avvo webinar: seo best practices for lawyers
TRANSCRIPT
Avvo, Inc. Confidential - ©2012
SEO Best Practices for Lawyers
August 16, 2012
Avvo, Inc. Confidential - ©2012
Started SEO back in 1999
Freelance web design firm from 2001-2007
In 2008, small business SEO and Wordpress
design
In the recent past, SEO consultant for:
Intro
Jake MartinSEO Nerd
Extraordinaire@jmwebdev
Avvo, Inc. Confidential - ©2012
4.7+ billion searches are done everyday on
Google by more than 500 million unique users
in over
130 countries.
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PaidOrganicG+ Local Map
Searching for “Seattle DUI” will give results similar to this:
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Measuring Website Usage
Free tools to monitor your internet marketing results
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Analytic Tools Provide Details on Website Usage
Useful stats include:
• Unique and total visitors• Most visited pages• Where the person came from
(referrer)• How long they spent on-site• How likely would they leave the
page?
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Knowing Where Your Users Are At
Search Engines and Social Networks
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Searches Per Month
150mm900mm 500mm 130mm
20mm25mm35mm 14mm20mm
50mm
2.5b10b 2.8b
Users
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SEO is ensuring that your website shows up in the organic search results and drives visitors back to your website.
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Most common free traffic sources that SEOs utilize
It’s complex and ever changing.
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Basic Principles of Search & SEO
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How Search Engines Work
3) Results are served
to user
2) Index is
built based
on hundreds of
factors
1) Search Engines Collect Web
Pages
Avvo, Inc. Confidential - ©2012
How Search Engines Work
3) Results are served
to user
2) Index is
built based
on hundreds of
factors
1) Search Engines Collect Web
Pages
How SEO Effects
Search Engines’ ResultsIncrease crawl
allotment and index rate/response
Backlinks: Authority and anchor text
Content and on-site factors
Google Search Plus Your World / Bing Facebook Likes
Rich snippet results / Rel authorship
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The Benefit of SEO
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1. IndexationSearch robots crawl and build indexes based on collected
and provided data. The faster your content is indexed,
the quicker it can begin to rank and generate traffic.
2. RankIndex is served to users who search the search engine.
3. VisitorsVisitors view website but are not guaranteed to take action.
4. ConversionsTrust, quality, convenience and emotional website
elements convert visitors into clients.
Four Main Benefits of SEO
Avvo, Inc. Confidential - ©2012
SEO Flow Chart
Rank
Google index
Bing/Yahoo! index
YouTube/Vimeo
Facebook/Twitter/Google+
Visitors
Conversion
1) Indexation
2) Rank
3)Visitors
4)Conversion
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The first page of a search engine receives 90%+ of the overall
clicks.
Rank
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Visitors Conversion
The key performance indicator that directly
correlates to return on marketing investment; sales
and new business.
- New inbound
phone calls
- New clients
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How does SEO get me more visitors?
The basics of a long-term SEO strategy
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Basic Keyword ResearchDetermining What People Are Searching For
• How many times per month the keyword in searched for in a given
location
• Data varies by search engine usage
• Google: https://adwords.google.com/o/Targeting/Explorer
• Bing: http://www.bing.com/toolbox/keywords
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Intermediate Keyword Research
Hint: Use related terms in conjunction with the auto-suggest to recursively generate high-value keywords.
Enter your keyword on Google, but don’t press enter!
Go to the bottom of the Google search results page:
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On-Site Optimization
Applying the keyword research:
• One keyword concept per web page
• Keyword and semantically related keywords used in Title, meta
description, content, image alt text, primary headings
Other factors to evaluate:
• Canonicalization (http://www.example.com vs. http://example.com)
• Sitemap and RSS feeds
• Robot-friendly navigation (including breadcrumbs and pagination)
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• How many backlinks does each of your webpages have?
• How trustworthy is the website that links back to your webpage?
• What is the anchor text of each backlink? What are the ratios?
• At what rate does the page acquire backlinks? (known as link
velocity)
Backlink campaigns are often deployed to build specific and quality
backlinks to improve a website’s external search engine optimization
metrics.
Externala.k.a Backlinks
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On-Site vs. External SEO
On-SiteTitle
Meta DescriptionH1-H3
Body ContentImage ALT
Page Load SpeedRich-snippet mark-
up
ExternalNumber of backlinksQuality of backlinks
Diversity of backlinks
Anchor text variety
Keyword Research
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Rich Snippet Results
• Add author photos and video thumbnails to search results
• Provide users with better expectations of content
• Show more content from the author
• Increase click-through on search results pages
Author
Video
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A few examples of what to expect from SEO services
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Basic Audit Process (One-Time Consulting; Price: $300-$1,500)
KeywordResearch
•Attorney’s specialties + Locations (cities, district, state)•Long-tail keywords (“Who is a good lawyer in Seattle?”)
CompetitionResearch
•Perceived and based on keyword data•How established is the competition? mozTrust, # of backlinks, backlink diversity•Number of video, map, and authority results in search engines results page
WebsiteAudit
•On-site: keyword, title, meta, content, site architecture, redirects, sitemaps, robots.txt•External: Determine strengths and weaknesses of attorney’s website and backlink profile•Make recommendations on how to fix issues (may not include usability suggestions)•May or may not offer a backlink service or campaign
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Basic Monthly SEO Services(Monthly service; Price: $300-$2,500+/mo)
Implement SEOFixes
• Fix on-site issues identified in Website Audit
• If the website architecture is unreasonably bad, may suggest site redesign
Perform BacklinkCampaigns
• Build backlinks through articles, videos, press releases, forums, and profiles
Monitor SERP Rank
• On a weekly or monthly basis, check Google, Bing, and Yahoo search engine rankings and deliver report
KeywordResearch
CompetitionResearch
WebsiteAudit
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Actionable Tips
Five things you can do today
and ten things to avoid
Avvo, Inc. Confidential - ©2012
• Easy way to generate traffic
- Map Results
- Google+ Results
- Mobile Results
• Free to use and setup
• Important for reviews
Claim Your Google+ Local Business
Pro-tip: The new changes to Google+ Business pages have been great for SEOs. Be sure to build quality links to your G+ business page to gain more exposure through Google Maps results!
http://bit.ly/nPubrA
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• Provides visual enhancement of search results
• Results in higher click-thru regardless of SERP
rank
• Takes 5 minutes to setup
• Watch the step-by-step video
Setup Rel Authorship
Which result do you think gets more clicks?
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Submit Yourself to Review Sites
Here’s 15 top sites you absolutely must be on if you
want to rank highly in Google+ Local / Maps!
Download the list here.
Yelp, Yellow Pages,
Superpages, Citysearch,
Angie's List, Judy's Book,
Manta, Merchant Circle,
Service Magic, YouTube,
Facebook, BBB, and more!
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• No one wants to read yet another DUI article that states the obvious
• Pictures and videos will help with SEO ranks and diversifying traffic
channels
• Use authority site’s such as Avvo to reference / promote your epic
content
• Learn how to be a great legal blogger here.
Create epic content
If you don’t currently have a blog, I would highly
recommend setting up one using the free content
management system, Wordpress. Click here to
learn more.
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Convert More
Phone # prominent
Call to action (Gutenberg rule)
Navigation
Video
Multi-lingual
All elements are above the fold
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Copy content
Keyword Stuff
Cloak or mask content
Buy Links
Free-For-All Links
Link Exchanges
Comment Spam
Article Spam / Spun Articles
Forum or QA Spam
… or Hire SEO firms who do the above!
Don’t Do These Things, Ever:
Avvo, Inc. Confidential - ©2012
• The Gutenberg rule
• Optical studies have shown that Western cultures’ eye tracking progresses
from the top left (high impact) to bottom right (high impact).
Appendix
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Recommended Anchor Text Distribution