Friday, May 31, 2019
Thursday, May 30, 2019
Wednesday, May 29, 2019
Tuesday, May 28, 2019
Monday, May 27, 2019
Friday, May 24, 2019
Wednesday, May 22, 2019
Tuesday, May 21, 2019
Monday, May 20, 2019
Friday, May 17, 2019
Wednesday, May 15, 2019
Tuesday, May 14, 2019
The New Moz Local Is on Its Way!
Posted by MiriamEllis
Exciting secrets can be so hard to keep. Finally, all of us at Moz have the green light to share with all of you a first glimpse of something we’ve been working on for months behind the scenes. Big inhale, big exhale...
Announcing: the new and improved Moz Local, to be rolled out beginning June 12!
Why is Moz updating the Moz Local platform?
Local search has evolved from caterpillar to butterfly in the seven years since we launched Moz Local. I think we’ve spent the time well, intensively studying both Google’s trajectory and the feedback of enterprise, marketing agency, and SMB customers.
Your generosity in telling us what you need as marketers has inspired us to action. Over the coming months, you’ll be seeing what Moz has learned reflected in a series of rollouts. Stage by stage, you’ll see that we’re planning to give our software the wings it needs to help you fully navigate the dynamic local search landscape and, in turn, grow your business.
We hope you’ll keep gathering together with us to watch Moz Local take full flight — changes will only become more robust as we move forward.
What can I expect from this upgrade?
Beginning June 12th, Moz Local customers will experience a fresh look and feel in the Moz Local interface, plus these added capabilities:
- New distribution partners to ensure your data is shared on the platforms that matter most in the evolving local search ecosystem
- Listing status and real-time updates to know the precise status of your location data
- Automated detection and permanent duplicate closure, taking the manual work out of the process and saving you significant time
- Integrations with Google and Facebook to gain deeper insights, reporting, and management for your location’s profiles
- An even better data clean-up process to ensure valid data is formatted properly for distribution
- A new activity feed to alert you to any changes to your location’s listings
- A suggestion engine to provide recommendations to increase accuracy, completeness, and consistency of your location data
Additional features available include:
- Managing reviews of your locations to keep your finger on the pulse of what customers are saying
- Social posting to engage with consumers and alert them to news, offers, and other updates
- Store locator and landing pages to share location data easily with both customers and search engines (available for Moz Local customers with 100 or more locations)
Remember, this is just the beginning. There's more to come in 2019, and you can expect ongoing communications from us as further new feature sets emerge!
When is it happening?
We'll be rolling out all the new changes beginning on June 12th. As with some large changes, this update will take a few days to complete, so some people will see the changes immediately while for others it may take up to a week. By June 21st, everyone should be able to explore the new Moz Local experience!
Don't worry — we'll have several more communications between now and then to help you prepare. Keep an eye out for our webinar and training materials to help ensure a smooth transition to the new Moz Local.
Are any metrics/scores changing?
Some of our reporting metrics will look different in the new Moz Local. We'll be sharing more information on these metrics and how to use them soon, but for now, here’s a quick overview of changes you can expect:
- Profile Completeness: Listing Score will be replaced by the improved Profile Completeness metric. This new feature will give you a better measurement of how complete your data is, what’s missing from it, and clear prompts to fill in any lacking information.
- Improved listing status reporting: Partner Accuracy Score will be replaced by improved reporting on listing status with all of our partners, including continuous information about the data they’ve received from us. You’ll be able to access an overview of your distribution network, so that you can see which sites your business is listed on. Plus, you’ll be able to go straight to the live listing with a single click.
- Visibility Index: Though they have similar names, Visibility Score is being replaced by something slightly different with the new and improved Visibility Index, which notates how the data you’ve provided us about a location matches or mismatches your information on your live listings.
- New ways to measure and act on listing reach: Reach Score will be leaving us in favor of even more relevant measurement via the Visibility Index and Profile Completeness metrics. The new Moz Local will include more actionable information to ensure your listings are accurate and complete.
Other FAQs
You'll likely have questions if you’re a current Moz Local customer or are considering becoming one. Please check out our resource center for further details, and feel free to leave us a question down in the comments — we'll be on point to respond to any wonderings or concerns you might have!
Where is Moz heading with this?
As a veteran local SEO, I’m finding the developments taking place with our software particularly exciting because, like you, I see how local search and local search marketing have matured over the past decade.
I’ve closely watched the best minds in our industry moving toward a holistic vision of how authenticity, customer engagement, data, analysis, and other factors underpin local business success. And we’ve all witnessed Google’s increasingly sophisticated presentation of local business information evolve and grow. It’s been quite a ride!
At every level of local commerce, owners and marketers deserve tools that bring order out of what can seem like chaos. We believe you deserve software that yields strategy. As our CEO, Sarah Bird, recently said of Moz,
“We are big believers in the power of local SEO.”
So the secret is finally out, and you can see where Moz is heading with the local side of our product lineup. It’s our serious plan to devote everything we’ve got into putting the power of local SEO into your hands.
Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!
from Moz Blog https://moz.com/blog/new-moz-local
via IFTTT
Monday, May 13, 2019
Friday, May 10, 2019
Thursday, May 9, 2019
Wednesday, May 8, 2019
MozCon 2019: Acceptance. Education. Donuts
Posted by PJ_Howland
We’re digital marketers; we make our living in a constantly changing (and consistently misunderstood) industry. It’s easy to feel like even those who are closest to us don’t really get what we do. Take me, for example, I once mentioned algorithms to my grandmother, and ever since then, she’s been absolutely (and adamantly) sure that I work with clocks. Did she think I said analog?
But despite the dynamic nature of marketing, Moz has always been a solid rock at the center of the storm. It’s been here since the beginning, a place where all the marketing nerds and SEO geeks could hang our hats and feel understood.
And MozCon feels like the culmination of that culture of acceptance.
MozCon: Helping you build your best self
As I’ve chatted with the good folks at Moz about this year’s MozCon, it’s clear to me that they pay attention to data. Why do I say that? Because they’re doubling down on making this year their most actionable year ever. As a past attendee, I can say that hearing that MozCon’s biggest focus is a dedication to actionable tactics gets me excited.
The creative media surrounding MozCon have an under-the-sea theme going on. These nautical nods are setting us all up for the deep dive into digital marketing we’re sure to see this year. Since there’s a good chance that most of us marketers never made it to prom (just me? Okay then...), it’s kind of fun to get a second chance to experience oceanic decor in a congregate environment (What, you’ve never dreamed about being Marty McFly at his parent’s Enchantment Under the Sea dance? Was I the only one?)
The point is that the upcoming MozCon is poised to do what it does so well: Offer a delightful mix of predictability and variety, presented in a way that’s designed to improve us without reforming us. New players will share the stage with established thought leaders and strategists. Innovation will go hand in hand with cherished tradition.
After looking at the initial agenda, here are a few of the front runner speakers and sessions I’m excited for in particular.
Casie Gillette — Thanks for the Memories: Creating Content People Remember
Digital marketers like data, right?
[Cue nodding heads and incoherent mumblings]
While I certainly love data, I also struggle with data. Sometimes I rely on the data so much that I become hesitant to take risks. And if there’s one thing our industry as a whole can improve on, it’s taking more risk.
Casie is taking to the stage with a mission to teach us how to make content memorable. With the promise that MozCon 2019 will be more tactical and strategic than ever before, I am earnestly giddy (feel free to picture that emotion however the mood takes you) to hear about what I can do to take a step back from the data, and instead put it on the line for something my audience will never forget.
Shannon McGuirk: How to Supercharge Link Building with a Digital PR Newsroom
Link-building, anyone? Yeah, it’s still a thing. After all, if you link-build it, they will come. Shannon promises to teach us how to set up a “digital PR room.” AKA, a link-earning machine! It sounds like she’s pulling back the entire curtain and will be showing us some concrete link-building tactics. I know how many hours go into earning a single link, so I am eagerly awaiting a process that scales.
Ross Simmonds — Keyword's Aren't Enough: How to Uncover Content Ideas Worth Chasing
Like many SEOs, I’m a firm believer in the power of valuable content. So when I hear about a session titled, “Keyword's Aren't Enough: How to Uncover Content Ideas Worth Chasing,” it’s eye-catching. Maybe more than eye-catching, it’s paradigm challenging. I love keywords, LOVE’em! Content marketing without keywords makes me a little uneasy. Let’s just say keywords are at the center of most of my strategy for content marketing decisions. I’m glad I have time to prepare my mind for what mad brilliance Ross will be sharing this year at MozCon.
Heather Physioc — Mastering Branded Search
Before I even jump into Heather’s digital game, let’s start with her taste in music. Her walk-on music was strong last year — real strong.
. @HeatherPhysioc I don't know who chooses the walk-on music. But you win! Ready to listen to everything you have to say. #mozcon2018
— PJ Howland (@askPJHowland) July 10, 2018
This year Heather is going to be chatting us up on branded search. At one glance I’m like, “Okay, color me intrigued…” Branded search seems so surface-level, but knowing Heather, it will be an engaging presentation replete with answers to (what I thought were) unanswerable questions about branded search. Heather has a background in working with enterprise brands, so for me, the opportunity to learn how to leverage big brand names for unique perspectives on what many may think is a pretty straightforward subject, is one I don’t dare pass up. Very excited for what’s sure to be a wild ride.
Britney Muller — Topic TBD, but looking forward to it nonetheless
I’ve never left a conference with more notes from a single session that I have from Britney’s MozCon address in 2017. I recall her sharing her trepidation about being the lead SEO for Moz. A quick project Britney took on was gutting some old and thin pages on Moz.com — about 70,000 community pages if my notes from the event are correct. But shortly, Moz.com saw a modest organic traffic bump. Britney is fearless as an SEO, and there’s something beyond the sheer value of case studies here. As SEOs, we too should be fearless in our work. I’m looking forward to Britney sharing data, insights, and her gutsy spirit with all of us.
Moz with Benefits...
Speakers and sessions are cool and all, but can I just say that all the little extras MozCon has to offer are amazing.
Networking is something that every conference touts. And sure we all like networking, cause that’s what we have to say right? What’s the phrase? “If you’re not networking, you’re not working”? At MozCon, networking is not a chore; it’s easy and enjoyable. Even productive. From an agency perspective, it’s a cool place outside the office to connect with clients too.
And how have I gotten this far and not mentioned the food at MozCon? The meals are excellent, but can I say a word about the snacks? Moz does not skimp when it comes to eats. Sure, I talked about some cool speakers and topics above, but you know what’s actually stolen my heart at MozCon? Top Pot donuts. I may be that guy that leaves a session 5 minutes early just to get a head start on these donuts. Does that mean I might miss out on valuable insights or strategies? Absolutely it does, and I don’t care. My goal has always been to get a couple of donuts down the hatch before I run into someone I know. That way, when they see me with a donut in each hand, they think that’s all I’ve had.
“Just two donuts this time, PJ?”
“Yeah, haha, just two…” Suckers.
Donuts aside, Moz cares immensely about their community and has done everything possible to make this the best year yet. So come as you are, and leave as you were… only better. The Moz culture of acceptance and education stands to deliver a MozCon experience that will keep you going throughout the year.
I can’t wait to take a deep dive into the sea of SEO with all of my fellow marketing geeks. And if you want to chat, I’ll be the guy hovering around the donut table.
Well, what did I miss?
For all the long-time MozCon attendees out there, what are you excited for?
Which speakers and sessions are you looking forward to most?
Do you have any favorite moments from years past?
Where are you grabbing dinner in the city?
Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!
from Moz Blog https://moz.com/blog/mozcon-2019-pj-howland
via IFTTT
Tuesday, May 7, 2019
Monday, May 6, 2019
Friday, May 3, 2019
Wednesday, May 1, 2019
Announcing the New Moz SEO Essentials Certificate: What It Is & How to Get Certified
Posted by BrianChilds
“Does Moz offer a certification?”
Educating the marketing community about SEO is one of our core values here at Moz. I worked at an agency prior to joining the team back in 2016, and much of what I learned about how to deliver SEO to our clients came from reading the Moz Blog and watching MozCon videos.
In 2016, one of Moz’s entrepreneurial product managers, Rachel Moore, launched a new catalog of SEO coursework called Moz Academy. This initiative enabled our community to learn faster through structured, interactive workshops. Since 2017, the team has taught SEO to almost 2,500 students through our various class offerings (I looked it up prior to writing this. That number made me really proud).
Across all these interactions, one question asked by our students kept surfacing:
Can I get a certificate for completing this coursework?
For agencies, the ability to show a certificate of completion is a way to differentiate themselves amongst a crowded market. I knew from my own experience how valuable having “HubSpot Inbound Certified” and “Adwords Certified” on my LinkedIn profile was — they allowed our team to show proficiency to our prospective clients. For our friends working as in-house marketers, showing a certificate of completion is a way of showing that the student made good on the investment they requested from their managers.
I’m proud to announce that Moz has put in a tremendous amount of effort to create a certificate program that meets this consistent customer demand. Today, Moz is launching the SEO Essentials Certificate through our Moz Academy platform. Check it out below:
What is an SEO Certificate?
An SEO Certificate from Moz is all about developing familiarization with Moz tools and covering some of the essential types of projects you can use to hit the ground running. Though attendees of the Moz Academy come from a variety of backgrounds, we built the certification coursework with an Agency or freelance SEO in mind. However, I believe this material is valuable for anyone interested in learning SEO.
The certificate is focused on five core competency areas:
- Fundamental SEO Concepts (Understand the Fundamentals)
- Keyword research (Develop Keyword Strategies)
- Page optimization (Apply On-Page Optimization Strategies)
- Link building essentials (Build Effective Link Strategies)
- Reporting on SEO (Create Efficient Reporting Strategies)
By completing this certificate, attendees should be able to articulate for their stakeholders where SEO fits in a digital strategy, how to find and target search engine results pages (SERPs) based on the competitive landscape, and how to approach delivering basic SEO tactics using the Moz toolset.
With this foundation, you'll be able to jump off into more advanced topics such as technical SEO fixes, local SEO, and how to set up your agency for success.
Check out just what's included in the coursework for the Moz SEO Essentials certificate:
1. Understand the Fundamentals
One challenge we observed in the development of SEO coursework: our users often started delivering organic traffic improvements without having a foundational understanding of where SEO tactics fit into a broader digital strategy. Often people will initiate optimization efforts without first conducting effective keyword research. Or, if keyword research was being done, it wasn’t framed within a repeatable, scalable process.
The Understand the Fundamentals course sets the stage for delivering SEO in a way that can be repeated efficiently. In addition to defining essential terminology used in the following classes, you learn how to organize keyword research in a way that produces insight about competition. This relatively simple framework can radically improve targeting of your SEO activities, especially for large enterprises that may compete in several different markets simultaneously.
2. Develop Keyword Strategies
After introducing a framework for conducting keyword research, the certificate program dives into a step-by-step process for creating large keyword clusters and identifying the keywords that will produce the best results. In the development of this coursework, we recognized that many articles and resources talk about keyword research but don’t define a repeatable, scalable process for actually doing it. So many articles about SEO promote hacks that may work for a particular use case, but lack step-by-step instructions. We developed this course to provide you with a practical process that can scale alongside your work.
You’ll learn the importance of mapping keyword clusters to the typical sales funnel customers follow as they move from exploration of solutions to purchase. I’ve presented this material in workshops to large enterprises and small companies — every marketing team that's used this process found it valuable.
By the end of the class, you’ll be familiar with the most valuable features of Moz Keyword Explorer and how to organize lists to help you identify and target the best keywords for your stakeholders.
3. Apply On-Page Optimization Strategies
For many websites, you can find quick wins simply by optimizing page attributes that target strategic keywords. For as much as search has evolved in recent years, we still operate primarily in a world where the text on a page defines the value of that page. This course provides an overview of those attributes and their relative importance.
You'll have a clear understanding of how to use site crawl and page optimization tools to identify, prioritize, and begin optimizing pages based on the keyword strategy they developed in the previous class. Often one of the challenges our students have discovered is that they moved too quickly into optimization without first having their strategy defined. This class will show how strategy and implementation fit together.
4. Build Effective Link Strategies
Link building is another practice that, as an agency marketer, I found difficult to scale. Many articles describe the importance of how relevant links relate to ranking, or hacks that produced a particular result for a page, but not how to create a repeatable process.
As you'll discover in the class, link building is more about process than tools. You’ll understand how to use Moz Link Explorer to isolate the best domains to target amongst the thousands you might consider. I use this process myself whenever launching new websites and it turns a week-long project into a few hours of work. For any agency, where time is literally money, driving down the cost of link analysis with Moz tools can be a big windfall.
5. Create Efficient Reporting Strategies
Whether you're working at an enterprise brand or providing digital marketing services, reporting on outcomes is a big part of your job. Because of the challenges inherent in reporting on attribution with SEO strategies, it's vital to understand both how to set up your data and some common ways to tie SEO projects to broader digital marketing initiatives. This course provides a framework for reporting on SEO that you can adjust to suit your needs. You’ll learn how to use Google Analytics and Moz tools to create actionable reports you can share with your team and stakeholders.
SEO Essentials Certificate FAQs
Here are some of the common questions our community has asked us about the SEO Essentials Certificate during the development process.
How do I get SEO Certified?
Moz offers the SEO Essentials Certificate program via the Moz Academy platform. When you visit Moz Academy, you will see the SEO Essentials Certificate program listed in the catalog. All you have to do is select the course and proceed through the login process.
How long does the SEO Essentials Certificate take?
The Moz SEO Essentials coursework consists of several hours of online instruction, as well as a few quizzes and a final exam. The coursework is developed to be completed within a week of starting. Some attendees have completed the coursework in two days, but for most folks, it takes about a week.
Will I get an SEO certificate and LinkedIn badge?
Yes! We've developed a way for you to get both a SEO certificate you can print and a LinkedIn badge to show you've completed the program. When you pass the final exam, you'll find links to both of these assets and instructions on how to generate them.
How long is the SEO Essentials Certificate valid?
The Moz SEO Essentials Certificate is valid for one year after registration. When the certificate expires, you'll need to retake the coursework to maintain your certification. We set the expiration at one year because SEO changes a lot! (Seriously — just take a look at the Google Algorithm Change History.) We want to make sure that you have the most up-to-date information when displaying your credentials online and to stakeholders.
Find yourself with questions not addressed in this post? Drop them in the comments and we'll do our best to get them answered.
Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!
from Moz Blog https://moz.com/blog/seo-certificate
via IFTTT
Give it up for Your MozCon 2019 Community Speakers!
Posted by cheryldraper
High fives and fist bumps for each and every person who took the time to pitch their hearts out for this years’ six community speaker spots — a whopping 130 entries were submitted!
Our selection committee read, watched, and researched, whittling things down to a shortlist of top contenders and then read, watched, and researched some more to determine if a potential speaker and their talk would be a perfect fit for the MozCon stage.
We take lots of things into account during our review, but ultimately there are three main factors that determine our final selections:
- Strength of the pitch (e.g., value, relevance to the audience, etc.)
- Can the content reasonably be delivered in the time allotted?
- Does it fit with overall programming and agenda?
After much deliberation, we’re confident these six community speakers are going to be a great addition to the MozCon Stage.
Grab a seat and see for yourself!
Ready to meet your MozCon Community Speakers?
Areej AbuAli, Head of SEO at Verve Search
Fixing the Indexability Challenge: A Data-Based Framework
How do you turn an unwieldy 2.5 million-URL website into a manageable and indexable site of just 20,000 pages? Areej will share the methodology and takeaways used to restructure a job aggregator site which, like many large websites, had huge problems with indexability and the rules used to direct robot crawl. This talk will tackle tough crawling and indexing issues, diving into the case study with flow charts to explain the full approach and how to implement it.
Christi Olson, Head of Evangelism, Search at Microsoft
What Voice Means for Search Marketers: Top Findings from the 2019 Report
How can search marketers take advantage of the strengths and weaknesses of today's voice assistants? Diving into three scenarios for informational, navigational, and transactional queries, Christi will share how to use language semantics for better content creation and paid targeting, how to optimize existing content to be voice-friendly (including the new voice schema markup!), and what to expect from future algorithm updates as they adapt to assistants that read responses aloud, no screen required. Highlighting takeaways around voice commerce from the report, this talk will ultimately provide a breakdown on how search marketers can begin to adapt their shopping experience for v-commerce.
Emily Triplett Lentz, Content Strategy Lead at Help Scout
How to Audit for Inclusive Content
Digital marketers have a responsibility to learn to spot the biases that frequently find their way into online copy, replacing them with alternatives that lead to stronger, clearer messaging and that cultivate wider, more loyal and enthusiastic audiences. Last year, Help Scout audited several years of content for unintentionally exclusionary language that associated physical disabilities or mental illness with negative-sounding terms, resulting in improved writing clarity and a stronger brand. You'll learn what inclusive content is, how it helps to engage a larger and more loyal audience, how to conduct an audit of potentially problematic language on a site, and how to optimize for inclusive, welcoming language.
Greg Gifford, Vice President of Search at DealerOn
Dark Helmet's Guide to Local Domination with Google Posts and Q&A
Google Posts and Questions & Answers are two incredibly powerful features of Google My Business, yet most people don't even know they exist. Greg will walk through Google Posts in detail, sharing how they work, how to use them, and tips for optimization based on testing with hundreds of clients. He'll also cover the Q&A section of GMB (a terrifying feature that lets anyone in the community speak for your business), share the results of a research project covering hundreds of clients, share some hilarious examples of Q&A run wild, and explain exactly how to use Q&A the right way to win more local business.
Joelle Irvine, Director, Marketing & Growth at Bookmark Content and Communications
Image & Visual Search Optimization Opportunities
With voice, local, and rich results only rising in importance, how do image and visual search fit into the online shopping ecosystem? Using examples from Google Images, Google Lens, and Pinterest Lens, Joelle will show how image optimization can improve overall customer experience and play a key role in discoverability, product evaluation, and purchase decisions for online shoppers, while at the same time accepting that image recognition technology is not yet perfect. Learn actionable tactics around image optimization, including image framing, categorizing, structured data, and indexing to better optimize for visual search.
Marie Haynes, Owner at Marie Haynes Consulting Inc.
Super-Practical Tips for Improving Your Site's E-A-T
Google has admitted that they measure the concept of "Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness" in their algorithms. If your site is categorized under YMYL (Your Money or Your Life), you absolutely must have good E-A-T in order to rank well. In this talk, you'll learn how Google measures E-A-T and what changes you can make both on site and off in order to outrank your competitors. Using real-life examples, Marie will answer what E-A-T is and how Google measures it, what changes you can make on your site to improve how E-A-T is displayed, and what you can do off-site to improve E-A-T.
Be sure to check out the initial agenda here to get a taste of all the MozCon goodness we've got in store for you.
Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!
from Moz Blog https://moz.com/blog/mozcon-2019-community-speakers
via IFTTT