Google Adwords Optimisation 1-Page MindMap

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Google Adwords is one of the most effective ways to generate high quality traffic to product and service business websites, but it’s sometimes hard to keep track of all the features and functionality.  That’s why I’ve put together a MindMap of Google Adwords success strategies that fits neatly onto one page:

Download The Google Adwords Optimisation 1-Page MindMap

This Google Adwords MindMap summarises the fundamental, must-have strategies behind the most successful Google Adwords accounts.  Yes, there are a few advanced strategies that wouldn’t fit onto one page, but in my experience of working with hundreds of Google Adwords accounts, 95% percent of advertisers have NOT covered the fundamentals.

• they have a few dozen keywords, not thousands
• they have 1 or 2 Adgroups per campaign, not 50+
• they don’t track properly
• their ad copy is flabby and ineffectual
• they waste a tonne of cash on overly-broad keywords that don’t produce RESULTS

(As a Google Adwords Qualified Company, Marketing Results manages high-performance campaigns for clients in competitive industries where advanced campaign management yields highly-profitable results. Here’s more about our Google Adwords Management services.)

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Easy Way To Build Links To Your Blog

One of the critical elements of search engine optimisation is creating a network of links to your website or blog. Sounds simple in theory, but it is not as easy as it seems to generate high-quality links on a scale large enough to have a positive effect on your search engine rankings.

One of the easiest ways to build links back to your blog is via commenting on “dofollow” blogs. It’s simple to do, but it’s surprising how many people $*&# it up.

What is “dofollow”, you ask?

To answer that question, you first have to know about “nofollow”. “Nofollow” an attribute of the <a> tag used to specify links in HTML. By placing the “nofollow” attribute on a link, a webmaster can BLOCK any “link juice” passing from their website to your website. In other words, the “nofollow” attribute makes a link useless from an SEO point of view.

When blogs started to become popular, spammers quickly came up with programs to post auto-generated comments containing spammy links (mostly for porn, pharma and gambling sites).

That’s when major blogging platforms such as WordPress instituted the “nofollow” attribute as the default setting for blog comments. The idea was to eliminate the incentive to post comment spam.

Didn’t quite work out that way though… spam comments are still rife. It’s necessary to fit out every blog with a prophylactic anti-comment-spam plugin such as Akismet (my instance has nuked around half a million spam comments already).

Enter “DoFollow”

So, instituting the “nofollow” plugin on WordPress has been a total failure. So much so that a plugin has been created called DoFollow that is designed to disable the NoFollow attribute on external links and make comment links “count” for search engine optimisation purposes.

Seeing as it’s pretty much mandatory to moderate blog comments, my view is that it’s OK for comment links to pass some SEO value.

The Marketing Results Blog Has The DoFollow Plugin Installed

This blog has the DoFollow plugin installed. In other words, if you leave a comment on this blog, you will gain a search engine benefit.

But that’s by the by — the important thing to note is that there are plenty of other blogs out there which use the DoFollow plugin as well. All you need to do is.

1. Locate DoFollow blogs (one resource for doing this is the website DoFollowBlogs.com)

2. Add to the discussion by posting regular comments on DoFollow blogs

3. Watch your search engine rankings increase

One strategy of many

Posting comments on DoFollow blogs is just one link-building strategy out of many. If you’re operating in a competitive niche, it won’t work in isolation. However, for most product and service websites, DoFollow comments are a valuable strategy that can produce tangible results.

The key to this strategy is consistent application. Don’t post one comment and forget about it. Post regularly to key blogs over a period of weeks and months and you’ll start to see the benefits.

Another vital strategy to keep in mind is that comments that offer value are likely to get approved by blogmasters. Many practitioners of the DoFollow strategy shoot themselves in the foot by posting self-promotional drivel that is simply deleted.

High-quality comments that contribute to the discussion will tend to garner more clickthroughs, in addition to potential search engine benefits.

One final point: you can outsource blog commenting to others, providing that the quality of posts is sufficient to ensure that comments get posted.

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DVD Launched

If you liked The Secret or What The Bleep, you’ll love The Wheel Of Life, which recently premiered in Melbourne.

The Wheel Of Life examines the metaphor of life as a wheel made up of a number of different segments. In order to achieve lasting and positive change, you need to get the segments into balance to allow your “Wheel” to roll smoothly.

The documentary features 17 experts in health, wellness and self-development. I’ve been involved in the marketing of the documentary online and have been one of the first to see the Final Cut.

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Lead Volume vs Opportunity Volume

For several years now I’ve been asking subscribers and clients to visualise their online sales process as a funnel with knowable metrics. You’re no doubt familiar with the analogy:

1000 visitors hit your website (“Visits”) –>
100 opt in to your Free Special Report (“Opt Ins”) –>
20 enquire (“Leads”) –>
5 become clients (“Sales”)

Whatever the exact number or specific conversion steps are in your business, you get the idea.

But I recently came across a very useful distinction on a Marketing Experiments webinar that dovetailed with a recent experience working with a client.

That is the distinction between Lead Volume and Opportunity Volume.

Lead Volume is the number of people filling out your enquiry form, but Opportunity Volume is the number of viable sales opportunities available to your sales team (or you, if you’re the only salesperson at your company).

Lead Volume is very often a measure of activity. Opportunity Volume is a measure of results and future expected revenues.

I recently dealt with a client whose only metric was Lead Volume: “Just get us more contact form submissions”.

“More contact form submissions is a brief that is relatively easy to fulfil. For starters, you can make the form easier to complete. Second, remove “strings” from the offer or add a guarantee.

When you do this, will the leads be more qualified? Will you create more viable Sales Opportunities? Not necessarily. In fact, you can very often clog up your sales pipeline with unqualified leads that do nothing more than take up your salespeople’s time and detract from closing genuine sales opportunities.

That’s why I’ve now included Opportunity Volume as one of the key lead generation metrics to track. It is a more reliable indicator of the success of your pre-sales marketing activities.

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