Hitwise says September 2011 search queries of eight or more words increased 3 percent from August 2011. So, what does this meant to you? Actually not much, but it does give me the opportunity, to show you the numbers for the other search term lengths. Knowing how many words the searching public (pretty much all of us), typically uses should be used in your search engine marketing strategy. You do have a search engine marketing strategy, don’t you?

That said, here are the numbers:

Knowing those numbers should affect how you approach search engine optimization (SEO), and your Google AdWords campaigns. You do have both of those in your search engine marketing strategy, don’t you?

Nearly every small business doesn’t update their website content  often enough. I know we certainly fall short in that regard, though I do intend for us to change that. Why is updating the content on your website important? Well, your website visitors are important! Repeat visitors deserve to see new content regularly. After all, there has to be a reason for them to be repeat visitors, and I mean other than when they are looking for your customer service or support contact information. You don’t really want them coming to your website only when they need support, do you? 

So, why else should you update your website regularly? Google and other search engines are good reasons. Google and the others are in the business of providing relevant, and fresh, results. If your website is updated frequently with well-written content, your website will get crawled more frequently by Google, Bing and other search engines. If you have written your content well, and it is relevant to what your intended market is searching for, your website has a better chance of achieving higher positions in search engine results. Google LOVES fresh, relevant, well-written content. Your customers and prospects will appreciate the most up-to-date information about your products, services, or company news.

I Know. I know. We are all busy and it takes time to update our websites. Well, we need (I swear I am going to try to practice what I preach) to realize we don’t have to write a  PhD Dissertation regularly to keep Google, et al happy. Most businesses continually improve, enhance, or add products or services. We can talk about how different customers use our products or services. We can talk about what is happening in our store or office, or locations. We can give tips and hints on how to use what we offer better or more efficiently. Be the expert. Get the idea?

Please remember websites are not “build it and they will come.”  It takes some effort to get positive results from your website.

So, how do we do that easily? Well, if you have a blog or “What’s New” area on your website, you already have the tools. If you don’t, ask your web developer if a blog is right for you. If you have a static website that your web developer updates for you, add a ”What’s New” area or page to your website, and then regularly send them updates. Open a free Twitter account, and put a widget (free from Twitter) that shows your latest Tweets on your home or other frequently visited page. If you have a Facebook page, do the same.

Take a look at your current website analytics, and write down the average number of monthly visitors, pages visited. and their time on your website. Start updating at least monthly, or weekly, or daily. After three months take a look at those statistics again. I am sure you will see the difference.

Google will visit your website more often, index your fresh, relevant, well-written content, and your increased number of website visitors will give you more opportunities.

Seems like I talk about Google AdWords frequently. There is a reason for that. Advertising using Google AdWords just plain works. Those of you using Google AdWords already know the benefits. This blog post is for those still not taking advantage of a very powerful, cost-effective advertising medium.

For the last few years, I have been writing (some may say, evangelizing) about using Google AdWords, and extolling its benefits. Since a significant number of our clients are not using AdWords, I obviously don’t convey the message well enough. Now, don’t get me wrong. We have many clients who enjoy the benefits of AdWords in increased, targeted traffic driven to their website for a budgeted amount that they control. They see quantifiable results. They know exactly how many people were delivered to specific pages on their websites, and the keywords their visitors used to get there. If they are also using Google Analytics and the the two accounts are linked, they know much more about their visitors. There are not many other ways to get self-qualified, quantifiable traffic to look at a specific product or service you offer, and at the advertising cost you choose.

Why use Google AdWords?

• Control Cost – You set your daily budget, set your maximum per click for single keywords, or by ad group
• Pay only for results – You’re charged only if someone clicks your ad, not when your ad is displayed.
• Local and regional targeting – Target by country, state, city, regions, or custom areas (set a radius of 10 or more miles from a point on the map)
• Local ads – Help potential customers find you by showing a business address with your AdWords text ads. You can show your location to people searching for local information on Google.com and Google Maps.

Enhance your adds with these Ad Extensions

• Site Links - your ad could look like this:

• Address – display your address to increase local traffic
• Phone – just list your phone number, or use phone extensions to enable “Click-to-Call“
• Products -  extend ads with relevant product details and photos from Google Merchant Center (a way for you to register your company and its list of products with Google).

I have just scratched the surface with this blog post of what Google AdWords and we at WebWise can do for you. If you are serious about driving self-qualified, targeted traffic to your website, please email adwords@webwisedesign.com or give us a call at 1-800-281-9993 or 608-822-3750.