Category: Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

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Google’s SGE – What is it and how will it affect SEO?

Google Search Generative Experience SGE

The Google search returns page has a new addition at the top as illustrated in the screenshot of its search return for “best delis in Manhattan” on this page. It is referred to as SGE for “Search Generative Experience.” In some cases it appears automatically, sometimes there is a prompt asking you if you would like to see it. This one of the most radical additions to the Google search returns page and is just rolling out. It won’t be fully deployed until 2024.

It significantly changes the was search results are displayed and, consequently, will have an effect on SEO.


Google’s use of its Search Generative Experience (SGE) will affect SEO in a number of ways.

  • It will place more emphasis on user experience and engagement. SGE will be designed to provide users with the most relevant and helpful information, even if it is not from a traditional search result. This means that websites that focus on providing high-quality, engaging content will be more likely to be featured in SGE snippets.
  • It will require a more holistic approach to SEO. Traditional SEO techniques, such as keyword research and link building, will still be important, but they will not be enough to guarantee success. SEO professionals will need to focus on creating content that is both informative and engaging, and that provides a good user experience.
  • It will make it more difficult to rank for competitive keywords. SGE snippets will often be the first thing that users see when they search for a particular keyword. This means that it will be more difficult to rank for those keywords, as users are less likely to click through to the actual website.
  • It will create new opportunities for businesses. SGE can be used to promote businesses in a number of ways. For example, businesses can create content that is targeted to specific SGE snippets, or they can use SGE to generate leads and sales.

Overall, Google’s use of SGE will have a significant impact on SEO. Businesses that want to stay ahead of the curve will need to adapt their SEO strategies to focus on user experience, engagement, and creating high-quality content.

  • Here are some specific things that businesses can do to optimize their websites for SGE:
    • Create content that is informative, engaging, and well-written.
    • Use keywords throughout your content, but don’t overdo it.
    • Promote your content on social media and other channels.
    • Build links to your content from other high-quality websites.
    • Make sure your website is mobile-friendly.
    • Track your results and make adjustments as needed.

It is still early days for SGE, and Google is constantly evolving the technology. However, by following these tips, businesses can position themselves to take advantage of this new search feature.

Search Engine Marketing Chicago is working with SGE every day and developing procedures to be ready for Google’s full deployment of the technology. Contact us with any questions about the future of SEO.

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Latent semantic indexing and your business’ SEO

LSI + Latent semantic indexing

Latent semantic indexing, also known as LSI, is a technique that helps search engines understand the context and meaning of the content on your business’ website. If you’re looking to improve your search engine rankings and drive more traffic to your site, incorporating LSI keywords into your content is an SEO crucial step.

First, let’s define what LSI keywords are. These are words or phrases that are semantically related to your primary keyword. For example, if your primary keyword is “dog food,” LSI keywords might include “pet nutrition,” “canine diet,” and “best dog food brands.” By including LSI keywords in your content, you’re giving search engines additional context and information about your business.

Your business’ brand is your company name and what it is. You can think of LSI keywords as your company’s “non-brand” which is to say what your company offers its clients in the words that they think of when thinking about what your business does.

Now, why is this important for SEO? Search engines use LSI keywords to determine the meaning and relevance of your content. If you have a page about “dog food” but only mention that keyword a few times, search engines might have a hard time understanding the topic of your page and ranking it for relevant searches. However, if you include LSI keywords that are related to “dog food,” search engines will have a better understanding of the content and be able to match it with relevant searches.

So, how can you incorporate LSI keywords into your content? There are several ways to do this:

  • Use synonyms: Instead of repeating your primary keyword over and over, try using synonyms that are related to the topic.
  • Use related phrases: Write about topics that are related to your primary keyword. For example, if your primary keyword is “dog food,” you could write about “dog nutrition,” “best dog food,” and “dog food brands.”
  • Use related questions: Answer questions that are related to your primary keyword. For example, if your primary keyword is “dog food,” you could answer questions like “What is the best dog food?” and “What are the ingredients in dog food?”

By incorporating LSI keywords into your content, you’re helping search engines understand the context and meaning of your content. This, in turn, can improve your organic search engine rankings and drive more relevant traffic to your site.

Another of the many benefit of working with sem[c] is because we do this really well, you don’t have to. Contact us for more info.

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Why all business owners should be using Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to promote their business

SEO for small business

If you’re a business owner, using SEO can greatly benefit your online presence.

Firstly, SEO can increase your website traffic by making it more visible on search engine results pages. This can lead to more customers finding your website and potentially making a purchase.

Additionally, SEO is a cost-effective way to drive qualified traffic to your website. Instead of paying for each user that clicks on your website (PPC), you only pay for the efforts to improve your website’s ranking in search results.

SEO also helps establish your business as a credible and trustworthy source. When your website appears high in search results, users will likely trust your business more and consider making a purchase.

SEO also provides long-term results, by improving the user experience and making your website more user-friendly, which can lead to higher search rankings and more organic traffic over time.

Lastly, if you are a local business, SEO can help promote your products and services to local customers at the exact time they are looking for them. This can be especially useful for small businesses that want to attract customers in their local area. By optimizing your website for local search, you can improve your chances of being found by customers who are searching for businesses like yours in their local area.

Overall, SEO can greatly benefit your business by increasing visibility, driving qualified traffic, establishing credibility, and providing long-term results.

sem[c] has extensively experience in optimization for B2C and B2B businesses. Contact us to find out how we can help your business.

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SEO – Five benefits to the website’s owner

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the visibility and ranking of a website or web page in search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo. SEO is important because it helps to improve the user experience by making it easier for people to find the information they are looking for on the internet.

Here are five benefits to any website offered by effective SEO:

  1. Increased traffic: By ranking higher in search engine results pages (SERPs), you can increase the number of visitors to your website.
  2. Cost-effective: SEO is a cost-effective way to drive traffic to your website compared to other forms of online advertising. Comprehensive SEO as we deliver to all sem[c] clients also reduced the cost of PPC campaigns like those in Google Ads.
  3. Increased credibility: Ranking high in search results helps to build credibility and trust with your audience.
  4. Better user experience: SEO helps to improve the user experience by making it easier for users to find the information they are looking for on your website.
  5. Long-term results: The effects of SEO are long-lasting, as opposed to paid advertising, which stops as soon as you stop paying for it.

Overall, SEO is an important part of any online marketing strategy as it helps to improve the visibility and credibility of your website, which can lead to increased traffic and sales.

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Great SEO vs. Really Bad Design

Bad design trumps everything, even great SEO

Great SEO by sem[c]

Huge problems arose the first day of sem[c]’s engagement. The previous SEO provider had also served as the web developer (Developer #1). He had been tasked to move the WordPress site into Visual Composer but instead used a little-known page builder from the UK without notifying the client. He also hadn’t mentioned that the page builder was reliant on the developer’s paid subscription. The result wasn’t pretty. The site instantly slowed to a crawl but sem[c] was able to replace most of the proprietary and paid plugins with free alternatives and restored performance by putting in many hours within one day of switchover.

There’s nothing that even great SEO (as done by sem[c]) can do to remedy a really bad design. Good business results depend on an effective team effort. Without that no amount of increased search traffic with get those results, as this tale of woe shows.

There remained problems in support and backup because there was no evidence available that a backup had ever been performed. Even if it had, the developer hadn’t been able to demonstrate a restore from backup. He only provided techno-babble excuses. He was unable to provide access to a development environment. The only thing he had delivered competently was the graphic design.

Working with a new developer (Developer #2), sem[c] recommended that a very inexpensive support subscription be purchased and that a working development environment be deployed retaining the graphic design. Before that could happen Developer #2 was fired. The next developer (Developer #3), had a condescending attitude that was worsened by his complete ignorance of SEO backed with very strong but wrong opinions. He was released within two days after his engagement for insulting the client. Not quite soon enough.

The next developer (Developer #4), was gung-ho for doing a complete (expensive) redesign and, consequently, was adamantly against spending $50 for the support option. The redesign was unnecessary and sem[c] continued to recommend retaining and improving the then-current design. This recommendation was ignored by the client. Nothing happened for the next four months except that sem[c] doubled search traffic to the old website. There was little evidence that any SEO had been done previously. There was no indication why the redesign was taking so long.

Without notification the new design launched badly. The front page took nearly 20 seconds to load. There were no calls to action. Functionality was spotty. Page URLs were changed without any need to do so. The new graphic design relied on the technique of cognitive dissonance. However, rather than using the technique correctly, Developer #4 never mentioned or illustrated what the client actually did. Nothing about the business’ expertise or benefits that a visitor might expect were mentioned. At all. On the technical side, there was still no relevant development environment. All in all it was awful.

This nonsense had a devastating effect on search performance. The site dropped from the first page for critical search terms to the third page. This forced sem[c] to completely redo everything that it had done over the previous five months.

After several more months of half-hearted attempts by this incompetent supplier to improve the horrible site performance a talented web developer (Developer #5) was brought in to assist sem[c] in correcting the mess made by Developer #4.

Unfortunately, the self-referential and client-adverse graphic design of the site itself remained. The Bounce Rate had skyrocketed due to the miserable site performance and, if that weren’t bad enough, the design had little to offer anyone to stay. They didn’t. Nearly 95% of visitors left after viewing just one page. It took months for all the corrections that were necessary to lower the Bounce Rate “down” to 80%.

SEO is not sales. There’s nothing that SEO, even when done by sem[c], can do to remedy really bad graphic and technical design. Good business results depend on an effective team effort. Without that unity of purpose no amount of increased search traffic with get the results that every business needs.

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It’s “your” website… really?

homepageWhat do you mean by “your” website? A typical website consists of files on a server that can be reached on the Internet by means of a domain name. Unless you own the webserver you can only edit “your” files by using the correct username and password to access your website’s hosting provider. You may not even know in which country the server is located.

asf_logoAnother thing that you might not know about your website is the type of server software that’s making it appear on the Internet. You might not know software named Apache and IIS.  There are even smaller divisions of specialties in this area. One of our clients got hacked because their (former) web hosting provider had not updated it’s PHP software. You have likely been licensed to use this software under your terms of agreement with your hosting provider.

Without a properly configured domain name your website’s address will be a string of numbers. This may require another username and password depending on your domain name registrar. We have had clients that only think they know who might know these usernames and passwords. We have had clients whose names are not part of their domain name registration.

Screenshot 2016-04-27 09.39.35Like many websites, yours might use a content management system (CMS) for convenience and ease of use. A typical CMS like WordPress supports plugins to offer specialized functionality. Both the CMS and the plugins are software written by someone (usually not you) and your use of them is under the terms of a license agreement about which you may know nothing. One of our clients licensed a proprietary CMS but didn’t receive the source code.  This resulted in there being no way to change anything about the front page of the website without paying the developer to make the change.

Other websites might think so highly of your website that they “borrow” from it without crediting you.  There are tools like Grammerly and CopyScape that can help you find your content if it gets expropriated.

You should also have information about usernames and passwords should anything happen to you so that whomever is entitled can access the website when you no longer can.

All of these items will be very helpful to know in case a problem arises. For example, if your website gets hacked someone will need to know everything above to find a solution. When this happens it’s very difficult to claim ownership of “your” website since someone else has proven himself to be in control. Having quick access will help minimize the duration of the problem. We have helped clients recover from hacks and Google provides us with a number of resources that are useful in crafting a solution.
Contact us for more information from sem[c] 

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Site hacked? Completely replacing it might not be enough…

When your site gets hacked completely replacing it might not be enough.

Your website is under attack every day. Unfortunately, everyone with a website is at risk for getting hacked.

sem[c] was brought in to help when a site that had previously been hacked and fixed but it seemed to have been hacked again.  The client reported that a number of site visitors had complained that the site had infected them with malware.

There are a number of things that need to be evaluated in a situation like this. In order to evaluate it’s necessary to see the problem in action. First a reading of the on-site scan showed no evidence of a hack.  This made sense since the entire site had been restored from backup and the security had been tightened months earlier. At the same time this strongly suggested that the site had NOT been hacked again.

Checking the results of a Google search was the next step. When using the Chrome browser on a Mac clicking on what should have been the company’s front page brought up a full-screen red warning which informed that the link led to a site known to disseminate malware.

Screenshot 2015-11-24 11.54.36
Google’s warning of a hacked site

It is important to note that the URL mentioned in the warning (via.7od.pw) was not the company’s address but was a kind of “man-in-the-middle’ that redirected to spam sites. Tests with other browsers did not bring up the red interstitial warning page and brought up random spam pages including those attempting to install malware.

Our conclusion?  Google’s index itself was corrupted. This helped to explain why Google was listing nearly twenty thousand crawl errors.  It also explained why both the Google and Bing bots were constantly requesting non-existent pages from the site. It’s important to note here that it’s been long discussed that Bing uses the Google index in its algorithm.

The very negative SEO implications should be obvious here. Visitors using Google to search were at best being warned from visiting the company’s site and at worse being exposed to malware. The company website’s performance risked degradation due to the thousands of requests for non-existent page. These problems led to a very serious trust issue with the site’s visitors.

The solution was not quite so obvious. One approach would be to use webmaster tools to individually remove each of the twenty thousand spurious sites on at a time. Instead, sem[c] was able to communicate to Google that it’s index had errors and needed to be updated.

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Optimizing your website for your market

What does Search Engine Optimization really mean?

SEO seems to mean different things to different people. You may think that it has something to do with being on the first page of Google search returns. While that’s true the strokes that paint that picture are too broad. In the phrase “search engine optimization” what’s truly important is the word “optimization”. Search engines give us an excellent tool to determine how people in your market are looking not only for you but for what you are selling. Instead of guessing you can actually know the words being used to search for what it is that you are selling. But that’s only the first step. Once you’ve determined the correct search phrases you need to align your ads, your links and everything else in your online presence to answer any likely prospect only question: “What’s in it for me?”.

Here is a case study in how we reorganized the Samurai Business Group’s sales training website. SBG had a website with the very typical first person presentation of “We do this and we do that”. Their extensive collection of testimonial videos were listed on only two pages of their site and were simply categorized as “Testimonials”. Since I sell SEO services I wanted to know if they had worked with anyone in my business but there was no way to know.

The sem[c] reorg of the site features a very simple and responsive design. The central theme now revolves around the video testimonials which recursively illustrates their central theme of sales training which is “this is not about us, it’s about you”. The testimonials are now categorized into vertical markets. Their website is now optimized for their market. Visit them at http://samuraibizgrp.com

Samurai Business Group sales training

Your website can be optimized too, contact us to find out how.

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What the scourge of referrer spam means to you

Referrer spam must be stopped

For a long time it was true that the more traffic that your website got the better.  No more.  Not exactly. Coders have been spoofing Google Analytics accounts to make it appear that visits are coming from what seems to be a never-ending list of websites. These “visits” are fake. No one is visiting your site from these “sites”. These fake visits provide no benefit to you. We’ve seen statistics in which the fake visits outnumber legitimate ones by a factor of ten to one. This type of activity is known as “referrer spam”. It is done by malicious hackers to game the link-counting algorithms that search engines use to create rankings.

What’s the harm is this?

It wouldn’t be called “spam” if it were something that you wanted. Just like with email spam there are a number of costs that you will likely pay for these fake visits:

  • Your site may run slower
  • Google may lower your search rankings
  • It is possible that some of this traffic represents probes for WordPress vulnerabilities
  • It is a complete waste of your time

While there are a number of techniques to mitigate the effect of referrer spam none of them is a complete solution. Like so many threats to the security of your website, keeping referrer spam under control requires monitoring and an advanced understanding of Google Analytics and the underlying structure of your website.

It might be helpful for you to think of maintaining the “health” of your website. There are a number of components to this:

  • A technically contemporary and secure website platform
  • Fresh, relevant content
  • Active (not dead) links to and from well-regarded sites (not referrer spam) that are pertinent to your business
  • A workable social media presence

Google has a short article about the importance of the above items called “Steps to a Google-friendly site”. The SEO practices followed by sem[c] have always conformed to the guidelines set by Google. Contact us if you have any questions about your website and how it’s looking in Search. We can help you make your website healthier.