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Marketing solutions home | Search optimization | Pay-per-click | Website design
Search engine optimization for continuing, professional, and executive education
JMH Consulting uses a rigorous and systematic four stage process for website optimization. Our approach includes milestones and metrics to ensure that every stage produces clear deliverables and measurable results. Below, is a diagram of our process, followed by a detailed description.
Phase 1: Keyword Research
Keyword Generation
Keywords are words or phrases commonly used when searching for a topic, class, certificate, program, or training event. Choosing effective keywords is a vital part of the web optimization process. Selected keywords are used to optimize individual pages in the website and for pay-per-click marketing. JMH Consulting uses a combination of approaches to generate keywords, including competitor analyses, brainstorming, keyword generation tools, pay-per-click results (when available), and website analytics (when available).
Keyword Evaluation
After generating a robust set of keywords, JMH Consulting categorizes, evaluates and ranks the keywords by their relevance and frequency of use in search engines. The resulting keywords are blended to form sets of first, second, and third tier1 optimization phrases.
Phase 2.1: Baseline Evaluation
Before optimizing the website, JMH generates baseline data to document how the current website performs on search engines. This baseline measure is repeated after the optimization process to indicate the effectiveness of our optimization efforts. The baseline evaluation consists of four components.
- Inbound Link Analysis - Inbound links are links from other websites to the website being optimized. JMH documents the quantity and quality2 of inbound links, which are an important part of the algorithms used by search engines to rank websites.
- Ranking Analysis - JMH uses keywords generated during Phase 1 of the Web Optimization process to conduct a Ranking Analysis for the pre-optimized website on top search engines. This results in a detailed understanding of the website’s performance on major search engines
- Site Architecture Analysis - JMH uses expert analysis and sophisticated site mapping tools to generate visual and XML sitemaps of the pre-optimized site. This helps us understand the scale and architecture of the site.
- Site Traffic Analysis – Using website analytics, we document the traffic from search engines and other sources to the pre-optimized website. This provides a benchmark to measure the effect of optimization on traffic after the project.
Phase 2.2: Analysis
Along with the baseline evaluation, JMH conducts a deep site analysis to assess how well the pre-optimized website is optimized and notes areas with the most potential for improvement. This helps identify “low hanging fruit” (e.g. improvements in headers, use of keywords in descriptions, etc.) as well as deeper, long term solutions (e.g. improvements to the website architecture, restructuring internal links, etc.).
Phase 3: Optimization
After completing the Baseline Evaluation and Analysis, JMH presents a series of recommendations for improving the website’s optimization. Many factors contribute to a website’s ranking and our recommendations are robust. Our holistic approach addresses criteria used by even the most advanced search engines.
During the Optimization phase JMH typically works with a client representative (often a technology coordinator or a website designer) to implement approved changes. Simple changes and those most likely to produce significant improvement are first implemented and evaluated. Then, based on results from the initial set of improvements, we conduct additional rounds of optimization to further improve the ranking.
Phase 4: Evaluation and Improvement
The final staggered phase measures the effects of changes made in the Optimization phase. JMH repeats the steps of the baseline evaluation to gauge the effectiveness of each round of optimization. The results from each round of optimization are used to better target and guide the next. During this stage, we deliver periodic reports on the progress and success of the improvements.
Footnotes
1. First tier keywords are extremely popular and competitive terms such as “continuing education”. Second tier keywords such as “continuing education in Hawaii” are less competitive, but still valuable. Third tier keywords are very specific terms such as “website design training in Hawaii” used infrequently, but by more intentional searchers.
2. The quality of inbound links is determined by the relative importance of the linking site (i.e. a link from CNN.com is of more value than a link from a local television station) and the relative similarity of the linking site (i.e. links from other sites related to adult education are more valuable than general topic websites)
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