Press Releases are Good for SEO
December 22, 2009
If you promote, work for, or own an online business, you know that Search Engine ranking can make or break your business. You can create the most attractive website on the Net that sells the hottest, in-demand products at dirt-cheap prices… but if Internet searchers can’t find your website, you don’t exist. Let’s look at an example.
Girlz Rule
Priscilla Pretty loves pink. Anything pink will do. Her pink fetish creates a voracious spending appetite and she needs money. She’s about to graduate from college and she decides to start her own business instead of working as an intern in a stuffy office cubicle for peanuts while she lives in her parents’ basement and pays off her student loans. She comes up with an idea for Girlz Rule, an online shop that sells all things pink, girlie, and great.
Her dorm roommate is a design and IT major, and after some haggling over the trading of a pair of pink Jimmy Choos they both love, she produces an awesomely pink, edgy website for Priscilla’s new business. Priscilla chooses her favorite pink products on the web, taps into an automated checkout system that lets her visitors order from her website, and sets up the products to ship directly form a third party vendor.
Easy-As-Pie, right? Wrong. Even though Girlz Rule has the new 5th generation hot pink iPod nano for $100, no one is ordering because no one is visiting the website. It’s lost in CyberSpace.
So, what’s Priscilla to do?
Content (and girls) Rule(s)
She can optimize her content. Contrary to popular opinion, SEO content does not have to be boring or stuffed to the brim with keywords.
You can have exciting, spunky, sassy, classy, or edgy content and be search engine optimized. SEO writing can be as fun and creative as any other type of writing, it just takes a skilled SEO writer to pull it off. So Priscilla hires an SEO writer to produce her website content and she starts getting natural, relevant traffic to her website- and a few sales. But she needs more sales to save up for a down payment on a loft apartment, so she keeps asks her SEO writer for help. She recommends an SEO press release.
SEO Press Releases
Priscilla can also publish an SEO press release. In Priscilla’s case, this is a news-style article detailing the arrival of Girlz Rule. It contains all the details of the new website, its owner, the products sold, guarantees offered, special promotions, and background information. It’s sort of like a newspaper article and sales flyer combined. It includes a link back to a special landing page on the Girlz Rule website.
The SEO press release is then distributed to key websites throughout the Internet, where visitors can read about the new business. But more importantly, the information (and the link back to Girlz Rule) is indexed and crawled by search engine spiders- on regular basis. The repeated mention of the Girlz Rule link boosts Priscilla’s search engine ranking because her website content has been optimized for relevancy to her target audience and it draws relevant visitors to her website who buy her products.
Proof in the Pudding
Web Pro News recently published a report on How Press Releases Can Be Great for Search. They cite a study by Arketi Group, that shows the media regularly uses the Internet as a tool to help determine what gets covered in the press. Wouldn’t it be great if the media came across your business on the Net and found it to be newsworthy?
By the way, Priscilla is doing great with her new business. She moved out of her parent’s basement and recently struck up a deal with a clothing designer to produce eco-friendly pink t-shirts to sell to Prius owners. Sean Platt is Priscilla’s biggest fan. He is anxiously awaiting the arrival of this week’s package. He bought three iPods and a t-shirt. 
The History and Future of Search (according to Google)
December 17, 2009
This is an interesting, but lengthy, video of Google’s presentation on the history and future of Search.
Seth on SEO
April 13, 2009
If you work online, you know who Seth Godin is. Heck, even if you don’t work online, you probably know who Seth is. He’s the one who cuts through all the crap related to marketing. He’s a trendsetter in the business and doesn’t mince words. Seth’s written a post about making money with SEO, and it’s well worth a read.
How to make Money With SEO by Seth Godin
Oh! And because bloggers are on top of things today, Aaron Wall of SEOBook has written a post about Seth’s latest. You can read it here: Aaron Wall on SEO strategies.
SEO Writing Skills for the Rest of Us
March 26, 2009
Many SEO writers will tout their writing skills as unparalleled, exceptional, well worth every penny. I’m not one of them. In fact, my writing skills are not exceptional at all, I just paid attention in English class, read a lot of books, and have the gift of gab from God above. Fortunately, I can translate that gift into written communication and am blessed with some pretty good SEO professionals as associates who have let me pick their collective brains. (Truth be told, my brain picking skills are much better than my writing skills. 
) Now, that’s not to say I don’t earn my paychecks. I work hard for my clients, and the end result is almost always exactly what they asked for.
With that in mind, I have an innovative thought for you: you can be your own SEO writer. Yep, you don’t need to hire me unless you are too strapped for time to learn the basics and write your own content. In fact, most of my clients come to me after they have been writing their own content for some time. Perhaps they have gotten too busy, sometimes they admit to exhausting their knowledge on a subject, often they are desperate for better results. That’s what I’m here for. But, if you have your own website, are strapped for cash, and have some free time on your hands, welcome to the world of SEO writing!
Paying it Forward
Rather than have you blunder your way around the web for the next six months, I thought I’d give you a hand up and share a few SEO tips to help you get started in SEO writing. Why would I do such a thing and endanger my future business profits by teaching you my business? Because someone did it for me, and I like to pay back my debts. God has blessed Blue Duck, and I believe He will continue to do so. But if He decides it’s time to close the doors and pass the business on to some young talented SEO writer, then so be it. So welcome to the first ever Blue Duck Copy SEO Writing Tips for the Rest of Us.
SEO Writing Tips for All
I had a hard time deciding where to start in all this. Do I start from the very beginning and define SEO and the terminology? Do I dig right in and give you the steaming hot latest SEO news from the experts? I decided to take the middle ground and go for something you can immediately put to use, keywords.
What This Tip Is Not
This post is not about how to choose the right keywords, or what keywords are, or how they should be used on a website. This is not a discussion about keyword density or siloing, or any other keyword building techniques. Those topics may appear in the future, just not here and now.
The Prerequisites
Before you put this tip to use, you’ll need to understand what a keyword is and how it is used to help people find your website. You’ll also need to have a list of the most profitable and relevant keywords for your website. The process of choosing the right keywords is often a hotly debated topic. If you don’t have a primary keyword phrase for your website, get one through whatever process you think is logical and acceptable.
You can find scores of information about keyword selection. I recommend visiting a few websites like SEO Book, Bruce Clay, SEOmoz, and Court’s Internet Marketing School. (And in case you noticed and are wondering why I’m suggesting marketing websites for SEO research, search engine optimization and search engine marketing are like peanut butter and jelly; you can eat them separately, but they go better together.)
For archival and search purposes, I’m going to publish the actual SEO tips separately in their own little posts. This may be a slight inconvenience for some, but it will give you a few minutes to do your research if you need to and give you something to look forward to in an hour or so.
You can read the the first installment of Blue Duck SEO Writing Tips here.
Why SEO Is Worth Your Time
February 23, 2009
photo credit: Dan4th
SEO, Search Engine Optimization, is one of the most important aspects of online business. You can create the best product since sliced bread, offer the best service on the planet, and put up a beautifully designed website, but if no one can find it, it’s all a waste of time. The Internet is a B-I-G place, folks, it’s easier to get lost than it is to get found. SEO is the key to putting your website on the Internet road map.
SEO: Varying by Degrees
SEO can be very simple yet complex at the same time. For the average website owner, all the SEO you need to know can be learned in a couple of days. However, if you are serious about promoting your website or making the most money from a PPC campaign, SEO can quickly become a monster.
Overall, SEO is not that difficult to understand, the complexity comes from the sheer volume of information you need to absorb to institute full-scale search engine optimization. Algorithms are constantly changing, trends emerge and die off, and the Internet continually evolves to meet the needs of the never-ending stream of information seekers flooding the world’s servers with requests.
SEO Writing Services
Blue Duck Copy is first and foremost an SEO writing service. We started out as a one-woman show, freelancing for some of the best companies on the Net. We did our marketing the old-fashioned way (so to speak). We sent out individual emails offering our writing services at reasonable fees to SEO companies as we came across them. More than a few took us up on the offer, and took that writer under their wing to learn the ins and outs of SEO practices in exchange for keyword articles, website content, and blog posts that were original, affordable, and search engine optimized for maximum profit. It was a cozy deal and everyone was happy.
Then, a freelance writer here and a hopeful writer there came to Blue Duck, asking for a piece of the pie. So, they got an assignment with a drawn-out email with a very condensed version of how to write for the SEO client they were assigned. The fresh influx of ideas and words was good for business. Now, Blue Duck is even more valuable, because when times get tough, competition gets fierce. That’s where SEO can make the difference between making money and going back to your day job (or filing for government assistance). Online businesses need SEO to thrive, now more than ever.
Changing Times
People are getting laid off, they sit at home and perhaps they try filling out online surveys for a few bucks, or they post to online job boards, trying to find work. More than a few will stumble upon a website telling them how online business is the key to making all their dreams come true. So, they plunk down $50 for a domain name and hosting, and set out to make a living in their pajamas.
The Net is seeing an influx of new online businesses. That means more competition for your website, no matter what your product or service is. Do you have a plan to stay afloat in these troubled financial times? Are you one of those newbie website owners looking for a path to success?
SEO may be the answer you are looking for (even if you didn’t know you were looking for it). Over the next few months, Blue Duck will be providing a sneak peak into the world of SEO. We’ll give you basic SEO instructions, free SEO tips, and SEO advice for the small business owner looking for an edge.
Ask an SEO Writer
In preparation for our SEO lessons, we’ll be taking questions from people just like you about SEO and SEO writing. So drop us an email, a comment, or visit our contact page to toss your inquiry into the hat. (We’ll also be holding a few contests along the way.)
It’s going to be an interesting journey, make sure you subscribe by email or RSS, or bookmark Blue Duck to join in the fun as we journey toward SEO success.
SEO Content Creation: What It Is and Why You Need It
November 20, 2008
SEO content creation is the house specialty here at Blue Duck Copy. It’s no secret that I write for other companies, many of them strictly dealing with SEO. Content creation and SEO marketing has changed over the years. I’ve seen the industry go from 1200 word, high keyword density articles, to 400-500 word, topic-specific siloed posts, as SEO companies adapt to search engine algorithms.
SEO Content Creation: What it Is
So, what exactly is SEO content creation?
It is content with a dual purpose. The goal of SEO content creation is not purely to entertain, persuade, or inform the reader, it is to help the client’s website rank higher for a given set of planned out keywords.
This is not merely slapping up a bunch of loosely related words, bridged by boring or rambling sentences and concepts, with a dash of sales copy thrown in for good measure. It is a lot like composing a song, solving a puzzle, or constructing a model.
I Love Legos
Many times, SEO content creation is not straight-forward writing. In order to meet special requests of clients, work in awkward keyword phrases, or construct a silo of related search terms, the SEO writer must look at the whole picture, as well as the individual parts, and find a way to make them interesting with a nice flow throughout.
Once the key pieces are in place, I can work on the whole, paragraph by paragraph, and work in captivating sales copy, benefits to the reader, bullet points, subheadings, and other important aspects that give SEO content creation its MoJo. Not everyone is cut out for SEO writing, even if they excel in other areas of writing because of this complexity.
Why You Need SEO Content Creation
If you make money from a form of online advertising, or offer online goods or services, you need SEO content creation to succeed. Search engine traffic directly affects your conversion rates. If consumers can’t find your website, you aren’t going to sell anything, even if you offer the best product or service in your niche.
Search engine algorithms change constantly. Search engines like Google are getting better and better at determining the purpose of website content, and having a high keyword density is no longer enough to rank well for a given keyword.
Learning the Dance
SEO for a website can be extremely complicated. Content with a too-high keyword density is penalized. You may also be docked for broken links, irrelevant content, linking to a BlackHat website, or any number of other Google No-No’s. Too many penalties, and your website could be lost in cyberspace for eternity.
Search engines provide the roadsigns and billboards for online consumers to find your website and SEO determines where your website is on the World Wide Map. If you are serious about making money from your website, you need to understand SEO.
*If you think you might be a crafty SEO content creation writer, send me an email. We’re hiring talented, reliable, and honest freelance SEO writers.* (And you don’t have to be a Christian to work for Blue Duck Copy, in case you’re wondering.)
