Screen Capturing the SERPs

If you are an SEO writer, it can help to keep track of your wins. One way I do this is by taking screen captures of some rankings in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs).

The SERPs change all the time. In the case of Google, there are many different data centers serving up information. This means you could technically be seeing different results depending on which data center you are pinging. It also means if you win a good SERP position, it may likely be fleeting. So if you want to share this win with your bosses, you need to take the time to know some methods of capturing this information as it happens.

I have some SEO tools that automatically ping some terms for me and they create a spread sheet I can analyze every day. But no one else should have to look at this--they don't care about it on this minute level. This is why I am there--to care. What I do for them is to capture images of good things, and imbed them in an email.

How you do a simple screen capture of a SERP
I used Google and a PC for this example.

1. I perform the search. In this case, I used "Freelance seo copywriter tips"
   
2. The SERP appears, with my results in the top 2 positions. Hooray!
   
3. Since I have multiple screens, I use the mouse to make sure it is on the right screen by clicking in the background of the SERP. I then hit "Ctrl"-"Alt"-"Print Scrn". The "Print Scrn" button is located just over the insert button on the far right of the top level of this keyboard. This saves the screen capture to my computer's memory.
   
4. I open PhotoShop, and create a new image. It has a size of about 1200 by 1000, to acommodate the screen capture. If you don't have PhotoShop, you can use Paint...just start a new image in whatever program you prefer.
   
5. In my new image, I hit "Ctrl"-"V" which pastes the screen capture from my computer's memory into the image I am creating.

At this point, you have something that looks like this:

Now this is fine, but I like to highlight a little further what it is I want them to see.

So I crop it, and then use the paintbrush tool in PhotoShop to highlight the search term, the number of results, my position, and sometimes offer other information.

I typed in the date in the sample below to give you an idea:

I might have circled them or whatever--I use the paintbrush tool because I think it looks funny, and it is simply meant for a quick look at what I am doing. If it needs to be more formal, I can make the lines more definite and precise.

But see how easy it is to give them a little bite of what you are doing? If you want to keep them happy, every once in a while offer one of these for a competitive keyphrase.
If you can show a high rank for the same thing in Yahoo and Google, you are showing about 80% or more of the search volume out there.

Nothing makes as much sense as something that works.

Old Clients, New Work

I was reminded twice this week why as a freelance seo writer, I always try to keep relationships healthy.

I had two older clients come back to me this past week seeking long-term engagements. This is great--I can offer more detailed service and they get more work...which means more money!

But I didn't seek these new engagements--they found me. And I am doing SEO work for both, but have not done SEO work for either client before. They were both copywriting clients who learned of my specialty while I worked for them. When their needs came up, they remembered me positively, and I got the call.

I've said it before, but it is worth repeating. Freelancing is a lot about making and maintaining good relationships. You never know who is going to one day be in charge, and what that means to you.

So if you are just starting out in this field, make sure to keep your relationships solid. Meet your deadlines, and do your best to resist any weirdo tendencies. Keep your personal tweaks personal. I have lost some good relationships because I was too casual, and offered too much. I regret this, not just from a work standpoint but as a personal failure. It's fine, and all part of the learning curve--but I wish I would've been smart enough to be able to keep some relationships stronger.

And those are of course, the exception. As a rule, I make myself easy to find and easy to talk to...and my clients appreciate it. And they return, sometimes months or even years later. Which feels pretty cool.

SEO Copywriting Tip

Been a while since I have offered a genuine SEO writing tip, so ...

Synonyms and SEO
If you have been in SEO for any length of time, you can see algorithms trying to improve. And they do improve, but sometimes in weird, slow-moving ways.

Over time, one thing I have seen is contextual results becoming more and more important in search, and I see this only increasing as time rolls on. Using synonyms, variations of your main keywords (like plurals), and any related terms should help you build contextual domain strength for your root keywords.

It makes perfect sense.
You are selling widgets. So you, as an SEO writer, go after both the short tail and the long tail keyphrases for widgets. This will include many synonyms, plurals, related terms, and longer strings.

You research what you can about the searches being made. You create a master list of targeted keyphrases, search strings, synonyms, and any related terms that people associate with widgets. Map it all out before you start writing anything--it is much easier to make it flow naturally as you write if you know clearly what you "need" to say.

Nail Down the Short Tail and Grab the Long Tail
Answer to the short tail in navigation/informational architecture (when you can). So you might have a page titled "Widgets" with a main navigational link also named "widgets" leading into the page. This creates a solidly anchored link, making the main keyword an integral part of your site. Great!

Within the page itself, you'll of course want to add some depth to the widget information--you can't simply repeat widget a million times and expect it to work. But here is where your research and knowledge of long tail search habits, as well as your mastery of synonyms and contextual referencing comes into play.


Example: Let's say that "wuggles" is a synonym to widgets. In your widgets page, you can think of wuggles as a second-tier keyword. You'll want to infuse your primary and secondary keyphrases seamlessly into your body content. In addition to the main sentences you write, look at the metadata, the page titles, your headers, bullets, and ordered lists.

Switch back and forth between wuggles and widgets pretty liberally. Connect them to words that comprise potential long-tail searches, like "get a widget" "buying a wuggle" "finding a widget provider" "wuggle information" and so on. By using your main keywords alongside some related synonyms, you can create a deeper contextual meaning to your content.

This doesn't mean you should focus on wuggles opposed to widgets. It means that you should display your understanding that in talking about widgets, wuggles make sense. The user will appreciate it, because they also associate wuggles with widgets and will spend more time reading what you have to say. And, since the algorithms are getting smarter and will want to see wuggles mentioned on a widgets page, it will also make the engines happy...a win-win, as they say.

DON'T STUFF
I've said it before, and will always say it: don't cram keywords into a page. Make it flow naturally, or don't do it...stiff, forced content is hard to read, which goes against the number one rule for SEO writing. You are writing for a user, not a search engine. And over-saturating keywords makes your content crappy, your intentions transparent, and your SEO efforts much less likely to work. Synonyms are no exception.

But honestly, I find that the shifts in the algorithms are actually making it easier to write well. It may be a little tougher to get the rankings you want as quickly, but it is MUCH easier to write a good page and not have to sweat the keywords as much as the writing itself. I consider that progress.

As the engines try to find new ways to get the best content to the user, they are getting better at realizing that keyword density is not the best answer (thank GOD!). The best answer is content that flows well, and speaks authoritatively...content that liberally and naturally uses a variety of related, contextual words. So bust out the Thesaurus, know your topic, research, and write!

Week in Review

So I thought it would be fun to do a little post about what I did this week, just to offer some input into a typical week/day for a freelance SEO writer.

I Dedicated Time to Getting New Business
I spent about 1 full day answering inquiries and making connections with potential new clients. 1 is a student asking for mentoring, and 2 new businesses inquired from referrals this week.

I find that setting aside some time every week to pursue new stuff is a good plan to keep the work flow at a manageable pace. I get lucky, and usually get by more on referrals now, so I don't have to look for work--it tends to find me. Knowing this, I am usually quick to take advantage of time off, and I go fishing or do something fun while I know I can.

If I didn't have some pretty strong prospects and a few working projects, I might make a few calls, or send out some emails as a way of reminding folks that I am here, and can help them make some money. Cold calling is far from my favorite thing to do, but it is effective if you are diligent. I more often have a tendency to just cherry-pick projects where I like the people and like the work. Once someone is happy and is seeing some results, it is easy to justify another project and another and another...meaning only that cold calling is not as necessary.

I Dedicated Time To Research
I spend at least 2-3 hours every day reading blogs and other websites...very often much more than that. My line of work is quickly changing, which is part of why I like doing it. But this requires me to be up-to-speed on new things like different coding practices, different media uses, new strategies--all kinds of related stuff. I am lucky because I like doing it--but this is a necessary part of my job.

Research does not have to be boring. It rarely is to me--no matter what subject matter I am looking at. Which is good of course, given my field. But I never know what I am going to learn, or how...and that is a big part of what makes life on the Interweb exciting and challenging. So if you are pursuing this as a career move, realize that you will spend a lot of time researching...learn to love it, or it will be a big hurdle for you to cross.

I Stayed on Top of My Deadlines
This week, I had 2 press releases, 2 blog posts, some product information, and two sales rep sites to optimize for a client. Done. It was in-hand and approved 12 hours ahead of schedule.

Meeting deadlines is perhaps the single most important thing to master as a freelance SEO writer. Most everything else can be forgiven--missing deadlines can have a very expensive ripple effect that will typically end with you looking for a new client. Miss a crucial deadline or two and you will be fired, no matter how good your work is.

It may not seem like much to you when you are just starting out, but often in a project, many different moving parts are coming together for a single impact. You might have a radio spot coordinating with a press release, a webpage, and a TV commercial for example--that is a lot of budget being focused on one project. If your copy is the thing slowing it down, none of the other parts can function properly until you are ready. This means that if you slip and miss a deadline, by the time you get the copy to the client they will already be angry at you being late. Believe me, if they are mad at you, they will very likely translate this feeling onto your work...seems petty, but it is true.

So avoid this. Be on time. If a ridiculously short deadline is asked for, you might try to push back and get more time. But do use caution. It can easily come across as you being slow or weak or a whiner if you need more time or resources than they are budgeting--so tread lightly here. You may be 100% justified, but you have to present it to the client so they can understand why you need more time. As a rule of thumb, I try not to ask for an extension unless I absolutely need it. So yes, this means I sometimes have to work crazy gorilla hours to get a project done. But that way, when I do ask for something extra, my request carries a little more weight because it is unusual.

One thing in my favor, is that I have done this a long time, and I know basically how long it takes me to get something done. So when I get a weird deadline, I know very early on that it is weird. I can often nip it in the bud, by resetting the expectations during the planning phases. It is ALWAYS easier to ask for more time before something starts--once the project is underway, it is like a train hurtling down the tracks.

I Spent Some Time Billing
My absolute least favorite part of this work is trying to get paid. I don't have to argue with anyone about it, but just coordinating invoices is a big pain to me. But I like getting paid, so this is a necessary evil.

I have a whiteboard in my office where I monitor my flow of invoices. I found that having it on the wall made me look at it all the time, and spend enough time to keep it full and flowing. If I notice I don't have enough invoices working, I try to complete some projects to get them billed out. If one or more of the invoices is lagging, I can make a call or shoot out an email to see what's up.

If you are new at this, do try to understand, that you getting paid really matters only to you. The client wants to get the project done. The bigger the client, the more convoluted the process to get paid can be. I now spend a few minutes when starting a new project to handle any billing questions. I find out who I should send them to, and who needs to approve them. When necessary, I introduce myself to the person in the billing department that I will deal with--I like making friends with these people for obvious reasons.

That was About It
Very basically, these were the elements of my week. The days divide up around these tasks however they do--it depends on what kind of priority everything has. But by knowing what my work weeks should more or less entail, I can keep enough work in the door and enough checks coming in to keep me fat and happy.

What is meant by Blackhat SEO?

If you are not familiar, there are generally thought to be 2 schools of SEO work--whitehat and blackhat. I am a Whitehat guy--meaning I don't do too many risky things, and I try to follow the established "rules" of SEO. So what is blackhat, and why would someone do it?

It's all about the Benjamins
Blackhat SEO is done for one of 2 reasons--the first (which is rare) is purely for malice. Much like some people like to create viruses and things that simply clog up or destroy machines, some blackhatters just like to throw a wrench in the system. Again, this is likely pretty rare, but I can't help but believe it to be true.

But much more common, is to use some risky techniques to get LOTS of traffic fast--and try to capitalize on it. Web work is all about traffic, and conversions are essentially a numbers game--throw enough people into a site, and sooner or later, some are going to click through an ad...and each click means $$$ to the site owner. So in a nutshell, blackhat SEO is about making money off traffic--typically, by any means necessary. So a blackhatter is going to try to figure out the loopholes that allow them to drive huge numbers of visits quickly, and they work the numbers to their financial advantage and then move on--preferably before getting caught. Stick and move, stick and move.

What do they do?
I can't by any means claim to be an expert, but I have studied some blackhat techniques. What I have seen, more than not, is that it is about writing clever scripts that quickly do something that would otherwise take a long time to accomplish. If blog comments are a good tactic for SEO (which they can be), a blackhatter will write a script that auto-finds and auto-populates as many blog comments as possible. Each comment has a link back to the main site, so run it a few nights in a row, and bingo--you have lots and lots of backlinks without ever really visiting a single blog.

Or, let's say that blogs themselves are the ticket to happiness. A good blackhat will create a script that creates and populates many blogs, so by running this a few times, they suddenly have many many web properties out there linking to the real site they want to promote. The content is obviously auto-generated, as it rarely makes sense--think of a spam email, and just make it larger, and more complex. To give you a sample, I just went out and found this little gem on some crappy auto-gen blog: "My study is Rolando and I am today 1 meg proportionality earnest most this change gifting possibleness that I am fortuitous sufficiency to hit been offered. I chose my intellect sagely and am today sight my dreams become to fruition. "

I hope you too, sight your dreams become to fruition.

But this must work sometimes--enough people do it to make me think that it is the monkey and the typewriter kind of thing going on here. Seems like a really sleazy way to make money to me though...

What's wrong with making money?
Nothing is wrong with making money off SEO work. Frankly, I don't have any real problem with blackhat stuff (though the example above does show why I dislike some of their web-clogging tactics)--but I simply won't do it, because it is risky. What's the risk? Being penalized by the search engines...usually, having the sites in question removed permanently from the index.

Black hatters are some of the smartest people on the web, and always have been--they can code circles around most of us (and they do). But they lose sites as often as they gain them, which is why they continually change tactics, and look for new loopholes to sneak into. To me, that is simply too time consuming to even consider an option.

Conclusion
Ultimately, even if you are a whitehat SEO writer, I have found it is smart to learn what you can about blackhat techniques. You don't have to do it, but you should study it, and understand why some of their techniques work. Why? Because you might be able to change it and gain some valuable headway. Besides, these are the guys and gals you will be competing with, so you'd better know what they are up to. Some people consider themselves "greyhats" or whatever--I don't mince words like that. Either you follow all the rules or you take risks...the levels of risk you take color you accordingly.

In the end, blackhat is not illegal. It is simply a game of risk--how much risk are you willing to take to find success? Whitehat techniques will very rarely get you penalized, if ever. Not so for blackhat--if you get pinched for spamming the web, it can have a cascading effect on every site you manage, both now and in the future. The best blackhats have to be very secretive, because if they are identified, they will be lucky to ever get a site to rank again. So they have to hide, and protect their efforts with secrecy and misdirection.

I personally don't like doing things that way. I like being transparent, and above board all the time. It makes it much easier on me, and offers a longer success rate to my clients. But if you are willing to take high risks, there is certainly a lot of money to be made off of mastering the right blackhat techniques.

It is a pretty elite club though--you have to be an extremely good coder, and you have to have a mind that is one step ahead of the pack all the time. Personally, I have a lot of respect for the blackhats...but it stops there. I will study and learn whatever I can from them, but when it comes to risk, SEO work is not where I want to go out on a limb--it is simply not worth it to me. Besides, I like writing--not coding. I want to be able to add something of value to the web, not just cash in. Big difference in approach there.

Hate to say it like this, but essentially my hat's off to anyone finding success on the web.

Studying the Competition

A big part of successful SEO work is studying the things that are working for your competitors. Once you have entered your niche and start to go head-to-head with other companies vying for the same prize, you can study and learn from what they are doing to help improve your own efforts.

Viewing the Number of Pages Indexed
One important measure of a site is the number of relevant pages indexed by the engines. It all starts here, really. Do a "site:---" command in the engines and compare the number of pages in your site to that of your competition. While page volume in and of itself is not the most important element of SEO, it is an important measure to monitor and improve. You should always be adding relevant content to your site--this is a big part of organic SEO. But if you are not getting your pages indexed properly, they might as well not exist...so if you see a competitor has hundreds or thousands more pages than you, look at how they are accomplishing it, and see if there might not be a good strategy in there for you to also employ.

Viewing the Back-Links
One of the most crucial elements of SEO is links into your site, or back-links. You should already know that you can do this by using a "link:--" command in some of the engines. Yahoo has the most extensive list to review, but Google works as well for this command. I tend to use Google first, and then run a check in Yahoo to see what Google is not counting.

But just as you can do this for your own sites, you can also run this check on your competitors. See where they are receiving some of their back-links, and you might be able to identify sites where you too can get a few links back to your sites.

Viewing the Source Code
If a competitor is doing better than you, it sometimes helps to see what they are doing in the code. You can do this by clicking on their page, and using a "view/source" command in your Internet browser. The source code will open in a new window, usually in a text format.

Look at the meta tags, the page titles, and the keywords used within the code that is not immediately visible (such as image alt attributes). Are they saturating the keywords better than you? Are they using headings and bullets that you aren't? The source code is closer to what the spiders see, so there may be things revealed that you can adopt and use in your own building strategies.

Keep an Open Mind
If you think you are doing everything right and you are still not achieving your goals, be open to what the competition is doing. Be ready to admit that they could be doing things better, and be willing to try new ideas. Some things, like age of the domain, are hard to control. But other things, like page volume and back-links, are certainly within the power of any SEO writer.

I always try to stay aware of what my competitors are doing. Some of them have more money than I do, and some have less concern about staying "white hat" and 100% above board to achieve their goals. This means I will sometimes lose a battle, but I typically can hang tough and win the war.

I have a fair amount of tried-and-true tricks up my sleeve to make things click the way I need them to--I spend at least 50-60 hours a week, every week, studying how the algorithms are shifting and behaving. I have sites that I use purely for testing theories...and I am constantly balancing risk against possible (or probable) gains. I read experts blogs, and if I don't use all the techniques, I certainly can get some good info out of them. In my experience, by the time the blogs are chattering about something, the technique is already overexposed and probably short-lived.That's fine by me--it still helps me to see what other people are looking at, and how these people might be applying these techniques to sites I am going up against, head-to-head.

I like competition. I like being challenged to beat someone at what we do. By no means do I always win--but I can certainly give most sites the organic SEO boost needed to improve traffic.

SEO Copywriting Tip : Keep it Coming

Fresh content is an aspect of organic ranking many websites fail to do. My own website (http://www.articulayers.com/) is unfortunately a great example of this--I have not been diligent in doing new site updates. In fact, other than a few very minor tweaks, I have not done much to this site in almost 2 years...simply been too busy.

On one hand it is good, because it made me start to look a little more seriously at blogging and other aspects of the craft, but for the good of my site's organic rankings, it has been the kiss of death. I totally owned my keyphrases for years, and in the last 6 months, have been dropping like a lead balloon.

I am not too worried about it, because when the time comes for me to put more muscle behind it, I will--in the meantime I have been testing some off-site strategies to see what happens. But I do know if I don't do something to improve the freshness of the content in my site, it will slowly fall off the map completely...or at least not get beyond the second page of the SERPs, which for me, is not really ranking at all.

An Easy Sell
I have found that selling the idea of fresh content is usually pretty easy with established clients. They may hesitate at first, but once I can clearly show them (preferably using their site) the value of adding fresh SEO content (as well as non-SEO pages) , they are quickly in my camp, and ready for me to add more girth and pull to their site's content. An SEO copywriter should be able to show a client proof (and I use that term a little liberally here, since you can't really prove much in organic SEO) that this service will have a lasting value. From there, it makes writing and posting new content a relatively easy sell.

Keep it Valuable
Remember that this type of fresh content is an SEO strategy, and like all solid SEO efforts it should be focused on providing more user value per visit. So if you have a client selling widgets, you want to offer content all about widgets--what they are, how they work, what to look out for, and so on. Posting your Aunt's cookie recipes might indeed add content, but this is not adding to the perceived "widgets" value of the domain...so it won't work as you might want it to.

Every niche has a million and one things to talk about. As an SEO writer, it is often my job to dig up the dirt and understand instinctively (or thru trial and error) what fires up the audience. From here, I need to know how I can blend this user need into the architecture of the site without disrupting the flow of information, or impeding the call-to-action. There is a very fine line between providing enough information to earn trust and making a sale..it is an SEO writer's tightrope.

Simple Strategies
In offering fresh, regular content there are some very simple things you can suggest.
Blogs
If you can get a blog infused into the site's architecture, you are opening up a beautiful channel of opportunity. Blogs are easier to write than many other types of copywriting, at least most of the time. The language is a little more casual, the topics can range all over the map (within reason, of course). And most importantly, it is something I can train a person to eventually take over--so my client can reduce their cost by handling this in-house. Though I love people coming back for more of my work, ideally, I am really after finishing a project and moving on. If I can work with a client to make them more self-sufficient, they will appreciate me more than if they depend on me for every word. Blogs offer this platform...and will tend to boost the organic aspects of a site significantly. Discussion boards work well too, but blogs are so easy, it is a shame not to harness them.

Press Releases
Most businesses have a lot going on, so why not share this with the world through regularly scheduled press releases? Writing press releases is pretty much a formula--once you have done enough of them, you see the pattern. Intro paragraph summing up the release, second paragraph highlighting the benefits of the action, third (and fourth) paragraphs offering quotes from the principals, and a summary to close. Bing, bang boom. Blast it out to a free news wire (there are lots who do it for free) or put a little money behind it to have it picked up by a reputable news wire. Note that paying to have it picked up may cost a couple hundred dollars, but in doing so, you are greatly improving the chances that this release is seen by more people. I typically suggest both--using the paid services for the really important releases, and the free ones for the rest.

I will say, if I am doing a "blast" of the release in either manner, I am always very careful to have it on the home site before anyone else can get it. Stronger sites (like major news services) will outrank you for your own press release, but over time, they will typically fall below the original post. pay special attention to the way you word your titles too--this has more juice than many people realize. By not optimizing the title, they miss an easy opportunity for SEO progress.
Tips and Hints
Every business probably has some tips and hints to make it easier to use their products or services. So map out a strategy that adds a new tip every week, or every month at least. Again, the point is showing the engines that your site is actively trying to add to the discussion. Sometimes tips and hints can become the entry pages that bring in targeted customers.

Testimonials and Case Studies
These are excellent sales tools that really work well when properly executed. A case study or testimonial will have a user putting themselves in the situation described--which is perfect! People tend to feel more comfortable making a purchase when they see that other people who have done so are reaping the benefits. Illustrate that for them.

Watch, and Learn
Use your analytics and tracking programs to see how these new pages perform. Look at keyword referrals, entry pages, forward paths and time spent on the pages. When fresh content is working well, not only will these all improve, but so will your SERP positions. If you see something is working better than other efforts, put more muscle behind it--expand the keywords, the subject matter and the amount of information you provide.

There is not set formula to follow: adding X number of pages will not result in Y every time. This is simply another aspect of SEO writing that provides a little job security...and there is no denying the effect that fresh content has in today's organic SEO world. Could change tomorrow of course, but for now, just do it.