.

This group came together as guests of Ammon Johns (of Ammon Johns and Company) and Bill Slawski (of SEO by the Sea) in Bill and Ammon’s Jumbo January Bogus Hangout. John Mueller, Webmaster Trends Analyst at Google, and Kristin Drysdale were there too, rounding out the reasons that this conversation was one to watch.

Topics explored in this hangout included:

• Knowledge Graph and direct answers SEO
• Usability and user testing
• Mobile — cross-channel, multi-screen advertising and voice search
• Future technology and marketing — AI and self-driving cars

Jump to topics by clicking the links above or read on for all the highlights.

Knowledge Graph and Direct Answers SEO

Bill Slawski shared that a Knowledge Graph Search API was released a few weeks ago. Since then, Slawski has been working on a new Google+ group for those who want to stay in the know about Google’s Knowledge Graph.

Can and should SEOs optimize for the Knowledge Graph?

It’s a topic that’s been discussed, and Bill thinks SEOs should optimize for Knowledge Graph and direct answer results. Since the new API lets marketers see searches that are connected to each other, Slawski says it’s a “good time to get involved” in direct answer optimization. Slawski suspects that Knowledge Graph optimization is overlooked by a lot of SEO professionals and adds that the Knowledge Graph shows information that perhaps isn’t thought of as SEO but should be.

Usability and User Testing

While most SEOs understand the importance of user testing and site audits, experience goes a long way to teach an SEO exactly when these two practices are needed the most. In Christine Churchill’s experience, sites that undergo redesigns often have the most SEO-related problems to fix.

About to undergo a redesign? You will need more than a webmaster to pull it off. The transition period after a redesign launch will be as smooth as possible with proper audits and testing beforehand. After a launch, Churchill advises testing to ensure the new design “answers the mail” and is easy to use.

Great webmasters, digital marketers, and SEOs consider usability, but it’s still not given proper credit or understood well by clients and business owners. In fact, the hangout participants revealed that for budget reasons, some SEOs even bury usability services in the scope of a different marketing field –  conversion analysis. Churchill believes usability doesn’t get anywhere near the budget segment that it should, which is a problem because it can make a big difference.

How does usability optimization and user testing help with digital marketing? DeGeyter suggests usability optimization does wonders for pure web marketing and helping a business grow. After noticing site issues, he usually runs user tests and provides his client with actionable recommendations that when implemented end up helping with conversions.

Also important to note about usability improvements: DeGeyter said that even if clients don’t get  number one rankings, usability improvements result in conversion increases and revenue – which makes them happy. He says clients don’t always know what they want. “We give them what they want, but you give them what they really need, and that’s going to satisfy them.”

Accessibility, User Intent, and Data Driven Decisions

It’s no surprise that Kim Krause Berg’s SEO focus for 2016 involves improving accessibility and better understanding user intent. She’s a user-experience guru with a company that specializes in both accessibility and user intent along with SEO.

This year Berg is also paying more attention to data-driven decisions for design and marketing work. Worth noting, Berg believes that marketers aren’t preparing for the aging Internet using populations in countries like Europe and America. She believes marketers have to be thinking about how older generations search.

About Mobile

These days it’s hard to have an SEO hangout without talking about mobile. Kim Krause Berg expressed that mobile is “throwing a wrench into everything.”

Ammon Johns suggests that advertising is adapting to users’ multi-screen browsing behavior, but recognizes that cross-channel attribution is still a big SEO challenge.

Bruce Clay had a lot to share on the topic of mobile SEO and mobile advertising. Google doesn’t make money from organic results, he noted. Google makes money on ads. According to Bruce, Google’s focused on making its ad serving systems faster and improving technologies that makes Google money. He said Google can control the format of results on the mobile browser better:

“The reason Google is so supportive of mobile right now is that this is a new environment where they can set the standard saying one organic, three pay per click … If you’re not at the very top you’re not going to show up.”

Bruce Clay believes mobile and local will be the focus of Google, and therefore SEOs, for the next few years.

“Just as a data point, I was around where there were mainframes and in walks the first PC. It’s taken almost 40 years for technology to get to the point where PC is being replaced by mobile.” Bruce views this progression as a natural evolution, not a revolution. He believes that SEOs need to adjust and be where the people are going to be.

(Bruce’s most recent 2016 Digital Marketing Predictions also reveal some other thoughts he has about where mobile is headed.) 

“Everybody has a mobile device. Many people have two mobile devices or more. I think that in a year, that is where everybody lives, and if we as an industry don’t adapt to that, then we’re going to … be left behind.”

Voice Search

Bruce Clay suggests that one of the biggest current challenges for SEOs is adapting to voice search. “Voice search is going to change what people do with a mobile device to the point where perhaps there won’t even be organic results on ‘those devices,’ and that could really change our entire platform going forward.”

Clay said that organic results will always be there. “If the info you’re after won’t conveniently fit on half a page, Google won’t answer.”

“We’re going to see Google go not just mobile, but mobile and local simultaneously, and those are going to change the dynamics of national companies. They’re going to change the dynamics of mobile, all sorts of things are going to be upset, if Google believes for that query you wanted a local presence. They’re going to give local presence precedence and the rest of organic will just have to catch up.”

On Content for Mobile Users

Terry Van Horne added another perspective to the mobile discussion by sharing his suspicions that mobile will not change things as much as people say it will. He said content will always move with the devices, and that marketers should only make one set of content that works across devices. He believes it will be too expensive to run double platforms. For example, responsive design works for mobile, and he thinks SEOs will come up with a similar solution for new devices.

Future Technology and Marketing

“You can’t invent new technology without worrying about where it goes,” said Ammon Johns during the hangout.

Artificial Intelligence

Beyond mobile and local SEO, Clay believes that SEOs will have no other choice but to figure out how to integrate AI. He thinks it will take a couple of years, but sees a future with holograms and 3D printers everywhere.

“If what we want to do as an industry is be where the industry is going, I think we have to understand the technology leaps, I think we have to understand the usability leaps, those are going to be evolutionary.”

Ammon Johns suggested that technology is a good number years off from a proper AI.

(This topic is echoed by Duane Forrester in his 2016 Digital Marketing Predictions, a must read.)

How far off is next-level artificial intelligence? Kim Krause Berg said that her Android phone’s AI is good at bad jokes. So, maybe quite a ways off.

Self-Driving Cars

According to Clay, “The primary reason I think Google wants to have cars that drive themselves is because while the car is driving itself you’re going to be seeing Google ads all over the dashboard. You’re a captive market and you can’t get away from the Google ads and the Google car. I see that as being the way the world works.”

Learning from the ’90s

It’s been solid decades since the SEOs featured in Bill and Ammon’s Jumbo January Bogus Hangout started their careers, and time has proven they have what it takes to stay in the game. Paying attention to the strategies they implemented in the past, what they’re working on today, and what they plan to do in the near future might just keep you in the race!

The post Modern Digital Marketing Strategies Video: ’90s SEOs Ammon Johns, Bill Slawski, Bruce Clay, Christine Churchill & Kim Krause Berg appeared first on Bruce Clay, Inc..

Dear marketing director, business owner, and digital marketing client: It’s been a pleasure working to make your website a well-oiled sales machine and useful resource for your customers this year. We spent time tuning up your website to be in line with established marketing best practices. We also followed search engine optimization announcements and new guidelines along with global marketing trends to make sure your business received every competitive advantage. To share our thoughts on digital marketing’s evolution and productive ways of thinking, we published our findings and recommendations on our blog for all to read.

Looking back on our blog posts of 2015, a story is told — a big picture of digital marketing today. Let’s look at the story of the last year to remember where we are and what’s expected of your business (and ours) when serving customers and attracting new ones online today.

This World is Mobile: SEO and PPC Need-to-Knows

Mobile SEO

The tale of mobile began many years ago, but 2015 was the year it became a main character in the world of digital marketing. As our SEO Manager Rob Ramirez first reported on the blog, Google announced the exact date it planned to make mobile-friendliness a ranking signal — sending a clear message that mobile is the primary lens through which digital marketing must be viewed.

Long before the announcement, though, we helped prepare you for the major search change (because we saw it coming) and offered technical advice on how to improve the search experience for your customers on the go.

Part of this preparation included the post “6 Mobile-Friendly Navigation Best Practices,” written by former BCI Senior Content Writer Chelsea Adams. One of our most read posts of 2015, it helps you see the mobile search experience through the eyes of your customer and provides valuable customer-friendly navigation tips so you can “keep Joe and the rest of your inbound traffic smiling.”

Preparing for Mobilegeddon also meant updating our popular SEO guides to reflect the latest information about mobile. For example, we revamped our popular “SEO 101: The 29-Point SEO Checklist,” with a new SEO to-do item.

Scroll to #26: “Review Mobile Usability Issues” to see how to check if your site is even performing well on mobile devices. It’s a great place to start if you’re new to the mobile journey as it introduces you to the Mobile Usability Report and the Mobile-Friendly Test, a simple way to find out if you have what it takes to satisfy Google’s mobile criteria.

The Mobile-Friendly Label

As a result of our prep work, clients began taking and passing the mobile-friendly test, until we noticed a pattern. Sometimes the mobile-friendly label didn’t show up in Google search results, even when a site passed Google’s exam.

Our Senior SEO Consultant Maryann Robbins researched the problem, compared notes with industry thought leaders, and came up with examples of why certain pages might not have the mobile-friendly annotation.

The timely results were published in the helpful post, “Why is My Mobile-Friendly Label Missing in Google Search Results,” a great resource to visit if you’re experiencing the same issues. This was also a very popular digital marketing blog post of 2015.

The Big Day

And then the big day came. On April 21, 2015, as promised, Google rolled out its mobile-friendly update. The update rewards mobile-friendly sites in mobile SERPs, providing a boost to beat their closest competitors. Our clients came out ahead on the other side because of strategic planning and preparation.

Shortly after “Mobilegeddon,” Google told us that they created a way for web pages to be “faster and lighter,” in an effort to speed up the mobile search experience for people with slow connections. What perhaps wasn’t so clear was that Google wanted (and wants) this so bad that it’s willing to do it for you.

That’s when our SEO Analyst John Alexander stepped up to write “Google Wants You to Make Your Site Faster or They’ll Do It for You. Will You Like the Result?” This popular article provides a picture of what Google wants to do (hint: it has to do with transcoding) and helps you weigh the pros and cons to answer that question for yourself.

Google reps have already said that Google’s primary initiative in 2016 is to make sites faster by encouraging the adoption of AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages).

The push to create a customer-friendly mobile experience continued to change nearly every aspect of SEO this past year, including the way URLs are featured in the mobile search results.

In April, Google told us that mobile search results will now appear with the “real-world name of the site instead of the domain name, and the URL structure of the sites in a breadcrumbs-like format.” Immediately we saw potential here, agreeing with Gary Illyes’ point, that this was an opportunity for websites to use Schema.org structured data to customize displayed breadcrumb URLs and site names.

Written by our Senior Technical Writer Paula Allen, “Google’s New Mobile Breadcrumb URLs: Making the Most of Your Site Name & URL Structure” details the changes and offers useful tips on how to use these changes to your website’s advantage.

Mobile PPC

In February of 2015, Google introduced call-only campaigns in AdWords, and shortly afterward we published “Tips for Getting the Most out of Call-Only Ads in Google AdWords,” written by former BCI SEM Analyst Jack Van Leeuwen.

What makes this article unique is not that it includes easy instructions on how to setup a call-only ad (although that information makes it helpful), but that it features insider tips based on “data and testing” we conducted for our PPC clients. For example, did you know there was a way to get more “granular control of the different bid and keyword strategies” of mobile preferred ads and call-only ads? Yup, there is, and the answer is in the article.

While we updated some of our digital marketing guides to include mobile sections, 2015 was also the year we found it useful to create new guides — such as our “Guide to Mobile PPC Opportunities” written by yours truly — that reflect just how valuable the mobile customer is to the pay per click advertiser.

This guide is helpful to both new and seasoned advertisers and provides clear instructions on everything from how to locate your mobile audience to how to monitor cross-device conversions. It also shares useful PPC tips on keyword research for mobile and features clear descriptions of all the mobile ads and extensions.

Be Useful: Content, Social Media, and Serving Your Customers

2015 taught us that everything we do as Internet marketers revolves around satisfying the customer.

In addition to mobile campaigns, the development of content and social media strategies are also focused on improving the customer experience. Google ended the year on that note, releasing an updated version of its Search Quality Rating Guidelines with its heavier emphasis on usefulness.

Paula spells out all you need to know that’s included in the 160-page guide in “2015 Search Quality Rating Guidelines Checklist: Aligning with Google’s Focus on Usefulness.” Content and the websites they appear on have to be helpful.

Of course there are challenges to writing useful content. Ever heard of writer’s block? In one of this year’s popular blog posts by Director of Training Mindy Weinstein, “Creating Content for a Boring Industry? No Problem,” we address a very common obstacle for content writers and online marketers – writing for a boring topic. The article offers three powerful tips on how to craft engaging SEO content regardless of what you’re writing about.

But how do you know if your content is really useful to your target audience and the search engines? There’s an SEO tool for that.

In a unique demonstration of the SEOToolSet’s Single Page Analyzer,  Social Media Editor Kristi Kellogg shows you how this handy tool can help you examine various elements of your content and compare it to SEO best practices.

“The Power of a Page Analyzer: I Ran ‘The Great Gatsby through an SEO Tool & This Is What Happened” reveals valuable insight such as the novel’s reading level, the most commonly used words on a page (categorized by one-, two-, three- and four-word phrases), how those words relate to one another, the topic of each page, and more. In addition to highlighting the power of the tool, the article is a fun read for literature lovers, especially fans of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel.

But there comes a time when every business owner and digital marketer is ready to hire a professional content writer – someone educated and experienced in the craft. That’s when you can rely on Kristi’s article “15 Content Writer Interview Questions You Need to Ask” to help you find the perfect professional to join your in-house digital marketing team. In fact, we use these questions to hire our own writers, so we know you can depend on them to hunt down great talent. :)

Conquering SEO and PPC Waves of Change

As we look back at the most popular blog posts of 2015, we see a clear picture of the customer. Today the customer experience is the core of nearly every marketing strategy and campaign. For us, this means you are the center of everything we do. We hope to be with you throughout 2016, too, as we work even harder to predict industry trends, shifts, and continue to fine-tune your websites to reflect the latest and established marketing best practices.

H.G. Wells said, “Adapt or perish, now as ever, is nature’s inexorable imperative.” How true this is for the digital marketing world! We work to do more than adapt, but to take advantage of change to become better than your competition.

The post Digital Marketing Highlight Reel: SEO, PPC & SMM appeared first on Bruce Clay, Inc..

Search and Display Ads

Remarketing in Bing Ads

Digital advertising offers some creative ways to reach consumers on all types of devices. But even when an ad brings a visitor to your site, it’s not a guarantee the visitor will convert. According to Bing, “96 percent of first time visitors leave websites without converting.” Fortunately, there are second chances.

In October, Bing released remarketing in Bing Ads, a new targeting upgrade for Search and Shopping campaigns that displays ads to people who have clicked on a Yahoo or Bing ad, and then have left your site without converting. Remarketing allows you to display better-tailored ads to people who have already been introduced to your products and services.

With Bing Ads remarketing, you can:

• Change your ad group bids for people in your remarketing lists. The adjustments will go into effect when those users search for the items you’re bidding on (Shopping campaigns) or search using the keywords you’re bidding on (Search campaigns). A higher bid bumps up the rank for ads shown to these users.
• Configure ad groups to only be triggered and show ads if a user is on your remarketing list. So, for example, your remarketing ad groups can include broader and more-generic keywords than in your “regular” search ad groups.

Image Extensions in Bing Ads

Another way to dress up your Bing Ads and increase the ROI of your campaigns is to use Image Extensions to add pictures to your ads. Earlier this month, Bing Ads introduced the ability for advertisers to add up to six images to ad copy and other ad extensions on PCs and tablets, but not on smartphones.

You can further customize the ad experience by including a unique URL for each image, which means you can choose where your customer goes after clicking on your ad. At this time, Bing Ads is trying out different layouts and variations of content and images.

Bing Ads Image Extensions can be used in all markets.

Bing Ads Unveils New Keyword Planner

If you can’t find the Research Keywords tool in Bing Ads, it’s because it’s now called the Keyword Planner. In September, Bing Ads released the new Keyword Planner, a tool that provides advertisers with relevant keyword and ad group suggestions.

Users can also find new keywords by multiplying keyword lists. But what takes the tool to a new level and makes it a formidable competitor to the AdWords Keyword Planner is the tool’s addition of search volume data and trends, plus performance and cost estimates. Performance and cost estimation data is available at the ad group or keyword level.

When it comes to targeting and filtering, the tool has many options, including the ability to narrow your keyword suggestions by network targeting and location, “filter by historical statistics, and keywords to include or exclude.” You can filter your search volume by device or locations within your targeted locations or sort via state, DMA or city to see “expected contribution from individual devices or locations.”

Already have a list of keywords? The Keyword Planner allows you to upload your list as a CSV file or paste it manually so you can group the expanded keyword set into ad groups, or discover the popularity of those keywords.

Yahoo Introduces Product Ads for Search and Display

Bing and Google are no longer the only search engines that offer product ads. In November, Yahoo announced Product Ads for retailers that can be displayed on desktop, mobile, and tablet devices.

These ads can show up in Yahoo Search and Polyvore, the shopping website Yahoo purchased earlier this year. According to the announcement, Kohl’s Wayfair and Overstock.com have already started using services related to Yahoo Product Ads. The data used to create the ads comes from customer product feeds, so you can now create digital product ads for all three major search engines.

Yahoo Gemini Enhances Targeting and Performance Features

Also in November, Yahoo improved their ad platform Gemini with a new conversion optimization feature and added custom audience capability for in-app actions. Conversion optimization allows advertisers to set their CPA target and pay per click, offering a way to stay on budget while reaching your lead generation goals

Gemini’s updated custom audience feature is for mobile app marketers and can target audiences on PC, mobile, and tablet devices.

The enhancement allows advertisers to target shoppers, gamers, and browsers who have shown interest in their “products or services based on their in-app actions.”

Google

AdWords Customer Match

Google’s latest feature helps advertisers reach their most valuable clients, the ones who have already purchased a product or joined a loyalty program. Marketers can now upload an email address list, which is then matched with signed-in users on Google. Once matched, advertisers can build campaigns and ads for that specific audience.

Google also creates a second list, a “similar audience” list, which is made up of people who share interests and behaviors with the people on your email list. Advertising to the second list, while excluding the first, can be a sound strategy.

Viewable CPM Campaigns

Why pay for a digital ad that hasn’t been seen? Google announced in November that all CPM campaigns (ones that are charged on a cost-per-thousand-impressions basis) are now viewable CPM campaigns. This means that marketers will not have to pay for an impression on the Google Display Network unless it’s viewable by a user.

Social Ads

If you haven’t started advertising on social media, it could be worth your investment because it’s paying off well for many marketers. According to a recent eMarketer’s report that surveyed 29 companies, paid social media advertising “is delivering a solid return on investment.”

When asked to grade a social network’s ROI on a scale of A+ through F, Facebook and Pinterest received an average grade of B and B+ respectively. LinkedIn got an average grade of C+, Twitter received a B+, and Instagram earned a C+.

Whether you’re new to paid advertising on social media sites or you’re a seasoned marketer, take advantage of these fancy enhancements to digital ads on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

Facebook and Instagram Ads

Facebook Launches Video Slideshow

If you want your ads to feature video content but don’t have a lot of time or resources, Facebook has made it easy for you. Facebook announced in October the addition of Slideshow, a way for advertisers to build “video” ads from still images. You can upload three to seven still images at a time, either from a video that’s already made, a photo shoot, or stock photos from Facebook’s library. Marketers can edit the length of the slideshow from 5 to 15 seconds. Slideshow is available in Power Editor and Ads Manager.

Instagram Ads Releases New Objectives, Rolls Interface into Facebook Ads Manager

Instagram Ads can now be optimized for reach and frequency, a new feature advertisers can use with both Instagram and Facebook. Instagram has also made it possible for advertisers to deliver their ads to people who are “most likely to take an action on their website.”

Twitter Ads

Twitter Releases New Analytics Tool Brand Hub

The best analytics tools give us the information we need to tweak and improve our campaigns. The latest product in Twitter’s analytics toolbox is Brand Hub, a tool released in October that shows marketers a ton of information about their Twitter advertising campaigns.

According to the announcement, Brand Hub sheds light on the way customers talk about a brand on Twitter. This includes how many Tweets are posted about the brand or product and more. It also helps keep track of when users talk about a brand, and reveals detailed information about the audience, including their gender, location, occupation types and other demographic data.

Twitter Starts Testing New Native Ad Format

It’s time to tell a story with Twitter ads. In October, Twitter started testing Promoted Moments, a new ad format that turns Twitter Moments into ads. Moments was introduced a few weeks before Promoted Moments, and is Twitter’s way of bringing the best of Twitter to one place. By tapping a lightning bolt tab of the same name, you get to see a page full of created Moments. Twitter Moments tell a story and feature autoplaying images, videos, Vines and GIFS. With Promoted Moments, an advertiser can use a storytelling format to create an ad.  It’s a unique way to engage your target audience and promote your brand.

Power Up Your 2016 Campaigns

A new year is an opportunity let go of the marketing strategies that don’t work and improve on the ones that do. Make sure your PPC strategies deliver increasing ROI by updating your campaigns with the latest paid search, display and social advertising features above.

Need help? Bruce Clay, Inc. offers world-class PPC management services for businesses that want day-to-day, hands-on support for their PPC advertising efforts. While we’ve been doing this for about 20 years, our company recently added top-ranked paid search expert David Szetela to the team to give you the ultimate edge of search advertising strategy.

One of your smartest New Year’s resolutions might be to talk to BCI!

The post PPC New Year’s Resolutions: Power-up Your 2016 Paid Search, Display & Social Advertising Campaigns appeared first on Bruce Clay, Inc..

It’s time to enjoy the open road.

Bruce Clay, Inc. adds Duane Forrester to the team in order to provide businesses with an exclusive advantage in search engine optimization methodology and digital marketing strategy. Forrester, who was awarded Search Personality of the Year at the 2014 U.S. Search Awards, is a visible and popular figure in the search industry.

“Everyone knows that Duane could have gone to work for any company he wanted,” says our president, Bruce Clay. “It’s an honor that he chose to work here.”

“@DuaneForrester could work for any company he wants. It’s an honor he chose BCI.”
Click To Tweet

Duane will have oversight of the organic search direction at Bruce Clay, Inc., as well as the company’s content, social media and design departments. He will also serve as a spokesman for Bruce Clay, Inc. by attending and speaking at industry conferences.

“Duane has great experience with how things work, and that will help us to enhance our existing capabilities for all aspects of digital marketing, including SEO, social media and web design. This is the man who created the Bing Webmaster Tools — that will give us a wealth of insight,” Bruce points out.

An SEO with Many Talents

Duane’s professional career path reveals a man who wears many hats — but one who wears each hat confidently. It’s easy to see why, no matter which hat he wears, Duane gives his all to the project or company at hand. He comes from a small business background and helped run a family-owned motel for 16 years. It was during this time that he learned what it takes to run a small business and discovered that he has a passion for helping companies grow.

Duane has made significant contributions to every place he’s worked, from developing the first player’s program for Caesar’s Palace in Canada to managing SEO at a sports startup that has since become a leader in the sports content publishing world.

Then, Microsoft called. During his eight-year career at Microsoft, Duane served as senior product manager at Bing — a role that led to the creation of Bing Webmaster Tools — and spent nearly five years as the primary touchpoint between Bing and the webmaster community. During this time he became known as the approachable face of Bing, bridging the gap between the search engine’s inner workings and the information-hungry SEO community.

“If you’ve ever heard Duane speak at a conference, you know that he is able to answer any question about how a search engine handles particular SEO concerns, from 404 pages to HTTPS,” said Mindy Weinstein, director of training at Bruce Clay, Inc. “He always has an answer and a thorough explanation — we are so excited to be able to take that experience and infuse it into our analysts’ ongoing education and our open enrollment SEOToolSet Training.”

“@DuaneForrester can answer any question about how a search engine handles #SEO concerns.”
Click To Tweet

So, the Big Question: Why BCI?

“Over the past decade I’ve been approached by countless agencies,” says Duane. “However, Bruce Clay, Inc. is different because of three main pillars that we stand on: services, proprietary tools, and talent. Most agencies don’t have as deep a tool set. They use rich tools, but not proprietary tools. If they need something fine-tuned for a client, they can’t walk down the hall and ask the programmer to add a parameter — which is something we can do.”

“When it comes to talent, I see agencies struggle. BCI is very stable and has an expert knowledge base. I know the team that’s here — and they’re smart SEOs.”

The Road Ahead

For Duane, the role of VP of organic search operations at BCI will allow him to take all of his cumulative experience and use it in new ways. He will be free to talk openly about Google, turn ideas into products faster, and enjoy the open roads of sunny Southern California — on the weekends, of course.

For BCI, having Duane on the team is a natural part of the company’s growth and commitment to excellence. For the last eight years in a row, Bruce Clay, Inc. has made the Inc. Magazine 500|5000 list as one of the fastest-growing private companies in the U.S. Most recently, in September the company added author, speaker, and paid search expert David Szetela as VP of paid search marketing operations.

“A growing number of our clients come to us for both SEO and PPC services, and Duane’s deep understanding of both disciplines will help accelerate that growth,” David explains.

Are You Confident in Your SEO Agency?

SEO is technical. You pay an SEO agency for its technical insight, experience, and ability to drive traffic to your site that grows your business. What if an agency had all of the above, plus skills and experience that no other agency could claim?

What if an SEO agency had Duane Forrester on the team?

With the addition of Duane Forrester, Bruce Clay, Inc. brings his knowledge of SEO to the world-class offerings of the company.

“If companies want to win at SEO, they should talk to us at some point,” says Bruce.

So let’s talk.

The post Search Expert Duane Forrester Joins Bruce Clay, Inc. as VP of Organic Search Operations to Take the Road Less Traveled appeared first on Bruce Clay, Inc..

Remember this guide? Who can forget the fresh face we met in 2009, so eager to make us coffee and protect us from evil villains.

The first edition instantly became a reliable reference guide for us and that lasted until 2012 when it grew in ways that strengthened our reliance on it. The second edition of “Search Engine Optimization All-in-One For Dummies” proved that it was more than just a helper, but an expert in SEO that deserved to be served coffee instead of making it for us.

Three years has passed since the second edition and the SEO world has changed drastically. More than ever, digital marketers need a reference guide that’s accessible, reliable, and reflects the latest updates in the industry. That’s what they’re getting in the freshly released third edition. Basically, the book is the perfect companion for any business owner, digital marketer, or anyone responsible to drive traffic to a site. This Halloween season, it also proved the perfect companion for Darth Vader, Tinkerbell, Minnie Mouse and more as the book got into various characters:

The book wasn’t the only one in character … we all take Halloween pretty seriously, too.

Your SEO Companion is Here

It’s hard to find the perfect companion, someone who knows what you’re going through and supports you along the way. Harder yet is to find someone who will grow and change with you over time.

But when the third edition of the “Search Engine Optimization All-in-One For Dummies” book arrived at our office, our hearts jumped! Our dear companion is everything we remember it to be, plus a whole lot more.

Sure, it can still teach us the fundamentals of SEO, but it’s grown so much since then! It can also walk us through today’s hottest subjects, including mobile, advancements in search engine algorithms, and the latest internet marketing technologies that pertain to SEO.

The Spooky Side of SEO

One of the scariest things about the SEO industry is that it’s changing at such a rapid pace. It can feel quite lonely without a companion you can trust. The good news is that you’re not alone. “Search Engine Optimization All-in-One Dummies 3rd Edition” can be your trusted friend ━ it’s there to guide you on all things SEO in a way that’s easy to understand.

Get Your SEO Companion

The 3rd edition of “Search Engine Optimization All-in-One for Dummies,” is available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Buy a copy today, or better yet, buy it for your office or the business owner or marketer in your life.

Everyone needs an SEO companion; be sure to get the right one. You can also learn more about Bruce Clay’s nearly 800-page SEO reference guide and take a sneak peek inside the book.

The post 3rd Edition of SEO for Dummies is the Perfect SEO Companion appeared first on Bruce Clay, Inc..

Today’s tool is the Check Server Page tool. The Check Server Page tool reports a page’s server header response codes to help you spot any server-level issues that might be affecting your site’s performance in search engine rankings.

It’s a simple diagnostic tool that helps you keep your server running its best. Dive in to learn exactly what it shows about your server and how to use the data to improve your organic search engine optimization strategy.

Today’s Free SEO Tool: Check Server Page Tool

Tool type: diagnostic tool, header check, server health What you’ll learn: the “crawlability” of your site and if there are any issues that might be blocking your site from showing up in search results.

Why this matters: The data you get from this tool shows you the header response codes for any page on your site, which gives you the opportunity to fix any errors. Fixing server-related errors makes your site easily crawlable for the search engines and provides a pleasant user experience. This is the Check Server Page tool; try it now.

Check Server Page Tool

Please submit your URL, one URL at a time:

How to Use It

1. Submit a URL and click the Check Response Headers button. You can only enter one URL at a time.
2. The Check Server Page tool produces a report that features information about the response codes for the URL you entered, including the server’s response headers, tags like the content type, expire date, and other important information like the server type, DNS IP & average ping time.

The HTTP response headers in the Check Server Page tool report vary depending on the type of server and the website you have. But a typical report gives you information about the following response headers:

• Status: Where you will find HTTP status codes, or a list of your redirects and any errors
• Content length: This is the size of the resource in bytes
• Expires: The date after which the resource will be outdated
• Server: The type of server
• Connection: Typically “keep-alive” or “close”

In addition to HTTP response headers, the report also provides other information about the page, including:

• The original URL
• DNS IP address
• Ping

How to Use This Data

When you run your key pages through this tool, you’ll learn server-level issues that might be affecting your site’s performance in search engine rankings.

Use the information provided in this report to do several things:

1. Identify server-related problems with a webpage.

Are you concerned about a recent falling out or a drop in rankings? The first place to check is your server. Apart from using it as a regular maintenance check, the Check Server Page tool should be your go-to diagnostic tool when there’s problem with your website’s ranking or visibility. To see potential problems, pay attention to the server status codes in the report.

To see the service status codes, run the tool and look at the Value column next to the Status header. Within that column the report will give you the server status codes for that URL the way search engines see them. What you do next depends on what you find.

A Healthy Server: 200 If you see the number 200, then you know the page is normal and healthy. If you’re doing a regular maintenance check, you should be satisfied with the results. However, if you’re trying to discover the reason for a fluctuation in your rankings, a healthy server means that you can now move on from this tool and focus your diagnosis on other SEO factors to find the cause of a drop or fall out.

Red Flag Error Codes: 302? 404? There are many different server status codes and each one gives the search engines specific information about your webpage. Some status codes should be seen as red flags, letting you know that there’s a real issue with how your site is being crawled by the search engines.

For example, a 302 server status code tells the search engine that a webpage has temporarily moved from one URL to another. This can give search engines the wrong idea and may delay passing the accumulated link equity (“link juice”) to the redirect destination. It is almost always better to use a 301 (permanent) redirect in these instances.

Another common server status code that could raise a red flag is the 404 error code, which basically tells search engine spiders that the webpage they are requesting is not there. Similar to the way human visitors react when coming across such a page, search engine spiders have no choice but to leave, which could stop them from indexing all of the pages on your site.

Common Error Codes It’s also possible to find error codes that might not be responsible for a fall out or a drop in rankings. Nevertheless, an error is an error. Even if it doesn’t raise a red flag, an error server code should be fixed in order to have a healthier server (and site).

2. Fix server error codes.

As mentioned above, the Check Server Page tool shows you any errors that might be stopping a search engine spider from properly indexing the web page. Now that you have identified these obstacles, it’s time to use the data you got from our SEO tools report to repair the damage.

For example, as we mentioned earlier, if you find a 302 redirect code, change it to a 301 status code. Unlike the temporary 302 redirect, a 301 redirect means that the webpage has moved permanently. This code allows a spider to travel easily from the old page to the new one without any problems and has the added benefit of transferring link juice to the new destination.

Repairing these errors can be a quick and easy way to improve the health of your server and boost your website rankings.

3. Check the page speed.

While the server header section of the report gives important information about your server, there’s a lot more to the report than the page status. Another valuable piece of data you will find in the report is the average ping time. This information is located at the bottom of the report in the category Other Info. Average ping time can often reveal network latency or overall site speed issues. You can expect an average ping to be anywhere from 30 – 100ms. Anything longer than that and you may have an issue. While ping time is not enough to confirm that there is a problem, it can signal a potential issue that can be revealed by performing a more thorough check of site speed and performance.

When to Use This Tool

The Check Server Page tool is a free diagnostic tool you can use anytime to find potential URL level server issues. Keeping your server healthy allows search engine spiders to react to pages on your site the way you want them to. Bookmark this Free SEO Tool Alert to use this tool as often as you need, including:

• After a site migration, to make sure that you’re using the proper redirect rules (using as few jumps as possible) and that those redirects are traveling through a 301 redirect instead of a 302.
• Before you manually submit your site to search engines to index new content, run a quick server check.
• Run it regularly, as part of your ongoing maintenance. It will help to ensure that your server is clean and healthy, especially for important landing pages.

Discover More FREE SEO Tools

If using free SEO tools works well for you, take advantage of this miniseries to learn how to use all 10 of our free tools. They are embedded within this miniseries as well as in our SEO Guide, which provides detailed context and education about the tools within our time-tested search engine optimization methodology.

If you like the complimentary tools, start using the SEOToolSet^®. Then you can save your projects and analyze your site more completely. The full SEOToolSet includes our Ranking Monitor.

If you’re serious about SEO, then the SEOToolSet is designed to give you the data and reports that you need to grow your business through organic search engine optimization. Also, the Bruce Clay SEO plugin for WordPress is included if your site runs on WP.

You can try both risk-free with a 7-day free trial. So give our tools a try!

The post Free SEO Tool Alert! Keep Your Server Running Its Best with the Check Server Page Tool appeared first on Bruce Clay, Inc..

Whether you’re new to Google Search Console (formerly called Google Webmaster Tools) or have been using it for years, you might have a question or two about its functionality and capabilities. In this article we answer some of the most frequently asked questions about Google Search Console from our readers as well as some additional ones that we hope will make using the tools easier for you.

Q&A for Using GSC

Q. How do I get the most out of Google Search Console?

A. Take advantage of new, richer data. This includes average position and referring data for more landing pages.

There are two enhanced sets of traffic data in Google Search Console that you should be analyzing and using, according to Robert Ramirez, SEO Manager at Bruce Clay Inc.

Enhanced Data #1: Average Position
Up until recently, Google Search Console showed limited information about the position of your queries. But with the rollout of the new Search Analytics report, you can now see the daily average position of the highest-ranking result for your queries presented in a new format that makes it easier to read and understand.

Although average position was featured in the old Search Queries report, the new version adds it as a fourth metric that you can check and view, right next to Clicks, Impressions, and CRT.

The new version also changes how the information is displayed. You can now automatically see the average positions of your top 50 queries presented as a trend line in the main Search Analytics report.

This information is valuable for when you want to see and analyze ranking fluctuations. It is also an easy way to spot any changes that might have occurred due to algorithm updates.

Step-by-step SEO instructions to observe average position data in Google Search Console

1. Sign in to Google Search Console and navigate to Search Traffic > Search Analytics.
2. In Search Analytics, select Position.
   Here you will see the average position of the top 50 queries used to reach your site.

   

3. Narrow the results by …
   a. Selecting a query. The default time span of the chart is four weeks, and you can increase the time span up to 90 days.
   b. Hovering over the chart and stopping on the date of your choice to see data for a specific day.
   c. Using the Dates filter to check-mark the time span you wish you view.

5. Scroll down to the see the average position to see data for each day within that time frame.

Enhanced Data #2: Referring data for more landing pages
Along with enhancing data for the average position of queries, Google Search Console now offers referring keyword information on more landing pages. Google’s software used to dish out keyword data for only the top three to five landing pages – a limited look at how people reach your website in Google search. Now, Google Search Console provides a thorough Search Analytics Report for your top 1,000 landing pages – that’s a lot more traffic data you can analyze and use to improve your rankings.

To see referring data for your landing pages in Google Search Console:

1. Select Search Traffic > Search Analytics.
2. Click on Pages. Scroll down to see all the landing pages.
3. Select the landing page you want.
4. Then select Queries again to see referring data for that landing page.

Q. How do I get Google to recrawl my site faster?

A. Submit your URL to Google manually.

Even without a manual invitation, search engine spiders will ultimately reach and crawl your site’s landing pages if you have linked to them from other pages on your site and your XML sitemap. But there’s a way to send an official invitation that will get them to your site faster than the automatic route: you can submit a URL manually.

Whether you have a new website or recently updated a page, you can manually submit a URL to Google for faster recrawling. How? You will have to use the Fetch as Google tool in Google Search Console. The tool is located under the Crawl tab and looks like this:

You can also do this for Bing. See our search engine optimization tutorial on how to manually submit a site to Google and Bing.

Q. Can I see data for Top Pages and Search Queries for the past year?

A. No, Google Search Console provides data for only the last 90 days.

While Google Analytics shows a longer history, it doesn’t show search queries. This is why many SEOs and site owners download their data on a monthly basis and create their own reports to monitor the information long-term.

One solution is to track your site’s rankings for all your keywords using our SEOToolSet^®, which runs scheduled ranking monitors. (Learn more about how to monitor your search engine rankings using SEOToolSet.)

Q. How do I set a date range for the Crawl Error reports? Specifically, how do I get the data for Desktop, Smartphone, and Feature phone together for the last 10 days?

A. You can’t.

Unfortunately, there’s no way to set a date range for the Crawl Error reports in Google. However, you can download the data into a spreadsheet and manipulate it according to the date range you need.

To access data for Desktop, Smartphone, and Feature phone, you will need to click on each tab in the report and download the data manually.

For more hands-on, step-by-step SEO tips, lead yourself through the 18-step SEO Guide. Perform search engine optimization with Bruce Clay Inc. methodology, from keyword research to competitive analysis to monitoring rankings, with free embedded tools along the way.

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