Search engine optimization articles for adult and continuing education
Landing page optimization
I'm hearing more buzz lately about the value of landing page optimization. As an example, consider the following scenario:
Assume that a website generates approximately 5,000 open-enrollment continuing education registrations per year at an average tuition of $200 each. This would mean that the total revenue processed by the website is $1,000,000 per year. Now assume that the website generates a conversion rate of 4%. In other words, one out of every twenty-five visitors registers for a class. What if you could make a few subtle changes in the design of your web pages that would better encourage visitors to register? If those changes increase the conversion rate by one percentage point (from 4% to 5%), you would then average one registration for every twenty visitors. Assuming the same number of people visit your website, your total number of registrations would increase to 6,250 and the revenue processed by the website would increase to $1,250,000. That's a $250,000 increase, which is probably well worth the effort!
Here are two articles that discuss the topic of landing page optimization from different perspectives:
Boost Search Traffic Conversion Rates with Post-Click Marketing
Landing Page Neglect: Are You Losing Money?
Combining organic search optimization and pay-per-click
The following articles explain how the combination of organic search optimization techniques and pay-per-click marketing campaigns can be combined to form a complete online marketing approach:
Coordinating Organic, Paid Search Efforts
Destroying the Myths of SEO and PPC
Keyword research
This is one of the better articles I’ve read that describes a comprehensive search optimization approach to keywords. The author does an excellent job describing the difference between “top tier” (computer training), “middle tier” (Atlanta computer training or Microsoft office training), and “third tier terms” (powerpoint training in Atlanta or Microsoft access computer training) – an understanding of the difference between these is important for setting your own search optimization expectations. Only huge organizations with thousands of site pages and hundreds of inbound links can expect to rank in the top 10 for “top tier” terms. Others should be content with optimizing for second and third tier terms and using PPC to get some local traffic from top tier searches. Collectively, however, there are probably more third tier searches used in search engines than first or second tier. If you think about a chart showing the number of searches performed for a variety of phrases, it might look like this (note the long tail on the right)…of course, there are hundreds of other possible third tier searches that aren’t shown here…you can see how these might add up!
This two part article discusses the process of keyword research, an invaluable first step in any search engine optimization campaign. Part two of this search engine research article is here.
Website optimization
About to launch a new departmental website? This article from ClickZ discusses the process of optimizing a brand new website during and just after launch
Often web designers and search optimizers find themselves struggling to combine efforts effectively. This article discusses the challenges that organization's face in bringing the two arts together and suggests some effective compromises
Link building
Increasing the number of links to your website is one of the most effective techniques for increasing your search engine rankings. This article discusses 5 reasons not to outsource the process of "link building" to "link development firms."
This Search Engine Watch forum thread provides many valuable Link Building resources.
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