Spin Markket + Digital is a customer service-driven company. While providing digital services for our clients we also want to make sure they understand the digital world we live in today. Your storefront today is digital and the entire world is looking in your window. #digitalmarketingstrategy #digitalmarketingtrends #digitalmarketing #seo #socialmediamarketing #contentmarketing #digital #google #data

Spin Markket - Community Support! Kris Patrick, Executive Director with Main Street Fort Dodge talks about how Spin Markket + Digital supports the projects in the Historic Downtown Districts with online digital platforms that promote the district and the businesses located in the district. #MakeSmallBig #ShopSmall #ShopLocal

Did you know that around 28% of all local searches typically result in a purchase? Recent times have shown us just how important it is for a business to have a solid online presence. In order to establish that presence, a business needs to succeed at both overall SEO and local SEO. The combination of a strong traditional and local SEO strategy can help propel your business way ahead of your competition. To effectively harness the power of local search, you need to first understand how to build and implement a good local SEO strategy. Read on to find the top 12 local SEO tips that can help improve your business’s online presence in 2021. #1. Do not delay in creating a GMB listing Creating a GMB listing is not very difficult. Just ensure that you complete your profile and list all your products and services. Once you are done setting up your GMB listing, start creating mini-posts for your clients using the Google Posts feature. This will not only help you keep your clients updated, but it will also show Google that you are taking the time to manage your listing. #2. Get your business listed in other important directories as well Listing your business on all the important online directories is essential for local SEO. Check whether there are any online business directories specific to your area, and target them along with the main national and global directories, such as: Yelp FourSquare Angie’s List Bing Places HotFrog Best of the Web About Us #3. Ensure your Name and Place (NAP) information is updated and correct Incorrect and inconsistent NAP information generally results in Google not displaying your GMB listing. So make sure your NAP information is correct and completely the same across all the platforms and in all your listings. In case your business moves to a new location, update this information on all platforms as soon as possible. Also, since a business’s profile information can now be updated based on changes suggested by consumers, you should keep a close eye on it to ensure there are no discrepancies. #4. Find out the local keywords you can target Targeting local keywords is an absolute must when it comes to local SEO. Make sure your research for local keywords includes longer tail keywords related to your business, as well as variations of search terms. You might also want to look into targeting hyper-local keywords. #5. See to it that your site is optimized with the local keywords Once you are done shortlisting the local keywords you would like to rank for, optimize your site using these keywords. The keywords must feature on your homepage, as well as your service pages in the following areas: Headings Title Tags Meta Descriptions Body Footer If possible, try and incorporate your main local keyword into the URL, as well. Just make sure that when you add these keywords, you incorporate them into the rest of the content as naturally as possible. #6. Create locally relevant content Creating non-local content for a locally focused business will do you no good. For better lead generation, you need to create content that is locally relevant. The best way to go about it would be by incorporating local keywords into content related to the products and/or services you offer. You can also come up with content that revolves around local news and events related to your business or industry. #7. Make your site mobile-friendly Statistics show that, of all the mobile searches conducted, 30% are location-related. This makes it extremely important to ensure that your site is mobile-friendly. If your site fails to work properly on mobile, there are high chances that you’ll lose quite a few of your potential consumers to a competitor whose website is easy to access on mobile. You can prevent this by optimizing your site for mobile. #8. Optimize your site for voice as well Mobile voice searches are now starting to become a common practice among consumers. It has come to light that mobile voice searches are 3X more likely to be related to something local, compared to text searches. However, voice search is still relatively new, and many businesses are yet to capitalize on it. Hence, optimizing your site and content for voice now will help you stay ahead of your competitors. #9. Always look for opportunities to build inbound links Building inbound links can strengthen not only your overall SEO efforts, but also your local SEO game. While there are many ways to build quality inbound links, one of the most effective is to connect with people and businesses related to your industry and figure out a way to place a contextual link on their websites. #10. If you serve multiple locations, create location pages If your business serves multiple locations, you will want your website to rank in the local searches for each of those locations. The best way to do so is by creating a separate page for every location, instead of just listing them down on one page. Besides creating unique content for every page, you will have to ensure that they are optimized for local keywords. #11. Take the time to manage your reviews Managing your reviews is an absolute must for succeeding in local SEO in 2021. Getting good reviews is great, but the negative ones can severely impact your authority and rankings. The best way to manage your negative reviews is to respond to them with an aim to resolve the issues that have been raised. This will not only help you retain customers, but will also show Google that you are actively working to enhance customer experience. Hence, it is crucial that you manage your reviews across all platforms and listings. #12. Don’t forget to pay attention to your overall SEO While local SEO is important, especially for the locally-focused businesses, that’s no reason to ignore overall SEO. Google has made it very clear that organic SERP plays a major role in improving your local rankings. Chances are high that if you ignore implementing certain very important traditional SEO components, your local SEO efforts may fail as well. So make sure you keep a close eye on that front. Final Takeaway The year 2020 played a huge role in the colossal move of the majority of the consumers and the smallest of businesses online. Even if you have already implemented some of the above listed local SEO tips, a lot more goes into building a comprehensive SEO strategy. If you find that your business is still floundering in the digital world, then it’s high time you get in touch with a reliable SEO expert to help you catch up to your competition. Contact us at Spin Markket + Digital Today!!

On Dec 3rd, 2020, Google began rolling out a new core algorithm update, and as always, it made some people happy while others weren’t as pleased about it. Google makes smaller modifications to its ranking formulas almost every day, but the big changes are made only about three times annually. This is also the reason why the recent change was anxiously anticipated since May 2020, when the last one took place. Like always, Google responded to queries and comments by referring to their boilerplate recommendations of the past, like what webmasters should know about Google’s core updates and the 175-page general guidelines for search quality evaluators. Simply put, Google reflected their casual, “don’t worry if you lost rankings attitude” by saying… “pages that drop after a core update don’t have anything wrong to fix.” But, if you still feel you need to do something, try “focusing on ensuring you’re offering the best content you can”. The same old line that they use whenever they are asked about getting your page ranked. What Can Be Done Even if your rankings have tanked as a result of the last core update, there are no specific actions that you can take to recover, says Google. They also went on to say that negative rankings do not mean there is anything wrong with your pages. That said, we haven’t noticed any rank drop for our clients due to this update. Google does suggest a list of questions to consider, based on different categories. Content and Quality Questions Does the content provide original information, reporting, research, or analysis? Does the content provide a substantial, complete, or comprehensive description of the topic? Does the content provide insightful analysis or interesting information that is beyond obvious? If the content draws on other sources, does it avoid simply copying or rewriting from those sources, and instead provide substantial additional value and originality? Expertise Questions Does the content present information in a way that makes you want to trust it? For example, does it include clear sourcing, evidence of the expertise involved, background about the author, or a reference to the site that publishes it? Presentation and Production Questions Does content display well for mobile devices when viewed on them? Need to know more contact us at Spin Markket + Digital today.

Staying updated with the latest Search Engine Optimization (SEO) related developments is important to increase your website’s traffic. It can be a bit demanding, but it is worth your efforts. To help you stay informed and prepared for the upcoming digital challenges, we have prepared a list of some SEO trends to look out for this year. These trends can be your flashlights on your way to SEO success. Here’s a quick rundown of the most relevant SEO trends: Artificial Intelligence Will Decide the Rankings RankBrain, Google’s AI algorithm, is an important factor to rank in SERPs. There is no specific information on how RankBrain functions, but it is said to help Google interpret queries by finding pages that are relevant, but may not have the exact keywords used in the queries. One of the best ways to optimize your SEO for RankBrain is by organizing the content on your page. BERT was rolled out in Google’s search system in October 2019 for English-language queries. The BERT algorithm will help Google better understand the intent behind users’ search queries. It aims to provide relevant results by understanding natural language. BERT will impact 10% of searches, so there are chances it will also affect your brand’s visibility. Again, great content will be rewarded! Discover, Google’s AI-driven tool, identifies user behavioral patterns and gradually learns these habits. The information collected is used to find the most accurate content that the users will be interested in. Wondering what you can do? Nothing! If Google indexes your page, your content is included. The Shift to Mobile-First Indexing Almost 70% of the sites shown in Google’s search results have shifted to mobile-first indexing. As of September 2020, Google has officially switched to mobile-first indexing. To ensure your web page is mobile-friendly, use the Mobile-Friendly Test Tool offered by Google Content Strategy Tips Wish to create quality content for your business? Follow the EAT principle (expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness) while you craft your content strategy. It helps to build a positive online presence and ensures that the user is protected from fraud & low-quality content. To rank higher in Google and to keep your users engaged, we recommend focusing on quality long-form content (3000+ words). Steps to create engaging long-form content include breaking the content into sections, adding headings and sub-headings, researching the topic in-depth, creating a content outline, etc. Local SEO Gains Importance Local SEO is evolving rapidly due to the rise of zero-click searches. Zero-click searches are results that are shown at the top of Google’s first page so the user doesn’t have to open a link. Wish to get started with local SEO? Create a GMB (Google My Business) page! A Featured Snippet aims to answer a search query, and is located at or near the top of a Google SERP. It is a great way to reach the first page of search results. Having a presence inside the PAA (People Also Ask) box is also an effective way to rank on the first page of the search results. Focus On User Search Intent Semantic Search is gradually gaining importance, because Google now analyzes the query context and tries to understand a user’s search intent to provide more relevant information. Wish to deal with Semantic Search? Create content that answers a question that your potential customers would pose. Google urges proper labeling and optimization of images, so now is the right time to optimize or recheck the images on your website. We recommend using good quality and relevant images. Also, customize the file name and label the photos properly so that the displayed images are inline with the content on the page. Other Ways to Optimize Keywords Voice Search Technology is popular enough to consider it an important ranking factor. Using the keywords that consumers use regularly for voice search can be useful to drive traffic to your site. YouTube has millions of users, so you must create video content to reach out to your potential customers. To get started, type your video’s topic, and study the results that appear. This will give you a list of keywords and tell you precisely what people on YouTube are looking for. Be Data-Driven Data science helps you to understand buyers and create targeted messages. Analytics can help you verify which URLs are getting crawled, and check page loading time, indexing, response errors, and more. Staying updated with the data and analytics related to your business gives you an edge over your competitors. The right SEO tools can guide you to prepare a smart SEO strategy and help you stay on top of the rankings. If you are on the lookout for SEO on your own website or your clients, we can be the right fit. Just connect with us at Spin Markket + Digital and our experts will assist you further.

Shop Iowa for Iowa Businesses - Learn more about this online marketplace where Iowa Businesses sell their products online. CLICK TO WATCH We'll talk with Shop Iowa where you can find things you'll love from Iowa businesses and how they are connecting Iowa Shoppers (and beyond) with online purchases from Iowa Businesses. Business Community Support Livestream this week features - Shop Iowa, Paper Moon, Alpha Media Fort Dodge, North Central Iowa SBDC, Main Street Fort Dodge, Iowa Economic Development Authority, Spin Markket #shopiowa #ShopSmall #shoplocal #onlinemarketing

Let's take time to discuss what SEO really is and why your business needs to implement a quality SEO Campaign today to get ready for tomorrow!

This is a question we hear a lot at Spin Markket + Digital. It also means that there are a number of ways to supply an answer to that question. An actual ROI is hard to track because SEO success can mean more customers, but it doesn’t necessarily guarantee it. You can track success by more customers in the door. You can track it by keyword rankings, or clicks, or interactions, or dozens of other measures. In this article we’ll help you understand how to tell if your SEO campaign is working with the KPIs and measures you need to track. CONVERSIONS What do you ultimately want when someone comes to your website? Essentially you want them to take an action. Whether that’s making a purchase through an e-commerce option. Maybe it’s filling out a lead gen form to learn more about your B2B company. Maybe you want them to pick up the phone and call so you can service their needs. Being able to track the success of an SEO campaign is essentially measuring an increase in conversions from your website. More conversions likely means more business and more revenue. You can track the conversion rate and try to get it higher by taking the number of conversions and divide it by the number of unique visits to your website. You can use this formula for all kinds of metrics like emails or new accounts and sales. As your conversion rate climbs, it means greater success from your SEO campaign. KEYWORDS One of the most common ways to measure an SEO campaign is to track keyword rankings and how they climb. One of the things we track at Spin Markket + DIgital is where desired keywords on a campaign start, and then where they are month by month. Every single day we see keywords on page 11 or lower (that means a ranking over below 1000) and watch them climb over the course of a campaign up to page 1 (ranking between 1-10). That’s the entire point of SEO is to get your website moving up in the rankings for the keywords that people search for.  So when you see an increase in rankings, that means your SEO campaign is successful. More keywords ranking high in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) should hopefully bring in more traffic. We have written extensively about keyword research and how to pick the right keywords for your business and your area. Picking the wrong keywords or keywords that are too competitive could lead to frustration and a website that doesn’t increase in the rankings. Essentially keywords rankings can be one of the biggest indicators of SEO campaign success. You can track the rankings of your main and halo keywords. Watch for the keywords that your competition ranks for then target those in your content. All these can help demonstrate the success of your campaign. TRAFFIC Increased traffic to a website is a huge win for SEO. That’s the ultimate goal is to get more traffic to your site through an increase in rankings. Essentially, you can’t just measure success by an increase in rankings. You need to make sure those rankings improve the traffic to your website. This is how many hits on a page you get. You can measure this through a variety of tools, though Google Analytics installed into the site is the most popular. You can track the traffic by page and see it’s progress over time as an SEO campaign continues on. Measuring traffic can also help you understand what kinds of advertising and other campaigns are working. Traffic can show you what worked and brought in more people and what may need a little more effort and work to make it happen. You also want to make sure the increased traffic to your website is relevant and the new visitors to your page stick around long enough to convert. If you see high bounce rates, also measured through Google Analytics, know that you need to change up your content. Higher traffic, but high bounce rates don’t necessarily mean success. High traffic with sustained time on page, with a bonus of higher conversion rates equal a truly successful SEO campaign. There’s a lot of additional traffic KPIs you can go into. You can also go in depth and measure things like organic traffic, referral traffic, increasing pages that bring in solid traffic like product pages. TIME ON PAGE In additional all the measures above, you want to make sure that once people find your website, they stay there long enough to convert or learn something. On pages like blogs or product review pages, you want to make sure that website visitors stay on that page for a longer amount of time. SEO can help to make those pages more substantial with good content, optimized with keywords. That increases the likelihood of people staying longer on the page. Other pages like “contact” pages likely won’t have a long time on page, but they’re still very important for a website to have. Essentially, the longer time a person spends on a page or a website, there’s a higher likelihood of conversion. So a good SEO campaign will help to improve and beef up those pages where you want people to spend time. This is fairly broad and generic terms. There are many different metrics and indicators of success for your website. You need to first decide on your overall business goals for your website and then plan how you’re going to achieve it. There’s many different metrics that better measure success depending on your goal.

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It is always a challenge in every community to find ways to promote your local businesses so they are easily found while also providing information about each individual business. Past options were printed maps, brochures, signage and stopping at the local convenience store to ask directions. Introducing an Interactive Map where we are able to show online to anyone searching what a community has to offer. This map provides a Google base platform that allows you to actually map out the businesses in a community. An example is the Main Street Fort Dodge map that Spin Markket + Digital recently developed to do just that. The map outlines the businesses in the area with pin markers that can also be personalized. Categories are set up to provide the viewer an easier way to find the businesses they are looking for. It also will only show the categories you specifically select for easier viewing as well. Next comes the additional benefits. Each business can personalize their location with photos, video and selection of where they want their business linked back to. Reviews automatically show when you hover over the pin. Some additional added value examples can include adding an Event category, a Street Closed or Under Construction category to identify streets that are closed for construction, and Potential Rental and For Sale properties. The link can be added to any digital platform such as Websites, Apps, and QR Codes. Adding more links to the Interactive Map improves the online presence of the map and the locations in the map. Other applications of the map are tourism sites, community events, infrastructure projects in communities, businesses that want to highlight projects that they have completed, realtors listing sales and open houses, and economic development areas and projects.

Websites are important for every business. In today’s digital age, having accessible online information is crucial for success. Having a website isn’t enough, though. What matters is what’s on your website. An ugly website can be a great way to shoot your business in the foot when people are searching for you online. Be sure to connect your Google Analytics for more insight. Our staff at Spin Markket + Digital can provide you assistance and answer questions. How to avoid having an ugly website: Ugly domain Long loading times Complicated or overwhelming interface Automatic music or videos Missing contact info Doesn’t have an opt-in newsletter Missing a blog section Your site lacks a clear message or "About Us" page. And remember any content that provides value will help with your conversion rates. For example, 77% of consumers online still enjoy a good old read in their downtime, especially as it pertains to blogs. Contact us at Spin Markket + Digital for more information on how your website looks online at 515-302-8026.

Have you ever noticed that some website URLs start with HTTP while others start with HTTPS? Maybe you’ve noticed a tiny lock icon in the top left corner of your browser? What exactly does it all mean? Websites that are HTTPS have an SSL certificate. SS-what? SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer and is a secure protocol developed for sending sensitive information over the internet. If a website you are on has an SSL certificate, it means that the site is secure and encrypted. Any data you enter is safely shared with that website and that website only. Let’s talk technical for a second. How does SSL actually prevent information theft? When you start to break down what SSL is, you’ll discover it’s asymmetric (or public-key) encryption. This requires each party to generate a public and private key pair. Imagine a padlock on a gate. Anyone can go up to the lock, inspect it, and even try to open it with their key. However, only the right key can actually unlock it. In this example, the padlock is a public key, they are visible to the general public. Private keys are exactly that, private. These private keys are used to unlock public keys. When you fill out a form on a website without an SSL certificate, the information can be intercepted by a hacker. This site would be classified as not secure. The information you submitted could be anything from a banking transaction to your credit card information. A hacker could intercept your information in a number of ways, one of the most common is when a hacker places a small, undetected listening program on the server that is hosting a website. That program ‘wakes up’ when a website visitor starts typing their information. This listening program will begin capturing the information and send it back to the hacker. When you visit a website that has an SSL certificate, your browser will form a connection with the web server and bind to it. This connection is secure so that no one besides you and the website where you’re submitting your information can see or access it. This connection happens instantly. There is no manual work required. You simply need to visit a website with an SSL certificate and your connection will automatically be secured. Why is SSL so important? You might be thinking, I’m not accepting sensitive information through my website! Regardless of if you are in the business of accepting delicate information or not, having an SSL certificate is still incredibly important. SSL and SEO In 2014, Google made adjustments to its ever-changing algorithm for SEO rankings. The major change? Websites using SSL certificates. Google began and still continues to flag sites without SSL certificates as untrustworthy. Sites with an SSL certificate receive an SEO boost and will be the default result for searchers. If you want to be findable on Google, having an SSL certificate on your website is absolutely necessary. SSL and online payments If you are conducting online transactions through your website, it is imperative that you have an SSL certificate. As an online shop, it’s your primary responsibility to ensure that the information being exchanged over your online store is protected. How do you prove to your customers that their usernames, passwords, and credit card numbers are not being revealed to malicious hackers? Having an SSL certificate! SSL and consumer trust Did you know that Google Chrome is the most popular web browser? 44.5% of internet users search the internet using it. On the Chrome browser, you are able to easily spot a site with an SSL certificate. Next to the URL is a tiny lock icon. If a site has an SSL certificate it shows it locked, however, if a site does not have an SSL certificate the lock will be open and red text will read ‘Not Secure’. The second a customer lands on a website that is labeled ‘not secure’, they are going to feel less comfortable browsing it, even if there is no sensitive information being passed across it. SSL certificates have become an absolute necessity for any business that wants to be perceived as trustworthy. There’s no denying the confidence and trust that an SSL certificate can provide to a site. Choosing an SSL certificate to secure a website demonstrates that a business values customer trust, which is essential to financial success, customer conversion, and business growth. Spin Markket + Digital - 515-302-8026 or info@spinmarkket.com