New comment by atramyar in "Ask HN: Who is hiring? (September 2022)"

Backblaze | Engineering, TechOps, Business Intelligence, Marketing, and Product Management | Full-time | Hybrid | San Mateo Backblaze is a public company that makes storing and using data astonishingly easy. When our founding team got together, they committed to helping people save their data. Today, the Backblaze Storage Cloud provides a foundational platform around the … Continue reading New comment by atramyar in "Ask HN: Who is hiring? (September 2022)"

Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, Senate candidate, supported cutting prison population in half

Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, a Democrat running against incumbent Republican Sen. Ron Johnson, has repeatedly advocated for cutting the state’s prison population in half, eliminating cash bail and other progressive criminal justice reforms.

Before entering public office, Barnes previously worked as an organizer for Milwaukee Inner City Congregations Allied for Hope, a Milwaukee-based social justice group, when he teamed up with another organization, Wisdom, to launch a 2012 initiative aimed at cutting Wisconsin’s prison population in half.

The 11×15 campaign sought to reduce the state’s prison population to 11,000 inmates by 2015, Barnes told local media at the time.

Barnes later served two terms in the Wisconsin State Assembly before he was chosen as the running mate to now-Democratic Gov. Tony Evers.

MANDELA BARNES’ TIES TO LINGERIE PARTY BARRING ‘RATCHETS’ COULD HAUNT HIS WISCONSIN SENATE BID

During their campaign in 2018, Evers signed onto Barnes’ idea of halving the state’s prison population. Evers, who at the time was the state schools superintendent, said he wanted to do that by allowing inmates to be released for good behavior, creating or expanding court diversion programs and treating 17-year-old offenders as juveniles instead of adults, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported at the time.

Evers did not put a time frame on halving the prison population, but he called it a “goal” and said he would not release violent offenders.

Months before the election in July 2018, Barnes celebrated Evers and other Democratic gubernatorial candidates for supporting his initiative.

“6 years ago when we kicked off the 11×15 campaign to cut the prison population in half, we could hardly find elected leaders or candidates to get onboard,” Barnes tweeted. “To see it embraced at a gubernatorial candidate forum makes me proud to have worked with such visionary organizers/activists.”

After Evers and Barnes won the election in November 2018, narrowly defeating incumbent Republicans Scott Walker and Rebecca Kleefisch, Barnes continued supporting the prison initiative, tweeting in October 2019, “Cool, let’s cut our prison population in half.”

Since Evers and Barnes entered office, Wisconsin’s prison population has been reduced by about 15%. In 2019, the population was 23,777, compared to 20,123 today, according to 2022 statistics from the state Department of Corrections.

The vast majority of those currently incarcerated – 68% – are classified as “violent” offenders, meaning it would be impossible to cut the population in “half” without releasing at least some of those violent offenders.

WISCONSIN DEM SENATE CANDIDATE SPENT NEARLY $600K ON POLICE DETAIL WHILE COZYING UP TO DEFUND POLICE MOVEMENT

In 2016, when he was still a state legislator, Barnes sponsored a bill to end cash bail in Wisconsin. The measure, which did not make it out of committee, would have required a defendant to be released unless there was “clear and convincing evidence” that he or she was a flight risk or a danger to society, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

During a September 2018 podcast, Barnes also said he supported allowing inmates to vote.

“I’ve long championed restoration of voting rights immediately once someone has served their sentence, and I mean, honestly, even when someone is locked up,” he said.

Barnes has also made statements online with a soft tone on the defund the police movement, and his campaign has received funding from five groups that advocate for defunding cops.

“Defunding the police only dreams of being as radical as a Donald Trump pardon,” Barnes tweeted in July 2020.

On Sept. 3, 2020, Barnes blasted the criminal justice system after the police officers involved in the shooting death of Breonna Taylor did not face charges.

“You can feel how you want about to calls to reform, defund, or abolish but the question is, how can a system that allows this to happen continue to be upheld?” he wrote.

The lieutenant governor also spoke at a major meeting for the Center for Popular Democracy — a far-left group that supports defunding the police and claims Israel targets Palestinians with “violent attacks.”

“Defund police. Defund police states,” the group tweeted in May of last year. “Defund militarized occupation. Defund state-sanctioned violence.”

Barnes has stated in the press that he does not support the defund the police movement, despite his past statements.

Johnson’s campaign slammed Barnes as “dangerous” in a statement to Fox News Digital.

“Lt. Gov. Barnes is a socialist liberal who cares more about catering to his ‘woke’ base than keeping Wisconsin families safe,” Johnson campaign spokesman Alec Zimmerman said.

“Crime is out-of-control in Wisconsin, and we can’t afford to elect a radical who cares more about criminals than their victims. Mandela Barnes is dangerous for Wisconsin,” he said.

Barnes’s campaign did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

Fox News’ Houston Keene contributed to this report.

Aces into Finals as Bird's career comes to close

The Aces returned to the WNBA Finals for the second time in the past three years with a 97-92 victory Tuesday in Game 4 of their semifinal series against the Storm, in the process bringing an end to Sue Bird’s legendary career.

The post Aces into Finals as Bird's career comes to close appeared first on Buy It At A Bargain – Deals And Reviews.

The post Aces into Finals as Bird's career comes to close appeared first on BUSINESS DEMO WEBSITES.

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Local SEO Keyword Research (Step-by-Step Guide)

Have you heard the line ‘ if you build it, they will come’? In case you don’t know, it’s from the late 80s Kevin Costner movie ‘Field of Dreams.’

It’s an inspiring quote, but when local business owners set up their websites, it doesn’t really hold true. They believe once they’re set up online, prospects start flocking to their doors wanting quotes, making orders, or signing up for their mailing lists. However, that isn’t the case for many people.

That’s not just conjecture on my part. Research shows that 77.23 percent of local business owners surveyed struggled to get online visibility.

According to the same survey, 42.85 percent believe that Google favors larger brands. Now, don’t get me wrong. High-profile businesses do tend to perform better online simply because more people are looking for them. However, that doesn’t mean your local company website can’t compete for local keywords.

All it takes is some careful local keyword research and a detailed local SEO strategy, and that’s exactly what I’m going to talk about today.

Why Is Local SEO Important?

Local SEO is valuable because it helps small companies reach potential customers who are looking for products or services in their area.

For example, if you own a home repair business, you would want to target people in your local area who may need your services. In other words, local keyword research targets potential customers who are already interested in what you have to offer.

When done correctly, local keyword research:

Generates more leads and sales.
Helps you rank higher in local search results, increasing website traffic.
Makes it easier for searchers to find you when they’re searching for local businesses on their mobile devices.
Builds trust and credibility with potential customers through reviews.

Research also supports the importance of local SEO. According to Statista, 35 percent of consumers go online multiple times weekly to find local businesses.

That’s not all, though. The research shows that 21 percent of consumers use the internet daily to find local businesses.

These stats demonstrate that as a local business, you need to be visible online, but perhaps you need some more evidence? Okay, here goes.

There are plenty of case studies showing how small businesses can benefit from local keyword research and SEO optimization. Just search for ‘local SEO case studies’, and you can see what I mean.

What Makes Local Keyword Research Unique

As I’ve already detailed, the main focus of local SEO and local keyword research is attracting more leads and gaining more customers.

However, aside from using local SEO to target a particular geographic area, there’s plenty more that makes local SEO different.

The most obvious is Google’s ranking factors. With local searches, the search engine giant considers several vital areas, such as:

The searcher’s location
The sentiment and keywords in online reviews
Name, address, and phone number quotations
A Google My Business profile and relevant keywords
Your Google Maps star rating
Social media interest

To improve your local SEO further, Google offers these tips:

Verify your location, to help improve visibility in local search.
Keep your opening hours up to date, especially around holiday times. This lets local consumers know you’re open, so they don’t have a wasted visit.
Manage/respond to reviews, to show you appreciate and act on feedback. Review management is also essential as positive reviews inspire consumer confidence, and can enhance business visibility.
Add photos and in-store listings. Images showcase your store and products, to give customers a deeper understanding of what you’re selling and whether the products are right for them.

Google also considers relevance, distance, and prominence (your overall web presence), including content, backlinks, and directory listings.

Another factor that makes local keyword research unique is the emphasis on modifiers. The search terms you integrate into writing must be super specific to your location. For example, if you’re a business in Austin, Texas, you would want to use keywords like ‘Austin restaurants’ rather than just ‘restaurants.’

Additionally, voice search is essential to local SEO. Research shows that 74 percent of people use voice search at least weekly to find local businesses, while 76 percent of voice search users choose smart speakers at least once a week, with most searching daily.

A further survey from SEMrush suggests optimizing voice search for each smart speaker (Alexa, Siri, Google Assistant, etc.) and has some helpful tips to enable you to do this:

Infographic from SEMrush showing facts about leveraging voice search for local businesses.

The above graphic also includes some useful tips you can introduce into your local keyword research strategy.

How To Find The Best Local Keywords

You know the importance of local keyword research, but how do you discover the best ones to use? Fortunately, it’s not as complicated as it may seem. Just follow these tips.

Find Industry-Related Local Keywords

To do this, first, consider what you offer and what services or products you want to promote; then brainstorm a list of keywords related to your business.

Alternatively, a simple way to find local-based keywords is using Google search results. Type in your main keyword and scroll down to the bottom of the page. There, you’ll see a section called ‘related searches.’ For example, a small business located in Miami could target the keyword ‘Miami dentist.’

Then:

Once you have a list of keywords, do online research to see how popular they are. You can use tools like Ubersuggest, Google Keyword Planner, or Google Trends to get this information. You could also use tools like Ubersuggest to analyze competitor keywords and see if it’s feasible to overtake them in the rankings.
Another way is to type a keyword into the Google search bar and watch as the autocomplete suggestions appear, giving you some great ideas for related local keywords.

Use Keyword Modifiers

Using keyword modifiers lets you focus your efforts on specific areas or types of searches for targeted traffic and better results from your local SEO efforts.

These modifiers can include location-based terms like ‘near me,’ ‘in my area,’ or ‘local.’ Or you might use ‘car mechanic Cincinnati’ or ‘local mechanic Cincinnati.’

Again, use Autosuggest, related search, or competitive keyword research to see the terms others are using.

Consider Keyword Intent

What are your prospects looking for? Are they looking to buy a product or service, find out more information, or just browsing? Once you know the searcher’s intent, you can better target your keywords and content to meet their needs. Use the same techniques, like Autosuggest, to get an idea of the keywords users are typing in.

Google Places Search Bar

Another great tool for finding local keywords is the Google Places search bar.

A map of Sydney, Australia from Google Maps.

When you do a geographical search by entering a location in the search bar, you get a ‘pick list,’ which includes places and likely search terms.

Once you have a list of keywords, it’s essential to analyze them and determine which ones are the best fit for your business.

Implicit Vs. Explicit Local Keywords

When doing local keyword research, there are two main ways to target your audience: implicit and explicit.

Implicit targeting is when a user searches for a term like ‘hardware store’ or ‘DIY.’ but doesn’t include specifics like location.

In simple terms, Google basically guesses what you’re looking for and offers your location-based results.

To find out what implicit local keywords might be important to your business, do some research online and talk to your customers. Ask them how they would search for a company like yours if they were looking for one in their area.

On the other hand, explicit local keyword targeting involves search terms that people use when looking for your product or service. For example, ‘Dentist in Santa Barbara’ or ‘Hairdresser in Venice Beach.’

How To Use Your Competition In Your Local Keyword Research

Can you really steal your competitors’ keywords? Absolutely! Just use a tool to conduct competitive research to find out what keywords they’re using.

There are a few ways to assess and use your competition in your local keyword research:

1. Look at the keywords they are targeting and see if there are any that you’re also targeting. Chances are, if your competitors are targeting a keyword, it’s because it’s profitable and has a lot of search volume.

2. See what their website looks like and how they rank for their target keywords. This can give you ideas on how to improve your website and rank higher for your target keywords. For less competition, you could take the opposite approach and target keywords your rivals aren’t using. Just make sure they’ve got a worthwhile search volume.

3. Review what content they are creating around their target keywords.

4. Look at the SERPs and pay attention to keywords. These terms are usually in bold.

Now let’s look at some tools to make your local keyword research easier.

The Best Local SEO Keyword Research Tools

I’ve already referenced my tool. Ubersuggest, but it’s worthy of another mention here. It’s an easy-to-use tool that delivers:

Keyword and content ideas
Keywords by traffic
Similar websites
And plenty more besides

For example, if I search for ‘digital marketing agencies California,’ I get:

Keyword ideas from Ubersuggest about digital marketing.

You can also choose from ‘prepositions,’ ‘related,’ ‘comparisons,’ and ‘questions,’ to get a better idea of search intent.

Other tools to consider:

Google Keyword Planner. With this tool, you can see competitive keywords and get ideas for other related keywords.
Moz Local to get a free listing score and see where you stand.
SERPStat to help you further analyze your competition and for SEO purposes.

Ultimately, the best way to find the right keywords for your business is to experiment with different tools and techniques and analyze what works for you.

FAQs

What is Local Keyword Research?

Local keyword research aims to identify relevant keywords that people are likely to use when searching for businesses like yours online.

How do I research keywords for local SEO?

Using the right tools is essential. After all, if potential customers can’t find you in your area, you’re missing out on a lot of business. Ubersuggest, Google Keyword Planner, and Moz’s Keyword Planner all get you off to a great start. Then there’s competitive analysis, viewing the SERPs to see what’s ranking, and using autocomplete.

How do I find the best local keywords?

When it comes to doing local keyword research, there are a few things you need to keep in mind. Consider what your customers might search for when they want to find your business and brainstorm. Then, conduct local keyword research with tools like Ubersuggest, Google’s Autosuggest, or People Also Ask. You can also view the SERPs and look for keywords.

Conclusion

Local keyword research should be an essential part of any small business marketing plan.

By understanding the keywords people in your area are searching for, you can create content and advertising that speaks to them directly, and by using the right tools like Ubersuggest, it’s easy to find out what those keywords are.

Search intent is also a vital part of online visibility, so don’t overlook that area if you want local customers to discover you online.

Do you use local keyword research? Share how you got your business on the map below.

How to Run a Content Audit (2022 Update)

Have you lost track of all the content you’ve created? It’s easy to do.

If you’re anything like me, you’re so focused on coming up with ideas and creating new articles that you might lose track of what you’ve already created.

But the truth is the content you’ve already created is just as valuable as anything you’re yet to create, possibly more so. Optimizing it just a little bit could result in thousands of dollars more in revenue.

That’s why you need a content audit of existing pages. In this article, I’ll cover:

What a content audit is
Why you need an audit
Content audit tools at your disposal
How to run a content audit step by step

Ready to create an inventory of your assets? Then let’s begin.

What is a Content Audit?

A content audit is the process of creating an inventory of your website’s content assets and analyzing them against a set of criteria.

It’s a way of keeping track of the content you have created, seeing which assets need improving, and identifying which topics to tackle next.

A content audit can be as brief or as detailed as you want. You can audit your entire site, just your blog, or even just a category of your blog. They can all offer value and insight. I recommend doing a comprehensive audit, though. The time you spend on your audit now will pay off later.

Why Does My Website Need a Content Audit?

You should carve out the time to do a content audit to see where the gaps are and to start creating better content.

Why should you do a content audit? There are a number of reasons a content audit can help your website perform better.

A content audit offers a heap of benefits. These include:

Analyzing the performance of your content to help you make data-backed decisions about which pages to improve.
Highlighting pages on your site that aren’t optimized for SEO. Some pages may be missing metadata or have a poor heading structure, for instance.
Identifying SEO opportunities and content gaps that you can fill with new content.
Improving the quality of content on your site to upgrade the reader experience.
Identifying content you can repurpose.
Creating a complete inventory of content that makes managing your content strategy easier in the future.
Improving your content’s accessibility and inclusivity.

Whether or not you see value in running a content audit, there are certain points in the life of your website when running a content audit becomes essential. Consider running a content audit if:

Your website is a few years old and you’ve never run an audit.
There’s no clear strategy or you’ve inherited a content marketing strategy from another team.
You’re redesigning your website.
You think you’ve created content on every possible topic in your niche.

Determine Your Content Audit’s Purpose

How you approach a content audit will depend on your goals. While you can create a content audit that achieves all of the benefits I listed above, it will be much more effective if you pick one or two goals to focus on.

For instance, if you want to use a content audit to improve your SEO, then you’ll want to focus on identifying content gaps and pages with missing metadata. That means paying particular attention to the technical SEO of each page.

Overview of SEO issues discovered on a web page.

Given you are reading a digital marketing blog, I’m going to write the rest of this guide as if you were running an SEO-driven content audit. You can still use this guide if you’re looking to improve your reader’s experience or make your content more inclusive and accessible, but just know some of the more technical aspects may not be relevant.

Content Audit Tools

Software tools are an essential part of the content audit process. Rather than go through your website manually, noting each issue in turn, you can use the following tools to automate much of the process.

Ubersuggest

If you’re running a content audit to improve your SEO, Ubersuggest is essential. Running a site audit is easy. Just enter your URL, click “Search,” and click “Site Audit” on the left. Think of this as a quick, free overall look at how your website is doing.

You’ll also get a snapshot of which SEO issues are most prevalent on your site and how critical they are.

Ubersuggest's homepage showing various SEO metrics.

Google Analytics

Do you want to compare the performance of your pages? Then use Google Analytics to find traffic data for each page.

Note: Be aware that Google is sunsetting Universal Analytics on July 1, 2023, in favor of Google Analytics 4. If you haven’t already, you should make the switch to GA4 before completing your content audit. The faster you switch, the more historical data you’ll have and the easier it will be to reuse your content audit in the future.

Broken Link Checkers

As you analyze your content, you’ll want to find and fix broken links. Integrity, Ahrefs, and Dead Link Checker can help you there.

A broken link checker tool named Integrity.

Content Inventory

You could manually pull each content link associated with your website, but that could take far too long and you could risk overlooking some things. Instead, you may want to try a content inventory tool like Screaming Frog or DynoMapper.

Website Content Audit Steps

It may seem like there’s a lot of work involved with creating a content audit. But it’s easy when you break it down into manageable steps.

#1: Create a List of Your Content Assets

The first step of a website content audit is to make an inventory of your assets. Seeing all of them in one location makes it much easier to analyze content performance, highlight areas to improve, and update each asset methodically.

Screaming Frog’s SEO Spider Tool is the best way to extract content assets from your site. It’s free to use if your site has less than 500 pages. But you can also use any of the other content extractors I mentioned above.

Whichever tool you use, export your data into a spreadsheet, making sure relevant data points (word count, meta description, target keyword, no. of images, etc.) are included. You may also want to add traffic data from Google Analytics to each page so you can analyze content performance alongside technical SEO metrics.

Creating a list of content assets using Microsoft Excel.

Content Audit Templates

As I explained above, you will want to build a content audit spreadsheet so you can keep all the data in one place. You can build one from scratch, download one of the following templates, or use these as a launching point and customize your spreadsheet.

Keep in mind the goals we discussed earlier. There are lots of stats or data points you could pull alongside each content. However, some data is going to be more relevant to you than others.

If you are using this audit to improve your content marketing engagement, you will want to check information about clickthroughs, social media engagement, comments, and so on.

If your goal is associated with SEO, you may want to include warnings and recommendations you gather from Ubersuggest.

#2: Create a List of Content Issues to Identify

Now you have all your content assets in one place; it’s time to analyze them. Go through each piece of content one at a time to see how it’s performing, whether it’s missing metadata or there are any obvious ways it can be improved.

Here are a few things to look for, in particular:

Duplicate Content: Search engines prioritize fresh content. If you have a lot of duplicate content living on different pages or posts, you’ll want to remove or rewrite those pages.
Outdated Content: People don’t want to read outdated content, and search engines overlook it too. Update it wherever possible.
Content Gaps: What’s missing in your content? Are there topics you haven’t addressed yet? Target markets you haven’t spoken to? Being able to look at everything at once can help you find the gaps and fill them in.
Target Keyword: Does the content asset target a particular keyword and include it in the copy?
Metadata: Have you written metadata descriptions for all pages? This spreadsheet is going to help you see which ones need to be written and which ones are repetitive and should be updated.
Image Data: Does every image have a descriptive title and alt tag? This will ensure your images are SEO-optimized and accessibility-friendly.
Word Count: Do your pages and posts have enough words to optimize for SEO? Or are they too short? Check that word count to see if pages need to be updated or edited down.

Keep track of everything by creating a note next to each asset about why it needs improving. You can also color-code your spreadsheet based on the type of optimization required, but this can quickly become complicated if a single asset has multiple issues.

#3: Address Content Issues

You can’t do everything at once, so now it’s time to prioritize your content issues. One strategy is to work through each asset numerically, starting with those at the top of the spreadsheet. Another is to group each optimization issue together and tackle them in bulk. For instance, you could update the meta data on every page, then move on to fixing image issues and so on.

Alternatively, use Ubersuggest to prioritize content issues for you. When you run an SEO audit on Ubersuggest, you’ll receive recommendations based on an issue’s difficulty and SEO impact.

Ranking content issues based on how difficult they are to fix and the impact of them.

Focusing on tasks with a high SEO impact and low difficulty will give you a series of quick wins. But you could also prioritize all of the easy tasks to get the ball rolling if you’re not that confident.

Content audits work best when they are tackled by several people, so don’t be afraid to ask for help and split up the work. Maybe you can take care of on-page issues while a colleague addresses the content gaps your audit has highlighted.

FAQs

What is a Content Audit?

A content audit is the process of creating an inventory of your website’s pages and analyzing their performance.

Why Do I Need To Do a Content Audit on My Website?

Content audits help you identify topic gaps, problems, and areas for improvement on your website. Good content helps you rank better in Google and can earn you more traffic, conversions, and revenue.

What Are Some Tools I Can Use for Content Audits?

You can use tools like Ubersuggest, SEMrush, and Ahrefs to run a content audit.

Where Do I Start With a Content Audit?

You should start your content by compiling a list of all of your content assets. You can do this by pulling a report through tools like Screaming Frog and then analyzing the results in a spreadsheet.

Conclusion

A content audit may feel overwhelming at first glance. But don’t let that stop you.

Starting a website content audit is one of the best steps you can take to improve your content marketing strategy. Compiling all of your assets in one place makes it much easier to see what needs improving and which assets are missing. It also makes it easier to prioritize and fix issues.

Once you’ve run a content audit once, managing your assets in the future becomes a breeze. You’ll have no problem taking your content marketing efforts to the next level.

What issues has your content audit identified?

How to Run a Content Audit (2022 Update)

Have you lost track of all the content you’ve created? It’s easy to do.

If you’re anything like me, you’re so focused on coming up with ideas and creating new articles that you might lose track of what you’ve already created.

That’s why you need a content audit of existing pages. In this article, I’ll cover:

What a content audit is
Why you need an audit
Content audit tools at your disposal
How to run a content audit step by step

Ready to create an inventory of your assets? Then let’s begin.

What is a Content Audit?

A content audit is the process of creating an inventory of your website’s content assets and analyzing them against a set of criteria.

It’s a way of keeping track of the content you have created, seeing which assets need improving, and identifying which topics to tackle next.

Why Does My Website Need a Content Audit?

You should carve out the time to do a content audit to see where the gaps are and to start creating better content.

Why should you do a content audit? There are a number of reasons a content audit can help your website perform better.

A content audit offers a heap of benefits. These include:

Analyzing the performance of your content to help you make data-backed decisions about which pages to improve.
Highlighting pages on your site that aren’t optimized for SEO. Some pages may be missing metadata or have a poor heading structure, for instance.
Identifying SEO opportunities and content gaps that you can fill with new content.
Improving the quality of content on your site to upgrade the reader experience.
Identifying content you can repurpose.
Creating a complete inventory of content that makes managing your content strategy easier in the future.
Improving your content’s accessibility and inclusivity.

Whether or not you see value in running a content audit, there are certain points in the life of your website when running a content audit becomes essential. Consider running a content audit if:

Your website is a few years old and you’ve never run an audit.
There’s no clear strategy or you’ve inherited a content marketing strategy from another team.
You’re redesigning your website.
You think you’ve created content on every possible topic in your niche.

Determine Your Content Audit’s Purpose