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Your Go-To Content Optimization Checklist

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Content is the lifeblood of digital marketing. It attracts, engages, and persuades, eventually turning prospects into loyal customers. Content optimization is the process of fine-tuning your content to make it more appealing and actionable. The goal is to improve not only the content’s search engine discoverability, but also its potential for engagement and conversion. 

Below we explore the ultimate content optimization checklist for boosting your marketing performance. These steps go hand in hand with the content tips outlined in our Conversion Rate Optimization guide.

How Content Optimization Works

To drive user engagement, content is optimized to resonate with the audience, cater to their needs, spark interest, and motivate them to act. In fact, you’ll appreciate that user experience is a priority right from the top. Content optimization begins with comprehending your audience and their needs, with keyword research providing insights into their interests.

This is the data that guides the subsequent content creation process. Our content optimization checklist will help you draft high-quality copy that is not only compelling, but also structured for easy readability and navigation. 

That’s not to say that content optimization ends when you publish the pieces. As you’ll learn from our content optimization checklist, this is a continuous engagement that demands constant monitoring and fine-tuning of your copy. You’ll be using tools like Google Analytics to track the performance of your content and identify possible areas for improvement. 

The Content Optimization Checklist

A content optimization checklist outlines the roadmap that you’ll use to maximize your content’s search engine visibility and user engagement. It smoothly integrates into your marketing processes, where it shapes your content creation from both a technical and strategic standpoint.

For instance, in our content optimization checklist, you’ll find a methodical blueprint for keyword research. This is what shows you how to center your content around the terms that resonate with your audience’s searches. 

The checklist also emphasizes content quality. It details the technical procedures for not just creating engaging content but also delivering value to your audience.

Our content optimization checklist additionally comes with guidelines for enhancing the user experience. You can follow them to simplify the navigation and keep your content easily readable. Mobile optimization is another focal point of the checklist, as it ensures that your content is readily accessible and perfectly modeled for mobile screens. 

You even get a roadmap for distributing content to the largest possible audience. Then to top it all off, the checklist integrates monitoring and analysis schedules, which should help you in tracking your content’s performance. 

Keyword Research and Usage

Keyword research is the foundation of content optimization, as it uncovers the keywords that your audience has been using to scan through the web for information, products, or services in your niche. You’ll get clarity on your audience’s interests, queries, and linguistic preferences, along with keywords your competitors are exploiting.

Some of the tools that you could use for the job include Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs Keyword Generator, Moz Keyword Explorer, or the SEMrush Keyword Magic Tool. These tools generate and assess keyword ideas based on search volume, difficulty, intent, and relevance.

Once you’ve identified keywords, here’s how you should integrate them into the content page for maximum impact:

  • Start incorporating your primary keyword early in your content, preferably within the first 100 words. 
  • Use the keywords in your content titles, headings, body text, meta tags, and URLs.
  • Pay attention to the questions prospective buyers are asking on social media and create content around them.
  • Avoid keyword stuffing; place keywords within the natural flow of the content. 
  • Use long-tail keywords to target variations on popular searches.
  • Regularly update your keyword strategy based on current trends and audience interests.
  • Avoid targeting the same keyword on multiple pages to prevent keyword cannibalization.
  • Insert Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) keywords in your content to help Google understand the context.
  • Keep the URLs short, descriptive, and include your target keywords.
  • Optimize your content for voice search by incorporating conversational keywords and questions.

Quality of Content

For easy readability, your content should maintain clear and concise language, employ active voice and second-person perspective, plus infuse storytelling and emotional appeal, all while avoiding grammatical and spelling errors. 

You might also want to make the text scannable by partitioning it with images, videos, charts, headings, subheadings, bullet points, and lists.

Here’s are some guidelines to keep in mind: 

  • Use tools like Grammarly, Hemingway Editor, or Yoast SEO to check and improve your content readability.
  • Use original research and data to add credibility to your content.
  • Align the content with your brand’s voice and style guidelines.
  • Use canonical tags to prevent duplicate content issues by specifying the “preferred” version of a page.
  • Structure content with header tags (H1, H2, etc.)
  • Make the content long enough to provide detailed information, but not so extended that it becomes boring.
  • Regularly audit your content and remove or update any outdated or low-quality content.

User Experience

Quality content is a critically important part of a seamless and enjoyable on-site experience for your users, enticing them to engage with your brand and ultimately convert.

Here are page design optimization guidelines to provide a great user experience:

  • Simplify navigation with clear menus and links that guide users to the information they’re looking for.
  • Keep important pages three or fewer clicks away from the homepage.
  • Accelerate page loading speeds by optimizing your images, skimming the code, and leveraging a Content Delivery Network (CDN).
  • Make the site accessible to people with disabilities. Use alt text with your images, attach transcripts to videos, and facilitate keyboard navigation. 
  • Use clear calls to action to guide users toward desired actions.
  • Capitalize on white space to cut down on avoid clutter and improve readability.
  • Implement structured data (Schema.org) to help search engines understand your content.
  • Optimize images with descriptive file names, alt tags, and compression.
  • Regularly check for and fix broken internal and external links.
  • Integrate breadcrumbs for easier navigation.
  • Set up a search function for convenient access to information.
  • Avoid using intrusive pop-ups or ads.

Mobile Optimization

The point of mobile optimization is to make the on-site experience seamless for mobile users. This is especially critical at a time when mobile accounts for close to 60% of website traffic.

Mobile users need a highly responsive website layout that automatically adjusts to fit the device’s screen size. With a responsive site design in place, make sure you address these other content optimization guidelines for mobile:

  • Optimize images, minify code, leverage browser caching, and reduce redirects to increase your mobile site’s loading speed.
  • Use larger font sizes, shorter paragraphs, and bullet points to make your content easily readable on a small screen. For even better legibility, try to increase the contrast between your text and background.
  • Maintain a touch-friendly design on all elements of your website – including menus, forms, and buttons. 
  • Since Flash isn’t supported on many mobile devices, use HTML5 for animations. 
  • Use Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test tool to be sure your website is mobile-friendly.
  • Implement Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) for mobile speed optimization.
  • Use a viewport meta tag to control the layout on mobile browsers.

Content Promotion and Distribution

The creation of high-quality, optimized content is only half the battle. The other half lies in getting this content in front of the right eyes. 

For the best possible reach, we’d advise you to distribute it using an omnichannel content promotion strategy. You should especially prioritize social media, email, and guest blogging. 

With email marketing, you get a direct line of communication with your audience. And when you send out those emails, you can expect an open rate of between 30-40% – with the bulk coming from engaged leads. You can even engage email conversion optimization techniques to drive sales directly from your automated messages. 

Some of the content promotion guidelines to keep in mind here are:

  • Highlight new posts or videos in your email signature to encourage people to check them out.
  • Personalize your emails to make the content more relevant and engaging for each subscriber.
  • Segment your email list based on subscriber interests, behavior, or demographics to deliver more targeted content.
  • Use A/B testing to optimize various email elements – like the call-to-action, layout, or delivery time.
  • Include clear and compelling calls-to-action in your emails to guide subscribers on what to do next.
  • Regularly clean your email list by removing inactive subscribers to maintain high deliverability rates.

Social media, on the other hand, offers a broader audience and more potential for engagement. The platforms to prioritize are Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and TikTok. 

While you’re at it, you should follow these principles:

  • Collaborate with influencers and other complementary businesses to promote your content.
  • Employ paid advertising to boost your content’s reach.
  • Regularly share and promote your old content.
  • Include social sharing buttons to encourage users to share your content.
  • Repurpose your content across different mediums. For example, a podcast episode could become a blog post, or key points from a blog post could inspire a series of tweets.

For collaborations with other publishers, the best content promotion channel would be guest blogging. It gives you the privilege of tapping into other websites’ audiences through content features. 

For the best outcome consider:

  • Using content syndication to reach a wider audience.
  • Repurposing your content into different formats like videos, infographics, podcasts, etc.
  • Creating a content calendar to plan your content promotion activities.
  • Identifying relevant blogs in your industry that accept guest posts.
  • Writing compelling pitches to external publishers, with each outlining your content idea and why it would be valuable to their audience.
  • Avoiding promotional or salesy content in your guest post.

Monitoring and Analysis

The final step in the content optimization process is monitoring and analysis. This is where you track the performance of your content to understand what’s working and areas that need improvement.

The likes of Google Analytics are equipped to generate detailed reports on a wide range of content engagement parameters. They show you which pages are attracting traffic, how long visitors are staying, and what actions they’re taking.

Here are some of the performance metrics that you should pay special attention to:

  • Pageviews: The total number of pages viewed. 
  • Unique Pageviews: The number of sessions during which the specified page was viewed at least once.
  • Bounce Rate: The percentage of single-page visits.
  • Exit Rate: The percentage of exits from your site that occurred out of the total pageviews.
  • Average Time on Page: The average amount of time users spend viewing a specific page or screen.

Start Optimizing Your Content for Better Marketing Today!

As you can see, content optimization is an end-to-end process that encompasses the entire creative workflow – from keyword research to content distribution and performance analysis. With the content optimization checklist, you’ll find it easier to not just coordinate every step, but also compose original content that resonates with your audience and achieves your marketing objectives. 

If all this sounds like a lot of work, it is. If you don’t have the time or the expertise to optimize your content, the experts at Globe Runner can help. We can fine tune your content and ensure you are making the most out of every visit to your website. Place your content optimization request today!

The Ultimate Guide to Link Building for Marketing Success

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What is Link Building?

In its most basic form, link building is the process of acquiring hyperlinks from other websites to your own. 

It’s considered to be one of the key pillars of SEO success, a fact that Google’s Andrey Lipattsev himself confirmed in a web seminar. The Search Quality Senior Strategist at Google revealed that links, content, and RankBrain are the top three ranking signals in Google’s search algorithm.

But, that’s not all there is to link building. You see, links are like the digital version of word-of-mouth marketing. Building them not only boosts your SEO, but also spreads brand awareness, attracts referral traffic, and establishes industry credibility.

Make no mistake about it, though. Link building is not as simple as scattering hyperlink breadcrumbs across the web. The most impactful links are those that are relevant, high-quality, and organically integrated. Such links are not forcibly embedded or purchased – rather, they’re earned based on the value of your content and the relationships you’ve nurtured.

This guide explains exactly how you can achieve these valuable links. Read on to discover the best SEO linking strategies to include in your digital marketing plan, the benefits they bring to your marketing efforts, plus the common mistakes to avoid. 

And to help you make sense of it all, let’s start with the basics of link building. This is where we go into the detail of what is link building, and the role that quality link building plays in SEO. 

Understanding the Basics of Link Building

Links come in two principal flavors – internal and external. 

Internal links are the ones that connect pages within the same domain. Their job is to help visitors navigate your website. They direct them from one piece of content to another in a logical and intuitive way.

External links, on the other hand, connect other domains to your website. They’re otherwise known as backlinks or incoming links, and their role is to point out references. Whenever a website publishes your backlink, they’re basically identifying your website as the go-to authority on the subject matter. 

Search engines like Google view these backlinks as votes of confidence. They interpret each as a sign that the link destination page has been vetted and qualified as a credible reference.  It’s a bit like being the popular kid in school. The more people like you (or in this case, link to you), the more visibility and recognition you get.

Link Signals and How They Influence SEO

In the context of SEO, link building is not about who can make the most moves, but rather who can execute each move with precision and grace.  Each backlink you acquire sends a distinct set of signals to search engines. The signals are then evaluated separately, and the SEO weight of each backlink is ultimately calculated based on a range of factors. 

Search engine algorithms typically consider factors such as:

  • Link Quantity: Search engines calculate the number of links pointing to a website and then interpret the total volume as an indication of its popularity and trustworthiness. Building more links may therefore have a positive influence on your SEO. 
  • Link Quality: The quality of the backlink matters just as much, if not more, than the quantity. Quality links are identified by evaluating the history of the linking domain, the relevance of the linking page, and the credibility of the linking source. High-quality links from authoritative and contextually-related websites are the ones that pack the strongest SEO punch.
  • Anchor Text: Anchor text, which is the clickable text in a hyperlink, helps search engines understand the context of the destination page. But, while optimizing anchor text with relevant keywords can boost the SEO value of the target page, overdoing it may raise red flags.
  • Link Diversity: A diverse link profile – with links coming from varied domains, IP addresses, and website types – is a boon for SEO. It represents a natural link-building pattern, thus minimizing the risk of being marked for shady “black hat” link-building tactics. 

To improve search engine rankings you want links that are: 

  • High-quality, relevant, and natural.
  • Anchored to contextual keywords. 
  • Diverse. 
  • Plentiful. 

Types of Links: Natural, Manual, and Self-Created

Now that you can answer the question “what is link building?” let’s review the three types of links you can pursue:

  • Natural Links: These are the backlinks you earn from other websites without any direct solicitation. You can build them by creating authoritative content that’s worth linking to. 
  • Manual Links: These are the links you actively seek out through outreach efforts. You could, for instance, collaborate with industry bloggers, influencers, or journalists on link exchange programs. 
  • Self-Created Links: Also known as non-editorial links, self-created links are built by website owners in an attempt to trick search engines. They are often integrated into blog comments, press releases, guest posts, advertorials, and infographics. 

Benefits of Link Building for Marketing

Whereas link building is often associated with SEO, it’s one of those digital marketing strategies that have multiple benefits.  Here are some of the positive impacts link building has on a website:

#1. Improves Organic Search Rankings

Securing quality backlinks from authoritative websites is like getting a vote of confidence in your industry. Search engines interpret such links as indicators of your site’s credibility and relevance, thereby elevating your organic search rankings.

Through this entire journey, anchor text provides search engines with context about your page. You can thus optimize hyperlinks with relevant keywords to enhance the SEO value of your page.

#2. Increases Website Traffic and Referrals

Once you’ve published a permanent backlink on an authoritative site, you stand to attract a steady stream of referral traffic. And unlike traditional advertising campaigns that cease to generate traffic once they end, high-quality backlinks can maintain a continuous flow of traffic from external sources.

Other than that, link building can drastically boost website visibility and exposure. As your site rises in search engine rankings, it pulls in more potential customers – translating to increased sales and revenue.

#3. Reinforces Brand Authority and Credibility

Google is not the only entity that recognizes endorsements from quality SEO linking. The links influence others as well. 

Whenever they come across your backlinks on authoritative platforms, web visitors begin to associate your brand with trustworthiness and reliability. This positive perception may then accelerate your engagement, conversions, and customer loyalty – further cementing your brand’s market dominance. 

#4. Expands Online Visibility and Reach

Link building can also significantly amplify your brand’s online visibility and reach. 

It turns out that the more your site is linked to on other sites, the more likely you are to attract additional links and traffic. This has a cascading effect, where increased visibility triggers even more page views, which can lead to exponential business growth.

The same link-building has the potential to generate opportunities for guest blogging, speaking engagements, or media coverage – all of which you could leverage for additional online visibility. Then if you manage to get your links published by websites that have a strong social media presence, your content will be shared widely with a large audience.

#5. Grows Conversions and Sales

As quality SEO linking propels your site higher in the search results, it’s expected to attract more potential customers – which should ultimately translate to increased sales and revenue.

You’ll also be seeing more conversions coming your way by virtue of being a leader in your industry. Customers find it easy to trust authoritative brands, a position that you’ll get through sustained link building. 

Strategies and Techniques for Effective Link Building

Over the past two decades, link building has transitioned from an anything goes proposition to a methodology focused on earning links via high-quality content and strategic outreach.  

This drastic shift has made the process of link building a bit more challenging. But then again, its exclusivity has turned it into an even more powerful tool for enhancing your website’s visibility, credibility, and organic reach. You just need to set yourself apart with the right strategies and techniques, explored below. 

Creating High-Quality, Relevant Content

What is link building without content?

The cornerstone of any successful link building strategy is high-quality content. This is the bait that lures other websites and convinces them to link to your own. And to be specific, the biggest magnets for backlinks are those exceptionally insightful content pieces that are well-researched, highly engaging, and full of unique perspectives.

Such content usually resonates with the interests and necessities of the target audience. It addresses their concerns, proposes relevant solutions, and provides authentic value.

To discover the best content opportunities in your industry, you could bring in tools like Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, or Moz Keyword Explorer. They’ll reveal keywords that have a strong search volume but present low competition.

Then when it comes to writing, we’d advise you to conduct in-depth research on your chosen subject while verifying the accuracy of the insights. All your arguments should further be supported by credible sources, statistics, and examples. 

You might also want to incorporate well-structured headings, bullet points, and paragraphs for the sake of readability. Then to attract even more engagement, consider complementing the text with multimedia elements such as images, infographics, videos, or charts. 

When the content piece finally goes live, remember to promote it extensively for increased visibility. The more people it reaches, the more likely you are to attract natural links. So, you can go ahead and engage audiences through social media, email marketing, and content syndication, or maybe reach out to influencers, bloggers, and media publishers in your niche.

Leveraging Guest Blogging and Influencer Outreach

Guest blogging and influencer outreach are two other powerful strategies for link building. 

Guest blogging, for starters, entails creating and publishing content on other websites within your industry or niche. You could thus incorporate your backlinks into the text or author’s bio, and then get the articles published on authoritative websites for optimum gains in link juice.

Influencer outreach, on the other hand, tries to foster relationships with industry influencers, in the hope that partnering with them will earn you backlinks and increase brand visibility. 

If you choose to give it a try, your best growth chances would be with celebrated influencers who command a highly dedicated and engaged following. You could then get them to promote your stuff through sponsored content, reviews, or interviews. All the endorsements from such influencers will serve as social proof for your brand, potentially leading to improved visibility and organic backlinks.

In both guest blogging and influencer outreach, you should try to partner with authoritative entities that resonate with your target audience. So, take the time to investigate your options by their online presence, content quality, engagement rates, and audience demographics.  Tools like Ahrefs, Moz, BuzzSumo, or NinjaOutreach can help. 

Building Relationships and Networking

If you manage to establish genuine connections with website owners, bloggers, influencers, and industry professionals, they’ll provide you with valuable opportunities for backlinks, guest blogging, and collaborative content creation. 

These relationships are not just for the short term. By continually providing value and nurturing the connections, you could maintain all those link building partnerships for the long haul.  

The networks will even support you with content amplification. You could request them to share and promote your publications among their audiences – thereby sparking more visibility, organic backlinks, and social media engagement. 

To build such relationships, start by identifying thought leaders in areas that complement your specialties. You could even use social media platforms, industry forums, conferences, and tools like BuzzSumo or NinjaOutreach to discover them. 

Once you’ve identified potential contacts, use a calculated approach to get noticed and build rapport. Engage with them on social media platforms, leave thoughtful comments on their blog posts, share their content, and engage in meaningful conversations.

Remember, the key to building relationships is providing value. So, to capture authoritative prospects, you should always find mutually beneficial ways of collaborating.

Utilizing Social Media for Link Building

Social media platforms, with their multi-billion active users, present a vast avenue for expanding your link-building reach and content visibility.

You’ll find opportunities for fostering relationships and networking with industry professionals, influencers, and potential link partners. You can also leverage content amplification to boost discoverability and potentially attract natural backlinks from a wide audience.  

Now, to exploit social media for link building, begin by crafting high-quality, share-worthy content on your website. You can embed social sharing buttons on your website, as well as incorporate CTAs into your blog posts to motivate readers to share the content.  The featured post layout itself should be designed in a manner that teases audiences with visually captivating content snippets.

Earning Links through Public Relations and Press Releases

Use press releases to broadcast your brand’s noteworthy events, product launches, industry insights, or significant achievements. The idea here is to get the attention of news outlets and industry publications, in the hope that they’ll feature your story in the media. Every single time you’re published is basically an opportunity to boost your brand’s credibility and build high DA backlinks. 

By regularly sharing valuable and newsworthy information, your brand will progressively increase its odds of getting published. Your ever-growing presence could even pique the interest of journalists, bloggers, and influencers – who might then start to treat your brand as a reliable source of industry news. 

Do some research and generate a list of newsworthy items about your brand and industry including events, milestones, product introductions, and industry revelations, etc.  Next, find the best publishers to share them with. Find journalists, bloggers, and influencers who specialize in your industry. You’ll need someone with a large online presence, a highly engaged audience, and content that complements your published topics. 

Link Building Best Practices and Tips

Conduct Competitor Backlink Analysis

An analysis of your competitors’ backlinks may yield invaluable insights into their link building strategies – including link patterns, anchor text distribution, and the types of websites they target for backlinks. 

Such info can be a springboard for enhancing your own link building strategy. You might, for instance, discover types of content or topics that they’ve garnered backlinks from, identify content gaps, uncover unique perspectives, or brainstorm ways to refine publications on your website. 

You’ll find the data in the backlink analysis sections of SEO research tool suites like Ahrefs, SEMrush, Moz, or Majestic.

Avoid Black Hat Link Building Techniques

Although the prospect of quick wins may appear attractive, resorting to black hat techniques exposes your website to all sorts of penalties – which may ultimately lead to a drop in rankings, diminished visibility, or even removal from search engine results. 

Bouncing back from such penalties is anything but easy. And that’s if you even manage to recover in the first place. 

Some of the most common black hat stumbling blocks that you might want to avoid include: 

  • Link Farms: Link farms are networks of thin websites that have been built exclusively to host tons of low-quality links.
  • Paid Links: According to Google, paid links are those backlinks procured from third-party websites or link networks. Payment could be in monetary form or incentives. 
  • Private Blog Networks (PBNs): PBNs are networks of websites that exist solely to contribute backlinks to a central destination site.

Balance Between Do-Follow and No-Follow Links

To remain on the good side of search engines, you need to carefully engineer your backlink profile to appear 100% organic. You can start by building a diverse portfolio of both Do-Follow and No-Follow links. 

Do-follow links are the standard backlinks that search engines acknowledge and follow. carry “link juice” from the referring web page to the linked page, thereby influencing search engine rankings and domain authority.

No-follow links are the direct opposite of that. Designated with the rel=”nofollow” attribute, they instruct search engines not to transfer link equity. This is what you should use on user-generated content, sponsored links, affiliate links, and so forth. 

A healthy mix of do-follow and no-follow links suggests to search engines that your website is acquiring backlinks naturally, rather than resorting to manipulative tactics.

Measure Your Link Building Success

Link building, like any other marketing strategy, should be quantified and monitored consistently. The analytics will help you objectively measure performance, discern the strengths and weaknesses in your tactics, as well as refine your approach over time.

The best time to work out the specifics is before the actual campaign. You should come up with clear goals, and then use that to define the KPIs to track. The objectives could range from increasing organic search traffic, improving search engine rankings, and driving referral traffic, to enhancing brand visibility.

Tools like Majestic, Ahrefs, or Moz are your compass in that journey. They offer detailed backlink analytics, with which you can monitor the quantity, quality, and diversity of your backlink profile. Some of their key metrics include domain authority, page authority, anchor text distribution, and the number of referring domains. 

But remember, acquiring backlinks is not the end goal in link building. You should try to measure even the impact of those links. The likes of SEMrush, Moz, and Ahrefs already have a rank-tracking feature for that.

Google Search Console can otherwise offer invaluable data on the number of clicks, impressions, and click-through rates (CTRs) from your backlinks. You could then adjust your strategy to focus on sources that drive meaningful traffic.

Common Link Building Mistakes to Avoid

As you undertake link building efforts, avoid these common mistakes:

Over-Emphasizing Quantity over Quality

One common misconception is that more is always better. Its proponents try to acquire as many links as possible, with little regard for their quality or relevance. 

This approach has, however, been proven to be counterproductive – as it could potentially damage your website’s search engine rankings and overall reputation. The likes of Google nowadays pay more attention to quality indicators such as the authority of the linking site, the context of the link within the content, and link profile authenticity. 

Ignoring Relevance and Context of Links

Another common pitfall is neglecting the relevance and context of the links you acquire. Ideally, your backlinks should come from websites that are pertinent to your industry or topic. A lack of relevance could otherwise dilute the value of the link and potentially undermine your SEO efforts.

You can gauge relevance by examining the content surrounding the link, the anchor text used, and the overall topical alignment between the linking and target sites.

Relying Solely on Link Directories

Link directories, once a popular method for link building, have fallen out of favor due to their susceptibility to manipulation. Google’s Penguin algorithm update, for instance, penalizes websites that rely heavily on low-quality directories for link building.

Instead of putting all your eggs in the directory basket, diversify your approach. Focus on acquiring links from authoritative and relevant websites through outreach, content marketing, and relationship building. This strategy is more likely to produce sustainable, long-term benefits.

Neglecting the Importance of Internal Linking

It’s understandable to prioritize backlinks in link building efforts  – but not at the cost of internal links. 

When inbound links pull in the link juice, you’ll need internal links to pass on the flow of link equity and authority to other pages on your website. The same internal links guide web visitors to related content, while search engines rely on them to interpret the site’s structure and hierarchy.

Failing to Update and Maintain Existing Links

Links, like any other website asset, links require regular maintenance and updates. And that’s because URLs could change over time, pages may be restructured, or content edited. Some of these adjustments lead to broken or outdated links, which may then compromise SEO performance and user experience.

You should thus audit your links from time to time to confirm that they’re up to date. Tools like Ahrefs will even flag up your broken backlinks, upon which you could reach out to the affected publishers with an update request.

What is Link Building to You? 

Based on everything we’ve covered, it’s now confirmed that the traditional one-sentence definition of link building doesn’t fully capture its essence. This is what you should say instead if you’re ever asked “what is link building?” 

  • It’s a competitive edge: While many websites engage in link building, those that do it effectively gain a significant advantage in the increasingly competitive digital landscape.
  • It drives organic growth: As your link profile expands, so does your organic traffic. Each new link is a pathway for web users to discover your website, convert faster, and buy more. 
  • It’s a strategy for long-term success: Unlike some digital marketing tactics that offer quick but fleeting results, link building is a strategy designed for long-term success. The benefits of a well-executed link building campaign can last as long as the links themselves.
  • It’s a relationship builder: You get to build long-term relationships with other websites and influencers, which then facilitate increased collaboration.
  • It generates exponential success: The few who achieve success in link building get to experience a cascading effect of more success. The wider your link profile expands, the more prominent your brand grows – thereby attracting even more backlinks. 
  • It’s a continuous journey: Link building isn’t a one-time task but an ongoing process. As your website evolves and grows, so too should your link building efforts.

To you, link building is more than just a tactic for improving search engine rankings. This is a far-reaching strategy that can positively impact nearly every aspect of your digital presence.

With those numerous benefits, however, comes just as many demanding conditions. Link building has evolved into a sophisticated marketing strategy that requires calculated tactics, data-driven decisions, interpersonal interactions, and finesse in working around search engine algorithms. 

You could try your luck with these strategies, but as you can see, link building is complex and multi-layered.  If you don’t have the time or the inclination to undertake your own link-building campaign, you could simply partner with a dynamic digital marketing agency that understands all the nooks and crannies of link building.

Don’t let link-building inexperience or intimidation hold you back from the huge traffic and lead gains you could realize. Contact Globe Runner today for a no-obligation quote on link-building or our full suite of SEO services.

What is Remarketing?

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Remarketing might seem like a straightforward concept at first. However, as it turns out, it’s often understood and misunderstood in equal measure.

Those who truly understand it are seeing significant bottom-line growth from their remarketing efforts. And that’s because they take the time to carefully fine-tune its highly intricate campaign triggers. 

The ones who misinterpret it, however, are struggling to figure out the configurations. Many of them mistakenly assume that remarketing is only a matter of plugging in automated retargeting tools, and then leaving the solutions to chase down cart abandoners on their own.

Much of this confusion comes from Google itself. Even though the platform is a remarketing giant in its own right, it doesn’t explicitly differentiate its remarketing services from retargeting solutions. The terms have been used interchangeably within its tool suite, thereby throwing off even seasoned marketers on where to draw the line between the two strategies. 

Thankfully, that ends here. This guide explores all the essentials of remarketing, the best practices you should follow, plus the benefits you should expect. You also get to find out the differences between retargeting and remarketing, as well as the types of services that you should be getting from your remarketing agency. 

Why Use Remarketing?

Remarketing is a digital marketing approach that allows brands to reconnect with individuals who have previously engaged with their business app, website, or other digital assets. The engagement medium is usually digital advertising channels – such as display ads, search ads, social media ads, and email marketing.

People here become part of a campaign audience once they’ve connected with a brand and shown interest. They could be first-time visitors who dropped out after exploring various product options, consumers who abandoned their cart while shopping, prospects who failed to complete filling out their forms, repeat customers who might have an interest in product upgrades, etc. 

The primary goal of the campaign is to help businesses make a sale that they previously missed out on. If you take a look at your sales analytics, you’ll notice that out of the multitude of leads who regularly stream into your website, your conversion rate is probably in the low single digits.  

Remarketing tools are designed to re-engage with those who did not buy, in the hope of closing the deal. 

Remarketing campaigns also reach out even to the converted customers to maximize sales opportunities with them. Existing customers tend to convert at a much higher rate, with a remarkable 60% to 70% average conversion rate on subsequent purchases.

Remarketing uses deeply personalized dynamic ads to help you raise those stakes even further in your favor. You get to convert the target audiences so much faster by showing them precisely what they want even when they’re away from your site.  

Retargeting vs. Remarketing

Although often used interchangeably, “remarketing” and “retargeting” are not synonymous. They may be closely related all right, but there are several distinct differences that set them apart from each other. 

The Differences Between Retargeting and Remarketing

The primary differences between retargeting and remarketing lie in their target audiences, information collection methods, mode of targeting, and contact channels. 

Retargeting uses personalized ads to connect with website visitors who left without converting, whereas remarketing is a broad term that covers all the personalized campaigns that target people who’ve interacted with your brand at any level – they could be first-time buyers, repeat customers, qualified leads, or just random prospects. 

In essence, therefore, you could say that retargeting is a subcategory of remarketing. It represents only a fraction of the efforts – meaning that not all remarketing campaigns would qualify as retargeting strategies. 

Retargeting: A closer look

Retargeting deals with audiences who may not be very familiar with your brand. They’ve been to your website, and now an embedded tracking code – a pixel – has identified them as someone interested in your offerings. The pixel tracks them around the web while keeping tabs on their preferences and interests. All that info is combined and then used to personalize their targeted ads according to personal interests and web behavior. 

The resultant retargeting ads are typically distributed through display ad networks such as the Google Display Network and Facebook Audience Network – both of which have an extensive footprint that extends across millions of publisher websites and apps. This is how you get to reach audiences wherever they go on the web. 

Most of the individuals that you’ll be engaging with retargeting ads fall within the 96% share of unconverted website visitors. They are part of the bulk majority that are not ready to buy when they check into your website. 

Remarketing: A closer look

Remarketing, on the other hand, covers the entire spectrum of marketing efforts targeting all types of people who’ve interacted with your brand. It encompasses not just retargeting ads, but also other forms of targeted engagement strategies across various touch points along the customer journey.

The audiences here tend to be more familiar with the brand, as they’ve probably interacted with it multiple times. They range from serial site visitors, mailing list subscribers, past customers, blog subscribers, returning buyers, inactive leads, etc. Remarketing ads try to push all of them through the sales funnel and ultimately generate conversions. 

With well-crafted remarketing services, it shouldn’t take you long to generate results. Repeat customers, for instance, have shown that they not only convert quicker, but also spend more as time goes by.  In three years, they’ll be forking out 67% more than they did in their first 6 months. 

That said, it’s worth noting that email was the traditional delivery channel for all these marketing messages. But, over time, remarketing expanded to accommodate additional options – with the primary ones now being display ad networks, social media, and on-site messaging. Some businesses are even investing in advanced remarketing services that support omni channel campaigns. 

The customer information itself is obtained from all the data that your business has built up over time. You’ll be personalizing all the marketing messages using insights from your embedded website trackers, mailing list contact profiles, sales database, etc. 

Best Practices for Remarketing Services

How to Optimize Remarketing Campaigns for Success

To achieve and maintain highly successful remarketing campaigns, you should always apply these best practices; 

  • Segment your audiences: To enhance ad personalization and relevance, segment your audience according to their behavior, interests, and demographics. This allows you to target each group with custom-tailored ads. 
  • Set clear goals: Clearly outline your campaign objectives and goals. This could be anything, from enhancing conversion rates and elevating brand visibility to growing your inbound traffic.
  • Optimize ad creative: Remember to craft captivating advertisements that not only reflect your brand identity, but also resonate deeply with your intended audience. You can experiment with various ad formats, visuals, and messaging to establish the best balance of ad assets.
  • Leverage dynamic remarketing: Employ dynamic remarketing to automatically generate customized advertisements that reflect each recipient’s behavior, interests, location, device, and past interactions.
  • Regulate ad frequency: Don’t bombard your audience with excessive ads. You should, instead, avoid ad fatigue by regulating the frequency of ad displays
  • Test, measure, and optimize: Keep experimenting with various strategies, ad formats, and targeting alternatives to uncover the most effective approach for your remarketing campaigns. And while you’re at it, you should especially monitor your click-through rates (CTR), conversion rates, and the accompanying return on ad spend (ROAS) KPIs.

Conclusion

Remarketing isn’t just a matter of plugging in automated retargeting tools and then letting them run.  Successful remarketing campaigns implement a multi-faceted workflow that tracks visitors’ interactions within your website, segments audiences, and then uses the insights to define personalization triggers for your dynamic remarketing campaigns. 

But this is easier said than done, of course.  You’ll need to keep building, managing, coordinating, and tracking all those campaign parameters while, at the same time, configuring the corresponding automation sequences.

The good news is, you can save yourself all that headache by turning to professional teams like Globe Runner. We have expert strategists, marketers, designers, and copywriters, all of whom will work together to ensure that your retargeting ads are always aligned with your brand and the interests of the target audience. 

So advanced are our remarketing services, in fact, that we’ve been recognized as an official  Google Partner. This form of certification comes with exclusive access to Google’s tools and info – assets that could go a long way toward empowering your remarketing campaigns. 

Contact us today for a quote.  We’re ready to supercharge your conversions with our highly advanced remarketing services.  

What’s the Difference Between Shopify and WooCommerce?

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WooCommerce vs Shopify is a showdown between two popular ecommerce platforms that are so alike yet so different. 

On the similarities front, we can agree that both platforms happen to; 

  • Help SMBs and enterprises set up online stores. 
  • Provide built-in inventory management, marketing, SEO, payment, and order fulfillment features. 
  • Come with customizable website themes. 
  • Support a wide range of extensions. 
  • Facilitate code-based and non-code website building. 

Conversely, the differences between Shopify and WooCommerce are not as general. They only become apparent when you dive deeper and then closely juxtapose the intricacies between WooCommerce vs Shopify architectures. 

Now, that’s exactly what we’ll be doing for the next minute or so. You can go ahead and follow along as we explore all those finer features that make Shopify and WooCommerce so different from each other. By the time you’re done, you’ll have made an informed decision and settled for either WooCommerce or Shopify as the best ecommerce platform for your online store. 

Main Difference Between WooCommerce vs Shopify 

The primary difference between Shopify and WooCommerce lies in their structure. Shopify is an all-in-one, fully-hosted, closed-source ecommerce platform, while WooCommerce is a self-hosted open-source plugin for WordPress-powered online stores. 

“All-in-one” here means that Shopify is an end-to-end solution. In addition to ecommerce functionalities, you’ll get a site builder along with web hosting, domain registration, and technical maintenance services. 

WooCommerce, on the other hand, is offered as a free WordPress plugin. It’s only after you’ve installed it on the CMS that you’ll have access to its ecommerce functionalities. 

Navigating the Features: A Beginner’s Look at WooCommerce vs Shopify Ease of Use

Getting started

To use WooCommerce, you need to purchase a WordPress hosting package from a third-party web host. Then on installing WordPress, you can proceed to set up WooCommerce just like any other WordPress plugin. That’ll transform your CMS framework into an ecommerce platform, complete with store building, inventory management, and payment processing capabilities. 

WooCommerce itself is compatible with all the popular WordPress page builders. So, you should be able to visually design an online store using a drag-and-drop editor. 

But, that notwithstanding, WooCommerce’s biggest highlight is its open-source architecture. This is what gives WooCommerce developers the privilege to extensively customize the platform’s underlying source code. 

The same level of freedom applies even to scaling. You get to expand your store’s capabilities by integrating prebuilt plugins, setting up custom extensions, or upgrading your web server. 

Shopify, on the other hand, is not as technical. It is, instead, engineered to make your online business journey easier, more seamless, and less demanding. You’ll, for example, appreciate that the platform takes care of all the essential website services – such as web hosting, domain registration, web security certificates, and so forth. 

Even Shopify’s site builder itself is user-friendlier and more intuitive than WordPress page builders. But, you won’t have access to the underlying source code. Shopify developers only get to edit their theme code. 

Themes and customization

Speaking of themes, WooCommerce boasts an overwhelming array of prebuilt offerings – 73 free and paid options in the WooCommerce Theme Store, plus tens of thousands more from external marketplaces – and WordPress development specialists.

Shopify too comes with a theme store, which offers a collection of about 100 paid and free website templates. Users can otherwise import more from external marketplaces – but the options are not as many as WooCommerce’s. On the flip side, however, Shopify’s themes are easier to customize, even though the editing options are a bit restrictive. 

Plugins and integrations

The two ecommerce platforms are additionally accompanied by a series of prebuilt app integrations. But, just like website templates, the volume of options differs quite significantly between Shopify and WooCommerce. 

Shopify’s App Store holds over 8,000 free and paid applications, while WooCommerce is compatible with about 800 extensions from its Woo Marketplace, plus over 60,000 more from the WordPress plugin directory. This, of course, translates to more flexibility for WooCommerce users. 

Setting Up Your Online Store: A Side-by-Side Comparison of WooCommerce and Shopify

Inventory management

Both WooCommerce and Shopify have powerful inventory management capabilities. But, while Shopify tries to make the whole process seamless, WooCommerce is designed to offer you unlimited flexibility. 

Shopify comes with a very intuitive system for setting up products and services, as well as coordinating subsequent orders and customers. You should be able to add single and bulk records of orders and customers, track stock, automate purchase orders, generate revenue reports, and so forth. 

WooCommerce, on the other hand, is perfectly suited for businesses with large inventories. There are no restrictions on the product attributes, categories, and reports that you can create and manage. 

Marketing, SEO, and promotions

When it comes to marketing, the WooCommerce vs Shopify battle generates mixed results. WooCommerce is slightly superior in SEO capabilities, but then loses out to Shopify in conversion campaigns and overall simplicity. 

That’s not to say Shopify is poor in search engine optimization. Its default platform is optimized nearly as much as WooCommerce’s. Not only does it automatically generate XML sitemaps, but you also get a built-in blogging platform along with basic controls for tweaking on-page SEO settings – including title tags, meta descriptions, URLs, and alt text. 

The only problem is, Shopify’s URL structure is rather rigid and not as customizable as WooCommerce’s. At least on the WordPress ecommerce platform, you can alter anything and everything about your on-page SEO attributes. 

Shopify, however, makes up for that with built-in email marketing tools. You should be able to send out automated emails to engage leads, recover abandoned carts, retain customers, etc. WooCommerce only offers such capabilities through third-party email marketing plugins. 

Payment processing

Whereas WooCommerce vs Shopify match up on the list of payment gateway integrations, Shopify is the only one that comes with a built-in option. Shopify Payments is the name and it processes payments from credit cards and debit cards, as well as digital accounts such as PayPal, Amazon Pay, and Apple Pay. 

The only issue is, it only supports sellers from selected regions. And if you otherwise settle for an alternative payment gateway, Shopify will deduct extra fees above the standard transaction charges – unlike WooCommere, which lets you ride on your preferred third-party options without levying ‘penalties’. 

Difference Between Shopify and WooCommerce Costs

WooCommerce itself is a free open-source ecommerce platform – but, in the end, it might end up costing you way more than Shopify. The bills here begin with web hosting, after which you might have to hire a WooCommerce developer to customize the entire business ecosystem. WooCommerce themes and plugins will also cost you money, as many of the well-developed ones happen to be premium. 

In contrast, Shopify offers a fully-hosted platform under a structured pricing schedule. You could purchase Shopify Basic for $32 a month, Shipify for $92 a month, Shopify Advanced for $399 a month, or Shopify Plus for $2,000+ a month. 

Then since Shopify’s website builder is exceedingly easy to use, you won’t need any assistance from a web developer. Extra costs only arise if you choose to purchase a premium theme or app. 

Wrapping Up: Which is Better Between WooCommerce and Shopify? 

On comparing these differences between WooCommerce and Shopify, it’s safe to say that there’s no obvious winner in the WooCommerce vs Shopify comparison. Your choice between the two should rather be based on your technical skills, business needs, and online store capital. 

Solopreneurs and small businesses, for instance, would be better off with Shopify. It’s cheaper in the long run, easier to use, all-rounded, and allows them to set up fully provisioned omnichannel stores without any technical coding skills. 

Conversely, WooCommerce is best reserved for enterprises, as its open-source structure is flexible enough to accommodate their highly specialized business needs. 

Are you ready for GA4?

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Just when we had all gotten comfortable using Universal Analytics, Google Analytics 4 (GA4) was brought in to replace it. The switch itself is happening in three phases:

  • It began on October 14, 2020, when GA4 displaced Universal Analytics as the default platform on the Google Analytics website. 
  • The next milestone will be on July 1, 2023, when the new Google Analytics 4 will permanently cease supporting Universal Analytics properties. 
  • The sunset for Universal Analytics 360 will then follow a year later on July 1, 2024. 

This is no ordinary “system upgrade”, though. Google Analytics 4 is, rather, a complete overhaul of the previous generation of Analytics. It has changed the entire data tracking ecosystem, forcing Universal Analytics users to retrain themselves on leveraging the platform. They now have a ton more data and customization options to work with, which in turn makes the learning curve even steeper. 

That has, understandably, elicited mixed reactions from the business community. On the whole, however, the users of Google Analytics 4 are seeing positive results from the renewed digital analytics. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) from the platform are turning out to be exceedingly transformative to websites and apps. 

All that power is yours for the taking, as GA4 itself is completely free of charge. This guide will even provide you with the headstart needed to get it underway. By the time you’re done reading it, you’ll have understood not just the full potential of Google Analytics 4, but also how to set it up on your website or app.

What is Google Analytics 4?

Google Analytics 4, or GA4 in short, is the latest version of Google’s web analytics platform. And while previous generations provided data analytics for websites, GA4 is engineered to track both web and app properties. 

The tracking system here is not built on the same technologies as its predecessors. Google Analytics 4, instead, rides on a user-centric ecosystem that follows customers through their entire journey. You get to monitor not just your traffic metrics, but also the corresponding customer usage analytics. 

Google has also future-proofed GA4 by aligning its data tracking with the latest privacy laws, including CCPA and GDPR. Third-party cookies and identifiers have been replaced by first-party trackers, which only monitor user behavior and keep the users anonymous. Any arising data gaps are then filled by predictive analytics from sophisticated machine learning and statistical models. 

Setting up Google Analytics 4 for Your Website or App

Your GA4 setup options depend on the strategy that you’re currently running on Google’s Analytics platforms. 

If, for instance, your properties were added to the Google Analytics platform after October 14, 2020, you don’t need to take any additional steps. You’re already set, as GA4 has been the default solution all along. 

The exemption doesn’t extend to any properties configured before that October 2020 D-Day. Universal Analytics was the default option back then, and you can even confirm it for yourself by checking your property’s ID. If the number begins with “UA”, it means the property was built on Universal Analytics and is due for GA4 migration.  

In that case, you might want to create a new one on Google Analytics 4 and then link it with your existing Universal Analytics asset. The setup process itself is as follows: 

  • Go to analytics.google.com and log into your Google account. 
  • Once you’ve landed on the dashboard, proceed to the left navigation panel and click on Admin. This will take you to your admin settings. 
  • Under the Admin tab, you’ll see two sections – Account and Property. Go to the Property section and hit the Create Property button positioned at the top. 
  • Google will subsequently display a series of property setup prompts, which you should follow to add a new property to the account.  
  • After the property has been added, GA4 will list it in the Property column of the Admin Settings page. You can then click on the Setup Assistant to launch the setup wizard. 
  • It’s on that Setup Assistant wizard where you get to connect your new Google Analytics 4 deployment with your website or app. The button at the top links your GA4 property with its pre-existing Universal Analytics equivalent, the Data Collection subsection configures Google Analytics 4 into your website, while Property Settings offers controls for defining audience segments and KPIs. 

Understanding Key Features of Google Analytics 4

Google Analytics 4 is essentially a blend of privacy-centric tracking, cross-channel data metrics, and AI-driven predictive analytics. This is what ultimately generates in-depth insights into your customers’ journeys – from the moment they land on your website, through all their touchpoints, to the actions they might take in the future. 

Universal Analytics had some pretty decent analytics too. But, it only offered generalized traffic data, with page views being the primary Key Performance Indicator (KPI). Google Analytics 4, on the other hand, goes beyond the page views to highlight individual audience interactions. You should be able to generate reports on engagement time, engagement rate, engagement sessions, etc. 

Another thing that GA4 saves you is the trouble of piecing together measurements from Google Analytics for Firebase, Firebase Analytics, and Google Analytics for Apps. You no longer have to combine different data analytics tools to monitor multiple devices. Everything is now available on one centralized interface, courtesy of GA4’s cross-device tracking. 

What it logs as user behavior is progressively fed into its underlying machine-learning engine, which then uses artificial intelligence and statistical models to make predictions about future events. It’s from these reports that you get to find out your revenue forecast, churn probability, purchase probability, etc. 

As for the properties, Google Analytics 4 is flexible enough to accommodate both apps and web-based assets. You can set it to track up to 2,000 properties at once. The limit on the number of source properties is 50, each of which can be broken down into 400 sub-properties. 

Using Google Analytics 4 for Website & App Tracking

GA4 is your go-to all-in-one digital analytics solution when you need to quantify user interactions on your website or app. It can track both website and app properties separately or as continuous experiences. Then from the analytics, you should be able to figure out not just the traffic volume streaming in, but also how users are engaging with your websites and apps. 

All the interactions are measured as events. And they could be any type of user activity – from opening a web page, opting into a mailing list, or completing a purchase, to watching an in-app ad, running an app feature, or opening app messages. 

You could also use Google Analytics 4 to track events executed by the website or app. This is where you measure occurrences like app crashes, form displays, page redirects, etc. 

Overall, you’ll be tracking four types of events on your GA4 account: 

  • Automatically collected events: These are the events that are measured by default when you add your website or app property to Google Analytics 4. Examples include app updates, in-app purchases, app sessions, and page visits. 
  • Enhanced measurement events: These are the events that are tracked when you proceed to enable the enhanced measurement option. They include form interactions, file downloads, video engagement, site search, outbound clicks, page scrolls, and page views.
  • Recommended events: While the previous two categories are default options, recommended events are set up manually from a list of predefined references. 
  • Custom events: Custom events are configured entirely from scratch. But, you’ll need custom coding skills to proceed. 

Google Analytics 4 further allows you to mark specific events as conversions. And they don’t have to be sales instances – any important occurrence to your business should do. 

Each user’s interactions are eventually linked to form a continuous user experience funnel. You’ll be able to view all the touchpoints and engagements that individual buyers sailed through before converting. This includes the actions taken on both your website and app properties. 

To understand the users even better, you might want to separate them into segments. GA4 facilitates this by allowing you to define the audience conditions for each segment. You could, for instance, have a segment for users who’ve only interacted with your app, another one for PC-based visitors, plus maybe separate categories for first-time and returning customers.

Using Google Analytics 4 for Online Marketing

Now that third-party cookies are practically dead, Google Analytics 4 couldn’t have come at a better time. Cookie rejection rates have already reached 64% and still rising, yet marketers need them more than ever to cater to the growing demand for personalized experiences. 

GA4 has found a way around the problem, allowing marketers to track audiences without violating any data privacy laws. Instead of identifying users by their IP addresses, the platform uses privacy-centric approaches such as IP anonymization. ID values here are in the form of randomly generated strings that are linked to users’ browsers and devices. 

Otherwise, when the user ID is unavailable, the system relies on user info from Google signals. And in the rare occasions that the two identifiers are both missing, Google Analytics 4 turns to AI-driven statistical modeling. It basically uses machine learning to predict the attributes of an unidentified user based on the behaviors of similar users.  

The predictive analytics go on to enrich the user data you’ve been collecting from events, and the result is usually accurately-segmented audiences. This is what you ultimately leverage in your targeted digital marketing campaigns. 

If, for instance, you integrate Google Analytics 4 with Google Ads, you’ll find your custom segments imported automatically to the Audience Manager section of Google Ads. You could then proceed to target the different groups of users with well-personalized paid ads. 

Conclusion

Google Analytics 4 can be said to be a more streamlined, future-proof version of Universal Analytics. You could even argue that the name “universal analytics” suits it better than its predecessor, as it offers an all-round view of customers’ journeys. Plus, Google has integrated multiple analytics assets to form a centralized dashboard for tracking both websites and apps. 

The tracking system itself is adapting very well to a cookie-free future – with the help of IP anonymization approaches, AI-driven predictive analytics, calculated statistical models, and privacy-centric identifiers. All these resources are always active across omnichannel touchpoints, thereby mapping out your customer’s paths in real-time. 

On the flip side, however, we’ll agree that all this power comes with a pretty steep learning curve. Setting up properties is the easiest bit. And after that comes the burden of coding custom events, defining audience segments, plus customizing multiple report attributes. All this is meant to culminate in meaningful insights, which you should then use to strategically optimize your web marketing campaigns. 

Not the type of stuff a business executive would have time for. And that’s where we come in. Globe Runner is the digital marketing agency that’ll not only create and manage your Google Analytics 4 portfolio, but also transform the analytics into high-precision targeted campaigns.

Contact us today to find out more about the future of data-driven personalization. 

Shopify Vs WooCommerce: Which Platform is Better in 2023?

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Shopify vs WooCommerce can be said to be the ecommerce platform equivalent of Coca-Cola vs Pepsi, iPhone vs Samsung, or McDonald’s vs Burger King. While both giants tout themselves as ecommerce platforms, they happen to empower online stores with very different architectures. However, despite the clear structural and procedural differences, businesses still find it difficult to point out an absolute winner between Shopify vs WooCommerce. 

Even the market share data itself doesn’t help much in resolving the dilemma, as WooCommerce and Shopify almost always end up canceling each other out on key indicators. 

Case in point – WooCommerce enjoys three times as much market share as Shopify, but then falls slightly behind when you compare their dominance across the top 10k sites on the web. 

It’s because of all this uncertainty that we’ve decided to compile the most conclusive comparison of Shopify vs WooCommerce. And unlike other publishers in this topic, we’re keeping our WooCommerce vs Shopify review concise and digestible. 

Overview of Shopify and WooCommerce Platforms

WooCommerce is a free open-source solution that powers WordPress-based online stores. It comes in the form of a WordPress plugin – which unpacks ecommerce functionalities during installation, and then proceeds to embed them into the WordPress content management system. 

Shopify, on the other hand, is an all-in-one ecommerce platform for building, hosting, facilitating, and growing online stores.  The whole system is engineered to run independently as a self-sufficient end-to-end solution. This is quite the contrast to WooCommerce, which binds itself to the WordPress core like some form of ecommerce platform exoskeleton. 

WooCommerce vs Shopify 2023 Comparison 

Shopify vs WooCommerce #1 – Ease of use, website builder, customization, security

Shopify and WooCommerce apply disparate approaches to website building and customization. 

The easiest and most seamless of the two happens to be Shopify, as its system is configured to eliminate technical complications from the store development process. No coding skills are needed here. You’ll find simple tools for registering your business domain, configuring hosting settings, and building a fully-fledged ecommerce site. 

Shopify’s theme store itself offers about 120 elegant website themes, all of which can be customized visually on its drag-and-drop website builder. Then if you ever need to supplement the default ecommerce functionalities, Shopify’s app store packs over 3,200 app integrations. The platform is also kind enough to take care of your web security. Essentials like SSL certificates and PCI-DSS compliance are already included by default. 

WooCommerce, on the other hand, prioritizes customization and scalability over ease of use. Its ecosystem is designed to give you unrestricted control over every aspect of your online store. The platform is compatible with thousands of themes, over 55,000 plugins and extensions, plus a wide range of site editors.  You could design web pages with drag-and-drop page builders, customize themes with the WordPress theme editor, as well as tinker with WooCommerce’s open-source code. But, all that comes after you’ve taken care of the web hosting service, domain registration, and site security certificates. 

WooCommerce vs Shopify #2 – Ecommerce, store management, sales

On the ecommerce front, both Shopify and WooCommerce provide tools for managing your inventory, payments, and order fulfillment. You can even set up a multichannel sales strategy, as both platforms are flexible enough to integrate with third-party sites. They support selling on marketplaces like Amazon and eBay, social media sites like Facebook and Pinterest, as well as other websites. 

The only difference is – Shopify offers its multichannel selling tools for free, while WooCommerce charges about $79.  Another built-in feature you’ll find on Shopify is abandoned card recovery. It helps businesses in retargeting cart abandoners with email remainders. 

On WooCommerce, though, you only get such capabilities through extensions from its plugin store. And the best ones always come at a price. The same disparity extends even to payment processing. Whereas both ecommerce platforms can be integrated with all the major payment gateways, Shopify starts you off with its native Shopify Payments. 

Shopify vs WooCommerce #3 – SEO, Marketing

Shopify and WooCommerce should be able to handle all forms of digital marketing campaigns. You can count on them for SEO, email marketing, social media marketing, on-site messaging, etc. 

On Shopify, for instance, you’ll find simple built-in controls for defining basic on-page SEO elements. You get to post SEO-optimized content, as well as edit your page descriptions, page titles, alt text, etc. The ecommerce platform will then automatically take care of the underlying technical bits – including canonical tags and sitemap. 

WooCommerce offers more or less the same capabilities. The SEO controls are not as straightforward as Shopify’s, but they go much deeper. For example, you should be able to customize rich snippets and store-level page URLs with WooCommerce’s SEO tools. Shopify’s SEO can only stretch that far when you bring in third-party apps. 

In email marketing, however, the tables turn in favor of Shopify. Its users can launch and manage campaigns with Shopify Email, whereas WooCommerce relies entirely on email marketing extensions. 

WooCommerce vs Shopify #4 – Pricing

Shopify vs WooCommerce pricing differences are not fixed. They, instead, vary based on website architecture and business needs. 

WooCommerce happens to be the most dynamic, with numerous factors defining its usage costs. The software itself is free – but, you’ll probably pay for web hosting, website development services, plus themes and extensions. 

A small business might probably spend hundreds to thousands of dollars on website building. This would then be followed up by recurrent charges on subscription services, plus maybe scaling costs from time to time. 

Shopify, on the other hand, offers pricing packages that cover everything – except premium templates and applications. They go for $32, $92, and $399 a month respectively. 

Shopify or WooCommerce: Which is the Best Ecommerce Platform for Small Businesses?

All in all, Shopify is the one that has emerged as the best ecommerce platform for small businesses. Not only is it cheaper than WooCoommerce, but it’s also easier to use, more comprehensive, and packs one of the best ecommerce website builders. You can create storefronts, sell across multiple online channels, run marketing campaigns, and manage sales – all without any prior technical experience. Then as the business grows, Shopify allows you to upscale resources, as well as expand functionalities through integrations from its app store. 

That’s not to say that WooCommerce is inferior. The fact that it’s built on WordPress makes it the best CMS for ecommerce. Plus, it’s supported by tens of thousands of themes and plugins. 

Small businesses just don’t have the capacity to fully exploit WooCommerce’s open-source platform. Only high-volume enterprises would best leverage its limitless customization – as they have the funds, technical proficiency, and system resources. 

Benefits of HubSpot For Your Business

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Still tracking your customers and leads with outdated spreadsheets or using multiple platforms that don’t talk to each other—one to manage leads, one for content, one for customer support etc.? HubSpot may be the solution you didn’t realize existed. Or, maybe you’ve gone to their site to read up on marketing tips without realizing that they’re way more than an incredible place to find hundreds of marketing blogs, ebooks, and statistics. 

What is HubSpot?

At its core, HubSpot is a customer relationship management platform. But it does so much more. HubSpot consists of its CRM and five hubs that can help you manage all your inbound marketing needs: 

  • CRM: keeps track of all your leads and customers as well as their activity and all your interactions with them in one easy-to-use platform that syncs with Gmail and Outlook for easy communication
  • Marketing Hub: a complete system to set up and manage your marketing campaigns as well as track the success of your campaigns so you can keep improving your conversions
  • Sales Hub: everything you need to manage your sales funnel from start to finish—manage, track and communicate with your leads with ease
  • Service Hub: a one-stop-shop for customer service with the ability to set up support chat and ticketing as well as conversation bots and a knowledge base 
  • CMS Hub: a content management system that makes updating web content and SEO easier and provides analytics to track web traffic and conversions
  • Operations Hub: helps you connect apps, clean up data, and automate processes 

So, let’s go over some of the benefits of HubSpot!

Why HubSpot? 

Well, to be honest, the list is pretty endless. So, let’s start off with five huge benefits of HubSpot.

  1. It’s free. The free version of HubSpot has a lot of functionality. Can you upgrade the features and benefits to a paid version? Of course you can. But you can easily get started with the free version and discover what works for you and what you may want to spend a little more on.
  2. It’s all-in-one. No more desperately trying to figure out how to get your CRM to talk to your email marketing platform to talk to your website. HubSpot does it all and makes sure that information is easily shared between tools, giving you (and your customers) a seamless buying journey. 
  3. It’s easy to use. HubSpot is intuitive. And if you need help or guidance, HubSpot academy has everything you could possibly want to know—with courses and certifications to make sure you’re getting the most out of the product. HubSpot also has an incredibly friendly and engaged community you can go to for questions, tips, and tricks. 
  4. It’s analytical. Gathering and interpreting data in HubSpot is intuitive and easy. Metrics are important, and HubSpot has in-depth dashboard reporting to give you the information you need instantly and without having to build complex queries.
  5. It has a ton of integrations. With so many companies using HubSpot, it’s natural that other companies and products are constantly building third-party integrations to work with it. Many of the apps you already use probably integrate seamlessly with Hubspot!

Sounds pretty amazing, right? Well, the news gets better! If you’re juggling running your business, marketing, and customer support at the same time, it can help to bring in experts. While HubSpot is intuitive, getting on top of your digital marketing game is still time-consuming. Luckily, some digital marketing agencies, like Globe Runner, have in-house HubSpot experts who can make sure that you’re making the most of every HubSpot feature that’s right for you. Globe Runner has expertise in using HubSpot for small businesses to big businesses, and knows how to use HubSpot to help your business take off!

Frequently Asked Questions

Is HubSpot a CRM?

While HubSpot is Constituent Relationship Management (CRM) software, HubSpot capabilities go far beyond what many people consider a useful CRM. HubSpot also functions as a digital marketing platform and all-in-one tool to manage marketing, sales, customer service, and content.  

What is HubSpot used for?

Whether you’re using HubSpot for small business or big business, HubSpot does it all. With five separate “hubs” for marketing, sales, service, CMS, and operations, HubSpot covers all your digital marketing and customer tracking needs. Rather than trying to track all your leads and customer interactions through multiple online systems and spreadsheets, HubSpot CRM is a cloud-based solution that can make sure you don’t lose track of your customers and where they are on their buyer’s journey. But HubSpot is also a one-stop-shop for digital marketing, allowing you to use the software to create content, track leads, and conversions, and provide customer support with chat tools and ticketing.  

Is HubSpot free?

The HubSpot software is free, and the free version includes many of the features in all five “hubs.” However, if you’re looking for additional bells and whistles, all of which can help boost your marketing and customer service games, there are bundles you can purchase, or build your own bundles to get exactly the features that allow you to make the most of the HubSpot benefits that address your pain points. 

What are some companies that use HubSpot?

With over 150,000 customers in 120 countries, HubSpot is a widely used and loved platform. Customers include Reddit, DoorDash, and the World Wildlife Fund, to name just a few.

Is HubSpot worth it for small business?

If you have customers (or need more customers) HubSpot has many features that help manage your customers and their buying journey. No matter the size of your business, there’s a version of HubSpot that can benefit you. And with pricing options that start at “absolutely free,” you’re sure to find a bundle that works for your needs and your budget.

Facts and Myths About SEO

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Every second, 40,000 searches are made on Google. That equals approximately 3.5 billion searches every day. And while not everyone is searching for your product or service, there’s a good chance that right now, someone is looking for exactly what you have to offer. With over 200 ranking factors in an algorithm that gets updated several times a year, making sure the people searching for you find you means keeping on top of your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) game. Because if you aren’t on the first of the search engine ranking pages (SERPs), your potential customers will have already found what they’re looking for before they get to you. SEO can be complicated, and everyone has an opinion on SEO and how it works. Let’s explore some actual facts about SEO and debunk some myths.      

Busting myths with SEO facts

Myth: Keywords don’t matter

Since the Google Hummingbird update years ago, there has been a lingering myth that the algorithm rewrite made a keyword strategy irrelevant. That’s not exactly true. Keywords still matter. After all, at the end of the day, that’s what a searcher is putting into the search engine. The update, however, changed the focus to search intent. So, keyword ratio is less important, but writing quality content that naturally incorporates important keywords and takes into account why someone is searching is still an integral part of effective SEO.

Myth: Link building doesn’t matter

Link building is key to Google’s E-A-T philosophy: Expertise. Authoritativeness. Trustworthiness. How does Google determine if your site has all of those things? Well, it relies on the Internet “word of mouth.” If websites that are well-known and trusted link to yours, then it’s considered a kind of endorsement of your site, giving it a boost in its rankings. In the same vein, if spam and untrusted websites link to yours, it will negatively affect your rankings. So, a thorough link-building strategy and content development can make a huge difference!

Myth: Local SEO is irrelevant

Let’s look at the local SEO facts. Almost half of all Google searches are local searches and half of all “near me” searches result in someone actually visiting a store. An impeccable local SEO strategy can help bring in more customers and build visibility in your region.

With Google algorithms changing all the time, it’s clear that the biggest SEO fact is that SEO is an ongoing process. Bringing in SEO experts, like Globe Runner, can keep all your digital marketing in the best position to rank higher on the keywords that matter most to your business. Check out how Globe Runner has helped businesses like yours reach and exceed their marketing goals!

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the top benefits of SEO?

The truth is that most people end up choosing one of the very first results that pop up on a search engine results page (SERP). That means the number one benefit of stellar SEO is that more potential customers will find your business because it’s ranking higher on those SERPs. Because great SEO requires a website that works well on various devices, including mobile, has up-to-date and trustworthy content, and is easy to navigate and use, one of the other benefits of SEO is that your overall website is going to attract more customers and visitors are more likely to convert into customers.

What is the purpose of SEO?

The overall goal of SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is to increase the organic traffic of potential customers to a company’s website through search engine results. When a potential customer goes looking for a product or service, most turn to search engines, like Google. Search engines have complex and ever-changing algorithms that sort through all the websites on the Internet to find the websites that match the closest with the intent of the searcher. SEO experts work within those algorithms to give your business a better chance of being at the top of the results pages for the keywords your most likely customers will be entering into those search engines. 

Is SEO worth it in 2022?

SEO is not only worth it in 2022, but it’s a necessity. Not only do the vast majority of people make purchases online, but even if they plan to make purchases in person, they start their search and research on the Internet. And with almost 2 billion websites on the Internet these days, the likelihood of a website accidentally ranking on the first page of any SERP is extremely small.

Filed Under: SEO

Holiday Season and PPC

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It’s the Holiday Marketing Season

With the exception of yearly back-to-college shopping, the winter holiday season is the biggest consumer spending event of the year. Adobe predicts that online sales will be up 2.5 percent over last year—with sales expected to reach $209.7 billion. It may seem too early to be thinking about the winter holidays while you’re still pondering Halloween costumes, but it’s already time to break out the pumpkin-spice and make sure your business doesn’t miss out on a successful holiday season that sets you up for the new year! 

Gone are the days when Black Friday signaled the start of the holiday shopping season. Now, that season starts in October. Last year, less than 20 percent of US shoppers intended to wait until after Thanksgiving to start shopping, and 43 percent intended to start before November. What does that mean for you? It means you could miss out on potential customers if you think you still have plenty of time to start your holiday marketing campaigns.

So, where should you be in your holiday campaigns, and is it too late to catch up? Let’s ease your minds first—it’s definitely not too late, but you may need to put everything in high gear! Many businesses have most of their planning and list clean-up done by the end of September and focus on the specifics of their holiday advertising in October, to have it ready to go by mid-to-late-October. Let’s dive into some easy holiday advertising ideas. 

Holiday marketing techniques

Use video marketing or webrooming. People love videos . . . and “trying” things. Make your pay-per-click (PPC) ads video ads to raise interest and engage potential customers. Or turn your website into a virtual showroom where customers can “browse” or virtually try your products.

Make online communication a two-way street. Engage with your potential customers on social media and on your website. Try using polls on social media or running contests. Make sure you’re responding to customer interactions on social media.

Be festive! Incorporate holiday themes, images, and puns into your holiday shopping ads. Holiday shopping can be stressful. You can lighten the mood and relieve some stress for your customers with fun and festive ads that give them some of that holiday spirit back. 

Retargeted! Ensure you have a comprehensive retargeting campaign. Most people shop; around online before they make a purchasing decision. Making sure that you’re following up on items left in carts and people who stopped by your site but didn’t purchase anything can bring in extra sales.

While you’re at it, don’t forget to make everything you do mobile-friendly. It’ll keep your customers and search engines happy. More and more people are using their phones to make purchases and Google prioritized mobile-friendliness in their search engine ranking algorithms. Feeling overwhelmed? You’re not alone! So are most holiday shoppers. They’re worried about inflation and the supply chain, not to mention the stress of hosting family and friends for the holidays. They’re looking for a shopping experience that removes some of their stress levels and makes their holiday shopping experience run a little smoother so they can focus on their families. 

Just like you can make your customers’ holiday season a little more convenient and easy to manage, a full-service digital marketing agency, like Globe Runner, can do the same for your holiday marketing season. Everyone goes into high marketing gear for the holidays, which is why now is a great time to engage in a pay-per-click holiday advertising campaign. Prices of ads do go up during the season, but the payoff is worth it. And agencies like Globe Runner can make sure you get the most for your PPC money. But don’t stop there! Globe Runner can also assist with conversion rate optimization and SEO. 

Frequently Asked Questions

Why should you advertise during the holiday season?

Let’s be honest, you should be marketing all year long! But the holidays are a fabulous time to engage your loyal customers and bring in new ones. It is, without a doubt, one of the busiest (and most profitable) shopping seasons of the year. The question is really, why wouldn’t you advertise during the holiday season?

When should you start advertising for the holiday season?

Supply chain issues over the last few years made people nervous about waiting to purchase gifts. And they’re worried that inflation will keep increasing prices. While the weekend after Thanksgiving used to signal the start of the holiday shopping season, it now starts in mid-October. Which means you should be advertising now! But it’s not too late to put together a stellar holiday advertising campaign and make the most of the holiday season!

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