Digital Marketing Roundup: November 2017

The Mobile Market

As we continue to move into the cozy days of fall – which has finally arrived to our fair city – the news of the day (or rather with this being a roundup based on the past 31 days, a month) in digital continues to revolve around quality content and mastering the mobile market, a non-stop talking point since the announcement of Google’s impending index split (maybe-possibly-probably next year).

At least, these are the topics I’ve come across in my own personal – and admittedly biased – browsing for news. There’s always a wide array of talking points from every corner of the world of web marketing, but my travels this month consistently brought me back to these two sandy shores, so expect to see most of this roundup revolve around these topics.

Okay, I’m already getting far too wordy, so let’s begin!

‘High-Quality Content’ Tips From Google’s Own Style Guides (Search Engine Land)

“What does Google want?”

This is a question we ask ourselves every once in a while – somewhere in the area of every single second of every single day – and while there are more than a fair share of expert opinions that seem to be pretty darn accurate, you just can’t beat hearing things directly from the horse’s mouth.

The trouble is, Google is a relatively quiet horse.

So I found myself somewhat thrilled to come across this article at Search Engine Land, which revealed that Google recently released their own guidelines for high quality content.

The guide is split into four sections:

Don’t pass up this opportunity to see what good content looks like to Google!

Mobile-First Updates From SMX East (Search Engine Land)

Another one from Search Engine Land, this post followed a panel at SMX East that focused on where exactly we are in terms of mobile and its impact on SEO.

Speakers on the panel consisted of:

While we still aren’t 100% on the answer to that question, the result is an extensive look at just about everything you should be doing yesterday to keep your mobile users – and Google’s mobile crawlers – happy, including:

  • A nice long list of bullet points detailing do’s and don’ts for a website, regardless of mobile configuration (Leslie To)
  • Some nice relevant statistics on adult reading levels in the US  – important for knowing how to write for your audience (Leslie To)
  • Information on domain configuration – quite technical, but useful for developers and those working with them to know (Leslie To)
  • How to utilize mobile-friendly development if you don’t have the budget for it (Ashley Berman Hale)
  • Google’s perspective (Gary Illyes)

The article also makes both Leslie and Ashley’s presentations available in full, making this one of the more in-depth and insightful posts I came across this month. Check it out in full here.

Tangential Content Earns More Links and Social Share in Boring Industries [New Research] (Moz)

Kerry Jones, director of marketing at Fractl, penned this impressive piece for Moz that focuses on a specific aspect of content marketing that Fractl calls “tangential content.”

Here’s their definition, from Kerry’s article:

At Fractl, we refer to content on a topic that’s related to (but not directly about) the brand that created it as “tangential content.”

Some hypothetical examples of tangential content would be:

A pool installation company creating content about summer safety tips and barbecue recipes.

A luggage retailer publishing country-specific travel guides.

An auto insurance broker offering car maintenance advice.

You get the picture. Suffice it to say, this type of content can be extremely useful for brands looking to add value via the web for both potential and existing customers, and Kerry’s post lays out several compelling statistics and strategic methods for it.

Check out the post in full here.

4 Common Mistakes That Tank Responsive Mobile Conversion (Search Engine Watch)

Yep, another post focused on the mobile market.

This one, from Search Engine Watch, outlines what not to do if you don’t want to scare mobile customers away from converting on your site.

The ‘common’ in the headline is the scary part: even if you think your mobile presence is as perfect as pumpkin pie, you might want to take a gander at this article just to be sure you’re not making any of these oft-seen mistakes.

Like, say:

Web pages with slow loading times have a major problem because mobile users are very irritated with slow web pages. The typical U.S. retail mobile site loads in 6.9 seconds in July 2016.

But, according to the Akamai study, “40% will abandon a web page if it takes more than three seconds to load”. And “64% of shoppers who are dissatisfied with their site visit will go somewhere else to shop next time.”

You sure you’re up to speed?

Check the full article here and find out.

How Google Handles Ranking Pages of Identical Products on a Site (The SEM Post)

This article is actually a little less intense than the others we’ve shared in this roundup, and it covers more of a niche topic, the mobile market.

Nonetheless, as we, here at Reach Digital, are involved with a good number of E-Commerce projects, we thought this was an important article to share.

The gist: a big concern in the world of SEO has always been duplicate content, particularly for E-Commerce sites with a range of similar products that are more than likely to appear on more than one landing page (i.e., overlapping categories) with the same content each time.

This article, like the two we’ve already covered, contains more insights straight from the horse’s mouth, as the information it shares comes from a Google Webmaster Office Hours hangout featuring John Mueller, Webmaster Trends Analyst at Google.

That means it’s very likely to clear up some misconceptions that many business owners and marketers may still have regarding duplicate content and its impact on something like an E-Commerce website.

Check out the full article here.

And That’s It for October in Digital!

Thanks again for stopping by to see what we found insightful and interesting in digital throughout October. If you missed September’s round-up, be sure to check it out here.

With November here, I imagine we’ll be seeing a focus shift to holiday-based marketing as people get ready to start stuffing stockings. We’re looking forward to reading about this year’s trends, especially with regards to the rise of the mobile market.

See you next month!

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