The Week in Review

DIY Keyword Research

DIY keyword research can be fun. Using dog collars as an example, here’s a rundown of basic research using Google AdWords Keyword Tool, Google Trends and Wordtracker; keyword variations and long tail; and vertical search. (Search Engine People)

25 Tips for Giving Your PPC Campaigns a Boost

To maximize ROI and minimize risk for paid-search advertising, follow these 25 tips. Among them are to know your sector, know your target CPA, tweak your titles and find negative keywords via social media monitoring. (Search Engine Watch)

About Half of Google Users Click on an Organic Search Result on Page One

According to a study from Slingshot SEO, only 52 percent of Google users click on an organic search result found on page one, while only 26 percent of Bing users do the same. A No. 1 ranking on Google gets a click-through rate of 18 percent. (Search Engine Land)

20 Key Performance Indicators to Monitor in Google Analytics

A key performance indicator (KPI) is "a set of measurements reflecting the performance or success of an organization in terms of progress of its goals." Here’s a list of 20 KPIs to track in Google Analytics, broken down into five categories: 1) general KPIs about the website, 2) visibility KPIs, 3) interaction KPIs, 4) transactional KPIs and 5) geo-targeting KPIs. (Web SEO Analytics)

Check My Links: A Dreamy Chrome Extension for Link Builders

Check My Links is a Chrome extension that "will become your best friend for building some of the top links on the web for multiple reasons." Here’s how to build links by finding broken ones using Check My Links: 1) direct find and replace, 2) content replacement, and 3) broken blogger blogs. (SEOmoz)

The New Lead-Generation Trio

The lead-generation trio used to be some combination of advertising, public relations and referrals. Now, with the altered online and social landscape, the lead-generation trio is advertising, SEO and social media. (Duct Tape Marketing)

5 Essential Social Media Writing Guidelines

Social media is a big part of online marketing strategies, and having managed, well-written content is important. Here are five guidelines for social media writing: 1) conduct detailed research to know your audience, 2) write for your reader, 3) write for the medium, 4) have personality and 5) get feedback. (DreamGrow)

Social Advertising

This infographic using data from Pivot offers a glimpse into social advertising — what companies think of it, how they’re using it and how well it’s working. Included are that 11 percent of responding companies are "very satisfied" with social advertising, Facebook is the social platform of choice for social advertising and 17 percent of companies aim to build brand awareness through social advertising. (Flowtown)

What PPC Managers Should Know About SEO

"Every PPC Manager should know a few things about SEO to round off his portfolio and know what all the SEO guys are talking about." PPC managers should know the various pros and cons that come with each SEO tool; know that some strategies focus on budget while others focus on hard work; and choose the right killer SEO technique for them. (PPC Hero)

Integrating SEO and PPC: 3 Areas to Explore

SEO and PPC should inform each other, that much is clear. The notion that they should reinforce one another is a trickier nut to crack. Here are three (of many) scenarios where SEO and PPC touch: 1) landing-page snippet text in PPC ad copy, 2) focusing on competitive search and 3) understanding traffic value. (Search Engine Watch)

Comments up 21% After Facebook’s New Hybrid News Feed

According to EdgeRank Checker, after the first two weeks of Facebook’s new hybrid News Feed, impressions were down 25.15 percent, while “likes” rose 9.43 percent and comments surged 2.15 percent. “Personally, we believe that EdgeRank has been made more focused. This will add additional pressure to Facebook Pages to truly create engaging content to expand their reach. We also do expect the impressions to Increase, although the percentage may never return to previous levels.” (EdgeRank Checker)

How to Take Your Keyword Research to a Higher Level

Keywords are the foundation of SEO, and quality keyword research takes time and investment. For improved keyword research, be sure to: study the topic, study marketplace competitors, write down seed words, use multiple keyword tools, review ranking competitors and revisit keyword tools. Then it’s off to keyword selection, keyword tracking, the long tail and keyword assignment. (Search Engine Land)

Harnessing the Power of Google Insights for Search

Google Insights for Search is a useful tool for trend data. To start, understand what the data does and doesn’t show. Understanding year-over-year performance changes, using competitive insights, conducting offline media tests and lift assessment are ways to use the data to help your business. (RKGBlog)

5 Social Media Analytics Tools to Check out

Social media analytics tools can help you know if your social media tactics are working, if you’re getting more traffic on Twitter or Facebook, at what times, and from whom. Radian6, Spredfast, Simply Measured, Crimson Hexagon and Sysomos are five tools to check out. (Search Engine People)

3 Tested Email Marketing Templates to Use

The art of email marketing is being able to write messages that are interesting content and persuasive sales pitches. Sadly, most emails are one or the other, but not both. Here are three email marketing templates to help you: 1) the story email, 2) the historical solution email and 3) the credible testimonial email. (Copyblogger)

When Should You Pause Google AdWords Keywords?

Here’s an overview of two major examples of keywords you’d be wise to pause, along with some words of warning for this decision. The two instances are: 1) keywords that spend money but don’t convert; and 2) keywords that don’t spend much, don’t convert and have low quality scores. (WordStream)

4 SEO Tips to Get Your Site Ready for 2012

Since SEO is a long-term endeavor, it’s a good idea to start thinking about your 2012 campaign now. Here are four things to do to prepare for next year: 1) revisit your keyword research, 2) update your website content, 3) brainstorm blog/article topics and 4) run a link audit. (Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Journal)

How to Use Guest Blogging for Effective Link Building

Here’s step-by-step plan for using guest blogging for building links: 1) research guest-blogging opportunities, 2) brainstorm blog topic ideas, 3) reach out to blog owners, 4) write and optimize your guest posts, and 5) track and measure the results of your link-building efforts. (HubSpot)

Do You Expect Social Media to Do Too Much for Your SEO Rankings?

There’s plenty of chatter about how social media has altered the SEO landscape. But Wil Reynolds, founder of SEER Interactive, has a strong message for you: the firestorm surrounding social media’s direct impact on search engine rankings needs to be tempered. He makes the case for why with some hard evidence. (ZDNet)

How and Why Long-Term SEO Works

SEO strategies can be dumped into three chronological buckets: short-term (focuses on the here and now), mid-term (projects short-term SEO six months into the future) and long-term (looks at least two years down the road). "Long-term SEO drives a Website toward the future by creating value that people will want to search for regardless of what the search engine algorithms are doing to low-value content." (SEO Theory)

8 Ways to Hurt Your SEO Objectives

Here’s a look at eight blunders that can dent your SEO objectives: 1) not updating content; 2) repetitive content; 3) giving the impression of over-optimization; 4) bad linking and URLs; 5) too much imagery; 6) using software programs in automating directory submission; 7) duplicate titles and meta descriptions throughout the site; and 8) too much spam. (Bloggertone)

The 10 Forbidden Rules of Link Building

The golden rule for link building is simply to make it look natural. On the flip side, here are 10 mistakes that go against that simple principle. Among them are getting too many links too quickly, lacking deep links and begging for links. (MachoArts)

The 7 Principles of Bulk Outreach for Link Building

Here are seven principles of bulk outreach for building links: 1) think like an email marketer; 2) search for and scrape lists of websites; 3) create offers that work at scale; 4) write powerful pitch templates; 5) simplify your prospect offers; 6) simplify your campaign success metrics; and 7) learn about CAN-SPAM. (Search Engine Watch)

How to Estimate Your Social Media Return on Investment

Social media return and ROI are helpful for comparing the efficiency of marketing campaigns, negotiating budgets with management, landing and retaining clients, and analyzing and optimizing current and future campaigns. To estimate social media return and ROI, start by defining your social media goal, defining your social media return based on that goal and define how you’ll tie hard dollars to the social media return. This post walks through social media ROI on sales, consumer insights and customer support. (Social Media Examiner)

A Comprehensive Guide to Local SEO

The original title of this post is "Local SEO: The Only Guide You Need." While you can be the judge of how accurate that is, this post does offer an in-depth rundown of local SEO. It includes discussions of the difference between a normal search and a local search, why you should care about local SEO, and how to get to the top of Google Places listings, among many, many other subjects. (Wilson Usman)