Ann Smarty - Practical Ecommerce

Articles by: Ann Smarty

Get the Practical Ecommerce RSS feed

Ann Smarty

Ann Smarty is the founder of Smarty Marketing, a boutique SEO agency based in New York, and Viral Content Bee, a social media promotion tool.

Ann's search engine optimization career began in 2010. She is the former editor-in-chief of Search Engine Journal and contributor to prominent search and social blogs, including Small Business Trends and Mashable.

Ann is also a frequent speaker at Pubcon and many other digital marketing events.

Contact Ann via email or LinkedIn.

Link Building
How Topic Authority Impacts SEO

November 30, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Google's assessment of expertise and trust is critical in achieving top rankings.
Design & Dev Tools
Custom GPTs for Marketers

November 27, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Creative GPTs can generate logos, web layouts, content analysis, brand messaging, and much more.
Technical SEO
3 New Metrics for Today’s SEO

November 23, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Modern search result pages are much more than 10 blue links. SEO performance metrics have changed, too.
SEO Tools
3 AI-powered SERP Analyzers

November 21, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Google has long relied on AI for organic rankings. Now search optimizers are using it too.
Analytics & Data
GA4: User Acquisition vs. Sessions

November 16, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Google Analytics 4 segregates traffic reports by user and session. Here's the difference.
Social Media
AI Tools to Create Reels, TikToks, Shorts

November 14, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Producing mini videos for social media once took hours. No more.
Keyword Research
SEO: Targeting the Long Tail for More Sales

November 9, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Targeting niche "long tail" queries has changed from exact-match keywords to understanding a searcher's intent and meaning.
Social Media
AI Tools for Better Social Media Profiles

November 7, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Done well, social media profiles entice followers and drive website engagement.
SEO Tools
How to Set up Organization Schema

November 2, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Google's use of structured data is shifting from producing rich snippets to explaining purpose and content.
SEO Tools
2 (Imperfect) Ways to Block Bard

October 31, 2023 • Ann Smarty

How to block Google Bard without jeopardizing organic search traffic?
Technical SEO
SEO: How to Target Countries

October 26, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Cross-border ecommerce is booming. Here's how to ensure a site ranks in organic search for a targeted country.
Technical SEO
SEO for SGE

October 24, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Google's AI-powered Search Generative Experience will soon roll out to all users, replacing the current layout and results.
SEO Tools
Google’s SITE Operator Is a Top SEO Tool

October 19, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Google's site: is a longstanding advanced search operator. It's handy for finding indexing errors, internal pages for linking and updating, and much more.
Design & Dev Tools
4 AI Tools to Condense Text, Audio, Video

October 17, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Sophisticated tools can now analyze, summarize, repurpose, and explain content — supercharging productivity.
On-page SEO
How to Recover from Google’s Helpful Content Update

October 15, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Google's helpful content guidelines aren't particularly helpful. Here are suggestions for affected sites.
Social Media
AI Tools to Create Social Media Videos

October 10, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Producing social media videos has never been easier or more impactful.
SEO Tools
4 Uses of Google’s URL Inspection Tool

October 5, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Search Console can identify non-indexed pages, duplicate content, crawl errors, and more.
Design & Dev Tools
Comparing 4 Image-to-text AI Tools

October 3, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Drop a photo into an AI vision technology tool and receive product descriptions, social media captions, and more. We test four leading providers.
Technical SEO
How 404s Impact Organic Rankings

September 28, 2023 • Ann Smarty

A deleted page is not the issue. The harm is from broken backlinks to that page.
Social Media
ChatGPT Prompts for Social Media Marketing

September 26, 2023 • Ann Smarty

The right prompts can increase social media productivity with idea suggestions, sample posts, repurposed content, and more.
SEO
SERP Signs of a Trusted Brand

September 21, 2023 • Ann Smarty

A site's trustworthiness could be its top ranking factor. Google provides clues on search result pages.
Content Marketing
Best Content Types for ChatGPT

September 19, 2023 • Ann Smarty

ChatGPT cannot share personal experiences, but it can help with rote descriptions, repurposed text, and more.
On-page SEO
Cross-border SEO for Same-language Sites

September 14, 2023 • Ann Smarty

How do merchants optimize organic rankings for country-specific sites, all in the same language?
Platforms & Apps
How to Train ChatGPT for Better Responses

September 12, 2023 • Ann Smarty

ChatGPT's responses are generic by default. Here's how to customize them to your business or product.
On-page SEO
SEO for Events

September 7, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Tactics include title keywords, consistent URLs, schema markup, speaker pages, and more.
Technical SEO
How Google Personalizes Search Results

August 29, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Search results differ based on a user's history, interactions, location, and more.
Photography & Video
4 Handy AI Video Generators

August 28, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Sophisticated tools offer many languages, avatars, voices, editing options, and more.
Technical SEO
How to Remove a Web Page from Google

August 24, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Legit reasons for removing a page from search results include confidentiality, premium content, dated info, and more.
Google Ads
ChatGPT Prompts for Pay-per-click Ads

August 21, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Grouping keywords, estimating budgets, generating copy — ChatGPT can streamline paid search and social media campaigns.
On-page SEO
SEO and Old Content

August 17, 2023 • Ann Smarty

Yes, fewer articles help Google crawl a site. No, deleting old articles does not automatically improve rankings.

1 2 3 4 5 Next »