Content Marketing, Mobile Web Sites, Lessons From the Field

transcript

Clarity ‘14: Lessons From the Field

Eric Enge @stonetemple +Eric Enge

Who is Eric Enge?

Lead Co-author: The Art of SEO CEO: Stone Temple Consulting, 30+

person Digital Marketing and SEO firm Columnist:

Interviewer:

Eric Enge – Fun Fact

1984 World Foosball Champion – “Goalie War”

Did Your Content Marketing Plan

Take a Wrong Turn?

The Traffic Growth Curve is Not Short

Started in 2009

This is where most people give up.

In Reality, It Looks More Like This:

Traffic Data is From: Everywhereist.com

Goal of Content Marketing is Not Direct Conversion

Search on “Buy Used Cars”

Not Conversion Optimized!

Yet, It Outranks This Page

Get Your Departments to Collaborate

Link Worthy Content

Visibility Building Efforts Shareable Content

PR Social Media

1 1 1 5+ + =

Don’t Launch Without a Plan!

Content Marketing Without a Plan is Like This

What is Needed to Move Up?“Nursing Education”

Summary of Data

Linking Page Level Analysis for One Competitor

Adapt to Many Platforms

Image Credit: Isitablog.co.uk

Likes, Tweets and +1s are Not the Answer

10,000 LikesWill MakeMe Rich!

Avoid Off Topic Content (as a Primary Focus)

If You Sell Golf Clubs … … Don’t Focus Your Content on Lawn Care

Example of Off Topic Content

And, Don’t Force It

Seventh GenerationSells Diapers and Other Household Products

They are Kicking Butt!

Over 1.2M Likes!

How Seventh Generation Positions Itself

“Seventh Generation is a health and wellness company that happens to produce consumer packaged goods.”

Let’s Get Mobile!

Mobile Subdomain orDynamic Serving Responsive Web Design

User Agent Detection

Request page

Detect User AgentSelect Right Site to Send

User Agent Detection Pitfalls

• Dependent on having a list of User Agent Strings• New devices getting added all the time• Mismatch problems are not uncommon• Don’t look for Googlebot-Mobile, focus on devices

• Risk of perceived cloaking• All Googlebot mobile crawlers use common device type user agents

• Use third party services instead of your own code

• Must use Vary HTTP header• On mobile subdomains, redirects slow load time

Vary HTTP Header• Whenever you use User Agent

Detection, implement Vary HTYP headers• Tells ISPs that page is User Agent

dependent• Keeps them from serving up cached

copies of pages when not appropriate• i.e. mobile page to a desktop, or vice

• Aids in discovery of mobile URLs

Vary HTTP and CDNs

Source: Cindy Krum, via Search Engine Land

What Google Said About It

“Vary: User-Agent is broken for the Internet in general. …the basic problem is that the user-agents vary so wildly that they are almost unique for every individual (not quite that bad but IE made it a mess by including the version numbers of .Net that are installed on users machines as part of the string). If you Vary on User-Agent then intermediate caches will pretty much end up never caching resources (like Akamai).”

Patrick Meenan, Staff Software Engineer at GoogleSource: RKG Blog

The Akamai Workaround

• Configure Akamai servers to ignore HTTP Vary and pass it downstream• Akamai servers are part of your infrastructure• Addresses ISP caching issues for you

• Rely on Akamai smart caching to do its thing• Better than dumb user agent detection (just like yours is!)• Save a bare minimum number of page copies to service devices

Mobile Site (“m.yourdomain.com”) Requirement

Rel=“alternate”(or tag in sitemap)

Rel=“canonical”

Implement a Mobile SitemapImplement Vary HTTP Headers

What is Dynamic Serving?

• Same process as a mobile subdomain, but …• No redirects required• Content is served on the same URL as your desktop pages• No rel=alternate / rel=canonical required

• No mobile sitemap needed• Still need the Vary HTTP header

Responsive Web Design

Problems with RWD

• Can be easier just to create a Smartphone site• Use case requirements may vary greatly• Flash and other technologies no longer

available to you on DT site• Phones may not support touch screen

features

• Full code often downloaded to mobile devices• Average page size on the web: 1.7 MB

• Ads may get cut off

Samsung is Probably Not Happy With This

Another Enterprise Site Issue Example

• Client was moving to RWD• Decision made to streamline nav in the site-wide menu for better

mobile experience• Put a crimp on a nav path that was desirable to broaden for SEO

reasons• Solution was to add drop down/expandable menus within a set of

links that existed below the fold on the homepage

Thank You!

Eric Engeeenge@stonetemple.comTwitter: @stonetempleGoogle Plus: +Eric Enge(508) 879-0950http://www.stonetemple.com