Search Engine Optimisation is an area of the internet that is still very much in its infancy. The techniques and skills required to optimise a website to meet the needs of your customers, the requirements of your business and the technical structure of search engines (preferably in that order) is an advanced skill-set that many say they have, but few can deliver.

I have specialised in Internet Marketing and Search Engine Optimisation in and around Glasgow for a few years now (for local, national and international clients), so I thought I would offer a snippet of the guidance I offer my clients on a daily basis. If you are Glasgow-based and would like to discuss Search Engine Optimisation or Internet Marketing details further, I have included my contact details at the end of this post for you.

Unfortunately, Internet Marketing brings with it a lot of hard-to-decipher technical, management and sales lingo which gets bandied around and can be used to influence those who are looking for advice. Phrases like “We optimise your title tags”, “We will include your keywords for the search engines”, “we will get you backlinks in over 1000 directories” are common. However, these are minor parts in a massive field that you really need to understand to appreciate, or trust someone professional (with a portfolio) to handle for you.

I often try and help clients understand what SEO and Internet Marketing are by comparing the process to baking a cake, and although the analogy may sound strange at first, it actually makes perfect sense (bare with me on this one).

If you are baking a cake, too much or too little of one ingredient creates poor results, in most cases you end up with a cake that goes in the bin…a complete waste of money and effort. If you get the mix just right, any assessment of that cake will favour well, and you will have a cake that everyone at the party talks about. If Google was at your party, and the cake was great, you would be the first person Google recommends when someone asks them “who bakes cakes?”.

Internet Marketing and Search Engine Optimisation is no different. There is a wealth of ingredients that are added to the mix, all of which must be put into the blender at the correct time, be of the perfect quantity and compliment the other ingredients. There are no shortcuts. Preparation is key. Perfect results come best when you let the cake rise slowly but surely. Turning up the heat to get a finished product in a shorter time will result in one sure outcome: failure. In the kitchen you can just start again, in the search engine world you may well have ruined your businesses reputation, worst case scenario you could get blacklisted!

Always make sure your Internet Marketing provider is using tried and tested, safe (white hat) online marketing techniques. An example of some of the ingredients in an internet marketing cake can include:

• Holistic overview and strategic planning.
• Implementation of web based data gathering techniques.
• Installation of analytical software to track users, referrers, trends, peaks, troughs, etc.
• Assessment of KPI’s and custom goal monitoring to ensure your site meets these targets.
• Assessment of your companies positioning against your competitors positioning.
• Collaborations to research high profile and niche markets for you to target.
• Analysis of content and restructure by professional copywriters to ensure a user friendly, descriptive company message which is rich in targeted search engine content.
• Optimisation of technical elements on your site.
• Creation and distribution of highly targeted, unique content.
• Implementation of socially aggregated content such as blogs, twitter, flickr, facebook etc.
• Targeted link building from sites that are local or highly regarded in your sphere of influence (quality not quantity!).
• Pay Per Click advertising.
• Email marketing.
• SMS marketing.
• Unique monthly reporting with custom mined data from analytics tool.

If these ingredients are finely mixed, properly baked and handled with care, you will end up with the perfect cake. As with all the greatest recipes in the world, the perfect mix of ingredients and attention to the finest details make the product not only unique, but a business success! Like some of the greatest recipes in the world (Irn-Bru, Coca Cola, KFC), we believe we have a secret recipe which works. We have worked for years analysing our results, tweaking the quantities of our ingredients, gaining feedback on the flavours all to create the perfect recipe.

So if all this talk of baking has made you hungry for new clients, new prospects and new results call me now on 01475 716726, or check our website for a wealth of information on more specialist areas.