This course will provide an overview of the search engine landscape and their differing results pages, with varied types of content returned. SEO (and Paid Search or “PPC” – to be covered 12/7/11) are unique forms of marketing because they “pull” people towards your Web site that are already looking for your policies and services. Many other forms of marketing rely on “pushing” enough messages out to qualified segments and hoping to catch a few that happen to be looking for the right thing at the right time. In order to effectively target Web searchers: you have to know what they are looking for. The process known as “keyword research” is likely the most important cornerstone in an SEO strategy, and will be covered in detail in this course.

Participants of this webinar will learn:

• Search Engine Landscape
  • Market Share and Usage Statistics
  • The Difference Between “free” and “paid” results
  • Different types of results (news, images, video, maps, etc)
• Search Engine Optimization
  • Overview of the fundamental areas of SEO
  • Introduction to keyword research and free tools available
  • Launching an SEO Program – Establishing Process and Workflows
  • Strategy – setting the course and timeline for development of recommendations
  • Competitive analysis tactics
  • Site performance – coding and navigation topics including an overview of common problem areas
  • Site theme development – selling multiple lines or focused on one area with lots of options?
  • What site/page assets should be considered for optimization?
• Getting “votes” from the rest of the Web – tactics to help improve and increase the inbound links pointed to pages on your site
• Setting benchmarks and measure ongoing performance (Traffic outweighs Rankings)