Acceptance of Circumstances, accountability, AEO, AI Search, Being Found on Google, brand promise, community involvement, competitive advantage, Customer Service, good will creation, keeping up with trends, lead generation, Memorability, Objectives Setting, organic SEO, reputation management, sales, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, staying current, strategic planning, target audiences, Target Marketing, traditional marketing, Understanding Your Environment, User experience

Your Best Chance Of Appearing In AI Overviews? Being The Best

After reading this Linked post by Eli Schwartz, a very well-respected and well-known SEO expert, about how to appear in Google AI Overviews, the above slogan came to me. I wanted to give credit where credit is due and share how I was inspired. It all makes great sense and is in keeping with what we, as a fellow SEO expert, has been sharing in recent months, i.e., if you want a search engine to declare you as the best, or indicate less directly that your organization is the best or one of the best in its field and geography by mentioning your organization’s name or sharing a link back to your site (known as a citation), then your organization has to earn that “best” title.

We’ve already discussed ways your organization can send signals to AI engines that you are trustworthy in a number of recent blog posts, and that includes getting rave reviews from happy customers. But, ultimately, the way to get those reviews is becoming a company whose products, services, and customer service is unmatched by competitors, by demonstrating your commitment to the community/communities you serve, and by making sure you’re an “employer of choice.”

Why I’ve Got The Experience and Knowledge To Speak To What Makes An Organization An Outstanding One

Having worked since I was a teenager and until my mid-50’s for employers (and served in a number of manager and director roles), and now, for the past 12 years run a marketing agency that has successfully served more than 150 clients and received public-facing accolades (reviews), compliments and appreciation from clients, I believe I’ve got the background and experience to speak to what makes an organization stand out from competitors, and therefore, be considered “the best.” You can learn more about my corporate marketing and marketing agency background on my Our Principal and History website page.

As a life-long marketer I feel so strongly about how many of the attributes below influence an organization’s success that I’ve written about many of the below in past blog posts!

What Does It Take For Your Organization To Be The “Best” In Your Industry and Geography?

  • Treat your employees well.
    • Offer them opportunities to learn and take on new and larger roles.
    • Take the time to listen to and consider employee’s ideas to improve work productivity or process, or the products and services you offer.
    • Offer tangible and intangible benefits that they value and/or need.
    • Celebrate personal and organizational milestones and successes.
    • Offer financial incentives where, if the company does well, the employee does well.
  • Deliver exceptional, world-class service each and every day at every point of contact (EPOC) with customers. As a marketing professional with more than 35 years of experience I know first-hand how important good customer service is to success. Not only when it comes to assisting customers/clients of your organizations, but handling inquiries and leads that come into your organization respectfully, effectively, and on a timely basis!
  • Offer solid, reliable products and services that meet client expectations and needs at a reasonable, fair price.
  • Give back to your community/communities.
  • Always keep an eye on business and daily life changes and how they impact your clients — whether they be businesses or consumers — and how you can make their lives easier or respond to a challenge they are facing.
  • Always be evolving and considering what new innovative product or service you can offer.
  • Educate. Educate. Educate — make sure staff and leaders have time to stay in the know on industry changes and national, regional, and local happenings and anything else that could negatively or positively impact how they and your business does their work or the products and services you offer. Ensure they can learn from both internal and external experts. To support all of this, designate times of the week as meeting-free and learning time!
  • Encourage out-of-the box thinking by all staff and leaders!
  • Treat your clients and customers like family.
  • Take the time to walk in your clients’ and customers’ shoes. Check out this blog post about the importance of walking in your customers’ shoes.
  • Show both your clients and customers appreciation regularly. A small “thank you” goes a long way!

I’ll likely add new features and characteristics to the above list as they strike me, but I think any organization that achieves the aforementioned will succeed at being top in their field, in their particular geography!

Acceptance of Circumstances, AEO, AI Search, Being Found On Bing, Being Found on Google, blog, content marketing, differentiation, GEO, good will creation, keeping up with trends, lead generation, pull marketing, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, staying current, target audiences, Target Marketing, Understanding Your Environment, User experience, website

The ABCs & Ds Of Being Found In Answer-Engine-Prompt And Traditional-Search-Engine Results

We will continue to conduct our own informal research — assessing how and when our own website pages and posts appear in both AI/Answer Engine Prompt results and traditional search engine results — but based on what we are seeing as of the date of this blog post, the items outlined in the image and bulleted section below seem to be common features or characteristics of website content that is being served up most frequently in any kind of AI or search engine.

And, it’s also very much in keeping with what we observed and commented on almost two years ago related to commonalties among content that was being served in traditional and AI search engine results.

How To Be Found Online? Do The Following Related To Your Website Content

  • Always keep your target audience in mind — what content/information would be helpful to them vs. content/information you want to share. Don’t be self-serving!
  • Keep your content clean and easily consumable by using bulleted or numbered lists
  • Don’t be afraid to take a different approach to what other experts are saying on a particular topic
  • We’ve talked about this in a number of blog posts, including this post about the types of links every website should have — always include internal links and external links to relevant content
This light gray vertical image says in a dark powder blue "the ABCs & Ds Of Appearing In Answer-Engine-Prompt and Traditional-Search Results and Has Bulleted Sharing the Same Bulleted Content That Is Served In the Post Itself

Need Help Figuring Out How To Write Content For Your Target Audiences Or How To Structure That Content?

Reach out today for a free marketing consultation regarding your organization’s particular challenges related to being found online.

Acceptance of Circumstances, accountability, brand promise, differentiation, Making Connections, Making Connections and Introductions, marketing best practices, Marketing Planning, Memorability, mission statement, Networking, Passion, push marketing, relationship building, sales, strategic planning, target audiences, Target Marketing, Understanding Your Environment, User experience

How Small Businesses Can Craft Winning Sales Pitches and Marketing That Last

Guest Blog Post by Charlie Michaels, Entrepreneurworld.net

Boston-area small business owners and marketing managers often face the same small business marketing challenges: low search visibility, inconsistent leads, and a nagging sense that efforts aren’t translating into clear ROI. When sales pitch development is driven by what the business wants to say instead of what buyers struggle with, messaging turns scattered and forgettable. The fastest way to tighten everything is target audience analysis that surfaces real customer pain points and connects them to a simple promise. That clarity becomes the foundation for effective brand communication.

Understanding a Credible Brand Narrative

At the center of a winning pitch is a brand narrative that starts with the buyer, not your business. You map the problem they are trying to solve, then choose storytelling techniques that make them feel understood. Strong research and clear strategy skills help you prove you can deliver, not just promise.

This matters because optimizing for search and ads only work when the message is consistent and believable. If your story is vague, prospects bounce and your marketing feels like a cost. When the story is grounded, it becomes easier to rank, convert, and measure what is working.

Picture a service company pitching “fast, reliable.” A better story names the stressful moment, offers relief, and shows evidence, since tapping into emotion helps people understand and care. Add your ‘why’ by defining the reason your business exists beyond profit..

This is the image of pitcher holding a ball in one hand and wearing a glove on the other and standing on the pitchers mound at a large ballpark and wearing a gray uniform with a long-sleeved navy blue top and the number 20 on it, plus a blue baseball cap

Turn One Core Offer Into 5 Assets and a Repeatable Pitch

If your brand narrative is clear, your customer’s problem, your promise, and the proof, your marketing gets a lot easier. Use the steps below to turn one core offer into a set of usable assets you can ship this week, then improve based on real engagement.

  1. Write a 30-second pitch template (and don’t improvise it): Draft one short script you can reuse across networking, sales calls, and your website hero section. Keep it to: Who you help ? the problem you solve ? your approach ? a believable outcome ? one proof point ? a simple CTA (call-to-action). Example: “We help busy local service businesses get found on Google by fixing on-page SEO and running targeted ads, so you generate consistent leads without guessing, here’s a recent result, and the next step is a 15-minute audit.”
  2. Translate your pitch into customer-centric messaging (“You” > “We”): Take each line of your pitch and rewrite it from the buyer’s perspective using the language they already use in emails and reviews. Aim for one sentence per stage of awareness: pain (“I’m spending on ads but leads are inconsistent”), desired outcome (“I need calls every week”), barrier (“I don’t have time to learn SEO”), confidence (“I want to know what I’m paying for”). This is how you keep the narrative credible without overpromising.
  3. Create 5 core assets from the same message spine: Build a mini “asset stack” so your offer shows up consistently in search, ads, and sales conversations. A simple set is: one landing page, one one-page PDF, a 6–8 slide deck, a short email sequence (3 emails), and 3 social posts that reuse the same hook and proof. Because collateral exists in physical or digital form, you can use the PDF both as a download for leads and as a leave-behind after meetings.
  4. Standardize your visuals with a print-ready template system: Pick two fonts, 2–3 brand colors, and one photo style, then lock them into a reusable layout for your one-pager and slides. A clean template reduces “design thrash” and makes your message easier to scan in a hurry; a great template can make a big difference in clarity, especially for pitch decks. If you also create quick printables for events, like a simple workshop sign, lobby flyer, or QR-code poster, using the same fonts and colors keeps everything consistent, and a printable free poster maker can help you produce those pieces without reinventing your layout.
  5. Add one proof element to every asset (and make it specific): Proof can be a short testimonial, a mini case study (“from X to Y in 60 days”), a screenshot of a metric, or a “what’s included” checklist. Tie the proof back to the customer’s problem from your brand narrative, avoid generic claims like “best in class.” If you’re new and lack results, use process proof: your audit checklist, reporting cadence, and what a client can expect in week 1.
  6. Track 3 engagement metrics and run a monthly “message tune-up”: Keep it simple: landing page conversion rate, email click rate, and deck/one-pager follow-up rate (how many people reply or book after receiving it). Once a month, update one thing based on the data: change the headline, swap the proof point, or tighten the CTA. When objections come up repeatedly, price, timelines, “we tried this before”, add a single slide, FAQ block, or one paragraph to address it with clear ROI logic and evidence.

Prospect Pitch and Marketing Questions Small Teams Ask

Q: What do I say when a prospect pushes back on price?
A: Reframe price as risk reduction and outcomes: what problem is costing them time, leads, or margin right now. Offer a smaller first step like a paid audit or a 30-day pilot with one measurable target. Then anchor with proof, even if it is process proof like reporting cadence and deliverables.

Q: How do I pick lead generation tactics without wasting money?
A: Match the channel to intent: search and local SEO for “ready to buy,” and email or retargeting for “not yet.” Start with one primary channel and one support channel, run it for 2 to 4 weeks, and keep the offer consistent so results are comparable.

Q: How should I measure marketing ROI if I do not have perfect tracking?
A: Use a simple baseline: leads, booked calls, close rate, and average deal value. Marketing leaders feeling that pressure from the board rose 21% is a reminder to report what you can, consistently, rather than waiting for perfect attribution.

Q: Can testimonials really improve conversions, or is that just nice-to-have?
A: They help because customer trust in SMB (small- and medium-sized business) sales is built on confidence, reliability, and credibility. Use specific testimonials tied to one objection, like timelines or results, and place them near your CTA.

Q: When should I change my pitch versus keep iterating on the same message?
A: Change it when qualified prospects repeatedly misunderstand what you do, who it is for, or what success looks like. Otherwise, keep the core claim stable and test one variable at a time like headline, offer, or proof.

Launch-Ready Pitch and Marketing Checklist

This checklist turns your pitch and campaign into a repeatable weekly system. It helps you stay focused on what moves revenue, especially when 60% fail to meet objectives and the difference is usually clarity and follow-through.

? Confirm a single goal and one primary success metric

? Define the buyer segment, problem, and decision trigger

? Draft a compelling elevator pitch that grabs attention fast

? Map three proof points to your top objections

? Choose one primary channel and one support channel

? Build one landing page with one CTA and one offer

? Track leads, booked calls, close rate, and deal value weekly

Ship the next iteration today, then let results steer your edits.

Turn Your Pitch Into a Long-Term Marketing Rhythm

Most small businesses don’t struggle with effort, they struggle with keeping the story consistent while results come in unevenly. The way through is a simple loop: treat your pitch and marketing as a living message, anchored by continuous marketing improvement through customer feedback utilization, sales performance analysis, and steady brand message refinement. When that becomes the norm, campaigns get clearer, conversations get easier, and your best customers start recognizing you faster. A strong pitch isn’t one perfect script; it’s a story you keep sharpening based on real results. Set a 30-minute weekly review to check what sold, what got ignored, and what customers repeated back. That rhythm turns day-to-day outreach into a long-term marketing strategy you can sustain through busy seasons and uncertainty.

About Our Guest Blogger, Charlie Michaels

Charlie Michaels created EntrepreneurWorld.net to connect and guide entrepreneurs all over the world! He came up with the idea in the midst of the pandemic. Feeling isolated and anxious, he thought other entrepreneurs, near and far, might be feeling the same way. He wanted to create a central digital gathering space where entrepreneurs could come to get support and learn from one another. Entrepreneur World is in its early stages, but Michaels is working hard to grow it to meet his big vision.

accountability, AI Search, alt-tags, Being Found On Bing, Being Found on Google, marketing best practices, meta tags, online presence, pull marketing, Search Engine Optimization, search terms, SEO, SEO tags, technical SEO, User experience, website

What Do Website Diagnostic Tools Help Reveal?

At Results Communications and Research, we often use two distinct website diagnostic tools to run website diagnostic reports for existing clients and prospective clients. These reports include:

  • Google Lighthouse Reports – these reports provide feedback — both an overall score for each category as well as detail on website factors, features, issues, etc. that contribute to the overall score — on the four broad categories below:
    • Performance
    • Accessibility
    • SEO
    • Best Practices
  • Site Auditor Reports – similar to Google Lighthouse Reports, these reports provide an overall score (but just one), but also give you all the behind-the-scenes detail, so you know what needs to be adjusted on your website, and why, to improve your score. What we love about this report is that it reports factors/issues that should be addressed into these three categories, so you know which ones are most important to address first, i.e., those that are most likely most contributing most to your site not ranking as well as it could in search engine results:
    • Critical – these should be addressed immediately
    • Error – these should be addressed after the above
    • Warning – these you can slowly chip away at
Powder blue/turquoisey square image that says "Why Run Website Diagnostics Reports? Related To Being Found On Google For Relevant Terms (SEO), They Identify: 1. Website Issues That May Cause Search Engines to "Ding" You, and Therefore, Be Reluctant To Serve Up Your Site 2. Website Practices/Features That Will Support Your Not Missing Out On SEO "Opportunities." The image also includes the logo of our SEO consulting firm, Results Communications and Research.

Why Run Website Diagnostics Reports?

If you’re a follower of our blog or a frequent visitor of our website, you know that our Boston digital marketing agency has an expertise in SEO (search engine optimization). We are super passionate about helping organizations be found on search engines for appropriate terms in relevant geographies. There are an extensive list of factors that can influence how likely Google or other search engines will be to serve your website up in search results. Ultimately, search engines want searchers to find what they need and have a good “user experience” when they visit a website that the search engine serves up in search results.

The two reports mentioned above can help you determine both SEO challenges and opportunities. We like to say, “they help you both identify issues with your website that are likely causing search engines to “ding” it and make them less eager/more reluctant to serve your site up in relevant search results, and identify missed opportunities related to being found on search.” The latter category reflects items that search engines aren’t necessarily dinging your site for, but if your website employed best practices related to them, your site would likely rank better in appropriate search results.

Examples Of SEO Challenges and Opportunities Revealed By Website Diagnostics Reports

There are a large number of factors and issues on which the above two diagnostics tools report, so the following list is far from exclusive. But, some examples of critical SEO challenges and opportunities that are revealed by the reports include:

Factors/Features That Likely Cause Your Site To Be “Dinged” By Search Engines:

  • Slow Site Load Speed – search engines do not like to serve up websites that are slow to load.
  • No Image Alternative Text Tags (Alt Tags) – search engines want site visitors to have a good “user experience,” as we mentioned above. If a site is not accessible, i.e., not able to be read by screen users used by those with visual impairment or other physical disabilities, how can the visitor have a good experience? Incorporating alt tags when you include an image on a website page or in a website blog post is just one of many factors to be addressed to ensure your website is accessible.
  • Pointing to internal or external website pages that have an http:// (non-secure) vs. https:// (secure) address. Search engines do not like to send visitors to insecure websites.
  • Broken links/missing pages – often pages to which website content links are removed/taken down — whether the links point to internal pages/posts or to external ones. Search engines see this as neglect and not keeping an eye on your website and will view this negatively.

Missed Opportunities That Cause You To Miss Out On Ranking Well In Search Engine Results:

  • Not employing SEO meta page/post title tags: we always call these “your most important piece of SEO real estate” as they are crawled by search engines and tell them for what topics/search terms to index a particular page or post on your website.
  • Not completing SEO meta description tags: while it’s unknown for certain how directly these tags influence how your website ranks, they indirectly do, at a minimum, since they let potential visitors know what a page of your site is all about when it is served up in search results. Ultimately, this causes your pages to have a higher click-thru rate, and Google and other search engines view sites that have more website visitor traffic as more credible ones, and therefore, ones they are more comfortable serving up in relevant searches.
  • Publishing duplicate website content: we won’t re-create the wheel since our most recent blog post speaks to the downfall of having too much duplicate content, but the takeaway is this: when you repeat the same or very similar content in numerous places on your website, search engines get confused and they may not serve up those pages in relevant search results, nor index that content to begin with!
  • Publishing content that is too short or that doesn’t contain enough true crawlable/indexable content: As we expressed in this blog post about an important Google Core Algorithm update, Google and other search engines do not like to serve up low-quality, unhelpful content. They want to serve up meaningful content that allows visitors to take action to address their particular concerns. In addition, search engines can’t crawl/index pdfs, so if a lot of a page’s content is housed in an infographic or image, that is content that search engines will not serve your site up for. Sure, you can tag the image on the back end, but it’s unlikely your tag can incorporate everything an infographic or an image with a lot of content, or a pdf, has to say.

Not Sure How To Run, Interpret, Or Respond To Website Diagnostics Reports?

As SEO Consultants, we can help you with all of the above, so reach out to our team of search engine optimization consultants today to schedule a complimentary discussion.

Acceptance of Circumstances, AI Search, Being Found On Bing, Being Found on Google, blog, Blog, Blogging, brand promise, Customer Service, good will creation, Google My Business Profile, keywords, marketing best practices, online presence, pull marketing, relationship building, Search Engine Optimization, search terms, SEO, staying current, target audiences, Target Marketing, Understanding Your Environment, User experience, walking

To Continue To Succeed At SEO, “You’re Going To Need A Quality Shoe”

11 Comments

Mark Knopfler fans will understand where the quoted phrase in our blog headline comes from. I was first introduced to Mark’s wonderful storytelling abilities by my husband, Jay, when we were dating or first married. One of Mark’s songs that I first took a great liking to was his song “Quality Shoe.” Be prepared for the earworm that comes from wanting to listen to this song over and over!

“Quality Shoe” by Mark Knopfler YouTube video

What Do Shoes Have To Do With SEO?

The answer to the question above is this: a great deal!

As we’ve called out in a number of blog posts over the past year, the SEO landscape continues to shift — and on a daily basis. As we recently expressed in this blog post about thriving — not just surviving — in the SEO jungle, it’s our belief at our Boston SEO Company/digital marketing agency that the organizations who will continue rank well in search-engine results, despite all the change on the search-engine front, are those that really try to walk in their target audiences’ shoes and answer the questions and concerns they have. And, keep in mind, that these questions and concerns may be related to the product or service the organizations who succeed at SEO offer, or they may be unrelated, or only distantly related.

Sure, as we discussed in another blog post about succeeding at SEO, entitled “Give The People What They Want, you can use keyword research tools to determine on which topics, particularly questions, your target audiences are regularly conducting Google searches. But part of walking in your target audiences’ shoes also includes:

  • digging down deep mentally and emotionally to really understand your marketplace and your organization’s place in it
  • making and taking the time to think about what are the likely questions your target audiences have about your products or services, plus, about working with/buying from/engaging your organization
  • brainstorming with individuals at all levels of your organization, particularly those who are in customer-service roles, or who actually provide or deliver your product or service, to determine what client “pain points” your product or service addresses
  • reaching out to customers with whom you have a strong and longstanding relationship to ask them for feedback about why they chose to work with your organization or buy your product, and how the product or service has made their life or job easier
  • In addition to chatting with your organization’s staff and clients about the problems your products or services solve and using those to inform website and other online content your organization publishes, as part of such internal and external discussions, ask about other pains/challenges your target audiences deal with regularly (even if you don’t offer a solution to them). Simply providing helpful information online on topics or questions that are tangential to your products or services, but important to your target audiences, is a great way to have search engines serve up your website or Google My Business Profile in related to searches being conducted by your target audiences even if they aren’t directly related to your organization. It’s a win-win.

So, break out those quality shoes and start the walking-in-your-clients’-shoes process today! And, check out this blog post that speaks to another reason you and your organization are “going to need some quality shoes.”

Plus, if you’re an avid walker (literally vs. figuratively) like us, check out our many blog posts about walking by selecting walking as your category when you visit our blog.

Need Help Determining What Online Content Would Benefit Your Target Audiences?

Schedule a complimentary SEO discussion today!

advertising agency, Being Found on Google, digital marketing agency, Google Ads, integrated marketing, landing page, landing pages, lead generation, marketing best practices, Marketing Planning, online advertising, paid search, Search Engine Optimization, SEM, strategic planning, target audiences, User experience, website

Is Your Advertising Landing Page Too Self-Serving, And Ultimately, Hurting Your Organization?

7 Comments

As a Greater Boston digital marketing agency and SEO company, we’ve implemented and executed countless online and traditional marketing activities to drive traffic to our clients’ websites, particularly online advertising campaigns that include Google Ads search advertising. Since we’ve already outlined in a former blog post what makes for an effective landing page (and what a landing page is to begin with), we won’t repeat that information here. Instead, we want to focus on why what we consider to be a “self-serving” landing page can hurt your organization.

Why You Shouldn’t Make Your Website Landing Page All About You

As we’ve explained in a number of past blog posts, in the marketing and marketing-activity-results-tracking world, a “conversion,” is a desired/desirable action that a website visitor takes on your website. A website visitor conversion could be:

  • Signing up for your e-newsletter
  • Clicking on social media icons that link to your various social media profiles to visit them
  • Completing an inquiry or contact form
  • Clicking on a hyperlinked e-mail address to send you an e-mail
  • Clicking on a hyperlinked phone number to call you
  • Downloading a white paper or a pdf housed on your website
  • Purchasing a product, service, or solution, including tickets to an event
  • Providing an e-mail address, via a gatekeeper type system, in order to download a document housed on your site, or to complete some other activity

We think you get the picture!

A mistake we often see marketers/advertisers make, though, is focusing too hard/much on the actions that THEY want visitors to take on their website, i.e., the actions THEY consider desirable vs. focusing on the actions that visitors may want to take and the tasks they hope and want to complete when they visit a website that offers the products, services, and solutions you do.

What The “Bounce Rate” Can Tell You About Your Landing Page

GA4 Google Analytics allows organizations to view the “engagement rate” for all your website pages and posts, including your landing pages (even if those are hidden from the navigation that the general public sees, and are only used in conjunction with specific marketing activities/campaigns). The inverse of a website page’s engagement rate is known as the “bounce rate,” and that can be calculated by subtracting the engagement rate from 100% (if a page’s engagement rate is 60%, then the bounce rate is 40%).

If a large percentage of visitors “bounce” from a website page or post, it means many prospective customers or customers left your website from that particular page or post without interacting in any way with the page or post (e.g., scrolling down on it, clicking on links/calls-to-actions/call-out buttons contained on it to visit other pages of the site, starting or completing a form contained on the page or post, etc.). The higher the bounce rate is, the less likely the page satisfies the needs of various visitors to complete desired tasks/take beneficial actions on your site — tasks and actions that are of importance to THEM vs. YOU.

How To Lower Your Landing Page Bounce Rate

Granted there will likely be some overlap between the actions A VISITOR might hope and want to take on your site and the ones YOU hope and want them to take on your site, but you and/or your team should go thru the following exercise to make sure your visitors’ needs are met more often than your own, and that they are a priority.

As SEO experts, we’ve shared quite often, including in this blog post about how helpful content impacts SEO/ranking on Google, that Google rewards websites that are helpful and are about what users want and need, not just what the website owner/advertisers want and need. To ensure your visitors have a positive experience and your website is “helpful,” we suggest you do the following:

  • Make a grid, such as the one shown below, that lists all the tasks that you want visitors to complete on your site, as well as the tasks you believe visitors want to complete on your site. Really think hard and try to walk in target audiences’ shoes! Keep in mind that many individuals already receive e-mails from countless organizations on a daily basis, and many are reluctant to have their name added to another e-mail list. They know what will likely follow is a stream of e-mails to sell them the product, service, or solution they were investigating on your website, or ones asking for a donation, etc. Will you cause them to “bounce,” and lose them altogether as a potential customer because you kept certain content “gated,” or your marketing activity took them to a landing page that only allowed them to visit that particular page of your website vs. quickly/easily visit other pages of your site?
  • Review the grid you created and highlight those activities that you believe would be considered desirable/beneficial to both parties, i.e., your organization AND website visitors. Functionality should then be created/installed and included on your landing page to allow for completion of those tasks.
  • Then, review the activities which you believe are more valued by visitors (less preferable to your organization), and consider for which of those actions you’d be willing to provide functionality on your site for visitors to complete them. A great example, is requiring individuals to reach out to schedule an appointment to get pricing information. Even if your pricing is customer-specific/customized, many prospective clients may be reluctant to reach out, particularly if they aren’t in a financial position to invest in your product or service immediately. Think about what/how much downfall there would be to providing visitor functionality to get an estimate/access pricing information, and whether you’d be better off keeping visitors happy and on your website longer, or better off letting them bounce. Only you will know the answer to the aforementioned and the implications of trade-offs.

Ultimately, the more the scale swings in the favor of your website visitor vs. your organization when it comes to desirable action-taking, the more your organization will likely be to succeed at providing a great user experience, ranking better in search engines, and ultimately driving sales from satisfied visitors who were able to obtain the information, and complete the tasks they wanted, without being on the receiving end of what might be perceived as too “hard of a sell” by your organization or a too “self-serving” website.

Get Complimentary Advice On Landing Pages From Online Advertising Experts

Want objective advice on how to set your landing page up so that both your organization and visitors achieve their objectives? Schedule a complimentary online advertising brainstorm with us!

Being Found on Google, blog, Blog, Blogging, keeping up with trends, keywords, lead generation, marketing best practices, marketing consultant, Marketing Planning, online presence, organic SEO, Search Engine Optimization, search terms, SEM, SEO, strategic planning, target audiences, Target Marketing, Understanding Your Environment, User experience, website

Blogging Is Still A Very Effective SEO Tactic

10 Comments

I recently watched a video from an SEO expert who stated that, for certain organizations, regular blogging may no longer be an effective SEO strategy.

The above is not what I’ve seen in the past and what I continue to see. My clients who make and take the time to write and post new blog posts on topics that their particular target audiences are interested in and need to better understand, continue to drive traffic to their website from audiences who have great potential to buy their products or use their services. And, they are driving those relevant audiences because they are ranking well on Google for desirable search terms (known as keywords) because Google is indexing their blog content and serving it up in search results in relevant geographies.

This is the image of hands that are on a laptop keyword and what is shown on the laptop screen is someone editing something that they are posting to a WordPress website. The image is shown to support our Boston SEO company's blog post about why you should continue to blog and how to blog effectively.

How To Blog Effectively

Anyone can “blog,” but how do you blog effectively to support SEO and actual sales?

  • Employ a keyword planner tool, like Google Ads’, to determine on which high-volume keywords your target audiences are searching
  • Use tools like Ubersuggest, Google Trends, and Answer The Public to see what questions your audiences has or what they are searching most about, and create blog posts that speak to those searches and questions
  • Use Google Analytics and Google Search Console to determine what new, or long-time, blog posts on your site individuals are visiting most and make sure that you:

Need Ideas About What To Blog About?

Our team can help you develop a blogging strategy that would include research to determine what you should be blogging about. Depending on the complexity of the products and services you offer, we can even write and post your blog posts for you and make sure they get crawled/indexed by Google.

Reach Out To Our Boston SEO Company Today!

We love a good complimentary discussion about any organization’s marketing challenges or opportunities — whether the organization be a nonprofit or for-profit. To-date, we’ve supported approximately 125 different brands, so there’s very few industries, products, or services for which we don’t have at least some relevant marketing experience; plus, we’re quick to learn new industries, products, and services. So, schedule your free call with our team of SEO experts today!

Acceptance of Circumstances, alt-tags, Being Found on Google, blog, Blog, Blogging, Google Ads, Google Nonprofit Ad Grant, keywords, organic SEO, paid search, pull marketing, Search Engine Optimization, search terms, SEM, SEO, SEO tags, User experience, website

How Not To Let Your SEO Strategy & Progress Slide When You’re Short On Time

1 Comment

The topic of this blog post wasn’t the one I planned to write about next. But, it’s particularly busy at Results Communications & Research, and that’s a good thing and blessing, right? It does mean, though, that the longer, more-detailed post topic I had on my radar will have to wait.

Right before posting this, I was faced with this challenge. I’ve been so busy helping clients with their paid SEO and organic SEO this spring and summer, I haven’t had the physical bandwidth to employ SEO tactics related to my own site that I encourage all my clients to implement — particularly the tactic I wrote about in my “Why It’s Time To Get Back To Internet and SEO Basics” blog post about being “fresh” by adding new content to, or updating existing content on your website.

So, I asked myself, “since I don’t have time to effectively write and post a really informative blog post, what small revisions can I make to my website to let Google know that my business, Results Communications & Research, is still alive & well? That we haven’t abandoned ship or shop? That we’re still open for business? That were not neglectful?

neon signage
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Small Website “Freshening-Ups” Support SEO

I landed on making a couple of simple tweaks. I recently had new, professional headshots taken. So, I added those to the About and Contact pages of my site, and wrote an image alt-tag for both of the photos. Alt-tags support being found on Google since Google will crawl and index such tags. They also make it clear to Google that your site is accessible to visually impaired individuals since alt-tags can be read by screen readers. It’s unknown if Google favors accessible sites over inaccessible ones, but Google does love sites that provide for a good user experience.

In addition to the above photo and tag additions, I added a new client name to the Google Nonprofit Ad Grant Services page of my site. And, I submitted all three revised pages of my site for indexing, using my Google Search Console account, so I and my site don’t have to wait for Google to find my revisions.

None of the above was a big lift, but it should support my site ranking well for relevant terms vs. it sliding as far as where in search results listings Google serves it up for desirable, high-volume search terms, known as keywords.

What small revisions can you make today to your site to support your SEO strategy?

Reach Out To Our Team Of SEO Experts

Need advice about small, less time-consuming tweaks you can regularly make to your site to support maintaining how it ranks in Google? Reach out today for a complimentary conversation.

Being Found on Google, blog, Blog, Blogging, competitive advantage, digital marketing agency, keywords, meta tags, online presence, organic SEO, pull marketing, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, SEO tags, strategic planning, User experience, website

Why You’re Missing Out If You Don’t Consider Joomla For Your Website CMS/Platform

4 Comments

While our Boston digital marketing agency doesn’t normally build websites for clients, we regularly advise our clients about what content management systems (CMS)/website platforms they should consider when launching a new website. We’ve also project managed the RFP/RFI process for several clients to arrive at the best-fit web developer and platform for a new site build. In addition, we often provide recommendations to clients for expert developers in various CMS with whom we’ve had the good fortunate to collaborate. One such collaborator and true partner is Robin Clapp at Web Design by Robin.

By working closely and collaboratively with Robin on the execution of SEO tactics on numerous mutual clients’ Joomla websites, we’ve gotten to know the many benefits to an organization of building and managing their website on Joomla. We’ve found it easy ourselves to use the tool to add new posts to resource/blog/news/articles sections of sites; plus, enter post title tags that support websites being found on Google for relevant high-volume keywords.

And, thru the results of SEO audits we conduct, we’ve become confident that, like WordPress and other sites built on non-drag-n-drop platforms, Joomla sites tend to rank well in Google when the proper SEO tactics are put in place. But, we’re letting Robin take it from here by sharing her thoughts below about why it’s a mistake not to consider Joomla as a website platform option when launching a new site.

From Guest Blogger, Robin Clapp, Web Design By Robin

While networking lately, I’ve been asked repeatedly, “What platform do you design websites on?” The reaction to my answer is confusion. They had never heard of Joomla. That’s okay! I don’t necessarily expect business owners to know all about website technology. So I put together these highlights to help them understand what Joomla is and why it is an excellent choice for a business website.

What Is Joomla and Why Should I Choose It For My Business Website?

What is Joomla and why should I choose it for my business website?

Joomla is the ideal Content Management System (CMS) platform for businesses and companies with websites with numerous pages and continuous content updates and additions.

At Web Design by Robin we have been designing custom websites in Joomla for 15+ years. Using extensive website development knowledge and years of experience developing websites in Joomla, each design is a custom experience tailored to your specific needs. Joomla provides a secure login and the ability to add, change, and remove content.

Benefits Of Using the Joomla Platform For Your New Website Include:

  • Joomla is a free, open-source content management system for publishing web content. Joomla is free and open-source because a community, not a company, owns it. The nonprofit organization, Open Source Matters, Inc. and the Joomla community develop the Joomla platform code where skilled Joomla specialists can design top-of-the-line websites.
  • Website content is template-agnostic. In the Joomla platform, content is created natively as individual elements. The template, in our case, a custom-designed template, is independent of the content, allowing for a design change while keeping the content as is.
  • Joomla has powerful role management and permissions built-in. This is useful if you have a variety of staff roles and responsibilities or tasks that they need to perform in relation to the website.
  • Content can be customized using custom fields. Custom fields include content and options such as video, audio, links, and images. Content can be categorized, tagged, searched, and sorted. All this is native to Joomla, making it an excellent solution for resource-heavy websites.
  • SEO metadata is easy to access and maintain in Joomla. Add your titles, descriptions, and alt tags in the same place you add your content. Joomla makes it easy.
  • Joomla is the leading platform when it comes to accessibility. If you choose accessibility for your website design, maintaining accessible content is easy going forward using Joomla’s built-in accessibility checker.

Joomla websites are beautiful, functional, and robust. At Web Design by Robin we design all our websites in Joomla. Check out our extensive portfolio to see just how diverse websites designed in Joomla can be.

What to learn more about Robin and Joomla?

Feel free to reach out to Robin directly, or ask us to make an introduction — we’d love to do so!

advertising agency, Being Found on Google, digital marketing agency, Google Ads, Google Nonprofit Ad Grant, Instagram, keywords, landing page, marketing agency, marketing best practices, Marketing Planning, Objectives Setting, online advertising, organic SEO, paid search, pull marketing, push marketing, Search Engine Optimization, search terms, SEM, SEO, strategic planning, target audiences, Target Marketing, traditional marketing, User experience, website

How To Know Where To Invest Marketing Energy and Dollars: Push Vs. Pull Marketing

30 Comments

Regardless of whether your organization has a small or large marketing budget and staff, you still want to spend your time and money on marketing judiciously. Who wants to throw either valuable dollars or time out the window, right?

Why not make this the year you ensure you’re maximizing your marketing efforts by revisiting your marketing plans based on the information shared below about what marketing tactics make sense based on available data.

What Is Pull Marketing?

Each marketing expert probably has their own thoughts on what they consider marketing tactics that fall in the “pull” category. But, at our Boston digital marketing agency and Boston SEO company, we think of “pull marketing” tactics as those to be employed if evidence shows that individuals are actively searching to identify someone in your geography who offers the products, services, and solutions to problems that your organization offers.

So how do you know if people are actively searching in the geography you serve for the products, services, and solutions you offer? The best way to ascertain the aforementioned is by conducting keyword research. As we explain in this previous blog post, keyword research helps you identify the average # of monthly Google searches that are conducted on search terms (known as keywords) relevant to your products, services, and solutions. Because of the tools to which you’ll need access and the challenges of figuring out how to structure your research, you’ll likely fare better by hiring an SEO company or a team of SEO experts, like ours, to conduct meaningful and accurate keyword research.

If keyword research does indicate a large volume of individuals are regularly searching to identify an organization like yours, then pull marketing tactics, such as optimizing your website to be found on Google via organic search engine optimization (SEO) tactics and/or paid search tactics (think Google Ads) make great marketing sense. You’ll still need to have an effective website (one with appropriate calls-to-actions and that provides for a strong user experience) to cause site visitors to take desired actions on your site (convert), but the two aforementioned tactics should definitely cause individuals who are “warm leads,” i.e., likely interested in your products because they are actively searching, to visit your website.

What Is Push Marketing?

We always like to say “push marketing” is about the putting the idea in the heads of individuals and organizations who might be a good fit for the product, service, or solution you offer. Push marketing tactics are all about serving up/providing information about your products or services to individuals who, based on various demographics and characteristics, such as age, gender, income level, job/career/industry, etc., might likely be interested in buying your product or engaging you for your service.

Examples of both digital and traditional push marketing tactics include: display advertising (both social media advertising and Google display advertising), banner advertising (ad purchased on a website that serves individuals and orgs. who might be a good fit for your product), and print advertising in a newspaper or magazine. The aforementioned list is not exclusive, but we think you get the picture.

So, when is push marketing warranted? Push marketing makes great sense if keyword research indicates that individuals aren’t actively searching in your geography to identify someone like your organization. Particularly when a product or service offered is a brand new one that your target audiences are not likely familiar with/don’t know exist, then focusing on executing effective push marketing tactics will be the most efficient use of your marketing time and dollars.

When To Employ Both Push and Pull Marketing

Organizations with particularly large marketing budgets and teams tend to employ both push and pull marketing tactics, and therefore, both pursue people that are “warmer” leads for their products and services, i.e., those who are actively searching AND people who are less warm but still might be a good fit for their products and services. A key reason they may employ both push and pull marketing tactics is that pull alone doesn’t bring in the volume of leads and sales they need to meet their sales objectives.

For smaller organizations who have fewer in-house individuals devoted to marketing and a limited marketing budget, the majority of marketing dollars and time should definitely be earmarked for the type of tactics — push vs. pull — that make the most sense for the organization, based on what keyword research and any other appropriate available data indicates. But, it’s likely still worth investing a small amount of time and dollars in push marketing tactics, like Google Display or Instagram/Facebook advertising, just to see what such tactics yield in results.

Our Team Of Marketing Experts And SEO Experts Is Here To Help

We always say our Boston SEO company and Boston digital marketing agency “never encourages clients or prospective clients to continue with or start with a marketing tactic that doesn’t make sense for them.” In fact, our company’s tagline since we launched our marketing agency in 2014 has been “maximizing results thru research-supported marketing.” We’ll never suggest a client employ a particular tactic, based on whether or not we offer a service related to it. If we don’t offer a marketing service from which research indicates a client would benefit, we’ll refer the work to a one of our fellow marketing collaborators. But, the very first step is holding a complimentary discussion to learn about your particular organization’s marketing challenges and opportunities, so please use our calendar app to select a convenient day and time for you if you’d like to chat!