Have you ever seen the following, anywhere – “source: Dude, trust me”? If so good, then this will be easier. If not, you’ll get the gist I’m sure. We are told all the time that content is important, that content marketing will help save you time, money and resources. We are told that it will get your message out, increase your visibility and strengthening your sales. OK, great. Source?

Well, Bill Gates once famously said that content is king. He’s an idiot. Do you realise how much spammy, useless pages flew into the aether because of that? Us either, but it’s a lot. Content is not king, quality content is

Why is quality content important?

Content doesn’t magically appear; it would be great if it did, but it doesn’t. It requires thought, planning, in-depth knowledge of the subject matter and it’s also important to know how to write it so that:

Honestly, quality content the most powerful tool in your digital marketing arsenal. We would go so far as to say it the only tool. After all, your social channels would be empty without it – you will go so far with stolen memes. You will also have nothing for your website, YouTube channels, podcasts… Nothing. Oh, and yes YouTube and podcasts… unless you wing it with no script, like a savage.

Because digital marketing is so vital for businesses today, you can’t very well expect your business to succeed without it. Not anymore.

Why you need quality content

The internet is like the world’s largest library, with every type of content imaginable that answers any question that you can throw at it (except maybe, ‘have God and Morgan Freeman ever been seen in the same room?’) and it is being constantly updated. Everyone is competing for business, and whatever it is that you do – there are a dozen others in your town doing the same thing and they all want the same customers. What are you going to do about that?

People are busy looking on the internet to buy what you are selling. How are you going to see to it that they buy from you and not a competitor in town? Content and content marketing makes it possible for your potential customers to find you, and much faster than they would otherwise.

There are other reasons, naturally. Such as:

People, some time ago, fell out of love with the faceless corporation. Big business realised this in time to take advantage of it. At no other point in recent history could you name the CEOs of the biggest companies on the planet. People trust people, not logos or slogans. They want a relationship with the brand they want to invest in, however small that investment may be.

The return on investment in great content and content marketing is obscene. In a good way. Depending on how well the content matches the needs of your audience, you could be enjoying conversion rates as much as 6 times higher than if you had no plan at all.

That’s just two other points, and I could go on, but the point is abundantly clear: content was, is and always will be the cornerstone of any marketing plan – especially of the content variety.

Excellent content sells. Source: you just read it.

If you need help, call me on 0044 (0)7486 571 264 or email me on dj@kaizen-digital.com

10 Benefits of SEO For Your Business

To be frank, every business (especially now) should be working towards building a strong organic presence in the search engines, whether in-house or outsourcing to an expert (hint hint…). 

Properly done with user intent in mind, SEO can often work more effectively than most other digital marketing strategies, so read on to see how SEO can be used to grow your business and its profits.

Fun fact… Every day your website is not optimised for the search engines you are losing money to your competitors.

Allow me to explain:

1. Your services are being searched for ON LINE.

There are millions of people doing billions of searches daily, and if you’re not optimising your site and content properly for search terms relevant to your services, you don’t stand a chance of being heard through all the noise. As a basic strategy if you are just starting out, don’t try and rank for ultra competitive keywords such as “recruitment”. Although search volume for (as an example) “fintech recruitment agency Manchester” may only show 15 people searching per month, the INTENTION of these searches is high, meaning if you’re optimised for that “long tail keyword”, your chances of conversion are significantly higher.  

2. Quality over quantity of traffic every…single…time.

People are actively looking for what they search for, whether their need be immediate or for future reference. If you rank on page 1 for their search, you’re almost guaranteed to get their attention. If you’re page two… who are you?? Proper SEO will ensure that the RIGHT people are hitting your site through effective targeting. There’s no point in attracting people to you business who will NEVER be interested in, or in a position to secure your services. 

3. Traffic from SEO converts more.

Most websites analytics show that their organic traffic is the one with the highest conversion rate, as mentioned above… it’s all about the search intent. Rank for the right keywords and people will come and convert.

4. Increase your sales and leads with SEO

Before revenue comes leads. And SEO is fantastic for INBOUND lead generation. A properly optimised site with properly optimised landing pages and an enticing Call To Action (CTA) will result in additional leads. An individual leaving their details for a call back, is already a more qualified lead than a cold call, as they’ve found their way to your site with INTENTION to engage you.

 

5. SEO can lower your Cost Per Acquisition (CPA).

Compared to paid ads (Google PPC etc) CPA is generally lower with SEO. Even when outsourcing the SEO, in the long run you often pay less than you might spend on ads to get the same amount of clients. 

6. SEO is organic, you don’t pay for each click.

Pay Per Click advertising (PPC) can be massively expensive for firms starting out or with restrictive budgets. Although SEO can take some time to kick in, it will bring you a constant flow of leads and traffic without having to pay for ads on Google Ads or Social Media per example.With PPC, once your budget is gone and ads stop running, that’s it, game over, no more leads. With SEO, it’s much easier to stay in the search engines for vastly longer without exponential costs!

7. SEO makes buying decisions easier.

As I’ve said before, SEO isn’t always about revenue generation. Brand awareness is a major benefit too. People will automatically believe that you are a trusted, relevant and authoritative name within your space PURELY because you’re on page 1 of Google etc. That awareness, that exposure will often reassure any potential clients that you’re a firm worth reaching out to, making their decision to engage easier.

8. SEO boosts Social Media Traffic

Quite simply, the more unique, relevant visitors you get to your site, the more people have the opportunity to engage with your social media platforms. Another chance for you to keep prospective clients and candidates “warm” that all starts with them finding you via search engines!

9. Good SEO will improve your website strength.

SEO will help your website (well, the domain actually) build strength as it grows through SEO best practices. A strong domain is made up of a number of factors including relevance, trust worthiness and authority, all factors which are impacted by SEO. By building good quality backlinks using content outreach for example (producing and pushing high quality, informative articles etc), you can easily improve how Google sees you as an influencer within your space.

10. SEO can help you get foot traffic (offline visitors)

For businesses that have a high street presence and physical location, or who have multiple offices in several locations, optimising your website for “Local SEO” can pay dividends. “Recruitment agencies near me” for example, will show your site in that search and allow people to easily find your address (assuming you’ve got a Google My Business page) and read reviews (assuming you have them). 

SEO should absolutely be one of your main marketing strategies. In fact, if I really try hard, I struggle to see any downsides to SEO. 

The only thing I can think of, and this is scraping the barrel, is that it can take a couple of months to see tangible results. But that even depends on how your site is structured. If your site already employs best practice in terms of structure, navigation, content etc, it IS possible to see tangible uplifts sooner. 

This snip is from a report for a new client, who saw these increases within a little under 8 weeks. This particular client did not have an optimum site structure and still saw fantastic results. 

The point being SEO is hands down the best long term strategy for revenue generation and brand exposure. Do it, but do it properly. If you can’t, reach out to me and find out how I can help you.

Thanks for reading (assuming you have!)

Dan Jones @ Kaizen Digital Consultancy
E – projects@kaizen-digital.com M – 0044 (0)7486 571 264 W – www.kaizen-digital.com

Recruitment SEO - You Wouldn't Go To A Sculptor For A Tattoo!


It always amazes me how often there can be so much friction between clients and providers of niche services such as SEO. I’ve definitely encountered it and I know for a FACT I’m not the only one.


The friction can be two-fold, from the business owner directly and/or their in-house marketing function, whether that’s a single person or a team.


I get it, as a business owner you’ve employed a person/team who are there to handle your marketing efforts, you’re already paying them for this so why on Earth would you fork out for a third party to work the “same tasks”? Or as the in-house marketer, this is your bag. Why should someone else steal your thunder or even threaten your very existence within your company??


A little disclaimer – I am not, for even a millisecond trying to bash on in-house teams. At all, so bear with…


My point is this, you wouldn’t go to a sculptor for a new tattoo. 


I can hear you thinking “what is he talking about?!” It’s pretty simple, whilst both sculptors and tattooists are classed as artists, their individual skill set is highly specific, and completely different. Now I’m not saying that a tattooist couldn’t pick up a lump of clay and turn it into a jug, or that the sculptor can’t draw, but it’s unlikely that the level of knowledge, the application and execution of their respective skillsets and the results they can achieve will be on par with each other.


So what has this got to do with my original point? 


Marketing is a wide term, encapsulating a massive variety of different skills and experiences. It even includes print (remember that?!). Even if we drill down into Digital Marketing – again, it’s an umbrella term which covers a multitude of services. Take my skills for example – Recruitment SEO – how much more specific can you get? 


Again, I know that there are some “general marketers” who have experience in SEO. I know that a LOT of Digital Marketers have a semi-basic working knowledge of SEO which is fine. The difference is when you deal with a specialist, that expertise can pay dividends. SEO is like a Mastermind specialist subject in itself, when you niche down like we do at Kaizen Digital with recruitment SEO, that level of industry-specific knowledge, where we intimately understand your business operations can be invaluable. 


So the takeaway from this? If you’re a business owner with no internal marketing function, there’s a chance that you could do your own SEO, but it’s unlikely – at least in terms of achieving decent results. If you’re an in-house marketer, perhaps your expertise, your “specialist subject” is more social media, email marketing, or content creation, it might not be SEO. But I’m not trying to step on your toes as it were. Quite the opposite in fact. I’ve worked extremely well alongside internal teams, and that collaboration, that partnership can be extremely useful to your employer, often our expertise compliment each other for a more…holistic approach to gaining traction. We’re after the same end results after all. We can be friends. 


Kaizen Digital work exclusively with recruitment and search firms to ultimately increase visibility in search engines through effective, recruitment-focused SEO campaigns. 


If you are considering SEO, or have any questions about our solutions, please get in touch. You can email my team on projects@kaizen-digital.com or call me directly on +44 (0)7389780035.


Thanks for reading,


Dan. 

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