Identifying and leveraging SEO
opportunities is at the core of achieving organic search dominance. This
process is particularly critical for large companies.
Big brands have an inherent SEO
advantage that, if leveraged, can lead to unrivaled organic performance. The
existence of such advantages sparks debate during every industry conference
Q&A session. Usually these debates focus on paid search spend influence,
immunity to algorithm updates, etc., most of which are pure noise.
So what proven advantages can large
companies leverage to gain a competitive edge?
Prospecting
Quality Lists
Most professionals agree targeted
outreach is at the core of any successful link building campaign. The process
of executing a results-oriented outreach strategy is time consuming (read:
expensive).
Prospecting and prioritizing
relevant, authoritative targets is a critical step in this process. Large
brands possess this inherent advantage: Targeted prospecting is done by Google
and other large media networks for free.
This unknown fact enables certain
companies to generate high-quality, extremely relevant lists with the click of
a button. How do they do it?
Executing display campaigns on
various media networks, such as Google Display Network (GDN), Value Click, and
Yahoo. The majority of display networks will provide transparency into ad
placements which can be used as the backbone of outreach campaigns for your SEO program. So how does it work?
If you're currently running ads on
Google Display Network (GDN), exporting your prospect list is easy. Within any
campaign, navigate to the “display network” tab, as seen below:
Once there, simply click on
“placements” within the sub navigation.
Finally, filter for “automatic
placements” to pull up your list along with KPIs such as clicks, CTR, etc. (KPI
information by placement is only available on GDN. Other vendors only provide
basic site information where your ad was displayed.)
These exported prospects are
guaranteed to be relevant to your site in the eyes of Google. The algorithm
Google uses to match advertising sites within GDN is built off the same
relevance algorithm used for organic search. This saves tons of time having to manually
qualifying each site. As a result, more time can be spent on persuasively
communicating your value proposition.
Have
a Unique Value Proposition
Executing a successful outreach
campaign isn’t just about prospecting quality lists. It’s critical to have a
unique value proposition when communicating with bloggers.
The number of companies executing
outreach campaigns is rising by the day. Most are using the same tools, social
networks and advanced search parameters to build their prospect lists. Over time,
only those with unique value propositions will receive responses.
Even following great outreach guides
like this one from Neil Patel becomes less effective over time. Why? Everyone
reads these guides and uses their templates. Running display advertising
provides a unique value proposition which can dramatically increase success rates.
Bloggers and webmasters want to make
money (surprise!). Part of their revenue stream is generated from users
clicking on ads.
If the content on the page mentions
the same brand being served in on-site advertising, the click-through rate on
the ads will increase. This connection and increase in revenue for the blogger
is the unique value proposition that will set you apart. As an added bonus,
your display campaign will also benefit from these incremental clicks.
Summary
Executing successful outreach
campaigns is a sure-fire way to drive continual organic performance long term.
As outreach continues to increase in popularity, unique and creative tactics
become critical.
If your company or client is running
display ads, you have an inherent advantage in both prospecting targets and
establishing a value proposition.
Looking
for additional outreach ideas and don’t have any display campaigns? Check out
this post outlining three unique ways to identify link prospects.
Source: - http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2258423/SEO-Outreach-Gain-a-Competitive-Edge-by-Running-Display-Ads
