Sometimes it’s hard to tell what goes together. Sometimes we’re pleasantly surprised about things that unexpectedly go really well together. Most Thursday nights I’m at the White Buffalo here in Hood River, Oregon, for wine tasting and book club. The draw has been the great, smart girls that contribute to the interesting discussion, but honestly I’d be there anyway for the wine tasting from local wineries and for the proscuitto wrapped figs. Something about the delicious saltiness of the Italian proscuitto and parmasean combined with the delectable thick sweetness of the figs is truly irresistible.
Savory and sweet go together in SEO as well. The devisive power of well-studied analytics goes beautifully with the sweet interactivity of a well-planned social media campaign. The savory flavors of link profile reporting goes perfectly with the sweet PR crafted not from analysis but from relationship.
The Morsel of the Story – Don’t just serve up savory hard data without actionable analysis or soft, warm and fuzzy relationship building marketing, put them together for the perfect combination.
Spatchcocking & SEO
I’ve been passionate about cooking for about 10 years. I love pouring over the appendix part of the cookbook to learn about specials tools, cooking styles and definitions. In my most recent version of Martha Stewart’s Food Magazine I came upon on article about spatchcocking. Immediately intrigued (mostly because I had never heard of the term) I read 3 pages of how to spatchcock, what knives to use to spatchcock and what temperature to cook poultry that has been spatchcocked. What was missing though was the “why”. Why spatchcock? Why spend 15 minutes and buy a special pair of poultry scissors to flip around the legs of a chicken to go a direction God never intended them to go? Why is butterflying a chicken superior? Since Martha knows her stuff I suspended disbelief and tried it and it was outstanding. The drippings from the fat in the legs was dispersed throughout some of the tougher parts of the chicken, it presented beautifully and salvaged some of the bird that may sometimes get overlooked. I’m now an evangelist for spatchcocking.
How often do you tell your clients they need something but don’t explain why. “KPI’s are one of our important execution strategies”, “Cross channel keyword research takes more time but is imperative to success across different networks”, “Link citations are necessary to local search algorithms”.
Recently we improved local search results for a client for whom we’d provided natural search results, but we didn’t provide additional metrics for Local Search to distinguish why both Natural and Local Search were relevant to their listings. Once we provided results, there was a better understanding of “why do I care about this.”
What you tell clients or customers they need is important, but telling them why creates better understanding and expectation.
The Morsel of the Story – If you want your clients to be evangelists for what you do, make sure they understood what and why.
I fell in love with Eggplant Parmesan in Cortona in Tuscany. It was served in the gorgeous deep green and blue glazed dish. The deep purple in the skin of the eggplant, the red of the fresh marinara, the deep green of the freshly picked basil all made my first impression so dramatic and to top off the experience, it tasted glorious.
I’ve since tried a few recipes to recreate the masterpiece I enjoyed in Italy, yet every time I get different results. sometimes the eggplant is too chewy, or it’s too saucy and not substantive, sometimes the ratio of mozzarella and parmesan doesn’t compliment the dish, it’s a moving target. The last time I served it I asked my son what he thought, “I’ve had better from you”. Getting past my initial reaction to banish him to a life time of Top Ramen for the remark, I asked what made it better before. He wasn’t sure, but he just knew this wasn’t my best effort. Online marketing is some science and some art, when it comes to search, we’re cooking with ingredients that haven’t all been identified. Trying to document what ingredients we use every time we create a search marketing recipe is part of getting better.
The Morsel of the Story-exceptional documentation is necessary in correlating cause and effect.
I met Third Door Media’s, Claire Shoen at the first SMX Advanced. I was by myself and walked in to the Pre Show party hoping to find someone I knew from Portland so I could have someone to chat with. On my way in Claire stopped me to ask how I was enjoying the show and to compliment me on my full length white rain coat. When I ran into Claire again at the SMX Social show in New York she remembered me, where I was from (and the fact that I rocked the white coat;) Claire may have used the white coat to remember me, but if you’ve met her you know she has remarkable recall about people and an amazing talent for putting people at ease.
The Morsel of the Story – Finding ways to make a connection is a powerful way to network and create a lasting impression.
My youngest daughter graduated from high school on Friday. She is brilliant, talented, beautiful and, as many seniors, SO ready to move on to the next phase of her life. Graduation is marked by a ceremony shared with family and friends, teachers and students who’ve shared many of the same experiences and trials. sitting through the ceremony made me realize the depth of importance of the ritual, as a way to celebrate the past and prepare for the future. As a way to mark a beginning and end.
Do you do that with your customers? In reviewing reports or status updates do you circle back an achievement with an overarching goal. Though it may be self-evident to you as the service provider, it may be worth while to take a moment to recognize the passage of a campaign that’s just surpassed your 12 month goal in 9 months, or congratulating the team for converting leads at a rate that exceeded expectations. Celebrating beginnings and ends let’s us acknowledge our accomplishments as well as clear the plate for new accomplishments and challenges.
I am fortunate to work with some very bright people and I find myself learning from my clients all he time. One of our clients’, Sue Gaulke, CEO of Successworks, provides presentation skills training to Fortune 500 clients, she also teaches at the Protocol School of Washington.
Sue wrote a book “101 Ways to Captivate a Business Audience” a few years back that is absolutely timeless when it comes to presentation advice.
It has been reproduced in several languages and has been used by salespeople and CEO alike. I’ve read it a couple of times through, but really focused on implementing its’ strategies for this week’s presentation at SMX Advanced.
Though every page has what Sue would call a “teachable” moment, two things really struck me this reading. One, that most great presenters have concerns about presenting. It’s okay to be nervous, athletes need the adrenaline as do presenters. It’s just not okay to make nervousness a focus. Second, and this is really a revelation, is to forget about yourself for a moment (your fear, your nervousness, your message, your deck) and think about your audience. She recommends actually taking your shoes off and figuratively putting on the shoes of the person you’re speaking to. It’s easy to spend too much time in your head, but asking, “How can I help someone benefit from my past knowledge and past mistakes?”
I really focused on that recommendation for this presentation. As a group over the course of a few calls the panel and I (directed by our fearless leader and moderator Chris Elwell) really honed in on the question of “What can we bring our attendees that no one else can bring to the table,” “How do we engage our audience in a way that is so meaningful to them that what they take away will stay with them throughout their careers”. No easy task, but I’m confident that Marty, Will and I will illuminate a topic that many consultants and agencies pay little attention to and one that can define the course of their business.
The Morsel of the Story-Putting focus on someone else is the best way to reach them.
Presentation Skills Training
I love food and most things related to food (growing it, cooking it, enjoying it).
I’ve had the good fortune of being an online marketer for 13 years. What do online marketing and food have to do with each other? Apparently a lot because for the past couple of years when I’m doing one of these disciplines I learn something that I can apply to the other. Today I’m embarking on a new blog adventure called, “The Morsel of the Story” and will hopefully draw illuminating analogies between search marketing and cooking. My love for food often crosses over into love of SEO (I’ve even helped with SEO for the purpose of experiencing amazing food. Check out our friends at this new West Linn restaurant, Allium Bistro)
I’ve never made Coq au Vin. It’s always looked intimidating and it takes a lot of time and planning. But a few months ago I set out to create my first Coq au Vin. I scoured my cookbooks and my favorite online recipe sites and came up with one from Bon Appetit Cookbook with illustrations and good step by step instructions that seemed daunting, yet doable. Coq au Vin takes twenty-one ingredients, nine steps and two days to prepare. Where to start? Accepting that there are risks and it may not be great allowed me to forget my concern and be excited about the potential reward.
My education and early career were in Journalism. I enjoy writing, but don’t have the confidence that all of my content development efforts will be rewarded with great exposure.
Writing well takes time and in online marketing 1 article out of 20 may provide great impact for you or your client. Writing is risky mostly because it takes effort that may or may not be rewarded. But when it is rewarded, that risk becomes encouragement and fuels creativity and excitement about a very important online marketing strategy.
Not every press release or blog post or article you write will be a masterpiece. Not every meal you create will be delectable. But encouraging yourself to pursue the masterpiece ups your game on a day-to-day basis. Now that I know I can make Coq au Vin (it was amazing, the family loved everything about it except the amount of dirty dished created in the process) I’m less fearful of preparing a duck ragu dish I love that used to intimidate.
Once a post or article gets picked up by the Wall Street Journal or American Express you have more confidence that efforts will be rewarded. (Read this marketing blog to learn more about facing risk and quieting what Seth Godin calls “the lizard brain”).
For every great effort it’s thoughtful to take a step back and acknowledge the “why?” Why make Coq au Vin rather than eating Chicken McNuggets, because ultimately it’s so damn tasty.
But there are other reasons, like the way the kitchen smells when it’s filled with the aroma of fresh sauteed garlic, smoky bacon and lightly simmering French Burgundy.
Why make a long term plan for online marketing rather than jumping on the “because everyone else is doing it” bandwagon? It’s risky sure, but there are great rewards.
Every day is filled with choices, like picking up Chicken McNuggets or creating Coq au Vin or responding to that “get on page one at Google for just $19.99″ email rather than creating a long-term relationship with a proven online marketing agency or creating long-term goals in-house.
Satisfying and long-lasting results come from dedicating the time, effort and acceptance of risk.
The Morsel of the Story? With great risk, comes great reward.
I’ve had this blog for 3 years as of next month. I’m passionate about writing and love the idea of making connection with your market and readers through blogs. I rely heavily on blogs and online communities for many things in my life, including:
Updates about search engine and online marketing from Search Engine Landd and Mashable
Recommendations for wine and wine tasting from Snooth and Cork’d
Gardening design and planting advice from A Way to Garden
Insights into being a parent of college age children at CollegeParents.org (blog is called “Hoverings”;)
I’ve encouraged my clients (and friends) to use blogs as a way to communicate with clients and potential clients in a way that helps brand, creates relationship, fosters interest and raises awareness.
Our Hood River real estate client, Copper West Properties, has a wonderful blog called “The View from Here”. Maui Meyer is a business owner, county commissioner and world-class windsurfer who believes his contribution to helping with your Hood River real estate transaction is second to the value he and his team bring in being trusted negotiators and local expert advisors to the real estate process. The blog includes helpful insider real estate trending and projecting information which includes text and video.
The site we built for our client Sue Gaulke at SuccessworksUSA.com included a blog which was initially meant to be updated twice a month for her clients, including Fortune 500 companies such as Nike, Intel, NBC, Lowe’s and Proctor & Gamble. She has recently completed a wonderful series called “Presentation Olympics” which she updated almost daily and she’s preparing to do a video series called the “No Choke Zone”.
My friends the Irwin’s, who recently purchased and renovated the beautiful Balch Hotel in Dufur, Oregon just started blogging about their experiences as hotel owners, sharing staff experiences and giving advice for brides on planning their weddings.
These business owners have leveraged blogs as a way to share their unique value proposition and they’re doing it really well.
As my blog has evolved, so has blogging. When I started “Search Forte” the goal was to help my clients and potential clients understand SEO/SEM well enough to engage in the conversation.
Now there are hundreds of thousands of blogs on SEO/SEM and my clients don’t just look to me for updating. They know where to go for the latest on search marketing as well as social marketing or digital asset management.
So in order to follow my own advice (Physician-Heal Thyself) I will begin posting for the MEDIA forte marketing blog with a new title “The Morsel of the Story”.
If we’ve ever met you know I love food (and cooking and gardening and wine) and I’ll be sharing insights into the art of SEO/SEM as it relates to food. I’ll have my first post later this month.
Let me know what you think!
My favorite SEO question-”how long will this take?” First, this answer has at least two parts, “how long will it take to rank and get traffic?” and “how long will it take to keep rankings and traffic?”
Answering, “How long will SEO take?” is like answering, “How long does it take to achieve trust, authority and relevance.” The real answer is that they’re both a process, not an event.
So how can online marketers answer this question in a way that helps the business owner make room in their marketing plans for much-needed SEO?
Important steps are to define goals based on the bottom line. Establishing expectation for ROI for your SEO campaign is far more helpful (and measurable, and attached to business success) than establishing goals around rankings and traffic.
Once you’ve established your goals, next steps are to define the trust, relevance and authority needed in your space. Steps for achieving this are different for a spa in a small town competing with 25 other spas, than steps for a laptop company competing with thousands of online companies which sell laptops.
What is trust online?
Trust is established through several criteria,
-How long have you been in business?
-How well does your site perform?
-Are you an expert in your field?
What is relevance online?
-Does the visitors search query match your site content and other signals?
What is authority online?
-Are you an established company?
-Are you serving exceptional, unique content that establishes you as an authority?
-Do other relevant and authoritative sites link to you because you provide important information to your visitors?
-Are you doing it better than anybody else in your space?
That last one is daunting, but the reality is that many searchers don’t delve past page one to get the answer they need. If there are 3,000,000 pages returned for a query, are you doing it better than the other 2,999,990 pages returned for that query? If not, you have more trust, relevance and authority to achieve.
What’s missing from many companies’ approach to SEO is the acceptance that SEO (like every other part of building a business) takes time and commitment. It’s not a one time event, nor is it easily achieved. With that in mind, it’s also not okay for your SEO company to have ambigious strategies and tactics for achieving trust , relevance and authority. Though SEO is a process, that process should be marked with events that achieve the end goal.
The good news is that establishing trust, relevance and authority will help you in other online marketing efforts including perception of your brand in social networks.
Getting clients to realize that search (and other onine marketing disciplies) is a process and not an event helps incorporate the need for an ongoing relationship with a search marketing professional that will help them get and maintain an edge. And what do you need from an SEO? You guessed it; trust, relevance and authority. Read Google documentation about choosing an SEO.
