Here at Leapfrogg, we spend time a great deal of time reading, sharing and bookmarking interesting articles and developments from the world of digital marketing and online retail. We figured that this would be a really useful resource for our blog readers, so from today, and every Friday, you’ll find a round-up of all the interesting articles we’ve been reading that week. We are calling it ‘The Weekly Shop’. So without further ado, here’s what has been making our ears prick up this week:
6 SEO Challenges Every Business Owner & Marketer Must Contend with in 2014
With the remainder of 2013 flying by, we all need to start thinking about our marketing strategy and budgeting for 2014. This article outlines the importance of looking beyond Web analytics to decide where to invest time and money and the six SEO challenges business owners and marketers will need to contend with when planning their marketing strategy for 2014.
Facebook Removes App Requirement for Promotions: Let the Giveaways Begin
Facebook made an announcement this week that they’ve removed the partner app requirement for running promotions on a Facebook page. Previously, you had to use a third party app to run a promotion which stopped businesses from ‘buying’ likes and also kept Facebook out of the legal issues surrounding competitions. Now, Facebook has removed the app requirement but there are still a few rules that you must follow. Great news for businesses, as competitions and promotions are a great way to drive traffic to your Facebook Page and website.
Turbocharge your retail strategy with customer data and insight
Recently, our Commercial Director Ben wrote an article for Econsultancy which explored the importance of insight and customer data when defining a search strategy. In this article he discusses the value of both transactional data and qualitative insights and how they can help turbo charge your search efforts and deliver a more informed and successful search strategy.
With Google’s recent quest for quality, authenticity, authority and usability, many of the tips that used to help get your site to the top of Google have been made redundant. This article from Search Engine Watch provides us with their 10 top tips on how to optimise your site for Google’s algorithm today and beyond.
‘Tis the Season to Get Ready for Your Busiest Time of Year
Last year, Clickz produced a helpful article on the importance of auditing your metrics from the holiday season. Following on from this, they have produced five tactics to focus on now that will help turn holiday browsers into buyers. Essential reading for retailers that are gearing up for the busy festive season.
Product Listing Ads Click-Through Rate 21% Higher Than Text Ads
Earlier in the week, Marin (PPC Management Software) released a report that showed Google’s Product Listing Ads (PLA) are winning in the paid search results with PLA click-through rates (CTR) remaining higher than standard text ads since November 2012. We’ve seen some great results from PLAs from nearly all our clients this year which shows that Shoppers continue to find PLAs more relevant to their searches than standard text ads. This article summarises the key findings from the report and Kye Mou from Marin gives four tips on how to maximise the performance of PLAs.
Ways to Optimize Press Releases & Avoid Google Penalties
The big bit of news which has been is dominating the SEO headlines is that Google recently announced that links in press releases carry zero SEO value. For a long time press releases, good and bad, were seen as a viable link building method, but not any longer. However, the press release still has a vital role to play in creating awareness of your brand, event, product or service and this article provides some great advice on how to optimise press releases and avoid being penalised.
Google’s Matt Cutts: I Recommend NoFollowing Links On Widgets
Following on from Google’s continued assault on questionable link building techniques; Google’s own Matt Cutts has posted a video to answer questions around the inclusion of embedded links in widgets. He explains that as these link sources have been abused in the past, he recommends using adding the rel=“nofollow” attribute on all widgets. This mainly stems from people using widgets on their websites but not realising there was a link back to a site embedded within it. He also recommends using the rel=no follow on any infographics. Watch the full video from Matt Cutts here.
Understanding Google’s Latest Assault On Unnatural Links
Without much fanfare or publicity, Google quietly updated the Link Schemes/Unnatural Links document inside the Webmaster Tools section of their site last month. Much of it is rather ambiguous and this article attempts to dissect the fact from fiction. Essential reading to understand what you should and shouldn’t be doing when it comes to building links.
Vince: The Google Update We Should Be Talking About
Back in 2009, Google released an update, named Vince (definitely the coolest named update!) This article revisits the basic premise of the Vince update what it means with regards to how SEO should be approached, namely that you must try and build a brand online to establish “trust” (with your target audience, as well as the search engines).
Amazing Correlation Between Google +1s and Higher Search Rankings
No sooner did the highly respected guys over at Moz release a study that (seemingly) demonstrated a direct correlation between +1’s and search engine rankings, did Matt Cutts swiftly refute the theory. Cutts posted on Hacker News that he was “Just trying to decide the politest way to debunk the idea that more Google +1s lead to higher Google web rankings. Let’s start with correlation != causation” and explained that it all simply boils down to the quality of the content. Not the amount of +1’s or shares the content has. His belief lies in what we’ve always been done for long term SEO success where creating great quality content which is likely to be shared is the best kind of strategy.
Government rules out online sales tax
And lastly, some good news for retailers – the government will not be introducing an online sales tax. Phew!
So that’s it for this week. We’d love to hear your thoughts on any of the news stories featured, so please do leave us a comment in the box below and keep an eye out for the next Weekly Digest next Friday!