Become an Internet Marketing ProfessionalWow I can’t believe it is almost March and I have not posted an article in almost 2 months. Ahh well the fact that I don’t have time for blog posts is a good thing…I have been so busy that I have had to train another person to help out. This brings me to the topic of becoming an internet marketing professional. There may not be many formal schools teaching SEO or PPC but the internet and your public library are full resources. 
Posted in Pay Per Click
Tagged internet marketing, internet marketing books, internet marketing consultants, ppc, seo
Comments Off
A Look at Internet Marketing in 2010This year the rate of change to internet marketing has increased exponentially. Whether it is the explosion of social media, the localization of Google or the inflow of advertising dollars online, 2010 will be a year to remember. I have listed my top 10 changes that effected internet marketing this year.
My advice is to put aside time each week to read internet marketing blogs, so that you can stay on top of all the changes, or hire a internet marketing consultant who will stay up to date for you!
Posted in Pay Per Click
Comments Off
Internet Marketing for Small BusinessesMy company Vancouver PPC, focuses on Internet marketing for small businesses. I hear from clients and friends that they are blown away at how affordable Internet marketing can be compared to traditional marketing media. I tend to agree but only if you are willing to but in the effort on an ongoing basis. The problem most people have is that they seem to think that is PPC & SEO is an one-time thing. Which couldn’t be farther from the truth. This post will outline some ongoing Internet marketing that a small business can conduct on a budget. PPC: There is a huge misconception that PPC has to be expensive. If you are a local company then you can just target your service area, which will decrease your costs considerably. Google Adwords’ Geo-targeting is so advances that you can literally draw a trapezoid on a map to determine where your ads will be displayed. For PPC, I highly recommend getting a PPC professional to set up your account and optimize it. Depending how much you are spending per month, a pay per click account can be set up and optimized within 4 to 6 weeks. At which point you can take over the management of your account. You may want to hire a PPC consultant, on a temporary basis, to set up seasonal campaigns. The majority of my PPC clients use my services on an adhoc basis to ramp up for holiday campaigns. Which can be very affordable and ROI positive. Pay per click really can be as simple or complex as you want, with a budget to match. For example, I spent 3 years full time optimizing an account for single multi-national company. You can always add new keywords and make your adcopy more relevant. The more time you spend optimizing your account the more money you will save because Adwords rewards advertisers that are more relevant with lower cost per clicks.
Posted in Pay Per Click, SEO
Comments Off
Local Search Optimization in CanadaGoogle has changed the way they show search results containing local search queries. Local search queries usually contain a “product or service + city name” or are conducted from mobile devices. The algorithm now pulls even more information from your Google Places/Business listing and displays that information in the first 3 to 8 spots in the search results. Previously, you would have seen these results beside a Google map in the results but they have now moved the map to the top right hand corner and given the Google Places listing the top left position. This is bad for PPC advertisers because the #4 spot in the sponsored results used to be amazing for ROI . Below I will show you a few ways to optimize your local presence. Example of local search:
Local Search Optimization in Canada The great thing about optimizing for local search is that it is usually free and just involves a bit of work on your end. The problem with the Canadian local search market is that it is dominated by Yellow Pages. In the US you can sign up for Bing Local Business Center and Yahoo Local but here in Canada Bing, and Yahoo get there local feed from Yellow Pages. (FYI the Yellow Pages Group is the number one Canadian owned site for unique visits according to ComScore) Sign up for local listings on:
Pimp out the listings
This is just phase one of local’s influence on search results, as people use their smart phones more it will be increasing more important to optimize for local. Social media metrics like reviews and “likes” on Facebook will also become huge factors in rankings. On the Pay Per Click side of things you can already incorporate reviews into your PPC ads, if you own a ecommerce site. More to come on optimizing for local paid search. If you would like help with your local search optimization or paid local search let me know.
Posted in Pay Per Click
Tagged canada local search, free local, local optimization, local search, paid local search
2 Comments
Pay Per Click ConsultantI may be a pay per click consultant and an expert when it comes to internet marketing. However, I am always looking for ways to refine my consulting skills. I have read a few consulting books that all seem to focus on a similar consulting process.
Here is the consulting process that can be applied to ppc consulting or any consulting for that matter:
Social Conscious Internet MarketingAs an internet marketing company in Vancouver, you don’t often come across a project that actually tries to make the world a better place, but I think I have found one. Sumaq Rugs is a company based in Vancouver that sells custom alpaca rugs from Peru. The thing that makes them unique is that the rugs are made the traditional way by using looms and 5% of every sale goes directly back into the weavers community.
When I talked to the owner’s Collis Verdicchio and Derek Beech, I asked them how they work the logistics of finding these families. They said that it was difficult finding Peruvian families with looms because only the wealthier families could afford them. There are no large manufacture plants for these rugs to be produced in, as they are all produced in family run workshops. Sumaq’s program is designed to increase the number of looms in each village. However, this would seem like a good business investment if it wasn’t for the fact that they pay “living wages”. This means that all the weavers are paid fare prices which allows them to provide for their families.
Another factor that makes this program a real success is the fact that it allows families to stay together. If these weavers didn’t have their own workshops they would be forced to leave their families and work at low paying manufacturing jobs in the large cities. Getting back to the internet marketing side of things, for this project we are pushing social media, article submissions with a small PPC campaign to try to get the word out about this awesome socially conscious company. I have only just begun on this project but I will keep everyone posted on their progress.
Posted in Pay Per Click, Social Media
Tagged pay per click, ppc, social media, vancouver internet marketing
4 Comments
Google Display NetworkThe Google Display Network, formally known as the Content Network, will separate the men from the boys when it comes to managing PPC. Honestly there is no easy way to do well on the display network other than test and spend money. I have spoken to a few pay per click gurus lately and they have admitted that you have to set high CPCs to break in and get impressions. Here are the best practices for setting up a display network account: Pay Per Click Landing PagesProbably the best pay per click landing page analogy I have heard was that a website is like a Sears store. You can go in the through the main entrance, which is like landing on a website’s home page. There are many irrelevant departments right in front, so you will have to walk a bit to get to the department you want. But what happens if you want to just go into the hardware department? Well at Sears there is a side door for the hardware store. You walk in and go directly to the hardware department and are out the door with minimal effort. This is exactly the same concept as a PPC landing page, where you know exactly what the searcher is searching for. So why would you send them to the front entrance, if you know they want to go to the side entrance and go to the hardware department? With PPC landing pages you want to send the searcher to the most relevant page as possible (side entrance). In a perfect world you would have a custom landing page for each keyword in your account. Since this is not very practical you should start making custom PPC landing pages for your most profitable keywords. So what makes a good landing page?  Another happy Pay Per Clicker Landing Page Best Practices:
I recommend trying out variations of each landing page element through A/B testing. This is made very easy with PPC because you can have two of the same ad copies in an adgroup with different destination URLs. Make sure that you have at least 100 clicks per landing page before making any judgments. But if you want to be sure which landing page is statistically the winner you can use this A/B tester calculator. Test test test… Who Says You Need a Website to Run PPCA client of mine was on a really tight budget and wanted to run a Halloween PPC campaign. The problem was that their main site needed a lot of work. There wasn’t enough time or money to create a whole new site. So we just created a stand alone page that contained all the basic information to get people into their store and buy Halloween costumes. Elements of the PPC landing page: * Halloween themed header
That is all you really need in a landing page….If you are looking for Halloween Costumes please visit their site, or should I say landing page!
Recommended Internet Marketing BooksI get asked all the time “how did you learn PPC and SEO?” Well you should probably read at least two books in any internet marketing field just to learn the basics. That way at least when you start reading blogs you will be able to spot the snake oil BS that it all over the net. I highly recommend the following books: 1. “Pay Per Click Search Engine Marketing: An Hour a Day” 2. “Pay Per Click Search Engine Marketing for Dummies” 3. “Search Engine Optimization for Dummies” 4. “Web Analytics: An Hour A Day” and 5. “Web Analytics 2.0″
Posted in PPC Books, Pay Per Click, SEO, Web Analytics
Tagged internet marketing books, pay per click books, ppc books
6 Comments
|
|
Home | Services | Testimonials | Contact | About Us | Resources | Vancouver Pay Per Click Blog
reviews: 
1199 Seymour Street, Vancouver, BC V6B1K3
