A storm passed through the sunset at Lake Havasu

Blogger Buzz: Getting to know the Blogger Community

Blogger Buzz: Getting to know the Blogger Community

A great question and as we say in Italy… “Con niente non si fa niente” ; with loosely translated means; ‘ with nothing , you can do nothing. This is incredibly relevant to SEO and life in general. As I will discuss in this important SEO release; quality SEO takes some time and most importantly consistency.

How long it takes to get ranking on your site depends on quite a number of factors.

• How long your site has been online for

• How many incoming links you already have

• Where the above links are placed

• How competitive your keywords or market is

• How well you optimize your pages

• The amount of time you spend on SEO

• Your current marketing budget and the % given to SEO

New Websites

Typically if your site is brand new and you are willing to spend a minimum of 8 to 10 hours work per week on SEO. Even using such a small budget of few hundred dollars, we can start to see some good results within two to three months. Of course if time is of the essence and with less restrictive budgetary constraints, we can up the hours spent on your site. The more time we spend the more we can expect definitive changes after as soon as one month.

What’s different about my approach to SEO? Let us start off with the most important aspect of my arsenal; consistency. Only with consistency can we also achieve my secondary directive; up to date solid techniques. By keeping my SEO strategy in line with the dominant powerhouse search engines (primarily Google™, Yahoo, ™ MSN™) you end up with results that will stand the test of time. There are a lot of gimmicks out there promising SEO rankings in a few days, these lessons in futility don’t last and may hurt your ranking in the long run. With new Google™ algorithms adapting to “SEO trickery” they are now punishing accordingly (severe rank cutting / blacklisting). Don’t make this common mistake and throw your money away, ending up with a lower ranking than you started and less novel traffic to your site.

It’s also important to give SEO the precedence it deserves in the fiscal planning of your company. If you have a small budget to work with there will of course be a trade off in terms of hours working on SEO, which means longer wait time on results.

Established Websites

If your site is established to some degree, hopefully you will be indexed already on the major search engines, obtained some inbound links and done some preliminary marketing.

This puts you in good stead to move forward a little faster in the rankings stakes. Although once again being dependent on chosen keywords, you should start to see upward movement of rankings within just a few weeks.

This does not mean that you will reach first place within this period but it does give some estimate to how long ranking may take for given keywords and phrases.

Alessandro Colangeli

How to create a successful recipe for my online business?

Well If you are looking to expand your business online the first thing one would do is research. Now If you have already done this you have quickly learned that everyone knows best and everyone has the perfect solution and half of those people end up being scams. When you are done, you have more questions than you started with and an empty pocket because you outsourced everything to different people.

First off let me start by saying getting a specialist in SEO on your side is one of the most important things you can do as a business owner. However do realize that it is not the only thing you need. There is something that a lot of business owners overlook when it comes to getting yourself noticed online. That is your reputation online.

According to ABC and USA today 80% of all new business is now being generated through reviews.

Step back for a second and let that soak in. That means if you are receiving a lot of negative feed back online you are only reaching 20% of you potential online customer base. In addition google released an algorithm late last year that now punishes businesses for having negative reviews pushing them farther down in rankings.

Think of it like this SEO is building roads to your business and reputation management makes you look good when people find you.

Pro-Insites has been developing strategies to work with this since the beginning of the industry. If you haven’t already give us a call and see how we can help.

“Knowledge is power” and our knowledge is free.

Manage your Business’ Reputation, Don’t let it manage your Business

As the influx of businesses into the online realm continues to increase, more and more business owners are awakening to the impact that this vast “World of Mouth” is having on their bottom line. I read an article yesterday where roughly 250 marketers were asked how many of them believed they should be leveraging SM/RM to their advantage. As one would expect, nearly every hand came up. When asked how many had actually implemented a strategy, only about ten hands remained.  This begs the question, why?

When handled properly,

Social Media/Reputation Management

can be one of the largest assets to your marketing arsenal.  Improperly implemented, one can generally hope for menial results at best, and a quagmire at worst. In speaking with clients, one of the running themes of discussion I run into, is the mindset of “I know I need to do something, but I don’t know what to do, how to do it, and if I did, I don’t have the time, resources, or desire to do it myself or hire more staff to handle it, so rather than open pandoras box and risk causing more harm than good, I have chosen to do nothing.” This is completely natural! Conditioning and trepidation can be powerful adversaries! Envision a child going to the dentist…

So… How does one avoid the pitfalls that plague the less successful ventures into this arena? How can I make this dentist visit not only painless, but pleasurable? You’re reading this, so in doing your research you are already ahead of the power curve. Things are changing online every day, so one needs to be up to speed with not only what is hitting hard now, but what WILL BE hitting hard down the road. Do your research, find what directories affect your specific business most. This is a good place to start. Case in point, a restaurant would probably be more concerned with directories like Menuism, Urbanspoon, Zagat, or Menupages. Doubtful an automotive dealership would find any of these sites useful, however would find dealerrater, ratemydealer, etc. much more effective.

Now, you’ve narrowed the scope of directories pertinent to your target market down to a handful of sites. Now what? First things first,

CLAIM YOUR LISTINGS!

This step is invaluable to the security and efficacy of your listings, yet is often overlooked. It costs nothing (I’m not aware of a site yet that charges for this), takes 5-20 minutes depending on site, depth of info, and user proficiency. Once claimed, your listing automatically ranks higher, and on many directories, enables you to respond to reviews, add pictures, video, and relevant information. All of this helps! If you can, and this is where the man-hours really start to rack up (if you’re dealing not only with directory sites like Google, Citysearch, etc., but your social media as well it does get a bit intense!) keep your information up to date. One useful tool I’ve found for keeping tabs on all my social media is Hootsuite.com. It brings all of your SM pages (FB, Twitter, Linkdin, and certain blogs) onto one dashboard that you can log into. It consolidates your updates, allows you to schedule posts for later dates, and plethora other options that really help streamline the process.

So we’ve addressed some things you can do yourself, for free. In my next article I’ll address some common mistakes made when dealing with Customer Reviews and some possible courses of action!

Common Sense SEO

So let’ talk a little more about common sense.  

Search engines use algorithms and algorithmic principles (rules) to decide how websites are ranked. Now many people think that the experts at the search engines walk around in white coats making rules and mathematical theories that no one could ever possible fathom. This is very incorrect.

Looking at algorithms as an indecipherable foreign language is a common misconception. To a very large extent nearly all algorithms are based on general or basic marketing principles and can be used to boost novel and relevant traffic to your site.

What happens if you walk into a very untidy shop, the shelves are cluttered and messy, prices cannot be found, the person at the front counter is having a cigarette? How long would you last in there? Would you buy anything? Assuredly not…

Search engines view websites exactly the same.

This holds true for inbound links. If you were in a fast food chicken shop and they had some type of advertising for lounge settings, would you find that odd? I would. Do think the store selling lounge settings would get many referrals from the shop? I certainly doubt it.

In the above instance, when we see outbound links on websites that have nothing to with the theme of the website, it is just as odd. The search engines know that the link is there only for SEO as they certainly aren’t going to get any referrals.

Walk into the same fast food chicken shop, then visit ten others and they all have advertising for the best ‘wholesale chicken store’. Would this be more appropriate? Do think the ‘wholesale chicken store’ may get some referrals? Do think it is worthwhile for the ‘wholesale chicken store’ to be advertising in such places. Absolutely, and the odds of having relevant referrals as a result are increased exponentially.

Search engines think the same things, what works offline as a marketing strategy can be applied to online marketing; the only difference is paradigm we operate within. The very same marketing practices that are taken on board with search engine rules and algorithms. This is why, if you do your marketing and SEO with common sense you can’t go wrong. At Pro-Insites we take this common sense organic approach to SEO.  When you partner with us to boost your SEO and develop your company’s online presence, you can be assured that we develop tangible results, by using sound, tried and true, marketing strategies.

(In our next installment we will discuss using blogs and backing linking to bolster your online presence and increase your ratings)

Costly SEO myths and misinformation

When it comes to SEO, myths and misinformation can cost you a hell of a lot!

• Lost rankings.
• Lost time.
• Marketing budget costs.
• Loss of profits and sales.

As stated previously, when working in a small business, time is precious. At ProInsites we realize that it is therefore imperative that we get some of this misinformation about SEO out of the way so that you may focus on SEO that will produce results and income for your business.
1. SEO is difficult.
You may have heard the saying, ” SEO is not rocket science” or you may have been told that ” SEO is  extremely difficult and one needs a computer science degree to do it”.
Well, the first comment is the closest description although an additional part was left off…
“ SEO is not rocket science however it is time consuming!”

Quality SEO can be accomplished and when a business is willing to devote some money and time to it. It is no different to any other service that requires skill and knowledge to execute. At ProInsites we only implement quality SEO because we acknowledge that a certain amount of time must be put in to achieve results and obtain a level of proficiency.
As for the people saying SEO is too hard, have you noticed who they usually are?
You guessed it, the big companies or individuals who are charging mega bucks for their SEO services. They certainly don’t want every company learning SEO or developing quality standards that they can’t compete with? That would mean loss of business and them having to decrease their outlandish fees! Wouldn’t that be a pity.
2. SEO submissions.
The days of submitting your website to the major search engines is long gone.   To get your whole site indexed and rolling forward we will simply submit one of your pages to any of the major social media sites, submit a press release using a PR service or build an xml sitemap and submit it to Google sitemaps.
3. Submit to thousands of search engines.
This one I truly love! Thousands of search engines usually mean hundreds of tiny search engines and directories no one uses plus thousands of ‘Free For All” (FFA) pages that will quickly deflate your rankings on any search engine.
Apart from some search engines based on your business theme and local search, the only search engines you need to be on are these top 5.
As you can see from the statistics from 2007 they make up over 90% of all searches done online using a major search engine.
4. The goal is to get as many top rankings as possible.
As discussed earlier, the goal is to get the maximum return of investment for your SEO efforts.
(In our next note of the SEO series, I will share how to keep your rankings in place using SEO long term strategies)

Invigorate all stages of your SEO campaign Part 2

So here are some rules I tend to apply when getting any type of traffic to our sales pages. This too would include any pages where you want something to happen.

1. Define the goal of your pages.

It sounds very simple but very few businesses do it. What is the intended purpose of the page that you are putting work and effort into to get it ranked?

• Make a sale.
• Sell a service.
• Acquire a lead, subscriber, etc.
• Sell advertising, Adsense, banner, etc.
• Pre-selling and clicking through to an affiliate program.
• General information/content pages for branding and building client relations.

2. Test to increase results.

SEO can increase traffic to a website however if the intended goal is not being achieved the task is pointless. Therefore testing must be carried out to make sure that your pages are achieving the goals at an optimal level that they have been built for.

Some averages on pages are for example…

• Sales – 1%
• Subscriptions – 20%

If you are not achieving such results, either your sales copy needs improving or you are targeting the wrong keywords for your page.

Cheers!

Invigorate all stages of your SEO campaign

Most business owners start off with the right intention. More rankings, leads to more traffic, leads to more sales.  Unfortunately, somewhere from the beginning stages with some decent traffic to the middle stages of an SEO campaign the initial reason for doing SEO is forgotten. That reason is and always will be; making increased profits.

Why does this happen? The most common reasons include...

• Being so happy about the increased traffic, the business owner/SEO contractor over extends themselves rather than sticking to their initial SEO planning.
• Trying to achieve high rankings on too many keywords for a single web page. This decreases targeted traffic and sale conversion rates.
• Deciding to take short cuts with there off site optimization campaigns.
• Not constantly testing to improve conversion rates on each and every sales page whether selling a product or service.

We offer an unwavering approach to SEO. By keeping our intention at the forefront of our approach we assure that not only will we maintain the gains we generate, but we will continue to expand and extend the goals we build in your SEO campaign.  
(In our next note of the SEO series,  I will share some rules I tend to apply to avoid these and other common pitfalls in SEO)

Cheers!

Brandon Forbes Talks About The Wild Wild West

The internet today in a lot of senses is like the wild wild west. It is highly unregulated and very cut throat. An article written by New York Times tells a story of a lady who went through some hardship because of this. It used to be that if you received negative reviews online it didn’t matter because it would still make you rank higher on Google. Now Google has changed that by releasing a new algorithm that actually combats that. If you receive a  negative review online then it will now actually hurt your rank. Reviews are becoming more and more important in online business. In fact a report released by ABC and USA Today stated that 80% of new business is now being generated through reviews.  So the questions I ask you:

Have you “googled” your business latley?

What are people saying about you?

How many of your happy customers actually make it home to write a review?

Contact Pro-Insites today and get a free analysis and consultation. Lets come up with dynamic solutions together

Cheers!

Brandon Forbes

Brandon Forbes Rants About Yelp Issues

With all the hype about online reviews and how they affect your business, it’s often difficult to decide what route you should take as a business owner in dealing with them. Companies like Yelp don’t make it any easier. At times it even seems they encourage consumers to write out right slanderous reviews. Now, as a business owner how are you to decide how to deal with this?

An article written by Keely Kolmes of the New York Times states:

“Some doctors address this problem by requiring their patients to sign forms promising not to post reviews of services on Web sites. A company called Medical Justice, which helps doctors fend off malpractice suits, has encouraged its clients to have patients sign agreements giving the doctors control over Web postings mentioning their practices.”

This is a method you can definitely try, but not one I would recommend. It’s trying to go around the problem instead of working through it. People will always complain no matter what you do. You need to take a 3rd party approach. Having someone gather reviews and syndicating them as well as defending negative reviews is essential in todays business. Call Pro-Insites today to see how we can help

Brandon Forbes Meets Cantillion

I went to Stone Bistro last night and had the amazing opportunity to meet the brewer of Cantillion. He brews such illustrious beers as Iris, the classic gueze, the Kriek, and many more. If you are into craft beer this was definitely the place to be. All who live local to San Diego don't forget about real ale at Pizza Port in Carlsbad. It's popping off in April. Till next time




Cheers!
Brandon Forbes

Brandon Forbes Consults Business Professionals

PRLog (Press Release) – Mar 25, 2011 – The way business is established online is through web-design, SEO, networking, and social media. Now you can go beyond this but this is what you need bare minimum. Now the issue with that is that you have to outsource to a SEO, outsource to a web guy, then outsource to someone else for your social media and networking. Now the problem with this is you as the business owner are now paying a crap load to outsource to multiple people/companies. Pro-Insites and their team of professionals have now brought all of that under one umbrella, and they do it all for LESS THAN YOU WOULD PAY A MINIMUM WAGE EMPLOYEE!!! Now this is an amazing tool especially for any kind of a start up company. So contact Pro-Insites and see how the can help you establish your business online as well as putting more  money in your pocket. This is a no brainer

Brandon Forbes Quickly Expands

Alright, as many of you know am co-founder of Pro-Insites. We are expanding really quickly and have well over a 90% retention rate. In one month I have expanded into five more states. I am really stoked about the direction this company is headed and cant wait to see what happens over the next few months. Please for all that haven't check out our web-site and see how we can help you or your business gain exposure. Cheers!
www.proinsites.com

Brandon Forbes

Brandon Says True Friends Follow Blogs

Okay, I know there are two sides of the fence. On one side of the fence stands everyone who loves to blog and write mini stories about every single thing that happens in their life. Although that is awesome there is another side of the fence. There are people on the other side of the fence that trash all the people who spend all of their time on blogger and facebook/farmville and twitter. Saying there is so much more to life than to waste your day being consumed with stuff you did 10 min. ago.
Here is the thing. Blogger, Facebook, twitter, tumblr, mellow, and so on, as pointless as some people might see them, they are not pointless. They are great tools for anybody to utilize to help create maximum exposure to their idea or business. So whether you agree with it or not follow a friends blog.. you might just be helping them make money.

Cheers!
Brandon Forbes

Brandon Forbes Eats at Primos

If you are an oceanside or vista local then you already know about the illustrious Primos food market. If you are new to the area you need to check out these guys. They provide large quantities of high quality food that will honestly knock your socks off! As a suggestion try the adobada tacos or the carne asada burritos. Just another awesome suggestion by me. Like always you can take it or leave it

Cheers!
Brandon Forbes

Brandon Forbes says stop waisting your time

Who is Brandon Forbes,  what is Brandon Forbes doing on this earth, what is Brandon Forbes supposed to accomplish. These are questions that people generally ask themselves as they go through life. These are pointless questions. Everyone spends so much time asking these pointless questions that people have been asking for thousands of years like they are going to be the magical 1 that cracks the code and reveals the meaning of life.  Guess what you won't be that magical one. The universe is way to complex for any one man to understand.
So with that said my suggestion is that everyone should stop trying to figure out the answers to these questions that will never get answers to and start trying to focus on answers to questions that apply to their immediate life. Questions like do I enjoy my job? What are my strengths? What are my weaknesses? What do I enjoy doing the most? These are the questions that make you who you are. Forget the media, forget the music you listen to, and forget that boss you may or may not respect. Figure your shit out on your own.
But hey, thats just my opinion.

Cheers!
Brandon Forbes

Brandon Forbes Eats At Brunos

So I went to Brunos in San Marcos, California the other day and had my socks blown off! First off I have got to say that all of their hot plates where amazing and I fell in love with their buttery potatoes. Our server was amazing and really sweet. She made me and my friends feel like we were with family. When I inquired about how some of the food was prepared I found out everything they had was daily made from scratch. All the way down to the noodles. I am amazed by this restaurant and can not wait to go back!

Cheers!
Brandon Forbes

Brandon Forbes Goes To Barrel Blast

Going to enjoy Barrel aged consecration and farley. I love being alive in such a golden age of craft beer. So many people are banding together, making collaborations all in the name of craft beer. The world of beer changes everyday and I want to be at the fore front of it all

Cheers!
Brandon Forbes

Growing Companies The Green Way

With the recent fad of, going green in every aspect of life, businesses are finding it more and more necessary to grow and develop their business the green way. Unfortunately most of these businesses do not know how to go about doing this, especially if your a start-up company that has a very limited budget. If you are one of these people.. stop breathe and don't panic, there are things your company can do big or small to grow the green way. Companies Like Pro-Insites, or Custom Organics are dedicated to providing this to businesses. Pro-Insites handles anything a business would ever need for marketing, online reputation defense, or even website design and maintenance and they do all of this in the most eco-friendly way as possible. Custom Organics provides anything from shirts to bags all made from recycled green materials. Its because of companies like these, that all businesses can hopefully look forward to a cleaner tomorrow.

Cheers!
Brandon Forbes