A 1,000 Word Post vs. A 2,000 Word Post: Which Has Better ROI? by @searchlabs

The argument over long-form content and short-form content is one which has been debated from behind keyboards since the advent of the Internet, and one which will doubtless carry on for the foreseeable future.

How Do You Measure ROI on Content?

There is no definitive method of measuring ROI on content, as each company/brand/site will be looking for something different. Whether you’re writing to bring more people to the site, increase conversions, establish credibility in your sector, or are just writing because you enjoy it, you’ll measure ROI differently.

There are often long lead times on seeing a direct conversion from content marketing (except perhaps in the retail and fashion sectors where this is probably less true) but there are some easier short-term ways to measure ROI if direct sales are not forthcoming. To measure ROI, consider using the following:

Organic search positions and SERP visibility (and backlink analysis)Traffic to siteTime spent on site and/or bounce rateSocial shares and engagement metrics

Now, let’s take a deeper look at each of these metrics and consider when using them to measure ROI would be most appropriate.

Organic Search Position

Getting higher positions in the SERPs will benefit any company, and having high-quality content is the best way to do this. It’s no secret that Google prefers content that answers a question, and will rank this content higher. A higher search position will inevitably have an impact on your online ROI (as long as it’s for a relevant key phrase). That is why many people engage in content marketing and why SEO, online PR, and content marketing are essentially one and the same in 2014.

Good visibility in the SERPs will get your site in front of more new users and increases your opportunity to increase ROI from content. Publishing two posts means you have the opportunity to rank for more terms, but only if these are relevant, worth reading, and good quality.

However, this doesn’t necessarily mean they will rank well long-term. In a study conducted by SerpIQ, blog post pages with over 2,000 words ranked higher than shorter blog posts, which makes sense. If you’re looking for an answer to a question, it’s likely a 500-word post may not have enough useful phrases users are searching for.

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Conversational Search Comes To Bing by @mattsouthern

Bing recently announced they are now offer conversational search, and it works very much the same way as Google’s conversational search. You can ask a natural language question, and then follow up with another question about the same subject and Bing will remember what you were asking about.

Here’s an example of me testing out Bing’s new search functions by asking it questions about Google.

First question: “who are the founders of Google?”

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Google Ends Exact and Phrase Keyword Match Ability in AdWords; Now Applying Close Variant Keyword Matching by @mattsouthern

At least 7% of Google searches contain a misspelling, according to a new post on Google’s Inside AdWords blog. However, people still want to find what they’re looking for even if they haven’t spelled it correctly.

That’s why Google has announced that they’re applying close variant keyword matching to all exact and phrase match keywords starting in September.

Close variant keyword matching is an intuitive way to return the correct results that users are searching for. It was introduced in 2012, and Google says advertisers have seen strong results. “Advertisers are receiving an average of 7% more exact and phrase match clicks with comparable clickthrough and conversion rates.”

These incremental increases in clicks help advertisers seize opportunities to convert customers that are otherwise missed by “Low search volume” keywords that are common for misspellings and abbreviations.

Google’s announcement contains testimonials from three advertisers. Here’s one from Stitch America:

“In matching common stemming variants such as “custom hats” for “customized hats”, we’ve seen five times as many clicks for exact and phrase match keywords. What’s more impressive is that this additional traffic costs half as much.”

Close variant matching was already the default setting for campaigns, which means most advertisers won’t see a change in keyword matching behavior. The option to disable close variants will be removed in September.

Advertisers will no longer be able to build extensive lists of misspelled, abbreviated, and other close variations of your keywords. Instead, Google recommends to focus on adding negative keywords–including close variants you don’t want to match for–to shape traffic and reduce cost.

In addition to improving your campaigns’ ROI with an improved click-through rate and lower cost per click, with this update Google also wants to help deliver a better ad experience for your customers.

To learn more about keyword matching options, please see Google’s Help Center article.

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Does Article Marketing Add Any Value To SEO Now?

Article marketing was a very popular backlinking process in the early 2010. People used to submit their articles into article directories with a link back to their business site in article resource box or through article body. A lot of people are asking the question, Does Article Marketing have any value now? Having massive number of backlinks was the key for getting ranking and SEO personals blasted article directories with spinned, crappy, meaningless articles for getting backlinks only. Now at the end of 2013, there is ALMOST no value of article marketing.

Does The Number of Backlinks Matter These Days?

First of all, you should show that we can only predict the ranking factors of Google. There is no specific way to dominate Google Ranking. Backlinking is a really good method to get good ranking at Google and people used to build mas backlinks for their sites through backlinking building software. Most of the succeeded. But after the Penguin update of Google, those sites nowhere near to first page of Google Search results. So, people started asking question Does The Number of Backlinks Matter These Days?

How To Be Safe From Being Scammed In Freelancing Sites

Freelancing sites are getting popular everyday. Sites like Freelancer, oDesk, Elance etc have already became the primary earning sources for a lot of freelance contractors around the world. The way freelancing sites are getting popular, scamming is increasing there too. We can read a lot of complains from both clients and contractors. 2 very popular complains we can hear -

**Clients got the work and denied to process the payment.
**Paid upfront 100% and the contractor never replied.
 

First one from the contractors and the second one from the Clients. So, How to be safe from being scammed in freelancing sites? This is the question. 

For Clients: Choose those freelance contractors which have got good reviews. Above 4 star contractors are usually good. Read a few feedback of previous clients if available. This will give you some overview about the contractor’s behavior, discipline etc. If you want to give opportunities to new contractors, you should never pay 100% upfront. There is escrow service available at Elance and milestones at freelancer.com. After the completion of the job you should release the payment. At oDesk, there is nothing like escrow or milestones. To be safe there, never pay 100% upfront if you see the contractor is new or have bad previous feedback.
 

For Contractors: Have a look at the feedback of the client before start working. If the client is new to you, never provide full work before processing the payment. At freelancer, oDesk, Elance, never work for a client who does not have payment method verified. Ask client to create milestones or escrows before start working if you are at freelancer.com or Elance.

Those tips might help you a bit to get rid of scammers but still there will be chances. Online is never 100% safe. The point here is no make the risk percentage lower. If you have some opinions, you are welcome to post it through comments.

Get your Forex Trading Capital for Free !!!

You must be wondering after looking at the title. Millions of people are trading in Forex market by investing their money to make some profit over it. Many of them are earning profits and many of them are loosing their money everyday. But now I can show you a way through which you will be able to earn the capital of your forex trading by doing a little work.