Archive for July, 2009

This week I started thinking about Christmas.  The “Leon’s Ho Ho Hold Event” jingle popped into my head. I wish I could say it was the heat getting to me, but with this mild summer that is not the case.  No I was actually thinking about SEO.

Whenever I hear the term ‘Christmas in July’ I automatically start thinking about the coming Christmas-New Year period and what SEO strategies I need to put in place so clients will rank well for the all important holiday period. Thousands of businesses rely on Christmas to generate the bulk of their income. To compete, it is best to be on the ball now.

You may think it is far too early to start a program designed to outrank everyone else six months in advance. There is more to SEO than on/off page optimization. For many businesses, they must decide now what products they are going to target. From that point you can determine which keywords you are going to target in both organic and paid search programs.

There is another issue to consider however. Christmas is one of the busiest times of the year online. However, the crazy shopping period starts usually around the beginning of November, not in December. Once December rolls around, not only have shoppers found what products they want - many of them having already purchased them.

In simple terms, the longer you wait the harder it will be to outrank anyone who starts now. Believe it or not, there are many businesses that commence their Christmas SEO programs on January 1 - it may be Christmas in July, but that signals the start of the SEO for Christmas season. Are you ready?