The Magic of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Who, What, Where, When, Why and How

As an Internet Marketing Consultanting company, one of the biggest categories of questions we get come across our inbox is questions regarding Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  Now we can certainly understand why -- as an SEO expert it can be extremely difficult to explain to a potential client (often a stranger whom we have not had the ability to build rapport of trust with through previous projects) that there is this magical set of text, often hidden, on a website that tells those invisible search engine crawlers where to go, what to associate your provided information with (including those hidden components) and how to associate that linked information with your content.  Yes, there is information that can be placed on your website you can’t normally see on the surface that increases your visibility in search engines.  It sounds a little bit like online voodoo…  And we can certainly appreciate the skepticism.  What?  How?  Okay if I hire you, how do I know that work is even done if its invisible?  What exactly would I be paying you for again?  How much does this invisible work cost?  Yes -- We said we can appreciate it!

Search Engine Optimization

We are hoping to clear up a lot of the mystery that surrounds Search Engine Optimization right here, right now. 

First of all, Targeting Pro Marketing specializes specifically in SEO.  There are a lot of companies that both offer and claim to have “certification” -- when the truth is, as of the time this article is published, there is NO SUCH THING AS CERTIFICATION IN SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION!  We know - you're going to want to go and use your favorite search engine to go check that out, which is expected.  Don’t worry, we’ll wait…

Search Engine Optimization Help - Targeting Pro Marketing

See what we mean?  There are not only many companies that offer this “certification” (everything from a one hour online class to webinars to mailing you a nifty piece of parchment paper in the mail that didn’t even have to be tri-folded).  How can a company possibly “give certification?”  There are several degrees behind Targeting Pro Marketing’s list of achievements and knowledge … we know what it takes to be certified in many areas of Information Technology (IT).  What kind of backing would be behind those companies’ certifications?  Are they accredited?  Does it come from a Search Engine company itself?  (ie: Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc).  We went as far as to research this concept with several accredited colleges here in the United States.  The answer was always the same: “Now, why would a search engine company, who spends endless hours and funding to coming up with specialized search algorithms would possibly want to go and give away all of that scientific data and research to the public to exploit their search results?”  Thank-you!  That’s what we thought all along, too!  But the internet is flooded with these shady "black hat" SEO certification companies.  Not only that, but consider how many of those companies that claim to “give certification” and every company duped by their claims in becoming “SEO certified” with those mail-in pieces of parchment… Wow, that certainly is a lot. 

Take-away:  If you see a company claiming to be “SEO certified” you might consider packing up your bags and walking away.  There honestly is no such thing.  Even if that company honestly believes they have some sort of certification, they apparently are able to be deceived by one of the latest scams in the internet marketing book.

Now that all that is cleared up, let’s dig into the nuts and bolts of SEO.  The who, what, where, when, why and how. 

Who Needs SEO?

Those seeking SEO services are typically business owners or web developers who have sought specialized knowledge for their company's search engine placement.  At Targeting Pro Marketing, we take our consulting very seriously and in doing so have gained life-long clients through honest assessment and feedback of client needs.  SEO services are for those looking to take their website to the next level.  This is usually for new websites, revamped websites (keeping similar content and structure, but getting a bit of a facelift), or established websites looking to gain more traffic for a larger slice of the market share. 

What is SEO?

SEO is much more than invisible text on your website.  It is a series of logical and categorized information that tell the search engine crawlers what your website is trying to convey to the world.  SEO feeds information back to search engines like your company description, title pages, page descriptions, region (including coverage areas for regions such as countries, states, provinces, areas, cities and zip codes), and keywords associated with all of that aforementioned data.  It also includes links on the website that are placed intelligently with coherent corresponding information paired with alt tags (link information text) to further strengthen the informational bond search engine crawlers will use to associate the data you provide to the link you provide.

Where is SEO?

SEO should be on every page of your website … and beyond.  We know some of you may be scratching your heads at this time.  But SEO can reach much further than just your website -- think of the huge outside the box idea of social media.  BOOM.  You have grown your potential Search Engine Optimization reach on the World Wide Web exponentially when coupling it with social media marketing.  SEO can often be tucked away in areas of the website you cannot always see without going into the source code of your website.  You can see snippets of it when your website is built and you see those descriptions and page titles popping up all over the web!  You can also catch glimpses of alt tags if you hover over links in certain web browsers - you will notice when you hover over a link (don’t click on it), a little box with text will appear -- this is the alt text associated with your web link. Building up these different associations is how to build your SEO prescence on the web.

When do SEO results occur?

This is probably the hardest part of Search Engine Optimization to convey to eager customers who would love to instant results on their investment and efforts.  The hard truth about SEO is that you will not typically start seeing results until two to three months minimum.  If a company claims to give you results in days or weeks, prepare to be leery.  The results of SEO are both an art and a science.  There is logic and structure behind it, but how you decided to tie it all together and execute it can be as individual as the company who takes on the job.  You can map SEO results many different ways and depending on how you want to tie in all of that information can be a formula that is very unique and individual to that particular website.  Did a light bulb go off?  Viola!  That is exactly what search engines want!  Beautiful unique content that is tied to other beautifully unique content with information their search engine bots can understand and interpret.  BOOM. 

Why do you need SEO?

Having a good-looking website is great.  But what if we told you that ugly websites with great SEO probably get way more traffic than your $4,000 gorgeously custom-designed site?  Having an attractive website is great for a positive user experience, there is no doubt in that.  If you want people who do find your website to enjoy their interaction with it while they are there (whether it is for education, product showcasing, service offers, sales and specials, etc.)…  but don’t you want people to get there to begin with? 

How does SEO work?

We are sure many people aware of the sales funnel.  More potential in, the more conversions, the more clients, the more sales, and the more money your company makes.  Want to increase revenue?  Get a bigger funnel.  How do you do that?  Get more visitors to your website to start that conversion.  How do you get more visitors to your website?  Make the search engines happy.  How do you make the search engines happy?  GET GREAT SEO!  The sooner… the better.  Remember that turn-around time for results?  That clock starts ticking after you say go and your SEO Company adds the valuable information to your website.

Excited yet?  We sure are!  Targeting Pro Marketing has an absolute obsession with Search Engine Optimization … many dedicated hours to analyzing and understanding how it works plus the ability to map that information in a comprehensive way that applies to the subject website is what is key to success!  Targeting Pro Marketing takes great pride in helping people -- and taking your business to the next level with SEO is what we do best!

Search Engine Optimization Specialist

Contact us for a custom website analysis: 352-553-8739 of Contact Targeting Pro Online.

Mark & Christine Barber
Targeting Pro Marketing - Web, Graphic, SEO and Social Media Expert
Targeting Pro Marketing Professional Website
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Website Help - I Need More Visitors

Increase Website Visitors

So you know you need help, but you're not exactly sure what your website needs. 

This is often what we hear from our clients and potential clients - we need more website visitors.

The truth is that you have to get down to the root of your website problems.

Some questions we can ask is:

Is your issue that your website is not modern and attractive to today's consumer?
If your website is not updated continually it may not appeal to today's customers.  Do you have text that pertains to your product or service?  What about images?  Are they updated and relevant to your customer base? Find out more how to keep your website modern, current and content-ready.

Do your images convey an equivalent message to your website text?
What top three images do your website give your potential customers?  Is that the image you want your website to be recognized as?  Do those images match your text/content/article appropriately? How can images help my website? Find out more how images can help your website search engine rankings. 

What do my meta tags tell search engines?
Is your content properly indexed for search engines?  Does your text convey the keywords you want to portray to the public?  Are you being perceived as an expert in your field? How do I rank with Google, Yahoo, AOL and other popular search engines? Why am I not ranking higher?

Here at Targeting Pro Marketing we KNOW websites, we KNOW internet marketing and we KNOW what your website needs to be found, loved and adored by your customer-base.

Does your website need a FREE assessment?  Contact us today and we will give you a FREE website analysis!

Contact Targeting Pro Marketing for your next marketing project.
Mark & Christine Barber
Targeting Pro Marketing - Web, Graphic, SEO & Social Media Expert
Targeting Pro Marketing Professional Website
Targeting Pro Marketing on Facebook  
Targeting Pro Marketing Blog
Targeting Pro Marketing on Twitter
Targeting Pro Marketing on LinkedIn  

Facebook Zen - Don't Fight Facebook, Learn To Love It!

You heard that right - don’t fight Facebook – learn to love it! I understand a lot of people may be intimidated by social media, but it really is not anything to be afraid of. (I promise!)
Facebook is a great casual networking arena where you can interact with individuals, organizations, companies, like products, and partake in causes. In this dynamic interactive space, you can make many types of connections that not only enrich you the individual – but can also enrich you the professional, the business owner, the entrepreneur, the expert.

Just dive right in, I promise the water is deep and you won’t hurt yourself, go ahead and make an account (or you can have someone help set one up for you, like a Virtual Assistant). Once you have an account set up you can begin to familiarize yourself with it and get used to how Facebook functions. There are some great articles to help you get started with Facebook out there I highly suggest reviewing. One thing to note is your privacy, Facebook offers privacy settings but please be aware of your safety at all times and the kind of information you are sharing with others.

Considering it is hard for one to interact with themselves – your first step to take is to “find friends.” Trust me when I say this begins to get addictive! Start with family members, branch to close friends and then coworkers. This will give you an excellent foundation to building your Facebook network. You will be surprised at how many Facebook users you know that will help connect you with others or give you friend suggestions. Soon your connection network will branch out in every direction imaginable.

Now that you have a nice friend base, you can move on to what it is exactly you would like to DO with Facebook. This is where some people get a little fuzzy or things begin to blur. Is this a personal account? If you want to keep family and friends separate from business, I suggest creating an additional “professional Facebook account” – one that reflects your network of colleagues and associates, vendors and clients. Since this article is referencing Facebook for business, we are going to focus on how you can use this very easy social medium to your business advantage. Remember – if it is professional, keep it professional.

Photos are a lot of fun, and are a great thing to share about you, what you do, what you are involved in, what passions you have, what activities you partake in and a way to offer a piece of you with the world. They make great conversation starters, so don’t be afraid to post about the great things going on in your life!

Videos are another way to share yourself with others and can also offer a great marketing platform. Videos are highly indexed in the search engines, and when linked to other social media networks like YouTube, you have a great start at a viral video (and did I mention FREE?). (Don’t worry, “viral” isn’t a bad thing, it simply means that it spreads on the Internet because people enjoy sharing it by all networking and link sharing means, including Twitter, Blogs, Facebook, MySpace, etc.

Status updates – pretty straightforward. Update your friends on what you are doing, what is on your mind, a quote that inspired you, a link that interested you, etc. I would suggest trying to get these in once a day as a normal interval (which it is completely understandable if you are not able to do this) but no less than once a week. Having a stale account can sometimes be a bad reflection when a potential client comes looking for you. The great thing about Facebook is that once your business gets hopping and using social media to boost your search engine rankings begin to pan out, you can always ask a Virtual Assistant to help you maintain your social media websites on an as-needed basis.

Comments are a lot of fun, too – this is how you interact with your friends list. When you see your “feed” you will see posts, status updates, videos and photos of the people you know. You can place comments on these items to mingle with your peers. Let the real you shine through!

The “Like” button is also an easy tool to use when interacting with friends. If you don’t really have anything to add to the discussion you can simply “like” someone else’s activity. This is a great way to keep active even if you are running short on time, and lets your friends know you are still in touch with them.

Not to mention you can link your Facebook page to your Blog, Twitter and other networking websites to get all of those feeds spreading out from just a single source - that's online marketing efficiency!

Again, it is always a good idea to be mindful of your posts and comments – Facebook is indeed a public networking site, no matter how private you think your comments are. Keep everything professional and please also be mindful of your safety and do not offer information that is too personal.

See? Not so scary now is it? Go forth my friends – go forth and network the world! If you want a great place to get started, feel free to friend Targeting Pro, I look forward to networking with you!

“God bless the Geek, for they shall Internet the earth.”

Email: TargetingPro@gmail.com
Blog: http://TargetingPro.blogspot.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TargetingPro
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/TargetingPro
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/TargetingPro

Stay tuned to the Targeting Pro blog for my upcoming articles that will delve deeper into each aspect of social media – we will be really getting into the meat and potatoes of what it takes to be top in your field. If you need assistance in setting up or maintaining your social media outlets, feel free to contact me to discuss if Virtual Assisting or Ghost Writing is right for you!

Search Engines Are Hungry

What are you feeding them?

Internet users are growing by the day, websites are growing by the day – that means that more and more of the world’s population has internet access. What does this mean for websites? Competition.

A website should not just simply “exist” – a website should be a living and breathing thing that is always changing and always growing with a business. It does not matter if the website’s purpose is to sell fine china, provide real estate services or simply to offer the public information – they all have the same goal: to be seen.

Having a static web page that never changes and never updates information will have a hard time competing in today’s online market. Everyone is fighting and fighting hard for a slice of the pie to make a living. The economy is currently in a state to push a website to the top, or push it out of the way – depending on where it wants to go.

If you build it, they will come, and no phrase could be truer for the web. Offer something no one else does, provide a unique service or fantastic product and market it correctly. Slapping up boring text on a website will have a hard job of drawing in people, it must be interesting, captivating and believable.

If you are ready to vamp up your website and turn it from bland to grand – leave it in the hands of a pro. Not a website expert? You don’t have to be! Targeting Pro offers flexible website plans for any budget and frees up your time to keep running your business.


Email: TargetingPro@gmail.com
Blog: http://TargetingPro.blogspot.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TargetingPro
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/TargetingPro
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/TargetingPro

Are You Utilizing Your Website To Its Full Potential?

Your most powerful asset to your marketing strategy should be your website. It is your way to literally touch the world using the internet to a very wide client base. It is your face to your clients, your community and your associates. There are a few questions you have to ask yourself in your assessment of where you want to be with your brand and image:

Are you putting in the time and effort into not only making it the best website in the business but also keeping it that way?

Do you have skills it takes to create a comprehensive and attractive website?

Do you have the time to create unique content that your clients and associates will find valuable?

Do you have the time to stay in touch with your clients using social media outlets?



A lot of people find it hard to answer yes to all of these questions. The next very important step is to say “Okay - now what do I do about it?”

I have come across many people who badly want to bring their websites up to speed but have no idea to go about doing it. I like to think of a website as a home. There is a base cost to even have one (as in domain & hosting fees), there are maintenance fees (perhaps you pay for a website to host on your page from an outside source), you have to keep it clean & current every single day, there are fees for updating & upgrading & renovating, etc…

Now every homeowner will know, that if you do not have the ability to perform all of these tasks yourself, they hire a professional to take care of their investment. If you do not have time to clean, you hire a trusted housekeeper, if you have a broken pipe you hire a plumber, if your roof is leaking you hire a roofer, if you need a remodel or overhaul you hire a contractor. Specialists were created because we all cannot be perfect in all things - if websites & search engine optimization are not your strong points, if writing unique content has you with writer’s block and if social media is intimidating & confusing, it is perfectly logical to hire someone to assist you in these technical matters.

You specialize in what you do for a reason - to provide exceptional service to your clients. As your internet marketing specialist, I also offer to give you the same exceptional service for your website. You don’t have to be a writing expert or a social media whiz to provide valuable information to the world - you can keep on being your own professional and having your website support taken care of with confidence.



If you would like a website strategy plan particularly tailored to your business, needs, area & area of expertise, feel free to get in touch!

Email: TargetingPro@gmail.com
Blog: http://TargetingPro.blogspot.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TargetingPro
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/TargetingPro
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/TargetingPro

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Why Do I Need A Virtual Assistant?

Every business has room for growth, no matter what the budget or economy holds. If you are not adapting to the changing market you will find yourself trying to survive in a world that no longer exists. All businesses benefit from intelligent and well-planned growth. Whether you need assistance for 1 hour, 1 week or several months – a Virtual Assistant is your on-hire help with no long-term obligation. Search Engine Optimization is another aspect every business website cannot be without. What does Search Engine Optimization (SEO) mean? It means that your website is geared up for the best possible search engine rankings with relevant content to help boost your placement. The more potential clients that see you, the more sales you will make.



If web design, graphic creation, html coding, linking, social media, Twitter, Facebook and blogging have your head spinning – allow a Virtual Assistant to help take the technical burden off of you so that you can get back to what you do best: Running your business. On-going web maintenance can sometimes be a hassle for individuals who are not familiar with the latest technology or have the bigger fish to fry on a daily basis. Signing on a Virtual Assistant to help maintain your website, content, SEO and even shadow writing for your blog can be priceless additions to your web presence. Effective website create online presence – make your reputation online as good as it is in the field!

Email: TargetingPro@gmail.com
Blog: http://TargetingPro.blogspot.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TargetingPro
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/TargetingPro
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/TargetingPro