As a special addition to our member promotion services, the Chamber is now offering a free Featured Member Profile, which will be printed in the Chamber View and posted on the website for a month, then moved into a prominently-placed online archive for the remainder of the year.  To win this free publicity, just drop your business card into the Featured Member Fishbowl at each monthly Networking Mixer and be present for the drawing.  For more information, call the Chamber, 410-719-9609.

Featured Member

November 2009

The Keyword Is Mightier Than the Sword:
Graphic SEO Quests for Clients Search-Engine Success

You’ve heard the Internet legends: how a small party of twentysomethings bands together, armed only with killer web skills and a dream. Within 18 months of starting out with a handful of clients and a shoestring income, they rocket to the top of the search engine rankings in their niche, with a spacious office, national/international clientele, and six-figure revenue.

Just a legend? Actually, no: that’s the history of Graphic SEO.

The company was founded in 2008 by college friends Adam Dodson and Joseph Alvini (now CEO and President/COO, respectively). Its mission: to “build up brick and mortar businesses beyond their local realm – to Maryland, the United States, and elsewhere if they can handle the travel or shipping,” says Mr. Dodson.

Supported by the business administration skills of Makeda Williams, the team was rounded out last month by the arrival of graphic artist Tavon Anthony. “We work as a team, we’re not hierarchical at all,” says Mr. Dodson. “We support each other. I get the coffee.” He grins.

With Mr. Alvini’s 10-plus years of Internet marketing and web development experience, Graphic SEO stands at the top of the online rankings for searches on “SEO”…and they’ve provided an equal success rate for large and small clients in a variety of niches. There’s a sci-fi/fantasy/strategy game flavor to the story as the team tells it: undertaking heroic quests, battling to reach the goal, vanquishing hapless competitors along the way.

Deepershopping.com is one example: an obscure, low-earning e-commerce site that Graphic SEO transformed to the third largest online Christian bookstore in the world within nine months. “Four online Christian bookstores originally had a stranglehold on the market,” Mr. Dodson says, and Mr. Alvini adds, “One of those bookstores, Parable, is now selling only offline…We’ve passed Family Christian Books, and we’re looking to pass #2, and then we’ll throw the One Ring in the volcano with Christian Books.”

The key to their system is precision in choosing keywords that will convert visitors to buyers. “One client came in saying she wanted to be #1 in “Christian Stores,” says Mr. Alvini, referring to keyword rankings. “We told her that with those keywords she could have a million hits but no sales – what she wanted was words that would convert to sales.”

How do they identify high-conversion words? Mr. Alvini smiles. ”We have our methods,” he says. Those methods include analysis of competitors’ keywords and tactics, along with Graphic SEO’s proprietary tools. Chosen keywords are used in the site’s HTML code, content, and pay-per-click ads.

The results speak for themselves. “We have clients whose sites were getting 0.2% conversions originally, and we brought it up to 2.0%, says Mr. Dodson. “They aren’t getting any more hits, but they’re getting five times as many sales.”

They warn their clients that they shouldn’t expect to create a website, turn it over to Graphic SEO, and forget about it. “A website is another store, another business,” says Mr. Alvini. “There’s a lot of management involved in maintaining an online store.” While the team does provide basic ongoing management for web presences, they urge clients to take an active role in maintaining the content of their sites. “We’re here to help,” says Mr. Dodson.

“Here” can be a little hard to find, however. Located on the second floor of the Catonsville Chamber’s Main Street building, Graphic SEO is marked by a small sign on its door. Still, they’re happy in their new location. “Catonsville is awesome,” says Mr. Dodson. “We love our office, we love the area, the Chamber is great, Taneytown Deli’s just across the street. We love it here.”

 Past Featured Members