Can you guess what marketing question we get asked the most?
Everybody wants to know how to SEO their website to get it to the number one spot in the search engines.
So it makes sense that one of our all-time-most-popular Advanced Modules in the Travel Expert Marketing Academy is an interview Heidi did with SEO Expert Neil Patel for this exclusive Academy training.
Today we’re going to share just a few of the golden nuggets of SEO wisdom that Neil shared with our Academy members. (If you’re an Academy Member, you can find the full interview in your Advanced Modules inside the Academy.)
For those of you who don’t know my friend Neil, he is a New York Times best selling author. He is the co-founder of Crazy Egg and Hello Bar (which are both fantastic marketing tools) and he helps companies like Amazon, NBC, GM, HP and Viacom grow their revenue. The Wall Street Journal calls him a top influencer on the web, Forbes says he is one of the top 10 online marketers, and Entrepreneur Magazine says he created one of the 100 most brilliant companies in the world. He was recognized as a top 100 entrepreneur under the age of 30 by President Obama and one of the top 100 entrepreneurs under the age of 35 by the United Nations. Neil has also been awarded Congressional Recognition from the United States House of Representatives.
In today’s Travel Expert Insider we’re going to share with you Neil’s advice when we asked him how you can succeed with SEO as a small business.
These are free, easy, actionable tips that anyone can do, right away.
As soon as you finish reading this email, put both of these items on your to-do list and make a plan for getting them done.
One thing that Neil made abundantly clear in this interview is that you should accept the fact that “travel” is a tough market to compete in in the world of SEO.
Unless you have a multi-million dollar ad budget, you are not going to be competitive with players like Travelocity, Exepedia, and the rest.
But don’t let that discourage you! You just need to think outside the box when you’re putting together your marketing plan.
One of the ways to win the SEO game as a “little guy” is to focus on your local market.
The first step Neil says you should absolutely take is to get yourself listed on Google. It’s free, and just takes a little bit of your time.
Go to www.google.com/business and set up your listing. Make sure your listing contains all of the information possible and set an appointment with yourself in your calendar to check your listing once a quarter for housekeeping – just take 10 minutes and make any necessary updates, fix any errors, etc.
Another great tip for getting yourself found for your local region is to include the region you are targeting in your website copy (e.g. Jane Smith, Travel Agent, Tampa, Florida).
And when you write blog posts, see if you can work in details about your local area. Maybe you write up a blog post about a great charity event you attended in your local area. Give the search engines as many clues as possible that you work in your local area.
It doesn’t matter that you can, and do take clients from all over the country, even the world. This is just a strategy to narrow-down your focus on an area of SEO that you CAN potentially win – your local region. This won’t mean that you will lose clients from other areas, it just means that you will gain more local clients.
Keep your eyes on your inbox for part two next week where we’ll give you what Neil says is THE most important thing you need to do to succeed in business, along with a few bonus tips for succeeding on-line in today’s highly competitive digital market.
Love & Success,
Galen, Heidi & Your Marketing Team
P.S. Another key to winning at SEO is writing good copy. Many small business owners can’t afford to hire a professional copywriter (at least at first) so you absolutely must learn how to write your own good copy!
In a couple weeks, Heidi will be hosting our oh-so-popular Email Marketing for Travel Agents Masterclass LIVE for the last time this year, and we’re not sure when she’ll host it live again!
At this LIVE online marketing training, you’ll discover:
🌟 Why you need an email list, how to create one, and how to fill it with new perspective IDEAL clients (Heidi has built several email lists of over 15K people each, and she’ll show you how you can do it too).
🌟 The most efficient way to send out regular e-Newsletters (this strategy will save you TONS of time).
🌟 How to convert your new email subscribers (ideal prospective clients), into PAYING clients.
🌟 And MUCH more!
Don’t miss your last opportunity to attend this class live — register now here.
