Link building is the process of having your business URL link from other sights. The more quality sites that have a link to your website, the higher your ranking. I read a lot about ways that people try to beat the systems to increase their SEO, but this often backfires. It is better to start by building a quality site with unique, valuable, and engaging content. One good piece of advice is to build your pages for the users in honest ways, not for search engines, then go about building links. It’s best to start with deep links, or links between your own pages so that users can easily get to their desired content on your website. Detective work will help you build relationships with other businesses that may be happy to put your link on their site and you can do the same for sites you find valuable. Social media is another source for backlinks.

My favorite work this week was with Google Analytics. There is a lot of data to be found and used there to help  a person optimize their website. For instance, whether men or women spent more per transaction,which areas are specific products selling best in, and what page are people leaving your website from. It is possible to evaluate your audience, acquisitions, behavior, and conversions in a myriad of ways. The successful use of Google Analytics starts with knowing the right questions to ask and then understanding what the data is telling you. While some of the business language is still new to me, it was fun to explore the demo account and see the availability of amazing information.

This week I set aside my personal feelings and fears about social media and advertising and learned about how these two things work together with SEO. Advertising on social media sites is similar to other advertising in that it needs to be segmented, searchable, snackable, and shareable. Users sharing your ad on social media is free advertising and increases the chances of more traffic to your website. It’s also important to write ads so that “spiders” can “crawl” your ad easily. These are terms for the software searching the ad for the keywords that users have entered in the search. I have to admit that the technical explanations of meta tags and data go a little over my head.

It’s important to post frequently and to understand how my target audience uses social media so I can create innovative ways to attract their attention. I like the idea of identifying potential partners or growing a network of business relationships that help each other. I felt that Instagram would be a good social media site for me to use. I could put photos of the books I review with short tidbits that would draw followers to my website. I could also offer special events like a story time in a park. So many people use social media that it would be a mistake to not become a part of this trend.

SEO is important for generating more traffic to a website. Part of SEO is making sure ads and keywords match the content users find on the website and that the site is easy to navigate. It’s also important to have landing pages that load quickly and keep a users interest. There are some more complicated coding practices too which is still a little above my head but involves making it easier for search programs to access and read a site.

Keywords play a critical role in SEO. The keyword should be in the URL, the title of a page, and in the body text of the page. The website should also be built to be used on mobile devices and easily shared through social media. Something I don’t have but need to create is links to other sites that will lead users to my site. I like the idea of finding another blog that relates to mine and putting a link to that blog on my site. Making it easy for visitors to share what they like from my site with others through social media is another way to create inbound links. I especially like the ideas that involve helping other business people and sharing the good I find on other websites.

Now that I’ve learned how to set up an advertising campaign it’s time to see if it will increase traffic to my website and if the users will take the desired action of clicking on my affiliate links and buying books. This action is called a conversion. I should be able to read the data I receive to determine if my return on investment (ROI) is good. Most likely I will discover which keywords are the best to keep using and which ones I should discontinue. I will also be able to evaluate my text ads for possible changes.

All of this makes sense in theory but actually setting up the conversion tracking is not so easy. In my case, small errors I’ve made while setting up my ad campaign had me overwhelmed and confused. Gratefully, I was blessed to reach an extremely knowledgeable and patient customer service specialist with Google Ads.  My conversion tracking is not working yet so I still need to figure that out, but Paul helped me redo my campaign and it is live. I can already see that only a few of my keywords are getting clicks.

This week has been a mix of opposite feelings about what I’m learning. Honestly, part of me is mentally worn out and ready to be done with this class. I’ve told myself several times that the end is in site. The other part of me is pleased with my website and that I finally got my affiliate links working. I’m also curious to see how the ad campaign performs over the next few weeks. It would be ironic if I became hooked on this business thing and kept it going after the class is over.

This week I installed Google Analytics to my website and connected it to my Google Ads campaign. Google Analytics will give me information about how people find and use my website. One bit of information I’ll receive is a Quality Score (QS) and I learned that if I give users what they want a great QS should follow. A high QS will lower my cost-per-click and give my ads better positions. Other data I’ll need to evaluate are my click through rates, impressions, and the relevance of my ads to my site.

The way to earn a high QS is to choose great keywords. Then, those keywords should be used in my advertisements and within the text of my landing page. My ads should be highly relevant to what my product is and use powerful action words like buy, order, find, or try. The ads should also highlight what is unique about my company and grab a reader’s attention. Once a user clicks on an ad, they’ll stay on my site longer if they find what they were looking for. It is also important to have a site that is well-organized, clear to understand and easy to navigate. It’s nice to have a tool that will help me analyze how all these elements are working together so that I can adjust my keywords, ads, and landing pages accordingly.

Taking what I learned about keywords last week I worked to improve my advertisements this week. There are four important terms to remember when creating a text ad: The ad should be specific, relevant, attractive, and empowering. I like the idea of helping customers make a decision more than trying to push something on them. I think the most empowering ads grab a searchers attention but stay simple. Peer feedback helped me realize I need to be careful that searchers can follow my train of thought.

A couple of other tips I find useful are to capitalize each word in a headline and to create a sense of urgency. Creating urgency took some brainstorming and I asked myself “Why would people need to read children’s book reviews?” My original goal was to give friendly advice which doesn’t have any urgency to it. One thing about childhood that creates urgency is realizing how quickly it passes by and the opportunities to share good things with them is fleeting. This idea gave me the urgency I was looking for.

Google Ads is an amazing concept to me. Companies can set up an advertising campaign and bid on keywords that bring searchers to click on their ads. The process for setting up a campaign is user friendly. Even so, I managed to go astray right from the start that took a bit of  help from Google Ads support to straighten out. Businesses need to decide what geographical area and devices they would like their ads to reach and need to set up a daily budget. Even creating the ad is a fill in the blank process. Just bring your best creative ideas that will capture the attention of potential customers.

Keywords need to be succinct and a good balance of specific and general. To specific may exclude some searchers from seeing your ads. Too general may waste advertising dollars as searchers that don’t want what you offer land on your site only to be disappointed. Good keywords match what a user would put in a search engine if they were looking for your product or service.

This week we researched legal business structures. I remember learning about this topic in some of my accounting classes but was glad for the review. My business will be a sole proprietorship which means I’ll be able to set it up quickly and run it the way I would like to. The scary part is that I’m then responsible for all debts and all my personal assets are not protected from paying those debts. Fortunately, my business is very low risk. A partnership would have the same risk, but there would be other people to work and share the risk with. An LLC limits liability which would be worth looking into if my business grows.

Once a structure is chosen then a business needs to obtain the proper licenses and permits from the city and/or state that they live in. This may include getting a DBA and a tax identification number (EIN). I won’t need a license for my blog but I will need to keep track of any income and expenses for my personal income taxes. I remember obtaining a license, EIN, and DBA before with our photography business as well as filling out a Schedule C for business gain/loss. I’m glad to keep it even more simple this time.

One of the most important things I learned this week is that web design is not art. This is actually a little hard for me to swallow because I like art and I like sharing my feelings through art. When I saw some of the examples of the types of colors, photos, or templates that are popular now I was not impressed. I must be in the minority. It soothed me a little to read that authentic images are important and to pay attention to some video backgrounds. There is still art in telling a story with a picture. I will need to remember to persuade people but to stay away from provoking emotion and help my site visitors find answers, take action, and complete the task they came to my site for in the first place. Persuading with numbers is more powerful than fancy vocabulary and I found the examples for this principle compelling. I also agree with having a minimum of menu items as this goes hand-in-hand with keeping a site clear and easy to navigate.

I learned a little about PayPal buttons this week too. PayPal makes it fairly easy to set-up and has options like subscription or donations. More thought needs to go into what having a PayPal button means behind the scenes. A good accounting system for tracking payments and tax collection is vital. A business also needs to have clear policies of how to settle payment disputes.

Compare and contrast exercises continued to be lifesavers for me as I explored the world of site builders and web hosting. Actually putting my decisions to use has been a bit treacherous though.

Site builders are programs that will assist in building a website and I learned about three different levels for varying levels of technical know-how. The drag-and-drop builders have themes to choose from and make building a website easier for beginners. A step up from that are open-source programs that also have pre-designed themes and allow for content management, or in other words, are more customizable. Finally there are programs for those comfortable writing their own HTML code which help experts create exactly what they are imagining. Being the beginner I am, I’m using Weebly, a drag and drop tool.

Web hosting companies provide storage for a person’s website and there are lots of options here too. Choosing a host comes down to deciding what is most important for you and your business. Fortunately Weebly also hosts so I don’t need to worry about compatibility issues.

There was moment of panicked second-guessing when it came time to purchase web hosting and a domain and start my site. I had to trust my research and dive in. I’m finding that drag and drop is still a challenge for me as I try to set up my site, so I need to read and/or watch some tutorials. I do like my domain name though: kid-reads.com. Now I just need to take a breath and face my fears as I launch this website.