Miki Dzugan, President, Rapport Online Inc.
Miki Dzugan believes that online marketing efforts should produce positive bottom-line results. That comes from many years of general management experience. Dzugan brings more than 30 years of experience in the fields of manufacturing, software development, computer hardware marketing and sales, computer software consulting, property management, education, and hospitality management into her position as president at Rapport. Her varied background enables her to quickly grasp the management goals of companies, and then define ways for them to integrate the use of the Internet into their marketing communications functions.
Rapport Online Inc was founded as an outgrowth of many years of Internet marketing and web- site development experience. Building rapport aptly describes the power that Internet communica- tions tools bring to doing business.
Rapport encompasses “branding” and believes that branding online is not achieved through adver- tising, but rather through experience and “buzz.” Rapport stresses direct communication and har- mony in its environment, and strives to provide these to its customers.
Jerri: What do you see as the current state of SEO?
Dzugan: For many SEO experts, the SEO/search engine relationship is a game of chess, us vs. them. They try to game the search engine to get their client to the top of the heap by taking advantage of what they can understand of the search engine algorithms. This may be done without respect to whether the site really belongs at the top of results. In other words, the search engine has the objec- tive to produce the most useful result for the searcher and the SEO is working to push his/her client in the searcher’s face.
SEOS that work against the best interest of the search engine are killing the golden goose. If the search engine does not produce good results, it will not be used.
Working with the best interest of search engines and searchers as well as our clients produces last- ing results. Sites that are optimized to rank high in results where they provide the best value are not as vulnerable to changes in search algorithms. Clients that were optimized years ago still retain high position in results even for quite competitive search terms.
You will find SEO divided into black hat and white hat with a big gray area that the experts debate. My thought is that if you are helping search engines to serve the searchers well, you are behaving ethically and effectively in the long term.
Jerri: What do you mean by helping the search engine serve searchers well? Are there specific activities that organizations should be doing?
Dzugan: The worst case of not serving the searchers well is to optimize a porn site to come up on top for a search for “candy land” for example. This kind of abuse is really hard to get past search engines now. It is easier to identify activities that organizations should not be doing. there is a whole list of spamming activities that can still sometimes succeed, temporarily. Organizations. should stake out their keywords carefully and aim for those that are realistically achievable. For example, a web site selling shoes has a better chance of achieving top results on a phrase, such as “women narrow shoes” or “child sport shoes” than if they go after “shoe” and “shoes.”
As part of this method of SEO I stumbled upon the concept of branding through search results. I’m beginning to hear more of this idea in industry discussions. I think this will be the next big thing in SEO.
Jerri: Explain how branding through search results works.
Dzugan: We use the kind of narrowing of keywords described above to reinforce our client’s brand. For example, my own company, Rapport Online, is very small, and how do you compete on key- words like “search engine optimization” without a staff member to work on that full time? We are staking out the concept of building rapport as the online marketing approach. Our site ranks on the first page of Google results for “keyword ad calculator” and other more specific phrases that relate to a cost-per-customer-acquired approach to online marketing.
Jerri: What strategies should companies be using to create their brand in search results?
Dzugan:
■Stake out the desired keywords.
■Use pay-per-click advertising to get your sales pitch across.
■ Optimize top-level pages for the desired brand keywords.
■Get linked in to the most popular and industry-related directories, using the brand concepts in the description.
And are there some branding opportunities that are better than others?
Certainly, less competitive brand concepts and more differentiating concepts are better. Our client Powder Technology, Inc., produces test dust for testing of engines, filters, etc. We have staked out the keyword “test dust” (not as easy as it sounds) and if you search on that keyword in Google you see that they pretty much own the top of the first page of results.
Niche brand concepts are easier opportunities than more general concepts, such as “best shoes” but, if you can pull it off, the more general concept will get much more traffic because more people will be using it in search. Just remember that if you are promoting your product as the “best” and it is inferior, you undermine consumer confidence in your company and the search engine that was used.
Jerri: What are the coming trends that you see affecting search engines over the next 12-18 months?
Dzugan: Ask Google. People have been waiting for mobile search to take off and maybe that will finally happen. It is hard with the small screen to effectively browse the net – it’s a whole different animal.
Google is working on personalized search, but I’m not keen on that concept, because I don’t really think the desired search result can be effectively predicted on past searches – not if you use search for a variety of reasons.
Jerri: Is there anything else you think is important for readers to understand about SEO?
Dzugan: SEO is still a buyer-beware industry. When considering SEO assistance, don’t fall for the slick presentation or guarantee. Get references. And never buy from a company that approaches you through unsolicited e-mail.