There are many ways to increase search engine traffic to your industrial site and there are lots of ways to convert those visitors into sales. Here are 7 great ways to get started:

• Add new content to your site once a week such as copy, pictures, or CAD drawings.
• Make it easy for your customers request a quote or contact you – make sure these links are prominent on every page of your site.
• Make sure your navigation links and other copy on your site is in text and not images
• Set your site up in Google Webmasters Tools and submit a sitemap.
• Build links to your site. Links can come from industrial directories and resellers
• Put your most important keywords are in your Title Tag
• Your navigation should run down the left side of your site and contain your keywords

If you use these tips, you’ll see more traffic from search engines, your visitors will convert better, and you can expect to see your sales increase soon!

Most people mistakenly believe that people find their site using only a handful keywords. The truth is visitors find your site using hundreds, even thousands of unique keywords every month. To illustrate this, here’s some actual keyword data from web analytics tools of our clients.

Last month, there were 3,549 keywords phrases that referred people from the search engines. The #1 keyword only referred 126 visitors, or 4%. The top 10 most popular keywords referred 691 visitors, or 19%. That means the 2,736, or 81% of the visitors came from keyword phrases that were not in the top 10.

This is because the majority of people use what is known as “long tail” searches. Long tail searches are keywords that are rarely searched for. However, they’re very important. For example, of those 3,549 keywords searched, 2,849, or 80% came from a keyword that was searched for only once. 80%!

The fastest way to optimize your site for these long tail keywords is by writing and adding more content to your site. You can do this by creating more pages or by adding more copy to your existing ones. Either way, you improve your chance to be found for those obscure keywords.

You can learn a lot about how your site and how it’s performing in the search engines through web analytics. A web analytics tool gathers information on the visitors to your website. Here’s the way it works. A small piece of code is placed on your webpage which enables the web analytics programs to capture data from the website. This information is then reported to you in a user-friendly way so it’s easy to understand. There are several metrics reported back depending on what tool you’re using, but here are some of the most common:

Unique Visitors – this is the number of people who are visiting your site.
Page Views – the amount of times your pages are seen by a visitor.
Search Engine Referrals – the number of visitors who come to your site through the search engines.
Keywords – shows you the keywords that are referring visitors to your site from the search engines.
Referring Sites – Shows you where visitors are coming besides the search engines including industrial sites like ThomasNet, Process Register, Industrial Quick Search, and MacRae’s Blue Book.

Unique Visitors is obviously the most looked at metric, but you can find useful information if you dig deeper. The keyword information in particular comes in handy for discovering what keywords are actually driving traffic to your site. In future posts, I’ll dive deeper into how use web analytics. For now, make sure you’re using some type of web analytics on your site.

Do you have any videos on your site? If so, you should submit them to YouTube. YouTube is a video sharing website where you can upload, view and share video clips. With an estimated 68 million unique visitors each month, it’s one of the most popular websites on the internet.

Don’t believe that anyone will watch your video that demonstrates your latest machinery? Think again. One our clients have a video that demonstrates how their 1700 ton press with robotic automation works. In the last 5 months this video has received over well 2,000 views!

YouTube can be a powerful tool in promoting your site. If you have videos, take a few hours and submit them or have your web developer take care of it. Here’s a link that shows you how to submit your video to YouTube. Otherwise call Ecreativeworks at 1-888-234-5071 and we’ll do it for you!

Now that you understand how Title Tags are used, it’s time to learn how they can help your rankings. The search engines use algorithms to decide how to rank pages for keyword searches. There are many criteria in the algorithms, but one of the more important ones is the Title Tag.

In short, the search engines give “credit” to your page for the keywords in the Title Tag. So it’s important to put the keywords you want to rank for in your Title Tag. Also, the words at the beginning of the title tag get more “credit” than towards the end. Here are some examples of poorly written Title Tags vs. well written ones:

Bad: Example Company, Inc.
Good: Aluminum Die Casting in Minnesota, Example Company, Inc.

Bad: Provider of Innovative Manufacturing Solutions, Example Company, Inc.
Good: Plastic Injection Molding, Molded Plastic Parts – Example Company, Inc.

Bad: Example Company, Inc. Laser Cutting
Good: Custom Laser Cutting Services by Example Company, Inc.

Research shows it’s best to keep your title to 10 words or less. Also, the words at the beginning of the title tag get more “credit” than towards the end.

Once you have the art of writing Title Tags down, you’ll see immediate results in your search engine rankings. Putting your keywords in the Title Tag does not guarantee you’ll rank at the top. However, I can guarantee you that you won’t rank at the top for competitive keywords if you don’t. Here are some more tips for writing great Title Tags:

• Keep your Title to 10 words or less.
• Put your company name at then end of the Title.
• Don’t use the same keyword more than 2 or 3 times.
• Use keywords that match each page of your site
• Every page of your site should have a unique Title

In my previous post about how to avoid duplicate content, we discussed the importance of having unique and descriptive Title Tags and Meta Descriptions on your site. Since you may not know what these are, I’m going to start with an overview of how Title Tags work.

The Title Tag is used to describe what your web page is about. More importantly, the search engines look at the words in the Title Tag to decide what your page is about. The Title Tag is not found in the copy of your website but it is found and used in two very important places. The first is in the top left corner of your web browser:

When people bookmark your site, the Title Tag is the default text. Make sure the name of your company is in your Title Tag for this reason. The other place your Title Tag is used is in the search engine results page:

See how the title from above matches up? When you write your titles you want to remember that your Title will be the link in the search engines results page. Next, I’ll show you how to write killer Title Tags to help you outrank your competition in what ever industry you’re in.

If Google thinks your site is using duplicate copy, or if another site is using the same copy as you, then there’s a chance it could hurt your site’s visibility and rankings. Here are some ways to keep this from happening.

Duplicate Manufacturer Copy: If you use online resellers to sell your industrial products, than this could affect your website. Sometimes resellers will use your copy word for word on their own websites instead of taking the time to rewrite it. Ideally Google should reward your site for the content, but this isn’t always the case. It’s possible the reseller will be given the credit and your pages will not rank.
Solution: If your resellers use your copy, they need to link back to your site from those pages. Or, make sure they only use small amounts of your copy, a paragraph at most per page

Little or No Content: If your pages only have one or two sentences different, Google may consider these pages duplicates.
Solution: Write longer descriptions for each product or service. We know in the industrial world this can be a challenge. So as a quick fix, you can write unique, descriptive title tags and meta description tags.

Printer Friendly Pages: If your site offers printer friendly pages for your industrial consumers, these will be considered duplicate content.
Solution: Ask your developer to use special tags (called no index, no follow) on your pages to tell Google to exclude these pages.

Other Issues: There are other issues that come up which are more complicated but happen less frequently. To read more about these, visit Google’s Blog.

The best way to make sure every page of your site is listed in Google is to have unique meta descriptions and titles, and at least 3 – 4 paragraphs of unique copy on every page. Exclude your printer pages and keep an eye on what your resellers are publishing on their site. If you do this, you should not fall into the duplicate content trap!

In my last 2 blog posts One Way to Build Links to your Site and Link Building: Let your Competition Lead the Way, I showed you two ways to find sites to build link from. Now it’s time to actually submit your site and start building links!

The first thing you need to do is prepare for submitting your site. There is certain information you’ll need, so in order to make the process faster it’s best to create and put all that information in one place. This way you can copy and paste it every time instead of typing the same thing over and over and having to create it on the fly.

Open up a new Excel spreadsheet. On the left column list these fields: URL, Email, Title 1, Title 2, Title 3, Description 1, Description 2, Keywords, User/Pass, Address, Phone

The URL, the address and phone of your site are easy. For the email address, make sure you give a valid email address that your check on a regular basis. Some sites will not include yours without a reply back. Also, some will send a reply once you site is listed.

You will notice there are 3 spots for title, this is because some sites will allow you to use keywords, some will not. So in Title 1, enter in the official name of your website only. On Title 2 and 3, enter in the official name but also add in a few keywords. When you submit your site pay attention to whether you have to use only the title of your site. It will be clearly stated somewhere if you do. If not, pick one of your titles with keywords to use. If you’re submitting to lots of sites, change up the keywords as you move along.

There are 2 spots for the description. You want to write a short one and a long one because many sites have a limit to the amount of characters you can or have to use. For the short, write a couple sentences briefly describing your site. For the long one, write 3 or 4. I suggest using some copy from home page to write your description. There a couple of rules to make sure you follow:
1. Do not use words like “best”, “greatest”, “#1” or your site will not be included. I suggest using some copy from home page to write this.
2. Do not use the title of your website again in the description.

There are 2 spots for the description. You want to write a short one and a long one because many sites have a limit to the amount of characters you can or have to use. For the short, write a couple sentences briefly describing your site. For the long one, write 3 or 4. I suggest using some copy from home page to write your description. There a couple of rules to make sure you follow:

Next, go to a new worksheet in you excel spreadsheet, or just create a whole new one. Across the top, you want to add the following: Website, Submitted, Added, User/Pass, and Notes. Next, copy and paste links to all the sites you gathered in the left column. When you submit your site make sure to enter the date, user/pass if needed, and any notes about the site that you want. Here’s what this spreadsheet will look like:

Now here’s the toughest part – waiting! Some sites will add your link within days, some may take weeks or months and some may never include it. Follow up once a month to see if your site has been added, but don’t obsess over it. Or an easier way to follow your links is by setting up a Google Webmasters Tool.

In Part Two of the Usability and SEO series, I talked about using a tried and true graphic and web design practice called ‘designing above the fold’ to enhance your search engine optimization and increase your conversions.

Next, let’s talk about our third and final installment of this series: using hot hyperlinking techniques to grab visitor attention, increase conversions, and increase search engine rankings!

Back in the olden days of search engine optimization, generally ‘on page’ factors were the only important considerations in search engine placement. This includes the use and placement of keywords throughout the content, placement and structure of headers and subheaders, etc. Basically, what you see ‘on the page’.

Later, as search engines became more sophisticated and discerning in their standards for placement of sites and site content, the structure of internal links became one of the key factors in evaluating a site for placement.

Hot Hyperlinking Techniques

It is essential nowadays for a website to combine on-page design factors and internal linking to achieve top search engine and page rankings. Including keywords in your content will certainly get attention, but making a piece of text into a hyperlink to another page on the site that contains an important keyword–now that’s hot! Not only is usability increased, the search engine sees a viable internal link with a well-placed keyword.

This is also critical to consider when including those all-important calls to action at the bottom of your page content. For example, you want to wrap up a page with a strong internal link and call to action. Your text might read, “We also provide hydraulic aluminum widgets and monkey wrenches. Contact us today! Let us assist you with your widget and wrench needs”.

Not bad! You’ve combined ‘on page’ keyword saturation with a strong internal link AND a call to action! That’s a lot of work from two sentences. Not only does the search engine find your page interesting and placement-worthy, you also guide your visitor in making contact. Welcome to a successful conversion!

Keep in mind–slapping a load of hyperlinks all over a page can be distracting to a visitor and end up hurting your cause. They will have difficulty making sense of all the links, become frustrated, and go to your competitor’s website. No good! Moderation is key. If there is a strong and unique link opportunity, make the best of it, but avoid six links that go to the same page.

Thank you for reading this series on three hot tips for SEO and increasing conversions. You’re hot to trot, now!

We discussed one way to build links to your site last week. Here’s another way for you to find sites that will link to you. Once again, get your trusty xcel spreadsheet handy to take notes. You’re going to use the same list of keywords you created from before, but this time just pick your top 3 - 5 most important keywords.

1. Go to Google and do a search for the first keyword. Look at the results and try to find your competition.

2. Next, copy and paste their urls (domain names) into your excel sheet. Make sure to only pick sites that are your direct competition. If you’re a sheet metal fabricator, pick sites that also specialize in sheet metal fabrication. Do not pick any information sites like Wikipedia, which only talk about what sheet metal fabrication is.

3. Next, you want to head over to Yahoo. You’re going to do a “back link check” on your competition. (The reason you need to use Yahoo is because Google won’t display all the back links.) Go to your spreadsheet and pick the first url from your competitor. I’ll use the Ecreativeworks site as an example. You want to type in “link:” then copy and paste the url, in this case http://www.ecreativeworks.com right next to it. It should look like this:

Then click “web search” on Yahoo. What you’ll get is a list of all the sites that are linking to your competitor’s site.

4. Now here comes the work! You need visit each site and decide if they are sites that you potentially would want a back link from. Don’t spend much time on each site, just copy and paste the link into your excel sheet for now. You want to compile the list of sites first, then research the sites when you are all done. Once you’ve gone through all the sites linking to the first site, you can start over again in Google with another keyword. Sometimes you get lucky on the first try and find a lot of great sites. Other times you may have to look through more.

5. When your list is complete, it’s time to look at all the sites you listed. When you visit each site, look at the bottom or very top of the page for links that will show you how to submit your site. These links are often called “Add URL”, “Submit your Site”, “Add a Link”, “Advertise with Us”. Many of these sites will charge your money to get links, but you should also find sites that offer free links.

Now you need to actually submit your site! In my next post, I’ll discuss ways to speed up the process of submitting your site.