SMS has become a popular marketing platform for businesses in recent years and for good reason. Its affordable cost and high ROI make it an irresistible marketing strategy. But marketers should be aware that SMS is not a DIY marketing plan.
There are lots of ways to do a texting campaign right and lots of ways to do it wrong, too. To make sure you get the most out of yours and end up in the first category, here are some best practices to make SMS work for your business:
Make Exclusive Offers For SMS Customers
Today, businesses have many points of contact with their customers. Social media, foot traffic, television and radio ads, email newsletters, coupons, pop-up ads and more. With all of these different ways to access your sales and promotions, why would they want to sign up for your SMS as well?
That's where exclusivity comes in. If customers know that they can get access to sales, notices, VIP passes and other goodies only through your SMS loyalty program, then they're more likely not only to sign up but to respond to your promotions.
Personalization
Clients' histories with your business are the building blocks of a great SMS marketing campaign. The more relevant your messages are to the customer, the higher response rates your messages will get which means higher ROI, which means profits. It all starts here.
By analyzing the data you have available on your clients - their geographic location, shopping habits and purchase history - you can aim your texts to them accurately instead of launching a blanket “hit or miss” campaign. A client who shops at your grocery store every Monday may appreciate a “Monday special” of 5% off purchases or a free coffee at your market's cafe.
When you reach out to customers with something that shows you're paying attention to them and know what they like and what they need, you'll not only create more loyal customers, you'll create a more successful SMS campaign.
Offer Useful Services
There are a lot of ways that SMS can be helpful to clients:
Advice and tips. Have you just sold your customer a new iPhone? Tips on how to improve battery life or how to use the various features might be welcome. How about someone who just bought some anti-aging products? They might like to know the best tips on how to eliminate crow's feet. What information can you offer your clients that will answer the questions implicated by the products they bought?
Appointment reminders. Who doesn't like help remembering all the things on their busy schedule? Support your customer by reminding them about an upcoming appointment by texting. Relying on timely email reminders can be a mistake: customers have overflowing email inboxes and email campaigns show less than 30% open rates.
The day before the appointment is usually the best time to send them SMS reminder - not too far in advance that they'll forget again, but so last minute that they don't have time to make it.
Delivery status. Customers want to know what's happening with their purchase orders arriving by delivery. Keep them updated with SMS messages to avoid fielding phone calls or emails which cost your company time and manpower.
Time It
One thing that's easiest for marketers to get wrong about SMS is the timing. Texting is immediate. It won't take hours or days for a customer to check your text. In fact, they're 90% likely to open it within a mere 3 minutes. With this in mind, it's best to send messages that are SMS-timely.
A restaurant wanting to promote dinner to their customers should send the message at the end of the work day when clients are making dinner plans and might be most temped to take advantage of a last-minute promotion at one of their favorite restaurants.
Retailers should also avoid sending a promotional message too early. If your event is on Saturday, don't send a message on Monday, send it on Friday or even Saturday morning. SMS messages are opened and read at record speed, but that also means they're easily forgotten. Send messages when you're ready to receive your customers, and not before.
One thing to be extra careful about is not crossing the line into inappropriate by sending customers messages very late at night or very early in the morning. Generally, if you stick to working hours, you can avoid overstepping the timing boundaries.
By keeping these ideas in mind while creating your SMS marketing plan, you'll get better results with your business and your customers.
SMS marketing campaigns can be a great addition to your mobile marketing strategy. Download the Modern Marketing Essentials Guide to Mobile Marketing and learn how to market to the customers who are glued to their mobile devices.
To some, email marketing can seem antiquated and even prehistoric when compared to more cutting-edge tactics such as SEO, social media, and mobile optimization.
Although it may not be the sexiest of strategies, there's no denying that it still gets results.
In fact, “email is 40 times more effective at acquiring new customers than Facebook or Twitter.” Just take a look at how it compares with other methods:
Also, you are six times more likely to get a click-through from an email campaign than you are from a tweet.
What about ROI?
For each dollar spent, email has an average ROI of $38. Impressive. Here's how Adobe paints the picture:
And it gets better.
Email marketing is easy.
Check out this data from MarketingCharts.com:
Email tops the list of “most effective” digital marketing tactics. But look! It's also easy!
Results? ROI? Easy? Effective?
Email marketing is killer. It works. It's awesome. You need to do it.
But in order to truly harness the power of email marketing, it's important to understand the psychology behind it and to know how to write emails that get results.
The statistics say that email marketing is effective. But statistics tell only part of the story. Statistics can't predict whether your email marketing efforts will be effective.
In order to create a successful email marketing campaign, it's crucial to know the tricks of the trade. Getting people to notice your emails, open your emails, click on the stuff in your emails, and respond to your emails is tricky.
Here are the fundamentals of what I've learned over the years.
1. Getting emails opened
Half the battle is getting prospects to open your emails.
Research from HubSpot found that companies with 1-10 employees typically receive a median open rate of 35.3% and companies with 26-200 employees receive a median open rate of 32.3%.
Here's another look at the stats from SmartInsights. Find your industry in the list, and see how your open rates compare:
These numbers aren't exactly staggering.
I've found that the key to maximizing my open rate is making my emails as personal and interesting as possible.
For instance, I suggest using your first name as your from address.
Why do I suggest this?
The data says so. In one survey, researchers asked “What most compels you to open a permission based email?”
I know what would get me to open an email: the from line!
Do I trust the sender? Do I want to hear from them? Do I like what they write? Is it going to help me in some way?
The best way for me to find that out is by looking at who sent the information.
Just take a look at these numbers. The from line is leading the subject line by double!
Most people are already drowning in emails and don't want to open something from some questionable corporate entity. But many are willing to open something from a real person, who is reaching out to them one-on-one.
If you are signed up to receive emails from me, you expect to see “Neil Patel” in the subject line.
I wrote the email, so I might as well be the one sending it.
Besides, it gives you, the reader, the authentic sense that you're hearing from me as a person, not some disembodied email marketing software.
2. Writing a captivating subject line
If your subject line is uninteresting, uninspiring, or mediocre, your email is likely to get passed over. Also, if it gives off a spammy-used car salesman-kind of vibe, it's probably going in the trash.
How do you grab attention with the subject line?
I've found that addressing a common issue or concern works well.
For example, you might promise that the contents of your email can help solve a problem, provide readers with valuable information to improve their lives, or make them happier.
Buffer knows that their audience wants to hear about social media tips. That's why they use subject lines like this one:
Throwing in some power words that stimulate readers and appeal to their emotions can have a tremendous impact as well.
Here are just some of the power words you can use:
amazing
mind-blowing
jaw-dropping
blissful
You get the idea. I recommend that you check out this list of 317 power words from Smart Blogger for more ideas.
Here's something I do to save time and effort and increase effectiveness of my email campaigns: I use or repurpose my blog article titles as my email subject lines.
This doesn't work for every industry or email marketing campaign, I know. But it works for me. The goal of my email marketing efforts is to help people with great content. That content, of course, lives on my blog. So, I might as well use the title of my article as my subject line.
3. Pique their curiosity
Finally, you'll want to make it so that readers are so intrigued by the subject line that they can't resist opening your email.
You'll want to pique their curiosity and leave an information gap that can be filled only by clicking.
For instance, a B2B company might use a subject line such as “How to Double Your Sales in Just 30 Minutes.”
One of my highest open rates came from an email I sent asking for people's help. I genuinely needed and wanted the response of my readers.
When I asked for readers' help, it created an information gap between my request and the point of my request. Why did I need help? The result was an insane level of open rates.
I've seen other great marketers do the same thing. Jayson DeMers, for example, created this email subject line that caught my attention:
He even used a smiley face.
4. Writing a killer opening line
Now that you've gotten readers to open your email, you need to draw them in deeper with an awesome opening line.
This is probably more important than you might think.
Why do I say this?
Because the subject line isn't always the first thing that people see!
GASP!
Yeah, I know you've been told that the subject line is the most important element of an email. As I explained above, however, the from line seems to have a higher level of impact on whether or not the email gets opened in the first place.
But is that all? The from line and the subject?
No. The first line of the email is important too.
Most email browsers today display a portion of the message directly in the email browser. You don't have to open the email to read a small section of it.
Depending on the length of the subject line (and the viewport of the browser), the body of the email has two or three times as much visibility!
It's not just desktop email programs that do this, though. Don't forget about mobile devices!
Most mobile email apps show the opening line.
So, what do you write in your opening line?
I like addressing each reader by their first name. This comes across as being personal and authentic, which is key for getting them to read on.
I also like to avoid the classic “Hi, my name is…” routine.
Instead, I prefer to opt for something like “I noticed that you…” or “I saw that we both…”
This approach helps the reader relate to me better and faster. I gain their attention by drawing upon a shared experience.
Make sure you get to the point of your email from the get go. Preliminary chatting might turn off people who simply want to find out what the email is about.
Just get right to the point so that you can make an instant connection.
Notice how Jacob McMillen did this in his email:
Writing like this will earn the respect of your readers. You value their time. You give them what they need. They get on with their lives.
5. The body
This is where it's time to really connect with your reader. It's your opportunity to show how your product/service can provide them with real value and improve their life.
I suggest keeping it short and simple and not overloading your reader with extraneous information.
Remember, the point here is to gain their attention and build some initial rapport. You're just looking to warm them up to advance them through the sales funnel.
You're not necessarily going for the jugular right away.
Be sure to break up text into short, digestible paragraphs.
I also suggest speaking in second person and using you when speaking to readers.
Ask personal questions to give your email an intimate feel as if you're talking face-to-face.
How, if at all, would you like to improve your strategy?
Is [benefit to them] a priority for you right now?
If you've ever read Ramit's emails, you know he does a great job with this. The paragraphs are short. The tone is personal. And the whole point of the email is spot on: it's filled with helpful, actionable information.
6. Nailing the closing
Besides the subject line, the closing is arguably the most important part of an email.
It's the point where a reader will decide whether or not they want to act on your offer and proceed any further.
Maybe it's to check out a landing page, sign up for a course, download an e-book, or straight up buy a product/service.
Whatever it may be, your CTA needs to be crystal clear.
Tell them exactly what you want them to do next, and make sure there's no guessing what that action is.
Some of us have the mistaken idea that we need to sneak in the CTA or somehow hide it in the email so it's not so obvious. Please don't make this mistake.
Your CTA is the money of your email-the reason why you're sending it in the first place. Make it strong, unmistakable, and absolutely clear.
This email from StackSocial, while not exactly personal, does have a great CTA. You can see it directly in the body of the email-the place where my eyes are first going to look.
7. Creating urgency
Here's another thing I've learned.
Many people have a tendency to procrastinate. Maybe they're wrapped up in something at the moment or just aren't in the mood to complete your desired action right now.
This is no good because once they close an email, the odds they'll come back to it are slim to none.
That's why it's vital to create urgency so that they feel compelled to take action right away.
Most marketers complain that the “most challenging obstacle” to their email marketing is getting people to take action by clicking on the call to action (or whatever the click goal of the email is).
I've found that setting a tight deadline tends to work well for this.
For example, you might say that an “offer expires tomorrow,” or “get it before it's gone,” or “only 10 spots left.”
This is essential for getting a prompt reply.
Conclusion
The bottom line is that email still matters and can be just as effective as many of the newer marketing tactics.
It's easy to get distracted by creating a sizzling-hot Twitter strategy, building a Facebook group, or starting your live video channel.
Those are all great things, and I don't discourage you from implementing them.
But email still works-although not on its own.
To truly get results, it's necessary to follow the right formula and understand the mindset of your readers.
By following these techniques, you should be able to increase both your open rate and response rate.
How does email marketing stack up against your other primary marketing channels in 2016?
How much time out of your life do you sacrifice to your commute? It's amazing how quickly it adds up.
If you drive/bike/bus just 30 minutes each way, that's five hours a week. Do that 50 weeks out of the year, and it's 250 hours, more than sixfull work weeks. Yeesh.
Now, I don't mean to bum you out. Just pointing out an opportunity. Most of us spend hours a week trapped in one form of conveyance or another. Why not use that time to continue your marketing education with a good podcast?
For those not in the know, podcasts are recorded shows (usually audio only, though some have a video component) posted on the Internet to stream or download. Think of it like an audio blog. You can usually tune in on the show's website, or subscribe on a service like iTunes, Google Music, or Stitcher. I recommend the latter option-the apps can put all your subscriptions in one place, and remember what episode you're on and where you left off. Most importantly, they put the whole shebang on your phone, where you can listen via Bluetooth, headphones, or Bluetooth headphones.
There are hundreds of thousands of podcasts out there, on every imaginable topic. Which means there are hundreds of podcasts just for marketers. Here are a few to get you started (in random order):
10 Digital Marketing Podcasts to Take You to the Next Level
Topics Covered: Mostly social media marketing, with a little general digital marketing thrown in.
Sample Guests: Lee Odden, Nick Westergaard, Brian Clark
Episode Length: ~45 minutes
Social Media Examiner has established itself as an amazing resource for all things social. Their blog posts are always intensely tactical, useful how-to guides for whatever topic they're tackling. I'm pleased to report the podcast is a worthy extension of the brand. Every Friday, host Michael Stelzner takes on a new topic, always with an expert guest to lend a hand.
Topics Covered: Interviews with authors of marketing books.
Sample Guests: David Spark, Jonah Berger, Carlos Hidalgo
Episode Length: 30-60 minutes
If you're looking for marketing books to read, or for an expanded take on the ones you've already been through, this podcast has you covered. Host Douglas Burdett interviews a new marketing book author each episode. You get an inside view of the author's process and their take on marketing, and frequently get recommendations for additional reading material, too.
Topics Covered: Digital marketing, advertising, social media marketing
Sample Guests: Maria Konnikova, Nancy Duarte
Episode Length: 60 minutes
SPOS (as it's called) is hosted by Mirum's Mitch Joel. Joel was an early adopter in the podcast game; they're up to 523 weekly episodes and counting. Mitch and his guests cover hot marketing topics, pick an app of the week, and even include some recommended music for you to enjoy.
Topics Covered: Content marketing, social media marketing
Sample Guests: Just the two hosts
Episode Length: 60 minutes
“PNR” stands for Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose, the brain trust behind the Content Marketing Institute. These guys have a decade of experience with content marketing, and they're both learned scholars about the tactic's historical roots. What's more, they're both entertaining performers with great chemistry together. And they answer listener questions! What's not to like?
Topics Covered: Advertising, digital marketing, current events
Sample Guests: Mitch Joel, Amber MacArthur
Episode Length: 60 minutes
Each of the 400+ episodes of the BeanCast is a lively, irreverent roundtable discussion with a different panel every time. Host Bob Knorpp keeps things light and keeps the conversation moving. If you can handle the occasional bit of crude humor, the BeanCast is a great way to stay up-to-date on marketing news while laughing your face off.
Topics Covered: Digital marketing, B2B marketing, content marketing
Sample Guests: Joe Pulizzi, Tim Washer, Sally Hogshead
Episode Length: 30-45 minutes
The original rock 'n' roll marketer Jason Miller of LinkedIn Marketing hosts this year-old podcast, drawing on a deep bench of talented marketers for insightful interviews. Jason knows how to have fun and keep things light, but never fails to elicit serious insights from his guests. Right now it looks like they're on a bit of a hiatus while Jason settles into his new role at LinkedIn UK, but there are plenty of back episodes to keep you going until he returns.
Sample Guests: Gary Vaynerchuk, Carlos Gil, Jonah Berger
Episode Length: ~45 minutes
Like the Sophisticated Marketer's Podcast, this one features industry veterans-in this case, Jay Baer and Salesforce's Adam Brown-who have a hefty rolodex of smart marketers to tap as guests. If your role involves social media at all, this is a must-listen.
This daily podcast is unique: It's short, and it doesn't feature noteworthy guests or lively discussion. Instead, the team at Growth Hacker TV picks one article from the blogosphere every day and summarizes it in a quick but thorough way. It's perfect for those fortunate enough to work from home-you can listen on the way from your bed to your office.
Topics Covered: marketing trends, advertising, social media marketing
Sample Guests: N/A
Episode Length: ~30 minutes
Hosts Mark Schaefer and Tom Webster describe their show as “The World's Most Entertaining Marketing Podcast.” I'll leave that to the listener to judge. But there's no denying Mark and Tom put on a good show. They're funny, they're insightful, and at 30 minutes an episode they always leave you wanting more.
Copyblogger's Sonia Simone has industry cred to share. She's put in her time and she knows her stuff. On this podcast, she alternates solid how-to episodes with thought leader interviews. All of Rainmaker.fm's podcasts are excellently produced and eminently worth your time, but this one is my personal favorite on the platform.
…And your bonus non-marketing (but fascinating) podcast:
Topics Covered: The invisible forces that shape our thoughts and interactions with the world and each other.
Sample Guests: A blind man who can ride a bike, a woman who can feel other people's pain.
Episode Length: 45 minutes
It's important for marketers to be aware of the wider world outside our bubble. For that purpose, I recommend Invisibilia. Hosts LuLu Miller, Alix Spiegel, and Hanna Rosin explore the invisible ways society, the environment, and our own bodies affect our decisions. It's a podcast that will challenge what you know about influence, free will, and much more. It may not be a marketing podcast, per se, but it's great for forcing your brain out of well-established ruts.
These are my picks for podcasts to make you a better marketer on your morning commute. What did I miss? Let me know in the comments.
Disclosure: LinkedIn Marketing is a TopRank Marketing client.
Are you one of the 40% of email marketers who don't segment their email campaigns? Since all ESP's have data collection functionality, customer data is abundantly available, and triggered emails are based on a basic level of segmentation already-that statistic seems out of place in 2016. There aren't many reasons still available for sending an entire database the same email.
Not segmenting an email campaign isn't marketing heresy, but the rewards of list segmentation outweigh not doing so. Personalized messages in the inbox drive 14% higher open rates and 63% better click performance. Even simple segmentation strategies can improve list performance, reducing inbox fatigue and unsubscribes.
Basic List Segmentation Strategies
Historically, list segmentation has been a manual process. Given the rate of adoption for email segmentation, it may still be predominantly manual. However, it is much easier these days to segment recipients directly in an ESP or related CRM. Basic recipient grouping approaches used to look like:
Recipient time zone-based deployment schedule
Active vs. inactive subscriber filtering
Open vs. click campaign activity
Subscription preference at sign-up
Sign-up date-based trigger
Moving Beyond Static Messages
Email is evolving past one-time deployments and monthly newsletters. Traditional marketing approaches have become less effective in highly competitive industries. Inboxes are filling up with more interactive messaging during the customer life cycle, and personalization is a key differentiator. Contextual email is replacing traditionally static templates with dynamically chosen content.
What is Contextual Email Marketing?
Contextual email marketing is data-driven personalization delivered at the moment-of-open. Meaning, as the recipient opens the email, the template populates with the most relevant content based on real-time variables. Content is pulled from custom feeds, social networks, and websites; or delivered using methods like timers, custom image display, and video.
Now, email can stay up-to-date with peripheral marketing efforts and customer journey data in the inbox. Long-term campaigns can be fitted with moment-of-open technology, extending content life and engagement. Both, marketing and transactional email campaigns can benefit from real-time email technology.
How does Moment-of-Open Technology Work?
Recipient details dictate what displays in the email at the time of open. Real-time technology can detect that information instantly from the recipient device. Location, time, weather, device type, operating system, as well as predefined data are used to construct hyper-personalized emails as they render. Every email deployed showcases different content, based on the recipient's unique information.
Advanced applications automatically use moment-of-open data to decide what type of media to deliver to each email provider. Ensuring the inbox experience for the recipient renders properly to deliver the message. An example of this could be the detection of an email client for video in email delivery. Depending on the client at the moment-of-open, different types of static, animated, or embedded video options can be displayed on the fly according to the inbox functionality requirements.
Segmentation Automation with Real Time Data
Automated segmentation improves email diversity without creating the need for additional templates, deployment schedules, or peripheral data selections. The use of behavioral data, moment-of-open data, and CRM data allow for segmentation after the send versus before-the-send list groupings. Essentially, a batch and blast email marketer could scale email personalization across their entire list with one real-time email template.
Real-time email technology enables rapid personalization, at scale, with minimal development resources. Smaller email departments can reach large audiences effectively without extra templates, lists, deployment scheduling bogging them down. Larger email departments can utilize real-time email technology across all campaigns for better content engagement, lowering department overhead, and strengthening email revenue.
If you have yet to segment your email campaigns you should definitely download Email Deliverability Modern Marketing Guide now. You'll gain proven strategies, best practices, and help to improve your email campaigns.
The recent vote for Britain to depart the European Union came with a tall side order of hate, racism, and fear. Your first reaction will probably mirror mine: deplorable. And it is. But there's more to it.
Hate Comes From Fear
This kind of hate, anyway, is the stuff of fear. The people most affected by any economic or political changes are those who are struggling to survive. No matter what the change is, it hits those who are the least stable in their lives and situations. When you see lots and lots of reports of people in Britain shouting “Go back to Poland,” my guess is that it comes from people who aren't getting enough to eat, or who have to decide whether to pay for medicine or heat.
Every SEO, webmaster, and digital marketer has a powerful tool at their disposal.
I would go so far as to say that this tool is a must-have. You can't do SEO without it.
What is this powerful tool?
It's Google Search Console, or GSC for short (former Google Webmaster Tools, or GWT).
GSC is a free service provided by Google to manage your website's search functionality. The search console is a collection of reports and tools that help you rectify errors as well as strategize and optimize your search engine rankings.
I want to show you exactly how you can use this powerful tool to improve your SEO.
Putting it bluntly, GSC is to SEO what oxygen is to humans. You need it. Your site can't live without it.
The article you're about to read will put you in a graduate-level intensive study of GSC. Once you understand the information shared here, you'll become a GSC ninja.
And it's going to make a huge difference in your SEO.
First, let me give you a quick overview. The article is pretty long, so you'll want to set aside a good half an hour to read it.
The article is divided into sections and subsections, based on the the GSC menu:
I'll give most of my attention to the first four sections: Parts A through D. Parts E and F are important but mostly self-explanatory.
Part A: Search Appearance
The Search Appearance section helps you visualize what your website would look like in the search results.
Please be aware that there are many code snippets such as rich cards, rich snippets, and different types of framework such as Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) as well as the usual HTML corrections that can help your website stand out and look ultra informative in search results.
Here is what each element in this section represents and how you should use it to your search advantage.
(a) Structured Data
Structured data (in the form of rich snippets), when programmed into the HTML code, marks up your content so that Google can categorize and index it better. Google uses it to serve up “rich” results.
SERP results that look like this are using structured data:
I searched for “blackberry sauce” on Google.
The image above contains the first four results.
Look at the results carefully. Two results, 3 and 4, look “richer” because they contain ratings, votes, and reviews. The fourth result even displays the calorie information.
Which result would you be tempted to click on? It depends on what you're looking for, of course, but I headed straight for results 3 and 4.
Why? Because the rich results told me that the site would not only help me learn how to make blackberry sauce but also provide reviews from people who have made it before.
Plus, I know how long it will take me to make it. I can also have the confidence that other people did it and liked it. And I can even find out how many calories I'll be consuming when I eat it.
See the power?
Visually, rich results will help you bring in the traffic.
Currently, Google supports rich snippets for the following:
Articles (AMP-only, I'll get to this later)
Local Businesses
Music
Recipes
Reviews
TV & Movies and Videos.
That may not seem like a huge list, but you'd be surprised to see how much rich information you can add to your site.
It makes a huge difference!
How to leverage Structured Data for SEO: Ask your developer to build rich snippets into all of the mentioned features available on your website. Ask them to refer to Schema.org for code snippets and help.
How does the GSC > Search Appearance > Structured Data section help?
It tells you where you have gone wrong with your rich snippets coding and provides you with a tool that helps you test live data (see the blue button in the image below).
(b) Rich Cards
Rich Cards are a new invention by Google. They work like Structured Data (see (a) above in case you haven't been paying attention) but are visually more appealing. Check this image out to learn the difference between rich snippets and rich cards:
When your content is visually appealing, it may translate to heavy user engagement, thereby increasing your traffic and sales. Google currently allows users to deploy rich cards for Recipes and Movies.
How to leverage Rich Cards for SEO: As in the case with rich snippets, ask your developer to build rich snippets into either recipes or movie information, if you host such information. Refer this page for sample code snippets.
How does the GSC > Search Appearance > Rich Cards section help?
It tells you where you have gone wrong with your rich cards coding and informs you how many cards you can enhance. Like in the rich snippets section, Google equips you with a tool that helps you test live data.
The Data Highlighter is an excellent substitute for Structured Data, and you don't need a developer to write the code snippets in your HTML.
It marks up the same content that Structured Data does.
That being said, this tool has limitations. You have to write the tags individually per URL. Basically, if you have thousands of pages on your website, it can be a pain.
How to leverage Rich Cards for SEO
Click on “Start Highlighting.” A pop-up will appear.
Enter your URL, and choose the data you want to highlight (articles, events, reviews, local business, movies, products, restaurants, TV shows, etc.).
Once you've made your selection, Google will render the page in GSC and allow you to highlight the relevant data.
You now have to select the text or images per page that you want to highlight. You can highlight titles, images, category, and ratings.
Google will then prompt you to highlight data in other pages as well and help create page sets.
Here's a helpful video for a tutorial on this feature:
(d) HTML Improvements
HTML improvements is a report that reveals any problem areas that Google has discovered while crawling/indexing your site.
Here is a list of issues that may surface in this report:
Duplicate/long/short meta descriptions
Missing/duplicate/long/short title tags
Content non-indexable by Google
How to leverage HTML Improvements Report for SEO:
It's simple. Just fix the problem areas that Google has reported.
Here are some basic SEO rules that you may already be aware of:
Ensure titles are up to 70 characters long (or up to 612 pixels in width).
Ensure descriptions are about 160-165 characters.
Each page must be supported by a unique title and description.
Google should be able to crawl all pages you want to rank in SERPs. Ensure that critical content is not blocked by robots.txt or .htaccess files.
(e) Sitelinks
Sitelinks are automatically generated by Google. You can't necessarily change these because Google uses its algorithm to decide when and how to display them.
Accelerated Mobile Pages is a technique that allows developers to build fast-loading HTML and JS pages. It is based on open source specifications.
The idea behind AMP HTML is to make web pages render quickly on mobile devices. The number of people using their mobile devices to browse the Internet is growing exponentially. Google introduced AMP HTML to help website owners remove any pages loading sluggishly for mobile devices.
How to leverage AMP for SEO:
Embrace the technology. Ask your developer to get up to speed on AMP, and then convert your regular HTML into AMP HTML.
This section digs deeper into your rankings and reports on links to your site, how your keywords are ranking, penalties imposed by Google, mobile-friendliness, etc.
There's a lot in this section. I consider it to be the most valuable section of GSC for SEO actionable data.
(a) Search Analytics Report
The report digs deep into your site and shows you how often the site showed up in search results.
The report even displays clicks per keyword, how each keyword ranked geographically, its click-through ratio, and more. Here's an image with each category broken down into parts and how you should leverage each feature or filter to improve your SEO:
The number of clicks per keyword. This helps you learn how each keyword ranks in the search results and how many clicks it received. You can build backlinks, add/optimize content, or create specific landing pages to increase the number of clicks per keyword.
The total number of impressions per keyword. This helps you understand how users interacted with a keyword. For example, a high number of impressions and a low number of clicks implies that your page title or description is not well written or that you have not built in rich snippets.
CTR (click-through ratio) is reported as a percentage. It is basically the CTR:Impressions ratio expressed as a percentage.
Checking the Position box tells you the search position per keyword. For example, position # 120 implies that ? particular keyword landed on Google SERP #12. You can then optimize keywords and pages based on the keywords you want to rank higher.
The Queries filter helps you search specific keywords from within the results, check how one keyword compares with another, and sort the keywords. The filter tool gives you a deeper insight into each keyword. Use this filter to drill down into the keywords and improve the performance of those that already rank high.
The Pages filter helps you filter URLs, compare one page with another (excellent for A/B split testing), and sort out pages in terms of clicks. Use this feature to figure out your top, middle, and worst performing pages, and then deploy SEO to improve their rankings.
The Countries filter comes into play if you are targeting a global audience. I've experimented with this, translating the Quick Sprout blog into 82 languages, and have seen some amazing results. This filter helps you filter your site performance by country and compare site rankings between two countries.
The Devices filter shows you the devices, including desktop, tablet, and mobile, used to access your site. You can compare search figures between the devices to get advanced insights. Use this filter to optimize your site for devices often used to access your website. For example, if mobile devices make up most of your searches, you can focus on improving your mobile user experience and creating faster loading pages.
The Search Type filter reports the volume of searches for web, images, and videos. Let's say you own an art gallery but are ranking low for image searches. You can then optimize your alt tags and image titles to help improve your image search rankings.
The Dates filter helps you set up a date range. You can compare site performance between two date ranges, just as you would do in Google Analytics.
(b) Links to your Site
This section reports the websites that link to your URLs and the keywords used by most backlinks.
You can gain a lot of valuable insights from this report.
Here are the two biggest takeaways:
You'll know whether you should be disavowing backlinks that look suspicious (pharma or drug enhancement sites, adult themed websites, foreign language sites, PBNs, thin content sites, link farms, unrelated spammy sites, and other sites that practice black-hat SEO).
You'll get a good perspective on who is linking to you and what they're linking to. This information can help you increase the number and quality of backlinks by targeting similar sites or by increasing engagement/advertising on the sites that already link to you the most.
(c) Internal Links
This section reports on the number of internal links pointing to a page.
Here's how you can use this report in SEO:
Many internal links to a web page inform Google that this is an important page. As a result, that page should rank higher than other pages for keywords present on that page.
You should focus on building internal links to important pages that do not have any or many internal links pointing to them. Avoid sending all your links to the “about” or “contact us” page. Instead, use internal links to strengthen your deep internal pages, such as content-rich articles or information pages.
Pages that have internal links pointing to them, but have been deleted or renamed, should be identified and redirected (using 301 redirects).
(d) Manual Actions
This report informs you when Google penalizes your site for any spam or black-hat techniques.
Keep in mind that a “manual action” is different from an algorithmic penalty. Algorithm penalties are automatic and will not be reflected in this section. Manual penalties, on the other hand, are more severe and require you to take extensive action.
After fixing the reported issues and ensuring your site contains meaningful content, you must file a reconsideration request to get your site ranking back in the SERPs.
This section is applicable only if your website serves translated/modified-for-a-country or regional content for users in different geographies beyond your main location.
For example, if your website attracts viewers from the UK, you may want to present a UK-English version to visitors from that area.
Or if you sell to customers from France and Germany, you should translate your website into those languages for better targeting.
In such cases, your web developer will employ the hreflang tag to inform Google to serve the appropriate page according to geography.
This GSC section reports on the accuracy of your hreflang tags. This information can help you fix and optimize your coding.
(f) Mobile Usability
This report lists problems that might be keeping your website from delivering a positive web experience on mobile devices.
Google reports on elements that are too close together, content that is wider than the screen, content for which the viewport is not set, and other places where the text is too small to read.
Everything in this report matters. Mobile optimization is a significant ranking factor, and your website needs to be totally up to par.
For SEO purposes, fix all the issues reported, and make sure that your website delivers a great experience on every device.
Part C: Google Index
This section reports on how Google is crawling and indexing your website and keywords.
(a) Index Status
The indexation status displays the URLs indexed by Google, blocked URLs (by your robots.txt) and any URLs that have been removed.
If you come across pages that are not indexed or blocked, you can find out what's happening on your end and correct the errors.
If there are any indexation issues, you may want to examine your robots.txt file or look into the accuracy of your sitemap.
(b) Content Keywords
This section reports on the keywords in your content and their significance in search results.
Drilling down into each keyword will help you understand the top pages where that particular keyword or its variants are situated.
The report helps you understand the keywords and pages that are not ranking well. Such reports help you optimize your content by introducing keywords and variants in the title, headers, alt tags, on page SEO, tags, and content.
(c) Blocked Resources
Google needs complete access to your javascript, CSS, JQuery, image files, etc., in order to index and render your pages correctly.
If you block Google from accessing any of these resources either by disallowing access in your robots.txt file or by any other means, you will stop Google from indexing and rendering your pages to viewers.
This section informs you where the blocked resources are hosted.
Unblock whatever is necessary to enhance your search engine rankings.
(d) Remove URLs
Some areas of your website must be kept private and away from the prowling eyes of the search engines.
For example, you may want to prevent search engines from crawling your members' private data, third-party content, or content that is of no value to your viewers.
The tool in this section informs Google that its bot must not index such URLs. After filling in the “Temporarily Hide” field, you can specify whether you want to remove the URL from the cache or search results or both. You can even temporarily hide URLs and make them indexable later.
Removing URLs containing thin, valueless, and third party content can really improve your SEO, and blocking search engines from accessing your members' private data will help protect your brand.
Part D: Crawl
This section reports on Googlebot's website crawl rate, the errors it picked up, sitemap, robots, URL parameters, and the indispensable Fetch as Google tool.
(a) Crawl Errors
Here's what you'll see in this section:
the last date Google crawled your site
server errors (Request Timed Out or instances of your site blocking Google)
Soft 404 errors (the URL does not exist, but the server does NOT return a 404 page)
URL pointing to a nonexistent page
URLs that redirect to an irrelevant page
URLs that are blocked for Googlebot mobile
Fixing any errors will help improve your SEO.
(b) Crawl Stats
Crawl stats report on Googlebot's daily crawl on your website, pages crawled, kilobytes downloaded, and the time it took to download a page.
Not all of this information is actionable, but there are some things that you want to pay attention to.
As a whole, this report shows how active Googlebot is on your website and how heavy or light your pages are.
I'm assuming you have already used Page Speed Insights for tweaking your loading speed and are adding fresh and helpful content on a regular basis. If not, run your website through this test, and make any improvements that it recommends.
(c) Fetch as Google
The Fetch as Google tool allows you to test the way Google fetches your URL and renders it.
Here's how to use the Fetch as Google Tool:
Enter the URL you want Google to fetch.
The Fetch Button checks whether the URL connects and whether the tool encountered errors, redirects, or any security loopholes. It checks the code but does not render the page.
The Fetch and Render button fetches the page (and checks for all the issues mentioned above) and renders it.
You can fetch the page for Desktop, Smartphones/Handhelds and even check the Mobile XHTML/WML (older hypertextual computer languages for mobile). cHTML for mobile is mostly used on Japanese mobile phones, so you may not have to use this feature.
After you Fetch and Render a page, you should, if required, submit it to Google for indexation.
Google can return any of the following statuses:
Complete: Google successfully crawled your page.
Partial: Implies that you have blocked Google from accessing some of your coding resources such as Javascript or JQuery, etc. These should be unblocked; otherwise, Google cannot render your page correctly.
Redirected: You set up a redirect to another page (maybe because you may have deleted the page or some other reason).
Not Found: Google could not find the URL on the server.
Not Authorized: Google (and other viewers) have been blocked from accessing the URL.
Blocked: Your robots.txt blocks Google from accessing your URL.
Unreachable or Temporarily Unreachable: Google's request got timed out.
Error: Some error prevented Google from accessing the URL.
When should you use the Fetch as Google tool and resubmit pages for reindexation?
After fixing any of the statuses described above
After optimizing a page with copy, images, or videos
After adding a new category/sub-category to your site
Whenever you optimize your site for mobile (select the Fetch for Smartphones option)
When you change your sitemap.xml or your robots.txt files
When you set up 301 redirects
When you buy an SSL encryption, which changes your http into https
(d) Robots.txt Tester
The robots.txt file (domain.com/robots.txt) informs search engines about the pages they should crawl (and those they shouldn't).
When a crawl bot looks at this page, it will crawl anything that's not disallowed.
For example, you don't want search engines to view your CGI-BIN, admin login, Forgot Password, members' private data, and some other areas of your website.
The robots.txt Tester section tests your robots.txt file and reports errors and warnings. It also allows you to test pages to check for any blocking.
(e) Sitemaps
A sitemap.xml is a critical part of SEO. It informs search engines about the URLs on your site along with the date they were changed. It helps search engines crawl and index your URLs efficiently.
This section in GSC allows you to submit Sitemaps. It also informs you about the number of URLs that were submitted and indexed.
Essentially, the tool helps you fine-tune your sitemaps.xml file to ensure all your URLs are indexed.
(f) URL Parameters
Quick warning: Work on this section only if you know how to code. Otherwise, you should ask your web developer to handle it for you.
URL parameters are values that are dynamically entered per URL. For example, if you own a product website that sells globally, you may set a Country parameter that differentiates pages that should be served in different geographies.
This GSC section allows you to tell Google how to handle your URLs.
Like I said earlier, this is a technical area, so don't go near it without your web developer. Setting the wrong parameters can ruin your SEO.
Part E: Security Issues
Security issues are a big concern with nearly any website today.
Google takes the issue very seriously. You may have seen warning screens like this one:
Google also displays these warnings in the SERPs.
Sometimes, websites are flagged for phishing.
If your site has been compromised, hacked, or is simply vulnerable to hackers, you'll find out about it in this section.
If, on the other hand, you see this message, you're clean.
What if your site is hacked?
Check out this video.
Hacked sites can be costly to fix, both in time and money. Thankfully, Google has a helpful tutorial on the process, which you can explore here.
Here is the process summarized:
Part F: Other Resources
“Other Resources” is a collection of Google's tools, helpers, and testers.
Here is a list of all these pages as summarized in GSC:
Learn to create a great website with valuable content and have it findable in Google Search.
I consider all of these resources helpful but not essential.
Don't feel like you have to spend a lot of time on each of them. For example, if you're not selling any products on your website, then you have no need to check out “Google Merchant Center.”
Choose the ones that are most important to your business and SEO, and focus on those.
Here are my four main suggestions, in order of importance:
Pagespeed Insights: Use this tool to improve your site loading time, and make an instant improvement in SEO.
Google My Business: If you run a local brick-and-mortar shop, check this out. It's essential.
Structured Data Testing Tool and Structured Data Markup Helper: Once you've mastered the basics of SEO, move on to structured data to further enhance your website.
Webmaster Academy: You can never learn too much about SEO, right?
Conclusion
If you've read through this guide, you know more about GSC than most people on the planet. Even better, you can use this information to improve your SEO, your website, and your business.
GSC is a powerful tool, and the more you learn how to use it, the better an SEO you become. So what do you think, are you going to start using it to improve your rankings?
