EYES HERE: Google’s November 1 Update's Impact on Your Mobile Website

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Today’s time and age have us all perpetually connected to our phones.

From downloading the latest music, surveying various videos, browsing through recipes, updating Facebook statuses—everything is manageable with the click of a finger.

For such a small and nondescript electronic device, our phones hold so much potential and power.

And Google is well aware of this fact, which is why application updates have been made to accommodate this colossal evolution. However, as the digital world develops and advances, the terrain once navigated by websites transforms itself as well—leaving digital marketing agencies to struggle with constant upgrades.

Currently, websites are traversing the digital landscape wrought by search engine juggernaut Google through the adoption of these changes and by vying amongst each other for that ever coveted “mobile-friendly” banner. The failure and nonconformity of which results to a demotion in search rankings—a search engine optimization (SEO for brevity) company’s ignominious living nightmare.

In spite of this recent mobile revolution given the moniker "mobilegeddon" by Google itself, having a “mobile-friendly” banner just does not seem to cut it nowadays. So, android app and iPhone app developers look closely and eyes here as this imminent update may very well change the gameplay of how you develop your apps.

As recently announced by Google, it would henceforth decrease the rankings of any mobile sites found to be forcing visitors to install an application as prompted by a giant app install interstitial pop-up.

Though these ads never hurt anyone, it is only right that Google do so. 

Imagine a typical day of web surfing on your mobile phone and having your experience interrupted by enormous app install interstitial pop-ups whose sheer size is enough to cover whatever you might be reading about.

They block a significant amount of content from view, are typically obtrusive and are irksome in the least. To address this issue accordingly, Google recently posted an update stating in context that commencing November first of this year, sites that show app install ads which hide a considerable amount of content on the transition from the search result page to the next page will be penalized.

This pivotal move by Google ensures that end users and visitors are granted the unhampered mobile experience they should have. Though mobile sites greatly exploit interstitial ads as a way to get users to notice their native apps, users, on the other hand, see this as an obvious marketing attempt and ploy to get them to download those apps.

So what does this mean for your company? 

Well, in essence, it means your company has to adapt to this recent change. Having a website that is considered mobile friendly will no longer suffice; alternatively, you must also take this new update into consideration by implementing various changes to acclimatize Google’s recent announcement.

To begin incorporating these changes, a banner overhaul is needed. Having it occupy nearly all the window space might get it noticed but would inevitably cause you to be penalized. Redesign your banner in such a way that it would be fixed at the bottom of your screen or at the top.

A size reduction would be needed as well-- which can be easily done with an app install banner which is supported by Chrome and Safari or you can opt for a classic approach with CSS remodeling.

Google perspective is to promote unhindered and quality user experience and in accordance to this vision, the search engine demigod will compel the market to do away with app interstitials. Non-compliance would mean the revocation of the “mobile-friendly” tag.

In two months’ time, this update will be enforced which means that you would need to start making changes immediately. Any delays on your part will cost you valuable ranking points making it imperative that you start today.

Content Strategy 101: Five Things You Need to Know When You’re Writing for the Web

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Are you at a loss for writing great and compelling content?

Or are you perhaps feeling a little bit dismayed by your lack of productivity, click-through rates, and overall ratings?

Or are you simply disappointed at how vastly different the writing strategy is when you are writing for articles to be published online?

Well, fret not.  Working as a content writer for an online marketing agency is not as straightforward as everyone in the industry wants it to be. As it is, you are not the first one to experience this array of dilemmas considering that content strategy is a comparatively fresh niche in the digital webspace. 

However, it frequently finds common ground with interface design, SEO, content marketing, user experience, traditional offline marketing and public relations.

To assist you in overcoming the hurdles there is in content writing, this article will highlight some of the prominent concepts of content strategy around the web. It details some guidelines for one to use especially to those who have never been exposed to content strategy—one that should be considered before they can craft their very own.

Listed below are five things that one needs to be aware for an effective content strategy:

Teamwork is essential in Content Strategy

The importance of compelling content is essentially ingrained in every content writer’s head. However, what most companies overlook is the fact that content alone would not do much and would not be as effective as a content strategy that utilizes the talents of the other members in the team. In order for a good content strategy to come into fruition, teamwork is necessary. As it is, the content strategy phase does not involve copywriting alone; user experience, design, marketing, etc. play a very big part on this too. For maximum content strategy efficacy, the other peer-disciplines should be equally involved as well.

Survey your audience’s literacy level and match that

Studies have shown that both high literacy and low literacy level audiences completed tasks faster and with less frustration when websites utilized contents that does not demand much from their literacy level. Though the usage of jargon may make your website look fairly polished and professional, your audiences may suffer. Use a common language—enough to make your audiences complete basic tasks at ease while maintaining the overall professional quality of your website.  In other words, keep the language simple and concise, you will be doing yourself and your

 low and high literacy level audiences a favor.

Create a voice and a tone for your brand

In order to set your brand apart, create a unique voice for it. It makes it easier for your audiences to identify you through a distinctive voice and a sole tone. This would also help you relate to your audiences on a personal level. Your voice reflects the kind of personality and identity your brand wants to project and to maintain a consistent approach, this voice should be utilized across all of your content. However, the tone should be more adaptable to the type of context your content has.

Exploit SEO and use it to your advantage

Though a lot would say otherwise, SEO is still very much alive. SEO should be a primary part in every content strategy. Let your SEO experts assist you in creating content that would go on to build brands instead of just throwing in a bunch of keywords and hoping your content would get the adequate number of click –throughs. Effective content strategies incorporate SEO and in order to remain in Google’s good list, SEO needs to make sure they embrace SEO content marketing.

Give your audience a voice

Perhaps the most widely overlooked aspect in content strategy is giving your audience a voice. You should never neglect this essential characteristic in crafting a content strategy considering the colossal part your audience plays in giving your website life. It may be humbling to realize that the most important content in your website is not yours, but the ones your audiences create, but this is exactly why websites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube are so successful. They allow users to create their own content while allowing them to peruse and engage the content of others. The bottom line here is to recognize the stories of your users are far more important that one you craft and in order for them to be seen, you must build platforms that would allow such.

The road to achieving and meeting a content strategy’s ultimate goal of meeting business objectives and fulfilling user’s expectations may be littered with many obstacles and hurdles but considering the finer details may help you reach your destination faster and easier. Ponder on the five guideline enumerated above and integrate them into your content strategy and notice the drastic changes you will make.

Be seen on Google: Craft Better Tutorials!

 

www.tutorialshunt.com

Anyone with a smart mobile phone or desktop/laptop and Internet access is bound to have an instructional how-to guide. Recipes, do it yourself projects, computer programming—you name it and there is a guarantee that you are bound to find something useful online. Just type away at the search box, hit enter and voila! Instant results!

In relation to this, should you be a wise digital marketing agency, you would be exploiting this marketing potential. After all, every single online marketing agency in business is competing for the much coveted top spot of Google's search results. So what better way than to make use of what people are constantly searching for online?

However, as straightforward as that may seem, it is not as easy to execute. Yes, writing a how-to guide can be easily done in a matter of hours or minutes in fact but lump that with a hundred or more so similar guides and your page will be buried in the search results. Before long, your how-to guide will not gain as much traction as it should and eventually, it will become irrelevant caused by stagnancy. For this reason, you need to make your how-to guides interesting and catchy, make it stand out.

To achieve this, you can:

Just like in school, showing and telling works to your advantage

No matter how comprehensive and expansive your tutorial is, nothing really beats explaining it in video format. And it makes sense because people would rather see how to do it than be taught how to do it simply by a large block of text. As can be gleaned in illustrious video sharing website, YouTube, video tutorials make up a huge block of its existing videos. From this, it can be inferred that users prefer this instructional medium above others. Consequently, utilizing this technique and having a great presence on Google's own video-sharing website will greatly reward you.

Use photos. Show and don't just simply tell.

If resources are hard to come by then use interesting photos that relate to your content. Sure, it may not be as effective in showing your viewers what to do, but a photo illustrating each step in the process is just as fine. Consequently, as this is written text and information, it would be best to use traditional SEO techniques that are appropriate for this format. 

Choose an appropriate target keyword, use the same keyword in headers and tags and include the same keyword in potential phrases people may likely search up. Including many photos as you possibly can in your how-to content creates a better understanding for the reader where words are not enough. Additionally, it would increase website visibility in image searches by including alternative tags and titles that include your keyword.

Utilize all available social media platforms

This is a basic technique in SEO: Be seen, be relevant, gain traffic and traction.

Accordingly, as this is the case, you should not limit your marketing campaign in a single social media platform. Widen your reach and diversify your content your social media content and gain more followers, viewers, and users this way. The more platforms you utilize, the chances of it getting shared by viewers are higher. Consequently, viewership rates will increase which would signal Google that your content has value.

Visit Quora or Reddit to find ideas for your next tutorial or how-to list

If you truly want your tutorial to make waves online or at least be relevant or if you are just at a loss as to what to write next, visit Quora or Reddit for a hub of tutorial and how-to ideas. These sites will serve as your window of information as to what the online population is currently clamoring for or what particular tutorials are on demand. After crafting your own tutorial, you can then go back to the site and post your tutorial for the users to see. Consequently, you wouldn't just be catering to their demands but promoting your page as well.

These four tricks are jumpstart tips to get you started with your tutorials or how-to lists and videos. Utilize them well and perhaps, maybe you can even discover some tips for yourself.  

Content Marketing 101: Six Types of Content to Boost Traffic and Engagement

People make the rookie mistake of thinking that content marketing is all about blogging. 
However, this is a vast understatement and a misconception no less. We have reached new depths in the creation of content that blogging is just one of the many and diverse ways to do it.

 However, with so many options to choose from, which of these drives more traffic to our respective websites? 

Which of these have better online traction and user engagement? 

A direct answer would be the hip and trendy ones. However, it is not as straightforward as we all think it should be. Utilizing just one type of popular content may initially guarantee you results, however maintaining this would prove to be difficult. Moreover, marketing just a single type of content is a surefire way to make your traffic and engagement rates tank and dip. The key is to add something new to the mix every once in a while. Make your page fun, exciting and fresh. 

So if you’re looking to add a new spin to your contents, let this article serve as your menu of the various types of contents you can choose to utilize on your page. 

GUIDES 

Guides are fairly common online and more often than not, they are usually exhaustive when it comes to detailing the information they are trying to convey. This is understandable as guides do not simply offer their readers information but rather, they have that authoritative voice that teaches their readers the relevant techniques on how to go about what is discussed. 

This content is relevantly popular as it encourages readers to do things themselves and take whatever task they have at hand by the reins. Though they are lengthy compared to other types of content, they are popular as they provide extensive information. 

MEMES

Making memes is one of the best content marketing ploys to attract a diverse population of online users and readers as it is fresh, new and trendy. It was fairly unheard of in the early 2010’s and made a sudden impact in the latter part of that same year. Memes are popular in a sense that they are humorous and readers can relate them better which is why they are such a hit with the online community. Memes utilize the voice of your audience who made this type of content popular in the first place. 


Memes are fun-filled pictures usually associated with pop culture alongside just a sprinkle of words. To make this more effective, they usually have a humorous undertone. It does not take a lot of brainwork to do and is relatively easy to utilize which is it is so popular. 

VIDEOS 

Videos offer you a lot more variety than ordinary writing ever can. 

It offers you a whole lot of possibilities and it certainly presents your content in a more visually entertaining way. Because videos are a lot more versatile than written contents, aestheticism is easily achieved through the utilization of motion pictures. Additionally, it helps you convey your message better, memorably and succinctly as well making this type of content effective in gaining traction. 


If it is done well, its power of persuasion will be unmatched.

HOW-TO’S

This one is a bit more popular than the rest and is certainly making rounds online. In fact, each and every content writer must have written at least one how-to article in her career. This is because how-to’s are relatively easy to do and succeed in capturing the interest of your audience. 

It is less extensive than a guide and is certainly not as exhaustive as one which is why it is an effective type of content for the type of audience who wants to get the gist of how to get a particular thing done without going through all the specifics.  For writers, this is a content that is rather easy to manipulate and create seeing as options are rather inexhaustible and seemingly endless. You basically focus on a single task at hand and create a step by step plan on how to accomplish it. 

In order for you how-to article to gain traction and efficacy, make it thorough and informative. Include diagrams and pictures as much as you can. 

In closing…

The options offered in this article are just a smidge of the various possibilities you can still try out there. When it comes to content creation, the possibilities are endless and in there is teeming potential for traction, traffic and audience engagement. Now, it is up to you to exploit that potential in your content strategies. 
Remember; do not stick to a particular type of content. Mix it up. 
Now, get up and get creating. 

5 Pointers for Attending SEO Seminars Alone

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Attending ALONE in an SEO training Philippines can really be a nerve-racking, especially when you are not exposed to that kind of environment. Agree? While other seems to enjoy attending the seminar, other people find it boring and annoying. When anxiety sets your mind in, you suddenly think other things. The thought of not going to attend the seminar instead strikes you anytime, and/or wish that the seminar will be done as soon as possible. It is definitely awkward to be alone. Well, sitting, listening, and enduring the talk until the end won’t hurt you after all.

Technically speaking, it is certainly¬ NOT a pain when you attend a seminar. In fact, you can get more and more knowledge about how SEO works. Moreover, you definitely can attend a seminar while enjoy the talk, especially when you are just focused on getting the knowledge that you want to have. Sad to say, not all people feel that way.

When your boss tells you to attend a seminar alone to represent your company, then you don’t have a choice but to follow.  Well, fret not! Below are some pointers for you to be able to feel at ease and expose to that kind of situation.

1. Always come prepared

Laptop and its charger, paper and pen, markers, extension cords, etc., when you come prepared and is all set, then you don’t have to worry about anything else. When you need something, you  don’t have to borrow from the person sitting next to you, which makes it more awkward. Your seatmate might think of you as irresponsible for not bring the important things needed for the seminar. Moreover, when you have something to write about, it gives you the opportunity to take down strong points from the speaker easily and immediately.

2. Avoid distractions

Being distracted is definitely the enemy of being attentive. One of the reasons why you feel bored and annoyed is because you don’t listen to what the speaker is talking about. Perhaps, you are holding your phone while texting with your friends, or opening social media and doing your own thing. Well, that unless if it is related to the seminar that you are attending to. Tweeting about the talk, researching the terms the speaker used is an exception. However, you should not spend too much of your time on the things that you are doing since it will definitely distract your focus from the seminar.

3.  Seek potential acquaintances

Just because you are alone in attending the seminar, it doesn’t mean that you are not going to mingle with the other people. Making friends with the person sitting next to you, and/or with other potential people will definitely be to your advantage. The person whom you mingle with is most likely to share his/her own knowledge about the SEO. There is a caveat though, you have to be keen and/or observant to the people around. There are people who attend the seminar just for the sake of attending without any determination to learn new things. Well, you don’t have to literally avoid, but you can still stick to the plan on making friends with the knowledgeable ones.

4. Participate

One of the many things you can do to avoid boredom is to participate. When it comes to seminars, there will definitely some group activities or workshops and/or question and answer portion to know whether you have learned something or not. You have to mingle with other people in the room for you to lessen the awkwardness that you have felt. Mind you, it works! Moreover, the more you participate, the more knowledge that you can get. Knowledge that you can have only by doing some hands on activities.  There will also be a caveat though, just because you are participating, it doesn’t mean that you are already good at it. You also have to be mindful of the things that surround you and learn something from it.

5. Dress appropriately

Last but definitely not the least, if you want to be confident in going to seminars alone, then you should start by dressing yourself appropriately. Your outfit will speak about who and what you are. When you dress in a formal and/or semi-formal at the event, then people will see you as a respectable person.They will think of you as a knowledgeable person, even if you know that you don’t have any idea about it at all. Well, you have to show your worth through expressing it with the way you look and dress.

DO’s and DON’TS of Using Emojis in Marketing Campaigns

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Technology is evolving every single day.

That much is a fact as evidenced by how far advanced the Internet is nowadays compared to how it was ten years ago. Along with that evolution, was the rise of the social media trifecta: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. These three juggernauts have managed to wheedle themselves into an average person’s daily lives.

And smart online marketing agencies are exploiting it. However, since the advent of this online rage, a few things have been making their rounds online as well. Consequently people both young and old are very receptive in utilizing it.

Take the Emoji for an example. What was once largely overlooked by users is now causing quite a stir and is making a lot of rounds online. And as of recently, it seems like even online marketers are capitalizing on its popularity. However, as tempting as lacing your marketing campaigns with Emojis is, this rather intrepid task is more of a hit or miss when being utilized in marketing campaigns.

But fear not, this article will walk you through the most basic DO’s and DON’TS in applying such in your campaigns.

DO NOT FORGO WORDS

Just because Emojis are trendy, it does not necessarily follow that every single one of your readers and followers can read them or speak it fluently.

Take a few seconds to give your post some brief contemplation, if it looks like it was composed by a teenager then odds are, you are doing it wrong. Apart from looking unprofessional, people would likely ignore your post because decoding your message is an absolute waste of time.

Stick to equal parts of message and Emojis. Use your words.

DON’T UTILIZE EMOJIS WHEN CONVEYING A SERIOUS MESSAGE 

There is always a time and place for the usage of Emojis.

Conveying a serious message is not. Emojis are meant to be accompanied with lighthearted, humorous and fun posts. And if you want to have an effective marketing campaign, then you should stick to this tactic. The utilization of Emojis in conveying a serious message or post can earn you the ire of your audience.

It would not only seem shallow on your part, but incredibly insensitive and callous as well. Additionally, your sound advice would fall to deaf ears. Don’t make the mistake of favoring Millennial targeting over making your post sensible and judicious.

DO USE IT CREATIVELY AND CREATE AN INTERACTIVE EXPERIENCE

Emojis are popular because they are trendy and your readers and followers are rather receptive to it because it is familiar to them. And more often than not, these users employ Emojis in their daily communications which is why as a smart online marketer, you  should acquaint yourself better in the usage of such.

You do not have to create a customized set of Emojis just so you can relate to your audience better, use what is given to you instead.Develop a habit of using Emojis in communicating to your audience and never forget to include them in your campaign in order to make your marketing strategy more inclusive and interactive.

Have fun with the Emojis, think of ways you can turn those little icons into games and see your post gain traction.

DO USE EMOJIS TO ENGAGE WITH YOUR AUDIENCE BETTER 

A smart and practical way to utilize Emojis is to commemorate momentous occasions and events. Though some pre-composed Emoji laced messages might be more of a hit or miss thing, never underestimate the power of a well-timed Tweet that can benefit from an Emoji or a lot of Emojis.

The frequent utilization of Emojis by various brands manifest their human side to their customers, as should you as an online marketer. Should the occasion call for it, get creative with Emoji art (include them in your Tweets in the same way, you would in a text message). Of course, as earlier stated, be careful in utilizing Emojis when topics are sensitive and serious.




Let’s face it, Emojis are here to stay. And if you want a successful marketing campaign, it would not hurt to include something trendy such as these Emojis.

After all, isn’t it much better to accompany your message with a round smiley faced fellow rather than a text that simply states *smiles*?