When it comes to search engine optimization (SEO), one of my biggest pet peeves is duplicate content. By duplicate content I mean when someone uses (read: steals) the content off of a webpage and republishes it on their own site. I remember once I did a search on Google for a chunk of text that appears on our homepage. Much to my dismay I found hundreds of websites that had copied our homepage text verbatim. Try checking for your original homepage text on a search engine sometime…you might find the same thing.

What got me thinking about this was an affiliate program I was looking at this morning that said that they offer a number of “SEO articles” for their affiliates. This is great if an affiliate needs content for PPC landing pages or something, but from an SEO standpoint, these articles are practically worthless.

Why?

To get the answer it is best to understand how a search engine like Google or Yahoo handles duplicate content. At the Search Engines Strategies conference a couple years back a panel with representatives from the major search engines explained that they all handle duplicate content in similar ways. Here’s how it works (at least a simplified version of how it works)…

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Dynamic keyword insertion (DKI) is an awesome tool that allows you to customize your Google ads to fit the searcher’s phrasing of key terms–exactly as he/she types them in. This makes your ads match specifically to the searcher’s query, a great way to help increase click-through rates.

If youve never used DKI, its really simple. Here are the formulas (pick one):

{KeyWord:”default keyword phrase of your choice”} OR {keyword:”default keyword phrase of your choice”}

One tip fellow blogger James pointed out to me: capitalizing the “K” and “W” in “KeyWord” causes the first letter of each word in your ad to appear capitalized. This helps your ad stand out and, in my experience, seems to be best practice. However, if youd rather keep everything lowercase, just choose the latter option instead.

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So I know this isn’t directly related to affiliate marketing, but I know that a lot of our affiliates are using or experimenting with blogs at this point, so I wanted to share my notes from one of my favorite sessions at the Blog Business Summit. The speakers of this session were Robert and Maryam Scoble, without a doubt the first couple of blogging. The session was called Ten Ways to a Killer Blog, but Robert and Maryam over-delivered with fifteen tips to having a killer blog. Without any further ado…fifteen ways to a killer blog:

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Ever wonder how juicy your blog is? Um…me either. But I have wondered how my blog stacks up to other blogs when it comes to links, Alexa ranking, and other factors (yes, I am a bit of a narcissist). So I was happy to find the new Text Link Ads Blog Juice Calculator.

Enter your blog URL and category and you’ll find out how your blog stacks up to the competition…but beware, it can be humbling. Like this blog, for example. I mean, I thought we were a juggernaut in the blog space…and all we got is a lousy two on the juiceability factor. Sheez!

[OK, I know this blog is small...I just wanted to use the word "juggernaut" in today's post. Success!]

Anyway, check your juicyness. And huge props to the people at Text Link Ads who provide us with a classic example of successful link-baiting. Very nice work.

On an unrelated note, I will be up at the Blogging Business Summit in Seattle for the rest of the week (holler if you want to meet up), so my posting may be a bit lighter than usual. Hopefully our PPC Power-houses, Maribeth and Penny will lay down some knowledge at some point this week.

Have a great week!

One of the things I’m learning about search engine campaigns is the importance of keeping your landing page content, keywords and ads all very specific to one another–and your topic.

In the campaigns that seem to convert the best and have the highest click-through rates, the keywords are based directly on the content and the ads are based directly on both the keywords and the content. It seems the tighter, more specific and relevant the three are to one another, the better the account performs–and the more the consumer is able to control his or her insurance shopping experience.

Whatever your content page is about, best practice is to bid on fewer terms that are specific to your content, rather than throwing in every term you can think of that might have anything to do with the subject. So if your article is on “women’s health insurance,” bid on terms like “women’s health insurance,” “health insurance for women,” and the like, rather than simply closely related terms like “women’s health issues.” Why? Because, once again, the more relevant your keywords are to your content and ads, the better your account will perform. As long as your ad is well written and relevant, anyone that sees it while searching for information on your topic should be compelled to find out what you have to offer. That means more impressions and more opportunity to convert consumers to leads.

So choose your keywords and write your ads and content carefully. And remember, keep those terms specific!

Wow - I don’t know if I am scared or really impressed.

Google just opened up the public beta of Website Optimizer - which basically helps you test different elements of your landing pages by using the Website Optimizer product. From looking at the demo it looks like you chose elements on you page that you would like to test - stuff like images, headlines and copy - and then Google uses JavaScript to switch those elements and test conversion based on the different page variations.

On one hand this seems like a really nice thing that Google is doing, especially for advertisers that have Quality Score problems in AdWords. But at the same time, it is kinda creepy to think that Google is collecting that information and is actually in charge of your Website content.

Here are some links to help you learn more about the product:

Neato Google Website Optimizer video

The set-up demo

Blog post from Inside AdWords

More info from the Unofficial Google Analytics Blog

Yahoo finally did it…well at least partially. Today Yahoo has rolled out the infamous “Panama” project to some of its advertisers. While you might not be in that select first group of advertisers, but if you want to be, Yahoo will let you request to be one of the first moved over.

Yahoo also has a lot of really good information available to understand the new platform. Make sure you check out the flash presentation that is hosted by a very nice sounding robot woman. There is also information on what do to prepare you account for the transition, FAQs and a PDF that talks about the upgrade.

Here is a link to the page with all of the information. Make sure you check it out. And if you start using the new platform, make sure you let us know how it is going…we will do the same.

Recently, I accompanied two of my colleagues to a Yahoo Search Marketing conference. Along with the delicious breakfast spread, they provided a lot of helpful information on how to create a successful search marketing campaign in Yahoo and beyond. We spent an entire day in that overly-air-conditioned conference room with the other wanna-be online advertising gurus; and thus received a lot of tips, tactics and advice. So I’ll impart the knowledge to you in a three-part blog series: Search Advertising: Trade Secrets.

Keywords are clutch. There were people at the conference who sheepishly admitted to having only 100 or so keywords in their whole campaign. If you want your business to flourish through online advertising, you need to generate as many keywords as possible. Without the resources of time and people, that can seem overwhelming. But it is possible to beef up your campaign with minimal effort.

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eTrafficJams has a brief but interesting article that lists some situations where you would want to outsource your entire search engine optimization (SEO) campaign and compares it with situations where you might just want to get an SEO copywriter. If you are in the very common situation of being a primarily pay-per-click (PPC) affiliate and you are looking for those big SEO bucks, you are going to want to give the article a read.

The article itself got me thinking about the shifts I have seen in our successful affiliate’s approach to affiliate marketing in the last couple of years. It seems to me that affiliates, once happy creating low-quality, easy to build sites that often got pulled from the search engines, are now looking towards creating website that are sustainable. I think a large part of that site sustainability comes down to the quality of a site’s design and content.

And I guess that would be one thing I would add to the eTrafficJams article - that hiring a skilled SEO copywriter, or designer for that matter, may also help pay dividends in your PPC campaigns and should help your sites overall sustainability. Good landing page copy can work for both SEO and PPC if done well - and having your pages rank well in both the natural and sponsored results can be very lucrative. Building out a quality site also help increase you chances of surviving some kind of “affiliate site” backlash that might come from search engines that are overwhelmed and fed up with “junk” affiliate sites.

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Have you tried those keyword-suggestion tools the search engines offer when you set up ad groups or campaigns in your Google or Yahoo accounts? If so, Im wondering if your experience with those terms is the same as mine: low impressions and even lower conversions?

When I first started an MSN account, I thought this must be a great tool. After all, who would know better than the search engines themselves which keywords would perform best? So I dumped in a ton of suggested terms—some of which seemed almost totally unrelated to my topic—and, as it turns out, they sat there getting no impressions (or next to none) and pulling my CTR down. As a result, Ive been spending quite a bit of time purging them from my account in an effort to make it more efficient and profitable.

I know my experience with these terms may not be universal; Ive heard others say they have done well in one search engine with the terms suggested by another one. However, the reverse has not always held true.

I think what it comes down to is this: If you want to use search engine-suggested keywords, use common sense to decide whether or not the suggested terms are specific enough and relate well to your campaign, rather than just accepting any and all of them. Then, once inserted, watch them closely over a period of time to see how well they perform (as with any other terms).

If they dont get enough impressions or dont convert well, best practice would be to dump them—and avoid letting your campaign suffer or become ineffective.

Happy Friday the 13th! Today is a good day for two things - IPOs and company-wide meetings.

First off, congrats to our competitor eHealth, who just debuted on the Nasdaq with a very successful IPO. Well done people - we are proud of you folks.

Secondly, today is InsureMe’s quarterly meeting - so everyone will be away from their desks starting at about noon mountain time. Our quarterly meetings are held in the InsureMe Bunker - which is where we shot this week’s Insurance Blog Wrap-Up video. So please miss us, and we will talk to you on Monday.

Have a great weekend!

I stumbled across this thread on Search Engine Watch and had a good laugh. If you are fed up with the less than stellar track record of Yahoo Search Marketing’s Direct Traffic Center (DTC), you are not alone. I know our PPC team doesn’t exactly love Yahoo right now.

It seems that much of the Direct Traffic Center’s functionality was down for about three days, and frighteningly enough, while it was down it sounded like Yahoo had little faith in restoring the system any time soon. From the last post in the thread it seems like things might be working over there again…but who knows if everything is fixed and if it will last.

I don’t know about you, but I am rooting for Yahoo to get their act together. A world without Yahoo would be a bit too Googly for me. Unfortunately, it seems like Yahoo’s biggest threat is might be Yahoo, as a recent article in The Economist pointed out.

We can only hope that Panama treats us advertisers better than DTC - but as the Search Engine Watch moderator Discovery says

Many affiliates that are new to PPC frequently bid quite high trying to be in the top position on main keywords like “health insurance” or “car insurance.” But first usually isn’t best for a number of reasons.

First, you’re competing for that position against the major insurance companies, such as eHealth.com or Progressive.com, who can afford to bid much higher for a much longer period of time than any affiliate ever could.

Second, the top position draws a large number of clicks from consumers who are just looking and not necessarily ready to buy. Consumers that click on lower position ads have spent the time to consider each ad before choosing the one they really want.

Third, on Google and MSN, your quality score will affect your positioning, so bidding high isn’t a guarantee that you’ll appear first, especially if your click-through-rate isn’t strong.

Fortunately there are a few things you can do to control your position.

Yahoo is easy; just use the bid tool to see where you are ranked and what others are paying to be in their respective positions. MSN is toughest; control is limited to your bid amount and dependent upon each keyword’s CTR.

Google has a wonderful tool which makes it easy to control your position. From the All Campaigns page, select a campaign and click “Edit Settings.” Under the Advanced Options Section on the Settings page, you’ll see a check box for Position Preference. Checking that box and saving the change will allow you to set your rank by keyword anywhere from 1 to 10+. While this won’t push your ad higher than your quality score permits, it can prevent you from being in top position and paying big bucks unless the keyword warrants that spot.

I’ve enabled this function on my Google account, and while I don’t use it on every keyword, in certain instances it’s certainly helped me maximize ROI. Test a few keywords in various positions, and you’ll soon learn which position is truly first for you.

I have always found Commission Junction’s business to be an interesting one. For those of you unfamiliar with Commission Junction, CJ serves as a link between advertisers and affiliates - giving affiliates a “one stop shop” to find the advertisers wares to sell, and providing a place for advertisers to tap into a large pool of affiliates. For this service Commission Junction charges about a 30% commission…which is admittedly a bit steep.

InsureMe has worked with Commission Junction for a few years and we are happy to do business with them. However, being an advertiser we have been getting the feeling that Commission Junction has been shrinking year-over-year. I can’t give you any facts, just a feeling that we have, as do other CJ advertisers I have spoken with.

In her recent article in ReveNews, Beth Kirsch speculates that Commission Junction may be on its way to being sold by its owner, ValueClick. While Beth points out (numerous times) that this is all speculation, it appears that she might have some inside information she is not really admitting to.

After reading the article it seems like ValueClick selling CJ might not be a bad idea, since ValueClick doesn’t seem to “get” affiliate marketing, and that misunderstanding of the business may very well be hurting CJ. Also, the transaction could take ValueClick in the direction they would like to go (think online ad agency) and allow them to better develop their behavioral marketing technology (instead of trying to collect the information through affiliates like they did with the Link Management Initiative).

All in all, Commission Junction is a good company and an important part of the affiliate marketing industry. If selling CJ will help CJ get back on track, I am all for it.

Read the article - get learned - and then sit back and watch. This could be interesting.

The Search Engine Watchers are talking about the (perpetually) upcoming Panama ad platform for Yahoo Search Marketing. There is actually a letter from Yahoo posted there that explains some of the changes that Panama will bring. There is some new stuff and some info that echoes our post after Search Engine Strategies.

I think Mel66 captures the overall feeling that InsureMe’s PPC team is feeling about Yahoo when he(she?) says:

I wish Yahoo would hurry up and get their crap together. Has anyone logged into the DTC this week? What a disaster.

Amen and amen Mel66.

Check the post and prepare for the coming changes…

The two fellas who founded YouTube have got to be doing the happy dance today…they just got $1.65 billion dollars richer. Reuters reports that, as speculated, Google just bought YouTube.

Mark Cuban has a good post on why he thinks this purchase is a bad idea from before the anouncement (copyright issues). And a post from after. Of course, he might just not want there to be another member of the Young Billionaires club.

Crazy, eh?

[Update - Chad and Steve, YouTubes co-founders, post a video about the acquisition...they seem a little giddy for some reason...]

Time was that IBM was the 800 pound (insert ugly animal here) in the technology world then Microsoft came along and kicked the 800 pound (insert ugly animal, or ex-wife here) and became the new. Now, Google is throwing around the 800 pound (insert my exs here) like the weight of last paycheck.

Read an interesting twist in the click fruad sagas .

Keep on …

It’s Friday, and after putting together one of our weekly blog wrap-up videos, I went on a hunt for a cool search engine optimization tool. And wouldn’t you believe it I didn’t find “a” cool SEO tool, I found “the” Cool SEO Tool!

We Build Pages created a tool where you enter your domain and a keyword and by hitting submit you get a wide range of interesting SEO ranking information. The Cool SEO Tool will find other well ranking domains and then give info like:

• Yahoo rank
• MSN rank
• Google pages indexed
• Allinanchor rank
• Age of URL (very cool to see in one place)
• Phrases on page
• And some other features that seem to be broken (you get what you pay for)

Have fun with the tool over the weekend. See if it can give you a better idea of what you need to do to rank well.

Here’s a fun test to try. Pick ten friends, show them a picture of a product like a big screen TV or cell phone, and ask them what they would type into Google to buy it online. You’ll be amazed at the variety of answers. Some will search by brand name, others by size, still others by price. This shows you how many different ways consumers will search for the same item.

Keyword choices are affected by so many things - age, ethnicity, birth place, income, etc. That’s why it is impossible for one person to try to guess all of the potential keywords consumers may use to search for a product - each of them has the same list of factors affecting their keyword choices. But there are ways to overcome this issue.

Each of the major search engines offers free keyword selector tools to help you build your list. They’ve spent a great deal of money analyzing terms to offer potential advertisers more keywords, which could in turn lead to more clicks and revenue. Each time I look over one of those lists, I literally say “Wow, I never thought of that!” Truth be told, you will too!

A few words of caution, though: Don’t look at each list as the definitive resource on the topic, and make sure that you watch your results very closely. I’ve had both great successes and great failures with those lists, and I deleted the failures before they cost me too much money, and used the successes in the other search engines.

I’ll talk about paid keyword sources in a later post.

As a paid search copywriter, I often find myself sitting at my computer for long periods every day typing in keywords and derivatives, then stuffing them into our search engine campaigns. But as anyone who does this kind of thing knows, that list of derivatives is infinite—and can drive even the sanest person nearly insane.

One day recently, I decided to take the advice of coworker James and one of our affiliates whos “in the know” and check out the Keyword Tumbler. Reading Jamess previous post on the subject, I installed it on my desktop and set out to figure out how it works. I didnt really “get it” at first; but after playing around with it for a while, I realized the potential this little gold mine really has.

I just happened to be working on state terms at the time, so I typed in my string of keywords with a state name and clicked on the keyword generator button. Voila! Multiple strings of those same keywords appeared, with the words all ordered differently. This definitely made things easier, so I took a leap of faith and plugged another state name into the same string of words. Like magic, a new keyword string appeared with my new state name.

Totally enticed, I wondered what would happen if I put in a two-word state name (like North Carolina, for instance). I knew I didnt want the words to appear separately, so I decided to type them together as one word (”NorthCarolina”). Sure enough, this kept the compound term together so I didnt end up with nonsensical mumbo jumbo separated by other words. I then highlighted all the terms generated using this method, used “ctrl f” to open the “find” box, typed the state terms in as one word (as Id entered them), and then replaced them the way I wanted them to appear instead (”North Carolina”).

Wow, this was really easy!

Needless to say, Im hooked. Ive decided the Keyword Tumbler is worth its weight in gold—and I wouldnt be surprised if it helps us score some big wins online. Better yet, its made generating keywords much quicker and easier, so Im spending less time doing that and more time writing.

And thats enough to, as my good friend and coworker Jeannine says, “make my heart go pitter-patter.”

If youve never tried this baby out, you dont know what youre missing. But dont take my word for it; check it out for yourself. Youll never go back!

I ran across a site last night while I was checking out Craigslist and I pretty much fell off my couch.

The owners of the site were looking for help with their search engine optimization and were asking for the following:

• Any minor website changes recommended to increase potential traffic.
• Any thoughts for additional key words or phrases for inclusion.
• Your fees.

When I actually visited the site, www.chartwellcapitaladvisors.com (yes I am using a “nofollow” tag on the link) I really couldnt believe my eyes - and I though this would be a good lesson for all of our affiliates new to SEO to learn what not to do.

But instead of telling you why, I want you to tell me…and there is even a prize for the first InsureMe affiliate (you need to have an account and no InsureMe employees please, sorry) to leave a comment with the answer. The prize is a copy of Seth Godins newest book, Small is the New Big (the book kicks butt).

So the official question is this: What is the biggest cardinal on-page optimization sin that the Chartwell Capital Advisors have committed?

Ready? GO!

Yet another judge has sided with Google stating, again, there is no trademark violation in selling PPC for trademarked terms. Its about time.

Read about it here.

Keep on …

Dear Affiliate Partners,

Thank you for your continued support and commitment. Last quarter was absolutely amazing! During that time, we rolled out our new lead site and began offering our affiliates script tracking, automated co-branding and increased payout frequencies.

As a result, our new lead site dramatically improved the consumer experience, as evidenced by improved conversions across the board. What’s even more exciting is a new, incredible ability to perform A/B testing on internal traffic, which we expect will lead to even more conversion enhancements.

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