“What according to you, are the must-have tools (apart from GA) should SEOs use to accumulate data?”
I legitimately don’t know how I ever did my job before I had STAT and SEMrush. Both of them are great competitive insights tools that I highly recommend.
“SEO is not something you do anymore.Its what happens when you do everything else right.”
SEO gets the visitor to the door, its upto your site content to welcome and retain that visitor. Integrating your online marketing efforts is all about breaking down silos and delivering amazing results. Social and SEO marketers are a big part of this.
SEO is the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a web search engine’s unpaid results—often referred to as “natural”, “organic”, or “earned” results. In general, the earlier (or higher ranked on the search results page), and more frequently a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine’s users, and these visitors can be converted into customers. SEO may target different kinds of search, including image search, local search, video search, academic search, news search and industry-specific vertical search engines.
Our interview today is with a SEO Manager – Meet Cori Graft
Cori became an Account Manager at Seer Interactive after about a year and a half of working in a more tactical Associate role. As an AM, she was responsible for driving strategy across her client accounts, delegating work to her team of Associates, and managing client relationships
Sharing some of her SEO Strategies, it’s truly an honor to host Cori Graft in our Agency expert interview series:
1. We would like to know a bit about your career background, and how and when you got into SEO and Digital Marketing?
I first got into digital marketing during my senior year of undergrad. I majored in music (flute!) and minored in Communications, and I needed to take one more class to fill my credits requirement for my minor. I chose a ‘Media Sales and Marketing’ class, which required students to work on a marketing plan for a local business focusing on a specific channel assigned by the professor. Traditionally there had only been three groups: Print, Radio, and TV, but that semester my professor “heard that the Facebook was offering ads” and added a fourth group: Social Media. I spent the entire semester learning about digital ads and SEO and was fascinated. I got an internship in digital marketing after graduation, then joined the SEO team at Seer Interactive and worked my way up from an entry level Associate to a Senior Account Manager.
2. What do you believe to be the most important task you do on a daily basis? Why?
I think my most important daily task is checking up on my clients’ sites and analytics to make sure things are functioning properly. I spend half an hour every morning combing through analytics platforms and browsing my clients’ sites, just to see if anything seems “off.” I send over anything strange that I find. This is important from a performance tracking perspective, but it’s even more important from a client relationship perspective. It’s comforting to know that someone’s checking up on things regularly and that someone has your back.
3. What resources or influencers do you follow for staying ahead in the world of SEO?
I read the Seer and Moz blogs regularly. People share great ideas on both of those and I’m always impressed by the community engagement in the comments sections! Rob Bucci (@STATrob), Mike Arnesen (@Mike_Arnesen), Cindy Krum (@Suzzicks), and Emily Grossman (@goutaste) are a few of my favorites to follow on Twitter.
4.What do you think is your greatest career accomplishment?
So far, my greatest career accomplishment has been mentoring people around me at Seer. There’s nothing better than working alongside someone and seeing them grow professionally! It’s so fulfilling.
5. In terms of keyword research, what according to you is the best strategy for local SEO?
Keyword strategy for local SEO shouldn’t be too different than non-local. The goal of keyword research should be to understand how your customers are searching for services that you can provide, or how they’re asking questions that you can answer. Brainstorming the questions they might ask and coming up with a list of related words and questions to run through a tool like Google Keyword Planner is a great way to start that process.
6.What are some of the local SEO challenges faced in general?
I think it’s challenging for business owners and SEO professionals to keep up with all of the changes that happen in local SEO. Solid SEO work shouldn’t be affected too much when an algorithm updates, but even the “good guys” who aren’t spamming can get caught up in updates that set back performance. On the SEO practitioner side, it can be difficult to explain that to clients. On the business owner side, it’s obviously frustrating if your business drops off the map without any warning and seemingly for no reason.
7.What is the best SEO tip you give for your clients and our audience?
Keep investing your time in strategies that really aim to help people. No matter how the algorithms shift, they’re always trying to help people find good information. Focus on providing that good information and making it easy for people to access it.
Today we got to know a few SEO strategies to boost up your business from the expert – Cori Graft. Going forward there are many more specialists that we want to chat with. We will resume our discussion with another expert in our next post.
Until then, Happy Marketing!!
