Internet Marketing and the Scientific Method

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Internet Marketing can be a complicated subject and practice. There are varying and contradictory opinions out there from online experts.

To further compound all these viewpoints, there are multiple search engines to care about as well. Then, we get into what facets of Internet Marketing matter most to your firm – organic search; AdWords; remarketing; geofencing; etc.

That’s quite a lot to juggle!

Also, it is often incorrectly assumed that there may a single cause or culprit as to why an Internet Marketing campaign is not performing well.

As an example, there are well over 200 factors that go into organically ranking a website. While many of these factors have varying weights of importance, there is normally a collective audit that needs to be run through to determine the offending issue.

It’s known by some that I love analogies (they work!) It takes a complicated subject and gets to the gist of what we all can relate to and understand. I use them all the time: when choosing the right keywords to localized content on your website to presentations on responsive design.

I have a new analogy that I want to share.

There is one constant common thread analogy that runs through all variables applied to Internet Marketing. I would encourage all participating and entertaining Internet Marketing to always think about it in this capacity and that simply is: Internet Marketing is akin to the Scientific Method.

The scientific method is defined as a process for experimentation that is used to explore observations and answer questions. Internet Marketing is essentially no different. The methods work all the way through our continual process.

Below are the same analogous processes as outlined by the actual scientific process (along with organic SEO examples – but this could be easily interchanged with AdWords; etc.):

  • Ask A Question – Why am I not ranked organically?
  • Do Background Research – Has there been algorithm updates? Have the normal “usual suspects of items” been checked? Has there been a penalization to the website?
  • Construct a Hypothesis – Once an offender has been determined, rely on your library of knowledge of organic SEO to take a calculated and educated guess on what may be the cause.
  • Test with an Experiment – Apply new and revised updates to the website.
  • Analyze Your Data and Draw a Conclusion – Did these updates help improve the website rank? Did this have an effect?
  • Report Your Results – Report the new and improved ranking results to your client and team.

The above example is a general process, but hopefully you get the point.

Whether you are concerned about why your Google Ads may not be receiving a good click-thru-rate or your geofencing campaign is not converting as anticipated, the same principle of the scientific method applies for figuring out why.

I believe this process, understanding, and communication takes the complicated aspects out of Internet Marketing and provides improved transparency for all those involved.

Further Learning

Are you interested in learning more about legal marketing? Head on over to our SEO Guidelines & Best Practices page. Our guide will teach you the do’s and don’ts for law firm SEO along with what we include in our SEO plans.

 

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