If you want to drive more organic traffic and make your content work smarter, not harder, it’s time to take a closer look at how these strategies work together. Here’s everything you need to know about content mapping and SEO.

What is Content Mapping?

Think of content mapping as a way to deliver the right content to the right person at the right time. It’s all about creating content that aligns with your audience’s journey, from first discovering your business to becoming a loyal customer.

Key Components of Content Mapping:

1. Buyer Personas: Who is your audience? What are their goals, challenges, and pain points?
2. Customer Journey Stages: What are the steps your prospects will take? (awareness, consideration, and decision)
3. Content Alignment: How can you match your content to specific personas and their stage in the journey?

Why It Matters: Content mapping makes your digital marketing more efficient and focused. Instead of guessing what your audience wants, you’re delivering exactly what they need when they need it.

The SEO Side of the Equation

Search Engine Optimization ensures that the content you create gets found. Without it, even the best content can sit unseen. Pairing SEO with content mapping means you’re not only creating content for your audience but also optimizing it to rank well on search engines.

How SEO Complements Content Mapping:

• Keyword Research: Identify what your audience is searching for at each stage of their journey.
• Content Structure: Use headings, subheadings, and metadata to make content easier to read and index.
• Search Intent: Understand why someone is searching for a term and create content that answers their query.

How to Build a Content Map with SEO in Mind

Here’s a 5-step guide to successfully combining your content mapping and SEO efforts:

Step 1: Know Your Audience

Start by truly getting to know who you’re talking to. Who are your ideal customers? Researching buyer personas can help you understand their goals, challenges, and what drives their decisions. If you can, use tools like surveys, interviews, or analytics to gather insights that paint a clear picture of your audience. The better you know them, the easier it is to create content they’ll care about.

Marketing Tip: Don’t skip analytics – without data, you’re flying blind!

Step 2: Research Keywords and Topics

Now it’s time to dig into what your audience is searching for. Tools like Ahrefs or SEMrush can help you uncover the terms and questions your potential customers are typing into search engines. Focus on long-tail keywords (specific phrases that match their concerns or interests.) This approach helps you align your content with the exact topics your audience wants to learn about.

Step 3: Map the Customer Journey

Step 4: Create Content That Ranks

When it’s time to start writing, focus on making your content as useful and actionable as possible. Do your research, and don’t skimp on providing real value. Keywords are important, but they should feel like a natural part of the flow (not crammed in awkwardly.) Boost your content’s credibility with link building. Include both internal links to your own pages and external links to trusted sources.

In short, you should:

• Write actionable, well-researched content
• Include keywords naturally without forcing them
• Add internal/external links to improve credibility

Marketing Tip: Don’t overstuff keywords. Search engines penalize content that feels spammy.

Step 5: Track Performance

Once your content is out there, keep an eye on how it’s performing. Use analytics tools to monitor traffic, engagement, and conversions. If something isn’t clicking with your audience, tweak your content map and adjust your strategy to focus on what’s working best. This ongoing process helps you stay aligned with your audience’s needs.

Tips to Get Ahead:

• Conduct a content audit: Review existing content to find gaps and opportunities.
• Cluster your topics. Group related topics and keywords to create a series of content.
• Repurpose your content. Turn a webinar into a blog post, infographic, or social media series.
• Collaborate across teams. Involve sales, customer service, and marketing to gather diverse insights.

The key to long-term success? Keep refining your strategy as your audience evolves. The more you adapt, the better your results will be.

Let MARION Guide Your Content Strategy

Not quite confident in your content strategy? At MARION, we specialize in everything digital marketing – content marketing, SEO, social media, PPC services, internet marketing audits and more. Our team understands how to align your content with your business goals, ensuring every piece you create works harder for your brand.

Contact our digital marketing agency today to set up a consultation!

It isn’t news that B2B manufacturing marketing is difficult. After all, your manufacturing marketing strategy has to bridge the gap between you, distributors, wholesalers, and users in an effective and cost-efficient way.

Targeting the right decision makers at the right time is a complex task that B2B marketing strategies need to address. Fortunately for you, there are ways to target a highly qualified audience with very granular messaging. How exactly?

Digital marketing for manufacturing companies.

How to Market a Manufacturing Company

Whether you’re relying on a marketing department in a manufacturing company or a marketing agency for the manufacturing sector, your whole marketing plan starts with a strong brand identity. Positioning your business is easier after you engage in research and discovery about your history, process, people, and differentiation.

Searching for the right digital marketing partner for manufacturers? Schedule a free consultation with MARION today to learn how we can help grow your B2B marketing operations!

Being in the manufacturing industry can look very different depending on your product, but can actually be boiled down into five main groups. Use this table to identify which main group and industry sub-group your operation belongs to.

Data pulled from McKinsey

Once you’ve developed your brand identity and decided how to position your company in the minds of your distributors and users, you can begin to set marketing goals. In many cases, your goals will involve financial targets that are closely tied to your mission statement. Then, figure out which strategies you’ll target to achieve those goals.

The rest of this article will cover the five digital marketing tactics that are highly effective for manufacturer growth.

Digital Marketing Strategies for Manufacturers

The most complicated part of a digital marketing strategy for most manufacturers is presenting the right message to decision-makers. Internet marketing for manufacturers helps to effectively target B2B decision-makers with little budget waste.

These five B2B manufacturing marketing strategies can each be used to grow your market share in a cost-efficient manner.

1. Content Marketing
2. SEO Marketing
3. PPC Marketing
4. Social Media Marketing
5. Marketing Automation

Look at each of the strategies, and decide on which method will best help you realize your goals.

1. Content Marketing for Manufacturers

In a 2018 survey of industrial marketers, 86% of respondents said they were using content marketing. Fortunately for you, only 22% of those manufacturing content marketers considered their organization to be “sophisticated” or “mature” at this skill. This Content Marketing Institute data indicates that you still have time to catch up if you aren’t leveraging the power of content marketing yet.

Content marketing strategies can take many different forms. Whether you’re distributing content through email marketing, social media marketing, or organic search, you can attract the right users by creating valuable content assets for your end users.

For example, a midstream pump manufacturer can use content marketing in Houston to write a blog post about the physics behind torque-speed curves to help midstream users determine how to select the right pump for their next application.

Solving Pain Points Through Strategic Content

The key to successful content marketing for manufacturers is identifying the pain points of your target audience, then building content assets that can ease that pain. If an industrial user isn’t sure how to choose between you and your competitors, put together a comprehensive list of performance factors for your product. If a heavy equipment user is struggling to choose between you and your closest competitor, write a detailed comparison piece to highlight the areas in which you come out on top.

By creating free value-added content for your potential customers, you can position your brand as an authority in your industry.

Contact MARION for help with B2B manufacturing content marketing in Austin or Houston today!

2. SEO for Manufacturing Companies

Manufacturing SEO is the practice of optimizing your website so that you show up at the top of search engine results when users are searching for the products you offer. For example, if you’re a chemical manufacturer, you want your surfactant web page to show up when a potential customer Googles “surfactant suppliers.”

According to a recent study, organic search helps to generate nearly 53% of B2B revenue. This means that successful manufacturing search engine optimization can be the key to meeting and exceeding your marketing growth goals.

The Role of Web Design in SEO Success

Keep in mind that an SEO-friendly web design is paramount to ranking well in search results. If your website looks like it’s from the 2000s, users may hit the back button and visit your competitor’s site instead. It’s like showing up to a business meeting or interview in sweatpants. Doing some competitor research, customer interviews, and user testing will help you develop the best manufacturing website design possible.

Aside from design, the content on your website is highly important to your SEO for B2B manufacturing. Like we mentioned in the first section, by creating content that addresses the pain points of your target users, you can rank highly in the search results and generate more revenue today.

If you’re interested in trusting your organic growth to an SEO agency in Austin or Houston, contact MARION today to schedule a free consultation!

3. PPC Advertising in Manufacturing Industries

Over the past decade, several types of digital marketing campaigns have improved the scalability of manufacturing advertising. Before the internet, manufacturing outfits had to rely on direct mail, cold calls, and costly trade shows to generate new opportunities. While there are benefits to relationship-based selling once the ice has been broken, gaining that initial exposure is difficult.

Today, pay-per-click advertising for manufacturers allows you to target psychographically. You can serve an ad that targets a potential customer’s exact need for mere dollars. This flies in the face of trade events where the barrier to entry can be tens of thousands of dollars.

An Example of PPC in Action

For example, a powder coating manufacturer can run pay-per-click ads that appear when a search engine user looks for “high temperature powder coating.” When an interested potential customer clicks on your ad, it will cost you around $2. Depending on the size of your average sale, the profit margin on PPC for manufacturers can be massive.

If you’re interested in running pay-per-click in Houston or Austin, contact the strategists at MARION today to set up a free consultation.

4. Social Media for Manufacturers

“My ideal customers aren’t on social media.”

Without fail, we hear this from industrial and manufacturing businesses about once per month. As of 2023, there are:

• Over 950 million professionals on LinkedIn
• Around 2.9 billion active users on Facebook
• Around 353 million Twitter users worldwide

Without a doubt, your target customers are on social media. Whether or not they are in the mindset to buy while browsing social media is a different story. When it comes to social media marketing for manufacturing, the most relevant platform for a high return on marketing investment is LinkedIn.

LinkedIn

50% of Americans with a college degree use LinkedIn. This makes using LinkedIn for B2B marketing a no-brainer. Not only is LinkedIn a great place to post organic updates that your connections can see in their timeline, but its ad targeting capabilities grow more and more advanced each year.

Effective advertising on social media depends on the niche audience that you’re targeting. LinkedIn allows you to target by:

Once you’ve refined your LinkedIn ad targeting options to reach the right decision-makers, you can begin generating a return on your manufacturing social media marketing efforts.

If you’re interested in exploring social media marketing in Houston or Austin, contact MARION to set up a free consultation with one of our strategists today!

At MARION, we pride ourselves on staying ahead of marketing trends to position your brand as an industry authority. Whether it’s designing campaigns that resonate with your audience or optimizing your digital presence to generate measurable results, our strategies are built to help your business thrive.

5. Marketing Automation for Manufacturing

Manufacturing outfits are moving to robotic process automation in an attempt to optimize costs and production. Doesn’t it make sense that your OEM digital marketing strategy makes use of automation too?

How Marketing Automation Simplifies Industrial Marketing

Digital marketing for industrial companies becomes dramatically easier when paired with the right marketing automation platform. Automation allows you to:

• Seamlessly track qualified leads.
• Identify which marketing messages are most effective.
• Score which marketing materials have the best impact on your bottom line.

By identifying which B2B manufacturing marketing materials have the highest conversion impact, you can focus your efforts for compounding returns and overall business growth.

Choosing the Right Platform for Your Strategy

The strategy behind marketing and manufacturing automation will largely depend on the platform you choose. While our sales and marketing teams generally recommend using HubSpot, we can work with several different automation platforms to help you reach your goals.

How to Choose a B2B Manufacturing Marketing Agency

Now that you’ve been exposed to several digital marketing strategies for b2b manufacturers, you can choose the strategy or strategies that best match your B2B manufacturing marketing goals. Depending on whether you’re interested in mostly branding, SEO, web design, or outsourced marketing, the following resources will help guide you through the process of choosing a marketing partner:

• How to choose a marketing firm – this is best if you need a bit of everything
• How to choose a web design company – this is best if you only want a website
• How to choose an SEO agency – this is best if you need ongoing search marketing
• How to choose a branding agency – this is best if you need help positioning your business and creating collateral

The general process for choosing a marketing team will follow the same steps.

1. Determine if the agency understands your business.
2. Analyze the team and their past success. Do they have a portfolio or case studies?
3. Do you get along with your future point of contact? This will affect the success of your partnership more than you know.
4. Does the agency seem to have a curious spirit?
5. Can the agency adapt to different circumstances?
6. Are you able to effectively communicate with the agency?

MARION Makes Digital Marketing for Manufacturers Easy

For over 40 years, MARION has been a trusted partner to local manufacturers, helping them navigate the evolving marketing landscape. Our extensive experience in industries like Energy, Chemicals, and Industrial Equipment means we bring unparalleled technical expertise to every project. From contract manufacturers to large-scale industrial operations, our local team understands the unique challenges you face and is equipped to deliver solutions that drive sustainable growth.

Our approach to digital marketing is rooted in aligning sales and marketing efforts to maximize lead generation and customer loyalty. By combining inbound marketing strategies with targeted paid campaigns, we help you attract more website visitors from your target market and convert them into long-term customers.

Ready to see the difference MARION can make? Explore our portfolio and case studies to view examples of our work, then contact us today to schedule a free consultation. Let’s discuss how we can support your goals for lead generation, customer loyalty, and sustainable growth in today’s competitive market!

Contact us today to set up a free consultation, and discover if we’re a good fit for your goals!

Keyword research is the backbone of any successful SEO strategy. Whether you’re new to the game or looking to refine your skills, mastering keyword research can significantly boost your website’s visibility and drive targeted traffic. Now, here’s how you can conduct keyword research like a pro.

Understand Your Audience

The first step in keyword research is understanding your audience. Who are they? What are their interests, needs, and pain points? Create detailed buyer personas to get a clear picture of your target market. This will help you identify the search terms they’re likely to use.

Brainstorm Seed Keywords

Start by brainstorming a list of seed keywords. These are the basic terms related to your business or industry. For example, if you run a pest control company, your seed keywords might include “termites,” “spiders,” “pest infestation,” and “extermination.” Think broadly at this stage and write down anything that comes to mind.

Use Keyword Research Tools

Once you have your seed keywords, it’s time to expand your list using keyword research tools. Here are some favorites:

• Ahrefs: Offers extensive data on keyword difficulty, search volume, and competitive analysis.
• SEMrush: Excellent for discovering related keywords and analyzing your competitors’ strategies.
• Ubersuggest: A user-friendly tool that provides keyword suggestions, search volume, and more.

Analyze Search Volume and Competition

When evaluating potential keywords, look at two main factors: search volume and competition. Search volume indicates how often a keyword is searched for, while competition shows how difficult it will be to rank for that keyword.

Aim for a balance. High search volume is great, but if the competition is too fierce, you might struggle to rank. Conversely, low-competition keywords might have less traffic, but they’re easier to dominate.

Look for Long-Tail Keywords

Long-tail keywords are longer, more specific phrases that often have lower search volumes but higher conversion rates. For example, instead of “pest control,” a long-tail keyword might be “commercial pest control houston.” These keywords are less competitive and can help you attract highly targeted traffic.

Learn more about long-tail vs. short-tail keywords.

Check Out the Competition

Take a peek at what your competitors are doing. Tools like Ahrefs and SEMrush allow you to analyze the keywords your competitors are ranking for. This can give you insights into their strategy and help you identify gaps in your own.

Focus on User Intent

Understanding user intent is crucial for effective keyword research. Are people looking for information, trying to make a purchase, or seeking a specific service? Tailor your keywords to match the intent behind the searches. For instance, “how to get rid of pests” indicates informational intent, while “hire pest control” shows transactional intent.

Create a Keyword Plan

Once you have a list of potential keywords, organize them into a plan. Group similar keywords together and map them to specific pages on your website. This will help you create targeted content that aligns with your audience’s search queries.

Monitor and Adjust

Keyword research isn’t a one-and-done task. Regularly monitor your rankings and adjust your digital content strategy as needed. Use analytics tools to track which keywords are driving traffic and conversions. Be ready to tweak your approach based on what’s working and what’s not.

The bottom line is that conducting keyword research like a pro takes time and practice — but the results are well worth it.

Get Started with MARION

Looking to boost your SEO rankings? Or do you need year-round marketing support? Either way, MARION can help you identify the most effective keywords to target your ideal audience. Our Houston SEO company will get you started on the path to online success.

Contact us today to learn more about our services.

Link building is an important aspect of SEO that often gets overlooked by businesses. Yet, it’s one of the most effective ways to improve your site’s search engine ranking and drive organic traffic. In this blog, we’ll explore why link building is crucial for SEO, how it works, and some practical tips to get started.

What is Link Building?

Link building is essentially the process of acquiring hyperlinks from other websites to your own. A hyperlink, or simply a link, is a way for users to navigate between pages on the internet. Search engines use these links to crawl the web; they crawl the links between the individual pages on your website and those between entire websites.

Why Search Engines Love Links

Search engines like Google use complex algorithms to determine the importance and relevance of your website. Links play a significant role in these algorithms. Think of each link as a vote of confidence from one site to another. So, the more quality links you have pointing to your website, the more credible and authoritative your site appears to search engines.

The Benefits of Link Building

Link building isn’t just about getting clicks — it’s about building credibility, driving traffic, and climbing the search engine ranks.

Improved Search Engine Rankings

Links are one of the top factors that search engines consider when determining where to rank your site. As a matter of fact, links remain one of the most important ranking factors in Google’s algorithm. Websites with a higher number of quality backlinks tend to rank higher on search engine results pages (SERPs).

Increased Organic Traffic

Higher search engine rankings often lead to more organic traffic. When your site ranks higher, it becomes more visible to potential visitors searching for relevant keywords. Quality link building can help you achieve these higher rankings and drive more targeted traffic to your site.

Enhanced Credibility and Authority

When reputable sites link to your website, it signals to search engines and users that your content is valuable and trustworthy. This can enhance your site’s credibility and authority in your industry, making it easier to build trust with your audience.

How to Build Quality Links

Ready to boost your website’s visibility? Here’s how to get started.

1. Focus on Relevant, High-Quality Sites

Not all links are created equal. A link from a highly authoritative site like a major news outlet or an industry-leading blog is worth more than multiple links from low-quality sites. Focus on building relationships with reputable websites that are relevant to your industry.

2. Create Shareable Content

One of the best ways to attract quality backlinks is by creating high-value, shareable content. This could be in the form of blog articles, infographics, videos, or research reports. Content that provides valuable insights, solves problems, or entertains is usually more likely to be shared and linked to by others.

3. Utilize Guest Blogging

Guest blogging is another effective link-building strategy. By writing high-quality posts for reputable blogs in your industry, you can earn backlinks to your site. Ensure that the blogs you choose have a good domain authority (DA) and are relevant to your niche.

4. Leverage Social Media

While social media links are typically no-follow (meaning they don’t pass authority), they can still drive traffic and visibility to your content. Share your content across social media platforms to increase its reach and the likelihood of it being linked to by other sites.

Common Link Building Mistakes to Avoid

Avoid these pitfalls to level up your link building game!

Buying Links

Buying links might seem like a quick way to boost your rankings, but it’s against Google’s guidelines. If caught, your site could be penalized, in turn leading to a significant drop in rankings and traffic.

Focusing on Quantity Over Quality

It’s better to have a few high-quality backlinks than numerous low-quality ones. Focus on earning links from authoritative, relevant sites rather than trying to accumulate as many links as possible.

Ignoring Internal Links

While external links are important, don’t forget about internal linking. Internal links help search engines understand the structure of your site and the relationship between your pages. They also help distribute page authority throughout your site.

Tips for Getting Started with Link Building

1. Conduct a Backlink Audit: Use tools like Ahrefs or SEMrush to analyze your current backlink profile and identify opportunities for improvement.
2. Create Link-Worthy Content: Focus on putting out content that is informative, engaging, and shareable.
3. Reach Out: Don’t be afraid to reach out to other websites and ask for a link. Provide value by suggesting how linking to your content can benefit their audience.
4. Track Your Progress: Regularly monitor your backlink profile to track your progress and be sure to adjust your digital content strategy as needed.

All in all,link building is a vital component of a successful integrated marketing strategy. When you implement effective link-building techniques, you can greatly improve your search engine rankings, drive more organic traffic, and establish your site as an authority in your industry.

Ready to Boost Your SEO with MARION?

If you’re looking to enhance your SEO strategy with effective link-building techniques, MARION is here to help. As a full-service marketing agency, we offer SEO, PPC, and digital marketing services that drive results.

Contact us today to learn more about how we can help your business thrive online!

If you’re just learning about keywords and their role in SEO, you may be wondering which ones are better for optimizing your web presence. Let’s dive into the differences between short-tail vs. long-tail keywords.

What are Short-Tail Keywords?

Short tail keywords are concise, one or two-word phrases that cast a broad net. They have high search volumes and attract a large audience. For example, “digital marketing” or “SEO” fall into this category.

While they offer broad visibility, the intense competition can make it challenging to secure top rankings.

Notice how the search volume for the short tail keyword “SEO” is huge? This may seem enticing, but with a Keyword Difficulty score of 100%, it’s safe to say you won’t be seeing any of that traffic.

What are Long-Tail Keywords?

On the flip side, long tail keywords are more specific phrases, often comprising three or more words. Examples include “digital marketing strategies for startups” or “SEO services in Texas.”

These keywords target a niche audience with lower competition and higher relevance. The specificity allows businesses to connect with users actively searching for precise information.

Here, you can see that the long tail keyword “SEO services in Texas” has a much lower Keyword Difficulty score of 25%. This means with the right optimization techniques, you can easily make it to the first page of Google. The only catch is that the search volume is only 50. This is why it’s important to take all factors into consideration when developing your digital content strategy.

Striking a Balance for SEO Success

The effectiveness of your SEO strategy often lies in achieving a harmonious balance between short-tail and long-tail keywords. Short tails provide broad visibility, casting a wide net to capture general interest. Long tails, with their specificity, hone in on targeted audiences, improving the likelihood of conversion. A carefully crafted combination of both can do wonders for your SEO.

Whether you lean towards short-tail keywords, long-tail keywords, or a strategic mix, professionals like MARION are equipped to tailor solutions that align with your unique objectives.

Contact MARION for Tailored Digital Marketing Excellence

Seeking an experienced digital marketing agency in Texas? You’ve come to the right place. Contact MARION for a tailored approach that aligns with your business goals. With expertise in Dallas, Houston, Austin, and beyond, MARION offers year-round marketing support to amplify your online presence. From SEO optimization to comprehensive digital strategies, you can trust that our team will grow your business.

Consult with MARION to learn more about our unique approach to integrated marketing.

This past March, Google rolled out another core algorithm update, which has had the SEO community buzzing about how it will impact website rankings. While the full effects of this update have likely not been observed, it is important to understand that measures can be taken to minimize the impact of Google’s ongoing algorithm updates.

Understanding The Foundation of Google’s Search Algorithm

With each update, Google is constantly refining its algorithms to ensure that the most relevant and authoritative content is featured prominently in search results.

Search intent and website relevance create the bedrock upon which Google’s search engine lays. Google has become the largest search engine in the world because it consistently delivers relevant, high-quality search results to users. Google uses these algorithm updates to better analyze, understand, and rank website content so that it can continue providing pertinent content to users.

If you’re worried that your search rankings will drop as a result of this algorithm update and other subsequent updates, fear not. There are many digital content strategies and useful tools to help you maintain and improve your rankings.

SEO Best Practices to Improve Your Google Rankings

Keeping up with Google algorithm updates is essential for any website or business that wants to stay competitive in the ever-changing digital landscape. This means that it’s important for website owners and marketers to keep on top of these changes so they can adjust their strategies accordingly. Below, we offer SEO best practices and steps you can take to ensure your content remains visible and relevant.

Prioritize High-Quality Website Content

Develop a thorough understanding of what your target market is researching, and create content aimed at educating, captivating, and providing solutions for their questions.

There are plenty of tools available (like SEMrush) that can help you find appropriate keywords to base your website content around. Remember, Google Search uses keywords at the core of its algorithm, so understanding the specific language consumers use and implementing it on your website will prove most successful.

Optimize For User Experience

Having relevant content isn’t enough if your website takes too long to load. Google wants users to be able to access information quickly. So ensure that page load time is fast, buttons and forms are accessible on mobile devices, and the website’s layout is conducive to a strong customer experience.

Set Up Google Alerts or Follow Google Search Relay on Twitter

Constantly monitoring the hundreds of updates that occur every year isn’t realistic; however, Google Alerts can notify you when a core algorithm update is scheduled to take place so that you have time to prepare and adapt. Simply go to google.com/alerts and enter keywords like “Google algorithm” to receive emails about when these alerts will take place. Another option is to follow Google Search Central on Twitter. This account regularly reports noteworthy changes occurring within the Google world.

Using Search Console, Google Analytics, and SEMrush To Regularly Monitor Rankings

Using these tools to monitor website traffic and conversions, as well as keyword rankings, can further assist you in staying ahead of Google’s algorithm updates. You can use these tools to see whether there are dips or spikes in website activity, which can be indicative of an algorithm update. These SEO monitoring tools can provide you with a better understanding of whether your content is compelling and offer insights into improving your content for better performance.

How to Rank Higher on Google with MARION Integrated Marketing

Ultimately a strong SEO strategy is the only way to maintain good rankings with Google. Therefore, developing strong SEO practices is paramount to showing up on Google Search regardless of an algorithm update. For more on SEO and marketing best practices, visit the MARION blog.

Contact MARION today to learn more about keeping up with SEO algorithm updates.

If there’s one thing 2023 has made us realize, it’s that there are numerous ways we can drive traffic to our websites and landing pages. Of course, it’s obvious that one of the best sources we can tap into for traffic is Google, but things start getting confusing when it comes to organic vs. paid search.

Organic Search and Paid Search: An Overview

Google is the largest search engine in the world, with over 4.3 billion users across the globe. So there’s certainly more than enough website attention to go around. Two ways to tap into this huge traffic source are organic search and paid search.

What is Organic Search?

In the world of online marketing, the term “organic” refers to something that happens naturally. In this instance, “organic search” refers to the users who find your content on Google or Bing by clicking on one of the unpaid results from the search engine results pages.

The one downside to ranking well on Google is the time and work it takes for your site to be seen in the organic search results.

It can easily take six months or more before obtaining a first-page ranking on Google. However, once you get there, you will reap the benefits of Google organic traffic.

In the early days of the internet, it was incredibly easy to rank well on Google. There wasn’t much competition, and Google’s algorithms were fairly easy to game.

Now that practically every business has a website, Google has begun cracking down on “black hat” SEO practices that allow people to rank through illegitimate tactics (such as keyword stuffing and private blog networks).

In 2023, the journey to ranking well on Google isn’t easy, but the result is very much worth the effort. Google has become part of our daily lives, and customers rely upon reliable search queries daily to inform their purchase decisions. Organic traffic is still relevant when driving traffic to your business.

If you’re searching for reputable SEO companies to help increase your organic traffic, reach out to our team today.

What is Paid Search?

You can think of paid searches as a “front of the line” pass in the sense that your ad will always appear at the top of Google, even above those who have worked hard to earn the top spot organically.

Like most online advertising platforms, Google allows you to pay for your link to be seen first. Some online consumers aren’t even aware that the first few links at the top of a Google search are ads (although Google labels each ad with a tiny green box).

Ads fit naturally at the top, and it’s easy to forget or overlook the fact that they are, indeed, ads. Where organically ranking on Google can take months or longer before you see results, Google paid ads can provide relatively instant results. This is the primary reason that paid searches have become extremely popular.

There’s a reason Google Ads is one of the most popular advertising platforms on the web. Internet marketers realize the effectiveness of Google paid search and have jumped in head-first.

Despite its popularity, starting a campaign without knowing what you’re doing would be very unwise. If you don’t set up your ad properly, there’s a good chance it won’t perform well, and you’ll quickly hemorrhage money.

If you’re searching for targeted pay-per-click advertising experts to manage your paid campaigns, contact MARION today.

Organic Search vs. Paid Search – Which One Is Better?

As paid search continues to skyrocket, the topic of natural search vs. paid search has led to many heated arguments.

Some have argued, quite enthusiastically, that organic search will always be better due to the sheer amount of traffic you can drive to your business website without the need for an advertising budget. Others believe that paying to “cut to the front of the line” is the better option because it shaves time off the long period it would take to otherwise rank well on Google.

Both sides make valid points, but it all boils down to this: some people will click on paid advertisements while others will click on organic links. Instead of focusing on organic vs. paid search, marketers should focus their attention on both streams of traffic.

The Best of Both Worlds

Think about it this way — every business owner and marketer would love to organically rank for the keyword(s) they deem beneficial for their business. But it’s ridiculous to believe that every website on the internet can achieve the number one position.

In the same sense, every brand loves the idea of being first for every possible query, yet the amount of money they would have to invest to achieve this goal would likely bankrupt them. There are just too many highly competitive keywords to cover.

Leveraging the benefits of both organic and paid queries will allow you to gain maximum exposure. There will be certain situations where you will want to use one over the other.

For example, if you’re looking to draw in free, consistent traffic for your business, implementing a long-term SEO plan should be your plan of attack. However, if you need quick results, paid search will be the best option.

Typically speaking, organic search is the most cost-effective long-term strategy to draw in traffic. Likewise, a well-optimized Google Ads campaign can be a cost-effective traffic-generation strategy. It all comes down to finding a balance between organic and paid search.

How to Measure Paid and Organic Search Results in Google Ads

If you’re already practicing search engine optimization and using Google Ads to get leads for your business, you can access a special report. There is a report in Google Ads called Paid & Organic. This report shows the paid and organic results for a single keyword.

For example, imagine that you are running paid search ads for the exact match keyword “digital marketing services,” and you also have a page on your public website that ranks well organically for that exact keyword. The Paid & Organic report would show you how many paid clicks and impressions you received for “digital marketing services” in addition to the organic clicks and impressions during that same time.

Marketers find that advertising for a search term you’re already ranking results in more total clicks than doing one or the other. For instance, imagine you’re getting 30 organic clicks per week for “digital marketing services.” It happens like clockwork, and you can’t seem to get any more clicks than that.

When you start using Google pay-per-click ads, your paid campaigns generate about ten clicks per week, but your organic clicks increase to 35 per week. Marketers speculate that seeing a brand in both paid and organic results encourages people to favor your brand by clicking on your results at a higher rate.

This Google help guide will help you connect your accounts and access the report. Now you can analyze data from your organic and paid search results.

Implementing The Best Traffic Strategy For Your Business

Savvy marketers know there is value in leveraging both organic and paid search. It’s your job to examine your industry’s organic vs. paid search statistics and determine which combination is right for your business.

No matter what type of marketing tactic you intend to use to drive traffic to your website and landing pages, you can rely upon the expertise of MARION to help you make the right decision to meet the needs of your business. Our digital marketing agency in Houston offers various services, including internet marketing, SEO, and PPC, to help your business grow.

Contact our team today to learn what we can do for your business.

Simply put, the purpose of marketing is to create awareness of a product, service, or event. Creative marketing is one of the most interesting and desirable aspects of marketing, as it can be used to convey a message through creativity. It brings customers to the company’s product and helps them keep their attention. It’s a proven way to boost conversion rates!

What is Creative Marketing?

Creative marketing is not just about coming up with catchy slogans or designing an attractive logo for a company. Instead, it involves using tools such as music, sound effects, symbols, and images to make consumers interested in buying a product.

Why Creative Marketing Matters Today

Creative advertising is an essential part of the modern marketing industry. It’s more than just an additional ingredient—it’s at the core of everything businesses do today. Creative marketing is crucial to the success of any company because it’s all about changing perceptions and connecting with potential customers on a new level.

Creativity has always been considered an essential resource in marketing, but it has taken on greater significance in recent years. With the rise of social media, consumers are bombarded with messages about products and services every day. To stand out, marketers must be innovative and creative in their marketing campaigns to gain attention and interest from potential buyers.

Check out these creative, successful social media campaigns.

The Challenge of Creativity in Marketing

Creativity is the cornerstone of marketing. It is one of the most critical aspects of an organization’s marketing efforts. A creative mind is what separates a good marketer from a great marketer. In addition, a creative mind can help build up ideas that are not only effective but also refreshing. 

As the digital environment continues to change, marketers are faced with increasing challenges regarding creativity. Marketing in an online environment is much different than traditional marketing, which poses some unique obstacles for marketers looking to be creative in their work.

The emergence of AI writers has made marketers’ jobs more streamlined and efficient as they can focus on what they are best at — creativity and emotions — rather than wasting time on technical skill sets and research.

How to Foster Creativity in Your Marketing Efforts

Did you know that 75% of individuals believe they are not living up to their creative potential? Becoming more creative can be challenging, as developing your artistic skills takes time and effort. It won’t happen overnight! However, the following tips will help you tap into your right brain and increase your creativity in marketing:

• Brainstorming: Brainstorming is a great way to develop new ideas for your product. You can do it alone or in a group, but ensure all participants are active and engaged.
• Ask yourself: When was the last time you went out of your comfort zone? Trying new things will give you fresh ideas and perspectives that you never imagined before.
• Bring the team together: Put together a creative task force of people with different backgrounds and skill sets. They will be able to provide different views and experiences that can be used for breakthrough marketing ideas.

What Creative Marketers Do Differently Than Traditional Marketers

Creative marketing is about individual creativity and the uniqueness of your product. Creative marketers rely on their wits, intuition, and skills to get where others can’t.

Traditional marketing is about tactics, techniques, and best practices. Traditional marketers use strategic methods to get your attention in crowded markets, but these techniques aren’t as effective as they once were. To truly get in front of people these days, you need to be creative.

Elevate Your Brand with a Creative Marketing Agency

To recap, creative marketing is a type of marketing that focuses on creativity and emotions. It is an effective tool used by businesses to generate new ideas and fresh perspectives while still engaging with customers. Creative marketing will never replace traditional forms of marketing. However, it can complement them in a way that brings out the best in both.

Simply ‘being creative’ isn’t always as easy as it sounds. Luckily, our digital marketing agency is here to help! The team at MARION has been serving Texas businesses for over 40 years. We’ve taken a creative approach to developing custom marketing plans for various industries. Check out MARION’s design portfolio to see what our creative designers can do.

Contact us today to learn how we can help your business grow by incorporating a creative strategy into your marketing project.

As one of the highest ROI marketing channels, SEO—or Search Engine Optimization—can make or break your business. A solid online presence is the key to staying ahead of the competition and growing your bottom line. So, how much do SEO services cost? And is it even worth it for small business owners? This guide will tell you everything you need to know about current SEO rates and pricing.

Should I Pay for SEO Services?

Are you allocating around 8% of your revenues to marketing?

According to the SBA, small businesses should have a B2B marketing budget of around 7-8% of their yearly revenue. However, the Small Business Administration mentions that in specific industries, businesses may need to earmark up to 20% of their annual revenue during the early branding years.

A 2019 study from BrightEdge shows that an average of 53% of all web traffic comes from organic search.

If your marketing budget should be 8% of your yearly revenue, and half of your small business marketing results come from search engines, then shouldn’t you invest 4% of your annual income in SEO?

Let’s do some math. For a small business with approximately $5 million in yearly revenue, you could invest up to $16k per month to reach SBA budgeting benchmarks.

This begs several questions for small business owners…

• How much does SEO cost?
• Should I pay for SEO services or do it myself?

There’s a good chance you started your business because you are an expert in your industry, not SEO. Read through the following considerations to better understand how much to spend on SEO and whether or not you can do it yourself.

What Kind of SEO Help Do You Need?

Depending on your industry, you may be generating several million in revenue without maintaining a staff of your own. You could be a solopreneur or leverage contractors when you need to execute outside your area of expertise.

Depending on your preferences and business goals, you have the following options for search engine optimization.

Optimize Your Own Site

The do-it-yourself approach to SEO is not for everyone, especially if you’re strapped for time. Believe it or not, Google’s algorithm goes through an average of 3,000 changes per year.

As a small business owner trying to manage customers, your business process, and even your own books, you likely don’t have the bandwidth to keep up with Google’s algorithm updates.

If you decide to take on this responsibility to cut the hard cost of SEO services, you’ll need to learn the basics. You can leverage plenty of free online resources during your SEO training. However, doing your own SEO requires a larger investment of your time in return for lower search engine optimization costs incurred by external resources.

There’s also a good chance that you’ll recognize early in the game that you need to heavily edit or even redesign your website. However, while a bias for action generally gives you an edge in business, it can have the opposite effect in the realm of SEO. So make sure you learn how to redesign a website without losing SEO before you make any changes.

Hire an SEO Specialist

Your next option is to hire an SEO specialist. So if you’re a small business owner wanting to keep your payroll taxes to a minimum, this option may not be for you. Hiring a W-2 employee will also require management on your part, so your time is still at risk of being invested in SEO. In addition, you will likely be limited to paying for an employee with a few years of experience since you won’t be able to provide much direction for new marketing talent.

One of the advantages of hiring an in-house SEO expert is that you have more control over the process without becoming too involved. In addition, content creation and industry subtleties won’t go overlooked because your employee has direct access to your insights and will become very familiar with your industry over time.

The most significant disadvantage is that hiring an in-house SEO specialist costs not only more time on your part but wages and payroll taxes too. How much is search engine optimization when you add up all the hidden costs of an employee? On the other hand, it may be less expensive to hire an agency with experience and specialized resources that a W-2 worker probably won’t have access to.

Hire an SEO Company

Hiring an SEO company is the best option for a small business owner who values their time and wants to leverage SEO professionals’ collective power and expertise. SEO services pricing will vary based on your business goals, and there is a minimal time investment required on your part. Learn how to advertise a small business locally.

How much do SEO services cost when you use an agency? You can take most of your time out of the cost equation and consider only the monthly SEO rates between agencies. Keep in mind that not all agencies will perform on the same level. In business, you get what you pay for—which is especially true for the value of SEO services.

For the highest quality SEO services in Texas, contact MARION today. We’ll review your marketing needs and craft a unique strategy to grow your online presence and get leads for your business.

Project-based or Ongoing SEO Services

How much is SEO per month vs. as a project fee? Of course, there is a difference, but whether or not you should use ongoing monthly SEO services or project-based search engine optimization pricing will depend on your long-term goals.

Monthly Retainer for SEO

A monthly retainer makes the most sense for a business without SEO talent on payroll. Even for small businesses with a marketing manager or CMO, the internal marketing talent may not know enough about SEO to want to make optimizations themselves.

The monthly SEO retainer is especially relevant for growing small businesses that need all their online branding and marketing services handled by a third party. The monthly recurring fee model is designed for two things:

1. Maintenance for small companies with a smaller budget and little web development knowledge
2. Growth for small businesses with a larger budget and no internal SEO talent

Paying monthly SEO rates will not align with your goals if you only need your company’s website “cleaned up” from a technical SEO standpoint.

SEO Project-based Pricing

Project-based pricing will make more sense for a small business with an internal marketing team but needs to establish a healthy search engine optimization foundation. The internal team may have experience with blogging and social media marketing campaigns but needs help formatting their site structure and website page templates to improve their inbound marketing results.

It may seem attractive to pay an SEO project fee and hope that you can just coast once your SEO support completes the job. However, your organic traffic will slowly dwindle without regularly publishing skillfully created and technically polished content. Content marketing services play a significant role in the success of your SEO, and project-based pricing will not help you achieve lasting success.

Hourly Consulting Pricing

Hourly SEO pricing makes the most sense for a do-it-yourself small business owner or a company with a small marketing team that lacks SEO experience. SEO consultants can help pinpoint technical website challenges while training you or your team to maintain your organic performance.

If you require substantial hourly consulting work, you may consider opting for monthly recurring SEO services to avoid reinventing the wheel.

How Much Do SEO Services Cost?

Let’s go back over the disclaimers before you decide how much to spend on SEO.

• What are your goals? The higher your growth goals, the higher your SEO spending should be.
• You get what you pay for. If you want to pay low prices, you can expect low-quality results.
• If you’re paying for SEO only, your prices will be lower than for an all-encompassing digital package or a full-service marketing package.

The following ranges of SEO pricing are from a survey of over 400 respondents released in early 2016. The following ranges refer to the cost of monthly SEO services.

• 10%— less than $500
• 27%— $500 – $1,000
• 29%— $1,000 – $2,500
• 20%— $2,500 – $5,000
• 15%— $5,000 – $10,000

These costs for SEO services seem to align with the SBA’s marketing budget benchmarks.

The next time you ask yourself if you should pay for SEO services, you’ll be able to make an informed decision based on the above data. Of course, the amount you spend on SEO services will hinge on your business goals and the firm you choose to partner with.

Google releases several algorithm updates every year, and these changes can have a significant impact on your SEO efforts. In other words, it affects how many eyes will reach your content.

So, how do you keep up with the ever-changing algorithm? Let’s go over some general best practices for ensuring your content stands up to any and all future changes.

How Often Does Google Update Its Algorithm?

Google is well-known for rolling out algorithm updates left and right. On average, there are upwards of 3,000 changes made per year. That being said, the majority of updates are minor improvements that may not be of interest to most content creators and typically go unnoticed.

However, Google also launches several significant changes every year, referred to as “core updates.” Often planned months in advance, these critical components of Google’s ranking algorithm are designed to enhance the quality and relevance of overall search results. As many digital marketing experts know, these updates are notorious for drastically affecting SEO, for better or for worse.

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Check out our ultimate timeline of Google algorithm updates >

Content Creation Best Practices

Simply put, it’s not enough to just produce high-quality content nowadays. Many businesses succeed at creating engaging and valuable content for their target audience—but that doesn’t automatically make it long-lasting, high-ranking content in the eyes of the algorithm.

To ensure your content outlasts future algorithm updates, you’ll need to play by Google’s rules. Follow these best practices and learn how to create the content you need for ongoing success.

• Focus on Quality Content
• Understand Google E-A-T
• Keep Your Audience in Mind

Focus on Quality

Regardless of Google algorithm updates over the years, quality is the key to generating inbound traffic. To create truly valuable content, you must have subject matter that is beneficial to the user—whether that be educational information, unique insights, proven research, new ideas, etc.

Additionally, if your content is presented neatly and accurately, your message is far more likely to get across. Avoid any errors that might make visitors click away. The top reasons that users are likely to leave a webpage include:

• Broken links and forms
• Spelling and grammar mistakes
• Outdated information
• Misleading/irrelevant title
• Poor format, design, or usability
• Not mobile-friendly (bad UX design)
• Overwhelming ads or pop-ups

But more importantly, you must have high-quality content by the algorithm’s standards in order to climb the ranks and beat your competitors. Here are three few red flags Google looks for when ranking websites.

1.     Poor On-Page Optimization

Elements like keywords and page titles play an important role in helping the algorithm determine what your content is about. Fortunately, it doesn’t take long to optimize title tags, image tags, meta descriptions, URLs, and XML sitemaps.

2.     Thin Content

Simply put, thin content is on-page content that is not useful to visitors. This includes doorway pages, affiliate pages, irrelevant guest posts, and content that is automatically generated or stolen from another online source.

3.     Insufficient Links

Not only do you need great content to gain Google’s approval and achieve high ranks, but you also need great links. The more high-value links your site has, the better your web presence. You’ll also want to avoid bad link-building practices to stay on Google’s good side.

Overall, Google favors meaningful, quality content related to the keywords you’re ranking for.

Understand the E-A-T Perspective

Ultimately, Google wants to give its users the best search engine experience possible, which is why it takes careful precautions to only promote trustworthy domains. As a result, Google’s perception of a business often correlates with the impression left on its target audience. So, how can you tailor your content to meet Google’s standards?

Google measures three main factors when determining how much trust should be placed in a particular brand or website—Expertise, Authority, and Trust—also known as E-A-T. The concept of E-A-T has been around for nearly a decade, yet many industry experts still struggle with it today.

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• Expertise – Expertise means to have exceptional knowledge or skill in a particular subject. Google tends to favor content created by subject matter experts. Simply put, the content on your site must demonstrate a higher level of expertise than the competition.
• Authority – Authority is all about reputation, typically among industry experts and influencers. When people see an individual or website as the go-to source of reliable information on a subject, that constitutes authority.
• Trust – Trust is about the accuracy, legitimacy, and transparency of a webpage’s content. Citing trustworthy sources is a big part of building trust with Google. Including publisher contact information is also helpful.

What exactly determines E-A-T? Google typically looks at a combination of the content, creator, and website. Therefore, the algorithm is constantly being trained to look for these variables when deciding which web pages to promote in search results.

Keep Reader Intention in Mind

Unlike Google, people don’t generally care about links and tags. They’re just searching for content that meets their needs. Therefore, you must tailor your content to your specific audience to achieve the best results. Ask yourself these questions to better understand Google audience targeting.

• Who is your target audience?
• What problems are they trying to solve?
• What writing style appeals to them most?
• How can you earn their trust?

Once you know your audience, all you have to do is create content they are specifically searching for. The best content creators know what strategies to use to boost reader engagement and drive traffic. 

For example, you can incorporate descriptive language into your writing to create an image in the reader’s mind and fully immerse them in your work. Likewise, using figurative language can transform ordinary content into an enhanced experience.

Follow these steps successfully, and the algorithm will reward your efforts with high ranks and leads for your business!

What About Future Google Algorithm Updates?

At this rate, it’s clear that Google won’t be slowing down on the updates anytime soon. And with thousands of algorithm changes per year, it’s impossible to keep up with all of them. It’s true that most updates won’t affect you, but it’s a mistake to ignore them entirely—especially the big ones.

Ultimately, it’s crucial that marketers and content creators know when major changes in the algorithm happen. It’s the only way to understand whether rankings shifted because of an internal change or a Google update.

So, do you have a proactive or reactive digital content strategy when it comes to Google algorithm changes? To ensure your content survives future search updates, you’ll need to raise the bar.

Get ahead of the algorithm and put your best foot forward with the content optimization tips mentioned in this article. Or if you’re not ready to take on that challenge, you can always recruit the help of an outsourced marketing agency that knows its way around the algorithm.

Contact us today to learn more about our SEO services in Houston and Austin, TX.