You might be forgiven if you mistook Nonstop Signs as an ordinary local graphic design and print company.
One visit to their website, however, and you’ll notice that their past clients include local businesses to Fortune 500 companies like PepsiCo and Ferrari.
Look deeper, and you’ll find that Nonstop Signs’ website is brimming with content: product categories, featured items, testimonials, and an unusually active B2B blog that spans a multitude of topics and keywords.
Unlike most local businesses that feature a bare-bones domain — Nonstop Signs’ website is actually a B2B content marketing machine.
This unassuming graphics and print business has built an enormous web presence that ranks for nearly 15k organic keywords that are supported by 90k backlinks.
This is no ordinary print and design company, and certainly not an ordinary website.
We got a chance to catch up with entrepreneur and Nonstop Signs’ founder, Brandon Strapper, to learn how he has built his growing print and design business from scratch — and how his innovative SEO strategy is supercharging his business’ web presence.
“We’ve produced a growing inventory of high performing B2B marketing content that is rich in high volume organic terms, local keywords, and quality backlinks — which we use to both boost our domain and then link back to our products.”
-Brandon Strapper, CEO of Nonstop Signs and 858 Graphics
How did you first start your business?
I started my company in 2007 in my early 20’s. I always wanted to start a business. I started several companies, one of which started with me buying a custom decal machine on eBay for $400.
You really did start from scratch — what did you end up doing with the custom decal machine?
I started selling custom decals door to door to businesses in San Diego, and then eventually built out a website and started selling nationwide while expanding our product line to all things trade show, printing, and signage.
I turned that $400 custom decal machine in a garage into an international printing powerhouse focused on helping businesses improve their marketing and branding, with everything from retail signage to packaging, to trade show displays.
You’ve powered both of your companies, 858 Graphics and later Nonstop Signs, with B2B Marketing and lead generation. What kind of challenges did these initiatives face?
Printing is a very competitive niche; there are billion-dollar brands going after popular products.
We counter this by staying on top of industry and marketing trends and introducing new products before the competition does.
Nonstop Signs’ website ranks for an enormous amount of organic keywords and is supported by nearly 90k backlinks. Can you tell us a little about your innovative SEO strategy?
Our SEO strategy relies heavily on link outreach and link building with websites that are relevant to our niche — which is signage, graphics, design, and B2B marketing.
We have created a process that includes using a team consisting of virtual assistants and US-based freelance content writers. Our VAs find relevant link opportunities, which our content marketing team then executes on by writing great content.
How does linking to other websites help build your domain’s SEO?
The articles link to those websites that are both relevant and hold a high domain authority — which can contribute to our domain authority. Our content also features internal links to other pages and products on our website.
As we create a higher volume and quality of content for our brand, it becomes easier for us to get more link opportunities.
Your blog covers a diverse range of articles — from “Best Graphic Design Books” to “Top Unique Gifts For Women.” How do articles that seem outside your niche fit into your marketing strategy?
We rank for many different terms within our niche — but we are also testing more material outside of our defined niche to see if we can link back to some of our B2C products.
These products include printing for photographers, custom acrylic prints, cabinet prints for homes, etc.
We rank for products or gifts that people are searching for so that we can then push our own products.
These are typically high volume, low keyword difficulty metrics that we are trying to go after.
Your website also ranks on the SERP for keywords like “pros and cons of living in San Diego,” — how does that work for you?
We have an office in San Diego and LA. We are trying to create local content that can generate local links.
We’re trying to figure out how we can use those local assets for directories and link building.
Can you tell us a little bit about the process that your VA and content team use to vet websites for linking to?
We look at every site before we go after it to make sure it’s relevant for one.
We want to make sure it’s within our niche, which is a pretty broad: business, design, signage, marketing.
It would be more difficult for someone with a smaller niche.
After relevance, we look at domain authority of the website using a MOZ tool.
Another consideration for link building is to make sure that the website you’re linking to is real and growing — and not just a spam website.
You mentioned that your team uses MOZ for checking domain authority — what other tools do you use for keyword research and SEO metrics?
Semrush and Ahrefs.
Do you have a promotion strategy with paid media?
Yes, we do. We post each article on Facebook and boost it. If it’s converting really well and it’s proven to be relevant, then we boost it more.
We also cross-post on LinkedIn and we just started testing LinkedIn paid ads as well.
Do you see your B2B content strategy changing at all in the future?
I think it will change at some point. We have spent most of our time this year creating relevant topic builders.
Our goal for the next 12 months moving forward is to create less volume of pieces but more high quality, longer pieces that are more in-depth.
Anything in the near future that you’re looking forward to for Nonstop Signs and 858 graphics, anything in the pipeline?
We’re really focused on making acquisitions in this space right now, that’s what we’re looking forward to the most.
Any advice for those trying to get their business and website off of the ground?
Build a great team of other marketing friends or paid advisors that you can lean on for help from time to time.
That’s been huge for me.
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