Author: David LeWallen, International SEO Strategist

Establishing a global web presence and optimizing for search engine results is more than just translation. In fact, without a true understanding of the cultural, political, linguistic, and social differences of the targeted country, marketers run the risk of driving users away.  And, without the proper International SEO Strategy, they run the risk of something worse – never being found by users in the first place. Take a look at some of the best-practices and strategic tips below to help you gain international exposure and SEO value.

1. Select Your Domain Name – Your domain name is the unique address that defines who you are and where you reside on the World Wide Web. When selecting an international domain, there are three options to consider:
   1. Country Code Top Level Domain (ccTLD) – Purchasing the ccTLD of your target country lets the search engines know where your business is located and what markets you are targeting for a specific website. This also helps to keep brand equity with your company. If you do not purchase your ccTLD for a specific country a competitor could buy http://www.yourcompanyname.fr for example.
   2. Country Code Sub-Domains – The second option for an international URL structure is to set up country specific sub-domains. E.G. http://fr.yourcompanyname.com this gives the search engines the ccTLD and lets them know that you are targeting France.
   3. Country Code Sub-Folders – If the previous two options are not viable then use a specific sub folder with the ccTLD of the country you are targeting (E.G. http://www.yourcompanyname.com/fr/).
       
2. Set the Country You Are Targeting in Webmaster Tools – If you choose “country code top level domain,” Google Webmaster Tools will target the country for you. If you choose “country code sub domains” or “sub folders,” you should set the country that you would like to target within your Google Webmaster Tools account. This is a secondary way of letting Google know what country you are targeting. Other search engines have a webmasters area as well and this varies by engine.
    
3. For Countries Where Google Is Not the Major Search Engine – You will want to host your site in the country in order to let the local search engines know that you are relevant for your target country. You will also want to submit your site to these search engines as well. Countries where this is the case includes Russia and China.
    
4. Localization – Your customers drive your business, so you need to not only speak their language but also their culture. If you simply translate your site, you may be missing out on some opportunities to target localized versions of the language. For example, if you were selling “soccer cleats” you would miss the localized version of that keyword “football boots” which is used in the United Kingdom
   1. Title and Meta Data Localization – Make sure to localize your title tags and Meta data, using keywords that are highly searched in the market you are targeting. Some companies will create a new site and translate the content into the language but leave all of the Meta data in English. In order to capture search traffic in the target country you need localize and optimize your title and Meta data.
   2. Content Localization – You need to have your content localized into the language you are targeting. Don’t forget about images that contain text, many times companies will translate/localize their text but they leave the same images from the U.S. site, and if those images have text in them that text will still be in English.
       
5. Global Gate Way – Your global gate way is your language or country selector page. It is important that this page be written in HTML as opposed to a dynamic script like Java or Ajax. By writing your global gate way in HTML the search engines will be able to read the links and pass link value to all of your international domains and URLs.  We do not recommend using flags to represent the countries because if one were from Mexico they may get offended if they have to click the Spanish flag in order to get content in Spanish.

There you have it. The five foundational steps to international SEO success. Implementing these best-practice recommendations will help you set a solid foundation, and you’ll be well on your way to establishing a strong global web presence.

y Rostin Ventures (c) 2010

Reverse SEO fits seamlessly within the context of your online reputation management (ORM) program. It is the quickest, most effective solution for dealing with bad press that has surfaced on the search engines about you or your company. By pushing negative listings from the front page of Google, Yahoo, and Bing, reverse SEO shields you from the damaging commentary of others.

Negative publicity online has become one of the most frustrating challenges for companies. It is typically anonymous. Names are often unattached to forum threads, blog posts, and even entire websites. Therefore, it is difficult to track and address the source of the complaint. Moreover, the growing popularity of social networking platforms has made it easier than ever for anyone with a mild grievance to give weight to their grudge. If you or your company have been the target of bad press online, it may be time to launch a reverse SEO campaign. 

In this article, we’ll clarify how negative publicity gains traction within the search engines, and how it can lead to a public relations nightmare. We’ll also provide a working blueprint for executing a reverse SEO campaign and controlling the damage.

Controlling Bad Publicity With Reverse Search Engine Optimization

To appreciate why reverse SEO is effective, you should understand how negative press takes root within the top search listings in the first place. Google, Yahoo, and Bing rank pages based on a large number of criteria. If a website and its individual pages satisfy the most important of those criteria, those pages will rank well.

A lot of the bad press that targets companies (possibly even yours) is placed on websites that meet key ranking parameters in the search algorithms. That means the negative publicity can climb into the top positions and gain exposure. When people search for you or your company, they’ll see the bad press. That damages your reputation.

Reverse search engine optimization is an ORM strategy that pushes negative publicity from the top search positions. By moving the bad press off the first page of listings, reverse SEO limits its exposure and stifles its impact.

Ingredients For An Effective Reverse SEO Campaign

Like search engine marketing, reverse SEO uses a methodical, multi-pronged approach to protect your online reputation. The first step is to identify the sites and pages that contain negative publicity about your company and that are ranking for important keywords. Those keywords might include your name, that of your company, or key employees.
 
The second step of reverse SEO is to analyze those sites and pages for their respective ranking authority. That will help you determine the effort and tools you’ll need to use in order to move them from the first page of listings within Google, Yahoo, and Bing. A negative PR blitz that is spreading across social networking sites is more difficult to overcome than a single blog post that is on a non-authoritative domain.

The third step is to gather the necessary tools and execute your reverse SEO campaign. Such tools might include optimized press releases, a new network of competing sites and blogs, social media profiles, and a social bookmarking program. Reverse SEO may also include heavy content syndication to build high-quality links. A search engine marketing specialist will have these tools at their disposal. 
Reverse SEO Begins Before Negative Press Emerges

The best time to launch a reverse SEO campaign is before bad publicity appears in the search engines. This is due to the way that the pages link. A page will rank well within the search engines if there are enough thematic links pointing toward it. However, once it ranks, it will gain exposure. That exacerbates the problem.

Negative press can spread rapidly as people attach the press to their own blogs, sites, forums, and social media accounts. That creates a growing portfolio of links pointing toward the damaging press, cementing its position in the top listings. It becomes more difficult to address. By launching a reverse SEO campaign upfront, you can prevent the negative publicity from gaining exposure in the first place.

Protect Your Online Reputation With Reverse SEO

Reverse SEO should play a key role in your online reputation management program. It is far too easy for unsatisfied customers, resentful employees, lazy journalists, and malicious competitors to tarnish your name. And when it happens, it is usually done under the cover of anonymity. Anonymity makes the complaint or grievance impossible to address in private.

Launch your reverse SEO campaign now – before trouble strikes and the damage begins to gain momentum in the search engines. In a year’s time, you’ll be glad you did.

With direct response well and truly in the bag, surely SEM for brand is the next big win for Google.  Here’s a shift in thinking to help brands up the ante.

SEM as a direct response tool gained instant appeal, spend sky rocketed and found its equilibrium where CPA is equitable. Search marketing for brand surely is the next big win for Google, but no one seems to be making a good case for brands.

It stands to reason that if millions of consumers are flagging their interest and are eager to explore responses, then brands should be getting in on the action, but search as a channel for brand marketing has not been embraced yet. 

This may be because brand marketers have been distracted by social media or perhaps have the wrongly ingrained mindset that search is a purely direct response tool. I have recently seen presentations around the subject of “Search for Brand” from both Google and the IAB, but it all seemed a bit one dimensional.

Search is currently seen as a tactic for obtaining rankings for branded content to drive direct response (which is really just the tip of the iceberg), and is measured using simple CPA/ROI calculations. So, for brands to fully embrace and harness the search opportunity, a big shift in thinking is required. 

Here is a contribution to help bring about that shift. I would very much welcome any feedback, comments or refinements from the community.

Building Brand Search Journeys

by Jack Hubbard

By Kent Lewis

Recently, our search engine marketing (SEM) agency, Anvil Media, was up against a competitor for a piece of business. It was one of the rare situations in which we were notified that the company selected the other SEM vendor. I inquired as to the reasoning behind the decision, and was surprised by the response. The prospective client believed the competing SEM vendor’s structure (a silo approach) was more appealing than Anvil’s fully-integrated account management approach. I was frustrated that the final decision wasn’t made based on relevant experience, testimonials or case studies illustrating our quality of service and results, and decided to share my thoughts as to why the fully-integrated approach is more effective than the specialized approach.

Let’s start with a definition of fully-integrated vs. specialized approach to SEM. Anvil Media’s fundamental philosophy is that SEM should be managed by a team that understands all elements, including search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) and social media marketing. Alternatively, the silo philosophy dictates that SEM services should be performed by professionals that specialize in one of the three disciplines: SEO, PPC or social media. While some would argue each philosophy has its benefits, I would argue that there is a clear winner, based on my 12 years of SEM experience.

Specialization is Unnecessary

Whether in-house or in an agency environment, most interactive marketing teams are segmented by specialization: design, Web development, copywriting, SEM, account management, etc. Due to the differences in education, focus and personalities, these disciplines rarely mix well, but are required to get the job done. For example, a good designer or writer is rarely an effective account or relationship manager. A good programmer is rarely a good designer.

With SEM, however, the skills and talents required to be good at SEO, PPC or social media are not divergent. A good SEM professional should be comfortable with marketing, communications and technology, but the nuances between SEO and PPC are subtle enough that they can be managed effectively by the same person.

Specialization is Counter-Productive

Agencies or in-house teams at larger corporations typically create specialized roles for SEO and PPC, with the thought that it creates efficiencies. While this methodology has been effective in creating an industrial economy, I’m not convinced it creates better results in a knowledge economy. The specialization typically results in the building of silos and potential animosity. My experience in 5 multi-disciplinary agencies (traditional full-service and interactive) demonstrated that if you have a fixed budgets and specialized teams, they will fight over the budgets to defend their fiefdom and justify their existence, as if they were competing companies.

It’s very unusual for an agency or corporate environment to effectively manage multi-disciplinary teams towards a common goal, especially in the current economic conditions where layoffs are a daily occurrence. Even with the best intentions in a well-functioning cross-disciplinary team, the additional layer of communication and management required hinders effective management. The right hand may not know what the left hand is doing, which rarely adds up to a successful effort.

Specialization hinders Return-on-Investment

When you have too many cooks in the kitchen, people can get burned. In the case of SEM, if someone is taught to market a company with only one set of tools, they get a myopic view of what success looks like, and how to get there. PPC specialists tend to frown at SEO specialists, and vice versa, even though both offer tremendous value.

A team’s lack of understanding of fundamental SEO, PPC or social media marketing strategies can drastically hinder a campaign’s performance. For example, a SEO specialist may determine a keyword is too competitive to achieve a high ranking in organic results, but may not have the knowledge, support or infrastructure to do anything about it. Similarly, a PPC specialist may find that a keyword is too expensive to purchase, but is unable to collaborate with an SEO specialist. Essentially, the success of an SEM campaign in a specialized environment depends on management’s ability to oversee strategy, communication and training.

A truly integrated SEO and PPC effort requires a deep understanding of human behavior, website usability, analytics and how SEM strategies and tactics intertwine to create optimal ROI. Unless your SEM team is effectively cross-trained and properly motivated to communicate and integrate, you can all but guarantee your SEM efforts are under-performing.