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You’ll never build a natural link until you’re worth
talking about
Tim Grice – Head of Search
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Keywords Rankings
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Links Rankings
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SEO
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Why?
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It worked
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Google is stupid
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Everybody does it
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It was cheap
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This categorically does not work anymore
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Penalties
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Manual Reviews
Trigger Review
Applied
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But also because….. • Disavow Data
• Devaluation of other signals
• Network Discovery
• Webmasters are more inclined to report
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Unnatural Links
Bad Strategy Penguin 2.0
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Algorithms
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2009 - Vince
“An algorithm that seemed to favour big brands, as it was thought users could trust brands more”
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2010 – May Day
“Sites with large-scale thin content were devalued, all in attempt to give users better results”
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2010 – Google Instant
“Faster results for users”
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2010 – Social Signals
“Google & Bing confirm the incorporation of social signals as part of the algorithm, leveraging user data
from Facebook & Twitter”
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2011 – Panda
“Affected 12% of search results, devaluing thin content, content farms, and websites that offered little
value to the user”
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2012 – Search + Your World
“Further moves towards personalisation and the incorporation of Google + user data”
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2012 – Venice
“Provided users with more localised results”
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2013 – Hummingbird
“Attempts to understand keyword associations and user intent.”
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SEO
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What Google think… Q:Want to use Google as a platform to sell?
A: Use Adwords, Shopping, Places.
Q:Want to add value, insight and contribute
to the conversation?
A: SEO is your friend.
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“How do I get to the top of Google?” is the wrong question.
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“How do I get so popular that Google has no choice but to rank
me?” is the right question.
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On site guidelines will always be in place. • Canonical tags
• Schema
• Pagination
• Duplicate Content
• Site Architecture
• Etc……
…and will always be important.
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But there is a reason Google doesn’t issue link strategy guidelines
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Let’s talk
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The current
CITATIONS
BUILD
CONVERSATIONS
NEWS
Sentiment
SOCIAL
Authority Relevance
Freshness
is listening to…
DESIGN
CONTENT
BLOG
Engagement
Satisfaction
Structure Quality
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Tactics are fine but first address your thinking.
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Some questions… • Who are your audience?
• What are they interested in?
• What online conversations are they having?
• What do they need answers to?
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Become genuinely interested
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• In your industry
• In your audience
• In your customers
• In problem solving
• In adding value
Interested in…
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Focus on their interests
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You begin asking the right questions. • What conversations are
people having?
• What are people missing?
• What do people find humorous?
• What would people find helpful?
• What do people find contentious
• What are people sharing?
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Historic questions What links do our competitors have?
What anchor text is best for Google?
What is the ideal PageRank for a link?
Do Google prefer in content links?
Will Google penalise me for paid sidebar links?
Is a link at the top of the page better than the bottom?
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Google want to know about
People
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Let’s talk
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Don’t pay for links….
Pay for a star
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Oh, and did I mention Links?
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Paid Media = Earned Links Use cheap paid media to kick start campaigns.
Contentious/Humorous content works best.
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Have a sense of humour
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Have an opinion
“If you don’t focus on people your link strategy will not stand the test of time”
Tim Grice Branded3
Link please
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Focusing on your audience means you can forget about
your products.
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Do your research and offer up your findings.
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You
Feeds the
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A strategy that meets multiple objectives • Activates conversation around your business
• Puts you in front of your target audience
• Encourages and increases brand search
• Generates shares and likes
• Allows you to truly engage people and build relationships
• Puts you in the ZMOT
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Customers will use an average of 10 resources before making a decision to purchase
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Summary • Put real effort into becoming the best result
• Take an interest in people
• Be worth talking about
• Talk in terms of your audience interests
• Add Value
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