Google can be your best friend. It is still the biggest search engine out there and if you run a website or blog I can guess that a big portion of your traffic comes from Google. That is why we install the SEO plugins on our blogs and try to make everything SEO friendly. If you are one the first page of search results for a given topic that can mean thousands of hits a month from Google alone. Now what if Google changed their algorithm and now your site was blacklisted or not indexed correctly? This is what has happened to my site and not only is it costing me traffic, but revenue as well.
I own and operate ThinkComputers.org, a computer hardware review site. Up until a few years ago our traffic was about 35% search engines and 65% referrals. Now it is about 65% search engines and 35% referrals. This was mainly because I finally moved the site over to WordPress. With WordPress I was able to customize my permalinks, add SEO plugins and easily create a sitemap for Google to read. This of course made the site show up better in search results for the products we reviewed and that increased our traffic as well as revenue.
As far as SEO we really did not do that much else. The plugins we had running were only the All in One SEO Pack and Google XML Sitemaps. The only other SEO we really did was change the permalink structure to thinkcomputers.org/%postname%/. This still gave us really great results and I was happy to see the increase in traffic over time.
This all changed right around February, I started to see an immediate decrease in traffic. At first I thought it was normal because January is always our biggest month because of CES. After still seeing a decrease over the next 2 months I knew something was up. So I went digging in our site stats only to find that our traffic from Google was practically cut in half. To give you an idea here is our traffic from Google in January 2011.
And in July 2011.
As you can see the traffic was basically cut in half. This is a huge amount of traffic and something that you can’t replace. Obviously since many of our ads are CPM-based our revenue has gone down tremdously as well. This is a killer and can potentially put websites out of business.
After doing some research on the February algorithm change it seems the change was made to weed out content farms. Obviously ThinkComputers is in no way a content farm as all of our content is 100% original. We also do not do any black-hat SEO, the only SEO we were doing is what I mentioned above. So why were we hit? I really cannot even tell you. So what are we to do? After reading around I found that I could submit a reconsideration request on how Google indexes my site. So I tried that and I received this response:
“Dear site owner or webmaster of http://www.thinkcomputers.org/, We received a request from a site owner to reconsider http://www.thinkcomputers.org/ for compliance with Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.
We reviewed your site and found no manual actions by the webspam team that might affect your site’s ranking in Google. There’s no need to file a reconsideration request for your site, because any ranking issues you may be experiencing are not related to a manual action taken by the webspam team.
Of course, there may be other issues with your site that affect your site’s ranking. Google’s computers determine the order of our search results using a series of formulas known as algorithms. We make hundreds of changes to our search algorithms each year, and we employ more than 200 different signals when ranking pages. As our algorithms change and as the web (including your site) changes, some fluctuation in ranking can happen as we make updates to present the best results to our users.
If you’ve experienced a change in ranking which you suspect may be more than a simple algorithm change, there are other things you may want to investigate as possible causes, such as a major change to your site’s content, content management system, or server architecture. For example, a site may not rank well if your server stops serving pages to Googlebot, or if you’ve changed the URLs for a large portion of your site’s pages. This article has a list of other potential reasons your site may not be doing well in search.
If you’re still unable to resolve your issue, please see our Webmaster Help Forum for support. Sincerely, Google Search Quality Team ”
Basically this means their new algorithm screwed me over and there is nothing I can do about it. So my only real option is to continue to work on SEO and pump out new content. If you have experienced a large change in traffic caused by Google’s algorithm changes let me know in the comments.
In my previous post, I talked about the importance of identifying and targeting search keywords that aren’t overly competitive, but that also receive enough searches to build a profitable site around.
Let’s walk through the process now of finding these “Moneywords.”
Take a moment to look at the Moneyword Matrix Chart, developed by my team at Niche Profit Classroom. You can see exactly what keywords you’re trying to find within any given niche market.
As you can see, the sweet spot is finding keywords with over 500 searches per month but under 10,000 competing pages for that particular keyword. The higher the search volume per month and the fewer the competitors, the better the keyword. You can plug any keyword you like into the matrix and instantly see whether it is poor, fair, good, excellent, or jackpot. Let’s walk through a real-world example of how to use this matrix, so that you can apply it to your own niche.
For example, if you type the term “Roses” into Google’s external keyword tool, you’ll get back hundreds of results. These are the terms related to roses people are actually searching with when they’re looking for information.
In the screenshot below, you’ll see three different settings you should use for your initial keyword research:
Type the niche topic into the search box.
Set your Match Type to “phrase.” Without going into too much detail, this gives you more accurate information to base your keyword research on. Some people use the exact term, and that’s a great tip for PPC advertising. But for information on organic search results, I prefer the phrase match. (The “exact” match is too restrictive).
Use the advanced filter to remove any keywords or keyword phrases that get under 500 Global Monthly searches per month from the results.
While not highlighted in the picture, note that we use the United States as the locale. Using a different country, even if you live in that country, is not going to give you the full potential audience, since you’re marketing to people worldwide.
If you get a lot of results that aren’t specific to the niche you’re looking at, use the “Include terms” and “Exclude terms” boxes in the upper left to further filter your results.
Looking at the results, we find there are tens of thousands of searches for many of the keywords. For example, according to Google’s tool, the phrase “blue roses” gets an estimated Global Monthly search volume of 49,500, as pictured below:
However, the number of competing pages for that term is 6,040,000 — which means over 6 million others are competing for it.
How did I find the number of competing pages?
Go to Google’s home page and type in the term within quotes. It’s important that you use the quotes so that you get the correct phrase match search results and the correct number of competing pages.
The picture below shows the correct way to look for competing pages for a particular term.
Now, if we plug those two numbers into our Moneyword Matrix, we can see immediately that the results are not very encouraging. This is a poor keyword to target for your website.
One of the terms that came up in our example above was “Rose Drawings,” which has 6,600 Monthly Global Searches per month. When we put that phrase into Google’s search engine inside quotes, the number of competing pages is 12,600. Can you see where we’re going here?
Let’s plug these numbers into the Moneyword Matrix.
We’ve found a Moneyword!
This would be a superb keyword phrase to build a page on your site about. You could feature pencil drawings, or have other drawings displayed, or maybe include an article on drawing techniques to create the perfect rose drawing. Such a page or article is likely to be ranked at the top of the organic search results within days or weeks, and can drive continual traffic to your site.
Finding 10 or 20 of these types of Moneyword keywords will cement your site, articles, and content at the top of Google’s organic search results and drive thousands of visitors to your site every month.
You definitely want to keep all the Jackpot, Excellent, and Good keywords, but don’t discard all those “Fair” keywords just yet. They can be useful in finding additional Moneywords. First, however, I want to tell you that very few people are going to take the time to do manual research for keywords in this manner, even with the Moneyword Matrix Chart to give them exact results.
This means that if you’re willing to take the time to do your due diligence, you’re going to be way ahead of the game when it comes to competing for search engine rankings.
Fortunately, there’s an automated solution that will save you time and effort. We’ve developed a tool that does most of the work for you. Simply download the Google results to your computer via a CSV file, and then run the tool. It will automatically get all the competing pages, match them with the number of searches per month, and return the rating of Jackpot, Excellent, Good, Fair, or Poor.
Here’s a screenshot of Niche Profit Classroom’s Moneyword Matrix keyword tool, which is available to Niche Profit Classroom members.
Remember I told you to not discard those Fair keywords? Search through the Fair keywords and locate the ones that have over 10,000 searches per month. You can then use those keywords to do additional keyword research and find other terms that may be useful.
For example, let’s take our “blue roses.” If we put “blue roses” into Google’s AdWords Tool search suggestion box, one of the terms returned is “blue roses meanings,” which gets 4,400 searches per month. If we go to Google and type in “blue roses meanings” with the quotes, we find the competition is only 7,700 sites. Using the Moneyword Matrix Chart, we discover that this is another Excellent keyword.
So while “blue roses” is not a Moneyword, the phrase “blue roses meanings” (note that it’s plural) is a Moneyword we can confidently rank for.
One way you can put Moneywords into action is by searching ClickBank’s Marketplace to find affiliate products to promote. By using our explanation here to find the right keywords, you can easily dominate the affiliate market for that product.
Once you’ve found a market you know is profitable, these steps make it easy to find highly searched, low competition keywords and phrases. This is the key to your continued success and profits. The Moneywords Matrix is your key to the keyword kingdom!
About the Author
Adam Short is a successful Internet marketer, speaker, and coach. Through his training, software and coaching platform at Niche Profit Classroom, he helps others start and grow successful and profitable online businesses.
Have you ever tried to optimize your website for Google and other search engines, but failed to attain the results you were after? Most Internet marketers at one point or another find themselves quite frustrated with their lack of search engine success. Many elect to throw in the towel and pursue other avenues of traffic. Unfortunately, this is often a mistake. Most marketers don’t realize that just one simple change to their approach to search engine optimization could revolutionize their results. So what is that one simple change? Simple – it’s keywords. Website traffic success depends on the keywords you choose, and most people use the wrong ones, which inevitably leads to disappointment and wasted time.
Fortunately, choosing the right keywords is a relatively simple and straightforward process. You don’t need to be an SEO guru, and you don’t have to spend a ton of time, money, or effort. In this article I’ll show you how to pick the right keywords to obtain top organic search engine rankings, thereby securing a free flow of highly targeted traffic to your website.
Before we get started with keyword research, let’s answer the question: Why is search engine traffic so desirable for website owners?
Here are a few of the key reasons:
Search engines are collectively one of the largest traffic sources in the world.
Search engine traffic is highly targeted traffic.
Organic search engine traffic is free.
On top of that, organic search engine traffic can be very low maintenance and low stress. Once you obtain top rankings for your “Moneywords” (we’ll define this term later), your rankings will often stick for months, or even years. This means you do not need to constantly fret over losing your rankings, thereby enabling you to direct more positive energy towards other aspects of your business.
Furthermore, obtaining top rankings in Google (and other search engines) is a win-win situation for both you and the search engines. Here’s why:
Google wants to give people the most relevant search results they can. Google wins when it can provide quality, relevant search results.
People who search on Google win when they find web sites that give them the information they’re searching for.
You win by targeting the right keywords and having your site appear at the top of the organic search results, thus capturing the attention of people who are looking for the very subject or niche you’re marketing.
So ultimately, everyone gets what they want. What could be better? With that said, let’s get into the “nitty gritty” of keyword research and how you can use it to drive swarms of free search engine traffic to your website.
First off – what is keyword research exactly? In a nutshell, keyword research is the foundation of Internet marketing. If you understand what terms or phrases your customers use to find information in search engines, you’ll know how to reach them. You’ll understand exactly which keyword phrases you should focus on so that your marketing efforts reap the most rewards.
I’m sure you’ve heard the famous marketing tenet, “Find out what people want, and then give it to them.” The problem is, no one really explains how to do that. That’s where keyword research comes in. It enables you to find out what people really want.
By knowing exactly what keywords people are using to search, and by understanding how to target those valuable keyword terms and phrases, you can rank at the top of Google’s organic search results any time you want.
Let’s explore two of the most common approaches to keyword research. Do a gut check and ask yourself if you fall into one or both of these categories:
Targeting the highest search volume keywords in your niche
Targeting only long-tail keywords in your niche
While both of these methods are common, neither one is ideal.
Let’s look first at high search volume keywords. These are usually keywords that are just a few words, such as “Roses Flowers,” or just the term “Roses.” Sure, it may be a profitable market, but getting ranked for such short keywords can be very difficult.
The number of other sites targeting or competing with you for these keywords is often enormous, so even if you do make it to the top of the organic results for such keywords, someone is always nipping at your heels, trying to knock you off of Google’s first page.
It’s a no-win situation. You‘ll always be competing for the top spots, always marketing to keep your keywords ranking where people can find you.
Long-tail keyword targeting also has serious drawbacks. These are words, terms, or long phrases of four, five, or more words within any given keyword phrase. (Such as “pink roses grow best in organic soil”.)
The problem with long-tail keywords is that they get little to no traffic each month. You have to target and maintain high-ranking results for hundreds, if not thousands, of keywords to generate enough traffic to continually sustain a profitable web site. That’s a lot of work. Creating content for that many keywords is time consuming and can be very expensive.
That brings us to a superior method for doing keyword research – targeting “Moneywords.” This approach examines keywords in a more scientific way. A “Moneyword” is a keyword that has very high search volume (lots of people are searching for the keyword each month) and very low competition in the search engines (very few websites are targeting the keyword).
The benefits of targeting Moneywords are many:
You’ll achieve multiple first-page ranking in Google’s organic results within weeks, and sometimes even within days.
You’ll spend minimal effort — especially with our Moneyword Matrix formula and keyword tool.
Your website ranking will stick to the top of the organic search results like super glue.
All of this results in long-term, automated traffic.
Sound good? Be sure to read Part 2, where I walk you through the exact process of identifying Moneywords and learning to dominate your niche.
About the Author
Adam Short is a successful Internet marketer, speaker, and coach. Through his training, software and coaching platform at Niche Profit Classroom, he helps others start and grow successful and profitable online businesses.
Have you ever tried to optimize your website for Google and other search engines, but failed to attain the results you were after? Most Internet marketers at once point or another find themselves quite frustrated with their lack of search engine success. Many elect to throw in the towel and pursue other avenues of traffic. Unfortunately, this is often a mistake. Most marketers don’t realize that just one simple change to their approach to search engine optimization could revolutionize their results. So what is that one simple change? Simple – it’s keywords. Website traffic success depends on the keywords you choose, and most people use the wrong ones, which inevitably leads to disappointment and wasted time.
Fortunately, choosing the right keywords is a relatively simple and straightforward process. You don’t need to be an SEO guru, and you don’t have to spend a ton of time, money, or effort. In this article I’ll show you how to pick the right keywords to obtain top organic search engine rankings, thereby securing a free flow of highly targeted traffic to your website.
Before we get started with keyword research, let’s answer the question: Why is search engine traffic so desirable for website owners?
Here are a few of the key reasons:
Search engines are collectively one of the largest traffic sources in the world.
Search engine traffic is highly targeted traffic.
Organic search engine traffic is free.
On top of that, organic search engine traffic can be very low maintenance and low stress. Once you obtain top rankings for your “Moneywords” (we’ll define this term later), your rankings will often stick for months, or even years. This means you do not need to constantly fret over losing your rankings, thereby enabling you to direct more positive energy towards other aspects of your business.
Furthermore, obtaining top rankings in Google (and other search engines) is a win-win situation for both you and the search engines. Here’s why:
Google wants to give people the most relevant search results they can. Google wins when it can provide quality, relevant search results.
People who search on Google win when they find web sites that give them the information they’re searching for.
You win by targeting the right keywords and having your site appear at the top of the organic search results, thus capturing the attention of people who are looking for the very subject or niche you’re marketing.
So ultimately, everyone gets what they want. What could be better? With that said, let’s get into the “nitty gritty” of keyword research and how you can use it to drive swarms of free search engine traffic to your website.
First off – what is keyword research exactly? In a nutshell, keyword research is the foundation of Internet marketing. If you understand what terms or phrases your customers use to find information in search engines, you’ll know how to reach them. You’ll understand exactly which keyword phrases you should focus on so that your marketing efforts reap the most rewards.
I’m sure you’ve heard the famous marketing tenet, “Find out what people want, and then give it to them.” The problem is, no one really explains how to do that. That’s where keyword research comes in. It enables you to find out what people really want.
By knowing exactly what keywords people are using to search, and by understanding how to target those valuable keyword terms and phrases, you can rank at the top of Google’s organic search results any time you want.
Let’s explore two of the most common approaches to keyword research. Do a gut check and ask yourself if you fall into one or both of these categories:
Targeting the highest search volume keywords in your niche
Targeting only long-tail keywords in your niche
While both of these methods are common, neither one is ideal.
Let’s look first at high search volume keywords. These are usually keywords that are just a few words, such as “Roses Flowers,” or just the term “Roses.” Sure, it may be a profitable market, but getting ranked for such short keywords can be very difficult.
The number of other sites targeting or competing with you for these keywords is often enormous, so even if you do make it to the top of the organic results for such keywords, someone is always nipping at your heels, trying to knock you off of Google’s first page.
It’s a no-win situation. You‘ll always be competing for the top spots, always marketing to keep your keywords ranking where people can find you.
Long-tail keyword targeting also has serious drawbacks. These are words, terms, or long phrases of four, five, or more words within any given keyword phrase. (Such as “pink roses grow best in organic soil”.)
The problem with long-tail keywords is that they get little to no traffic each month. You have to target and maintain high-ranking results for hundreds, if not thousands, of keywords to generate enough traffic to continually sustain a profitable web site. That’s a lot of work. Creating content for that many keywords is time consuming and can be very expensive.
That brings us to a superior method for doing keyword research – targeting “Moneywords.” This approach examines keywords in a more scientific way. A “Moneyword” is a keyword that has very high search volume (lots of people are searching for the keyword each month) and very low competition in the search engines (very few websites are targeting the keyword).
The benefits of targeting Moneywords are many:
You’ll achieve multiple first-page ranking in Google’s organic results within weeks, and sometimes even within days.
You’ll spend minimal effort — especially with our Moneyword Matrix formula and keyword tool.
Your website ranking will stick to the top of the organic search results like super glue.
All of this results in long-term, automated traffic.
Sound good? Be sure to check back soon for Part 2, where I’ll walk you through the exact process of identifying Moneywords and learning to dominate your niche.
About the Author
Adam Short is a successful Internet marketer, speaker, and coach. Through his training, software and coaching platform at Niche Profit Classroom, he helps others start and grow successful and profitable online businesses.
In the short time that has followed Google’s release of Instant search much has already been written about the possible ramifications for online marketing in general. Whilst it is certainly too early to assess the impact of giving users immediate feedback on their search queries, we can make an initial assessment of the considerations it raises for advertisers and affiliates.
It might seem obvious that as results now display instantaneously and change as the search terms are entered – without users having to hit enter after each search – it follows that users will refine their searches as they go, based on what they think of the instantaneously-served results.
However, it is not for certain that people know what it is they want to find before they start searching for it. Will users really continue refining their searches by using longer and longer search queries, or will they want to keep their options open and explore the web based on the results closest to a more limited string of terms?
For example, a user might know that they want to buy at 32 inch LCD TV, but beyond that they might not have a preference – or not have enough information to be able to decide – about the TV’s exact specification (brand, colour, serial number, etc). They might therefore decide to search on keywords related to ‘32 inch LCD TVs’, but not extend their Google search further than that. Any deeper comparisons may be done on the rest of the web, away from Google. If this is the case, we might wonder whether sites optimised for longer tail keywords are really in a better position following this change, as some have already argued.
Google’s attempt to predict with ever-greater accuracy what a user is looking for might be more effective on brand-led search terms than ones where generic terms lead. Compare the difference in results, for example, on ‘Comet sales’ against a generic term that is also related to a brand: ‘Low cost holidays’. The impact on sites that are dependent for their traffic on mis-spellings could be significant, but at the same time Google is good enough at predictive corrections to suggest results that have already anticipated the most common mis-spellings. Generic terms however are another matter. A company whose brand name incorporates a generic search term, such as ‘Low Cost Holidays’ or ‘Sports Shoes’ (or even part of a generic term), might find that users bypass the opportunity to click-through to their sites and opt to continue typing, refining their searches as Google automatically suggests results tailored to those generic terms and attempting more accurate and informed click-throughs. As such, Instant Search could potentially lead users further away from the advertiser quicker, and therefore it might be necessary for these advertisers to rank better for long-tail generic terms, or brand + generic long-tail terms (‘low cost holiday car rental’ or ‘low cost holiday travel insurance’, for instance).
Advertisers may find it necessary to look to affiliates to support them to a greater extent for long-tail keywords that follow common generic search queries. For example, at present Google returns results for Tesco, Curry’s and John Lewis on ‘LCD TV’; for Curry’s and Tesco on ‘LCD TV 32 inch’; but for none of these three on the longer tail ‘LCD TV 32 inch reviews’.
If we imagine a scenario in which users know roughly what they want – a TV, or travel insurance, for example – but not exactly what they want (or are not willing to search for exactly what they want) – a 32 inch Samsung LCD TV, for example – then searches are likely to stop somewhere ‘in the middle’: on a relatively short but nonetheless product- or service-specific search term. Users are unlikely to be satisfied with the results presented very early on in their Instant searches. A user beginning their search with the term ‘car’, for instance, does not necessarily want to shop at the first suggested results: Carphone Warehouse. Google’s Instant search results invite the user to extend their search far enough until Google has found an apt suggestion for their query. However, users may not wish to keep searching beyond what they are absolutely sure of looking for in case they miss potentially good offers or want to keep their options open.
We might compare this situation to an analogous one that has faced price comparison sites. As comparison sites have become more and more sophisticated, users are invited to refine their searches to an ever greater degree. It is no longer enough for a user to know they want an LCD TV, they are invited to go further and specify the brand, the colour, the dimensions and more in-depth specifications. As argued above however, it is not always clear that potential customers are yet aware of what they want to this extent, and even if they were, whether they would be willing to risk missing out on deals, offers, or similar products by going through a more in-depth search. One possible implication for affiliates might therefore be that the hard work of converting the sale would still take place on affiliates’ site, despite their route to this site from Google being slightly different, perhaps shorter.
There are however a few things that the appearance of Instant search makes more certain. One might be that the greater the use of Instant search the less important that below-the-fold results will be. This is likely in turn to privilege the paid results, which for most popular keywords with Instant search appear to be more prominent and more numerous than organic listings. Searches will be quicker, and so the impression times for each paid ad will be shorter, but the relative importance of the placement of these ads against the rest of the search results will be greater as the generic terms further down the page will get seen less. However, we might wonder whether people will still prefer to cast their eyes up and down the results page after each search, rather than only at the top few results with Instant search.
There is a final consideration to think about. If Google is expecting that users are more likely to continue searching for something until they find results which offer them what they are looking for, exposure to paid ads is going to be far greater, even if they are not clicked on precisely because the paid ads change as the queries change. For example, suppose a user wants to search for ‘mobile phone exchange’ with the intention of getting cashback on their old handset. The keyword ‘mobile’ might return paid ads for Carphone Warehouse, as might the extension to ‘mobile phone’. Finally, if the full search term, ‘mobile phone exchange’, also shows a paid ad for Carphone Warehouse the user will have been exposed to Carphone Warehouse ads at every stage of their search – essentially, for three different search terms. Surely this would increase the chance of them clicking the Carphone Warehouse ad, even if its position was lower than a competitor’s – such as Mobile Phone Xchange’s – given the likelihood that the user now has the impression that Carphone Warehouse is the best possible result for their mobile-related query? Carphone Warehouse could be embedded in the user’s mind as synonymous with mobiles.
Search habits and attitudes vary from person to person, as does the way we interact with our computers when we search. Think, for example, of the difference in user experience for someone who touch-types and can look at a page of results at the same time as they search, compared to someone who looks from the keyboard to the screen alternately. The introduction of Instant search by Google might be seen as a part of its wider strategy to bridge the gap between what the user looks for and what they find, and therefore an attempt to keep users on Google and diminish the time spent hopping around the rest of the web. We will have to wait and see however to what extent users adopt the new service or reject it, and how affiliates and advertisers adapt to this new way of conducting search.
August produced some welcome news for online marketers in general. The latest IMRG-Capgemini figures for online sales in July recorded the highest growth since before the recession in 2007, with £5bn spent online. This represents an increase of 18% on last July and 14% on June.
eCommera’s research into the scale of online retail growth brought out some interesting headline figures. 42.6% of UK consumers buy something online every week, with an average spend per month of £71. The report also reveals some interesting attitudinal findings: over 60% of respondents citing the availability of deals as the reason they choose to shop online.
econsultancy published its research into the habits and attitudes of online shoppers with some interesting findings on email and voucher code engagement. 61% of respondents named email as their preferred method for receiving offers, with 35% saying they bought something online because of an email they received. Another report by email marketers SignUp.to earlier in August identified the most effective sectors for email as restaurants and B2B.
econsultancy’s report also found that 60% of respondents had used an online voucher code in the last 12 months and that free shipping was the most popular motivation for 82% of shoppers surveyed. This finding is complemented by a separate piece of research in August by Experian and Cheetah into last year’s pre-Christmas shopping in the US. Free delivery with no minimum spend produced transaction rates of 70% and, intriguingly, free delivery offers were the even more popular than percentage off or money off discounts.
A common fear among Internet marketers these days is the dreaded “Google slap.” If you’re not familiar with the term, it refers to Google significantly lowering the Quality Score of AdWords ad/advertisers, or banning them from advertising on AdWords outright.
Since Google slaps can be a big concern for ClickBank affiliates and vendors, we’ve made a concerted effort to work with Google to identify what causes them to lower the Quality Score of particular ads or landing pages. Now we’d like to share what we’ve learned with you so you can ensure your advertising and landing pages meet Google’s quality guidelines and maintain a positive Quality Score.
We’ve condensed the information we’ve learned directly from Google into the following videos, which discuss topics like the purpose of Quality Score, what goes into Quality Score calculation, specific techniques and page elements that Google frowns upon, and what to do if you’ve been “slapped.” As we learn more about this issue, we’ll continue to share it with you. Feel free to leave comments with questions or concerns, and we’ll try to get them answered for you.
A common fear among Internet marketers these days is the dreaded “Google slap.” If you’re not familiar with the term, it refers to Google significantly lowering the Quality Score of AdWords ad/advertisers, or banning them from advertising on AdWords outright.
Since Google slaps can be a big concern for ClickBank affiliates and vendors, we’ve made a concerted effort to work with Google to identify what causes them to lower the Quality Score of particular ads or landing pages. Now we’d like to share what we’ve learned with you so you can ensure your advertising and landing pages meet Google’s quality guidelines and maintain a positive Quality Score.
We’ve condensed the information we’ve learned directly from Google into the following videos, which discuss topics like the purpose of Quality Score, what goes into Quality Score calculation, specific techniques and page elements that Google frowns upon, and what to do if you’ve been “slapped.” As we learn more about this issue, we’ll continue to share it with you. Feel free to leave comments with questions or concerns, and we’ll try to get them answered for you.
In the ultra-competitive affiliate marketing landscape, it’s a good idea to always be on the lookout for new and innovative ways to promote products. Somewhat ironically, a great new space for affiliate promotions is actually an advertising medium that’s been around a long time: television.
Up to now, advertising on TV was far too expensive and complicated for the average marketer. However, Google recently introduced Google TV, which allows practically anyone to create TV spots within their AdWords account and run them on national cable TV. One of the most amazing parts is the low cost- as low as $20 for an ad spot!
Considering the huge potential reach of television, this can be a great way to advertise your own product or separate yourself from other affiliates who are promoting the same product. And considering how powerful and relatively inexpensive video creation tools and software packages are today, it’s reasonable for almost anyone to create a simple TV ad they can test out.
If you’re not sure you’re capable of creating an effective TV ad, check out this Copyblogger post on the topic. It’s written from the perspective of promoting a blog, but the same idea applies to ClickBank products or affiliate websites. It has some great advice on making your ad compelling to viewers.
One important thing to remember is that if you’re an affiliate who’s using this service, you shouldn’t try to promote a basic HopLink, since advertising on TV requires that viewers be able to remember the website so they can type it in. HopLink URLs are too complicated for this purpose, so your best bet is to send traffic to an affiliate landing page, such as a review site, blog, or other content-based site, where you then recommend one or more ClickBank products to your visitors. Try to keep the URL of your site as simple and memorable as possible. If you’re a vendor and want to send traffic to your own site, you can just send people directly to your Pitch Page URL.
If you’ve been struggling to make AdWords work for you due to the level of competition or pricing, it’s worth checking out Google TV to see if it could be an effective new way to promote products. Some of the best strategies for affiliate marketing success are testing out new promotional techniques and being an early entrant into new marketing spaces before they get overcrowded and too competitive. Who knows- you could end up being the next advertising mogul!
Do you think TV ads could work for your promotional efforts? Please share your thoughts in the comments!
Successful marketers have known for a long time that the more often you can get your product in front of potential customers, the more likely they are to buy. For traditional marketers, this has usually been accomplished by methods such as print, radio, or TV advertising.
In a move that should benefit affiliate marketers and vendors, Google announced yesterday that they’ve brought this same ability to remarket to customers to PPC advertising.
Basically, in your Google AdWords account, you can specify that you want to display ads for your products or site to people who have already visited your site from a paid click. Your subsequent ads will be shown to them in the Google Content Network, when they’re browsing other sites related to your product. This gives you a great opportunity to remind people of the benefits of your product, or offer them a reason to come back and check out your site again. It’s possible that the first time they visited your site, they just weren’t ready to buy, but after browsing around online, a well-written ad could be just what it takes to get them to come back and buy this time.
If you do AdWords advertising, be sure to check it out!
