A recent study showing the power-law effect on Google search ranking traffic is enough to underscore what we already know: the Zipfian distribution (aka Power-Law, Pareto Principle, or 80-20 Rule) of the information economics, nicely formulated in the book Information Rules. (Disclaimer: Hal Varian was the dean of the UC Berkeley Information School when I attended for my Masters degree.)

We at SEO Chiangmai agree with the general advice to largely ignore the Google algorithm factors for specific targeting based on the fact that Google makes more than one change per day to the search algorithm. However, as has been recently announced, some algorithm changes will make an impact on search traffic. Therefore for business, it is important to understand and to have a strategy to deal with such a dynamic system.

The Concept of Relevance for SEO

Back in my I-School days, we learned that relevance is a human, not a computer concept. That is, what is relevant is measured by humans. In particular, Information Science early days and even now in the various TREC competitions, measures relevance with use of retired Information professionals, that is: retired CIA officers. What is relevant is what experts agree upon as relevant (there is heavy use of inter-rater reliability statistics in the social sciences). Google has merely produced a computer-based system for returning relevant results based on 200+ clues of human behavior with computers, the same clues that are accessible to computers and can be used to approximate human judgement of relevance.

For SEO -- from a strategic perspective -- this means creating one's own dynamical system based on relevance to perform against that of the Google juggernaut. This does not mean re-inventing PageRank, but rather designing a checklist that can be used effectively.

SEO Chiangmai Internet Marketing Factors

We at SEO Chiangmai are the leading SEO and SEM, Internet Marketing and Ecommerce consultant in Thailand and serving Mainland Southeast Asia, the Greater Mekong Subregion. Our set of factors are part and parcel of our content+social media consulting services offering which provides excellent, measurable and affordable business results. We will present a significant number of our factors in upcoming articles on SEO Chiangmai and elsewhere on the web.

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International SEO Offerings and Experience

SEO Chiangmai is an SEO/SEM/Internet Marketing/Ecommerce consulting company. We've taught marketing, innovation and entrepreneurship, public relations, and organizational communication at the university level for 7 years. We've done IT consulting for 10 years and Internet marketing consulting for 5 years. The point is that this experience and expertise is brought to bear specifically in Internet Marketing where we do SEM (paid search/advertising) and SEO (site optimization and link-building).

Seven-Part Strategy

We have found a seven-part strategy works best:

• Keyword research, including competitor and market research
• Modern, open-source content management system and search engine integration (WordPress + SEO plugins)
• Content, content, content - updated, relevant, on-page SEO-ed content
• Social media integration, including Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube
• Linkbuilding
• Advertising (paid search and banner ads)
• Analytics, to provide feedback and progress measurements

Case Study - 140 Hours / 4 Months / $5,000 USD

Our most recent success story we engaged with a client for 140 hours over 4 months and achieved a 300% increase in traffic and keyword ranking. One thing that is an advantage is our cost structure, being located in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Our price for this work was $5,000 USD (at $35/hour). This client also conducted an ongoing Google Adwords campaign of approximately 1,000 USD/mo. This campaign is one crucial element of the overall SEO/SEM efforts.

SEO Scalability

As far as our scalability, we are a small shop but could take on new select clients. We are a little picky because it is important that the client believe in and adopt appropriate content creation activities, and be willing to conduct an ongoing Google Adwords campaign.

Copy Writing and Content Strategy Requirement

We can do copywriting if the client so desires, but the point is that someone has to create regular content. The effectiveness of our strategy requires regular (if only weekly) content creation according to specific SEO guidelines. We have had clients who simply do not take this step and therefore see only small, incremental improvement in their rankings, organic and paid traffic. This as you can imagine is quite frustrating, and so we generally "out-counsel" them.

White Label

If SEO/SEM firms have clients who are willing to engage with us on all seven elements of our strategy, then we are interested in discussing further. We can do all work white label.

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Generally the SEM side of SEO/SEM means the paid aspect of search marketing.

SEO and SEM - Both are Marketing

Both SEO and SEM deal of course with marketing, which is "the creation of a customer" in the words of the guru Peter Drucker. If your SEO guy or gal doesn't understand marketing (or thinks it is just promotion or advertising) you might have a problem.

As I liked to say in my marketing lectures at the University of Hawaii, advertising is about ads, branding is about brands and marketing is about markets. Markets are collections of customers, either our own, our competitors or the industry's potential customers. Too often marketing is defined as the front of the funnel, the initial pitch or contact (or repeated, unwelcome contact) by a brand to it's non-customers. However SEO has to do also with getting good visitors to the site, not just visitors, and converting them when they get to the site. This requires insight into what the customer wants and expects, not just targeting high-traffic keywords or pitching the anonymous, undifferentiated masses.

The M in SEM, Marketing Strategy

Conversion is the real metric of interest, conversion rates and conversion costs. The cost of inventory and the scalability of it is the other side. But we have to see a converted customer as more than a single person and a single purchase. It might be true that each visitor might make one and only one purchase, however the appropriate word-of-mouth leverage from that customer can mean many more customers in the future. This is a "duh" statement, but easily gets forgotten in the calculation of customer profitability and advertising costs.

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