Jeg har skrevet en blogg om hvorfor SEO og UX må jobbe sammen. Den prøver å illustrere hvordan SEO-tankegang kan være med å gjøre UX-prosjekter bedre om en kommer til 1st base litt kjapt.
Les den på 3min.io:
Hvorfor din neste forelskelse bør være en SEOer
Ikke vær så forbanna ivrig hele tiden!
Jeg skjønner at det er fristende å komme i gang med annonsering, og at dere trenger trafikk, men løsningen er ikke å bruke en haug med penger i Google Adwords.
Dere må ha et fornuftig sted å sende trafikken, ellers kommer dere bare til å bruke penger på å irritere en hel haug av potensielle kunder.
Lag landingssider som
Med kjøpsprosess her mener jeg ikke at dere trenger å ha en «bestill nå» knapp, men dere må ha en mulighet for å fortsette samtalen med den potensielle kunden.
PS: Jeg husker ikke hvor jeg har stjålet den illustrasjonen fra. Har ligget på desktoppen min i åresvis. Kan det være fra Steve Krugs brilliante «Don’t Make Me Think»?
Det kan høres ut som et paradoks, men faktum er at når vi får et hinder i veien så begynner hjernen å løse problemet. Tenk MacGyver. Begrensingene tvinger deg til å se utenfor de vanlige tankebanene og åpner dermed for nye, innovative løsninger..
Ofte skjer dette i form av ulykker og ressursmangel. Nød lærer naken…o sv. Men vi kan også tvinge oss inn i “constraintsene” av fri vilje:
Poenget er å gi deg og dine et problem å løse. Det er nemlig slik hjernen funker. Den løser problemer.
Brain sees problem – Brain solves problem -Tegning av Sean d’Souza
En nyttig standardsetning i kreative prosesser kan derfor være “Hvordan [sett inn problem/oppgave] uten å bruke [sett inn den vanlige metoden/verktøyet du pleier å bruke]?”
Her er et eksempel:
Denne geniale og svært berusede franskmannen har vært utsatt for creative constraints og funnet svaret. Du bruker skoa!
All markedsføring (og det meste annet i livet) handler om å «get the basics right».
Det er garantert flere ting du kan sette opp som en liste over basic marketing. Gjør gjerne det og sørg for at du har alt det under kontroll. Creative constraints kommer i spill når du har alt det grunnleggende på plass og sliter med å komme videre i utvikling av nytt content og nye konsepter.
Da kan en begynne å lage seg litt problemer og tvinge frem kreativiteten.
Hvilke “constraints” mener du kan være nyttige når en driver med innholdsutvikling?
Denne posten bygger på en artikkel jeg skrev på gode gamle Kuttisme i 2009.
Mange kunder jeg jobber med bruker mye tid og penger på merkevarebygging, men ofte ser jeg at de glemmer å gjøre de tingene som ikke koster penger.
De har gjerne en Facebookside og en twitterkonto, men så stopper det. Og det er kanskje greit nok.
Problemet er bare at om ett år eller to så har dere kanskje produsert noe materiale som burde vært tilgjengelig på plattformer som YouTube, Vimeo, Slideshare, Flickr, LinkedIn eller noe annet, og så er det en annen som sitter på merkenavnet ditt der.
Derfor oppfordrer jeg til å opprette profiler på alle potensielle plattformer for å være rustet den gangen du trenger dem. SPESIELT PÅ YOUTUBE, fordi videoinnhold blir viktigere og viktigere, og du BØR begynne å lage det!
«Men, vi har ikke noen videoer. Hva i all verden skal vi legge ut på YouTube?»
Vanlig problem.
Men det er veldig enkelt å lage en video. Du kan filme den med mobilen om du vil, men det enkleste er å ta en Powerpoint-fil og lagre den som video.
De fleste virksomheter har en enkel firmapresentasjon eller en slags salgspresentasjon som er like grei på film som på slides.
Her er et eksempel fra Troll Forsikring (kunde).
Troll Forsikring – Enkel Presentasjon av ledelse og eiere
Den er helt grei. Ikke noe mer. Men da har vi i alle fall sikret at merkenavnet er representert på verdens nest største søkemotor (YouTube), og vi risikerer ikke at en eller annen luring hijacker merkevaren.
Copybloggers egen blogg er så bra at du får lyst til å elske med den. Det er litt vanskelig, men det er lov å prøve. Meld deg i alle fall på nyhetsbrevet deres. Det er kjærlighet det også.
Her er deres fantastiske infografikk om bloggskriving:
![11 Essential Ingredients Every Blog Post Needs [Infographic]](https://copyblogger.com/cdn-origin/images/650/essential-blog-post-ingredients-infographic.jpg "11 Essential Ingredients Every Blog Post Needs [Infographic]")
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Jeg satt og så den aldeles glitrende Ole Brumm sammen med min 5 år gamle datter da det plutselig dukket opp 2 lærdommer som jeg syns alle som skriver bør få med seg.
Her er den engelske versjonen:
Heldigvis er det lenger og lenger mellom hver gang en møter svære tekstblokker på nett, men på intranett, i presentasjoner og i dokumenter som skrives og leses på skjerm syndes det ennå.
Derfor bør vi høre litt på AA Milne og hans lille bjørn:
«A paragraph is a group of sentences that form a complete thought.»
«Et avsnitt er en gruppe setninger som former en komplett tanke.»
En tanke.
Ikke to.
Eller tre.
En!
Tenk derfor på Ole Brumm neste gang du skriver eller ser igjennom en tekst. Inneholder avsnittet ditt mer enn én ide? Mer enn én tanke? Da er det på plass med noen linjeskift og litt luft så lesernes hjerne kan bearbeide den første tanken og forberede seg på den neste.
Akkurat som Brumm er dine lesere på jakt etter noe de liker. De skanner teksten, og overskrifter og mellomoverskrifter er hjelpemidlene for å bestemme om dette er noe å lese eller om en skal finne tilbake-knappen og se hva Google eller Facebook kan tilby.
Vi må bruke mer tid på overskriftene.
“On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar.”
– David Ogilvy
Klarer ikke overskriftene dine formidle at det er honning å finne så vil ikke travle bjørner ta seg bryet med å lese. Derfor må du legge mer kreativitet og mer arbeid i overskriftene.
Mine beste tips til bedre overskrifter?
Hva er dine beste triks?
Titteltaggen og metabeskrivelsen er det eneste som står mellom dem som googler og din nettside. Hvordan skal du formulere deg for å sikre at brukerne velger din oppføring slik at de velger din oppføring og ikke klikker over eller under og går inn i evig fortapelse?
Titteltaggen er det viktigste ranking-elementet på siden din. Hvis du ønsker å bli nummer 1 i Google for ordet ”webstrategi” eller ”Reise til Cuba” så må du bruke det i tittelen.
Eyetrackingstudier viser også at vi skummer søkeresultatsider (SERP – Search Engine Result Page). Tommelfingerregelen er derfor å ha søkeordet/triggerordet først i tittelen. Men dette er noe som bør testes. Ta også hensyn til hvordan de andre oppføringene i SERPet ser ut.
Metabeskrivelsen har ingen påvirkning på ranking, men en god metabeskrivelse vil kunne påvirke click-through og bounce rate.
Skurken Walter Donovan tenker at drikkebegeret til Jesus må være storslagent og forgylt, men blir brutalt redusert til aske når han tar en slurk av det. ”He chose … poorly” sier korsfarer-vakten lakonisk.
La Donovans skjebne være en reminder om at titteltaggen og metabeskivelsen ikke er reklame. Vær veldig forsiktig med å smøre på med adjektiver og salgsbudskap.
Tittel og meta skal selge siden du sender dem til, ikke produktet eller tjenesten på siden. Du skal hjelpe folk å velge riktig link ved å gi en korrekt beskrivelse av siden som frister folk til å klikke. ”Dette er det du finner/kan gjøre om du klikker på denne linken”.
Jeg gjentar: Tittel og meta har som oppgave å gi et riktig bilde av siden du vil hente folk til. Overselger du risikerer du at de bare hopper rett ut igjen.
Atferdspsykologi har nøkkelen
For at noen skal utføre en atferd er det i følge verdens ledende ekspert på atferdspsykologi – BJ Fogg – 3 ting som må være på plass: Vi må ha motivasjon, evne og en trigger.
Eller for å si det på en annen måte: Vi må ville det, forstå hvordan vi skal gjøre det og vi må trigges til å gjøre det NÅ.
Tenk på tittel og meta som en trigger. Vi skal trigge folk til å klikke. Hvordan triggere utformes varierer med motivasjonsnivå og evne.
Så hvordan er atferdspsykologien i et søk?
Motivasjon og evne vil variere, men vi kan anta at det er en viss grad av motivasjon tilstede. Ellers ville en aldri ha googlet.
Vi kan også anta at det ofte er litt mindre evne tilstede. Hvis evnen var 100% hadde de ikke trengt å gjøre ett søk.
Min påstand: Flere bør utforme titteltagg og metabeskrivelse som en fasilitator-trigger. Eller en guide om en er kjent med skill-will matrisen.
Alt for mange behandler tittel og meta som en skrikende reklameplakat når de egentlig burde se på det som en enkel bruksanvisning. Bruk Adwords til reklamebudskapet og la din organiske oppføring i søkeresultatet virkelig stå for den siden du sender folk til.
I Indiana Jones og det siste korstog definerte Walter Donovan Jesus som ”The Son of God” og valgte et storslagent drikkebeger av gull, mens arkeologen Jones ga han personaen ”son of a carpenter” og valgte – helt riktig – et enkelt trebeger.
Personas er en måte å personliggjøre segmenteringen din, slik at den blir enklere å forholde seg til for dem som lager innhold. Rett å slett og samle de store kunde-/brukergruppene i en fiktiv person eller arketype. UX-folk bruker det til å kvalitetssikre at de lager nettsider for målgruppen og ikke for seg selv.
Det mange glemmer er at UX, eller brukeropplevelse som det heter på norsk, starter i søkeresultatet med en tittel og metabeskrivelse som appellerer til din valgte målgruppe. Du må trigge folk og du må trigge de folkene du ønsker og trigge. Ved å bruke personas blir den jobben mye enklere.
Personas kan en bruke uker og måneder på å definere, men på samme måte som Indiana Jones trenger du ikke alltid en helt 100% gjennomarbeidet personas for å skrive tittel og meta, men du kan tenke over noen av disse elementene:
Kjønn og aldersgruppe: Dette vil hjelpe deg å finne riktig tone
Motivasjon/mål med besøket: Hvor er de i kjøpsprosessen? Hva er de ute etter? Kjøp? Oversikt? Inspirasjon? Priser? Kunnskap? Dette vil gi deg gode setninger å bruke i metabeskrivelsen.
Evne/Kunnskapsnivå: Snakker du til eksperter som om de var nybegynnere mister de tillit og gidder IKKE å klikke på linken din. Og bruker du fagsjargong til nybegynnere så skjønner de deg ikke..
Choose wisely.
PS: Les gjerne DIY User Personas for en dypere forståelse av personas og besøk http://www.behaviormodel.org/ for å lære mer om atferdspsykologi.
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By Kåre Garnes – @kaaregarnes
Ever wondered how much longer it will be before your SEO efforts are yielding results?
So was a client of mine, frustrated by seeing only minor improvements three months in. Knowing he’s an avid fan of aussie rockers AC/DC, I ditched the standard explanation of all the variables that affect rankings and how “SEO is a long term strategy” and blah blah – and instead I quoted Bon Scott to him:
It’s a long way to the top (if you wanna rock’n’roll)
Inspired by his positive reaction I dug deeper into my collection of hard rock and metal to see if there were further teachings to be found and shared.
There was.
(You will find a link to all the music at the bottom of this post.)
Maiden‘s classic number points to one of the most important and often overlooked SEO factors: A good name.
Your brand or company name can be a free ride into SEO happiness. Choose a name with your location and keyword in it, like “Oslo SEO” or “Hotel California” and your natural URLs, title tags and incoming links will automatically give you an advantage.
This requires only a willingness to be a bit boring when choosing a name …
Norwegian denim-rockers Turbonegro weren´t talking about title tags and meta descriptions when they wrote this deathpunk anthem, but few bands know more about image and presentation than these underground favourites.
Remember that SEO is not about getting to the top of the rankings, but to get the users interacting and buying. How you look on the Search Engine Result Page determines how successful you are.
That process starts with what’s inside your head-tag. So put some work into making good titles and meta descriptions.
Not only does this song have one of the best basslines in history, it also hints to one of the easiest ways of getting links; Asking your suppliers, customers, partners, employees and other´s whom you already have an established relationship to link to you. Ask and you shall receive.
Pick up the phone or shoot them an email: Learn the lovercall, baby.
(According to Moz the number 1 and 2 ranking factors are incoming links.)
Doing white hat SEO takes time, especially if competition is strong. And when you´ve done all you can and rankings don´t seem to move, this absolute legend of a song can provide some consolation.
It´s a long way to the top.
Google Panda, Google Hummingbird, Google +, Google Places, Google This, Google That.
The only thing certain in the world of search engine optimization is that there will be changes and new stuff you have to learn and employ. SEO means staying updated and agile.
Or as singer Rob Halford puts it in this megahit: it’s a case of do or die. You got another thing coming.
Should Black hat seo be feared?
Employing it can potentially put you out of business if Google find out (and does something about it), so yes. Be sceptical about black hat techniques.
However, don’t be so afraid that you don’t dare getting to know it. You should know your enemy. There might be techniques there that can also be employed ethically.
SEO is not about rankings, but about getting searchers to find your content and do what you want them to do, whether it is to buy, download, like or read.
If you have content that is not doing this, listen to these fine female rockers advice: Take it off!
Rule of thumb: Anything that doesn´t contribute to you reaching your goals, ACTIVELY contributes to you NOT reaching them.
Speed is an important factor for Google – and for users! Google openly states that their main goal is to get people the info they want as fast as possible.
This means not only making sure your load time is superfast, it also means that you should use rich snippets to allow google to put you right on the SERP. (Disclaimer: If your business is clicks: Think twice before using rich snippets)
Troublegum might be the most underrated album in the history of music and in SEO context it gives a number of valuable lessons.
The first is about linkbuilding. Some think you can do SEO without linkbuilding and if you a unice offer and an abundance of creative resources at hand you might. But a competitor with the same resources and a willingness to suffer through linkbuilding will outrank you.
You cannot be an SEO savior without the suffering.
Troublegum´s second lesson is that SEO is about not about rankings, but conversions, and you will never get any unless you have a “trigger inside”.
You need something that makes people take action. This includes urgency factors, uniqueness and simply being clear about what you want people to do.
Without triggers, people will procrastrinate.
This amazing Peter Green classic – done even more amazingly by Priest – has a fantastic line about user experience:
“You come creeping around, making me do things I don´t wanna do”
With Panda the user experience has – thankfully – become an important factor for search rankings, and we need to make sure we don´t mess up the user experience by having flash intro’s, uneccesary form fields and having users jump through hoops to get where they want.
Linkbaiting is a fantastic tactic, but often companies never get around to this as they think it’s about creating “viral” videos.
It´s not. It’s about giving people tools, infographics, videos etc. = content they need in a format they want. Throw them a bone and links will follow.
Isn’t it amazing how many songs AC/DC have made about SEO? In this 1980 classic they explore the concept of freemium.
The idea that people will like you better if you give them free alcohol is easy to understand, and if you have ever engaged in this activity at your local you might also have noticed that people tend to buy you alcohol back – and throw in a shot. (more on alcohol here)
In the SEO world this translates into you giving away something of value, like a report, a tool, knowledge – and people will say thank you in form of links, PR, social shares etc.
Free alcohol is a brilliant strategy to gather a huge following.
As stated earlier, SEO is about conversions and the conversions are more likely found in the long tail. Trick is to find keywords with good traffic and low competion. So do proper keyword research and find those diamonds in the rough.
The first song thrash gods Slayer ever recorded teaches us to always be testing – and to appreciate good guitar work!
Thing is, to really succeed online is to always be looking for that little something that increases conversions. Be an aggresive perfector.
Remember: The most important teaching to take away from the distinguished gentlemen and women of hard rock and metal is – of course – to:
Please leave a comment with – or without – your favourite metal song with SEO connotations before you head over to youtube to listen through all the wonderful songs above on my SEO Metal playlist. (play all – opens in new tab)
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I love beer.
And wine.
And cocktails. And whisky. And … I could go on, but you get the point. Drinking with friends is a favourite activity for a lot of us.
But have we learnt anything about marketing from all that time spent in bars and at parties?
I have. Or at least I think I have:
Being from Norway where a beer sets you back 10 dollars in most bars, an open bar is the most tempting thing in the world. Free alcohol is popular anywhere, but inexperienced drinkers everywhere have a tendency to go ape, drink with both hands and ruin the party for the rest of us.
A lot of internet marketers do the same when they find “free marketing space”. We’ve seen this in social media, and on email as well. Companies overdo the marketing and ruin the whole thing.
If I had a drink for every so called “newsletter” I get that is nothing more than a sales pitch in disguise, I’ld be Charlie Sheen by 10am every single day.
And don´t get me started on Facebook and Twitter… full of “Look at me!”-marketing.
Don´t get me wrong: It’s OK to do marketing in social media and in newsletters, but you have to do it with moderation or you´ll ruin it for yourself and possibly everyone else.
Some of the best beers in the world are made within the walls of Trappist monasteries by munks who devote their lives to prayer – and the noble craft of brewing.
These munks do – contrary to common belief – not live in total silence. However: they speak only when necessary and take great pride in communicating as effectively as possible. By minimising distractions they can focus on the quality of their work and their quest to receive and exercise the will of God..
Think of the trappists when designing websites. Stop giving 14 call to actions on every page, stop asking for unnecessary info in sign-up forms and stop the marketing fluffy fluff happytalk!
Instead think of how you can install more silence to your website. What can you remove to make your communication more effective?
Who leaves the party early? Bores and people who are not really interested in being there.
Stamina is important whatever you do, and if you really want to succeed – especially in marketing segments like brand building or SEO – you have to stick with it. I´m all for flexibility and speed of change but if you’re leaving too early you´ll miss the fun.
There is a limit to how long you should stick to it if it’s not yielding results. Know when to cut your losses and look elsewhere.
My wife has the terrible habit of ordering drinks with fancy names. “Hawaiian Honeymoon Hoedown”, “Blue Elephant tail”, “Cinnamon Tropic Infusion” …. Sound interesting, but they all taste like shit and coconuts.
I constantly tell her that the mixing of drinks is an age-old craft, people have tried mixing alcohol with all other consumable products for centuries. The good drinks are all invented, and given names like “White Russian”, “Mojito”, “Caipirinha”, “Martini” and what have you. Names we know and love.
My point is that if some media (especially catalogue) salesman pitches you a fantastic sounding concept – and you’ve never heard of it – it’s probably not worth it.
Internet marketing is a younger craft than the consumption of alcohol, so there are exeptions. Ask for a free taster.
*For worried Scandinavians: I always end up drinking the her drinks for her. (Wasting alcohol is not an option for us up north).
When asked for recommendations on “a good drink”, the best bartenders will always reply with something along this line: “Do you like them sweet or sour?”
Good bartenders know segmentation and tailoring to customer needs. They find the drink that suits you, not the drink that suits them.
Being interested about what the customer actually wants is a very profitable habit.
Drinking and raising hell is a very important factor in growing up and evolving as a human beeing. You have to test limits and boundaries and find out where you fit in.
A lot of marketers – especially consultants – are far too afraid to offend managers to get real results. They compromise and never try new stuff as they are too scared of failing. We need to be braver.
PS: If you wanna get to heaven (you gotta raise a little hell) is also a fantastic song by cowpunk outfit Nine Pound Hammer.
Buy someone a beer, and they will buy you a beer back. And throw in a shot! or a Fernet.
The concept of freemium is well established in the software business, as it is in the “first fix free” drug dealing business, but can it work for everybody? You bet – just look at the rise of content marketing – it is built around giving out knowledge. And nobody knows your business more than you – so start a blog, write a whitepaper or a presentation.
Point is: Giving is a great way to build trust and start a relationship. Give the idea – sell the system.
I remember buying a round of jello shots to a group of Dutch and South African backpackers in Ios, Greece. Turned out one of the best nights out ever. I was getting free drinks left and right. Still email them once in a while. But that night also taught me:
I love competition, but some battles you just can’t win. In search, small boutique hotels could never outrank sites like hotels.com or the big hotel chains for high volume searches in Google. And they could never match their PPC or display ad budgets.
So … am I saying they should just give up?
No. But we have to be smart on where we choose to compete. If we can find longtail phrases and get a result, thats great! Can we tell better stories than our competitors, fantastic! And for a small boutique hotel there´s Tripadvisor where size doesn´t matter.
Over time too much alcohol will kill you, and it’s the same with marketing. If you send emails too often, people will ignore them. If you over-SEO your website, Google will throw you out. If you have too many call to actions on your site people will choose the wrong one or give up choosing.
For the PPC-lovers: A friend of mine was doing PPC for a company that’s in the kid’s birthdays business. So he used adwords keyword tool to generate hundreds of varieties around the term “birthday” and thought “I’ll just select all, throw them in there and see what works.” What he forgot was that he had dynamic keyword insertion in his ads – so some of them read: “Hitler’s Birthday: Celebrate it at [Client’s Brand]“..
Market responsively!
Bartending is a craft, not an art. They use measuring tools to get their mix right.
We still come across huge companies that are not using analytics. Who don’t know which part of their online marketing works, or how the different tactics play together. Who have no idea which terms they are findable for and who even run PPC campaigns without knowing which terms or ads are driving conversions.
Use analytics or you’ll end up with a marketing mix that is either too sweet or to sour – if drinkable at all!
Nothing beats a good Irish Coffee on cold winter nights, but ordering this drink is always done with a bit of fear. Are you getting the delightful smooth coffee drink, or are you getting the awful prefab aerosol cream version that goes flat after 30 seconds?
Stockphotoes are the aerosol cream of internet.
Men in suits shaking hands? Politically correct/Ethnical diverse workgroups discussing graphs? Older boss younger employee laughing and pointing at computer screens? Stockphotoes do the same to your website as prefab cream does to Irish Coffee: Makes it bland and tasteless!
I’m all for being as effective and to the point as possible. A lot of companies overdesign and overemotionalize their marketing when what they really need to do is just say “This is the product. Here´s what it does for you. Click here to buy”.
Simple.
However, some go full monty – and though effective for some time, the overly simple websites become boring. You have to add some ice, some coolness, to keep people coming back.
Ever had a brew in your hand and no opener in sight? I know about 50 ways to open a beer without a bottle opener. I can use teeth, shoes, lighters, knives, spoons, another bottle, belts, iphones … well, I stopped myself that time, but the point is:
When you remove the tool you normally use – it forces you to be creative.
So think: How would you do marketing if you had no money? Or if you had no website? or if…
Sorry about the expletives, but if you haven’t heard Nouvelle Vagues version of Dead Kennedys’ punk anthem “Too drunk to fuck” you seriously need to reconsider your musical priorities. It is a thing of beauty.
Some of us have experienced this side effect of too much drink – and as marketers we need to take heed: Sometimes we are too much in love with our marketing that we forget about the end product.
There are many negative effects of drinking too much, and blackouts are one of them.
One of the greatest sins in marketing is that we stop doing the stuff that works, we forget doing what we were doing when we’re successful as we chase the next big idea. We just ride the wave. And then jump on the next one. And the next one. And the next one. (Watch the movie “Hangover” for more description on this issue.)
And then: In our quest for new and improved ROI we stop doing the stuff that got us in a position to try all this new stuff.
In my work I’ve come across people who stopped:
Sometimes the new stuff more then compensate for “the old boring stuff”, but sometimes new stuff proves to be something that just work in a little window of time, and then you sit there panicking.
Should you find yourself in this situation, ask yourself — what did we do differently last year? Or five years ago? Why did we stop? What has changed?
If you are new in the organization ask the senior people – and do not limit yourself to senior marketing people or executives – you’ll get the best reality checks from people in the warehouse, on customer service or my favourite: Economy seniors. (They usually stay at firms for long periods, keep their eyes on the numbers, and get the job on analyzing stuff that doen’t work!) These people can tell you what has worked well in the past, as well as explain why you stopped. Listen to them, they are sober friends the morning after.
These people in some way or another inspired these lessons and/or deserve a thank you:
Leave a comment here or invite me over for drinks at @kaaregarnes
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