What We Read This Week (WWRTW) – December 9, 2017

About What We Read This Week (WWRTW): Each week, we share bits and bobs from around the web that 270netters have been reading this week.

The big news in SEO this week was Google’s announcement that it’s expanding the character limits on its featured snippets (more on that later). Besides that, there was a ton of great new content this week:

“3 Powerful Graphic Design Tools for Busy Marketers” – Social Media Examiner

Though our favorites (Canva and Stencil) aren’t on this list, these three programs create some pretty impressive images. It’s easier than ever to create gorgeous blog headers and social media images, so we love to see lists that bring new ones to our attention. This is making it easier for businesses to really power themselves through to creating some great, engaging elements without a lot of training. Even though creating images is part of our job, we think it’s great when people can learn new skills!

“What Do Google’s New, Longer Snippets Mean for SEO?” – Moz

Google’s announcement that it is expanding its featured snippets has been big news in the SEO world recently. SEOs are trying to figure out exactly how this will impact our business, and Rand Fishkin at Moz has given three ways the longer snippets could affect what we do. We agree with his assessment: That the longer snippets may lead to a lower click-through rate, but crafting informative, complete snippets that may lead to higher rankings makes it a pretty good trade-off.

“White Hat vs Black Hat SEO: Which Hat Will You Wear” – SEMrush

Here at 270net, we’re firmly in the “White Hat is best” camp. Even though it does take longer to see results than employing Black Hat SEO techniques, the long-term payoff is much better. We’d rather take the slow-but-steady route and it take a while for our clients to see true rankings improvements than to use Black Hat techniques for quick results that eventually get our clients banned. That’s not a good result for anyone.

“Brands Ignoring Consumers on Social Media are in Trouble [Infographic]” – Social Media Today

This infographic points to something we’ve been counseling our clients on for quite some time now: A social media presence is no longer optional for a business; it’s essential. The same goes for a good, easy-to-navigate website. With more customers turning to contacting businesses on social media to resolve customer service issues, it’s more important than ever to have a solid plan for posting to and managing social media accounts. It could cost you some serious business if you don’t have a plan in place.

“These 42 Tools Will Take Your Content To The Next Level… No Matter Your Strategy, Industry or Skill Level” – Medium

Covering everything from planning to promotion, this guide includes a whole host of great tools and tips. We even added some new bookmarks and tools to our repertoire! This guide is bound to be helpful to anyone looking to work on their content, beginner to expert.