Our take on what is SEO and how does SEO work

Step 1: Set the goal

Before you can do any work, the goal must be captured. At Gunner Technology, we create an issue to record the goal and work with the client to reach a stated goal.

Ideally, it would be a SMART goal such as:

“By the end of quarter 1, I’d like to increase leads generated from our web form by 30%”

In this case, however, we assumed the client knows what the current number of leads generated from the lead form is.

If this is an unknown, then a hard fast number should be set forth, such as:

“By the end of quarter 1, I’d like to generate 100 leads from our web form”

Whatever the goal is, it needs to be recorded, and as stated, we generally do this in the issue.

Step 2: Explain how the goal will be measured.

Again, most likely this will be done through Google Analytics as we set this up for all our new clients.

However, it is possible the client uses another analytics software package or has no software package at all.

This becomes a problem in the later case if Gunner Technology can not access the existing web site in order to add the necessary software.

If this is the case, do not proceed with the project and tell the client that analytics software must be installed before we can move forward.

If Gunner Technology is doing the Web Development work for the project, the SEO must provide the needed tracking information to the developer who will then add the conversion code to the page or pages.

Step 3: Assign roles

In every project there will be the following roles. Sometimes one person from the client will fill every role while other times, all the roles may be filled by GT personel.

• Content Providers: This role will be responsible for handing over or creating the raw content. This could be PR releases, company white papers, photos from company outings, etc.
• Content Editors: This role will edit the content into packages suitable for web publication. This may mean editing for keyword density (making sure Keywords and phrases appear often and in the appropriate places), splitting up the content into multiple packages, adding titles, adding descriptions and setting the URL of the final page.
• Distributors: This role will be responsible for creating link wheels and submitting the site and content to directories, such as Digg, StumbleUpon, Delicious, Twitter and Facebook as well as forums and blogs via posts and comments
• Connectors: This role will be responsible for further spreading the content once the Distributors have submitted it. Ideally, there will be a distribution list of connectors who will receive and email whenever content is submitted so that the connectors may go out and Like It, Retweet It, etc.
• Analysts: This role will responsible for generating status reports from Google Analytics or similar analytics software on a weekly and monthly basis. The status reports will contain updates on how the team is progressing toward the stated goal.
• Strategist: This role will be responsible for using tools like Google Webmaster Tools and Keyword Tools to identify Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats to the SEO strategy. This role will ultimately order landing pages built and site changes made based on Keyword Research, audits and competitive analyses.

Step 4: Devise the first campaign

Prerequisites

Before any work begins, we need to make sure the site has been verified with Google’s Account Manager and added to Google’s Webmaster tools and Bing’s Webmaster Tools and finally, that a site map has been created and submitted to both webmaster tools.

Head Terms

Every campaign should include a certain number of head Keywords and phrases (usually between one and five) and a list of accompanying long-tail Keywords/phrases to accompany each head keyword/phrase.

First, the head terms should be selected using Google’s Keyword Tool

Obviously, what we’re looking for here is terms with high monthly searches and relatively low competition.

Once we have a good idea of what head Keywords and phrases we’d like to pursue, we perform and SEO Audit and Competitive Analysis.

The Audit and Analysis will provide the strategist with an idea of where the site currently stands against those head terms and how it stacks up against the competition. Also, it will provide recommendations on how the site/landing page can rank higher for those head terms. Finally, the audit will give the Strategist a good idea of long-tail terms to pursue as part of this campaign.

Here is a sample Audit and Competitive Analysis

• SEO Audit
• Competitive Analysis

Long-tail Terms

The strategist should supplement that list of long-tail term suggestions using Google’s Wonder Wheel and related searches.

Wordstream also has a keyword tool that will offer long-tail ideas

The strategist should select between two and five long-tail terms and to attach to each head term.

Network Identification

Once the Keywords have been identified, the strategist needs to identify networks in which the client needs to become active, so that they can generate links.

What we mean here is this. If at the last moment, someone pops into a blog community, message board or forum and starts posting links back to their own content, the accounts will be locked.

Beyond this, many communities will not allow links in submissions until the account has contributed a certain number of posts that do not contain links.

So, the client needs to become active early here, so when it does come time to create links, the networks will allow this.

The strategist should search for blogs that allow comments and forums that allow posts without nofollowing the links, if possible.

Also, the strategist should use the audit to see where the competition is getting their links. If there are sites in that list that are not forums and blogs, someone on the content team needs to reach out and find out why the competitor has a link and the client does not.

Finally, the client will most likely have an internal network of partners. The strategist should ask the client for this list, and someone needs to reach out and ask these partners to include a link to the landing page.

Note, that it is extremely important that, when link building, the link contain the exact keyword or phrase as the text of the link.

So, for example, when asking the client’s partners for links, don’t ask for a link like this mycompany.com. Ask for links like this: Best Steak in LA.

One other note, when requesting links, do not do a link swap to the site your are requesting the link.

For example, if your partner owns the domain partner-example.com, and we want a link to client-example.com, do not promise a link from client-example.com to partner-example.com. If the client owns another domain, we can offer a link to partner-example.com from clients-other-domain.com. But avoid direct link swaps.

Content Strategy

Next, the strategist must create a content strategy.

Obviously, a landing page needs to be created for each head term, but should they all be published at once or spaced out?

What time of day should they be published?

What types of pages should they be? (product page, home page, category page, contact page, blog post, etc)

Once the landing page is published, it’s time to start getting links.

This is done by:

• Commenting on blogs identified in the previous step
• Posting the links in forums identified in the previous step
• Requesting links from partners identified in the previous step
• Submitting the landing page to sites like Twitter, Reddit, Delicious, Facebook and StumbleUpon
• Creating a Link Wheel, using the landing page as the hub. See How to create a link wheel
• Publishing long-tail optimized pages that link back to this landing page

That last point deserves more attention.

After the landing page has been created, published and syndicated, it still needs to be optimized further.

As we mentioned, there will be two to 10 long-tail terms associated with every head-term, meaning that there should be two to 10 pages created for each of these landing pages.

The process for creating the long-tail termed pages is exactly the same, except that each should link to the head termed page, in which it is associated.

Content Editors and Content Producers need to know what they will be producing content about, when and where.

The content strategy will provide them a significant size of Keywords which they should be pursuing.

The content strategy also includes an editorial calendar and sample headlines to help get the creative juices flowing.

PPC

At this point, the campaign may be considered complete. However, if the client has budged for paid-inclusion in search, this step in which to do it.

The strategist should use Google’s traffic estimator and placement tool and obviously, the client’s budget, to decide which Keywords (long-tail and/or head terms) on which to bid, how much to bid and where the ads should be placed.

Step 5: Rinse, Wash and Repeat

Truly successful Search Marketing is never done and requires new Keywords, contents and links.

It’s imperative to stay ahead of the competition.