This pa
st month seemed fairly calm from an SEO point of view. There were no major Matt Cutts declarations or Google updates that sent the industry scrambling. In the world of social media and content marketing, LinkedIn continues to assert itself as a force to be reckoned with while Google+ remains a source of much confusion. There were a lot of great articles in April, and we’ve rounded up the best to help you get the most out of your business. Enjoy, and if you’re looking for the same great content the rest of the month, don’t forget to check in with us on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.
SEO
5 Steps to Set Up a Stellar SEO Strategy
Whether you’re in charge of executing an SEO strategy for a highly established website or a brand new domain, possessing the ability to understand the current business situation, along with seeing future challenges and opportunities, is critical when crafting a sustainable plan of attack.
Come Over to the Plus Side: Google+ and its SEO Benefits
SEO as we knew it is dead. Or at least it’s dying. The good news is that Google+ is evolving to present an entirely new (and much more natural, too) form of SEO meant to help searches find the most useful content available.
Google’s Matt Cutts on SEO: A Retrospective
Panda. Google vs. Bing. Penguin. Guest blogging. The years of 2011 to 2013 were nothing short of tumultuous for the search industry. And as the voice and face of Google, Matt Cutts felt the wrath of angry webmasters and marketers.
Keyword Research: Where is My Niche?
If you are not familiar with niches, you should be. But we aren’t talking about roles within an ecosystem, but rather about marketing.
SEO 101: Getting The On-Page SEO Basics
If you don’t get the basics of on-page SEO right, you have very little chance of securing top spots for competitive key phrases, even if you’ve got a fantastic outreach and PR campaign and an awesome link profile!
One Way to Future-Proof Your SEO
7 Keys to Great SEO For Content Marketers
Welcome to the second post in our Contently Labs series, where we answer common questions we hear from current or prospective brand publishers. Today’s question: “What SEO practices are most important nowadays for brand publishers?”
The Best Place to Hide a Dead Body is Page Two of Google
The title of this post is quite attention-grabbing and packs a powerful message. It certainly caught my attention when the quote was dropped on inbound.org by Dharmesh Shah on April 3rd.
Content Marketing
Creating Buyer Personas to Push Your Content Strategy Forward
Many small business owners are revamping their content marketing strategy this year, and while there are lots of different ways to alter your strategy and stay safe being discussed amongst the Webmaster and SEO community, one of my favorites is by creating buyer personas.
Why Content Goes Viral: What Analyzing 100 Million Articles Taught Us
Here at BuzzSumo, we’ve analyzed the social share counts of over 100 million articles in the past 8 months. So it’s fair to say we have a pretty good idea of what gets shared the most.
Is Referral Traffic from Reddit of Any Value to Publishers?
Reddit is a veritable goldmine for useful, interesting or downright bizarre content, making it a perfect tool for procrastination.
How to Frack Your Content Marketing and Close The Social Loop
Brands are missing a big opportunity to close the “social loop” and “frack” their owned content.Advanced technologies using learning algorithms, content recommendations and visual content platforms are powering top publisher sites today to help connect readers with content they will love.
How to Do Content Marketing on a Shoestring Budget
“Content marketing” sounds expensive. For a lot of companies, it is expensive. Most of the businesses I work with aren’t exactly rolling around in piles of money.
Social Media
50 Expert Tips for Getting Started on Social Media
“If you were to give a one-sentence tip to a small business owner just starting out with social media, what would you say?” That’s the question we’ve been asking a lot over the last few weeks.
21 Social Media Tips You’ll Wish You’d Known Sooner
For Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Foursquare.
The 6 Dangerous Fallacies of Social Media
You may have heard of social media. There’s been a bit of news about it recently. However, a lot of people making that news have created expectations and beliefs about social media that aren’t true.
We Can All Be LinkedIn Influencers. Here’s How
When LinkedIn launched the publishing network known as LinkedIn Influencer in 2012, members gained instant access to top voices in business such as Richard Branson, Martha Stewart, and Arianna Huffington.
Transforming Social ROI From a Myth Into Reality
Here’s a question I still get way too often: “What’s the ROI of social media?” It’s usually a B2B marketer that’s doing the asking, someone seemingly resigned to spending valuable time and resources on social media without really understanding why.
We’ll finish up this month’s roundup with Matt Cutts answering the question, “How does Google choose the title for search results?”
Image: Flickr/dok1