Google did it again, and this time they’re calling it Penguin 2.0. As the leading source of valuable information for everyday Internet users, Google must ensure their search results display legitimate and relevant information. To do this, they’re constantly tweaking their definition of high-quality websites, while sending businesses invested in SEO marketing scrambling to adjust accordingly. Quality websites are rewarded with high search visibility and low quality, or spammy, websites are punished with lower and lower search rankings. In other words, Google’s new algorithm, Penguin 2.0, and its respective updates, has a major role in determining your content’s online traffic.

Matt Cutts, head of Google’s webspam team, began leaking hints about the 2.0 algorithm update in early May via his Twitter page and blog. The Penguin 2.0 algorithm finished rolling out on May 22, 2013, sealing a new way that search results are ranked, indexed and filtered.

The new algorithm focuses primarily on webspam. However, there are a few key updates to consider as you adjust your content to Penguin 2.0 standards. Cutts himself has promised better detection and communication regarding hackers, lifted ranking for “authoritative sites” in a specific industry, and a more diverse first page of search results. Other important changes include improved link analysis software to target unnatural link profiles and spammy websites (primarily pornographic and gaming sites), and a greater leniency for borderline victims of Google’s previous Panda update.

“Black Hat and Link Spammers Less Likely to Show Up in Search Results after Summer” on Searchland

A couple weeks pre-launch, Barry Schwartz revealed his expectations for the new technology’s features. Schwartz accurately predicted Penguin 2.0 technology would predominantly attack spammy sites as well as sites that artificially inflate their link profiles. This means, if you want to avoid being attacked by Penguin 2.0, remove unnatural links from your site.

“Practical Tips for Modern SEO from the Best Minds in Europe” on HubSpot

Kieran Flanagan references 5 eBooks written by European industry leaders to help recover sites hit by a Google update. However, in order to avoid a Google penalty, Flanagan suggests boosting the quality and ranking of your content by becoming “Panda-free,” or generating personal surveys using identical criteria as Google’s Panda algorithm.

“Google Rolls Out Latest Penguin Algorithm Update” on HubSpot

Desmond Wong claims that Penguin 4, sporting Penguin 2.0 technology, is “the most major change in Google’s Penguin algorithm since Penguin 1.” As you adjust to Penguin 2.0, keep in mind the “authority boost,” improved link analysis software, and greater leniency for borderline victims of the previous Panda update.

“Google Penguin 2.0 Casualties: Why Sites Got Hit” on Search Engine Watch

Danny Goodwin explores why certain sites’ search visibility was destroyed by the update. Sites that heavily employ exact match anchor text, or “money keywords,” have been hit hard, supporting the idea that the new update primarily targets unnatural link profiles. Goodwin references HOME24.DE and cheapoair.com as two cases that received massive search visibility drops after the update. Immediately remove unnatural links from your site in order to maintain your current search visibility.

“4 Steps to Take After a Google Manual Penalty is Removed” on Search Engine Watch

What if Penguin 2.0 has already penalized your content’s visibility? Your first step is to clean up your website; next, your should appeal to Google for a reconsideration. Chuck Price provides four useful steps to consider after your appeal to Google is approved, and the penalty is then removed.

1. Inspect your foundation for clean source code and conduct an on-page site audit
2. Panda-proof your website
3. Build your Google+ author rank
4. Safely rebuild your link profile. Remove unnatural links from your site.

“Google’s Penguin Update 2.0: Loser analysis” on Searchmetrics

Marcus Tober also confirmed Schwartz’s prediction that pornographic and gaming sites would be primary targets of Penguin 2.0. The update focuses primarily on webspam; thus, sites containing untrusted links are receiving the harshest penalties. Remove unnatural links from your site.

Matt Cutts warns webmasters, “If you’ve been hanging out on a lot of black hat forums and trading different types spamming package tips and that sort of stuff, then it might be a more eventful summer for you.”

Rich snippets have become a hot topic in the Internet marketing / SEO world as of late. So what are they?

A rich snippet is a preview of the page that appears under the search result. It impacts your organic search results by providing a better sense of the content on the page to users. Through a rich snippet, users can get a quick access without visiting the page, and search engines can provide more relevant results for search terms. A win-win, right?

So Does It Work?

YES. Common sense tells us that the more aesthetically appealing the layout the more attention it will receive. Visual cues and images implemented by rich snippets help your search result page stand out from the crowd of generic text. Some companies have seen as much as a 20-30% increase in click-through rates after implementing rich snippets. In addition, more traffic means the better chance of drawing the targeted audience.

B2C vs. B2B

Admittedly, more businesses that sell to end consumers are using rich snippets than B2B companies. However there’s a lot of value for any organization that’s serious about SEO to deploy microdata.

For a B2C brand, microdata can be used to define dates, prices, locations, descriptions, products, and etc. For E-commerce sites, product information elements can not only benefit SEO, but also usability purposes to attract potential customers. Product information elements include: product name, brand, model, description, price, availability, aggregate review score and quantity, related products, and product review.

For your B2B client, the contact information is a prime candidate to be marked. Also for corporate B2B sites, mark the entire header section under the Corporation schema as most headers include some form of logo, global navigation, company name and phone number.

For both B2C and B2B clients, if there is a blog authored by the company personnel, mark them to open up Google Authorship opportunities.

Additional Sources

To learn more about rich snippets and microdata we suggest the following helpful resources:

• Visual Guide to Rich Snippets
• Rich snippets (microdata, microformats, RDFa, and Data Highlighter)
• Google Rich Snippet Guidelines
• Rich snippets not appearing

PS…

No, the irony isn’t lost on us that we haven’t yet implemented microdata on methodsavvy.com. To be honest, we’ve been meaning to for a while now but have just been so darn busy with our clients that we haven’t gotten to it quite yet. But its in the pipeline and coming shortly. So don’t be surprised if your next search results for Method Savvy looks a little different.

As of January 4^th, we have a bright, new office for us to call home. It’s got a fantastic view of downtown Durham and even has wind turbines on the roof. Our new address is 502 Rigsbee Avenue, Suite 205, Durham, NC 27701. Stop by and say hello.

Image and building courtesy of BuildSense | Studio B Architecture.

In July 2012, The Fournaise Marketing Group released an interesting, if admittedly sad, statement on business unit alignment. For their 2012 Global Marketing Effectiveness Program Report, they interviewed more than 1,200 CEOs from across the globe and found that a staggering 80% “… admit they do not really trust and are not very impressed by the work done by marketers.”

Wow.

Billions of dollars are spent on marketing and advertising each year. Yet CEOs willingly admit that they don’t trust the teams responsible for deploying those resources. Why? Because “…they have lost trust in marketer’s business abilities and have given up on holding [them] accountable.”

Which begs the question: where did the relationship between marketers and C-level decision-makers go wrong? If you ask me, it happened right about the time that marketers couldn’t clearly articulate the return they are providing to their company in realistic and measurable terms.

Let’s put it this way: our goal as an agency boils down to being able to deliver a multiple of return for a company’s investment in advertising and marketing. For some of our clients they want a 3:1 or 4:1 return. Others want a 8:1 or 10:1 return. Regardless of the exact multiple, the function is the same. You give us $1 of investment and we will build creative, strategic and tactical processes that allow us to return to you $3, $5 or $10. Are there guarantees? Of course not. But within this framework is a clear set of goals that provide focus to all marketing and advertising activities.

Now, whether you’re at an agency or work within an internal marketing department, I believe the days of throwing money and ideas at the wall to see what will stick are over (regardless of how much fun those days were to live through). Today, to be a successful marketer, you now need to be part artist and part scientist. You need to not only believe in accountability, but be hungry for it. If you do you’ll be rewarded with more trust, and therefore more budget, by your CEOs.

So how exactly do you accomplish this? A few starting points for you:

Define Success in Measurable Terms

Or to put it another way, start with the end in mind. No marketing investments should be made without having a clear definition of success. Meaning, “increase revenues by the end of the year” isn’t good enough. Rather, “increase revenues by 30% before December 31st” is specific and measurable… and makes everyone on the marketing team accountable.

Articulate What It’ll Take to Get There

The only thing worse than failing is not knowing that it’s happening. To protect yourself from that fate, and to give yourself the opportunity to pivot before it’s too late, create metrics that you can measure campaign performance against as you move along. These can be as simple as a certain amount of website traffic or a specific number of sales leads. But regardless of what they are they should be specific enough that if you’re off track you’ll see the red flags in time to make adjustments.

Align Your Marketing Analytics

There’s a great phrase that’s commonly used by computer scientists: “garbage in, garbage out.” Through the lens marketing analytics that can be applied to mean that if you don’t have your analytics platforms set up correctly – meaning that you don’t have good data being collected – then you’ll be in a position to make poor decisions as a result.

In modern marketing departments alignment between your varied analytics platforms – such as web analytics, marketing automation analytics, sales CRM analytics, etc. – is mission critical. You have no hope of running a data-driven marketing department and impressing your CEO without it. So don’t slack on getting this set up correctly.

Know Your CPL, CPA and LTV

Learn to love, and how to measure, these three acronyms:

• Cost Per Lead (CPL) = the average cost, typically by channel, to secure a sales leads.
• Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) = the average cost, by channel, to secure a customer.
• Lifetime Value of a Customer (LTV) = the average value, often by type, of a customer over their lifetime in doing business wiht your company.

If you understand CPL, CPA and LTV and know how to measure them then you can build a reliable model of your sales funnel. And if you can do that then you have the knowledge required to establish a repeatable process for revenue growth… which CEOs always love.

Learn How to Properly Manage Expectations

This might seem obvious, but as marketers it’s important we don’t go off into a corner and whittle away without involvement from the the core company decision-makers. Getting buy-in early and often from C-level folks is a critical aspect of campaign success.

There’s nothing wrong in being forced to justify your positions. In fact, as a data-driven marketer it’s a worthy challenge as it forces you to make better decisions. Take a page from your Finance department brethren and get comfortable in justifying decisions with data and models. It’ll make expectations management much easier in the long-run.

Happy Halloween!

What happens when you cross the site retargeting advertising buying strategy with our Leads Are Easy Customers Are Hard webinar series and zombies? You get Happy Halloween wishes from Method Savvy.

Hello again, folks. We are pleased to announce that Jake Finkelstein is speaking at the Triangle Chapter of American Marketing Association October Training Camp on Thursday, October 18^th.

During the session on “Effective Marketing Analytics,”  Jake will join other marketing professionals in a panel discussion of marketing measurement strategies, particularly for digital media. Triangle AMA President and 4 Action Marketing CEO Ted Seward will be the panel moderator.

We hope you can attend. There are sure to be many actionable takeaways surrounding the day’s theme of  “Transitioning Your Brand from Offline to Online.” Other training camp sessions include:

• Mobile Happens: Everything a Marketer Needs to Understand About Mobile
•  Your Brand Has a Facebook and Twitter Presence – Now What?
• The Four Stages of Content Marketing
• Creating a Culture of Testing

The day-long event will be held at Briar Creek Country Club from 8am- 5pm. You can register for the training camp online by clicking here. See you there.

Successful companies are well-oiled lead generation machines. Yet, with 79% of marketing produced leads never advancing from prospect to buyer, the expense and difficulty of acquiring customers continues to rise.

Mark your calendars:

Method Savvy and actionCOACH have joined forces to bring you a two-part webinar series. We’ll explore how clarity of purpose and data-driven marketing eliminate budgetary waste while increasing sales.

Believe us, this will not be your average post-lunch webinar snooze fest. There’ll be real takaways from these presentations, like why you should develop a “Compelling Why” surrounding your company mission and values and how you should really go about optimizing your sales funnel.

“Leads Are Easy, Customers Are Hard” Webinar Series

We will cover:

• Why buyers decide when they know, like and trust an offer
• How to clearly communicate your mission and values to encourage buying behavior
• Understand why and how prospects get stuck in the sales funnel
• Real world examples of revenue-optimized lead nurturing programs

Click here for more details on the webinar series. We hope you can join us for some good ol’ fashion learning!

As an agency, you’re only as good your team … and boy, oh boy have we gotten good. Ladies and gentleman, we’re thrilled to announce Gwynne Murphy and Ty Gwennap as the newest additions to the Method Savvy team.

Gwynne is our newest Account Manager, serving as the day-to-day liaison between the agency’s account team and clients. When not keeping the troops in line, she’s working with clients to make sure that the needs and goals are met with every project.

Prior to joining Method Savvy, Gwynne spent two years as a Marketing Manager at Bandwidth.com, where she implemented and managed a variety of digital marketing campaigns. She also has extensive PR agency experience, having worked at firms such as Weber Shandwick, Howard Merrell & Partners and MMI Public Relations. A natural born organizer, for Gwynne nothing beats the feeling of crossing off a task on her to-do list.

Ty has come on board as our Digital Marketing Coordinator and comes from Elon University’s Interactive Media program. He works on digital design and production initiatives including website management, web design/development, email marketing campaigns and just about everything else digital.

Prior to earning his master’s degree, he worked as a financial advisor for more than two years after producing marketing videos for a medical supply company in the Triangle area. While Ty has many unique talents, he prides himself on being able to catch a cooked shrimp with chopsticks, having once accomplished such a feat at a Japanese steakhouse.

Please join us in welcoming our newest team members. You can contact them on @MethodSavvy on Twitter.

Altrius + Method Savvy

We’re excited to announce that Altrius, a wealth management and financial advisor firm, has selected Method Savvy to lead their marketing, advertising and lead generation efforts. We’ll let the below press release do all the talking, but if you’d like to know more please contact us for details.

Press Release

Durham, NC., May 31, 2012. – Method Savvy, a leading data-driven marketing and advertising agency, is pleased to announce that it has been selected by Altrius to market the firm’s private wealth management services throughout North Carolina. Rooted in long-term risk management and the pursuit of total return on behalf of their clients, Altrius strives to consistently apply their investment philosophy across a broad range of wealth management strategies.

Using a methodology that emphasizes accountability, analytics and return on investment; Method Savvy will develop and execute strategic marketing and advertising campaigns designed to generate new business from pre-qualified prospects while raising awareness for Altrius.

“With the continued success of our New Bern practice and the opening of our office in Raleigh, Altrius is poised for extensive growth in the coming years,” said Altrius’ President, James Russo. “We’re excited to partner with the experienced and effective team at Method Savvy to guide our lead generation and marketing efforts as we move forward.”

About Altrius
Altrius seeks to deliver diversified, total return focused investment management solutions designed to take advantage of dynamic market opportunities while minimizing risk. With a history of providing global balanced portfolios for more than 15 years, Altrius’ investment and wealth management teams are dedicated to the pursuit of total return on behalf of investors. More information on Altrius is available at www.altrius-capital.com.

About Method Savvy
Method Savvy helps businesses to increase sales and lower customer acquisition costs using data-driven advertising and marketing strategies. The company’s approach is founded on the belief that proper data collection and analysis informs the creative advertising and strategic marketing process, helping companies to establish a repeatable process of revenue growth.

Headquartered in the heart of downtown Durham, NC, Method Savvy is proud to work with growth-stage and Fortune 1000 businesses across the financial, technology and consumer product industries. For more information and case studies, please visit our Web Site at www.methodsavvy.com.

The other day Heather Pownall from Southern Energy asked me about a tweet I recently shared on Twitter:

RT @CMBlog: the Q is not what’s the best time of day to tweet- Q is does the time & date matter. BOOM! @webby2001 #soslam

— Devin Kelley (@DevinPK10) April 27, 2012

I would actually add one more question to the process: Do you need to tweet at all? The short answer is generally yes, especially given the current benefits of social for SEO.

Now assuming social does make sense for your audience, does the time and date matter? Again, I would say the answer is yes, but, I would guess not in the way most people are thinking. Lemon.ly has a great infographic on when to tweet. This infographic is really general and I would guess only helpful for people looking to que up tweets in something like HootSuite or ArygleSocial and hope they are getting more clicks by links.

While queuing tweets can be helpful, in my experience it’s not the best way to grow and convert on a social presence. There is a great article by a body builder about how most of the time people spend in the gym is only doing maintenance, not producing real gains. This initially sounds disappointing, but makes sense the most you think about it.

The bodybuilder says real gains are made when you are truly focused, getting enough sleep and eating right. In short, when you have the proper environment, you make real gains. In my experience I gain the most followers, get the most clicks and have the best conversations on Twitter when the environment is most conducive to my audience. Namely, live Tweeting conferences, Tweetups or live chats.

So does the time and date matter? Yes. But not the time of day that you can que tweets and get 2 extra clicks on bit.ly. The time and date matter when your audience is most engaged because that’s where sizable gains will take place weather you’re looking to add 2 reps to your bench press or 100 Twitter followers who are prospective customers. To find when your audience is most engaged there are certainly tools you can use like WhentoTweet, but better yet, I would suggest listening.

The people you follow on Twitter should be a reflection of the type of people you want following you. Are they people you’re following taking part in a Twitter chat this afternoon? Be there too. That’s the best time and date for you to Tweet. Are they heading to a conference? Be there. Can’t make it? Follow the hashtag and “borrow” content. You’ll gain followers, get more clicks and assuming you’re in the right places, that traffic will convert.