Do you want to learn about SEO? Are you tired of your boss asking you why your site isn’t #1 on Google and not being able to answer? Or are you the proactive hero that’s looking to drive measurable results for your company and get yourself promoted? I’m excited to offer this 73 question search engine optimization training as a starting point.

If you can answer all of these questions, I’m confident that you’ll be right on your way to driving relevant, free traffic for credit union, bank, hospital, or other business websites! Ok, now that you’ve read this far, here it is, FREE for a not-so-limited time.

The 73 Question SEO Training Worksheet

Tip: feel free to heavily utilize the website http://www.google.com to find answers to these questions (that’s an SEO joke).

SEO in General

• Why is SEO important for businesses?
• How fast can you expect to see business results from an SEO campaign?
• Is one goal of SEO to show up #1 for your business’ brand name? Why or why not?
• Define SEM.
• Define SEO.
• Define PPC / Sponsored Search.
• How is Pay Per Click (PPC) different from SEO in terms of when a business can expect to see results? Why is this?

How Search Engines Work

• Generally, which are the 3-4 most popular search engines and their respective market share?
• How large are the search engines in YouTube or Facebook? Should a marketer change what they are doing to account for these?
• Explain the difference between organic vs. Pay Per Click (PPC) listings.
• Explain the difference between on-page and off-page SEO.
• Which is better, a link from your site to another relevant site, or vice versa?
• Explain why inbound links are important for effective SEO.
• Which is more important, on-page SEO or link building? Why?
• What is a SERP? How do you explain which results are ads vs. organic listings?
• Explain the Google algorithm.
• What is “blended search” or “universal search?” What’s the difference?
• What is “personalized search?” How does this affect measuring the results of SEO efforts?
• If a client says they want to be #1 on Google, how could that potentially not help them at all?
• If a client asks why they are listed #3 on their computer, but #8 on their boss’ computer, what could be the reason for that?
• Explain how the concept of The Long Tail relates to SEO.
• Why does Google care about duplicate content?
• How does a search engine understand the content of an image, such as a .jpg file? When you search Google Images, how does it know what to show you?
• Show an example of “clean” code and “messy” code as it relates to SEO.
• What is a Google search operator?
• List three common Google operators used for SEO.

On-Page SEO

• List four places on a web page or in the HTML that Google looks for keywords.
• Which of these are believed to carry the most weight to Google?
• How important is it to have keywords in the domain name?
• Show examples of a URL that has a subdirectory and a URL that has a subdomain.
• Which is better for SEO: a new page on a subdirectory or a subdomain? Why?
• Explain why every page on a website should have its own keyword strategy.
• What does Google use a website’s robots.txt file for?
• Explain how a search engine understands what a web page is all about.
• What’s a meta tag? How important are they?
• Generally, what significance do domain names play in Google’s eyes?
• List one example of an SEO-friendly URL and one example of a non-SEO-friendly URL.
• Do dynamically generated pages get indexed by the search engines?
• How would you optimize a client’s Flash website? Why is this a challenge?
• What is cloaking? Would we recommend this to a client?
• What does keyword density mean?
• What is keyword proximity?
• What is keyword stuffing?
• What is considered a good keyword density for SEO?
• “Write for the visitors, not for the search engines.” Is this still true?
• What is the .htaccess file generally used for when doing SEO?
• Why create a site map for SEO? In what file format is the site map created? How do you submit a site map to a search engine? Does is need to be submitted?
• List three “black hat” SEO techniques and why they are against Google’s guidelines.

Off-Page SEO and Link Building

• How do you get links from other websites?
• What does “nofollow” mean and how does it relate to SEO/link building?
• What does it mean to create a relevant inbound link? Provide an example of a relevant link and a non-relevant link.
• What is anchor text and how does it relate to link building?
• Explain how a press release can be used for SEO.
• Explain how an article release can be used for SEO.
• How can your site’s SEO be improved by doing an article release? Why does this help?
• What is a link farm? Would we use one for a client’s website?

Keyword Research

• Investigate the Google Adwords Keyword Tool and Wordtracker. What are some pros and cons of each? Which do you prefer?
• Why use a Keyword Effectiveness Index (KEI)? What factors should go into a KEI?

Local Search

• Why has local search grown in importance in recent years?
• How does a business change the information in its listing? What are some challenges with this?
• What are the major differences between how Google and MSN get the data for their local listings?
• How do you optimize a listing? What elements of a listing can be optimized? How do you relate a website’s keyword strategy to its listing?

Getting SEO Data

• List five key metrics to consider when evaluating how well a website is optimized.
• How the data for each of these collected?
• How reliable is this data?
• How does Alexa.com get its data?
• How does Quantcast.com get its data?
• How does SEMRush.com get its data?

Google Analytics for SEO

• Explain the differences between the three main traffic sources in GA (direct, referring, and search engines).
• Generate a report that shows how much traffic your site has received from search engines in the last year and export the report as a PDF.
• Generate a report that shows the inbound traffic to your site for only one single keyword in the last year and export the report as a PDF.
• Use the keyword filter to show all inbound keyword traffic for terms excluding your brand name and export the report as a PDF. Why is this an important measure of the website’s SEO results?
• Note the top search term from the last task. Explain why it is your top term.

But wait, there’s more! Keep reading the Priority Integrated Marketing blog to learn even more about SEO:

5 Mobile SEO Best Practices

4 Tips for Social Search Optimization (SSO)

3 Credit Union and Bank SEO Strategies

Hope you enjoy your post-assignment recess. @haugenbrian | bhaugen@priorityresults.com

While there were many great answers, my favorite was from the one person who really hit the nail on the head.  Hanna made the point that marketers really need to change their mindset from one of pushing messages out to today’s best practice, which is to work on pulling reactions in.

There were many other good responses. To attempt to summarize:

• You need good Facebook Page content to get likes.
• You need likers to put good content to use.
• Consistency is really hard!
• Consider giveaways or contests to generate initial buzz.

Whether you’re a marketer for a bank, credit union, hospital, or other business, I think you will agree that it’s pretty tough to create effective Facebook Page content on an ongoing basis. Many marketers I talk to bring this up as a need they’ve identified. I would say that right now, only a minority of people have a plan and process in place that they’re happy with. But Facebook Pages are a really new channel, if you think about it. How long did it take for marketers to get really good at TV or radio spots? The industry will always take time to develop best practices, and the accompanying budgets to support them.

For now, we just need to continue doing what we can to improve Facebook Page content, report the results, rinse, and repeat.

@haugenbrian | bhaugen@priorityresults.com

How can your healthcare organization effectively leverage the power and popularity of devices like the iPad and iPhone? How can your brand associate itself with these prestigious brands? Here are some ideas!

1. How about a branded calorie counting app?

If you haven’t personally tried one of these yet, I’d highly recommend it! While it can seem too time-consuming at first to input every single morsel of food you eat and any workouts you partake in, you might find the practice to actually be kind-of fun! Apps like Lose it! and MyNetDiary can really offer a new outlook on the food choices you make, and show your progress with bright, interactive charts.

And since they can save recipes, including your commonly eaten meals, you can input that Chipotle Burrito Bowl with black beans, barbocoa, green and corn salsa, cheese, and lettuce in no time at all (PRO TIP: cutting the tortilla and sour cream from your Chipotle visit can really help to keep you within your daily calorie budget!).

2. What about a super-interactive publication?

Have you heard of The Daily yet?

This video helps us imagine the possibilities of a custom interactive publication that waiting patients can easily access using a QR code. What if they could read an article by one of your leading physicians and then send a follow-up question via Twitter with one click? Many experts believe that interactive publications are really in their infancy right now.

3. Can you make it easier for patients or customers to provide information?

When people aren’t feeling well, they want you to provide solutions to get them back in good health as soon as possible. Brands that are able to help in times like these are forever remembered by these benefactors in a favorable light. iManage Migraine by the pharmaceutical giant Merck is a cool example of the possibilities.

Apparently, one way to treat chronic migraines is to keep a journal of events that can be passed along to the healthcare provider. I can’t imagine making this any more convenient for the patient. Rather than having to carry around a notebook or laptop all day, they can simply fire up the app on the go to document the needed information.

4. Or maybe you can be there with them every step of the way.

BabyBump is a good example of how a healthcare brand could provide a lot of value to a coveted segment during one of the most important times in their lives.

As marketers, we are always looking for the next way to create and deepen relationships with people. There really are some exciting possibilities cropping up now that the mobile technology market has hit its tipping point. What do you think is next on the horizon for healthcare marketers?

@haugenbrian | bhaugen@priorityresults.com

Having a Facebook page is quickly becoming the status quo for credit unions and community banks.This Mashable article from late 2009 listed 5 ways banks were using social media at that time, and I think these are still the five major strategies for social media marketing:

• Community building
• Product research
• Customer service
• Marketing & promotion
• Transparency

From the article we saw how banks interacted and built strong relationships with the customer. The following are examples of the kind of interactions I’ve seen on credit union and bank Facebook pages. You will see many similarities with good pages, such as:

• Replies to member comments usually come the same day or within a half of a business day.
• Members are addressed by name.
• Advice is always clear and concise, providing phone numbers or tracking down other info. Confidential account information is never disclosed.
• If it is appropriate to continue the dialogue offline, the financial institution politely tells them where to call.
• While you don’t necessarily see this in my examples, these pages leave conspicuous reminders to users that they should not ever post sensitive information in these online channels.

Interaction Examples: Customer Service

Interaction Examples: Content/News

Interaction Examples: General Comments

Here was my question:

After 22 hours, here are some of the best responses provided by our panel of experts (click to enlarge):

There is clearly a lot of great knowledge out there on email marketing content production. Thanks to all who contributed answers to my question. It is open through the next week, so keep them coming!

@haugenbrian | bhaugen@priorityresults.com

Here’s a table that breaks down the three biggest uses for SEO while offering a few examples to illustrate why SEO is a great tactic to implement when you want to increase leads, improve your onling branding efforts and protect or repair your bank or credit union’s online reputation.

Happy New Year! Best wishes for SEO success in 2011.

If you’re still a little unfamilar with the differences between an installed, or proprietary app and a mobile-optimized (otherwise known as a browser-based) app, check out my colleague Brian Bierbaum’s post: Building Mobile Apps: Proprietary Vs. Browser-based. After you understand the basic differences, you might agree that for your businesses objectives, a mobile-optimized Web app (i.e. website) may be a better option for you than an installed (native) app. Here are 5 reasons:

• Due to market-share realities, installed smartphone apps need to be built for at least two platforms (iPhone and Android). There is potentially even more work if you want to support all the other platforms rising in popularity (BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Palm, etc.).
• Installed apps need to be updated periodically as the platforms make updates. That means an ongoing cost to you.
• Installed apps should really be used when you need to integrate with the functionality of the phone, such as GPS, notifications, camera, etc.
• Web apps are good for making information easier to read for people. Examples: try reading The Washington Post or ESPN in your smartphone’s browser using the normal site vs. the Web optimized site.
• Web apps are generally easier to build and maintain than installed apps.

Now if your goal goes beyond simply wanting to provide information, such as mobile banking features, doctor appointment requests, or a photo submission contest, an installed app will probably be where you are headed. But if you’re just looking to provide the same information that your website already has, but in a more easy to use format, my argument is that a mobile Web app is probably best for you!

If this topic piques your interest, you should also read this column from Michael Brown on MobileMarketer.com. It’s a really well-written breakdown of this same topic, with a lot more details and examples than I’ve provided here.

My colleague Brian Bierbaum has more interesting points related to mobile in another post: Are Mobile Apps Worth My Time (and Budget)?

@haugenbrian | bhaugen@priorityresults.com

Sometimes Facebook’s internal site search isn’t the easiest way to find examples of what your peers or competitors are doing. Here are some examples of lists of credit union and bank profiles that can be generated by using Google’s site search feature.

Google search for “credit union site:facebook.com“ 

Google search for “bank site:facebook.com”

The same method can also be applied to Twitter with interesting results.

Twitter search for “credit union site:twitter.com”

Twitter search for “community bank site:twitter.com”

Then, to quickly review lots of pages at once, I’m a big fan of using the “open in a new tab” feature in most browsers.

Just right-click on the link and select “open in new tab,” or whatever sounds similar. This example uses my favorite browser, Google Chrome.

And now after opening a half-dozen different pages in a matter of seconds,  I can easily click into each and check them out (click the image below to enlarge).

And last but not least, Chrome has a cool feature where you can quickly delete all these tabs at once.

I’m always looking for new ways to save time and energy! Does anyone have other search or browser tips?

@haugenbrian | bhaugen@priorityresults.com

SEO for Mindshare/Branding

When it comes to establishing/maintaining your brand, your focus should be on increasing your perceived authority. This can be a very important goal for healthcare organizations that are competing in the same market with larger or more renowned organizations. It’s important to aim for traffic that you’re interested in – think traffic of people searching for the top hospital in your city. Posting new blog posts or articles on a consistent basis, a practice sometimes referred to as “link bait,” will increase the likelihood of your content being shared and becoming more memorable. Finally, Fishkin suggests aiming for the long tail instead of simply high volume traffic, so try using terms such as “top heart surgery hospital” rather than “top hospital.”

SEO for Lead Acquisition & Direct Marketing

This goal is probably the most common goal of SEO for businesses. Many will start by using sponsored search, such as Google AdWords, to gain targeted traffic to their site. But many soon realize that paying a variable cost per lead is not a very scalable growth model. SEO can be thought of as more of a fixed cost. You can invest in an expert on staff, or hire a marketing firm to do it for you. Either way, you are essentially paying a set fee every year for traffic that can compound and has relatively no growth ceiling.

Improving your lead acquisition with SEO will simply make it easier for prospective patients to learn that your hospital is an option for the healthcare services they are looking for. Many people don’t know the first place to look when a medical issue arises. That’s why they turn to Google.

To begin your SEO for lead acquisition strategy, Fishkin suggests starting with keyword phrases that convert well or have previously performed well in your sponsored search campaign. After you have finalized your keyword strategy, start implementing the plan with a solid foundation of on-site optimization including keyword-rich title tags, URLs, headings, and body copy. Also, write your meta descriptions to really sell the click, since many times that is the text that shows up in your Google listing. Finally, include your target terms in your meta keywords, even though it is said that Google doesn’t really look at that anymore. Finally, you’ll want to put an ongoing plan in place for your off-page SEO. A key part of that is to actively create links from relevant sites to your blog posts, health-related articles, and other interesting content. It’s a tedious task, but any SEO expert will tell you that it really pays off!

SEO for Reputation Management

SEO for reputation management is continuing to grow in popularity, and for good reason. SEO is one of the most effective ways to get the content you DON’T want off of page one, while replacing it with the content you DO want. An added benefit of SEO is that you can use it either proactively or reactively. It can go head-to-head with already existing negative content, or ward off potential future negative content. Keyword targeting in this instance is fairly easy (it’s how people refer to your brand), although don’t overlook it because it might reveal some variants you might be missing (common misspellings, for example).

Client Reputation Management SEO Case Study

James R. Boyle + Associates, a leading Minneapolis strategic communications firm, came to Priority Integrated Marketing looking to enhance the reputation of one of their own high profile clients who had fallen upon an unfavorable digital footprint. A comprehensive reputation management SEO strategy was implemented, which resulted in a much more favorable online presence. Strategically placed content on new and popular web properties, as well as a solid cross-linking architecture meant a drastic reduction in negative content about the client on page 1 of Google and other top search engines.

Does your hospital have an SEO strategy? Does it follow one of these 3 models, or do you use another approach?

@haugenbrian | bhaugen@priorityresults.com

The good news for you Type A people is that Facebook has actually generated a mathematical formula to determine what makes it into the news feed. News of the EdgeRank formula made quite a splash at Facebook’s f8 conference. The experts at TeachtoFish Digital can give you an inside look at the exact equation and break down some of the terminology.

What This Means to You

Facebook’s EdgeRank news feed optimization has created a system that demands frequent and consistent interaction. If your content is not commented on, liked, and posted often, its EdgeRank score is probably circling the drain. But if you frequently post relevant and response-warranting content, you’re more likely to show up in the news feed.

How to Relevantly Increase Your News Feed Presence

There are two kind of facebook feeds: the live feed and the news feed. The live feed posts events as they occur. The news feed is made up of what the EdgeRank formula picks out of your connection’s profiles. The more you engage with a certain profile/person, the more likely it is that their updates and activities will end up in your news feed.

This is Facebook’s way of saying, “I see that you comment on National Bank’s status updates often, here’s a link they just shared.” Consultants at BrandGlue estimate that about 1 in 500 updates make it into the news feed. So if you only update your status once a week or once a month, you’re less likely to make it out of the bottom of the pile. Similar to a lottery, the more entries you have, the more chances you have to “win.”

You might have heard this tip before, but creating a social media editorial calendar can really help you stay on track. If you widen your content subject matter, you create more opportunities to reach previously untapped audiences. By mapping out your social media content, you can create a clear strategy for engagement with your customers effectively.