Does Anchor Text Effect Site Rankings? In a recent Google Hangout session, John Mueller, Senior Webmaster Trends Analyst at Google, discussed if anchor text can directly affect a site’s rankings. Good internal linking practices have always been seen as a basic component of SEO and anchor text is a large part of this. What is Anchor…
PPC advertising has never been a standalone medium when it comes to generating leads and sales for an organisation. Pay-per-click campaigns use a “last click” conversion model, regardless of the medium – whether that be Facebook, Google, Bing, Linkedin or Twitter (to name a few). A last click model assigns 100% credit to the final…
Google Release New Voice Search Schema Google have launched a new voice search or “speakable” structured data to adapt to the rise in voice search. This structured data is code which can be added to your content to mark up sections which may be most relevant to be read aloud by a digital assistant. This is…
We are delighted to have been awarded a Platinum award at the Hermes Creative Awards 2018, one of the most prestigious creative awards in the industry. Hermes Creative Awards highlights outstanding work from professionals within the media industry. Our award was for our work on White Room Bridal, where we reinvigorated their web presence to…
The popularity of smartphones has changed the way that websites are indexed on the Internet. Decades ago, when websites were first made, everyone was using static HTML pages. PHP sites and many others came later, leading to dynamic or responsive web pages that would change based upon the device that was viewing it. Now Google…
Webspam Report – Google Reduces Spam Links By Nearly Half Google’s annual Webspam Report has recently been released, highlighting a series of statistics from their battle against “web spam” throughout 2017. What is Web Spam? Google defines “spam” as any action which violates the Webmaster Guidelines. The amount of spam sites currently in search…
As you will know, during May the hot topic of GDPR became a reality. There has been much talk of the “email bombardment” leading up to this but now Google have had their say on website reaction post-deadline. Since 25th May, many websites have chosen to display a notice detailing their privacy policy and GDPR…
It’s official – we’re the best SEO and PPC agency in the North! We are ecstatic to have won “Best SEO and PPC Agency” at this year’s Prolific North Awards. The Prolific North Awards took place on 24 May at the Principal Hotel in Manchester. We had been shortlisted in the Best SEO and PPC…
We’re ecstatic to be shortlisted as “Top SEO & PPC Agency” at the Prolific North Awards 2018. Update: We Won Best SEO and PPC Agency!! We’ve been nominated for the Top SEO & PPC Agency award, along with 4 other agencies, in recognition of our consistent growth and evidence of delivering outstanding results across digital…
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) comes into effect on 25 May 2018. It applies to every business that holds, collects and stores personally identifiable information about EU citizens. The Economist recently called personal data ‘the world’s most valuable resource’. It’s so valuable, that according to UK Government statistics, nearly half of all UK businesses…
We’re all for trying out our clients’ wares – and never more so than when there’s delicious food at the end of it! Sales director Alex Hill and account manager Dan Rawley recently had the great fortune to be invited along to new client the School of Artisan Food’s one-day Italian baking and pizza making…
We’re delighted to have reached the finals of the European Search Awards, for “Best PPC Campaign”. The European Search Awards are an international competition, celebrating the very best in search marketing across Europe. With senior judges from the likes of The LEGO Group, John Lewis, Canon and Microsoft, the bar is very high. These awards…
We’re delighted to have picked up a Gold Award at the AVA Digital Awards, for our work with a leading charity. The AVA Digital Awards is an international competition, designed to recognise the outstanding achievement by professionals involved in the creation of digital media and campaigns. Our Gold was awarded for our work with a…
The latest of many updates to the search engine results pages, Google claim that multifaceted featured snippets will provide “more actionable results to nuanced queries”. Searches can often be interpreted in different ways. With multifaceted featured snippets, Google will present the searcher with the answer to each. In the example given, if someone searches for…
Google have begun rolling out the new version of Search Console – formerly Webmaster Tools – to all sites this year after many months of Beta testing. The new Search Console features a much cleaner, modern appearance with the data laid out in a more interactive way. For those who use Adwords, you will notice…
Our team at The SEO Works strive constantly to offer excellent industry knowledge and great customer service. This has been recognised by the leading B2B ratings and reviews platform, Clutch.co. Out of the thousands of UK companies listed on their website, we were named a top digital marketing company, SEO and PPC in the UK!…
It was a great result for us last night as we picked up the award for “Best PPC Campaign” at the Northern Digital Awards, making us a best in class PPC agency in the UK. The awards recognise the very best in digital marketing campaigns and talent across the North. Over 450 people attended the…
The SEO Works have partnered with Heart Research UK to support the launch of Sing for your Heart. The campaign, led by a 6-year-old boy with an incurable heart condition has gone viral after receiving celebrity backing. Sing for your Heart has reached over 16 million people online and seen support from pop princess Pixie…
We’re delighted to have won “Best Integrated Campaign” at the UK Search Awards, held at The Ballroom South Bank in London. Our work was for an integrated marketing campaign across PPC, SEO, and other digital channels for a leading online retailer that generated an 1700% overall return on investment. The UK Search Awards, hosted by…
Google now shows results based on where your device is geographically, irrespective of what domain identifier you use when navigating to Google. For example, if you’re in Germany and you hit up google.co.uk, you’ll see localised results for Germany. This is a big sea change for Google, as currently one-fifth of all search queries are…
SEO vs PPC – it’s a big debate amongst marketers. Unfortunately, though, there is a misconception that SEO and PPC teams are somehow working against one another, each trying to persuade marketing heads to allocate more of the budget towards their area of expertise. There was a time when The SEO Works only did SEO. Hence…
Are you a charity who wants to raise awareness? Or perhaps run a campaign to drive donations? It’s still a little known-fact amongst many not for profits and charities that grants are available to them, direct from Google. You could use this money to create an effective online campaign that meets your goals. Read on…
Google have announced that they will introduce flexible sampling to subscription based publications, in order to help increase their potential subscription rate. This new program comes in two forms, lead in or metering. The lead in format shows a part of the article without exposing all the content while metering provides visitors with a series…
Google have now introduced trending searches and instant answers for its iOS app. The screenshot below shows how trending searches (left) and instant answers (right) will display for iOS users: This means that on its iPhone and iPad app Google will now recommend searches for users based on popular recent searches in the user’s area…
There are a lot of factors involved in a successful PPC campaign. Competition, the nature of the client’s business, bespoke audience strategy, channel selection, the level of optimization focus, and the degree of support required are just some of the significant variables. And unfortunately, it’s fairly easy for a poor provider to implement a weak…
We’re always proud of the work that we deliver for our clients. We’re especially proud this week as we’ve been awarded a Platinum award from the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals (AMCP) in their dotCOMM awards. The dotCOMM Awards is an international competition honouring excellence in web creativity and digital communication. The competition spotlights…
Google have specified that Rich Results are now available for video and recipe content within Google Image Search on mobile devices. If you perform a Google Search for “Daily Show Youtube” via mobile, it will fetch video thumbnails amongst regular image results that when clicked on results in an information rich panel. If you select…
Major Ranking Fluctuations Fuel Algorithm Update Rumours The search marketing industry has been alive, once again, with rumours of a major Google algorithm update. Significant ranking fluctuations, which far exceed those that can be attributed to background noise, have been occurring since June 25th. The suggestion that a notable algorithm update is being rolled out…
In the modern age of gadgetry it isn’t unknown for people to prefer to text rather than pick up the phone and speak to someone, which is why using message extensions can allow you to engage a whole new audience with your ads. By enabling message extensions you allow a user to contact you via…
We are proud to announce that we been selected as one of the official G Cloud suppliers, on the latest framework for UK Public Sector organisations to procure solutions called G-Cloud 9. You can find on the Crown Commercial Service’s Digital Marketplace under the G-Cloud 9 Framework. We’re part of the Digital Outcomes and Specialists…
We’re proud to have won a Gold award at the Hermes Creative Awards, one of the largest and most prestigious creative competitions in the world. The Hermes Creative Awards are designed to celebrate outstanding creative talent backed by great results. We picked up our Gold Award for our work with Whitmores Timber. We helped design…
This week we met up with an expert operating within China to discuss all things related to SEO in China. Xuming He, the founder of SEO China, visited our head offices here in Sheffield and we had a fantastic afternoon with him where we shared our insights of the UK market and in turn he…
Digital ad spend in the UK has gone past a significant threshold, reaching £10.3bn in 2016, an increase of 17.3%. A report released by the Internet Advertising Bureau UK and PwC indicates it is the highest annual growth rate for nine years. The last time annual growth was higher was in 2007 (38pc). Marketing budgets…
We’re excited to announce that we have been shortlisted at the Prolific North Awards, as Best SEO & PPC Agency. The annual event recognises outstanding campaigns and exceptional talent in the creative and media industries across the North, attracting hundreds of entries to the program. The awards are evaluated by a high-prestige panel of industry…
We thoroughly enjoyed the BrightonSEO talks this year. Held twice a year, it brings together some of the best speakers in the world of search. Content strategy driving an SEO campaign was a key theme touched upon in many of the talks. Here are ten of the main pointers we took from the BrightonSEO sessions…
The threat of site hacking, or hackers affecting your online business continues to grow as the number of compromised websites increased further during last year. Findings reported in Google’s #NoHacked review show that approximately 32% more sites were hacked when compared to the previous year. Fortunately, 84% of webmasters that applied for reconsideration were successful…
Last Friday we headed down to Google for the invite-only Game On Celebrate event. Held at Google HQ in London, it was a celebration for agencies with official Google Partner status, looking back at performance across 2016. Part of the event included the Google Partners awards, which celebrated the achievements of the best agencies out…
When setting out on a website marketing project, the one thing that is important (but quite often overlooked) is measuring website performance. Without some key fundamentals in place from the start, it makes it hard to set a baseline of performance and then measure the improvement over time. This is where website goals come into…
Two Major Google Updates Over February At the beginning of February Google rolled out a new algorithm update which had an effect on their processing of backlinks. Some webmasters reported a high fluctuation in search rankings for their sites, with some sites benefiting massively from the update and some losing rankings. One week after this on the…
What do clients want when they turn to an SEO agency? Results. That’s what The SEO Works has been delivering since 2009, and our work is getting noticed as a top SEO company. Recently, The SEO Works was named a top SEO company in the UK by Clutch, a business-to-business market research firm based in…