Meet Matt Anton, SEO Consultant

Matt Anton is an online marketer with a current focus on SEO, also known as search engine optimization, creating products and services to help clients rank their businesses in Google.

1. You and your brother spent a long time learning-by-doing before starting your own company. What ultimately was the tipping point that led you into going into business for yourselves?

The tipping point was when I had a corporate job as an online marketing manager of a billion dollar travel agency, and I realized the companies we were outsourcing to, i.e. the SEO agency and PPC agency, were not doing a whole lot to earn the amazing amounts of money the travel agency was paying them. I loved the corporate job at first because I wanted to really help with my knowledge and passion, but the red tape and middle man mentality really left me wanting more. Around the same time, my brother Dan Anton was injured from a combat IED in Iraq; he is a retired Army Ranger Major having completed two tours in Iraq, receiving two bronze stars for valor in combat. He didn't want to be a desk general, and so he started to get more serious about our online marketing efforts. From 2006-2011 we were both part-time online marketers, though we made some money with it. In 2011, the corporate rat race was over, and Dan and I were ready to take the plunge and provide services to other marketers.

2. How would you summarize the scope of your business and how you help people?

Our mission is to help businesses achieve more success, and the vehicles were currently use to get there are focused around SEO, search engine optimization, and social media marketing. Dan and myself played video games constantly growing up, so we always love to figure ways around systems, test them, break them, and thrive at them. SEO and online marketing is just a game, and we love it, and there is no better feeling in the world than helping others, so it's a true win-win.

3. Why is it important to hire a professional SEO consultant rather than only taking a DIY approach to online marketing?

I believe if you hire someone you should always have a basic understanding so you don't get taken advantage of; however, the economy runs smoothly because everyone has a specialty. You wouldn't expect your local butcher to change your oil and fix your broken arm. If you have a real business, you need to have a real SEO consultant/service behind it; otherwise you will be dividing your efforts.

4. What are some things that people can do for free to help build reputable backlinks to their websites?

A great user experience. It sounds cliche that a quality website and content means a lot, but it truly does. In my younger years, I assumed all it took was the right mass media machine and all would work out. While it's probably easier to promote a decent product with mass marketing, few of us have this type of budget, so the easier solution is to create a great product (website/content) and have effective marketing behind it. Reaching out to others and begging sounds good in theory, but it's a waste of time. Would you want to link out to someone begging you for a link? Relationships are good, but they are founded on trust, and that starts with your reputation, which is directly linked to your internet presence and content.

5. For people who have always wanted to be entrepreneurs but have never quite managed to take the leap, what's your advice?

Keep your day job. I lived in my parents' basement more or less for years while I worked odd jobs saving up the funds to start. The thing about services is you don't have to invest much money at all to help someone else; most services can be time consuming, not capital consuming, so do it before or after your regular full/part-time job. It will make you appreciate it more, and not having a job while you work on your journey will make you desperate and take unnecessary risks and decisions. You'll know when you are ready when your workload begins to exceed hours available, and then you go down the outsourcing/delegation rabbit hole.

Thanks, Matt!

Meet Ilan Finer of In Local Business

In Local Business provides business owners with professional internet marketing solutions--such as search engine optimization and website analysis--to help bring in more customers and generate more sales.

1. Why is SEO marketing so much more affordable than offline forms of marketing like direct mail--and other online forms of marketing like email marketing?

When using SEO marketing, there are many advantages over other marketing media:

First, the people who are looking in the search engines are very precise; they are looking for something using keywords (whether it is for information, a service provider, a product, or a local business), which means that when using SEO on the right profitable keywords will be very effective because you get found by people who are looking for you.

In other marketing there is much less certainty whether the people who are exposed to your marketing are in need of your service, or if they are the right clients for your service. In SEO perhaps you are targeting fewer people, but those are the relevant people for your business.

Second, when comparing the prices of actually obtaining a client from any kind of marketing, the stats are shown as follows:

Average Cost Per Customer

Television Ad - $230 for obtaining a customer
Specialty Magazine - $125 for obtaining a customer
Direct Mail - $70 for obtaining a customer
Email Marketing - $60 for obtaining a customer
Yellow Pages - $20 for obtaining a customer
SEO - $8.5 for obtaining a customer

Because SEO is the most direct kind of marketing you can use, simply because the people who will find you through organic search (search engines) are looking for your service, your marketing is much more specific and effective; therefore, the price of obtaining a client through SEO is much more affordable then other kinds of marketing.

2. In starting your business, why did you decide to specialize on offering local SEO optimization (and how does this differ from SEO in general)?

There is a huge difference between local SEO and general SEO, especially for local businesses. We have noticed many local businesses are performing their SEO in a bad way, and have much more room to improve. Let me give you an example:

A dental clinic is Houston, Texas is trying to advertise their business through SEO; the keywords they have chosen are:

Dental Implants
Cosmetic Dental
Dental Clinic
Dentists
Best Dentist in Texas

Choosing general keywords is a big mistake that many small businesses make. They are trying to rank for general keywords, which will make them face more competition; it will be much harder to rank high for those keywords, and more importantly, they will get seen by people who are unlikely to use their services.

Let’s say this specific dental clinic have done a huge SEO campaign and spent a lot of money to achieve first ranking on those general keywords. Most of the people who will perform an internet search and will find this clinic probably will be from many parts of the world, and will unlikely go to Houston, Texas for a dentist.

Therefore, it will be wiser to perform your SEO locally, using local keywords such as:

Dental Implants Houston TX
Cosmetic Dental Houston
Dental Clinic Houston TX
Dentists in Houston
Best Dentists in Houston Texas

Although those keywords will have fewer searches in the search engines, the people who are looking for those keywords are probably located in Houston, Texas and will more likely to use a local dentist (especially if they are looking for it now).

Keywords should be determined by keyword research, the amount of monthly searches, and competition level. We are specialized in helping local businesses in establishing their business in the search engines, both with their local listing on Google+ and in the organic search for Google / Bing / Yahoo and other big search engines.

We help simply by optimizing business websites to target the profitable, relevant keywords so that they can rank more easily when potential clients are looking for their services.

3. What are some typical packages of services that you put together for companies?

We have many different packages that can fit for every business and every budget. The packages are divided into four different classes. Each package is divided according to the amount of keywords you wish to target; you can choose between 5-30 keywords in a package.

We offer a free consultation on our website in order for companies to choose the right package for their business, as it depends on their current performance, budget, and market competition. We recommend that clients consult with us before choosing a package. More details about the different packages are available here.

4. What is unique about reaching customers via mobile devices as opposed to more generalized internet marketing?

In today's world, most people in the western civilization have smartphones, and those mobile devices are going with them everywhere; when those people are looking for a service online, they go to their mobile device first, and perform a search. In the future we can only expect this trend to expand.

In the United States alone, over 90% of the population now owns a cell phone. If that is not enough, over 25% of the U.S. population are "mobile-only," which means they mostly use only the mobile and rarely if ever use a computer. 

Mobile marketing gives local business more customers, and right now in 2013 most of the local business that have a website don't optimize it for mobile use. Therefore, it is still relatively easy to dominate in the local mobile results for any business that starts to optimize for mobile marketing.

5. For a local business owner who is just beginning to explore SEM and SEO opportunities, what do you recommend as a good way to get started?

Since there is a lot to learn about the subject, I would recommend a local businessperson who is just starting his or her internet marketing to learn about the subject first. There are many ways one can advertise a business; understanding the big picture is extremely important, and can save a lot of time, money, and trouble.

First, I would recommend that a business owner perform keyword research (by a professional) so the local business owner will understand the business' online market.

--How many people are looking for each keyword a month?
--What is the competition on those keywords?
--Is it worth it to target those keywords, or other keywords?

All of those questions can be answered by good keyword research. It will help build the strategy for the business and clear things out, as well as anticipate how long it will take to see results.

Second, after you have the keyword research complete and you know how many keywords you wish to target, plan your SEO for the long run. SEO takes time, and to see real results can take a few months, but there are also a few things you can do to help make it faster and more effective.

"On Page Optimization." This refers to your website content. If you optimize your website to the profitable keywords you have decided to target, it will help rank you higher on Google because it will see that your website is optimized for those keywords, and will give you a better ranking then your competition who haven't done it.

"Off Page Optimization." This mostly refers to how many links are connecting to your website, and what the web is saying about your website. Again, this is measured by the amount of links your website has, and the quality of those links.

However, for individuals or businesses who don't have the time or will to learn all about internet marketing, I would simply recommend the use of a professional service for SEO. It's worth the time and money, since you will see results in few months without all the headache of studying internet marketing.

Thanks, Ilan!