The Art of Going Viral with Video ft. President Obama

This past Sunday, Feb. 15, was the deadline for people to sign up for healthcare coverage. While this is a priority for many people across the country, millennials have been elusive and have proven to be a hard demographic to appeal to with this message.

President Obama wanted everyone, especially millennials, to sign up for healthcare coverage. There are two great ways to connect with this powerful demographic: social media marketing and viral videos; so, to connect with Millennials, the President utilized those mediums, especially the video part. Obama and Buzzfeed Motion Pictures created a video to promote Healthcare.gov. 

The results that speak of the video's success are still being calculated; however, the popularity of the video is tremendous, having been watched 15 million times in its first eight hours. By the end of last night, the video surpassed 42 million views.

In the video, we see President Obama doing American-Millennial things like taking a selfie on his iPhone with a selfie-stick, blaming Obama for something (you know the sarcastic phrase, "Thanks, Obama."). However, the point of the video is hidden in his speech practice that is done in front of the mirror.

Obama is no shy person to social media, using it heavily in both Presidential campaigns and for other efforts, such as his Reddit AMA, chats with YouTube stars, and other creative projects.

Does your business need to reach a difficult demographic with its marketing? Does your business want to improve its social media presence? Then email Integraphix and our Chicago creative marketing team can help you strategize! 

What SEOs and Social Marketers Can Learn from NASA

NASA teaches us a lot of stuff, such as the effects of various science experiments in space and other really cool & interesting phenomenon; however, they have also taught us "creatives" a thing or two about our own domain.

The days leading up to a campaign can be petrifying. You wait for the time when everything is going as you planned it to; social media marketing posts all the way up to online ads, everything has to be perfect and your results are ideal. The launch is set to happen.

This launch is what NASA infamously refers to as "liftoff", our Chicago SEO team says "infamous" because the line, "We have lift off" is known by 99.99999999% of humans on the planet, probably. As creatives, we are always wanting to believe that our work is so necessary to planet survival that the work has to be done right now and that the world is watching as it happens. This level of pressure can make it so we don't recall the tips we've learned along the way.

Marketers are not the only people to understand this pressure, remember, NASA has the task of getting a huge rocket ship into space. They want people to know the level of pressure they have.

Now and then, NASA invites social media influencers to a program called NASA Social, in which the influencers attend a launch and document the whole thing. Here are some of the things that can be learned from seeing the launch of a spaceship, such as Orion.

1. Make your brand loyalists and all stakeholders a priority. Yes, brand loyalists are under the "stakeholder" umbrella. Now, with each step of the launch, NASA Social gives attendees the same level of exposure as the press. They can meet with NASA leaders and go inside building where the spacecraft is being built, etc. By giving the social influencers this level of access, NASA is going above and beyond for their brand fans. 
2. Get help when needed. There are few journeys one can make solo. However, the journey of going into space and leaving the atmosphere is not one of those journeys. NASA calls in lots of help, including the U.S. Navy and its own employees. As humans, we like to try and do things ourselves instead of calling in help. 
3. If conditions are not optimal, wait. Do you ever see a space launch during a hurricane? No. We don't even see them happen during a thunderstorm. Why? Well, these less than optimal conditions are not going to increase the chances of a successful launch, which are already hard to get. NASA waits as long as it needs to for perfect conditions to execute the launch. 
4. Test and retest. NASA runs multiple tests on things they do, especially when it comes to launches. They never say, "Well, this will be the first launch for this aircraft. We've never seen what it can do or tested for any flaws. But we have some eager astronauts and we'd hate to say 'No'". By the time the launch arrives, they know everything because the tests have informed them of the necessary info. Can mistakes still happen? Yes. 
5. Think big. NASA has shown several interviews about Orion, the ship destined for Mars. Why Mars? Well, we've been to the Moon and the ISS plenty of times, Mars has yet to be conquered by anything more than a satellite (We see you, Rover). 

NASA has a lot of intelligence behind it, much like a successful marketing campaign. 

As a Chicago SEO company, we strive to know the latest and best techniques and help clients gain exposure and heightened success. Do you want to hire a creative marketing agency that knows what will work for your company because it looks at you as unique and not cookie-cutter? Then talk to Integraphix! 

Local SEO in 2015: Maps & Review Sites are Key

When you want to do great internet marketing and search engine optimization, for your business, you have to look at optimizing and promotion beyond your website. In regards to a local business, this means considering maps and review sites.

If you only do internal SEO, then you are missing out on some serious promotion for your site. When Google released the Pigeon update back in July 2014, it put more emphasis on local SEO. Directory/review sites such as Yelp now have the possibility of ranking above a business's website.

Do a search for "bakery in [your local city]". You will have to go past map listings and then, likely some Yelp or other review site listings, THEN you will find some websites.

So what can you do to rank well? 

Set up your Google My Business account. List your site and make sure all information is 100% correct. You can create a listing or claim ownership of an existing one. This is a free service and will help a lot.

Utilize Yelp. Yelp gets a lot of flack for "fake reviews. Any review site will (and does) have fake reviews on the site. Guaranteed. However, it is a great place to have your business listed and get good reviews because it can really help with Google rankings. Make sure to claim your business on Yelp.

Optimize any and all listings. Claim your listings. Verify information. Add photos, hours of operation, contact info, vanity URL, and other important information. Our Chicago SEO company makes sure this is done for all clients because it helps so much.

Gather some reviews and testimonials. Have people give you reviews (don't buy them or ask your family members) but when you have a customer, ask them to fill out a review. Also, ask around for some testimonials. You won't want to ask for reviews on sites, as that is often frowned upon.

Engage with people. On social media and review sites, talk to people. Respond to them. The more talking going on and the more traffic, the better it is for your site. This also shows people that your site is human-owned and run, not by robots. As a social media marketing firm, we can tell you that there is a massive difference in popularity and success of companies's online presence between those that are robotic vs. human.

Does your business need to be noticed on the web? Contact Integraphix and see how we can help you! Talk with our digital marketing team about search engine marketing and social media.

Google Breaks Unwritten Rule of "No Updates Around Holiday Season"

Since Google released its Florida update in 2003, they have kept an unofficial rule that they would not release any big updates like Panda or Penguin around the holiday season. However, that run ended this year with a series of Penguin updates.

The first round of Penguin was released October 17, 2014; however, since then, Google has released four more updates. On Nov. 27, Dec 2, 5, and 6, the world saw updates from Google for its Penguin filter. The releases in December have not officially been mentioned by Google but publisher reports make it pretty clear.

The Google Penguin update is Google's filter on spam. When a website is slammed by the update, it has to clean up its spam and wait until the next Penguin update is released to have a chance at freedom. If the site did what it was supposed to, then Google will lift the penalties.

In the past, Google has blatantly mentioned their path for avoiding releases like these at this time of year, however, someone decided that the move would be abolished… at least in 2014.

This certainly can have a scare on those who are not confident in the SEO abilities but there are no reasons to be afraid as long as you use common sense, make sure you stay on top of what is known about "Google approved" practices, and you take care of things.

Do you want to be ranked on Google with search engine optimization? Then chat with Integraphix and see how our white-hat SEO techniques are going to help your business be seen on the web. 

We are a Chicago SEO firm and have Los Angeles SEO firm, New York SEO company, Phoenix SEO company, and Charlotte SEO firm offices.

The Best Way to Help Your SEO

When it comes to having good SEO, you need to have this one thing down or else your search engine optimization will suffer greatly.

What is that one thing? CONTENT. Content, my friends. As an SEO firm, we operate offices across the country and one thing we can tell you is that people all over love to see good content. Of course, good content doesn't just soothe the soul of humans, it also soothes the souls of the search engines.

You have to write great content! This is the heart of your SEO efforts. What is great content? It is content that helps people, is captivating, relatable, interesting, and even sales-oriented. Great content shows your customers why they need your services and how you can better their lives. It gets people to realize they have a connection with your brand. Sure, you can write about your cat and how he is adorable but that will not work for your flooring site.

You have to write unique content. This means no copying what other people write. One, that's plagiarism. Two, if you avoid that, it just looks tacky. Do your own research and find out what people want to read and write about that. Write stuff that is not on other sites or other pages of your site. As an SEO company, we can't stress this enough. People hate it. Search engines hate it.

Post new content frequently. Your site should have new content added to it on a regular basis. A site that adds new content is seen as more credible than static sites. Your rankings will see great improvements if you do this. Search engine rankings are sometimes hard to achieve, you want to do all you can to get them!

Need help creating great content? Then contact Integraphix who has a whole team of talented marketing specialists who write specifically for SEO purposes.

Why Optimize Images for the Web

In order for your website to rank well on the internet, it has to be optimized. One aspect of websites that have to be optimized are the images. When images are not optimized, that hurts the chances of being ranked well on search results.

Search engines like it when every part of your website is optimized; however, even just in regards to the images, when they are optimized, they are much more likely to be pulled up in the images tab on search results.

What does it mean to optimize images? There are 5 parts to an image that have to be optimized.

1. Alt tag
2. File name
3. File size
4. Caption

What do these do? Why should they matter? Well… 

1. The alt tag is what the search engines read to find out what the image is. Since they don't have eyes to see what an image looks like, they go by words. No alt tag? Search engines will have no idea what the image is, they like to know. This is a great text alternative when browsers are not able to render an image correctly. It will add lots of SEO value to your site. Using plain English is a good idea here.  
2. File name is what the image is labeled when saved. Why does this matter? Well, it is more information for the search engines to pull when a search is made. An image named "liow20u09508.jpg" will mean nothing when someone searches for a "Ford Mustang 2014", however, an image named, "2014-red-ford-mustang.jpg" will do you good. 
3. The file size does indeed matter. Why? Well, if your file is too large, then the image will take lots of time to load (load times impact SEO rankings). Make the image a small file size.  
4. The caption is more information for the search engine and is also good for human viewers. People will read this to find out what is going on in an image and this means less bounce rate (that impacts rankings). 

Don't know how to optimize your images? Then contact Integraphix, a Chicago SEO firm that services the whole country! Our marketing specialists have in-depth SEO knowledge and can help get your site properly optimized. 

5 Ways SEO Can Help a Small Business

A good product or service that is appealing and can sell itself is something that every company wants. However, not even when your company has a product or service that is fantastic, it doesn't always get noticed by itself, without doing much promotion. For those products, there are several marketing tactics that a business can use to promote; one of those tactics is search engine optimization. A marketing strategy like SEO is great for any company, no matter what the size is; small companies of less than ten employees experience the same benefit as a company of 500+ employees, recognition and traffic to the site.

More than 3/4s of online shoppers use search engines to guide their decisions on where to purchase an item online; this means that if your site is not utilizing SEO, then it is missing a large segment of shoppers in the marketplace. When you are a large business, getting recognized is how your business continues to gain sales; when you are an entrepreneur or small business, it is how you survive. Here, we have 5 ways that SEO can help an entrepreneur and small business.

1. Reputation management. When your business is getting started, any amount of negative reviews, press, or other information can make a huge dent. If you are on the attack, being proactive, then you are able to put good news out there and create the first impression on your terms. 
2. Figure out what they are searching for. In SEO, you use keywords to allow search engines to pick up on your online content; when the search engines connect the keywords with you, you are posted as a result to those terms when people use them in searches. If someone searches for "Chicago tshirt company" and that's a keyword you use, then you have a greater chance of being seen by the searcher. It helps you understand what your consumers are looking for and how much they look for those things. 
3. Traffic to your site increases. When you do search engine optimization then you allow more people to see your site, thus, more people will go to it. A large company can get away with less SEO than a small one since they have a larger consumer base to know of and talk about their site/business. Getting this traffic to your site is free and can generate some real sales. 
4. Social media. Using social media is a great aspect of SEO because it can allow your business real time customer service, news, and promotion. You can create great links to other businesses and people in the community. The more your name appears on the internet, the better your SEO will be. 
5. Credibility. When you are shown on the internet and as an expert, then your credibility (ethos) will be given a higher rating by consumers. When a company earns the trust of a consumer, the brand loyalty is what can create long-term sales. 

If you want an SEO company that can help your business get noticed, then contact Integraphix. We are a Chicago marketing company. 

Why Content Matters with SEO

Content in search engine optimization is not just something you do, it is the thing you do. Everything about SEO revolves around the content. There are several things to consider when talking about content for SEO but we will focus on the big three: keywords, quality, and freshness.

The Hummingbird update that happened was a big change for the search algorithm that Google put into place. There is more focus on keywords now than ever before once the Hummingbird update came; keywords are to be in the titles of things, meta tags, in the paragraphs, your keyword density, etc. However, in regards to keywords, more emphasis is now on what the article is about and how you are using the keywords within all the content.

In the past, Google studied the search trends around the world and realized they had to improve identifications among synonyms and concept grouping. What does this mean? It means you should have both synonyms that are related to your main keywords as well as keywords directly related to the topic. This has changed search engine marketing strategy for every internet marketing firm in Chicago, New York, San Franciso, etc.

What about the article quality? You now have to write articles that are longer and are much more meaningful. Back in the day, you could get away with articles that were only 250 words but now, that minimum has doubled. A lot of websites have seen themselves get hit by Google because they had too little content. Ideally, webpages of 300, 400, 500+ words do well, even some sites with 1500 word articles do well. The most important thing is how well your articles are written; Google likes to see how well your stuff is written since that impacts its search quality.

Fresh content is a big, big deal. If you are unable to create content from your own mind, then you will need some extra help; having content that you did not make up is not only plagiarism but it will also get you hit by the big ol' Google. Online marketing has a focus on creating fresh, fun content for audiences and for good reason. Write on things that other people are not covering, or if they are, take a new spin on it. Always putting up new content to your site will help you quite a bit!

If you are looking for a Chicago marketing company that can help with your SEO needs, then contact Integraphix. 

5 Reasons Why Your Company Needs to do SEO

Search engine optimization is a tool for businesses that can get their name in front of web users whenever they search for things related to that business. However, there are some people who believe it is not worth the time, effort, or money. So why should you not believe those people but rather invest in SEO?

1. SEO works. Unless your company is a huge company that has throngs of followers and can have people visiting your website because it simply exists, then your company needs SEO to show people your website exists and that they should go to it. When you are a small to medium sized company, you will see that people will not find your website unless you do SEO. If you sign up for Google Analytics without SEO, check out what your Google Analytics says after just a month or two of doing SEO, you'll see a difference. With SEO, your link can appear as the first link under the paid links (Google Adwords), people trust the organic links (where yours will be) over the paid links. 
2. It will work for a long time. Looking at how search engines function and continue to change, it has been shown that search engine optimization will not stop being a worthy investment anytime soon. As long as there are keywords and links on the internet, SEO will be a force on the internet. It will also work for a long time since SEO is like a train; it takes a little bit of time and effort to gain traction and chug along but once it does, it goes for a while. 
3. It is cost efficient. Compared to the cost of other kinds of marketing, including internet marketing, paying for SEO is much more efficient since the pricing is lower yet your results last longer. 
4. People use the internet for research. When someone is looking to install a home sprinkler system so their lawns get consistent watering, they are going to look for a company on the internet that services their areas. When they see your organic link up there and think, "Hmm, I'll check them out" guess what, they will check your site out! Once they do and they decide you're a worthy company to contact or not, they'll make the next move. Of course, you'd have never gotten the chance if you didn't do SEO. 
5. The competition is doing SEO too. If you have competitors, which you do, then you will be outshined if they are doing SEO and you are not. They will be in a position to be seen by the internet and your site won't even be listed on the internet, according to search engines. 

Putting time and effort into organic SEO is a worthy venture for any company that is of small, medium, or even large stature. Very few companies are able to have a dominating presence on the internet without any SEO assistance. 

3 Things That Can Harm Your SEO

SEO has a lot of components to it and each one is essentially as important as the other parts because they all contribute important aspects to successful SEO efforts. If you do not do all of the different components currently, your SEO will suffer. However, there are three things that harm your SEO without you really even realizing it. Well, until you read this blog post.

1. Not having fresh content. Not having fresh content when you write things like blogs and articles, as well as your website content, means that search engines will not like you. If you don't have original content, then that means you copied it from somewhere else and that is plagiarism and a big no-no to search engines. What will happen? You will be penalized by either have bad rankings and even getting your website blocked. Believe it or not, copying content you wrote but for something else counts too; did you have a great article that you think would make for a wonderful blog post as well? Well, you can reuse it but you'd better change the words and rewrite it or you'll be in some trouble. Trust someone in the search engine optimization business who does blogging, search engines know when you do this. 
2. Having a slow loading site. People expect websites to load in less than a second. So what if your website takes 5 seconds to load, or worse, 10 seconds? In the grand scheme of things, waiting 10 seconds for something like the internet to load and getting upset is ludicrous, but it is what it is. So how does a slow website harm your SEO? Well, the point of SEO is to get your website more exposure and get more people to visit your website; if your site takes too long to load, people give up on it and leave. People giving up on your site does not accomplish the goal of SEO; in fact, it raises your bounce rate which can harm your ranking chances. 
3. Poor navigation of the website. This can harm your SEO because if a search engine crawler has trouble moving around your site, it will not send a favorable report back to Google, Yahoo, whoever, and it will not look good for you. Also, if people have trouble, navigating your site, they won't return and that won't be good for you either. 

Take a look at these three things when analyzing your site and its promotion. If you have any questions, feel free to contact Integraphix - a Chicago marketing company and we'll be glad to help you out. 

9 Easy SEO tips

Search engine optimization can be a tricky, tricky business since things are constantly changing. Google likes to change the rules on doing SEO and normal people do as well by changing what they search and how they do it. So how do you know if you're doing SEO that is quality and will be noticed by the search engines?

1. Put your keyword in your domain. When you obtain a domain name, make sure that your keyword is in your domain name; search engines like to see this. 
2. Put your keyword in after your URL. This is the part of the URL that comes after your domain such as www.mywebsite.com/seo-tips-for-you instead of keeping it generic. Why does this matter? It matters because you have to allow search engines to know what pages are talking about before they get past the URL. 
3. Put keywords in your title tags, Meta descriptions, H1 tags, and web copy. When you have title tags on your site (which you have to have!), meta descriptions, H1s, and web copy, make sure you place your keyword(s) in there. You want the search engines to find things they like when they view your site. They like to see keywords. However, do not do keyword stuffing; this is when you stuff your content with keywords so much that it is overwhelming for search engines. 
4. Don't forget to optimize images on your site. When search engines crawl through your site, they will know if you have images; if the search engine can't determine what the image is, it will not care about the images. Make sure every image is optimized with a description. 
5. Build internal links. Your website will have more than one page and your blog will have more than one post; with these different pages and posts, make sure you create links between them. Have links on pages that connect to other pages or posts and vice versa. Search engines like to see that you have "alternate routes" on the highway that is your website. 
6. Make your site known to search engines. Just creating your site means nothing. You have to submit it to search engines! Submit your site to directories as well. 
7. Make your site easy to navigate. Search engines and people hate sites that take 10 years to navigate. If your site is not so easy that a new visitor can figure it out instantly, then your site will not get much traffic. 
8. Have good content. Your site needs to have content that is appropriate for your topics and that there is enough of it. Make sure your content is not copied or you will face big penalties from search engines. 
9. Get on social media. Have a company FB business page, twitter, YouTube,Yelp, Pinterest, Instagram, Tumblr, blog, etc. Now, which ones you choose matters to reach your target audience so do your research. Chances are Facebook and Twitter are going to reach everyone but as far as what else to add, that's where research will help you. 

Just so you know, if your business has a brick & mortar, then add Google Maps to your site. Search engines and people love seeing this on your site. 

If you are looking for a search engine marketing firm, the contact Integraphix - a Chicago marketing firm. 

Integraphix is a leading Chicago Marketing, Advertising and Creative Agency creating strong brand identity and marketing strategies with our unique mix of advertising, graphic design, web design, and internet marketing expertise. We give free consultations. 

The Importance of Website Audits

If you do search engine optimization, then you have a website. Since you have a website, you should look at how it is doing and how SEO is affecting your website. How do you do this? There are two programs that you should have (in addition to others but we will focus on two) that can tell you how

your website is doing.

Using these two tools below will help you truly analyze how your website is performing and how it can be made better or if you have done everything right. If you want your website to be successful and not get penalized by search engines, then you are going to have to do website audits on your site. Admittedly, doing one can be scary, especially if you haven't done them before, because you may find that you have a lot to fix. These are not only helpful and necessary if you do SEO but also if you do web design because you want to know what to do during your designing so your site or your client's site perform well; if they perform well because of a great design, you will look good, real good.

The first program that you should have if you do SEO, whether for your own site or someone else's, is Website Auditor in the SEO Powersuite package. What does Website Auditor do? This tool looks through an entire website and shows all the structural parts of the website which includes things like the pages, site errors, validation, and much more. You can see things like your Google Page Rank, Alexa rating, where links are from/where they're going, any site problems, warnings/red flags, anything you want and need to know about your website.

The second program you should utilize is Google Analytics. This will give you measurements of how many people are visiting your site, where they are from, how long they look at your site, how many pages, how they found your site, etc. Anything you need to know about who looks at your site, you can find out.



If you are looking for a search engine optimization company, hire Integraphix - a Chicago marketing company.

Why Should I Do Search Engine Optimization?

Search engine optimization is a marketing aspect that many people do not consider when trying to increase their brand awareness. The truth is, search engine optimization is something that the majority of small companies need to utilize if they wish to gain notoriety in the small business world. Search
engine optimization is not the newest form of internet marketing but is certainly not the oldest; due to this factor, there are still companies who can be skeptical about why they should utilize these services.

But what are some concrete reasons for why a small company should do SEO? There are a few reasons.

1. The first reason small companies should do SEO is because of how many people ignore the paid search results. According to 2013 data, studies showed that approximately 94 percent of people ignored the paid search results and opted for the organic search results. Why is this the case? Well people tend to trust referrals from friends and those they know; despite not truly knowing the people who also like the organic links that you see, it is as if you do. See, the mind recognizes the popularity of the organic results and the fact that those links are ranked so well because they are genuinely good and have earned their place in line. When we see the paid links, we generally recognize they were bought and did not earn their place there; consequently, we do not trust that the paid links are genuinely helpful. They might be complete garbage but are only there because that company laid out the money for top spot. 
1. Think of it this way, do you trust a commercial or your best friend's referral when learning about a product? While you might trust both, you will most likely trust your friend's words more since you know they are not being paid to endorse or speak well of the product; they genuinely like it and want to tell you about it because they think you will like it as well. 
2. The second reason for SEO is because of how many people do not go past the first page of results on a search engine. When people search for something on the internet, they know that the best links come up first. When someone is searching for a helpful link, they will scan the first page in-depth, but fewer than 30 percent of people actually go to the second page. After unsuccessfully finding the link they want, most people will simply try a variation of their original search until they get something that is suitable. 
3. The third reason for SEO is due to the fact that small companies who do no sort of SEO do not rank well with search engines. If you read the first two reasons, you will see why this is a problem. A search engine will not rank your site well if it does not see the effort to appear as a good site, essentially. 

As a Chicago marketing company, Integraphix Inc. knows all about internet marketing and especially about SEO. If you are considering SEO for your business, give us a call at 847-537-0067, visit our site,  or email us at info@integraphix.com. We give free consultations and are a full-service Chicago marketing firm.  

          

Big Changes Coming to Google for SEO

So, there are plenty of changes coming to the search engine optimization world, Google will be releasing an update to Penguin. This one is called *drum roll* Penguin 2.0! Shocker. BUT, it is important for you to know what this means so your site does not get hit, or if you're an SEO consulting company, then your clients' sites. Google promises that this update will be a real trouble-maker.

A big deal with this change is the update's ability to shake down all the SEO on the internet and crack down on any spammy and poor quality links. What this means is that you will have to check your site's links by performing an audit. Even if you think your links are good, do not assume, do an audit on your site's backlinks and links. Avoid links that are attached to SEO inspired sites, like backlink farm sites, and things of the like. Also try to avoid links with contrived anchor text, or anchor text that has been beaten to death.

What you will want to do is to build a list of all the backlinks you have for your site on the internet, you can do this by using SEO SpyGlass. Next, look to see what links you have that are still active and what links you have that are dead, remove the dead ones. Third, look for any questionable links that are tied to your site, ditch them ASAP; check for the domain IP, domain age, Google page rank, Alexa rank, and external links. Fourth, look for links with suspicious anchor text because this kind of goes along with the notion of questionable backlinks and using overly optimized keywords/anchor text. Fifth, look for any poor backlinks to your site with your own eye, maybe the SpyGlass missed something. And lastly, Talk to webmasters about removing the bad links.

This blog will hopefully help you avoid poor rankings due to poor back links but there is more you can do, for a complete run down, do a Google search of the new update and see for yourself. We will make it through this update!

Don't Rush to Change Keywords

If you do search engine optimization, you know about keywords. Keywords are your backbone for search engine optimization. They are what get you noticed by the world on the internet. Keywords are the things that people type into the search engines and why your material on the internet and your website become relevant to the people using those keywords. The only problem is that many people are eager to change the keywords and try to be innovative.

The thing about keywords is that they have to establish themselves in reference to your website. So, for example, you use "Dentist in Chicagoland" as a keyword for your dentist office, this keyword has to become associated with your website, according to the search engines. If you change your keywords too often, then the search engines don't like it and your rankings will suffer.

Keywords can stick around for a few months or even longer so you don't really have to worry about them having a short expiration date, they aren't like milk. Think of them more like juice.

If you do not know how to choose a keyword, well there is a science to that. Keywords are often 2-3 words long. one word phrases are called short-tail keywords and they make up less than 30% of searches on the web. Phrases longer than 3 words are called long-tail keywords and make up gets fewer uses with each additional word. The longer and more precise the keywords are, the sooner you will get increased traffic. It is easier to optimize a site and rank for a unique phrase with little competition. The longer and more precise your keyword is, the fewer visitors you will get, but the more targeted your traffic is. The narrower the search term you target, the greater part of visitors convert to actual customers.

When choosing keywords, you want to make a list of keywords to choose from. They must pertain to what you offer or sell. To help you, you can use the Google Keyword Planner tool. You can use more general keywords or more specific like "Chicago Instrument Shop". What makes it more specific is the addition of "Chicago".

How do you pick the best keywords? Good question. You will need to calculate the Keyword Efficiency Index, or KEI. This index show you how good a keyword is for bringing traffic to your site. You will want keywords with high KEI. There are three components to KEI and they are: relevance ( how closely your keyword is related to what you offer to your customers. You can rank the relevance in terms of excellent, good, or poor). Another component of KEI is the search volume (this is how many queries are made for a keyword per month). The third component is competition (how many websites try to rank for this keyword- generally, all sites that have the same keyword as you are your online competition. The fewer websites that are optimized for the same keyword, the better KEI).

As a Chicago marketing company, we do all sorts of internet marketing, search engine optimization, social media marketing, blogs, web design, and more. We know all about keywords and how they work and how to use them to someone's advantage.

Updating Your Keywords

Successful search engine optimization is about having keywords. Keywords are what connect your website to what people search on search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo.

While finding the perfect keyword is important to the success of your search engine optimization it is more important to understand why you use the keywords you choose. An SEO consultant agency or internet marketing agency will know the importance of why certain keywords win over other keywords. One reason is because you want keywords that have lower competition while having higher amounts of searches. More importantly, an internet marketing firm will know that the keywords will speak to the company's target markets.

In addition to knowing why it is important to know the right keywords to choose for your search engine optimization marketing but it also what are your next set of keywords? The tricky thing about keywords is that after a while, they become less effective. If you know anything about marketing , then you know that consumers change their minds all. the. time. It is frustrating. Consequently, while certain keywords will work for a while, you will have to change them after a few months because people are no longer searching for those words as much as they used to.

Keywords are a cornerstone to successful and search engine optimization . Do it right and you're golden. The only trick is this, you won't always do it right.

Why You Should Do Social Media Marketing

Why do social media marketing for your business? Is it even worth it? It is definitely something to look into if you want to grow your small business or if you want to build brand loyalty with your consumers. Here's the thing though, you want to grow your small business and you want to build brand loyalty with consumers. Social media has done a lot in the business world and done things that we did not even know were possible.

One way social media has impacted marketing, especially internet marketing is that it has enabled quick interaction between consumers and businesses. For example, Coca-Cola has a twitter account for Doc Pemberton, inventor of Coke, and when people tweet at him, he will respond and interact; of course their other twitters will do the same, but it is just cool to see. Other brand's twitter accounts interact. The reason this is so great is because it makes consumers feel like they are noticed by their favorite brands and can actually have their voice be heard. Being able to talk with a company is like talking to a friend; you are much more loyal and genuine with a friend than you are with a stranger.

A second way social media marketing has impacted internet marketing is by enabling companies to announce news much faster than they were able to in the past. For example, say a company want to announce a new promo opportunity or something like a logo change, they can do it via social media in a few minutes; in the past, they would have to rely more on traditional media and public relations to do this work.

A third way that social media has impacted marketing is by allowing companies to go places that they were not able to go before. I don't mean that they can establish offices in geographic locations that they couldn't before but rather get involved in things they couldn't before, or at least with as much ease. For example, MLB was able to post pictures on Instagram during the home run derby when in the days prior to social media, they couldn't post their own pictures of the home run derby as the derby was going on; not that there were rules against it, but uploading pictures to the computer and then to the internet took a lot longer than simply hitting a single button on Instagram.

Overall, social media has had a huge impact on marketing and has so many benefits to it; if your business is not in on the social media buzz, you can be missing sales and exposure.

Valuable Internal Optimization Tips

As a Chicago Marketing Company we stress the value of Search Engine Optimization. If you want web traffic from search engines there are certain areas of your website that must be optimized.

Title Tags – Title tags are shown up as the title in search results and on browser windows. Our Chicago Marketing team has found that title tags are the most important place to insert your keywords on your website. A strong title tag should contain between 65-70 characters or less. It is important to choose keywords for your title tags that correspond with the content on the page.

H1 Tags – Search engines have been attracted to h1 tags for years. Our Chicago Marketing Company has found that some websites don’t even utilize H1 tags! Many search engine optimization experts have found that H1 tags are one of the most important factors of internal optimization. You are only hurting your website by not including H1 tags.

URL – The key to any web page is it’s URL. Within your website you will have different pages designated to separate web URL’s. Our web designers in Chicago always name particular page’s slug according to what the page and content is about. Example: http://www.integraphix.com/services/chicago_internet_marketing entails information regarding our Chicago Internet Marketing services.

Image Tags – Our creative agency has found that images are often ignored when it comes to search engine optimization. It is very important that all of your images on your website are saved according to your keywords to help increase web traffic. Make sure that all of your images on your website are given logical and readable names. An image saved as “logo.jpg”says nothing to search engines. Saving an image as “Chicago-web-design-company-logo.jpg” will help your website for search engine optimization purposes. Uploading images to your website saved as keywords will definitely help increase your rankings and ultimately increase your web traffic.

Content – When creating web content for your website, it is very important to include a variety of keywords. As a Chicago Marketing Company, we recommend you use at least 4-5 keywords on each of your pages. If your site is legitimate and you are targeting the right audience, your keywords should fall into the copy naturally. It is important to understand that the more content you put on your site, the better off you are in terms of search engine optimization.

Without a solid foundation of internal optimization on your website, you cannot grasp the full potential of search engine optimization. For a FREE Marketing Analysis of your website, contact Integraphix: 847-537-0067. Our Chicago Marketing Company consists of our creative team specialists that have the knowledge and experience on  how to increase interest with search engines.

Why Your Company Needs a Blog

Yes, we have decided that we are going to 'blog' about 'blogging' today.  If you constantly find yourself putting off starting up a blog for your company, you should get started as soon as possible.  There are about a million good reasons why a company should have a blog and as a Chicago SEO company, we cannot stress a blog's importance enough.  If you have been putting it off, here's why you should get started today:

1- A blog is essential to boost your SEO: As a Chicago SEO company, we constantly tell our customers how effective a blog is for boosting their website's SEO rankings.  Search engine crawlers love, love, love fresh, brand new content being added to a website on a constant basis.  Sticking a blog right on your website will give you the ability to add that fresh content every time you post something new.  Postings give you a chance to utilize keywords and show search engines that you are actively using and updating your website.  When we do web design for a client we typically create a built in blog right on the client's website.  We suggest having multiple blogs if you can keep up with it.  The more blogs your company has that link back to your company's website, the better off you are in the world of search engine optimization. A blog, whether your blog is through blogger or you are using a blog on your website, gives you a great place to add links back to your website, which is also a great way (if not the best way) to boost SEO rankings.

2- A blog is a great place to show that you are the expert in your industry: Refine your list of potential blog topics and stick to talking about topics related to your company's industry.  Say you own a coffee shop, then topics that you should blog about should all surround the industry you belong to.  Keeping it relevant will help search engine's crawlers identify who your business is and what you do and will give you a chance to become the expert in your industry.  Your blog gives you a special place to show what you know and impress potential customers.  

3- A blog is a great way to interact with potential and current customers: A blog is a great place to spearhead conversations with your potential and current customers.  Your blog will keep your customers informed and has the ability to help you reel in potential customers.  Just like your social media profiles, blogging is another great way to bring the social aspect to your business.

4- Your blog will help you build your brand: Blogging is a simple way of helping you establish your brand.  Blogging gives you the ability to make your brand more personal and drive more traffic to your company's website, which in turn helps you build your brand.  Perhaps lots of people begin reading your company blog, then great!  Put on your sales hat and lead those blog readers back to your company's website.  That gives your company all the more potential to get that brand exposure you have been craving.

5- Blogging will help keep yourself and your customers in the loop:  Since your company blog should take on topics related to your industry, it can serve as a learning tool not only for your readers and customers, but also for yourself.  A great way to stay current with the latest industry trends is to blog about it.  Your blog could also serve as a vehicle for communicating the latest company news almost like a company newsletter.

Looking for tips on creating a company blog?  We'd be happy to discuss blogging with you.  Feel free to comment below or contact us.

Social Media’s Role on SEO

The new year is vastly approaching and you want to drive more traffic to your website.  Makes perfect sense to us!  As a team of web designers and SEO specialists, we cannot stress the importance of SEO enough when it comes to getting more traffic to your website.  We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: social media greatly affects SEO rankings, but what is social media’s role in it all?  Here’s a few ways that social media can and will affect your SEO rankings:

Social media site content speaks to the search engines

Okay, well sort of!  Social media content, when updated regularly and when well written, lets search engines know that your business is an active online participant.  If and when social media engagement becomes a ranking factor for your website, you will surely benefit if you spend time on social media sites.  If you haven’t immersed yourself or your business in social media, now is the time to do it.  Don’t have the time?  Set up a consultation with a social media company or a marketing company well-versed in speaking social media. 

The more links back to your website the better

The more sites that link back to your website, the better your SEO rankings will be, so this means all those social media sites you have created and began using are great links back to your website.  Because social media sites point back to your website, it will help create better SEO rankings for your website.  As an SEO firm, we always tell clients to picture their website in the center of a spider’s web and that it’s their job to create extensions from that web that will bring people straight to their website.  That is exactly what creating and using social media sites will do for you.  Perhaps someone didn’t find your website yet, but they did find your social media page.  Great.  Now bring them to your website and sell them on your services and products.  That’s what it is all about!

Be an active participant

Don’t expect to receive any kind of rankings boost just because you finally set up that Twitter account last week.  You have to be an active participant and yes, the search engines know who is an active participant and who’s not.  This means that if set up your social media accounts a year ago, but have never used them, they will not do you any good.  Try to set aside time out of your day each day to post some relevant content for potential customers to read and for search engines to grab on to.  Being an active social media participant means that you are posting great, original content, reposting other people’s great content, and interacting with potential customers.  If you find that you just do not have the time consider speaking with a social media firm or a marketing company.

Social media sites provide an opportunity for optimization

Social media sites are a great place for optimization tactics to take place.  Utilize social media sites as a way to get friends, fans and followers back to your website.  Social media profiles can be optimized for search similar to internally optimizing a website, so tag your images, write a great about us or company bio and utilize those keywords. 

The ability of sharing content greatly affects rankings

Encourage friends, fans and followers to share your content.  Sharing content is a great way to give your search engine rankings a boost.  Use strong calls to action in all of your posts and encourage readers to share your content through social networks.

Comment or questions are always welcome, feel free to comment below or contact us.