Welcome to Natural Search Blog
Natural Search Blog provides articles on search engine optimization including keyword reasearch, on-page factors, link-building, social media optimization, local search optimization, image search optimization, and mobile SEO.
In addition to natural search optimization topics, we also cover internet marketing, ecommerce, web design, usability, and technology.
Recent Entries
10 Tips For Buying Domain Names
Buying domains can be a tricky issue. A crucial factor in the success of an online start up is a fantastic domain name. It is easy for people to remember and link to the site. Domain names should be easy to spell, easy to say and have a .com extension.
If the domain name aptly represents the industry or niche it does business in, it can get direct traffic where users type it into the address bar and reach the site. It also represents your company in cyberspace and is the first port of call online.
There are two tricky issue involved in the buying of domains. The first is that you cannot use comparable sales figures (as in the case of real estate). The second is the intrinsic value of the domain name itself (as in the case of vehicle, jewellery etc). These are intangibles and cannot be used as bargaining chips at the negotiating table.
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Posted by stephan of stephan on 08/23/2009
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Filed under: Domain Names, Search Engine Optimization, SEO approaches to contact domain owners, auckland natural search, auckland paid search, auckland search marketing, brainstorm domain names, dead pages, domain auction sites, domain buying tips, domain name evaluation, domain squatter pages, domain valuation, enforceable contract, hiring a law or pr firm, price negotiation, real business domains, site under construction, written agreement
WSJ Comments On Idearc Bankruptcy & Verizon Culpability
A few days ago, the Wall Street Journal’s Dennis Berman commented in his column entitled “The Two Sides of Verizon’s Deal Making” on whether Verizon might have some responsibility for the bankruptcies of Idearc, Hawaiian Telecom and FairPoint Communications. As you may recall, I posted an op-ed piece on the subject, Idearc’s Bankruptcy – Who’s Really Responsible? at Search Engine Land not long back, and now Berman’s take on the issue appears to hold a lot of sympathy for my position that Verizon caused the yellow pages company to fail shortly after it was spun off by requiring it to do so with an unreasonably high debt load.
Berman states that while the market in 2006 may’ve allowed Verizon to take billions in the deal divesting itself of its directories corporation, Idearc, he further states:
“It took too much.”
Will there be any consequences for Verizon’s throwing off these companies with unserviceably high debt loads? Burman reports:
“These things matter greatly to how state and federal regulators perceive the company. Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and Hawaii each are in an uproar over the FairPoint divestiture, with much of the ire directed at Verizon.”
In a brief video piece, David Berman debates the issue with Evan Newmark, who takes the opposite viewpoint that Verizon should not be held responsible for the performance of its divested companies. (more…)
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 08/18/2009
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Filed under: General, Market Data, Worst Practices, Yellow Pages bankruptcies, bankruptcy, divestments, FairPoint Communications, FairPoint Communications Bankruptcy, Hawaiian Telecom, Hawaiian Telecom Bankruptcy, idearc, idearc bankruptcy, M&A, mergers and acquisitions, spinoffs, Verizon
Taking On An Existing PPC Campaign – Things To Be Aware Of
Working in a search marketing firm throws up lots of interesting challenges. One of them is taking over an existing Pay Per Click campaign from another agency as the client is very unhappy with her paid search efforts. Her main grouse is that she is not getting enough business out of her PPC campaigns and her ROI (Return on Investment) is pretty poor.
There are a variety of factors that are contributing to the client’s poor performance in paid search. If you are taking over the client’s existing campaign, there are positives and negatives which you have to be aware of. This post will discuss these at length in no particular order.
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Posted by Ravi of Netconcepts Ltd. on 08/16/2009
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Filed under: Monetization of Search, Paid Search adwords quality score, broad match, business scope expansion, clickthrough rate CTR, dynamic keyword insertion dki, exact match, expand geo targeting, google keyword tool, google website optimizer, keyword match, multivariate testing, pay per click campaign, phrase match, ppc account history, ppc campaign, relevance, ROI, Search-Engine-Marketing, targeting
Do Users Trust Organic Or Paid Results More On Search Engines?
It is a known fact that Pay Per Click (PPC) model of advertising has contributed the most revenue to the Google coffers in the past few years. The fact that paid search contributes to only 12% of the total search traffic is fascinating with a bevy of tools flooding the market all promising to deliver the ultimate solution in paid search marketing.
Organic search is still the biggest driver of search traffic at a whopping 88%. Unlike paid search where results are measurable accurately and instantly, the organic SEO process is a long term strategy with measurable results becoming clearer over time. Yet, the big question in every online marketer’s mind is – Which results do users trust more on search engines – the organic or paid results?
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Posted by Ravi of Netconcepts Ltd. on 08/09/2009
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Filed under: General, Paid Search, Search Engine Optimization, SEO B2C marketing, consumer trust levels, online consumer behavior, online-marketing, organic search, organic vs paid search trust levels, Paid Search, trust organic results or paid results, website usability
Link Building Through Social Media – Is It That Difficult?
The post today deals with link building using social media. Most SEO practitioners love to use social media to build backlinks to a site. It is a powerful method and can gain numerous inbound links in a short period of time.
For this, the content has to be of high quality along the lines of linkbait and capable of going viral. It gets picked up by various social media properties and earns lot of link love. Yet, there are people who complain that they are not having success in using this technique. One of the major reasons for failure is the inability to build relationships.
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Posted by Ravi of Netconcepts Ltd. on 08/02/2009
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Filed under: Link Building, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, Social Media Optimization auckland search marketing consultancy, building relationships, engaging with community, external link profile, indirect link building, link building using social media, linkbait, netconepts auckland, online communities, organic seo, pay per click marketing services, SEO, sharing link love, social media properties, spam intolerant, Viral-Marketing
Quova Awarded Patent for Improved Geotargeting
Quova recently announced that they were awarded a patent for various methods which improve geotargeting accuracy and capability. My understanding is that Quova has been using these methods for quite some time already, prior to receiving the patent.
Here’s Quova’s description of the innovations:
“Quova’s newly added patent describes a method for determining the geographic location of an Internet user based upon combining trace routes, user registration information, host names with textual patterns that reveal geolocation information and Internet Service Provider (ISP) service area information. These trace routes describe the pathways by which data moves through the Internet. Each node or ‘hop’ in the trace route is identified by an IP address. These interconnected nodes can be used to recreate the topology of the Internet. Each geolocation can then be assigned to these IP addresses in order to determine the location of each node, up to and including the end user’s IP address and the geolocation of that end user.”
I previously have written about Quova in my extensive article, (more…)
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 07/28/2009
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Filed under: Advertising, Best Practices, Local Search, Maps, Research and Development, Security, technology click-fraud, geo targeted ads, geodata, geographic location data, Geolocation, geotargeting, Quova
The Future Of SEO
Today’s post covers a very interesting topic – The future of SEO and is based on a Whiteboard Friday discussion by Rand Fishkin at SEOmoz. The search marketing industry is today poised on the brink of explosive growth and is seen to be the major source of advertising eclipsing the likes of the traditional mediums such as television and print media.
It is an interesting trip to the future and Rand’s views are equally interesting on what would be relevant in 5 to 10 years from now. He admits these are his personal views and is not an indicator of things to come. But it is a good reminder to be ready for it if it materialises in future.
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Posted by Ravi of Netconcepts Ltd. on 07/26/2009
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Filed under: Search Engine Optimization, SEO accessibility of seo, Add new tag, auckland search marketing, content seo, correlation analysis, data driven seo, future of seo, link graph analysis, Netconcepts, organic seo, ppc services, query demand, social graph metrics, social media optimisation, usage metrics, verticalization of seo
Social Media Marketing Goals
As more and more companies have adopted SEO practices in optimizing their websites, though there is still plenty of room for improvement, it’s no surprise that they have begun turning more attention to social media marketing (SMM). Of course, with all the attention these new venues have gained and become more mainstream, this only makes sense.
However, this has also lead more into jumping in head first without using their heads. Perhaps this is due to the added pressures of a challenging economy or feeling behind the curve. While social media isn’t exactly new, there is plenty of curve left, and using a challenging economy as a catalyst to jump onboard and sinking precious resources into something that you don’t understand or have any idea how to measure is extremely short-sighted.
(more…)
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Posted by Brian R. Brown of Netconcepts on 07/23/2009
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Filed under: Social Media Optimization goal setting, SMM, social-media-marketing
Google Image Search – Second Only To Web Search In Size
This post is based on the interview between Eric Enge and Peter Linsley, Google’s Product Manager for Image Search. It reveals some interesting aspects of image search which is growing at an accelerated pace.
A recent survey by Hitwise in February 2009 shows Google Image Search as part of the troika of top web properties owned by Google in terms of traffic and revenue.
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Posted by Ravi of Netconcepts Ltd. on 07/19/2009
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Filed under: Best Practices, Google, Image Optimization, Search Engine Optimization, Searching, SEO alt text, auckland search engine optimisation, auckland seo, combating spam in image search, facial recognition software, Google-Image-Search, googlelabs, growth of image search, image search results, image-search, matching image with content, Netconcepts, on page factors in optimising images, ranking of images, signals in html world, signals in image world, similar images, universal search results, web page strength
Measuring Link Bait
Last week, Stephan Spencer talked about The Social Media Underground over at Search Engine Land. While the broad brush strokes of the article were across social media, the technique of link baiting however was very much at the center. Of course there are endless ways to paint on the link bait canvas, but in many cases, there will be an element of social media involved, which may also mean time and/or money.
Link bait can be a powerful tool, especially when used in conjunction with a powerful social media network. Like many things however, it generally comes at a cost. Even if there aren’t any direct costs, such as engaging writers or paying for services directly, there will at least be direct time if you or your company creates the link bait yourself, and potentially in-kind costs, such as helping to return the favor or similar for someone else within your social media network.
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Posted by Brian R. Brown of Netconcepts on 07/15/2009
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Filed under: Social Media Optimization, Tracking and Reporting link-bait, linkbait, SMM, Social-Media, social-media-marketing
