(Tweet this article!) It’s resolution time! And despite the sudden irritation you feel from your gym being over crowded by all the “resolutioners,” there is something special about the idea of starting fresh. It’s empowering! This month SEO Juice will dive into 2012 SEO resolutions: Getting organized, getting fit and making new friends in order to improve your SEO.

After all, just as it is so with every holiday season, it’s far more important what you choose to do between New Years and Christmas than it is between Christmas and New Years. So let’s start the year off right!

Getting Organized:

It’s on just about every New Year resolution list. In 2012, with the mix of social media, content creation, content promotion, relationship building and staying on top of the changing industry, being organized can seem overwhelming. With search becoming more and more social, it’s no mystery that blogging and engaging in social media can be one of the most valuable tools to improve your SEO and develop a stronger brand.

So how do we make getting organized less overwhelming?

Create a Content Calendar – A content calendar can be created in an hour or two and can ease the stress in the long run. Make a plan for when you will post articles to your blog or have an article ready for a guest post. Take into account all the different holidays or events on the horizon and be thinking of how you will capitalize on them with your content.

Social Media Plan – Write down your social media goals, how you want to engage with your fans and what types of links/articles you want to share with them. Create guidelines for the types of statuses and links you want to post, keeping them in line with your goals. But remember, your social profiles need to be more than virtual paperweights. Give your fans a reason to come back to your fan page and click through to your website again and again. Be engaging! Ask their opinions and answer their questions. This is the key to building their trust, building links and becoming an authority online.

Contact List – Keep a running spreadsheet of your opportunities online and your contacts to get your content published. Jot down their information and the types of articles a particular website publishes. As this list builds up, you’ll be much more organized and ready when it comes time to guest post.

Getting Fit:

When it comes to content we’ve all heard the saying “content is king,” and likewise, “quality is better than quantity”. Strengthening your content and adding muscle to your pages is still going to be one of the best SEO resolutions you could make. But like all fitness regimes, it’s important to vary your strategies.

Lose the dead weight- Getting SEO fit in 2012 is going to take losing the dead weight content and/or pages and adding the muscle! Go over your old, outdated content or blog posts and revise (or do away with). If your blog tends to have recurring topics, be mindful of duplicate or repetitive content.

Go Fresh - Naturally, search engines won’t be able to keep their hands (crawlers) off you if you’re posting fresh content! Try something new this year. Get a team together and brainstorm some “fresh” ideas for a blog series.

Vary your routine – Your SEO fitness routine should be well-balanced and varied between strategies. Include everything from updating your websites old content, researching new keywords, guest posting, expanding social networks and link building. The mix of strategies will make the difference.

Making New Friends:

Building relationships online can be a very powerful New Year’s SEO resolution. When it comes to building your brand, networking within your industry can provide valuable links, opportunities and expand your knowledge base.

Guest Posting – I scratch your back, you scratch mine. Guest posting is a great way to expand your audience and influence online. Not only is the article a valuable link for you site, but by guest posting you are also establishing yourself as an authority for the topic. What are the benefits of allowing someone to guest post on your blog? Well, it’s free, fresh content for your site, which will only increase traffic coming to your site from search engines.

Get out there – If you want to make yourself known in your industry, you need to get out there! Whether you’re building relationships with potential clients on social networks or contributing to discussions on forums or blog posts with other professionals in your industry, branding yourself online starts online! So are you there?

Next Week on SEO Juice: Stay tuned next week for a deeper discussion on 2012 SEO Resolution #1: Getting Organized. (Tweet this article!)

By Katelyn Wheaton

So how do we channel the knowledge we already have? Well, one example comes from a previous blog post that showcased The Danberry Company’s use of Market Update reports. These reports share information on sold, active and pending properties in specific neighborhoods and are customizable to each consumer. (To read more about these reports, read Conference Highlight: Implementing Technology at a Local Level)

Another example comes from our newest Enterprise Network member, Hasson Company Realtors. At the 2010 Active Enterprise Network Annual Conference, Steve Studly, from Hasson Company Realtors, spoke about a unique program they’ve established to position their agents as local experts in the community. During his presentation, Steve shared the strategy and implementation process behind Hasson’s Ask the Expert Program. This program was designed to engage Hasson agents and customers in the local area. By building a relationship with a local magazine and reaching customers via the local magazine and Hasson’s blog, customers were encouraged to ask questions pertinent to real estate in their local market. The program showcases questions from area residents and the answers given by Hasson agents on topics ranging from neighborhood and school information to market trends.

Blogging is another great medium for posting hyperlocal content. Write about events happening in the community and share market information pertaining to neighborhoods in the area. Not only does this help with Search Engine Optimization, but it attracts readers to your website whether they’re interested in buying or selling home or not. Because they’re still interested in news related to their specific area, you have the ability to remain in front of past, current and potential clients.

Writing content for a hyperlocal audience allows us to explore the qualities that make our communities unique. Being an ambassador of community information helps leverage the expertise and knowledge we already have in order to position us as a reliable source while creating a conversation with our customers.

Related Posts:

Active Website Hosts Active Enterprise Network Annual Conference

Conference Highlight: Implementing Technology at a Local Level

By Amanda Stephan

Presentation highlights include:

Content is King

1. What message do you want to communicate?
2. Define your area of expertise
3. What geographical area do you want to influence?
4. Develop value through unique content
5. Make your content shareable

Understanding Duplicate Content

1. Becoming the authoritative source
2. Duplicate content in regards to property listings
3. Develop unique content that is different than shared content in IDX feed
4. Include content centered around IPWs with links to property details page
5. Understanding Page Rank

Understanding the Search Demand Curve

1. Identify where you rank on your Fat Head, Chunky Middle and Long tail terms and develop a strategy for each
2. Capture more traffic from the tail
3. Understand what terms are converting into sales
4. Use SEO performances in your marketing efforts
5. Use search results to develop more unique content

Building Your Local Brand

1. What is the message we are trying to communicate about our brand?
2. How to use all the tools and resources we have at our disposal to build our local brand
   • -Website, offline networks, social sites, blog, etc.
3. Need to establish a plan for bringing our offline networks online
4. Use syndication outlets not only for your property listings,  but for other content as well- i.e. news, press releases, blogs, etc.
5. It’s important that you’re reaching the right people with your message

How to Write an Effective Blog

1. Choose a topic
2. Create an effective title
3. Think about the layout
4. Include unique content, keywords and links
5. Decide if multiple posts are necessary

By John Sable

blog.activewebsite.com

Luckily for you, there is. This week, Active Community wants to take a closer look at how to write a more effective blog. There are many reasons why people decide to begin blogging. For companies, blogging is a great tool for driving traffic to your site and increasing your search engine rankings. Blogging also gives you a unique opportunity to express yourself while engaging and interacting with your readers in a way that was previously unavailable.

However, if you don’t have a strategic plan of execution in place, then you run the risk of having used all your time and energy for nothing. The goal of any blog is not only to get the information out there on the web, but to get the information out on the web that people will want to read.

With millions of people already blogging, it’s important that you don’t get lost in the masses. By following some simple guidelines, you’ll have a better foundation for your blog that will hopefully help you attract more readers. In order to do this, we’ll be dissecting the blog how Blogging is Like a First Date that will be posted after this presentation. Watch our video to find out more!

Related Posts:

Blogging is Like a First Date

Active Community: Building Your Local Brand

Active Community: Understanding the Search Demand Curve

Active Community: Understanding Duplicate Content

By John Sable

blog.activewebsite.com

Just like dating, there are rules we must follow when blogging in order to establish the foundation for a solid relationship. At Active Website, we work with Active Enterprise Network Members to ensure they’re getting the most out of their blogging experience. Most people go on a first date with certain expectations – the same is true for blog readers. By focusing on a few simple rules, Network Members can reach their followers in a way that will fill the needs of both parties – hopefully creating a lasting union. This post focuses on guidelines to follow when blogging as they relate to dating. For more information on how to write an effective blog, check out this week’s Active Community video presentation as well.

1. Only date one person at a time.

While there are definitely two schools of thought here, there is no denying that playing the field can lead to complications and get you in trouble. We need to remember this for our blogs as well. Your blog article should be narrowed and focused on one idea. People have short attention spans and won’t take the time to read a multi-page blog. If you focus on one topic, you’ll be able to go into more detail without losing their interest. For example, instead of focusing on the broad term real estate technology, go into detail on one specific aspect of it. It should be more about quality, not quantity. Read tip No. 5 for other ways to approach this.

2. First impressions are important.

When going on a date, people typically want to put their best foot forward. The same should be true for your blog. Research states that you only have 30 seconds to make a good impression. After that, people have already generated an opinion of you. So how do we create a good first impression? You reel them in with an intriguing title. The title is the first thing readers see, so you need to grab their attention right away. If you don’t, you’ll get stuck with the bill when your date sneaks out the back door before dinner was even served.

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3. Dress Appropriately.

Adding to tip No. 2, remember that your look says a lot about you. Your blog’s image has a lot of impact when it comes to engaging your reader. People don’t spend a lot of time reading through blogs, so you don’t want to muddy it up with a lot of text. Instead, find ways to break it up. Include section headers, graphs, images and pulled quotes to guide your readers through the blog. People are very visually oriented, so if you don’t have something to keep their attention, their minds will start to wander. And if they’re not engaged, they won’t bother reading your blog from start to finish.

4. Good Communication is Important.

Not only does your look say a lot about you, but what you say does too (shocking, I know). You want to find ways to communicate effectively, otherwise there is no point in blogging in the first place. You need to understand that this is a great avenue for establishing a voice. By creating unique content, including links and utilizing your top keywords, you’re going to become more desirable to search engines – setting the stage for a second date.

5. Don’t Get Ahead of Yourself.

As we mentioned earlier, it’s important to focus on only one topic per blog post. Just as you wouldn’t spill your entire life story on a first date, the same holds true for your blog. Instead, take your time and tell your story over a series of blog posts. This gives readers a reason to come back for more, which leads us into our last and final tip.

6. Be Patient and Don’t Rush the Relationship.

Asking someone to marry you on the first date or picking baby names over dinner is a sure fire way to end the night alone. You need to be patient and nurture the relationship before you jump into things. For your blog, don’t expect to gain a huge following right way. It’s more important that you have quality followers than quantity. Instead, use the time to find ways to market yourself to the people who are most likely to benefit from what you have to say. You’ll have much more of an impact if you take your time. Not to mention, research says that the more time you take to build a quality relationship, the more likely your chances of staying together.

Related Posts:

Active Community: How to Write an Effective Blog

The Importance of Telling a Story

By Amanda Stephan

blog.activewebsite.com

For example, the early algorithms understood that a dog and a puppy were related and loosely synonymous. Additionally, the understanding was that the adjective boiling was related to heat. However, early implementations of search algorithms would return word association errors that resulted in the understanding that ‘hot dog’ was loosely related to the phrase ‘boiling puppy.’

Evidence of this context-aware artificial intelligence can be seen in modern engines when we run the query ‘hot dogs’ and examine the ‘Related Searches’ area (in Google, this is generally placed at the very bottom of the result page). Instead of having queries related to poached pooches, one is given ‘what are hot dogs made of’, ‘how to cook hot dogs’ and ‘ball park franks.’

Knowing the engines have this understanding, one can take on new tools in the content writing process that will increase article creation turnaround time, readability for the user and global relevance. For the following examples, we’ll be working on a hypothetical site for a real estate brokerage specializing in luxury real estate on Mars. The most effective terms will be ‘Martian homes’ and ‘Mars real estate.’

Direct Match
This is the usage most common to content-writing for SEO. Though it can have great benefit in ranking well for the query deemed most effective, overuse of the phrase will result in severe penalties across all engines. Both ‘Mars homes’ and ‘Mars real estate’ are direct matches for the most effective terms.

Proximity Match
Using a direct match can severely hurt readability in many cases and is a quick road to keyword stuffing (overuse). As an alternative (though less effective), having the words close together will have a positive effect and maintain the usefulness of an article for the user. As both ‘homes in the northern region of Mars’ and ‘real estate on Mars’ contain the selected terms and are contextually the same, these will improve the relevance for the targeted queries. Please note, ‘real estate near the Mars candy factory’ and ‘sitting at home with his dog, Mars’ will not help (the engines are smarter than that).

Semantic Match
When a phrase has an identical meaning, this can be used to get a strong relevance boost. Although not as effective as a direct match, using the phrase ‘Martian housing market’ is completely acceptable. This is particularly so if the flow of the sentence would be disrupted by use of ‘Mars real estate.’

Although using all three match types is acceptable, please don’t forget that your most powerful weapon for strong placement is still the direct match. To be safe, use direct and proximity matching once every other paragraph and avoid chaining keyword phrases together, but go wild with your semantic matches.

By Cody Snider

This being said, today we’d like to introduce you to another great site we follow regularly, SEOmoz.com. Although the following video is not a part of the Active Community presentations, the message is relevant to what we’ve been discussing these past weeks.

In the video, Rand discusses how to establish a sustainable SEO strategy. With changes being made to search engines constantly, it’s important to set a solid foundation because, while the implementation of your strategy may change, the overall concept behind it is still there. By focusing on three areas- technical, content and marketing – you’re able to build on to your existing SEO plan as technology evolves. To hear Rand discuss this in further detail, watch the following video from a previous SEOmoz Whiteboard Session.

Related Links:

Active Community: Understanding the Search Demand Curve

Active Community: Understanding Duplicate Content

Active Community Presents 2010 Search Objectives

SEOmoz Daily Blog

By John Sable

Understanding how to set ourselves apart from the competition through content will help increase SEO and traffic to our sites. Watch the following presentation to hear more on this topic and to find examples of what we can do to outrank our competitors.

Related Links:

Google Says Yes: You Can Still Sculpt PageRank.

Active Community Presents 2010 Search Objectives

By John Sable

blog.activewebsite.com

Below is an introductory video that discusses the topics we will be covering over the next 5 weeks. The videos that follow this presentation will expand on search objectives and will go into detail on how to drive more traffic to your site.

To kick the series off, today we are presented a video tutorial that stresses the importance of content.  We talk about this a lot, but content is necessary for an effective SEO plan. As you’re watching this presentation, we really want you to pay attention to the ways the mentioned sites are developing unique content. After you watch this, it is our hope you’ll take a closer look at how you’re promoting not only your broker websites, but your properties as well.

This video will cover the following topics as they relate to content:

• Define Your Area of Expertise
• Crafting Your Message
• Developing a Voice
• Developing Value Through Unique Content
• Make Your Content Shareable

Websites mentioned in this presentation:

Chicago Relocation Blog

Reno Realty Blog

LandVest

Telling a Good Story on Zero Energy

Bill Tancer, General Manager at Hitwise, blog

By John Sable

blog.activewebsite.com

With the Enterprise Network, we’re really trying to instill the idea that unique and engaging content is the driving force behind generating traffic to their sites. We’ve discussed for quite some time the importance of content and using it to your advantage to increase SEO. This is a great tool to use for your company, but another aspect of our industry we should be focusing on is establishing a relationship with the community as well.

Along with quality content, we need to find other ways to provide services to our clients that will bring them to our websites. By becoming the voice of your community, not only are you an essential resource to new clients, but you’re also providing value to fellow community members.

Your company has the potential to be the go-to site for community information. More than likely, if you’re in the real estate industry, you have strong ties to the community. From school information to market statistics to cost of living reports, you are the experts when it comes to your region. So why not put your vast pool of knowledge to good use for your customers? On your websites’ community pages and blog, you should strive to become THE voice of your community. Your site should be a one-stop-shop for any questions future or current residents have about your city.

By creating a Current Events section on your website, you can attract residents to your site by providing them up-to-date information about your community (and provide quality content to your site as well!). Users don’t want to spend a lot of time searching dozens of sites in order to find what’s going on in your city that weekend. If  they can go to one site and find all the available information they will.  That could be you!

Below is a list of 10 resources you should be utilizing for finding content:

1. Local Chamber of Commerce
2. Local city and county website
3. Local school district website
4. Local newspapers
5. Local radio stations
6. Local TV stations
7. City Magazines
8. City Visitors Center
9. City Entertainment Venues
10. Citysearch.com

A great example of a brokerage that understands the need to create a connection with their users is Enterprise Network Member Milestone Realty Consultants. This Kentucky-based company is not only providing users with information pertaining to entertainment, recreation, schools, shopping, etc., but they’re taking it a step further. Having just launched their new website last month, Milestone offers users insight into their local regions by streaming community videos from their homepage. Below is an example of Kentucky’s Louisville  community video that does a really good job of captivating their audience and appealing to their needs.

Along with this video comes neighborhood statistics from demographics to libraries to parks in the area and a list of agents who serve that particular community. Not only is this a great resource, but it’s a fantastic call to action by providing a list of experts to help them find their next home.

When it comes to your own website, think about ways you can reach out and educate your local community. Take the burden off your clients and compile relevant information for them. The first step should be adding important community content, including links to other local vendors and current events that are happening in your area. Not only will it help increase traffic to your site, it keeps your name in front of these users for when they’re ready to purchase their next home.

Related Posts:

Milestone Realty Consultants Community Pages

Using Content to Increase SEO

6 Unique Content Ideas to Boost Your Website’s Value & Link-Worthiness

By Amanda Stephan

http://blog.activewebsite.com/