Personal Branding for Photographers Explained

This post has been contributed by Andrew Graham.(ref:http://goo.gl/qjP1hV)

Since photographers usually work as solo artists, they often don’t think of themselves, or market themselves, in terms of corporate branding. However, building a strong brand in the mind of your audience/potential clients is probably the most important thing you can do to take your career as a photographer to the next level.

And your lack of a strong personal brand could be the only thing standing between you and that next big client. Here are some basics on personal branding for photographers.

What is Personal Branding?

Personal branding is all about creating a unified image/feeling/experience of yourself in the mind of the consumer. It’s about taking your already unique and interesting personality and style, and distilling it into an easily recognizable identity.

Find Your Niche

Specializing can be a particularly quick way of developing a style and brand for your photography. It’s easier to gain quick recognition as a specialist, so whether it is landscapes, portraits, food, or fashion, find a niche that you enjoy and really go for it.

Creating/Designing a Photography Logo

Using a logo is a matter of personal preference. Some photographers have logos, others use a certain typeface, or a self-portrait etc. But, if you do opt to use a logo, make sure you know the basics of good logo design. You want something simple, legible and memorable.

Here’s an example of good photography logo:

This logo is clean, simple and instantly legible. It also does a good job of incorporating the camera into the logo. Too many photography logos use heavy handed references to lenses, apertures or whole cameras. Here, the subtle suggestion of the wide focus frame communicates photography without beating you over the head with it.

And now a bad one:

Yikes. It’s pretty easy to see what makes this a bad logo. It’s too busy, the font is difficult to read, the blue green colors in what I think is an iris are (ironically) hard on the eye. It’s just a mess.

When it comes to designing a logo, less is more. If a logo is clean and classic, you likely won’t want to change it later on, which is good because once people get your logo stuck in their minds, changing it on them can be risky.

Craft a Unified Social Media Presence

Because it’s free, immediate and simple to use, your social media presence is perhaps both the easiest and most critical arena for developing and promoting your personal brand. A good social media presence involves the following:

CONSISTENCY

Decide on an image, either a logo or a photo that you think best represents you as an artist and make that your profile pic on every account you have. Same goes for your user name.

SIMPLICITY

You want to be easy to find and easy to remember, so your user name should be simple. If you want to be @johnDoe, but all that’s available is @JohnDoe37786 try something else, like @johnDoePhoto or, include your location (e.g. @johnDoeNYC).

OUTPUT

The worst thing you can do is let your account stagnate. Your social media outlets allow you to get your name in front of thousands of eyes on a daily basis, so engage frequently. Try to post something at least once a day from all of your accounts.

VARIETY

If you post the same sort of thing over and over, people will quickly get bored and start skipping your posts. Mix up your feed with samples of your work, interesting photo exhibitions, interesting art/photography news etc. As long as everything you post fits your voice and speaks to your point of view as an artist, it will help solidify your brand and keep it fresh in people’s minds.

Reach Out to Likeminded Photographers

Using social media to connect with other artists can help build your personal brand as well as your network in the field. Find other photographers whose work you like and admire, and post links and shutouts to their photos/exhibitions. Chances are they’ll respond in kind with a repost or a link to your work, which means you’ve just gained access to their entire audience.

Once you have fine-tuned your personal brand and put yourself out there on social media, you’ll be surprised how much it will transform your business. Slick marketing and clean branding project authority and professionalism. But there is one thing that should never get lost in the shuffle: Quality. Once you’re attracting higher quality clients, you’re going to have to deliver at the highest level.

If we can learn one thing from Google+, or Crystal Pepsi, it’s that no amount of brand recognition can make up for a poor product. So whatever you do, put photography first, and don’t let marketing and branding get in the way of producing the very best work you can.

How to Optimize Your Social Profiles for Search

Have you thought about optimizing your social accounts for search?

Do you know where to use keywords in your social profiles?

In social media, there are two search engines you have to optimize for: the search function within each social network and Google search.

In this article you’ll discover where to use keywords in your social profiles and pages so you are found when people search.

Discover how optimize your social profiles for search.

Anatomy of Google Search Results

First, take a look at the anatomy of a result in Google Search.

Example of a search result in Google.

There are three things you can usually (but not always) control in Google search results for your website and social profiles and pages: the title, page URL and description.

The title is shown first in a search result. This is made up of 50 to 60 characters generally found in the SEO title of a page. The SEO title for Social Media Examiner (as shown in the Google search result above) is:

Social Media Examiner: Social media marketing how to, research, case studies, news and more! | Social Media Examiner

The URL of the page is shown below the title. On social networks, your URL is usually the social network’s domain name followed by your chosen username.

The description of the page is shown below the URL. This is the 155 characters generally found in the meta description of the page. The meta description for this website is:

Social Media Examiner helps businesses master social media marketing to find leads, increase sales and improve branding using Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest and YouTube

For Google search results, also note that Google can only pull information that is available on your public profile. This means you need to log out of each social network completely to see what your profile or page looks like. Anything that isn’t publicly viewable won’t be indexed by Google.

Here’s how to use keywords in your social profiles and pages to improve your visibility in search results.

#1: Optimize Your Facebook Page

When it comes to Facebook pages, you’ll see that most pages appear in Google search results like this.

Toyota’s Facebook page in Google search results.

Google’s search results use the Facebook page name, short description, number of likes and number of people talking about the page.

Specific elements of a Facebook page appear in Google search results.

In terms of keyword optimization, Facebook pages with keywords in the page name generally rank higher in Google search, as you can see below in a search for “cars on Facebook.” Although Toyota is a top brand for cars, their Facebook page doesn’t appear in the first page of search results.

Facebook pages optimized for the keyword “cars.”

Facebook search, on the other hand, uses more than just your page name. When you start a search for “cars,” you’ll see an option to click on Cars Pages.

A search for cars on Facebook.

When you click on Cars Pages, you’ll get pages in the Cars subcategory, found under the main brand or product category for pages.

Brand pages in Facebook search results.

If you switch your search term to just the keyword “cars” (without selecting Cars Pages), you have the option to find search results for that keyword under People, Photos, Pages, Places, Groups, Apps and Events.

If you’re a local business owner, note that your page will appear in Facebook search under Places based on your proximity to the searcher and the category of your page. In this case “car” or “cars” must be in the subcategory.

Local business pages in search results.

Key takeaway: If you want your page to come up in Google search for a keyword, that keyword needs to be in your page’s name. To come up in Facebook search, that keyword needs to be in your page’s subcategory.

#2: Optimize Your Twitter Profile

When it comes to Twitter profiles, you’ll see that most profiles appear in Google search results like this:

Twitter profile in Google search.

Instead of using the Twitter bio as the meta description for your profile in search results, Google pulls one of your latest tweets along with your profile name, username, number of followers, number of photos and videos and number of tweets.

Specific elements of Twitter profiles appear in Google search results.

In terms of keyword optimization, Twitter profiles with keywords in the name or username generally rank higher in Google search, as you can see below in a search for “cars on Twitter.” Again, although Toyota is a top brand for cars, their Twitter profile does not appear in the first page of search results.

Twitter profiles optimized for the keyword “cars.”

In search results on Twitter, profiles that are related to the keyword or phrase searched will appear, even if they don’t have the keyword in the name, username or bio.

Twitter search results for a specific keyword.

For example, Top Gear isn’t optimized for cars, but is a well-known show about them. Further down in the results, you also see unrelated queries with a keyword match, like a profile for a musician named Carly.

Key takeaway: If you want your Twitter profile to come up in Google search for a keyword, that keyword needs to be in your profile name or username. To come up inTwitter search, that keyword must be textually relevant to your account. Including it in the name, username or bio can also help.

#3: Optimize Your LinkedIn Company Page

For LinkedIn company pages, you’ll see that most pages appear in Google search results like this:

A LinkedIn company page in Google search results.

Google pulls your company page name and description for their search results.

Specific elements of the LinkedIn company page that appear in Google search results.

In terms of keyword optimization, LinkedIn company pages with keywords in the page name generally rank higher in Google search, as you can see below in a search for “cars on LinkedIn.”

LinkedIn company pages optimized for the keyword “cars.”

In search results on LinkedIn, company pages that have the keyword or phrase searched in their name will appear first.

LinkedIn search results for a specific keyword.

Key takeaway: If you want your company page to come up in Google or LinkedIn search for a keyword, that keyword needs to be in your company page name.

#4: Optimize Your Other Social Accounts

Now that you understand how profiles and pages from the top social networks appear in search and how keyword placement can help your rankings, let’s take a quick look at how to optimize your profiles and pages for other networks.

For Google+ pages, Google uses the profile name and a snippet from the introduction in search results. Pages with a specific keyword in the name rank best in search on Google and in Google+ search.

For YouTube channels, Google uses the channel name and description in search results. Videos with a specific keyword in the video name are more likely to appear in Google search over channels. Channels with a specific keyword in the channel name rank best in YouTube search under the Channels filter.

You can use SEO tactics to improve visibility for all your social profiles. Image: Shutterstock.

For Instagram profiles, Google uses the profile name, username and bio in search results. Profiles with a specific keyword in the name rank best in search on Google and in the Instagram app.

For Pinterest profiles, Google uses the profile name and description in search results. Pinterest boards with a specific keyword in the board name are more likely to appear in Google search results over profiles. Profiles with a specific keyword in the name will rank best in Pinterest search under the Pinners filter.

Instagram Ad Rollout Will Make It the Top Media Buy: New Research

Are you using Instagram for your business?

Have you thought about advertising on the platform?

Instagram just began offering paid advertising opportunities through select developer partners. In the coming months the platform is expected to create a Facebook-like self-serve option for any budget.

In this article you’ll discover findings from studies about Instagram’s current reach, and the potential to reach targeted audiences with ads.

Evolution of Instagram Ads

In December 2014, Instagram reported its user base hit 300 million, 64.2 million from the U.S. alone. More exciting to brands and marketers than strict user numbers, however, was the engagement rate. Instagram users like, comment and re-gram at a rate of between 3.1% (Socialbakers research) to 4.2% (Forrester research). Comparably, Twitter and Facebook posts have engagement rates of .07% and below.

Discover what research shows about Instagram’s ad rollout.

With population and engagement numbers like these, of course brands wanted to get access to Instagram audiences. For three years now, Facebook has been working on the correct advertising mix for Instagram. Until June 2015, businesses could only reach Instagram audiences by posting content, commenting, sharing and liking consumer posts. Instagram’s few brand partners could place sponsored posts, much like Facebook’s boosted posts. Strict ads, however, were not available.

In June 2015, Instagram rolled out the call-to-action buttons Shop Now, Learn More and Install Now, which take users to mini-apps within Instagram, rather than brand websites. That way, users stay on Instagram once they’ve shopped, learned and installed.

Now Instagram has provided advertising opportunities for all brands… provided you enter via one of their developer partners. These partners include Ampush, Brand Networks, 4C, Kenshoo, Nanigans, Salesforce Marketing Cloud, SocialCode and Unified. They require a minimum spend, so if you’re a small business, you won’t be able to take advantage of Instagram’s new advertising opportunities until later in the year.

Explore Instagram’s ad platform. Image: Placeit.

Facebook’s advertising followed the same path: It offered advertising to certain brands and then eventually made ads user-friendly enough that a developer intermediary was not needed.

If you don’t have the budget to utilize developer intermediaries, now is a good time to familiarize yourself with Instagram so that when the ads roll out to everyone, including small businesses, creating and posting an ad will be a simple task. On its blog,Instagram explains:

Instagram ads will be available to advertisers of all types later this year. We are currently testing self-serve buying interfaces and APIs with a small group of partners, and we expect to make them more widely available over the coming months.

With the context understood, small- and medium-sized businesses must evaluate whether Instagram is the right place for them. The following research will help with these decisions.

#1: Instagram’s Access to Facebook Data Offers a Significant Opportunity

Lighting a fire under many marketers, Instagram currently doesn’t have the pay-to-play platform that Facebook instituted in spring 2013. Before that point, companies that had built Facebook audiences had the luxury of getting each post to nearly every earned follower. Facebook then dropped organic reach to 6% and lower, forcing companies to pay to boost posts for as little as $1 per day if they wanted to reach more of their earned audience.

Instagram benefits from Facebook data. Image: Shutterstock.

Conversely, on Instagram, for the foreseeable future, each post will reach close to 100% of its earned audience… free! Well, free except for the time costs and any costs involved with Instagram’s partners or other outside consulting. When Instagram will go to the Facebook-style pay-to-play platform is unclear. Until that time, you’ll save significant marketing dollars experimenting with which content wins the most attention, engagement and likes.

This said, at this time Instagram is only allowing ads through the developer partners mentioned above. Because most small businesses spend less than $500 per month on ALL marketing (and because we expect developer partners to require more than that just for Instagram), smaller shops remain locked out of the platform until the self-serve option becomes available.

If you have a larger budget, on the other hand, you have an amazing opportunity to reach and engage a large, young audience quickly, through the partners listed above. Not only do you get the channel without a charge, but you also get access to parent company Facebook’s unprecedented consumer data and narrow targeting tools. In their Intelligence Report: Instagram, L2 explains that:

…management has ensured the mother ship remains relevant by handcuffing Instagram’s targeting and direct-response capabilities to the parent platform. Ad packages across both Facebook and Instagram, leveraging previously eschewed data-sharing practices, are the marketing world’s nuclear fusion.

“Nuclear fusion?” Let’s take a look.

Instagram has outpaced competitors, and market analysts expect this momentum to continue. Recent research from eMarketer indicates that over the next three years, Instagram will increase its lead on Twitter, Pinterest and Tumblr. By 2019, 33.6% or 111.6 million of U.S. Internet users will be active Instagram users. By that point, Facebook will have leveled off for several years with 52.8% of U.S. Internet users consistently patronizing the platform.

Despite coming onto the scene years later than Tumblr and Twitter, Instagram will become the highest-traffic platform of all except Facebook.

Increased advertisement on Instagram will mean more competition for eyeballs, however, and engagement has to fall from today’s levels, taking some of the air from Instagram fans’ balloons.

What Happened To The Google Panda 4.2 Update? Did It Make A U-Turn?

Google has no comment on why many webmasters have seen their Panda 4.2 gains reversed on August 14.

Barry Schwartz on September 4, 2015 at 9:40 am

Google Panda 4.2 was released by Google as a really slow update that started on July 18, 2015. But around August 14, some are speculating (including myself) that the Panda 4.2 update was reversed or changed significantly.

We knew that Panda 4.2 would roll out over several months and that over time, more and more pages on your site would be updated with the revised Panda score. So if you recovered from the Panda penalty, you should have seen a small and gradual improvement in your Google rankings as the weeks passed. But after August 14, many of those who saw the small and gradual improvement noticed that those gains were wiped out overnight.

Here is a graph I shared from my own personal recovery on the Search Engine Roundtable:

The vertical red line is the Panda release date, and the horizontal line shows my pre-Panda 4.2 Google organic traffic and how it returned to the same level after August 14.

I am not the only one noticing this; there are tons of webmasters who are seeing the same thing. I covered much of that in mypost earlier this week on the Search Engine Roundtable.

We’ve asked Google about this, but they decided not to comment about this specific change.

For more on Panda 4.2, see our interview with Google.

Google To Double The Number Of Health Conditions In Search Results

Google expands their medical conditions database and enables you to print out these conditions to give to your doctor.

Google announced they are more than doubling their health conditions database, so that when you search for health or medical topics in Google, you are more likely to find factual medical data on that condition.

Google launched medical content in search back in February with about 400 conditions. Over the next few weeks, you should see more than 900 conditions listed. Google also is adding downloadable PDFs and updating the overall design on both Web and mobile.

Here are the three large changes happening with Google’s medical search results:

• Hundreds more health conditions (soon more than 900 total, more than double the number Google started with) with quick at-a-glance info on symptoms, treatments, prevalence and more
• Visual design improvements and some more specific triggering so it’s quicker and easier to get the info you need (for example, you can now search for “pink eye symptoms,” and you’ll get straight to the symptoms tab)
• A “Download PDF” link so you can easily print this information for a doctor’s visit — this has been a top request from doctors

7 Ways to Track Your Social Media Marketing Activities

#1: Discover Optimal Times to Post

Use a tool like SumAll to track metrics such as what times of the day you get the most engagement and which content types work best for your social posts.


Find out when your social media posts get the most engagement.

As you gather these insights, start scheduling your posts at optimal times. Make other changes as well, such as a different content type or voice, to connect with and grow your audience.

#2: Examine the Reach of a Keyword on Twitter

To track the reach of a specific keyword or hashtag on Twitter, use a tool like TweetReach. For example, if you’re running a campaign with an associated hashtag, you can determine how far your hashtag traveled over a given time frame. TweetReach’s free service will look at 1,500 tweets for a given keyword.

For example, below are the results for a search for the hashtag #MondayBlogs. The results show that the term had a reach of nearly 211,000 accounts.


TweetReach analyzes tweets that match your keyword search term.

TweetReach also shows you the most influential accounts that help spread your message and makes it easy for you to engage with them.

With the premium service, you can track a hashtag over weeks or months to see how your campaign is spreading on Twitter.

#3: Research Your Competition

If you want to know where your competitors excel and where they’re falling short on social, use a tool like Rival IQ to find out.

Why is this good to know? If your competitors are tanking on Snapchat, for example, chances are you will too. Or if your competitors aren’t on Snapchat, it might be worth a look to see why. Maybe they were on the platform previously and it didn’t work out, or perhaps it’s just a venue they haven’t explored yet.

Use RivalIQ to research your competitors’ social presences.

A recent blog post from Rival IQ reveals engagement rates for Shopify and their competitors, complete with detailed graphics showing where each company has a social presence and where they get the most interaction.

You may find some of the results surprising. For example, Shopify gets the most engagement on Instagram. That’s probably not the first place you’d think people would go for an ecommerce solution, but Shopify is connecting well there.

#4: Identify Industry Influencers

Use a tool like BuzzSumo to identify who the influencers are in your field and what they’re talking about. Then connect with those people, talk to them and make sure you’re responding to them when they tweet you.


Beyond that, you can use BuzzSumo to find out which posts are getting the most action, discover relevant keywords you may have been unaware of andfind new Twitter chats to participate in. You can also see who shared the best content so you can target your following habits in the hope that they’ll follow you back.


Discover influential users, content and keywords.

Filter your results if you want to see what video is performing best or for details on infographics, for example. You can go back for a year, which is particularly useful if you have season-specific content.

All in all, BuzzSumo gives you insights on how to word your posts and whom to engage with for growth on which social platform. It’s a great tool for fine-tuning how you present your content on social media. Check out how your own posts rank to make sure that you’re improving over time.

#5: Determine Website Traffic Sources

With a customized landing page, you can measure many metrics, the most basic of which is just where website traffic is coming from.

Say you’re spending 10 hours a week crafting Twitter posts because you’re certain that your audience is there. If you then discover that your Facebook landing page is driving more traffic, you can streamline your efforts either by reducing the amount of time you’re spending on Twitter or by fine-tuning your efforts there to get a better click rate.

As you extend your reach, you can use custom landing pages to experiment with sales language, incentive offers and sign-up methods.

#6: Find Relevant Followers

Many social media marketers use ManageFlitter as a Twitter unfollow tool. It tells you which users aren’t following you back so you can take those people off your list and move on to folks who are more likely to engage with you. But this tool does so much more than that.


ManageFlitter analyzes tweets that match your search term.

It helps you find your ideal customers on Twitter, making it easy for you to follow them. Later, you can check whether those folks have followed you back. If you discover that a lot of them aren’t following you, it may be time to tweak your message or your bio. More relevant users are not only more likely to reciprocate your follow, but also more likely to engage with you and become customers.

#7: Examine Your Klout Score

Klout measures your influence by looking at how your social media posts drive the actions of your followers.

On Twitter, Klout takes into account the number of active followers you have and the value of those who retweet you. So, if you’re retweeted by someone with a Klout score of 75, it has more value (to Klout) than a retweet from someone with a Klout score of 35. Klout also looks at how many Twitter lists you’re on and who curates those lists.

On Facebook, Klout looks at either your page or personal profile, and how many followers or friends you have contributes to your score. According to Klout, they process 12 billion social signals a day from 620 million scored users.


Your Klout score fluctuates daily, so checking it every day isn’t particularly insightful. Instead, look for solid growth over the previous month.

If you’re not sure what your Klout score is, you can see it by logging into Klout.com and attaching your Twitter and/or Facebook account. The more social networks you connect, the better, because it’s a more accurate measure of your influence.

Final Thoughts

Measuring various social media metrics can seem like a daunting task.

If you’re overwhelmed at the thought of using multiple tools to measure these metrics, try incorporating one new method each month. That gives you time to see what kind of information you can gather. Make sure the tools you use offer meaningful information for your social strategy.

Ref: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/track-your-social-media-marketing-activities/

2014 SEO Playbook: On-Page Factors

Welcome to part 2 of my annual SEO playbook. (Click here for part 1.) I have to thank Danny Sullivan and the Search Engine Land team for giving me the perfect outline for the 2014 playbook, the Periodic Table of SEO Success Factors.

Part 2 will cover on-page factors, including content, HTML and architecture. You’ll find more than enough food for thought and some very actionable steps. This is not a step-by-step SEO guide, and it’s pretty informal. Before embarking on a search engine optimization campaign, do your research or consult with an expert.

Content: Quality

Quality was a big discussion item during 2013, especially topics like word count and deep content.

After Panda, you’d think we would be well past the age of producing short “fluff” articles. However, too many websites, especially business sites that struggle to post fresh content, continue the practice. Recently, I saw a corporate blog post listing 10 must-read books on a topic — the article consisted of 10 thumbnail images and the names of the books, linked to an online bookstore. You can’t afford to keep putting out cut-rate articles like that; in bulk, they are perfect Panda-penalty bait.

On the opposite end is deep content — pages or articles of around 1,500 words or more. Websites have seen success with this content, so it may make sense to take the time spent creating lots of short, “fluffy” posts and use it instead to produce a few longer, more meaningful articles. Whatever you do, make sure content is well written, with attention to grammar and spelling. Don’t just say something; back it up with thoughtful opinion or researched facts. Put some meat on the bones. Personally, when it comes to article content, if I cannot easily pass 450 words, I will combine it with other content or deem it not worth writing about.

As for e-commerce descriptions, I used to deem 250 words as the sweet spot. Nowadays, I am less concerned about word count and more focused on creating a great list, matching features with benefits.

Content: Keywords

Keyword research is not going anywhere and is still the foundation of all on-site SEO. The difference is, after the Hummingbird update, we are discussing the role of entities, where topics take the place of keywords in the result pages. Google has made great strides in synonym identification and concept grouping — some have even called it the death of the long-tail keyword. (But, as with all the supposed death knells in our field, this, too, is probably an exaggeration.)

My advice is to make sure each page stands on its own as a topic. Do not create multiple pages about the same exact thing in order to optimize for different keywords. Instead, stick to single, well-written, citation-worthy, topic pages and optimize them for multiple keywords. This can be another good reason to use long-form content.

Content: Engagement

Engagement is about whether visitors spend time reading your content or bounce quickly away. Once again, meaningful content is key. It’s amazing how it all comes back to quality. Are you publishing something your audience or target personas will want to read, or are you just filling holes in an editorial calendar — or perhaps publishing out of guilt because you have not published anything recently?

Engagement isn’t just limited to text content, either; Web page design is equally important. Words don’t just have to read well to be engaging — they have to look good. Readability includes everything from page layout to font selection to letter and line spacing. Additionally, pay attention to navigation and the presentation of links to other content, as these elements can have a huge impact on time, bounce rates and other visitor engagement metrics such as time on page/time on site.

Content: Ads

Another part of layout is the placement of ads. Search engines will not ding you for having advertisements. That would be hypercritical. What they will penalize is too many ads or inappropriate ad placements.

I do not foresee big changes in this area beyond the enhancement of current search engine policies. In addition to display ads, be especially wary of text link ads. Make certain they are content-appropriate or matching, and that you nofollow them. If you still use automated phrase link advertising inside your content, I strongly suggest you consider removing this. If you use interstitial or pop-up advertising, make sure it doesn’t interfere with the ability of search engines to crawl your pages.

Content: Freshness

I am a big proponent of fresh content — this includes not just posting about hot topics, but also ensuring that you are publishing new content on a regular or frequent basis. Not only is new content important to attract readership, it also improves crawl frequency and depth. Earlier, I wrote that you should not create content just to check off your editorial calendar. Not to backtrack, but if you do not have an editorial calendar in place, you probably should create one and get to work creating content.

Think of your content as a tool to generate awareness and trust. This means you must get beyond writing about just your company and its products or services. Go broader and become a resource — a real, viable, honest-to-goodness resource — for your target market and the people or companies that your target market serves.

Taking this broad approach will give you more to write about, allowing you to focus on topics of interest to your target market. This is the kind of content you can build an audience with. In my opinion, if you are not trying to build an audience at the top of the marketing funnel, you are probably doing it wrong. Obviously, there are exceptions to this; though, I think a lot more companies fail here than don’t need to worry about it.

HTML: Titles & Headers

Title tags are interesting right now. The usual rules for writing optimized title tags and headers have not changed. I do foresee search engines (Google especially) rewriting more title tags algorithmically. If you see Google rewriting your title tags, test changing your HTML to the same text Google presents in the SERPs. By test, I mean change a judicious few, then observe what happens to performance indicators. If you see improvement, a broader title tag optimization program could prove worthwhile.

Going back to entity search and optimizing for multiple keywords… when you are doing topic optimization, you must be cognizant of which keywords you use in the title and H1 tags. I wish I could give you a surefire formula, but one does not exist. As you look at synonyms, pay attention to which words or phrases received the most exact match searches and trust your intuition when it comes to popular language use.

HTML: Description

I don’t see anything changing with Meta description tag optimization. Write unique descriptions for every page. They will not change your rankings; but, well-written descriptions can increase click-through rate.

I always pay attention to length, around 150 words. In reality, the actual length depends on the combined pixel width of all characters, but from a practical standpoint just make sure your descriptions are not getting cut off when they appear in the results.

For pages that appear in site links, be sure that the portion of the description that appears beneath each link forms a coherent thought. This is a place where many enterprise sites and brands can improve.

HTML: Structured Data Markup

Each year, it seems structured data markup is always a big topic.

First is the question of whether or not you should use it for organic search engine optimization. Some long-time experts do not like structured markup or machine-readable language because they do not want to help the search engines present information in a format that does not generate visits.

For example, if you type in the name of your favorite NFL team, Google will show you information about that team, including their next scheduled game, right on the SERP. Here’s an example I fondly remember: someone once asked, if you ran a zoo website, would you want Google to show your business hours at the top of the search results, or do you want people to visit the website, where they will learn more about current exhibits and events? This is a fair question — to which I think the fair answer is, whatever will get the most bodies through the door.

Google, Bing and Yahoo are going to show the data they want and in the format they desire regardless of how you or I feel. Personally, I’d much rather be a trusted source, even if it means my website information is made available in the SERPs. For this reason, I am a huge proponent of structured data markup like schema.org and RDFa.

Other forms of structured markup, like the author and publisher tags, are not controversial and have entered the realm of best practices. Use them.

HTML: Keyword Stuffing & Hidden Elements

Negative ranking factors like keyword stuffing and hidden text are so old that many of us practitioners brush them off as search engine optimization 101. Unfortunately nothing is ever so easy.

Stuffing is definitely a factor in e-commerce shopping cart optimization. It can be tricky not to use the same word or phrase over and over again when they are used as categories or descriptions for products. Different shopping carts have different levels of control. Some are more easily optimized than others. On category pages, it may be as simple as limiting the number of products you display on each page. Without going into an entire lesson on shopping cart optimization, what I will tell you is: if you have not done a shopping cart review in the last two years, it is time. Make certain your e-commerce platform is keeping up.

It still surprises me how often I see unintentional cloaking. Usually, it’s a result of the template writer getting around a quirk of the content management system. But I have also seen static links in a template that are cloaked using display: none on some pages while they appear on others, depending on something such as the category. The bottom line is this: if it appears on the page, it should be in the HTML. If it does not appear on the page, it should not appear in the HTML.

Architecture: Crawl

Not enough search engine optimizers pay attention to crawl. I realize this is a pretty broad statement, but too many of us get so caught up in everything else that this becomes one of the first things we ignore unless there are red, flashing error messages. Obviously, you want to make sure that search engines can crawl your website and all your pages (at least the ones you want crawled). Keep in mind that if you do not want to botch the flow of PageRank through your site, use the meta noindex, follow tag to exclude pages, not robots.txt.

The other concern you should have is whether or not search engines crawl and capture updates to existing pages in a timely manner. If not, it could be an overall domain authority issue or that PageRank is not flowing deep enough in sufficient quantities.

There are tricks to resolve this, such as linking to updated pages from your homepage or a level-one page until the updated deep page gets reached. The more wholesome approach is to make sure that the content which gets updated is naturally close to content or sections of content with higher authority, or to build legitimate internal links from related content that has its own off-site PageRank.

I am not telling you all your content should be crawled all the time. Search engines budget crawl frequency and depth for good reasons. What I am saying is manage your website crawl budget and use it well; don’t just leave everything up to chance.

Architecture: Duplicate Content

Earlier this year, Matt Cutts stunned the search engine optimization community by telling us not to worry about duplicate content. He assured us that Google will recognize this duplicate content, combine the disbursed authority, and present one URL in the SERPs.

This is really not a big surprise, as Google has been working toward this for quite some time. Webmaster tools has had automated parameter identification and Google spokespersons have discussed duplicate content consolidation for some time.

To repeat what I have written before, Google is not the only search engine out there and reality does not always work the way Google says it does. The bottom line is: keep managing your duplicate content by preventing or eliminating as much as possible, and as for the rest, put your canonical tags in place.

Speaking of canonical tags, I know a popular hack has been to use one canonical URL, improperly, on all the pages of multipage articles. There are other canonical hacks out there, as well. I’d be wary of these. If you’re using canonical tags, machine-readable content or advanced meta-tags, you’re basically waving a big red flag telling search engines that your website is technically savvy and using search engine optimization. In other words, you’re begging for additional scrutiny.

It would not surprise me if Google becomes more fierce in penalizing websites for this type of technical misdirection. Search engines tend to use a soft touch on levying penalties algorithmically for fear they will burn innocent websites. But as we have seen with Panda and Penguin, as they become more confident, they also become more aggressive. If you are optimizing for an employer, keep it clean.

Architecture: Speed

Most websites are not going to see an SEO benefit from increasing the speed of their website. Google has always said only a small fraction of sites are affected by this part of the ranking algorithm. This view seems to be borne out by correlation studies. Honestly, the best test of speed is to take your laptop to the local café and surf around your website. If you are not waiting for pages to load up, then you are probably okay.

The exceptions (sites that should be concerned about speed) are large enterprise and e-commerce websites. If you optimize for one of these, shaving a few milliseconds from load time may lower bounce rates and increase conversions or sales.

Architecture: URLs

The current best practices for URLs should hold true throughout 2014. Simple and easily readable URLs are not just about search engine optimization. With today’s multi-tabbed browsers, people are more likely to see your URLs than they are your title tags.

I will also add that, when seen in the search engine results pages, readable URLs are more likely to get clicked on than nonsensical ones. If your content management system cannot create readable URLs based on your title tags or will not let you customize URLs, it is probably time for a CMS review. This is now a basic search engine optimization feature, so if your CMS cannot handle it, I wonder about the rest of your CMS’s SEO efficacy.

Architecture: Mobile

2013 was an interesting year for mobile SEO. Google and Bing agree that the ideal configuration is for websites to have a single set of URLs for all devices and to use responsive Web design to present them accordingly. In reality, not all content management systems can handle this, and Web designers have presented case studies of situations where the search engine standard is neither practical nor desirable.

If you can execute what Google and Bing recommend, do so. However, if you cannot or have a good reason not to, be sure to use canonical tags that point to the most complete version of each page, probably your desktop version, and employ redirects based on browser platform for screen size.

You will not risk a penalty from the search engines as long as your website treats all visitors equally and doesn’t make exceptions for search engine spiders. Basically, this is similar to automatic redirection of visitors based on their geographic location for language preference.

That about wraps it up for on-page SEO factors in 2014. Be on the lookout for Part 3 of my 2014 SEO Playbook, which will cover off-page SEO factors relating to link building, local search and social media.