In today’s age of social media, search engine optimisation & search engine marketing, there is a misconception that anyone can do it.

If you know how to edit some meta tags, insert alt tags in images and stuff your content full of relevant keywords you can carry out SEO on your website.

If you create a group for your company on Facebook and get 50 members, you are a Social Media expert.

If you can setup your own PPC account in Google AdWords and broadcast your ads to the nation, then you earn the title of Search Engine Marketing Manager.

The truth is that this is all a misconception. Because there is so much information floating around about SEM, SEO, PPC and the like, both bad and good it is difficult for anyone to know if they are really doing a good job or not. I can say for a fact that a lot of people are doing a bad job, and Google is not helping in this area because all they are thinking about is their revenue stream.

99% of Google’s revenue comes from Google AdWords. Without this revenue stream Google wouldn’t exist as it does today.

As a specialist in this field it upsets and frustrates me that Google project the misconception to it’s AdWords advertisers that anyone can open and successfully run their own account. Of course, it is possible to open and start a new account quite easily, just as it is possible to do SEO on your website with a few META tag adjustments and keyword placements… not.

With basic help on how to run your own AdWords campaign, Google makes it look easy for the average person to run a successful campaign.

When you think about it, Google is the next Microsoft. Microsoft make it easy for anyone to open a new spreadsheet, word document or powerpoint presentation. While this is great, it doesn’t mean that you are an expert in any of these programs, it just means that you can spend a lot of money on a program in which you are going to use maybe 5% of it’s total features.

This applies equally to Google AdWords. AdWords is a fantastic platform and offers advanced analytics and adjustments to the ads run on this platform. The average user will use 5% of AdWords capabilities. A specialist in the field will use 90%+, giving their client maximum Return On Investment (ROI) and maximum benefit through Google AdWords.

Just because you can open and appear to run your own account in Google AdWords, doesn’t mean that you are not flushing your money down the toilet in overpriced keyword bids and under-optimised account setup. The basic user will lose out big time with their 5% knowledge and 95% ad spend. Don’t be fooled into thinking your are an expert just because you know the basics.

Remember that AdWords amateurs spend 95% of their money as they only use 5% of the programs features. Professionals use 95% of AdWords features, while spending only 5% of their money.

SEOmoz Whiteboard Friday – Ignore the Tail at Your Peril! from Scott Willoughby on Vimeo.

The long tail can be applied to both Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Pay Per Click (PPC) management alike.

I have seen many clients and SEO/PPC agencies alike who target the “fat head” and/or “chunky middle” (see the video for an explanation), even sometimes just the “fat head” – but they do not consider or even recognize the long tail.

As Rand explains, up to 75% of all traffic can come from the long tail. Therefore if you are only targeting the “fat head” and/or “chunky middle”, you are missing out on most of the traffic that could be coming to your website, and the most relevant traffic at that!

SEOmoz Whiteboard Friday – Email Marketing and SEO from Scott Willoughby on Vimeo.

Not only are there differences with English from one country to another – England, Australia, America – but translating from one language to another is generally a bad idea.

For example, were I to say hello in England I might say “Good morning old chap”, in Australia I may say “G’day mate” and in America I might just say “Yo!”. Each country has specific keywords which are searched for more often and which have more competition due to their popularity.

To learn more, read this article on “Translating Keywords Should Never EVER Happen“.

Selling SEO Projects Against PPC Campaigns discusses the easy part of selling PPC, the hard part of selling SEO and finally, selling your SEO product.

Although this article is not so much for clients reading about whether SEO is a better investment over PPC or vice versa, it does offer some interesting information for the client on why PPC is easy to sell, and why SEO is more difficult in comparison.

The five tips explained in greater detail within the article are:

1. Country-Level Domain Name.
2. Country-Specific Domain Hosting.
3. In-Market External Linking.
4. Language Revision
5. Localized Blogging

Again, we are reminded that having a country specific domain and hosting within the country that your products or services are sold or located is very important in gaining higher visibility in search engines.

Mark looks at some important aspects that will determine if you have any chance to make an impact on the web with your current or proposed web site. Key areas which Mark takes a look at are:

• Help People Find Your Web Site
• Make Sure Your Home Page Resolves Correctly
• Create Quality Content — and Lots of It

Of course, remember that every website is reletive to its competitors. If your competitors are ranking high in search engines and offer the same or similar website content, services, products or layout to yours, then there is probably no reason why you, too should not be able to rank high.

• Most executive management teams don’t yet fully understand the economics and far-reaching business implications of SEO.
• Search engine marketing’s transformation of legacy enterprise profitability is in its infancy.
• Most people outside of the search engine community do not fully appreciate the magnitude of the shift from push to pull marketing.
• Management teams must understand SEO to effectively manage it.
• Measuring SEO is still an imprecise art form, which Google appears determined to prevent from becoming a science.
• Search engine marketing might be the largest change management project in history.
• Executive recruiting needs to look beyond the job title to hire effective search engine marketing leaders.
• Search marketing-centric organizations will outperform.

“[Visitors] will come only if you’ve structured your information in a way that’s easy for visitors to navigate, and for search engines to understand.”

Herndon gives you six steps to follow in order to structure your website in the most ideal way:

1. Start with an audit of your product offerings.
2. Take your list to the Google AdWords Keyword Tool.
3. Compare your findings to your product list.
4. Classify your products.
5. Leverage your products.
6. Race to the bottom.

Read the full article on “SEO Friendly Site Structure – If You Build it, Will They Come?“.