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Amazon vs. Google: Decoding the World’s Largest E-commerce Search Engine
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A lot of people forget that Amazon is a search engine, let alone the largest search engine for e-commerce. With 54 percent of product searches now taking place on Amazon, it’s time to take it seriously as the world’s largest search engine for e-commerce. In fact, if we exclude YouTube as part of Google, Amazon is technically the second largest search engine in the world.

As real estate on Google becomes increasingly difficult to maintain, moving beyond a website-centric e-commerce strategy is a no brainer. With 54% of shoppers choosing to shop on e-commerce marketplaces, it’s no surprise that online marketplaces are the number one most important digital marketing channel in the US, according to a 2018 study by the Digital Marketing Institute. While marketplaces like Etsy and Walmart are growing fast, Amazon maintains its dominance of e-commerce market share owning 47 percent of online sales, and 5 percent of all retail sales in the US.

Considering that there are currently over 500 million products listed on Amazon.com, and more than two-thirds of clicks happen on the first page of Amazon’s search results—selling products on Amazon is no longer as easy as “set it and forget it.” 

Enter the power of SEO.

When we think of SEO, many of us are aware of the basics of how Google’s algorithm works, but not many of us are up to speed with SEO on Amazon. Before we delve into Amazon’s algorithm, it’s important to note how Google and Amazon’s starkly different business models are key to what drives their algorithms and ultimately how we approach SEO on the two platforms.

The academic vs. The stockbroker

Google was born in 1998 through a Ph.D. project by Lawrence Page and Sergey Brin. It was the first search engine of its kind designed to crawl and index the web more efficiently than any existing systems at the time.

Google was built on a foundation of scientific research and academia, with a mission to;

“Organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful” — Google

Now, answering 5.6 billion queries every day, Google’s mission is becoming increasingly difficult — which is why their algorithm is designed as the most complex search engine in the world, continuously refined through hundreds of updates every year.

Amazon doesn’t have searcher intent issues

When it comes to SEO, the contrasting business models of these two companies lead the search engines to ask very different questions in order to deliver the right results to the user.

On one hand, we have Google who asks the question:

“What results most accurately answer the searcher’s query?”

Amazon, on the other hand, wants to know:

“What product is the searcher most likely to buy?”

On Amazon, people aren’t asking questions, they’re searching for products—and what’s more, they’re ready to buy. So, while Google is busy honing an algorithm that aims to understand the nuances of human language, Amazon’s search engine serves one purpose—to understand searches just enough to rank products based on their propensity to sell.

With this in mind, working to increase organic rankings on Amazon becomes a lot less daunting.

 

To read full article, click here: https://moz.com/blog/amazon-vs-google

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In-depth On-Site SEO Checklist for 2019
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  • Not everything is a ranking factor. Some are for usability, accessibility, and branding. And some of these may not apply to you.
SEO Internet Marketing quote

1. Meta Tags

  • Title Tags – You should include a title with every page on your website. It provides web crawlers with context for indexing and ranking while providing visitors with an insight into your content. Your title should be kept under 70 characters. Doing so will keep your titles from being shortened at the tops of browsers or tabs where they are normally displayed
  • Description Tags – Optimize the description portion of your markup by ensuring there is a maximum length, with spaces, of no more than 200 characters. Though the description has no value for search ranking, it adds usability and can either drive traffic to or away from, your website. Anything over that character count can result in your descriptions being truncated, or maybe not even being used within SERPs.
  • Geo-Targeting – Include Geo-meta tags, which provide context for localized searches. Mobile searches rely heavily upon this metric. Use www.geo-tag.de to automatically generate Geo-meta tags.
Geo targeting code example
  • Language – Ensure you are using appropriate language tags. W3C recommends the use of an HTML attribute instead of the old method of using a meta entry.
  • Multiple Locations – Multi-regional and multilingual sites should reflect their versatility with easy to discern navigational elements, multi-regional meta tags, and text to help visitors get to the part of the site most appropriate for them.
  • Hreflang Attribute – HTML markup using the hreflang attribute should be utilized to allow browsers and search engines to control for language automatically.
  • Canonical Tags – Employ canonical tags to keep from being penalized for duplicate text. In situations where your website’s information needs to appear in more than one place, this coding element lets Google and other search engines know you are not trying to game the system.
canonical tag code example
To read the full article, click here: https://www.amberddesign.com/onsite-seo-checklist/
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UPS Study Reveals Consumer Concerns, Efficiencies In Online Shopping, Research
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Consumers have a host of concerns moving into this year’s holiday shopping season, spanning from search engines and marketplaces to privacy and returns, according to the UPS 2019 Customer Experience Study of 18,000 customers in 15 countries.   

The report focuses primarily on business-to-consumer (B2C) online shopping, and also shares some business-to-business (B2B) research findings.

Globally, 65% of online shoppers express extreme concern about data privacy. In Europe, consumers show a preference for a payment method with increased security such as PayPal, Alipay, and WeChat Pay. Anxiety about security rises with age. Some 73% of online shoppers age 65 and older feel extremely concerned about online shopping security.

To read full article, click here: https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/339103/ups-study-reveals-consumer-concerns-efficiencies.html

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Businesses and Search Directories
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Here are some helpful tips for new or existing businesses seeking listing advice on search directories. When it comes to listing your business to multiple search directories, a useful tip that not many people know about is that you can change them manually which is free. Usually, in each directory, there is a link or button that allows you to claim the listing. While there, you can edit the information to match your business perfectly.

Although automatic listings services are available, some companies do not let you keep the updates they provide once you stop using their services on a monthly basis. Even then, automatic listing services do not always cover every single directory which you would still have to edit yourself. The advantage of hiring a marketing agency instead allows you to control your budget while keeping the updates the agency has done for your business. Remember, the improper information listed about your company on search directories could greatly affect the number of visits.

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HTTP vs. HTTPS: Which is Better?
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Unless you are tech savvy and are constantly keeping up to date with the latest digital trends, the average user would probably not understand what HTTP or HTTPS even means. In simple terms, HTTP stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol and is the most common way to connect and access websites. On the other hand, HTTPS is another iteration of HTTP but adds a layer of security to handle confidential material. Another protocol that can be used with HTTPS is the secure socket layer (SSL) which checks to make sure that the information from one party sent to another is consistent without any tampering.

HTTPS is used for e-commerce businesses or banks who require online payments via credit card since the added layer of security and encryption make it a safer choice than HTTP. Now that you know which one is better to use, how does HTTPS contribute towards Search Engine Optimization (SEO)? When it comes to Google search, Google tends to put preference towards safer websites which HTTPS fulfills. Ultimately, this leads to slightly increased rankings for websites that use HTTPS but what mostly changes the ranking is still website content.

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Does a Landing Page Help SEO and PPC?
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Pay-Per-Click (PPC) and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) are the two most important tools for any online marketing strategy. They both help with short term and long term strategies. The goal is to maximize exposure while at the same time investing only the necessary amount of money to help raise ROI.

PPC is a vital tool for search engine marketing. Some terms can be costly, so it is imperative that you pay the lowest possible cost-per-click price possible. Google Adwords allows you to maximize cost by having the bets possible quality score, which is a metric that Google uses by evaluating the keyword with your website. Naturally, an important component of the analysis is the website Landing Page.

If you simply link all of your 20 or more keyword terms to your homepage, you will more than likely have a low quality score. Furthermore, why would you link a keyword, for example “womens suits”, to your homepage, where its  goal is to allow a person to select where they want to go on your website? Naturally if someone is looking for an item via a keyword, they want to find what they are looking for right away. The more clicks someone has to make in order to get to an action on your website, the bigger the chances that they won’t.

A Landing Page is therefore an important part of your PPC strategy. A Landing Page is an unique website page that is specific to a keyword, product, or purpose.  Most of the time they are not found via normal website search, but only through a marketing channel.  So, for PPC, if your keyword is “womens suits”, your Landing Page will deal specifically with this term, either with content, products, action items, or all.

As for SEO, Landing Pages fit a similar purpose.  Every SEO Strategy consists of dozens or terms, but not all of them yield high priority. Therefore a Landing Page can help you create unique content for keywords that are not ranking high on your website for SEO density.  Again, these pages are not viewable via normal website search. They are built uniquely so that your site can appear in search results for specific terms that the page is named after, has a title tag for, and is content rich with.

Landing Pages are key to any advanced PPC and SEO strategy. it can help your bottom line, improve spending, and make your site highly optimized for short and long term online marketing strategies.

 

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Pinterest for Your Business: a New Social Media Tool That You Need NOW
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Pinterest has quickly risen in 2012 and has become one of the hottest social networks for  fashion curators, celebrities, brands, and even the POTUS! But more importantly, it is now becoming a must have for e-commerce and business services websites everywhere!

The growth of Pinterest was very sudden and is one of the surprises in the Technology Industry for 2012. Pinterest grew its audience from 2.5 million people to 25 million between 2011 and 2012. By the end of the year, Nielsen ranked Pinterest as the sixth most popular social network, with 27.2 million unique U.S. visitors.

So how exactly does Pinterest work for you an your business? It can allow you to grow an audience similar to Facebook and Twitter BUT it also allows users to follow your brand and share it on a level that encourages trends, products, and reviews. It also is a great SEO tool as well. Your “board” can be optimized with your top terms to make your content SEO rich and gain a larger audience.

If you are in E-Commerce, it is critical that you add an item to Pinterest for your followers to check out (and share,

too!), with a price banner in the corner of the photo. Simply type out the value within the caption, like “Men’s Designer Shirt, $59”. Not only will it grow interest in your product, but can lead directly to sales as well.

One important element of Pinterest that is not only new but critical to business owners, whom are not really aware, is that most Pinterest users are in the purchase-ready part of the buying cycle! They are willing and ready to purchase items as they browse the Pinterest network. Therefore, it is CRUCIAL that you get your products in front of willing buyers who come across your products.
Pinterest is now becoming a critical marketing tool for businesses and is a new and innovative way to drive traffic to your website and, more importantly, build brand awareness and sales.  Pinterest is actively building integration tools for websites and site platforms like Magento, WordPress, and others. Not having Pinterest in 2013 will be a big mistake. Build your presence with Pinterest and see active users that are looking for a product or service like yours. It has even been reported that ROI and Sales is actually HIGHER on Pinterest than Facebook and Twitter COMBINED. That also is a tidbit of information that many are not aware of yet. Take this info and run with it before your competitors do.
Pin it to win!
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Yelp Has Replaced Google Places on the new iPhone 5 Maps App – The Good and the Bad For Your Business
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The highly anticipated iPhone 5 has come with several new features; a bigger screen, faster operating system, lighter design, and a list of other new tools and gadgets.  As a business owner though, one thing you might of noticed has or will catch your attention sooner or later- Yelp is now the main source of business information on the new Apple Maps tool! Gone is Google Places, which has been the most targeted network for local businesses the last 10 years.  What does that mean? A lot if you never considered Yelp important, which no one has recently since Google Places launched a few years ago.

So how does this impact your business? Well, for starters, if your business is not listed on Yelp, you should do it now! When someone searches for a business address, phone number, or location information, Yelp is now fully integrated in the new Apple Maps app.  Google is now not only not integrated in Apple Maps, it is also not providing driving directions on the phone itself.

Is Yelp a good thing or bad thing for your business?? Well, for many business owners, including myself, Yelp is both a plus and a minus, depending on your experience. For starters, anyone can leave a review on your Yelp listing, good or bad, with no consequences.  I have had a lot of clients who had an ex employee or even a competitor write a damaging review and Yelp cannot remove it, as per their “guidelines”. Why? Well Yelp isn’t really a business directory, its a social network. Since people run Yelp, the company does not oversee or approve both good and bad reviews.  It has an automated system that regulates reviews and wants to show “balance”. So, even if you have 4 new customers write great reviews about your company, the bad review will still show on top in order to show the reader a fair analysis. But, as you have read, there is no filter for bad press, so if you run into this situation, it can be damaging for your business.

Now thats not to say Google Maps and Places was all fair. There was and still is a lot of bad practices and similar bad tactics used. But, unlike Yelp, Google has a special team that eventually hears and settles complaints from business owners. There has been no indication from Yelp that they are going to legitimize their business listings as of yet.

I see it as a personal attack on Google considering the current Apple vs Samsung patent lawsuits going on.  As you may have read, Apple is suing Samsung, which has smartphones running on the Android OS, the arch rival of the Apple OS, over similar features found in their phones.  I have to suspect that alienating Google from one of the most used iPhone apps is a direct hit to Google in order to strut their muscle. For business owners, it may be a time to either panic or become more active in this new trend that is surely going to affect every local business.

What can you do? Well, taking a strong and new approach to Yelp is key.  Regulating and cleaning up your Yelp page is the number one priority.  Many have said that if you become a paying Yelp customer, it is easier to get the Yelp team to help you with negative reviews. That, to me, makes sense. The first step is to CLAIM YOUR LISTING. you do this under a free Yelp business account, not a regular account. Go to http://biz.yelp.com to set it up.

You must monitor your Yelp account constantly now, as much as your Google Places accounts.  Yelp is now positioned to re-emerge as a strong local search player, so stay up to date on new tools that they are surely to deploy soon.  Most importantly, get new clients to write positive reviews, because sooner or later you are going to run into a situation and you do not want the negative marks to hurt the ability to product business!

Contact us if you need help setting up your Yelp Action Plan today.

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How Title Tags on your Website can help your SEO Plan
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Whats up guys,

One of the many questions that clients ask me about their current website is how they can optimize it to get better rankings in search engines, primarily Google.  Many do not understand that before spending money on advertising and an SEO team, they have to get their website going with the proper keywords intact.  SEO starts in a websites inception- when pages are being built and content is being written.  This starts with a websites Title Tag.

The Title tag is like the thesis to your college essay. It encompasses the main points, or keywords, of your page. The page headers, content, and links are supposed to support the main keywords of that page, which is intended to tell Google what your page is about. Each page should be indexed. Do no saturate your page with your keyword phrase though! A rule of thumb is to repeat your keyword no more than 3 times per 200 words.

Alot of websites have tons of pages, but use the same title tag for each page!! This tells Google the page is about the same subject matter, or keywords, virtually making your pages worthless.

The keyword tag and description tag is what Google uses to describe your website in its search listings, so this alone should tell you of its importance. Be smart and write effective content for each page, and use a set keyword phrase. And also please be practical. The main page should have your most important keywords, and your other pages should encompass other terms, but make them similar. For example, “wholesale handbags, purses”. If you have a 5 page website, one or two terms will suffice. 5 pages and 10 keywords will not!!

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Top 10 Reasons to Create Micro Websites for your Business
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Business exposure is so crucial nowadays, especially in todays economy. I see so many businesses cram soo much information on their websites with the intention of exposing all of their products and services to their customers. With their online marketing and advertising budgets lower than before, it has become crucial for businesses to sell as much as possible to each web visitor all the time.

They also have the intention of becoming optimized and listed for all their web services on Google and other search engines. But, since their website is so full of different information and services, it is hard for them to become specialized in a specific service or product… hence, they have a low page rank and do not appear on the 1st page of their product keyword searches! This is huge dilemma and alot of businesses do not know what to do. They cannot afford to remove information, they have no time to redesign their site… and their budget is small. What can they do?

Creating micro websites is the answer! A micro website is a mini website that is specific to a product or service. You have 10 products? The key here is creating 10 mini websites (3-4 pages) that are keyword dense and specific to theis product/service, with a powerful keyword based URL. The goal? Get optimized and listed faster for this product/service keyword, thus having another “branch” in your online marketing tree of offerings.

Here are the top 10 reasons this will work:

  1. You can keep it specific to a keyword phrase only! You do not have to worry about Google or another search engine not knowing about what your site is about. The content and keywords will be very specific and direct.
  2. You can buy a keyword based URL for your product or service. As you all may know, your URL is the most powerful SEO tool in search engine optimization. Adding your keyword to your domain name can work wonders.
  3. You can show your company specialization for this particular product or service. As you know, many web visitors do not take the time to really familiarize themselves with your different offerings. A micro website gives you the chance to show off your expertise and uniqueness of your company as it relates to the product or service.
  4. A micro website will get you ranked faster. Creating a micro website that is specific to a keyword phrase gives you up to a 40% faster optimization rate, thus getting you ranked higher much faster than your main website would.
  5. Saves you money in online advertising. As you know, SEO takes alot of time. A micro website can save you tons of money in the long run since it can get listed faster than your main website.
  6. Gives your company more exposure. Imagine having your micro websites appear for all of your products or services, along with your main website? This is called web dominance. Why not give it a try?
  7. Are affordable. Micro websites cost considerably less than adding the amount of pages to your website, both in design and advertising costs. Why not save money and get more exposure on the internet with another website?
  8. Great regional strategy. Does your business have multiple locations? Are your services offered in different areas? Micro websites can also help you target geo specific customers with the same keyword strategy!
  9. Create backlinks to your website to boost it’s page rank. Micro websites can also boost your main website traffic and ranking too. Linking your micro websites to your main website will give your main site considerable web traffic, thus boosting its page rank and backlinks considerably.
  10. It works. Thousands of internet savvy businesses have been implementing micro websites to their online busness model. Try typing in a city based keyword, check Google local listings, and see how many websites are the same company. This gives companies who implement it more exposure, better SEO results, and a competitive advantage… all the while saving them tons of money. Try it!

If you would like my company, www.RGPacific.com, to work with you to implement this strategy, please give me a call at 323-314-2127. We are located in Los Angeles and offer the best and most affordable web design, development, and internet marketing services.

Please do not hesitate to post some questions!

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