SEO

How To Request Google Reviews From Your Customers

If you want to get business from the 4 billion people worldwide using the internet, then you should be paying attention to Google. Not only do you want your company listed on Google, but you should also have plenty of Google reviews to back it up. Reviews are crucial to earning business from new customers—in fact, 85% of consumers say they trust online reviews just as much as they do personal recommendations from friends.

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What is the difference between a keyword and a keyphrase?

You’ve probably heard that doing keyword research is an essential, first step in optimizing your website properly. But how about these keywords: can they only be single words or can they also be longer multi-word keyphrases? And what exactly is the difference between the two? In this SEO basics post, we’ll explain the difference between a keyword and a keyphrase.

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5 Things I Wish I Knew Before Hiring an SEO Vendor

As part of my job at the company where I work, I basically “taught myself” how to do SEO.

It wasn’t easy and it didn’t happen overnight.

I don’t claim to be an absolute SEO expert, but I have learned a few tricks and shortcuts – I’m talking about ethical, effective, SEO strategies and tactics – not the sleazy and self-defeating kind that gets your site banned by Google. 

Unfortunately, I gained this knowledge from hard-earned experience – by having a few run-ins with unqualified, unreliable SEO vendors.

The fact is, there are too many bad SEO firms out there who make unrealistic promises, use weird and shoddy methods, and cause more harm than good.

Especially a few years ago, the field of SEO services was kind of a Wild West, with too many fly-by-night firms claiming to be able to deliver results that were ultimately unsustainable as Google tweaked its algorithm. 

The good news?

Good SEO matters and it makes a difference in your business results.

It is definitely possible – more than ever – to do SEO the right way to drive better search results and get more traffic to your site, without doing unethical tricks to game the system and without making your site sound like a robot wrote it. 

I’ve learned lots of lessons along the way that may be valuable in helping your company do SEO the right way – or helping your SEO advisory firm to sell your services more effectively by building trust with your prospective clients. 

Here are five things I wish I had known before I hired my first SEO vendor.

1. SEO Guarantees Are Often Unrealistic

If an SEO firm is promising you “top 10 search results on Google,” just run.

It isn’t realistic.

In fact, it’s impossible to guarantee a top spot on Google, especially for some of the more popular and competitive search keywords.

It takes a lot of time and work to get your site to climb the ladder on Google.

Don’t expect it to happen overnight, and don’t trust anyone who tells you they can do it. 

2. SEO Takes Time

SEO is not something where you flip a switch and watch the results pour in – it’s an ongoing process.

You need to constantly tweak your site and adjust your SEO strategies, and then wait to see how Google views your results.

It’s like planting a garden – you have to plant the seeds, see which ones sprout and grow, and then you have to tend the garden over time to maintain the progress you’ve made.

The Google algorithm is constantly learning and adapting, so your SEO strategies need to keep up. 

3. Don’t Worry About Keyword Density

My first SEO vendor tried to get me to rewrite the content for our site as if a robot could read it, and put way too much focus on including a certain percentage of keywords within the overall text.

After a certain point, keyword density just starts to sound ridiculous – it changes the whole voice and flow of your content, and makes it feel like you’re writing for a robot.

Maybe this worked back in 2009, but Google has gotten smarter since then.

Google tends to reward websites that have higher quality content, where the website actually is “about” what it claims to be about – you can’t just stuff your website full of “business” terms and expect Google to send customers to you.

By all means, include keywords and try to target the keywords that are important for your business, but don’t go crazy with calculating keyword densities.

Write with humanity, for a human audience.  

4. Quality Links, Not Quantity Links

The SEO game used to be all about getting lots of links back to the site, even if you had to pay for links from shady link farms and other dark corners of the Internet.

The truth is: low-quality links are a loser’s game.

It isn’t about getting tons of links from lower-ranked sites; in fact, that’s bad.

Today, you want really good content that people want to read and share.

It’s better to work harder to get a few good links from well-respected sites (like Search Engine Journal) than to scrape the bottom of the barrel with an outdated link-building strategy.

Google judges you by the company you keep. If too many low-quality sites are linking to your site, your Google results will suffer.  

5. Want Quick Results? Use Google Ads

If you need an immediate boost in your SEO, buy Google Ads for your most important search terms. This puts you at the top of the listings right away.

There’s a reason why Google gets most of its revenue from paid search ads: they work.

Check out the Google Ads Keyword Planner tool to get started.

Keep experimenting and learning.

Try new things and see what gets results.

You might be amazed at how much you can do with $500 of Google PPC ads, depending on your business and your target keywords. 

Conclusion

SEO never ends, so you must commit to it as an ongoing process.

Spend some time every week or every day on doing some of the simple everyday things, such as:

  • Creating new content.
  • Updating your website.
  • Posting links to your site on social media.
  • And more.

All of this will help you build a sustainable, long-term SEO strategy. 


Source: This article was originally posted at Search Engine Journal by Gregg Schwartz on January 23, 2019

How to Set up Google Tag Manager for Better PPC Tracking

Proper tracking is crucial to the success of any PPC campaign.

If you aren’t tracking conversions correctly, you won’t have the right data flowing into ad accounts to make informed decisions about keywords, ad copy, and audiences.

Unfortunately, implementation can be a barrier for accounts of all sizes. An overworked developer or a bureaucratic IT department can take weeks to add a simple Google Ads conversion code.

Thankfully, Google Tag Manager provides a solution to save time and back-and-forth communication when implementing tracking codes. Once a single code has been installed on the site, PPC marketers can then have full access to add as many ad platform tags as they need.

This article will walk you through how to set up Google Tag Manager (GTM) and deploy tags for major ad platforms.

Setting Up Google Tag Manager

If you haven’t yet created a GTM account, start here. The interface will walk you through setting up a new account.

Set up Google Tag Manager account

Within your account, you’ll also need to create a container for your site. Generally, you’ll want to name this the domain name where the GTM container will be used.

Select Web and click Create to start your account.

Set up Google Tag Manager container

Next, you’ll see a box appear containing the code to add to your site. You’ll need to add the first snippet of code toward the top portion of the site and the second snippet right after the opening tag.

Install Google Tag Manager

Note that if you use WordPress, you can also install GTM using this plugin. Some other CMS platforms have built-in GTM integration; check with your provider’s support if you’re unsure where to go.

Checking Tag Installation

To double-check that GTM is installed properly, install the Google Tag Assistant extension in Chrome.

Now, navigate to the page you wish to check and click the extensions’ icon in your browser bar.

Google Tag Assistant

You should now see Google Tag Manager listed, along with any other active tags for Google products.

  • A green “smiley face” indicates the code is functional.
  • Blue indicates potential issues (such as placement in a non-standard section of the code).
  • Red indicates an error in installation.

You can click on the tag to see more details about errors for troubleshooting.

1. Implementing Google Ads Tags

For Google Ads, you can deploy both conversion and remarketing tags through GTM.

First, we’ll implement a conversion tag.

Adding a Google Ads Conversion Tag

Navigate to your desired GTM account and container. On the overview screen, select Add a New Tag.

Add New Tag in Google Tag Manager

In the window that appears, click in the Tag Configuration to choose a tag type.

Choose Tag Type

Select Google Ads Conversion Tracking.

Choose Tag Type

Now, go to your Google Ads account in another tab or window to grab the Conversion ID and label. Click the Tools icon on the top menu and select Conversions.

Set Up Google Ads Conversion

Next, either create a new conversion or click an existing one to edit. Under the Tag Setup section, select the option to Use Google Tag Manager.

Google Ads Conversion ID

You’ll now see the Conversion ID and Conversion label. Copy these and paste into the respective fields in your GTM tag.

Google Ads Conversion Tag

Next, add a trigger to determine where your conversion tag fires on the site. Of course, what you define as a conversion will vary from site to site, and the setup will be different for each.

In this instance, we’ll set up a conversion to fire on a “Thank You” page, assuming that a user sees this page after submitting a form.

Click within the Triggering section to begin setting up your trigger. Within the window that appears, click the Plus (+) button in the upper right to add a new trigger.

Add Google Tag Manager Trigger

Name the trigger based on the specific conversion point you’re wanting to track. Click within Trigger Configuration to select the type of trigger. For this example, we’ll select Page View to track all hits to a certain URL.

Choose Trigger Type

Select Some page views so the trigger only fires on defined pages. Next, use the section below to define where the trigger will fire. We’ll set up a rule for a Page Path that contains /thank-you.

Thank You Page Trigger

Save your trigger, and save your tag. For now, your edits will live in your workspace within GTM. Note that to push any GTM edit live on your site, you’ll need to click Submit and then Publish.

Next, we’ll add a remarketing tag.

Adding a Google Ads Remarketing Tag

Create a new tag in GTM and select a tag type of Google Ads Remarketing. Now, you’ll need to find your remarketing tag in your Google Ads account (or enable it if you haven’t done so).

Navigate to Tools > Audience Manager from the top menu.

Access Audience Manager

Next. select Audience sources from the left menu. If your Google Ads tag is already active, click Details; otherwise, you’ll see an option to create your tag.

Google Ads Audience Sources

On the Details page, scroll to the bottom Tag setup section and click it to expand. Next, click Use Tag Manager at the bottom of that section.

Google Ads Global Site Tag

You’ll see a box appear with your Conversion ID, which you can then copy and paste into the corresponding GTM box. Note that you don’t need a Conversion Label for a remarketing tag.

GTM Google Ads Remarketing Tag

Next, click the “Triggering” section to choose where your remarketing tag should fire. If you simply want to include the tag across your entire site, choose All Pages. You can also set up triggers to fire the code only on select pages if necessary.

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Google Tag Manager Trigger

Finally, save your tag, and don’t forget to publish it live once ready!

2. Adding the Bing UET Tag

Now, we’ll cover setting up the Bing Ads tag in GTM. Create a new tag and select Bing Ads Universal Event Tracking as the tag type.

Next, go to your Bing Ads account to obtain the UET ID. Navigate to Conversion Tracking > UET tags from the left column.

If you haven’t yet created the tag, you’ll see a prompt to walk through setting it up. If the tag was previously set up, you can copy the Tag ID from the table.

Accessing Bing UET Tag

Paste the ID into the proper field in GTM. For the default setup, you won’t need to adjust any of the advanced settings.

Bing Ads UET Setup in Google Tag Manager

Next, choose a trigger for where you want the tag to appear. Since the Bing UET tag is a global tag, you’ll most likely want to fire this on all pages.

Once the global tag is in place, you can also add additional tags for event-based conversions. Use the same Tag ID, and select an Event Type of “custom.” Then, you can define parameters based on what you’ve set up in Bing for your custom conversion.

To check the setup of the UET tag, you can use Bing’s UET helper Chrome extension.

3. Adding the Facebook Pixel

While the previous two platforms we covered have built-in GTM templates, Facebook Ads does not.

Thankfully, GTM includes a Custom HTML tag as an alternative option, and Facebook offers a direct integration to make the setup process simple.

To access your pixel from your Facebook Ads account, mouse over the menu from the top bar and select Pixels. If you haven’t yet set up a pixel, you’ll be prompted to do so.

Accessing Facebook Pixel

Otherwise, click Details on the proper pixel and Set up.

Set up Facebook Pixel

Now, you’ll see a box with options to select a setup method.

Click Use an Integration or Tag Manager and then select Google Tag Manager from the options that appear.

Use Tag Manager Integration

You’ll now see a series of steps walking you through logging into your account, selecting the proper GTM container, and finalizing setup.

Connect Tag Manager and Facebook

To check the setup of the Facebook Pixel, you can use the Facebook Pixel Helper Chrome Extension.

4. Adding the LinkedIn Insights Tag

To add LinkedIn’s tag in GTM, create a new tag and select LinkedIn Insight as the tag type. You’ll now need to grab the Partner ID from your LinkedIn Ads account.

From within your account, go to the Account Assets dropdown on the top bar and select Insight Tag.

Access LinkedIn Insight Tag

You’ll now see the code for your tag, or be prompted to set the tag up if you haven’t done so yet.

LinkedIn Insight Tag Code

Look for the second line of code, which should look like the following (the number will vary):

_linkedin_partner_id = “12345”;

The number within the quotes is your Partner ID, so add that to the field in GTM.

LinkedIn Insight Tag in Google Tag Manager
Now, add a trigger for all pages (or define any specific criteria necessary for where the tag appears or doesn’t appear on your site) and publish the tag live on your site.

5. Adding the Twitter Universal Website Tag

To add the Twitter Ads tag to your site, create a new tag and choose Twitter Universal Website Tag as the tag type. Next, you’ll need the pixel ID from your Twitter Ads account.

From the top menu in Twitter Ads, navigate to Tools > Conversion Tracking.

Access Conversion Tracking in Twitter Ads

On the page that appears, click “View code and installation instructions.”

View Twitter Ads Universal Website Tag

Now, you’ll see the code in a text box.

Set up Twitter Ads Universal Website Tag

Find the line of code that looks like the following (the final string in quotes will vary):

twq(‘init’,’12345’);

You’ll want to copy the string of characters within the second pair of quotes. Insert that string into the “Twitter pixel ID” field in your GTM tag.

LinkedIn Insight Google Tag Manager

For the global pixel deployment, you shouldn’t need to customize any additional settings. Add a trigger for All Pages (or whatever pages you want the pixel to appear on) and publish it live.

Conclusion

Google Tag Manager can help to majorly simplify tracking tag deployment for organizations of all sizes. With the ability to add tags more efficiently, you can reduce unnecessary communication and save time for other priority tasks.

If you haven’t yet worked with Google Tag Manager, start an account for free and begin setting up some tags for your ad accounts.

If you’ve started with GTM but haven’t dug in very far, try out some new templates and set up some custom HTML tags.

You’ll likely find using a tag management platform an improvement on previous methods of tag implementation.


Source: This article was originally posted at Search Engine Journal by Tim Jensen on January 28, 2019.