Matt Cutts from Google just made a great YouTube video while trying to explain how Google ranks websites. 聽What is most important to understand is the process of crawling a website and being able to extract the information for relevancy on a page. 聽What he mentions very quickly is anchor text. 聽This is a big聽component聽to SEO. 聽If you have a website being crawled for the first time, and Google sees some words with a link pointing to another web page, this is called “Anchor Text”.

An example of anchor text links is when I write SEO Company with a link. 聽When google crawls this page, we are essentially telling Google the URL we just pointed to is all about “SEO Company“. 聽This helps them see聽relevancy聽to pages. 聽Now if this process is done several hundred times, or even thousands of times…Google will see the pattern of anchor text and help you rank for that聽particular聽phrase.

Now here comes the “art” of SEO. 聽DO NOT over backlink with the exact same anchor text. 聽Even after reading this article are you able to re-write it word for word back on your blog? 聽Probably not. 聽So an exact match of anchor text across thousands of sites is not very organic. 聽People are going to use different phrases and words to describe your page. 聽You should be sure to have diversity in your聽back-linking聽as to be more organic.

Watch this video and let us know what you think. 聽I hope this helps give a bit more light into how Google ranks websites.

Thu, Apr, 2012 @ 4:33 pm
Tags: google seo, phoenix seo company, search engine optimization, seo, White Hat SEO
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There is some big news hitting the SEO world.聽 There are studies showing the power of linking Facebook comments to your website.聽 As you have heard us mention several times, SEO has largely been influenced by content.聽 “Content is King!” We have yelled this from the roof tops to help clients understand the importance of adding content, content and a bit more content.

With the recent reports showing Google search results picking up Facebook comments, it is now a great way to link to articles on your website with a Facebook plugin.聽聽 Here is a quick example so this will make sense to everyone.

I write this blog post, don’t forget to leave a comment at the bottom of the page you see an area you can leave a comment with your Facebook login.聽 Now every time someone leaves a comment using the facebook extension, that text is indexed to my blog page.聽 So if you leave a comment saying “SEO is as crazy as purple dragons.” In theory, you could search that exact phrase within a few days on Google and see our blog post pop up.

This is very exciting due to the power of adding searchable content to a page.聽 If you are able to add a blog post which results on lots of talk through comments, all of this text is indexed and will help with your ranking authority.

We hope this helps, and be sure to leave a quick comment! 聽 Let us know if you need help syncing your facebook account to your website.

Tue, Nov, 2011 @ 7:52 pm
Tags: facebook, facebook comments for seo, seo, social media seo
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Thu, Oct, 2011 @ 6:06 pm
Tags: phoenix seo, search engine marketing phoenix, search marketing, seo
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Dex phone book as we know it is dying.聽 I hope I don’t scare too many people by saying that.聽 The reality is people are not using the phone book for the information in which it contains.聽 Back in the day before cell phones did EVERYTHING, phone books were a great resource to find the local restaurants.聽 They could help you find Joe the plumber.聽 You would go to them to find coupons for the dry cleaners.聽 For whatever reason you went to the phone book, you just don’t anymore.聽 With the ease of a internet enabled cell phone you can find all of those things probably faster and most importantly where ever you want.聽 You can do it while driving, waiting to pick your kids up from school or even in line while waiting to buy a pizza you see a discount code online.

Now that we have agreed that the internet is the way of the future, and growing daily, you need to understand what different trends are when beginning your internet marketing.聽 Every person out there has a different perception of what internet marketing is.聽 To some it might include paying google to list a advertisement for their website when people search a certain term.聽 To others a logo on a friends website that promotes your new business venture.聽 Both are internet marketing, due to the fact that you are trying to expose to internet viewers your service or product.

Marketing on the internet can be so much more than just a listing here or there.聽 It can be a game of monopoly that leaves your hungry to dominate a search term that is growing.聽 That is where we come in.聽 We want to give you advice on how you can make your website visible to the most amount of people, in the shortest amount of time.聽 I am not saying it is a short term effort, because you will see that big efforts at the beginning will have a large compounding effect as your site becomes popular and stronger relevancy in the search engines eyes.

Internet marketing in Phoenix has not been a priority as compared to bigger cities around the US.聽 In fact it has been one of the last states to really see the importance to getting exposure on the internet.聽 As internet marketing grows, watch out for the new industry leaders.聽 The first companies in each industry that jump on internet marketing first will have the strongest presence which leads to more sales than the past big dawgs of old marketing ways.

Tue, Oct, 2011 @ 5:55 pm
Tags: exposure, increase sales, internet marketing, phoenix marketing, phone book, seo
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It is very clear that SEO has some muddy ideas floating around.聽 Let us take just few paragraphs to clear up some of the SEO Agency confusion points you might run into between different Agencies here in Phoenix.

Local Phoenix Web Marketing vs National Web Marketing

Often the case for seo clutter is the lack of understanding between local SEO and National SEO.聽 Search engines operate by showing you the most relevant information possible to your search terms.聽 If you search for fitness trainer, you’ll see afaa.com pop up as number one.聽 Why? You have no interest in Aerobics Association of America? I didn’t think so… but the Google engine sure thought it was applicable to you.聽 This is because their content on their website is formatted around the terms “fitness trainer” and gets a ton of traffic.

So how can we find a local version?聽 Well, we just need to add “Phoenix” in front of our search, and bam…local results.聽 This is important because if you are a personal fitness trainer located in Phoenix, you shouldn’t be spending your time trying to rank your website for national search terms.聽 Although the numbers look very convincing to rank nationally, it won’t help your business.聽 You personally can’t fly all over the country for each client.

Take a look at the Phoenix SEO Agency proposal.聽 Are you paying for a bunch of national ranking that won’t get your business anywhere, or are you ranking locally.聽 Rank local first!

Social Media: Bust or Brilliant?

I have written several times about social media and the power behind it.聽 I am not a fan so much of small businesses spending outrageous amounts of time on Twitter.聽 It can become the biggest bust of time.聽 However, facebook seems to have a more powerful local feel.聽 Take the time to automate your facebook posts to link on your twitter account.聽 This is a good way of killing two birds with one stone.

If you are looking for a Phoenix SEO Agency or Social Media Agency, feel free to contact us at Local Work Marketing to give you some free advice.聽 Our phone number is 602.283.5684.

Tue, Oct, 2011 @ 10:37 pm
Tags: bust vs brilliant, phoenix seo agency, phoenix web marketing, seo, seo agency, Social Media, web marketing
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The internet is an amazing tool to connect with information.聽 You can research the most sophisticated material out there.聽 Remember what it was like the first time you heard that you could bank online?聽 I bet 80% of people that first heard that back in 2001 said there is no way I would trust my banking needs to be met using the internet.聽 Now here we are 10 years later using the internet to arm our security system on our homes.

As the internet grows, so does the market place to make money.聽 There have been too many millionaires from great websites born overnight.聽 These brilliant minds have created a concept that is unique and makes people feel like they now can’t live without it.聽 Creating a great website is only the first part to the puzzle.

Often too many times we have seen some great ideas walk in our door asking what it would take to push an idea to a million dollars.聽 Unfortunately, most people we talk to seem to miss the most important part…TRAFFIC.聽聽 People, you can not make money if no one knows you exist.聽 Once the know you exist, how are they going to find you?

In a perfect world, with lots of startup cash (I know most don’t have it) this is what I would do:

1. Facebook: I would build an amazing landing page.聽 One that captures interest and drives them to “like” my page.聽 This is so powerful, because of the fact you can continually re-market to them everyday!聽 How amazing is that .聽 You dump some cash into fb ads…get some fans… then market to them daily and give them a great reason to recommend your page to all of their friends.
2. Website: This should go without being said.聽 I didn’t want to assume anything, but you have to create a nice website that shows off who you are.聽 Give folks some excitement about your brand and who you are.
3. Re-target banner ads:聽 This is very cool.聽 You can embed a cookie in your website for your visitors to automatically download into their browsers.聽 Once those visitors leave your website, your cookie “speaks” to the banner ad network and it will show your banner ad over and over to each visitor.聽 They will feel as if your banner ad is following them.聽 I can’t tell you enough on how great this tool is.
4. SEO: Obviously, based on my rant above, you knew SEO would be on my list of To-Dos.聽 You HAVE TO rank well organically in the search engines to really make a huge impact.聽 It is too important not to.聽 Essentially you are having the search engines recommend you do their loyal users.聽 The search engines are saying “Hey, I know you are looking for ‘Bright Green Hats’ so here is who I recommend for you.”

I hope this helps get an understanding of how important it is to not rely on just one internet marketing method, but to put together a system that works together.聽 Please feel free to call us or any of our IMS (Internet Marketing Specialists) for help or to just run though some ideas.

Wed, Aug, 2011 @ 7:31 pm
Tags: banner ads, facebook, internet marketing, local serach, search engine marketing, seo
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What makes a good SEO firm.

Finding the right internet marketing company can be a tough challenge.聽 So we are going to give you our top 3 questions you need to ask your internet marketing firm before doing business with them

1. SEO Stats-聽 Whether you are hiring an internet marketing company to just build your website, or manage your entire online presence, it is important to see how well they have done in the past with helping their past clients get traffic.聽 Just building a website is not enough anymore.聽 You have to work at actually driving traffic to your pages.
2. Communication Pattern- Now I know there is no such thing as the perfect internet marketing company.聽 There are always issues that will arise.聽 You must talk to a previous customer and ask them one thing, 鈥渉ow well was company, XYZ, at communication?鈥澛� If your company can not effectively share with you good communication behavior, you are in for a mess.聽 Websites get very technical and you need to know what is going on.聽 Make sure you ask the company you are interviewing for your business for a list of past clients that you can reference.
3. Bragging Time-聽 It is okay to ask the internet marketing company to brag a little bit.聽 Here鈥檚 why, if they have never accomplished an amazing website, what are the chances they will do it with yours.聽 Sit back and let them show off some of their 鈥渂iggie鈥� sites.聽 Uses these as comparison to the other companies you choose.聽 You will see a big difference in quality once you compare everyone鈥檚 top tier sites.

Taking the time to ask the right questions, will save you a headache of work and lost time/money.聽 Websites and internet marketing is a big investment, make sure you don鈥檛 flush yours down the toilet.

Thu, May, 2011 @ 12:17 am
Tags: internet marketing questions, seo, seo firm, top 3
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Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a common practice of optimizing a website by creating and improving the internal and external aspects to achieve more traffic from search engines. SEO uses 鈥渟piders鈥� which are search engine programs that judge web pages. These 鈥渟piders鈥� rely on what can be seen on a pages source code. They count the different amount of information from a page and index it on the search engines server. The information from your site is now indexed and it can be searched for.

What SEO does is it follows a algorithm that was created and uses things like coding, keywords, content and structure to boost your web site. SEO is closely monitored by search engines and they are very strict on what is passed for ethical methods of SEO. Black hat and White hat tactics are what these methods are referred to.

Black hat SEO is the practice of unethical methods and techniques聽to rank your website. It is very frowned upon in the SEO and Internet Marketing community. Black hat SEO breaks the rules and regulations put forth by search engines. It is not worth the chance of being聽penalized聽or banned due to these tactics.

White hat SEO sticks to the guidelines and rules that were created by search engines. It is an approach that is humanized and spam free. No one likes spam. White hat SEO provides a long lasting strategy of using keywords and links that are not going to be聽recognized聽as unethical.

You want to go with a company that uses organic, white hat SEO tactics. The coding, links and content are very important and need to be unique. Not randomized information so that the search engine 鈥渟piders鈥� can see that your site is of value. Using SEO for your Internet Marketing needs is very beneficial if done right. Make sure you stay away from companies that use unethical and black hat methods of SEO. 聽Don’t believe us? Just Google “Black hat SEO JCPenney.” 聽There聽penalties聽are pretty convincing of making sure your SEO work is done the right way.

Tue, May, 2011 @ 6:34 pm
Tags: black hat, seo, trusted internet marketing, White Hat SEO
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SEO TRAINING:

The Power Of SEO Basics

Next Class: June 8th, at 5:00 pm. 聽Click HERE to register.

Today with the internet booming, it is important to get your business on the first page of search results. 聽Did you know that 99% of search engine searches never make it past the first page of results? 聽Where are you now? 聽Are you infront of the 99% or the 1%?

Class Details

- Start at 5:00 pm, end at 6:30

- Personal Q&A with Pros 6:30-7:00

- Call for any questions 623.266.2726

Some quick facts:

• Foursquare聽just reached 8 million users. These people are “checking in” to our business and telling their friends.聽 Do you know who they are? Wouldn’t you like to know?
• Facebook has more than 500 million “active” users worldwide.
• There are more than聽200 million active userscurrently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices.
• 95 Million tweets are writter per day (Sept. 2010).
• LinkedIn has crossed the 100聽 million user milestone.
• LinkedIn said that it is adding聽1 million new members each week, which equates to one new member every second!
• Over 4 million people are connected and auto-sharing to at least one social network.

What Will Be Covered:

• Understanding The Basics
• Common Terms
• Site Structure
• Keyword Research
• Competition Research
• Implimintation Strategy and Techniques
• How To Track Results

Fri, Apr, 2011 @ 5:22 pm
Tags: classes, seo, seo class, seo courses
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How To Benefit From Social Media as a Small Business

Social media can be overwhelming to say the least.聽 At first glance you will find yourself getting a headache trying to understand the jargon, the platforms, while still finding time to answer your cell phone.聽 Social media when done correctly can be very effective, but when done wrong, it鈥檚 simply just a big waste of time.聽 Below we will outline how to utilize social media effectively as a small business without the headache and wasted time.

Social media is the technology and tools people use to communicate easily via the internet or with mobile phones.聽 The most popular social media platforms are built for quick messages and chat through services like Twitter and Facebook.聽 A blog on a website is considered social media because you are able to interact with people through a comments board after the article.聽聽 Customer review sites such as Yelp.com and bookmarking sites like Delicious.com offer specific interaction between fans to rate and promote their favorites.

Small business interaction with social media is an important way to dialogue with customers and show transparency and desire for customer care.聽聽 You can easily monitor trends and what people are saying about specific services or products.聽 If you were a towing company, you might want to watch Twitter for messages using the words, broken down. In an instant you can offer your services and show your concern to help out a situation.聽 You get a new customer and when they excitedly talk about your kindness to all of their Twitter fans, you become the hero of the day.

Simply monitor what people are saying on social sites.聽 To track what people are saying, set up a Google Alert on your company name, or use some Twitter platforms like Tweetdeck to give you real time notifications.

The number one waste of time on social media is spent promoting to the wrong audience.聽 Anyone can get 鈥渇ans鈥� on Facebook or a bunch of 鈥渇ollowers鈥� on twitter.聽 Ask yourself if they truly are you ideal audience.聽 If you market more to business owners, Linkedin might work better.聽 It offers you direct contact with specific positions inside of companies.

Find your audience and interact!聽 The key is getting involved.聽 Answer questions, ask questions鈥ffer opinions.聽 When you show you care, people will want to get involved.聽 Engaging your prospects in social media can build your credibility and reach more customers.

Whatever form of social media you choose, try to add to it on a regular basis.聽 New content brings visitors back and shows transparency to new visitors.聽 Keep up the positive buzz about who you are and what you offer.

Thu, Apr, 2011 @ 11:25 pm
Tags: facebook, google alert, linkedin, seo, Social Media, Twitter
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