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Category: Local SEO

Optimizing Your Business for Local Search

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There are many factors that determine how well your business ranks in local search. And with more and more users looking to their mobile devices to find local businesses while on the go, making sure that you rank locally will be instrumental to overall success. By optimizing the following factors, the search engine marketing experts at Saba, Inc. believe you will be more likely to gain the maximum amount of traffic to your site and generate high profit for your company.

Correctly Categorizing Your Business

In Google’s local listings, you have the option to select a primary category for your business. This is extremely important. Google will list your business based on this category and it will make it more likely that customers will find you when they run a search. Placing your business in the wrong category is the biggest mistake that many owners make when marketing their organizations locally.

Brick and Mortar Address in the City of Search

If you own a bakery with a physical address in Los Angeles, your company will be more likely to appear in searches for bakeries in Los Angeles. At the same token, if a person is searching for a bakery from a smartphone in Los Angeles, Google is more likely to deliver your business as a result. This does create somewhat of a challenge for businesses that are located just outside of the metropolitan area. A bakery in Torrance, for example, that also serves customers in Los Angeles, may find it harder to rank well locally.

Structured Citations

A citation is a mention of your company’s name elsewhere on the Web. If, for example, your business has Yelp! reviews or a listing in credible online directories, these count as “structured citations.” The more structured citations your business can claim, the better you will rank in search. Many businesses flounder in search when their citations are inconsistent. If your company is cited as “Liz’s Bakery” in one listing and “Liz’s Cupcakes” in another, you will have a harder time ranking in local search.

Have other questions about boosting your local visibility online? Reach out to Saba, Inc. today and schedule a complimentary, website audit and consultation with one of our San Diego SEO and online marketing experts. Call 858-277-1717 – we look forward to hearing from you!

Users Rely More and More on Mobile Phones for Search

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Since the emergence of smart phones, the Internet is constantly available at any moment as long as one has their phone close by. Due to this convenience, people are relying heavily on their smart phones for web searches. According to comScore’s 2014 report, 53% of the total time spent on the Internet comes from mobile phones and tablets. Additionally, the Harvard Business Review explains that 31% of mobile Internet users have stated that their mobile devices are their primary access to the web.

For businesses, marketing agencies, and San Diego SEO companies, these statistics emphasize the importance of having mobile-friendly websites, ensuring that customers can be reached on their schedule, which is often on the go. In fact, reports further indicate that 42% of users relied solely on their mobile devices for researching their purchase, and 55% of mobile shoppers actually go through to make a purchase. This tells us that without mobile-friendly websites, businesses are eliminating nearly 50% of their market. Mobile-friendly or responsive websites are becoming a necessity, rather than simply a convenience.

According to many marketing experts, mobile websites are the best option for businesses due to their immediacy, compatibility, broad reach, and ability to be shared. Most importantly, mobile websites are often easier to create than mobile apps. However, the mobile app market is growing and in many cases, can supplement a great online website, helping to increase brand and customer loyalty. Click here for more information about mobile app development in San Diego.

But don’t think that mobile websites can only impact a customer who is looking to make a purchase from the home or office. According to a recent study by Usablenet.com, 33% of shoppers would rather rely on searching their smartphone for help rather than ask a sales associate in store. This means that businesses who do a majority of their sales in-store can still benefit from upgrading their website to a mobile friendly or responsive website template.

Searching from a mobile device also has another benefit for businesses. Generally, mobile devices use location services to optimize search results even further. Marketing can now be location-based, providing even better search results for users. This targeted marketing approach increases the quality of leads, and can thus play a role in increasing sales.

The implications of customers becoming more reliant on their mobile devices for searches are clear. Without adapting to the mobile world, businesses are drastically limiting their market and giving a competitive edge to their competitors. If you would like to learn how to make your website mobile friendly, reach out to Saba, Inc. We are an online marketing company that specializes in SEO, PPC and web development in San Diego. With the help of our online marketing experts, you can reach your targeted audience, drive traffic and increase sales.

To request a free website analysis or simply have a conversation, reach out to us at 858-277-1717 or fill out our online form.

Penguin 3.0 Update Guidelines

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The purpose of Penguin, a filter that sits on top of Google’s regular algorithm, is to reduce search engine rankings that violate Google’s ranking guidelines. The current update, introduced in October 2014, is Penguin 3.0, affecting less than one percent of search engine queries. While Google describes this update as a “refresh with no new signals added,” it’s still important to understand the guidelines if you want to get the most out of your SEO efforts.

The War on Link Spam Continues

The main purpose of Penguin is to catch and flag so-called link spam while cutting down on deceptive and/or manipulative practices incorporated into the design of a website to achieve an artificially inflated Google ranking. The Penguin 3.0 updates (really the 6th version) are designed to demote sites implementing bad practice “black hat SEO” linking techniques, including:

• Creating one page for the “bots” and another for human users, known as “cloaking”
• Purposely overusing “hot button keywords” and creating a link based on those words
• Excessive use of exact-match keywords in links
• Executing link schemes, such as buying and selling links and excessive link exchanges (“you link me, I’ll link you”)
• Excessive internal linking

Keep in mind that Penguin updates only impact links to a site, not the content of websites. The primary goal of the Penguin guidelines is to encourage website developers and designers to use multiple link-building techniques rather than simply relying on those methods solely designed to entice clicks. While Google won’t reveal exactly how much weight is given to each ranking factor, it’s no secret that there has been an increased focus on the quality and authenticity of links.

If you’re concerned about how your business is faring after the recent Penguin 3.0 changes, contact Saba SEO at (858) 277.1717. Our dedicated team of web designers, content writers, and marketing experts are fully prepared to make sure all of our clients thrive after every new update.

How Does Google Determine Rankings?

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Google takes several different factors into consideration when determining how a site will show up after that initial search request is entered. Understanding Google’s search criteria can help you optimize your own website so that it will rank higher, preferably somewhere within the first page of returned results, since searchers aren’t likely to browse through multiple pages.

Here are just some of the ways that top internet marketing companies, such as Saba SEO, work to get clients to that esteemed first page.

Keyword Density

Google’s spiders do more than search for keywords, they determine how many times keywords are used within a page and how “organic” or natural those keywords and phrases are in relation to the surrounding content. In general, you need to have a keyword density of at least 2 percent for a word to rank. However, you don’t want to go beyond 5 or 6 percent or you’ll get a flag for keyword stuffing. You’ll also want to use keywords for your:

• Image and photo captions
• Headlines and subheads
• Root domain name
• Page name URL
• Internal and external link anchor text on a page

Title Tags, Meta Descriptions and File Names

Google uses title tags, meta descriptions and file names to find your webpages, so you want to make sure you’re using relevant keywords and phrases that accurately reflect your content. Google will flag sites that use misleading keywords just to generate clicks, which won’t lead to many conversions anyway. Google also searches for meta tags containing hidden keywords, and phrases in the header of site that are invisible to the user yet still considered by Google for indexing purposes.

The Quality of Links

If you’re going to use links to other sites within your content (which can be a good thing), make sure the links are valid. Google will flag content if the links are bad or direct users to poor quality sites. Google also considers the quality of inbound links, referring to the process of someone linking back to your site while your site links back to their site.

Google uses over 200 different factors in determining how a site ranks. While the search engine giant won’t reveal how it weighs each factor, having an understanding of some key ranking criteria can definitely give you the upper hand when looking to put your content in front of the right audience.

It also pays to have an expertly trained and experienced team on your side. If you’re looking for a company who can help get your business on the map, turn to Saba SEO. Our team of web designers, content writers and marketing specialists can work with you to help you target the right audience effectively and affordably. Give Saba SEO a call at 858-277-1717 to get the ball rolling.

 

Have You Disappeared from Google’s 7 Pack?

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Adding to Google’s menagerie of algorithm updates, its recent local modification “Pigeon,” was released on July 24, 2014, for American English searches. Like the release of Panda and Penguin before it, Pigeon has left some local businesses looking to make adjustments to their search engine optimization, as they find they are no longer appearing in Google’s seven pack – the grouping of results appearing alongside a Google Map which pinpoints their locations. Continue reading “Have You Disappeared from Google’s 7 Pack?”

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