SEO Website Optimization Onsite / Offsite
In a world where existence becomes a question whether someone or something can be found in a Search Engine Index or not, one of the Major Questions for Webmasters is how to become a part of those Indexes and how to get to the top. While target one, being in that index is quite easy to reach, target two, reaching the top, is something that most often cause some headache.
I give you one example: Let’s say you are the world best insurance company, and you offer the best, cheapest and most secure insurances in the world. Now you open a webpage, offering people your wonderful insurances. The search engines do not really know a lot about insurances, in fact they know nothing about it at all, what they are looking for is keywords, content and relevancy. So they rank your page among some 500.000.000 websites dealing with the keyword insurance. And guess what, even the world best insurance would deserve rank 1 in a search engine, you will be miles away for this spot when your site starts to be being listed in the index.
Here is were SEO (Search Engine Optimization) starts. Now there are a lot of companies and website professionals out there offering SEO for your website, and I don’t want to talk about that for know. But lets look at the thing from a simple point of view. One, there is the website. You can put in as much intelligence in building that site as you want (in fact you have to), but at one point, optimization is over. If there should be something like a score for website content (including all Meta-Tags, Links, Anchor, etc), than there is a maximum score, and if this maximum is reached… Bang you are there: 100 %, nothing can be done with the website beyond that point.
Now looking at the search result for insurance, we have to face one thing: Even if you belong to the Top 1 o/oo of Website Builders, there are still 500.000 websites which we have to assume getting a 100 % score for their site. And being the last of a half a million list is the same like not being in the index at all.
If the answer to a good rank does not lie on or in the site, there is only one place left were we will find the solution: Off the site. Try and search for “miserable failure” and believe me, that those sites did NOT optimize their websites toward this term. Have a look of how that works at Wikipedia.
Now, coming back to our insurance problem, here is what we have to do, after we reached the 100 % score for our website: We have to find other websites willing to link our site in order to be seen more relevant for the Search Engines. It just an undenied fact, that whenever a search engine finds a link within a Websites, which already has some relevance, it talks this link as important and it will have a deeper look into the linked site. So, the more website linking your site, the higher your own site’s relevancy will be. The higher the relevancy, the higher the rank within the search engine result list.
Again, there are a lot of do and don’t with gathering such links, but if you are looking for a ranking that stays stable for years, than you need to look for high quality links every day. A good point to start with might be your customer base. A lot of people have websites these days, and a lot more have their own blog somewhere. Some of them might be willing to link your site, just because they are very satisfied customers, some of them might do so if you offer them a little commission for any successful business through their link.
If it comes to commission, it comes to affiliates. Obliviously there are a lot of ready built affiliates Networks out there offering to bring your name and your add on maybe thousands of websites in a couple of days. Yes, if you choose the right Affiliate-Network, than this might be a good thing for your business in regard of traffic, but it has almost no influence in regard of your website rising in search engine results. Why is this? Well it is easy. Ads on those Affiliate sites point to the Affiliate Network processing software. Here, traffic is registered, analyzed and finally forwarded towards your landing page. Thus, looking at relevancy, your Website is NOT linked by all those Ads, and your rank will not go up by those links. Instead these links point to the Network Company Site, and their rank will go up with your advert.
So, if you consider to work with affiliates (which you should), you should also consider to use your own Affiliate software running under your own Domain, as every Affiliate you gather will not only send you traffic, but he also will point a link to your domain. So while you grow your own affiliate base, your natural page ranking will become better and better.
Affiliate Marketing is one piece of a successful e-commerce story, it can be one piece of a successful SEO Story if you succeed in building affiliates for your own Affiliate Software running on your server.
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Search Engine Optimization Strategy - An Overview
Search Engine Optimization Strategy - An Overview
Web masters often feel like pulling their hair out and throwing a major childish tantrum when their search engine optimization strategy efforts don’t pay off. It is indeed maddening to find that SEO efforts that have cost so much time and energy have not borne anything fruitful. Has the search engine optimization work been done correctly, though? That’s the important question!
There are SEO practices that are actually based on search engine optimization strategy misconceptions. Before embarking on another optimization attempt, web masters would find it worthwhile to read about the common SEO fallacies that one should correct so that SEO will not be wasted.
Meta-tags and hidden text
Web masters include the keywords in their meta-tags and this is standard practice. However, some web masters stop there. This is very bad practice!
If a web master wishes to increase his or her pages’ relevance to a search engine queries, then the keywords should also be found on the pages themselves, not only in the meta-tags or codes. It is true that search engines see these keywords within the hidden coding of your website. But an important fact to bear in mind is that words within your page content, visible to readers are now more important than meta-tags.
To compromise, some web administrators incorporate invisible keywords. These are called such because the human eye cannot decipher them. The texts’ color is similar to the background so they blend in with the background when the page is viewed. On the other hand, search engines still see this text so they count towards keyword relevance.
However, what some web masters don’t realize is that these keyword phrases would have been a lot more valuable as keyword phrase anchor texts had they been visible. These anchor texts could have also linked to other pages in the site so that the relevance of the whole site is promoted. It is also pertinent to mention that hidden texts are borderline search engine optimization strategy for it is in fact fooling search engines to believe that the site is relevant to the query. In other words they could get your site banned from search engines!!!
Web page design
Some web masters focus so much on the elements of the web site to the exclusion of other offsite search engine optimization strategy aspects. It is true that a web site should have worthy content that has search engine optimized keywords in place. Keywords distributed in the content of the page increases its relevance to a search engine query in that keyword category. Pages that are aptly and keyword titled are also a very good way to improve the site’s ranking.
Nevertheless, web masters should never believe that having very relevant and keyword-rich pages is the only way to increase page ranking. Search engines actually give much weight to link popularity in their search algorithms. A web administrator must therefore maintain appropriate keyword density but must also work towards improving link popularity through inbound links from other renowned web sites that have related content.
Short-term SEO
Some web masters think that once search engine optimization strategy measures are initiated, they should see the jump in page ranking immediately. This is the most common misconception about search engine optimization and this leads to unnecessary aggravation on the web masters’ part.
Search engine optimization measures do not give instant returns; they take time, sometimes months, to work properly and give a web site’s rank a boost. Web traffic would eventually increase after search engine optimization strategy is set into motion. Meanwhile, web masters can save themselves so much frustration if they just wait for progress and find other means to increase traffic to their sites.
Web masters often feel like pulling their hair out and throwing a major childish tantrum when their search engine optimization strategy efforts don’t pay off. It is indeed maddening to find that SEO efforts that have cost so much time and energy have not borne anything fruitful. Has the search engine optimization work been done correctly, though? That’s the important question!
There are SEO practices that are actually based on search engine optimization strategy misconceptions. Before embarking on another optimization attempt, web masters would find it worthwhile to read about the common SEO fallacies that one should correct so that SEO will not be wasted.
Meta-tags and hidden text
Web masters include the keywords in their meta-tags and this is standard practice. However, some web masters stop there. This is very bad practice!
If a web master wishes to increase his or her pages’ relevance to a search engine queries, then the keywords should also be found on the pages themselves, not only in the meta-tags or codes. It is true that search engines see these keywords within the hidden coding of your website. But an important fact to bear in mind is that words within your page content, visible to readers are now more important than meta-tags.
To compromise, some web administrators incorporate invisible keywords. These are called such because the human eye cannot decipher them. The texts’ color is similar to the background so they blend in with the background when the page is viewed. On the other hand, search engines still see this text so they count towards keyword relevance.
However, what some web masters don’t realize is that these keyword phrases would have been a lot more valuable as keyword phrase anchor texts had they been visible. These anchor texts could have also linked to other pages in the site so that the relevance of the whole site is promoted. It is also pertinent to mention that hidden texts are borderline search engine optimization strategy for it is in fact fooling search engines to believe that the site is relevant to the query. In other words they could get your site banned from search engines!!!
Web page design
Some web masters focus so much on the elements of the web site to the exclusion of other offsite search engine optimization strategy aspects. It is true that a web site should have worthy content that has search engine optimized keywords in place. Keywords distributed in the content of the page increases its relevance to a search engine query in that keyword category. Pages that are aptly and keyword titled are also a very good way to improve the site’s ranking.
Nevertheless, web masters should never believe that having very relevant and keyword-rich pages is the only way to increase page ranking. Search engines actually give much weight to link popularity in their search algorithms. A web administrator must therefore maintain appropriate keyword density but must also work towards improving link popularity through inbound links from other renowned web sites that have related content.
Short-term SEO
Some web masters think that once search engine optimization strategy measures are initiated, they should see the jump in page ranking immediately. This is the most common misconception about search engine optimization and this leads to unnecessary aggravation on the web masters’ part.
Search engine optimization measures do not give instant returns; they take time, sometimes months, to work properly and give a web site’s rank a boost. Web traffic would eventually increase after search engine optimization strategy is set into motion. Meanwhile, web masters can save themselves so much frustration if they just wait for progress and find other means to increase traffic to their sites.
Monday, March 26, 2007
SEO: Don't Get Blacklisted
SEO: Don't Get Blacklisted
Search engine optimization (SEO) is an excellent way of ranking high on search engine results. Though, sometimes webmasters use unfair means to get to the top. In order to avoid getting blacklisted from search engines you should avoid the following black hat SEO methods:
Hidden Text
Hidden text is content that is not visible to visitors but can still be read by search engines. Most major search engines recognize hidden text as search spam. To remain on search engines, do not use hidden text on your website.
Submission Methods
Automated software does not get you good results. This technique can result in spamming and get your web site removed from search engines. Most software is not worth using and does not get you into that many search engines. You are better off submitting your site to standard search engines once a month. We highly recommend software that puts the user at the page and enters in the information for the user to review, make edits, then complete a hand submission.
Doorway Pages
Doorway pages are created to do well in search engines for a particular phrase. They are designed for search engines, not humans. Doorway pages are unethical because they do not serve a purpose to visitors. Major search engines have been known to ban websites that use this method of promotion.
Free for all Links
Although FFA pages are often free and do not require a reciprocal link, most FFA websites are not indexed by search engines and will not benefit your website at all. These sites tend to be nothing more than spammed pages and will not attract any visitors to your website.
Enough with the bad and on with the Good
The best practice in getting better rankings comes down to one thing, content. Think about every site you browse yourself. You visit the site for a reason or you go to it because of it's content. In order to attract visitors you need to provide them with a motive. The next steps include formatting your site for search engines and getting your link out there!
Link building can be very time consuming, especially with a small budget. The most important item when ranking your site is how many quality, content related incoming links you have. Some common methods are link exchanges, directory submissions, writing articles, and really leaving a link where ever it won't be considered spam.
Of course, there are other items included in algorithms that are also important when ranking your site such as content quality, word density, meta tags, and html validation. No one but the software engineers themselves know the true algorithms used in each search engine but webmasters are beginning to learn more and more as time goes on. Using advanced software, webmasters are able to compare search results with most important ranking items and try to replicate their research with their own web sites.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is an excellent way of ranking high on search engine results. Though, sometimes webmasters use unfair means to get to the top. In order to avoid getting blacklisted from search engines you should avoid the following black hat SEO methods:
Hidden Text
Hidden text is content that is not visible to visitors but can still be read by search engines. Most major search engines recognize hidden text as search spam. To remain on search engines, do not use hidden text on your website.
Submission Methods
Automated software does not get you good results. This technique can result in spamming and get your web site removed from search engines. Most software is not worth using and does not get you into that many search engines. You are better off submitting your site to standard search engines once a month. We highly recommend software that puts the user at the page and enters in the information for the user to review, make edits, then complete a hand submission.
Doorway Pages
Doorway pages are created to do well in search engines for a particular phrase. They are designed for search engines, not humans. Doorway pages are unethical because they do not serve a purpose to visitors. Major search engines have been known to ban websites that use this method of promotion.
Free for all Links
Although FFA pages are often free and do not require a reciprocal link, most FFA websites are not indexed by search engines and will not benefit your website at all. These sites tend to be nothing more than spammed pages and will not attract any visitors to your website.
Enough with the bad and on with the Good
The best practice in getting better rankings comes down to one thing, content. Think about every site you browse yourself. You visit the site for a reason or you go to it because of it's content. In order to attract visitors you need to provide them with a motive. The next steps include formatting your site for search engines and getting your link out there!
Link building can be very time consuming, especially with a small budget. The most important item when ranking your site is how many quality, content related incoming links you have. Some common methods are link exchanges, directory submissions, writing articles, and really leaving a link where ever it won't be considered spam.
Of course, there are other items included in algorithms that are also important when ranking your site such as content quality, word density, meta tags, and html validation. No one but the software engineers themselves know the true algorithms used in each search engine but webmasters are beginning to learn more and more as time goes on. Using advanced software, webmasters are able to compare search results with most important ranking items and try to replicate their research with their own web sites.
Sunday, March 25, 2007
SEO Self-Reflection
SEO articles abound on social media linking strategies. SEO blog posts are legion on the topic of link and widget bait. SEO forums buzz endlessly about reciprocal versus one-way linking. There is no doubt that all of those various types of external, inbound links matter. But how often do we discuss internal linking strategies?
I had a long conversation with an apprentice level SEO this week. When she was questioned about her grasp of internal linking strategy, she gave that interesting "Did-I-hear-you-correctly?" type of puzzled stare that says very plainly "Are you pulling my leg, or was that a serious comment?"
This made me reflect on the less strenuously debated SEO strategies that are crucial to ranking well for specific keyword phrases. Since internal linking is so important to SEO, but rarely discussed, I often wonder how many SEO's truly comprehend the importance of internal interlinking of pages and how critical outbound links are to ranking well in the search engines.
Let's try to remedy that and raise the level of internal linking strategy discussions to at least a whisper, because the level of discussion on the topic now is barely audible.
I'm going to step out on a limb here and suggest that internal linking matters more than reciprocal links, possibly more than social media links such as Digg and Del.icio.us links matter and maybe even as much as (javascript and flash) widget links and in some cases, more than (wimpy) link bait (as practiced by most) matters.
How sites link to their own content internally tells the search engines more about what matters most on a site than almost any other cue (save title tags). I'm going to step further out on that limb and attempt to rank the importance of various internal links to SEO. So here's the top 6 list:
Navigation TEXT Links
No image links, No Javascript Links, NO Image Map Links - Only keyword focused embedded text links to menu items. Use CSS, Use graphic Background images and text links using keywords. It's not that hard to do.
Breadcrumb Links (category - subcategory)
This type of link can vary by type of site. Ecommerce sites would use one type of structure, while informational sites would use a different hierarchy. These high level link structures define what you think is important and point visitors (and search engine robots) to an overall structure. Your opinion of what matters to your site informs the search engines. If your site is loosely organized by randomly linking internally, you may be randomly ranked.
Subject & Topic Group Links (related pages)
This is where many lose focus and fail to map internal structure for either search engines or visitors. Newspapers and large informational sites that rank very well will always use "Related Stories" pages. There are at least a couple of good reasons for this. The first is usability and the second is topical relevance of the page.
Many sites lose focus and use "Most Popular" links to pages unrelated to those they are on. This dilutes the relevance and topicality of the page by looking at the site as do tag clouds on broad ranging topical sites with many areas of interest.
Single Item Focus Page Links
This link probably ranks in imporance at the top of the list here, but without those elements above them, single item links lack structure that search engines crave and don't help as much as they do when that larger structure supports them.
So now is when I point to the site we all love to hate, WikiPedia. I'll argue that this single factor, added to the supporting heirarchical structure of WikiPedia is what makes it rank so extremely well for nearly every topic you can think of. WikiPedia links internally to every page, every time a word or phrase with it's own page is mentioned. Every page, every time, site-wide. If any topic has a page, anywhere on WikiPedia, it links from ANY use of that word or phrase back to that page ABOUT that word or phrase. This is the magic bullet, but is only important within the overall structure.
Sitemap Links
OK, this is the internal link we all agree on and rarely question. It's accepted and necessary, again, from both a usability standpoint and relevance. The site index list of links to every page (or to subindexes of pages). Since nobody questions that sitemaps matter, I'll stop there.
Outbound Links
Now comes the controversy, the raised blood pressure, the nofollow tags and the standard "company policy" against outbound links. This is where I simply have to point at blogs. Search engines like them in many cases because they reference external sources, they quote multiple viewpoints and link out to them. In some cases bloggers are paid to link out to external sources.
I'll baldly state my opinion here and leave it to your own experience and "company policy" to decide your own outbound linking strategy. Outbound links increase relevance of the pages they are on when they link to supporting information externally. I'll put it differently for those with the puzzled look on their faces. Outbound links increase your search engine ranking.
So now I'll hope that at least my fellow SEO's will begin discussing this, offer case studies, offer anecdotal evidence, point to random examples, try to prove me wrong - but let's TALK about internal linking and raise it's importance. Talk enough that apprentice level SEO's know that it matters how we link internally and how we link OUT. Do a little SEO self-reflection and reassess your internal linking strategy.
I had a long conversation with an apprentice level SEO this week. When she was questioned about her grasp of internal linking strategy, she gave that interesting "Did-I-hear-you-correctly?" type of puzzled stare that says very plainly "Are you pulling my leg, or was that a serious comment?"
This made me reflect on the less strenuously debated SEO strategies that are crucial to ranking well for specific keyword phrases. Since internal linking is so important to SEO, but rarely discussed, I often wonder how many SEO's truly comprehend the importance of internal interlinking of pages and how critical outbound links are to ranking well in the search engines.
Let's try to remedy that and raise the level of internal linking strategy discussions to at least a whisper, because the level of discussion on the topic now is barely audible.
I'm going to step out on a limb here and suggest that internal linking matters more than reciprocal links, possibly more than social media links such as Digg and Del.icio.us links matter and maybe even as much as (javascript and flash) widget links and in some cases, more than (wimpy) link bait (as practiced by most) matters.
How sites link to their own content internally tells the search engines more about what matters most on a site than almost any other cue (save title tags). I'm going to step further out on that limb and attempt to rank the importance of various internal links to SEO. So here's the top 6 list:
Navigation TEXT Links
No image links, No Javascript Links, NO Image Map Links - Only keyword focused embedded text links to menu items. Use CSS, Use graphic Background images and text links using keywords. It's not that hard to do.
Breadcrumb Links (category - subcategory)
This type of link can vary by type of site. Ecommerce sites would use one type of structure, while informational sites would use a different hierarchy. These high level link structures define what you think is important and point visitors (and search engine robots) to an overall structure. Your opinion of what matters to your site informs the search engines. If your site is loosely organized by randomly linking internally, you may be randomly ranked.
Subject & Topic Group Links (related pages)
This is where many lose focus and fail to map internal structure for either search engines or visitors. Newspapers and large informational sites that rank very well will always use "Related Stories" pages. There are at least a couple of good reasons for this. The first is usability and the second is topical relevance of the page.
Many sites lose focus and use "Most Popular" links to pages unrelated to those they are on. This dilutes the relevance and topicality of the page by looking at the site as do tag clouds on broad ranging topical sites with many areas of interest.
Single Item Focus Page Links
This link probably ranks in imporance at the top of the list here, but without those elements above them, single item links lack structure that search engines crave and don't help as much as they do when that larger structure supports them.
So now is when I point to the site we all love to hate, WikiPedia. I'll argue that this single factor, added to the supporting heirarchical structure of WikiPedia is what makes it rank so extremely well for nearly every topic you can think of. WikiPedia links internally to every page, every time a word or phrase with it's own page is mentioned. Every page, every time, site-wide. If any topic has a page, anywhere on WikiPedia, it links from ANY use of that word or phrase back to that page ABOUT that word or phrase. This is the magic bullet, but is only important within the overall structure.
Sitemap Links
OK, this is the internal link we all agree on and rarely question. It's accepted and necessary, again, from both a usability standpoint and relevance. The site index list of links to every page (or to subindexes of pages). Since nobody questions that sitemaps matter, I'll stop there.
Outbound Links
Now comes the controversy, the raised blood pressure, the nofollow tags and the standard "company policy" against outbound links. This is where I simply have to point at blogs. Search engines like them in many cases because they reference external sources, they quote multiple viewpoints and link out to them. In some cases bloggers are paid to link out to external sources.
I'll baldly state my opinion here and leave it to your own experience and "company policy" to decide your own outbound linking strategy. Outbound links increase relevance of the pages they are on when they link to supporting information externally. I'll put it differently for those with the puzzled look on their faces. Outbound links increase your search engine ranking.
So now I'll hope that at least my fellow SEO's will begin discussing this, offer case studies, offer anecdotal evidence, point to random examples, try to prove me wrong - but let's TALK about internal linking and raise it's importance. Talk enough that apprentice level SEO's know that it matters how we link internally and how we link OUT. Do a little SEO self-reflection and reassess your internal linking strategy.
Friday, March 23, 2007
SEO - How To Get Backlinks
SEO - How To Get Backlinks
Submit to Directories
There are a lot of free web directories on the net now and there are an equal number of sites that list free web directories.
So your first step should be to visit every directory and submit your link to every free web directory you can find.
Link Exchanges
If you are taking part in reciprocal link exchanges it is important that you 1) Exchange links only with related sites. If a site has nothing to do with your site a reciprocal backlink from it will serve little to no purpose and 2) Do not mass mail webmasters. If there is one thing that will guarantee i will ignore you it is if i receive an email that has been BCC’ed to a thousand other webmasters. You could also get other webmaster to ask for a link exchange by putting a contact form on your site and letting people know you are open for link exchanges.
Link Baiting
Link baiting is when you post something controversial, a flame or something very interesting on your site with the intention of getting people to blog about it or post it on forums. Link baiting is sometimes seen as “spam” but take no notice of that, It’s not, People are choosing to link to you, It’s upto them.
Providing Quality Content
This is my favorite way to get backlinks. Make a good site with good content.
If there is one thing people like, and like to link to, it is a good site.
Posting on forums
I am hesitant to include this suggestion, But i will, and i will explain exactly what i mean.
When i say by posting on forums read it as `join a forum and contribute`. It does not mean join a forum, spam your link 50 times and then leave. Most forums allow you to include a signature in your posts so it’s an easy way to get backlinks. If you become a trusted regular poster it will also mean you get a lot of traffic from these backlinks. Spamming not only make you look like an amateur, But it will be deleted that same day by a moderator, Probably before a google bot even gets to see it.
RSS Feeds
RSS feeds allow you to syndicate your content. This means other sites display your content on their pages via a feed which includes a backlink to the original article or page. So you could syndicate us
Submit Articles
If you know a lot about the area you work in (as you should) then writing articles could be very beneficial. Every time you write and submit an article that is one backlink, and the good thing about articles is they are often copied and used on other article sites, sent in news letters or posted on forums, Each time this happens you get another backlink.
Provide a link to me code
Put a page on your site that contains link to me code. This will be HTML code that people just have to cut and paste into their site to link to you. But don’t use all text. Provide a few banners, some buttons, Be creative. Sometimes if people are trying to find filler for their site they will be more than happy to include your sexy looking banner or button on their page.
The trick is to make it easy for people to link to you.
Buy Text Links
If you have money set aside for your advertising you can also Buy Text Links from companies such as LinkWorth, Also good if you want to make money and sell text links.
Submit to Directories
There are a lot of free web directories on the net now and there are an equal number of sites that list free web directories.
So your first step should be to visit every directory and submit your link to every free web directory you can find.
Link Exchanges
If you are taking part in reciprocal link exchanges it is important that you 1) Exchange links only with related sites. If a site has nothing to do with your site a reciprocal backlink from it will serve little to no purpose and 2) Do not mass mail webmasters. If there is one thing that will guarantee i will ignore you it is if i receive an email that has been BCC’ed to a thousand other webmasters. You could also get other webmaster to ask for a link exchange by putting a contact form on your site and letting people know you are open for link exchanges.
Link Baiting
Link baiting is when you post something controversial, a flame or something very interesting on your site with the intention of getting people to blog about it or post it on forums. Link baiting is sometimes seen as “spam” but take no notice of that, It’s not, People are choosing to link to you, It’s upto them.
Providing Quality Content
This is my favorite way to get backlinks. Make a good site with good content.
If there is one thing people like, and like to link to, it is a good site.
Posting on forums
I am hesitant to include this suggestion, But i will, and i will explain exactly what i mean.
When i say by posting on forums read it as `join a forum and contribute`. It does not mean join a forum, spam your link 50 times and then leave. Most forums allow you to include a signature in your posts so it’s an easy way to get backlinks. If you become a trusted regular poster it will also mean you get a lot of traffic from these backlinks. Spamming not only make you look like an amateur, But it will be deleted that same day by a moderator, Probably before a google bot even gets to see it.
RSS Feeds
RSS feeds allow you to syndicate your content. This means other sites display your content on their pages via a feed which includes a backlink to the original article or page. So you could syndicate us
Submit Articles
If you know a lot about the area you work in (as you should) then writing articles could be very beneficial. Every time you write and submit an article that is one backlink, and the good thing about articles is they are often copied and used on other article sites, sent in news letters or posted on forums, Each time this happens you get another backlink.
Provide a link to me code
Put a page on your site that contains link to me code. This will be HTML code that people just have to cut and paste into their site to link to you. But don’t use all text. Provide a few banners, some buttons, Be creative. Sometimes if people are trying to find filler for their site they will be more than happy to include your sexy looking banner or button on their page.
The trick is to make it easy for people to link to you.
Buy Text Links
If you have money set aside for your advertising you can also Buy Text Links from companies such as LinkWorth, Also good if you want to make money and sell text links.
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Ignorance Is Bliss, But Costly: The 5 Dumbest SEO Mistakes Revealed
Ignorance Is Bliss, But Costly: The 5 Dumbest SEO
As new and even experienced web site owners we have all committed our share of blunders and stumbles along the way of making our sites rank higher on the major search engines. A lot of times we have gone against our gut feelings and listened to hearsay and unproven search engine optimization advice, or have jumped on the latest SEO bandwagon circulating the top SEO forums. But how many times have you made changes to your web site structure, content, or link popularity that cost you search engine ranking without being able to pinpoint the exact cause in the first place?
Well, ranking drops or the lack of ranking success initially can happen for many reasons, some of these reasons are within your control and others are not. For example, search engine algorithms updates and competitors moving on in your territory are completely out of your control. However, in this article I want to focus on factors and search engine optimization techniques that are in your control, but you may not be even aware of.
Do you like to give your web site a fresh new look every couple of years or even more frequently? Did you know that the number one reason for ranking drops is site redesigns without taking into consideration the SEO implications?
Perhaps you have changed the page titles on a few web pages, or renamed a couple of important directories and as a result your search engine rankings had dropped. How can you prevent unintentional ranking gaffs from happening in the future?
Ignorance is No Excuse When It Comes to Google, Yahoo and MSN
While no one can prevent you from committing every possible SEO mistake especially unknowingly, but these top 5 SEO blunders you should definitely want to avoid.
1.) Structure, Design and Usability: Images used to embed content and navigational link. Designing or redesigning the web site with content embedded in images. There is nothing wrong with designing your web site and navigation to be super sleek and stylish. However, going overboard with visual layouts and fancy graphics can reduce the amount of text you can squeeze in the content area and visible links, leaving nothing for the search engines to index. On average, each web page should contain a minimum of 200 to 300 words of text sprinkled with the target keywords. Also the navigation should contain mainly text links using well focused target keywords in those internal links.
2.) Web site Navigation: “Click Here” – “Click There”. Your website visitor will no doubt will understand and follow the “Click Here” instructions, but can the search engines figure out as easily what the target pages are about? Give the search engines and your visitors a clue about the destination page by “labeling” your hyperlinks with a simple 2-3 word keyword rich instruction instead of using “Click Here” over and over. For example, if you want your visitors to find out about your “blue widgets” products, use “blue widgets” in your hyper links like this Blue Widgets. The bottom line is, no one cares if you rank number 1 for “Click Here”.
3.) Usability and SEO: “Welcome to Our Home Page”. If every page title on your web site starts with this text you are on your way to be ranked number one for this phrase. This is clearly not what you want. It’s time to review every web page on your web site and give it a meaningful keyword rich title, and while you are working on the head section of the web page, pay some attention to the meta description, and meta keywords as well. Although optimizing meta tags are no longer considered a ranking factor on today’s search engines, having a unique page description and set of keywords will set your pages apart from the competition, not to mention the meta description is often used word for word to describe your website in the search results pages.
4.) Link Popularity: Cross linking your website and acquiring inbound links over saturated with the same keywords. If you own a number of domains, the temptation is always there to take the easy road to link building by linking your websites together regardless of content and keyword focus. It seems easy right? There are two problems with this approach. The first one is, you mostly likely host all the websites on the same server so your web sites are easily grouped into the same C IP class by the search engines and set of spam triggers. The second problem is linking web sites with a diverse keyword focus may diminishes any inbound linking gains due to thematically unrelated keywords. An unnaturally high number inbound links with the exact same anchor text links can also spell trouble. The web is a naturally growing ecosystem of sorts, everyone links to whom ever they want to, and how they want to. This results in inbound links with a wide variety of anchor text wordings. When you acquire inbound links through link exchanges, paid links or other sources you have to watch for links with an unnaturally high repetition of keywords in the anchor text to avoid the search engine spam radars.
5.) Structure, Design and Usability: Changing page and directory names and leaving orphaned pages on the engines. Changing web page names and directory names should be done with the outmost care. The older the web pages are the more harm you can do by not following some simple rules in removing or changing web page URLs. The search engines index new web pages within days if not hours on your website automatically thanks to their powerful crawler agents. Once the location of the new URL is registered with the search engines, it will remain in their database forever providing you don’t delete or rename the page. If you remove or rename the web page, the search engines will remove the page from their index including any link popularity or Google Page Rank data. This can have a negative influence on your web site’s ranking and your link popularity. The better approach would be to leave the page URL intact and simply write new content for the page. If you absolutely must remove or rename the web page, use what is called a “301 Permanent Redirect” to the new URL.
About The Author:
Joel Katona is the founder of Trendmetrix Software a full service SEO Company and the architect behind SEO Studio a leading SEO Software. Don't forget to check out his free step-by-step SEO Training guide. http://www.trendmx.com
As new and even experienced web site owners we have all committed our share of blunders and stumbles along the way of making our sites rank higher on the major search engines. A lot of times we have gone against our gut feelings and listened to hearsay and unproven search engine optimization advice, or have jumped on the latest SEO bandwagon circulating the top SEO forums. But how many times have you made changes to your web site structure, content, or link popularity that cost you search engine ranking without being able to pinpoint the exact cause in the first place?
Well, ranking drops or the lack of ranking success initially can happen for many reasons, some of these reasons are within your control and others are not. For example, search engine algorithms updates and competitors moving on in your territory are completely out of your control. However, in this article I want to focus on factors and search engine optimization techniques that are in your control, but you may not be even aware of.
Do you like to give your web site a fresh new look every couple of years or even more frequently? Did you know that the number one reason for ranking drops is site redesigns without taking into consideration the SEO implications?
Perhaps you have changed the page titles on a few web pages, or renamed a couple of important directories and as a result your search engine rankings had dropped. How can you prevent unintentional ranking gaffs from happening in the future?
Ignorance is No Excuse When It Comes to Google, Yahoo and MSN
While no one can prevent you from committing every possible SEO mistake especially unknowingly, but these top 5 SEO blunders you should definitely want to avoid.
1.) Structure, Design and Usability: Images used to embed content and navigational link. Designing or redesigning the web site with content embedded in images. There is nothing wrong with designing your web site and navigation to be super sleek and stylish. However, going overboard with visual layouts and fancy graphics can reduce the amount of text you can squeeze in the content area and visible links, leaving nothing for the search engines to index. On average, each web page should contain a minimum of 200 to 300 words of text sprinkled with the target keywords. Also the navigation should contain mainly text links using well focused target keywords in those internal links.
2.) Web site Navigation: “Click Here” – “Click There”. Your website visitor will no doubt will understand and follow the “Click Here” instructions, but can the search engines figure out as easily what the target pages are about? Give the search engines and your visitors a clue about the destination page by “labeling” your hyperlinks with a simple 2-3 word keyword rich instruction instead of using “Click Here” over and over. For example, if you want your visitors to find out about your “blue widgets” products, use “blue widgets” in your hyper links like this Blue Widgets. The bottom line is, no one cares if you rank number 1 for “Click Here”.
3.) Usability and SEO: “Welcome to Our Home Page”. If every page title on your web site starts with this text you are on your way to be ranked number one for this phrase. This is clearly not what you want. It’s time to review every web page on your web site and give it a meaningful keyword rich title, and while you are working on the head section of the web page, pay some attention to the meta description, and meta keywords as well. Although optimizing meta tags are no longer considered a ranking factor on today’s search engines, having a unique page description and set of keywords will set your pages apart from the competition, not to mention the meta description is often used word for word to describe your website in the search results pages.
4.) Link Popularity: Cross linking your website and acquiring inbound links over saturated with the same keywords. If you own a number of domains, the temptation is always there to take the easy road to link building by linking your websites together regardless of content and keyword focus. It seems easy right? There are two problems with this approach. The first one is, you mostly likely host all the websites on the same server so your web sites are easily grouped into the same C IP class by the search engines and set of spam triggers. The second problem is linking web sites with a diverse keyword focus may diminishes any inbound linking gains due to thematically unrelated keywords. An unnaturally high number inbound links with the exact same anchor text links can also spell trouble. The web is a naturally growing ecosystem of sorts, everyone links to whom ever they want to, and how they want to. This results in inbound links with a wide variety of anchor text wordings. When you acquire inbound links through link exchanges, paid links or other sources you have to watch for links with an unnaturally high repetition of keywords in the anchor text to avoid the search engine spam radars.
5.) Structure, Design and Usability: Changing page and directory names and leaving orphaned pages on the engines. Changing web page names and directory names should be done with the outmost care. The older the web pages are the more harm you can do by not following some simple rules in removing or changing web page URLs. The search engines index new web pages within days if not hours on your website automatically thanks to their powerful crawler agents. Once the location of the new URL is registered with the search engines, it will remain in their database forever providing you don’t delete or rename the page. If you remove or rename the web page, the search engines will remove the page from their index including any link popularity or Google Page Rank data. This can have a negative influence on your web site’s ranking and your link popularity. The better approach would be to leave the page URL intact and simply write new content for the page. If you absolutely must remove or rename the web page, use what is called a “301 Permanent Redirect” to the new URL.
About The Author:
Joel Katona is the founder of Trendmetrix Software a full service SEO Company and the architect behind SEO Studio a leading SEO Software. Don't forget to check out his free step-by-step SEO Training guide. http://www.trendmx.com
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Modern SEO Techniques
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) are methods that aid in the improvement of a website's ranking in the listings of search engines. There are different kinds of listings that are displayed in the results pages of search engines, such as paid inclusion, pay-per-click advertisements, and organic search results. Utilizing SEO can increase the quantity of site visitors that acts on the activity that the site intends.
Sites have different goals for search optimization. Some sites search for all kinds of traffic. A SEO strategy that is broad in scope can be advantageous for sites that cover broad interest, such as directories and periodicals. On the other hand, majority of the sites attempt to maximize their pages for a high quantity of very specific keywords that radiate the possibility of a sale. Usually, focusing on well-chosen traffic produces sales leads of desirable quality, and allows advertisers to pull in more business.
The importance of having a high rank for an advertiser's site cannot be emphasized enough. Unfortunately, many site owners believe that their site has a high-ranking, when the truth is exactly the opposite. Others who are aware that they do not possess enough presence in search engines do not know that it is possible to achieve the ranking they want, and that they can get it through means that are a lot easier and more efficient.
So what are the techniques that advertisers must employ to maximize their optimization and garner the site activity and profits that they seek? Here are some of the most useful ones.
1. Title tags should be written in a creative way. It should be created with the strongest keyword targets as the basis. It is the most important tag of a web site when it comes to optimization. The specific keyword of the web site that is being optimized should be the one that is placed in the title tag. It goes without saying that every site should have its own title tag.
2. Carefully select the words and phrases to be assigned to Alt tags. Alt tags are not really mandatory, but they are provided for text browsers because images do not get displayed in web browsers, and it is the Alt tags that give information to the users about its significance. The rule in Alt tags is fairly simple: only key phrases or key words should be put in Alt tags, overdoing may cause a site to disappear in search results or get banned from it indefinitely.
3. Manage keyword density. Keyword density is the percentage occupied by keywords or keyword phrases in a web page. Ideally, keywords are used once in the title tag, the heading tag, and in bold text. Keywords should be placed at the top of the page, and phrases can be inserted in every paragraph, depending on how long the paragraph is.
4. Determine the appropriate page size for the site. Speed is a vital element to the success of a site, and it important to both online visitors and the search engines. It is recommended to limit web pages under 15K.
5. Create rich themes for the pages. Search engines are increasingly getting particular about themes. Content should be created as often as possible, and the pages should be maintained to 200 to 500 words. The content should be created in relation to the market, and should be linked to the other related content present on the site.
6. Make the site's design attractive to the viewer. All efforts in optimization will be in vain if the site is poorly designed and if its contents are hard for viewers to read. There should be more text content than HTML content in the web site. Viewers should be able to use the pages in all major browsers. It should be noted that most search engines veer away from JavaScript and Flash.
7. Stay away from the bad techniques. Utilizing them could get a site blacklisted from the search engines. Spamming is a no-no, and the following techniques are considered spamming: doorway and identical pages, tiny or invisible text, cloaking, usage of keyword phrases in author tags etc.
Advertisers should keep in mind that simplicity is the basis of a successful SEO campaign. Sites should be easy for viewers to locate, follow, and read, and should contain relevant content. Following the techniques above will prove worthwhile for site owners in the future.
Best of success,
Jeanette Kersbergen
Sites have different goals for search optimization. Some sites search for all kinds of traffic. A SEO strategy that is broad in scope can be advantageous for sites that cover broad interest, such as directories and periodicals. On the other hand, majority of the sites attempt to maximize their pages for a high quantity of very specific keywords that radiate the possibility of a sale. Usually, focusing on well-chosen traffic produces sales leads of desirable quality, and allows advertisers to pull in more business.
The importance of having a high rank for an advertiser's site cannot be emphasized enough. Unfortunately, many site owners believe that their site has a high-ranking, when the truth is exactly the opposite. Others who are aware that they do not possess enough presence in search engines do not know that it is possible to achieve the ranking they want, and that they can get it through means that are a lot easier and more efficient.
So what are the techniques that advertisers must employ to maximize their optimization and garner the site activity and profits that they seek? Here are some of the most useful ones.
1. Title tags should be written in a creative way. It should be created with the strongest keyword targets as the basis. It is the most important tag of a web site when it comes to optimization. The specific keyword of the web site that is being optimized should be the one that is placed in the title tag. It goes without saying that every site should have its own title tag.
2. Carefully select the words and phrases to be assigned to Alt tags. Alt tags are not really mandatory, but they are provided for text browsers because images do not get displayed in web browsers, and it is the Alt tags that give information to the users about its significance. The rule in Alt tags is fairly simple: only key phrases or key words should be put in Alt tags, overdoing may cause a site to disappear in search results or get banned from it indefinitely.
3. Manage keyword density. Keyword density is the percentage occupied by keywords or keyword phrases in a web page. Ideally, keywords are used once in the title tag, the heading tag, and in bold text. Keywords should be placed at the top of the page, and phrases can be inserted in every paragraph, depending on how long the paragraph is.
4. Determine the appropriate page size for the site. Speed is a vital element to the success of a site, and it important to both online visitors and the search engines. It is recommended to limit web pages under 15K.
5. Create rich themes for the pages. Search engines are increasingly getting particular about themes. Content should be created as often as possible, and the pages should be maintained to 200 to 500 words. The content should be created in relation to the market, and should be linked to the other related content present on the site.
6. Make the site's design attractive to the viewer. All efforts in optimization will be in vain if the site is poorly designed and if its contents are hard for viewers to read. There should be more text content than HTML content in the web site. Viewers should be able to use the pages in all major browsers. It should be noted that most search engines veer away from JavaScript and Flash.
7. Stay away from the bad techniques. Utilizing them could get a site blacklisted from the search engines. Spamming is a no-no, and the following techniques are considered spamming: doorway and identical pages, tiny or invisible text, cloaking, usage of keyword phrases in author tags etc.
Advertisers should keep in mind that simplicity is the basis of a successful SEO campaign. Sites should be easy for viewers to locate, follow, and read, and should contain relevant content. Following the techniques above will prove worthwhile for site owners in the future.
Best of success,
Jeanette Kersbergen
Artificial Intelligent SEO Strategies
Artificial intelligence is advancing, thus offering web owners' innovational tools that authorize to allow them to vindicate their web bearings with less effort. Web owners' strive on keyword finders, keyword generators, Link popularity checkers, link-building tools, services, and other strategies they employ to market a web page.
Beginners marketing their web pages too many times fall short of focus to senior search engine eternal optimistic that seek these excellent marketing tools so that they get the quality and relevancy pursued in the game of SEO.
Many beginners in SEO marketing will use prevalent tools accessible on the net, which are sometimes the Search Engine Promoters. These tools are at your relegation, which users can access from the challenging SEO mixtures that claim to guarantee to take your web pages to the ranks at the summit of key search engines.
Ranking is of great magnitude to SEO experts. For a web site to reach the top fuses, it must direct or draw a towering quantity of traffic to an Internet pages by using relevant keywords or links. For that reason, understanding the advancing strategies in SEO marketing is critical, especially to those marketing their web pages to major search engines.
Links verses SEO Content
SEO marketing often involves link popularity, which are lines of attack that webmasters, developers and unalike other web owners bring into play to endorse their web pages to the major search engines.
The webmasters of use solicitation to work in links on their pages, which must have relevancy to the products or services offered at their site to consummate link popularity. To achieve link popularity the web sites must have quality links that meets the moral philosophy of major search engines to reach the top ranks. Most webmasters deem link building as the top SEO tactic that gets a web page ranked at the top of prime search engines. Contrarily, SEO tactics, such as content on web pages with dense keyword has proven far more effective in helping web owners to reach top search engine ranking.
Search engine optimizing is a trade SEO solution that web owners have given over for years to promote web pages. SEO marketing engages link exchange, keyword density articles, spiders, URL, and other strategies to market a given web page. Web legatees employ a middling of options to get their web Internet pages enrolled on the top search engines, yet the density of keywords often bring them the best rewards.
Of course, the webmasters must submit their web pages to the top search engines, which their best solution is submitting the site to thousands of open directories, as well as to Google's, Yahoo! in addition, MSN.
Beginners marketing their web pages too many times fall short of focus to senior search engine eternal optimistic that seek these excellent marketing tools so that they get the quality and relevancy pursued in the game of SEO.
Many beginners in SEO marketing will use prevalent tools accessible on the net, which are sometimes the Search Engine Promoters. These tools are at your relegation, which users can access from the challenging SEO mixtures that claim to guarantee to take your web pages to the ranks at the summit of key search engines.
Ranking is of great magnitude to SEO experts. For a web site to reach the top fuses, it must direct or draw a towering quantity of traffic to an Internet pages by using relevant keywords or links. For that reason, understanding the advancing strategies in SEO marketing is critical, especially to those marketing their web pages to major search engines.
Links verses SEO Content
SEO marketing often involves link popularity, which are lines of attack that webmasters, developers and unalike other web owners bring into play to endorse their web pages to the major search engines.
The webmasters of use solicitation to work in links on their pages, which must have relevancy to the products or services offered at their site to consummate link popularity. To achieve link popularity the web sites must have quality links that meets the moral philosophy of major search engines to reach the top ranks. Most webmasters deem link building as the top SEO tactic that gets a web page ranked at the top of prime search engines. Contrarily, SEO tactics, such as content on web pages with dense keyword has proven far more effective in helping web owners to reach top search engine ranking.
Search engine optimizing is a trade SEO solution that web owners have given over for years to promote web pages. SEO marketing engages link exchange, keyword density articles, spiders, URL, and other strategies to market a given web page. Web legatees employ a middling of options to get their web Internet pages enrolled on the top search engines, yet the density of keywords often bring them the best rewards.
Of course, the webmasters must submit their web pages to the top search engines, which their best solution is submitting the site to thousands of open directories, as well as to Google's, Yahoo! in addition, MSN.
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
SEO Off-page Optimizing
SEO Off-page Optimizing
Off-page optimizing is to have links that come to your site. You hear internet marketers talk about having links point to their website or to a particular web page. Off-page optimizing makes your website look more valuable when other sites link to yours.
When looking for sites to link back to your site, look for sites having a higher page ranking than yours and are related to your site in some way. Higher-ranked sites help up your page ranking more than lower- ranked sites. Although, just about any site that links to your site will be a plus. Links of this nature are called one-way links.
Another type of link is a reciprocal link. A reciprocal link is linking back to the other website that is linking to you. Make certain the other website retains your link on their site. If they do remove your link, ask them to put it back. On the other hand, you can remove their link from your site.
In addition, set up a trade links page. When you do, it should contain pages that are sub-categories (i.e. marketing, investing, real estate). By doing this, it is much easier for you to maintain the list of links. The other reason is that you do not want to have over 20 outbound links on any given page. What do I mean by outbound links? An outbound link is any link that points to any web page that is not part of your website.
Indexed pages verses ranked pages
There is a difference between having your website or web page indexed verses ranked. To have your website indexed; search engines crawl your site at least once, know about your site, and insert your URL into their index of sites to crawl.
One of the easiest and fastest ways to have your site indexed is to include your URL in a message on a blog or forum that has a lot of traffic. Another way, although it is slower, is to submit articles and press releases.
Page rank is harder to come by. Three things determine the page ranking of your site: use of keywords in the content of your site; how many sites link back to your site and the quality of those sites (link popularity); and the text that these sites have used to link to you (anchor text).
When your site has a page rank, it usually means that you are receiving a fair amount of traffic and are building up what is called back links. Back links come when another site puts your link on their site. If, at all possible, you want to link with sites that have a page ranking of 3 or above.
Things to stay away from
Here are some things that can get you banned from search engines:
* Hidden text
o This is when you make the font color the same as the background color so that your customers are not able to see the wording. A way to check if sites are doing this is to press (Ctrl A). You could hide keywords in the body of your web page and no one will see them. You could also put other content on the page that no one would see but the search engines.
* Hidden links
o This is the same thing as hidden text only you do it with links. Let’s say on your squeeze page you want to put a link to another page on your website, but you don’t want anyone to go there, for whatever reason. This would be an example where you would hide the link and run a chance of having your site banned from the search engines.
* Keyword stuffing
o Keyword stuffing is using the exact same keyword repeatedly and in your alt tags, Meta tags, and title tags. This practice could get you banned from search engines. If you use your keywords in these tags and they are not repeated more than three times in each tag, you should be fine.
* Page cloaking
o A cloaked page is a page created to be invisible to the regular visitor of your website. The cloaked page contains code in it to detect when a search engine spider comes on the site. The spider is diverted to this cloaked page, which is set up to make your site look like one thing to a search engine in order to increase your search engine position on searches. What your customer sees is something entirely different.
* Doorways or bridge pages
o Doorway or bridge pages use the same concept as a cloaked page, but usually are located at different web hosting companies.
* Link Farms
o Link farms are "black hat" (taboo). Link farms are sites that consist of links to other sites and advertising of some sort. Their main goal is to provide a link to other sites and make money off advertising. There is usually no valuable content at all on these sites.
Off-page optimizing is to have links that come to your site. You hear internet marketers talk about having links point to their website or to a particular web page. Off-page optimizing makes your website look more valuable when other sites link to yours.
When looking for sites to link back to your site, look for sites having a higher page ranking than yours and are related to your site in some way. Higher-ranked sites help up your page ranking more than lower- ranked sites. Although, just about any site that links to your site will be a plus. Links of this nature are called one-way links.
Another type of link is a reciprocal link. A reciprocal link is linking back to the other website that is linking to you. Make certain the other website retains your link on their site. If they do remove your link, ask them to put it back. On the other hand, you can remove their link from your site.
In addition, set up a trade links page. When you do, it should contain pages that are sub-categories (i.e. marketing, investing, real estate). By doing this, it is much easier for you to maintain the list of links. The other reason is that you do not want to have over 20 outbound links on any given page. What do I mean by outbound links? An outbound link is any link that points to any web page that is not part of your website.
Indexed pages verses ranked pages
There is a difference between having your website or web page indexed verses ranked. To have your website indexed; search engines crawl your site at least once, know about your site, and insert your URL into their index of sites to crawl.
One of the easiest and fastest ways to have your site indexed is to include your URL in a message on a blog or forum that has a lot of traffic. Another way, although it is slower, is to submit articles and press releases.
Page rank is harder to come by. Three things determine the page ranking of your site: use of keywords in the content of your site; how many sites link back to your site and the quality of those sites (link popularity); and the text that these sites have used to link to you (anchor text).
When your site has a page rank, it usually means that you are receiving a fair amount of traffic and are building up what is called back links. Back links come when another site puts your link on their site. If, at all possible, you want to link with sites that have a page ranking of 3 or above.
Things to stay away from
Here are some things that can get you banned from search engines:
* Hidden text
o This is when you make the font color the same as the background color so that your customers are not able to see the wording. A way to check if sites are doing this is to press (Ctrl A). You could hide keywords in the body of your web page and no one will see them. You could also put other content on the page that no one would see but the search engines.
* Hidden links
o This is the same thing as hidden text only you do it with links. Let’s say on your squeeze page you want to put a link to another page on your website, but you don’t want anyone to go there, for whatever reason. This would be an example where you would hide the link and run a chance of having your site banned from the search engines.
* Keyword stuffing
o Keyword stuffing is using the exact same keyword repeatedly and in your alt tags, Meta tags, and title tags. This practice could get you banned from search engines. If you use your keywords in these tags and they are not repeated more than three times in each tag, you should be fine.
* Page cloaking
o A cloaked page is a page created to be invisible to the regular visitor of your website. The cloaked page contains code in it to detect when a search engine spider comes on the site. The spider is diverted to this cloaked page, which is set up to make your site look like one thing to a search engine in order to increase your search engine position on searches. What your customer sees is something entirely different.
* Doorways or bridge pages
o Doorway or bridge pages use the same concept as a cloaked page, but usually are located at different web hosting companies.
* Link Farms
o Link farms are "black hat" (taboo). Link farms are sites that consist of links to other sites and advertising of some sort. Their main goal is to provide a link to other sites and make money off advertising. There is usually no valuable content at all on these sites.
6 Things High Ranking Websites Have That Yours Doesn't
I've looked at a lot of websites over the years and helped a lot of clients, and I've yet to meet anyone who is totally committed to making their site as successful as it could be.
This is particularly true when it comes to search engine optimization. Most online businesses make a half-hearted attempt to get better search engine rankings, but rarely implement anymore than one or two things that could really help make their site a success.
Which of the following does your website have?
1. Unique Page Titles.
Take a look at a selection of web pages that come up high in the search engine results for any search term and you'll notice they all have one thing in common: unique page titles. Denoted by in HTML, page titles tell the search engines what your web page is about, and are thought to be a critical factor in how search engines determine the order in which pages are displayed in the search engine result pages (SERPS) for a specific search term.
2. Descriptive Keyword Links.
How do search engines find and index your site? They follow links from one page to another, indexing content as they go. If the links they follow contain keywords and phrases that are relevant to the page content, the search engines will boost the ranking of that page in their results. You should also use keywords and phrases in the site's navigation (menu), as those terms are (or should be) highly relevant for the page they link to.
3. Keywords in Your On-page Copy.
If you want the search engines to know what your page is about, and rank it appropriately, you must scatter keywords throughout your on-page copy. Keywords in your copy establish your site's relevance for words searchers use when they're looking for your product or service.
4. Clean, Accessible Website Design.
Messy, bloated HTML code, 404 errors, re-directs, too many graphics, content hiding behind forms etc., all hinder the search engines' ability to index your site. And if they can't index it, they can't rank it. Follow W3C's accessibility guidelines when building your website. Better yet, ask your website designer what he knows about standards compliant website design. If he or she can't answer, find someone who can.
5. Focused Site Topic.
It seems logical that the more focused your site is, the higher it will rank for related search terms. For example, a site that is focused on the sale of exercise mini-trampolines will probably do better for the search term "mini trampolines" than a site that tries to sell a number of unrelated or a selection of different exercise equipment. In addition, it makes sense to create specialty websites whenever possible. That way, you don't fall into the trap of trying to do too many things and end up doing none of them well.
6. Relevant Incoming Links.
The number of other sites that link to your site's pages is important but the quality of those sites, and the text used in the link, carries much more weight with the search engines. For example, one relevant link from an "authority" site such as a .org, .gov, or a site that's proven itself as a reliable source, provides more value than several links from unrelated or "unproven" sites.
Of course, there are other several other factors that go into determining a site's ranking (far too many to go into here) but these are some of the most important.
They're all easy to implement, so there's really no excuse for not taking advantage of them especially if you want to make sure your site is found and visited by as many people as possible. Then all you'll need to worry about is getting those people to buy something from you on a frequent basis.
And that's really what it's all about.
This is particularly true when it comes to search engine optimization. Most online businesses make a half-hearted attempt to get better search engine rankings, but rarely implement anymore than one or two things that could really help make their site a success.
Which of the following does your website have?
1. Unique Page Titles.
Take a look at a selection of web pages that come up high in the search engine results for any search term and you'll notice they all have one thing in common: unique page titles. Denoted by in HTML, page titles tell the search engines what your web page is about, and are thought to be a critical factor in how search engines determine the order in which pages are displayed in the search engine result pages (SERPS) for a specific search term.
2. Descriptive Keyword Links.
How do search engines find and index your site? They follow links from one page to another, indexing content as they go. If the links they follow contain keywords and phrases that are relevant to the page content, the search engines will boost the ranking of that page in their results. You should also use keywords and phrases in the site's navigation (menu), as those terms are (or should be) highly relevant for the page they link to.
3. Keywords in Your On-page Copy.
If you want the search engines to know what your page is about, and rank it appropriately, you must scatter keywords throughout your on-page copy. Keywords in your copy establish your site's relevance for words searchers use when they're looking for your product or service.
4. Clean, Accessible Website Design.
Messy, bloated HTML code, 404 errors, re-directs, too many graphics, content hiding behind forms etc., all hinder the search engines' ability to index your site. And if they can't index it, they can't rank it. Follow W3C's accessibility guidelines when building your website. Better yet, ask your website designer what he knows about standards compliant website design. If he or she can't answer, find someone who can.
5. Focused Site Topic.
It seems logical that the more focused your site is, the higher it will rank for related search terms. For example, a site that is focused on the sale of exercise mini-trampolines will probably do better for the search term "mini trampolines" than a site that tries to sell a number of unrelated or a selection of different exercise equipment. In addition, it makes sense to create specialty websites whenever possible. That way, you don't fall into the trap of trying to do too many things and end up doing none of them well.
6. Relevant Incoming Links.
The number of other sites that link to your site's pages is important but the quality of those sites, and the text used in the link, carries much more weight with the search engines. For example, one relevant link from an "authority" site such as a .org, .gov, or a site that's proven itself as a reliable source, provides more value than several links from unrelated or "unproven" sites.
Of course, there are other several other factors that go into determining a site's ranking (far too many to go into here) but these are some of the most important.
They're all easy to implement, so there's really no excuse for not taking advantage of them especially if you want to make sure your site is found and visited by as many people as possible. Then all you'll need to worry about is getting those people to buy something from you on a frequent basis.
And that's really what it's all about.
Monday, March 19, 2007
Internet Marketing Is As Easy As 1-2-3
This article will show you how to get good search engine ranking, once you know how to do the basics it will drive traffic to you online business and it will make it successful. The cost of online marketing that includes software, hardware, and website design may be higher when compared to other means. When starting an online business people don’t realize that an online business and an offline business are very similar.
When starting an online business find a marketing expert that can help you formulate a plan that is specific to your business, this way you can see the potential of your business. If you spend time learning the ins and outs of the internet and plan carefully you can make a nice income for yourself online. If you do the internet advertising correctly it will have the ability to drive visitors to your site and double your sales..
You must incorporate internet marketing efforts to boost traffic and to increase the sales of your website. You hear a lot of talk about niche marketing this is just another marketing tactic, concentrate on building links and steer clear of these type of ideas that really don’t pay off in the long run. Remember this important information and your business will grow, there is not one tool, marketing technique that will bring instant free traffic and instant sales.
Many business website owners don’t realize you need some type of internet marketing strategy. When creating a strategy you need to create your plan with the things you know and the things you don’t know. Internet marketing strategy is very similar to other marketing strategies.
This means that potential customers become positively disposed towards you because they have seen you associated with something they value and/or admire. When starting an affiliate program this is a great way to increase sales and increase your customer base. You must have customers to sell your service or product. The reason behind this is that with your list you can target customers that are interested in your product or service.
Writing articles is one of the most utilized Internet marketing media today. Providing information through these articles is a surefire way to drive hot traffic to your web site, and then dollars to your business. Most of these internet gurus have learned their marketing skills from years of trial and error, they have read many reports and they have tested their theories.
Internet marketing tools can help you make a lot of money. Once you business starts making money you will need to make other task easier, you can accomplish this by finding tools that will do what you want them to do and will make your tasks easier so you can do other things.
Another important factor is on page keywords, Remember when submitting links to have you text link contain important keywords relevant to your site.
What ever marketing you do for your business remember one important fact. Do not get upset if you are not receiving the traffic you want. Building a business takes time, you need to be patient. Keep building your business everyday and before you know it you will have so much traffic and business you will be glad you took this approach.
When starting an online business find a marketing expert that can help you formulate a plan that is specific to your business, this way you can see the potential of your business. If you spend time learning the ins and outs of the internet and plan carefully you can make a nice income for yourself online. If you do the internet advertising correctly it will have the ability to drive visitors to your site and double your sales..
You must incorporate internet marketing efforts to boost traffic and to increase the sales of your website. You hear a lot of talk about niche marketing this is just another marketing tactic, concentrate on building links and steer clear of these type of ideas that really don’t pay off in the long run. Remember this important information and your business will grow, there is not one tool, marketing technique that will bring instant free traffic and instant sales.
Many business website owners don’t realize you need some type of internet marketing strategy. When creating a strategy you need to create your plan with the things you know and the things you don’t know. Internet marketing strategy is very similar to other marketing strategies.
This means that potential customers become positively disposed towards you because they have seen you associated with something they value and/or admire. When starting an affiliate program this is a great way to increase sales and increase your customer base. You must have customers to sell your service or product. The reason behind this is that with your list you can target customers that are interested in your product or service.
Writing articles is one of the most utilized Internet marketing media today. Providing information through these articles is a surefire way to drive hot traffic to your web site, and then dollars to your business. Most of these internet gurus have learned their marketing skills from years of trial and error, they have read many reports and they have tested their theories.
Internet marketing tools can help you make a lot of money. Once you business starts making money you will need to make other task easier, you can accomplish this by finding tools that will do what you want them to do and will make your tasks easier so you can do other things.
Another important factor is on page keywords, Remember when submitting links to have you text link contain important keywords relevant to your site.
What ever marketing you do for your business remember one important fact. Do not get upset if you are not receiving the traffic you want. Building a business takes time, you need to be patient. Keep building your business everyday and before you know it you will have so much traffic and business you will be glad you took this approach.
Saturday, March 17, 2007
SEO for Big Three
The Major Factors:
There are some constants in search engine optimization; some factors that, by necessity, must be considered by all the major engines. Fortunately for use, these factors are generally the most important. Unfortunately, each of the engines uses them in different ways. Let's begin by listing these factors:
- Age
- Content
- Keyword density
- How it fares in the results
- Site structure
Age
Many of you will already be familiar with the aging delay that is commonly referred to as "the sandbox". For those of you that aren't familiar with it, the sandbox is a penalty that is applied to new sites and new links under the assumption that they cannot play nicely with others. It is only after time that the penalty is lightened and eventually disappears and the site is left to play in the park with the rest of the+ "nice sites".
This penalty is applied most strongly by Google and to a lesser degree Yahoo! On Google a new website cannot expect to rank for any competitive phrases for between 6 and 8 months. Even then, the links that are being built to this site still have to age so for most new sites competing for high-competition phrases you're looking at a good year-or-so to see top results though you'll likely see good results for many of your secondary phrases well before then. The penalty is also applied by Yahoo! but to a far lesser degree. The penalty on Yahoo is both shorter and lighter than that applied by Google. MSN does not apply such a penalty at the time of this writing.
Content
This is obviously a key feature across all the engines but again Yahoo! and Google take the lead in penalizing sites that do not have a lot of content related to a similar theme. Recently we have seen this act as mixed blessing, at least on Google, with some major sites getting overlooked due to a large amount of information on a wide variety of topics in exchange for sites focused on a single topic however with their recent tweaks they seem to be balancing the overall content focus with other factors to create a solid set of rankings that are relevant, will provide results that are more likely to produce the desired information, that don't neglect sites that may contain wide information on a wide variety of topics yet provide a good deal of valuable content on the searches subject. Yahoo doesn't seem to be catching up in this area with some holes in their results. That said, as the are not "gamed" as much as Google they haven't had to put on such strong filters and their results remain solid despite this.
It should be noted that the content does not necessarily have to contain the same keywords to be considered related. The engines are getting far better at determining themes of sites and knowing which words are related to each other. For example, Google will view the word "personal" and "personalized" as related by theme. You may not rank the same for both words in a search however they are tied together.
Keyword Density
Keyword density is the overall percentage of your page content that is made up of the targeted keywords. An additional factor in keyword density is the percentage of your keyword content that used special formatting such as bold, italic, anchor text, etc. While keyword density is not the end-all-be all of SEO (there is no single factor that is) it is a factor and one of the more difficult to optimize properly. While hitting specific densities for both overall content and special formats is easy enough, it becomes more difficult when you consider and are even more important than optimization: your real-for-real human visitor!
Keyword density holds the most weight on MSN, followed by Yahoo! with Google coming in last. This does not mean it should not be considered for reasons which will follow below.
How a Site Fares In the Results
One factor that is not often discussed among SEO's and which is not known to many outside the community is that how your site fares in the results is a factor. This factor is a fairly recent addition but is sure top become a stronger and stronger part of the overall algorithm as it matures. Google pioneered this technology however Yahoo! appears to be following suit and MSN is sure to do so as well considering that this is information that is very easy for any engine to track and truly adds to the "democracy" of the results in that it becomes the users "vote" that helps secure or topple a high ranking site.
This factor breaks down as such; the search engine knows when you have clicked on a result. They also know when you have returned to the results to try another site. If a site shows up for a specific search query often yet visitors tend to return to the results quickly after visiting the site the engine can thus assume that the searcher did not find what they were looking for on the site and thus the site can be deemed not relevant for that phrase. This factor alone has far-reaching effects on a number of traditionally non-SEO related factors and pulls them into the SEO-realm. Content now has to be more captivating, navigation has to be clear and easily accessed and the visitor has to be able to find the information that they're looking for quickly and easily. If the searcher returns to the search results quickly you will lose a point. If this happens often enough you will lose positioning.
Site Structure
The way your site is structured determines how easily a search engine spider can get through it; the priority is gives specific content, and how much code the spider has to weed through to get to your content. Essentially, having a structure that allows the spider to easily get through your website, placed the content areas as high up in the HTML code as possible, and which minimizes the use of formatting code such as the font tag will increase the overall weight of the content and insure that the content you want the spiders to focus on are what they "see" early on.
Many sites are structured such that the actual content doesn't appear until half-way down the page as far as the HTML code is concerned. Having a content area that starts at line 174 in the code is not a good start when it comes to SEO. While there is no specific answer as to what line the content area should start, using proper table structures or better yet, table less design practices using CSS can greatly increase the weight your content is given. Using CSS again we can significantly reduce the need for formatting code, further reducing the amount of coding that the search engine has to go through to get to the content.
The higher up in your HTML the content lies the greater the weight it is given. Optimized site structure, especially in moderate to high competition industries, is one of the first steps one can take to secure a competitive advantage over one's competition.
Backlinks
Ah backlinks. Once upon a time simply securing mass numbers of links to your site using whatever means were available was enough to rocket sites to the top of the rankings. Fortunately for search engine users this is no longer the case. With back links, as with websites in general, it's quality that counts. While there are numerous factors regarding the value of a link (many of which were discussed on the article, "SEO For Google") the basics are:
- Age. The older the link the more weight it has. (Google and Yahoo!)
- Link location. Links higher up on the page hold more weight. (All three)
- Link location two. Links occurring within content hold more weight that a directory-style link. (Google and Yahoo! to a lesser degree)
- Anchor text and formatting. The anchor text and the use of special formats in the text affect a link's weight. (All three)
- Relevancy. The relevancy of the site linking to you. (Google and Yahoo predominantly)
- Number of links. The more links there are on a single page, the less valuable the link to your site from that page is.
- Non-recip links. Non-reciprocal links hold more weight than reciprocal links. (Google and yahoo! to a lesser degree)
- Authority sites. Links from authority sites (.gov, .edu and respected news and information related) hold more weight.
Tying It Together
Knowing this one must assess the best course of action when launching into a new SEO campaign. For the purposes of this conclusion we will assume the the keywords we are targeting are in the moderate to high competition levels. In this event one must balance off the various factors and timelines to produce the highest ROI in the short term with an eye on maximum profitability in the long term. What we mean by this is that with aging delays occurring on Google and to a lesser degree Yahoo! one should focus first on MSN. This means that when you are adjusting your keyword densities and tweaking the onsite factors early in the campaign you will want to focus on hitting optimal levels for MSN knowing that Google, regardless of what you do, is unlikely to rank you highly for your primary phrases for some time.
Your link building efforts will need to take into account the long-term objective of ranking highly on Google with an understanding that MSN is not going to penalize your newly created backlinks with aging delays. A balance of speed vs perfection will be required. All the links you build should be relevant (if your visitors wouldn't be interested in going to the site then don't link to it) however if you can't always get inline links or your link will appear lower on the page you will still want to secure it.
After time (assuming that the right tactics have been used) you will notice your MSN rankings improve. This is a good benchmark for how your site will fare overall. Once you are ranking well on MSN it's time to focus your attention on Yahoo! At this stage you will want to slowly shift the onsite optimization towards Yahoo! You may be asking, "Am I about to lose my MSN rankings?" Good question and the answer should be, "no" if your continuing on the right path. Non-optimal levels in one area can be offset by increased strength in another. While you are slowly shifting the onsite optimization away from MSN's optimal levels you are continuing to develop more and more links further strengthening your site in this area to make up the difference.
After a couple months you will notice your Yahoo! rankings improving. A general timeline would be (assuming you are working diligently at it and are targeting fairly competitive phrases with a new site):
2 - 3 months: MSN rankings secured
4 - 6 months: Yahoo! rankings improving
6 - 8 months: Yahoo! rankings secured and Google improving. Many secondary phrases are attained on Google.
8 - 12 months: Google rankings secured.
The timelines will be quite different if you are working with an existing site (i.e. it has a solid history and a good PageRank already), are targeting less competitive phrases, and a variety of other considerations.
There are some constants in search engine optimization; some factors that, by necessity, must be considered by all the major engines. Fortunately for use, these factors are generally the most important. Unfortunately, each of the engines uses them in different ways. Let's begin by listing these factors:
- Age
- Content
- Keyword density
- How it fares in the results
- Site structure
Age
Many of you will already be familiar with the aging delay that is commonly referred to as "the sandbox". For those of you that aren't familiar with it, the sandbox is a penalty that is applied to new sites and new links under the assumption that they cannot play nicely with others. It is only after time that the penalty is lightened and eventually disappears and the site is left to play in the park with the rest of the+ "nice sites".
This penalty is applied most strongly by Google and to a lesser degree Yahoo! On Google a new website cannot expect to rank for any competitive phrases for between 6 and 8 months. Even then, the links that are being built to this site still have to age so for most new sites competing for high-competition phrases you're looking at a good year-or-so to see top results though you'll likely see good results for many of your secondary phrases well before then. The penalty is also applied by Yahoo! but to a far lesser degree. The penalty on Yahoo is both shorter and lighter than that applied by Google. MSN does not apply such a penalty at the time of this writing.
Content
This is obviously a key feature across all the engines but again Yahoo! and Google take the lead in penalizing sites that do not have a lot of content related to a similar theme. Recently we have seen this act as mixed blessing, at least on Google, with some major sites getting overlooked due to a large amount of information on a wide variety of topics in exchange for sites focused on a single topic however with their recent tweaks they seem to be balancing the overall content focus with other factors to create a solid set of rankings that are relevant, will provide results that are more likely to produce the desired information, that don't neglect sites that may contain wide information on a wide variety of topics yet provide a good deal of valuable content on the searches subject. Yahoo doesn't seem to be catching up in this area with some holes in their results. That said, as the are not "gamed" as much as Google they haven't had to put on such strong filters and their results remain solid despite this.
It should be noted that the content does not necessarily have to contain the same keywords to be considered related. The engines are getting far better at determining themes of sites and knowing which words are related to each other. For example, Google will view the word "personal" and "personalized" as related by theme. You may not rank the same for both words in a search however they are tied together.
Keyword Density
Keyword density is the overall percentage of your page content that is made up of the targeted keywords. An additional factor in keyword density is the percentage of your keyword content that used special formatting such as bold, italic, anchor text, etc. While keyword density is not the end-all-be all of SEO (there is no single factor that is) it is a factor and one of the more difficult to optimize properly. While hitting specific densities for both overall content and special formats is easy enough, it becomes more difficult when you consider and are even more important than optimization: your real-for-real human visitor!
Keyword density holds the most weight on MSN, followed by Yahoo! with Google coming in last. This does not mean it should not be considered for reasons which will follow below.
How a Site Fares In the Results
One factor that is not often discussed among SEO's and which is not known to many outside the community is that how your site fares in the results is a factor. This factor is a fairly recent addition but is sure top become a stronger and stronger part of the overall algorithm as it matures. Google pioneered this technology however Yahoo! appears to be following suit and MSN is sure to do so as well considering that this is information that is very easy for any engine to track and truly adds to the "democracy" of the results in that it becomes the users "vote" that helps secure or topple a high ranking site.
This factor breaks down as such; the search engine knows when you have clicked on a result. They also know when you have returned to the results to try another site. If a site shows up for a specific search query often yet visitors tend to return to the results quickly after visiting the site the engine can thus assume that the searcher did not find what they were looking for on the site and thus the site can be deemed not relevant for that phrase. This factor alone has far-reaching effects on a number of traditionally non-SEO related factors and pulls them into the SEO-realm. Content now has to be more captivating, navigation has to be clear and easily accessed and the visitor has to be able to find the information that they're looking for quickly and easily. If the searcher returns to the search results quickly you will lose a point. If this happens often enough you will lose positioning.
Site Structure
The way your site is structured determines how easily a search engine spider can get through it; the priority is gives specific content, and how much code the spider has to weed through to get to your content. Essentially, having a structure that allows the spider to easily get through your website, placed the content areas as high up in the HTML code as possible, and which minimizes the use of formatting code such as the font tag will increase the overall weight of the content and insure that the content you want the spiders to focus on are what they "see" early on.
Many sites are structured such that the actual content doesn't appear until half-way down the page as far as the HTML code is concerned. Having a content area that starts at line 174 in the code is not a good start when it comes to SEO. While there is no specific answer as to what line the content area should start, using proper table structures or better yet, table less design practices using CSS can greatly increase the weight your content is given. Using CSS again we can significantly reduce the need for formatting code, further reducing the amount of coding that the search engine has to go through to get to the content.
The higher up in your HTML the content lies the greater the weight it is given. Optimized site structure, especially in moderate to high competition industries, is one of the first steps one can take to secure a competitive advantage over one's competition.
Backlinks
Ah backlinks. Once upon a time simply securing mass numbers of links to your site using whatever means were available was enough to rocket sites to the top of the rankings. Fortunately for search engine users this is no longer the case. With back links, as with websites in general, it's quality that counts. While there are numerous factors regarding the value of a link (many of which were discussed on the article, "SEO For Google") the basics are:
- Age. The older the link the more weight it has. (Google and Yahoo!)
- Link location. Links higher up on the page hold more weight. (All three)
- Link location two. Links occurring within content hold more weight that a directory-style link. (Google and Yahoo! to a lesser degree)
- Anchor text and formatting. The anchor text and the use of special formats in the text affect a link's weight. (All three)
- Relevancy. The relevancy of the site linking to you. (Google and Yahoo predominantly)
- Number of links. The more links there are on a single page, the less valuable the link to your site from that page is.
- Non-recip links. Non-reciprocal links hold more weight than reciprocal links. (Google and yahoo! to a lesser degree)
- Authority sites. Links from authority sites (.gov, .edu and respected news and information related) hold more weight.
Tying It Together
Knowing this one must assess the best course of action when launching into a new SEO campaign. For the purposes of this conclusion we will assume the the keywords we are targeting are in the moderate to high competition levels. In this event one must balance off the various factors and timelines to produce the highest ROI in the short term with an eye on maximum profitability in the long term. What we mean by this is that with aging delays occurring on Google and to a lesser degree Yahoo! one should focus first on MSN. This means that when you are adjusting your keyword densities and tweaking the onsite factors early in the campaign you will want to focus on hitting optimal levels for MSN knowing that Google, regardless of what you do, is unlikely to rank you highly for your primary phrases for some time.
Your link building efforts will need to take into account the long-term objective of ranking highly on Google with an understanding that MSN is not going to penalize your newly created backlinks with aging delays. A balance of speed vs perfection will be required. All the links you build should be relevant (if your visitors wouldn't be interested in going to the site then don't link to it) however if you can't always get inline links or your link will appear lower on the page you will still want to secure it.
After time (assuming that the right tactics have been used) you will notice your MSN rankings improve. This is a good benchmark for how your site will fare overall. Once you are ranking well on MSN it's time to focus your attention on Yahoo! At this stage you will want to slowly shift the onsite optimization towards Yahoo! You may be asking, "Am I about to lose my MSN rankings?" Good question and the answer should be, "no" if your continuing on the right path. Non-optimal levels in one area can be offset by increased strength in another. While you are slowly shifting the onsite optimization away from MSN's optimal levels you are continuing to develop more and more links further strengthening your site in this area to make up the difference.
After a couple months you will notice your Yahoo! rankings improving. A general timeline would be (assuming you are working diligently at it and are targeting fairly competitive phrases with a new site):
2 - 3 months: MSN rankings secured
4 - 6 months: Yahoo! rankings improving
6 - 8 months: Yahoo! rankings secured and Google improving. Many secondary phrases are attained on Google.
8 - 12 months: Google rankings secured.
The timelines will be quite different if you are working with an existing site (i.e. it has a solid history and a good PageRank already), are targeting less competitive phrases, and a variety of other considerations.
SEO for Google
This article is part three of a four part series on optimizing your website for the the three major search engines. Part one, titled "SEO For MSN" covered optimizing your website to rank highly on MSN, while part two, titled "SEO For Yahoo!" covered optimizing your website to rank on Yahoo!. In this article we will cover optimizing your website for Google.
I likely don't even need to mention that Google is currently the largest of all the search engines with ComScore Media estimating this giant to be responsible for 42.7% of all online searches in March of 2006. For this reason people tend to view Google as the engine to rank on. While this point is debatable (let's remember that there's still 57.3% of searches that aren't done on Google) it's definitely an important engine to rank on. So how is it done?
The Factors
To optimize and rank highly on Google, as with any of the major engines, specific areas need to be addressed. On Google the most important of these factors are:
- Backlinks
- Age
- Content
- How it fares in the results
Backlinks
- The age of the links - Like domains, links gain weight with age. The longer your links have been on a web page the higher their value. Basically this means that your link building efforts today aren't going to pay off for a number of months. The weight seems to age gradually. In a month your link will hold partial weight, in two months it'll hold a bit more and so on. Links hold the majority of their weight after about 5 to 6 months.
- The location of the link - The physical location of your link on the page is an indicator to Google of its value. A link buried in the footer of a page will hold virtually no weight whereas a link near the top (i.e. where a visitor is likely to see it) will hold much more. Another location factor is how this link is situated relative to the content around it. A link that is located within content holds more weight than a link in a typical link-page or directory format with a title and description. The inline nature of the aforementioned location indicates that the link itself is more natural.
- The anchor text and formatting - The linking text used is obviously important. If you are targeting a phrase such as "seo firms" then using these two keywords in the anchor text is going to attach relevancy between your site and these keywords. Be careful though, building a thousand links using all the same anchor text is going to look suspicious. Vary your anchor text, perhaps include other keywords and you'll find your efforts rewarded. The formatting of the link is also relevant. A link that uses bold, italics, etc. is obviously meant to be seen by a visitor and is thus more highly regarded by Google.
- Relevancy - The relevancy of the site linking to you is of key importance. Getting a link on a health site if you're an SEO firm is going to hold little weight whereas a link from an SEO resource site will be much more valuable.
- PageRank - While the value of PageRank is arguably dropping when one is considering it's importance in link building it is still a factor. A link from a PageRank 5 page is worth substantially more than a link from a PageRank 2 page.
Age
In a patent application from back in 2004 Google told SEO firms (and anyone else for that matter) that age was an important factor. Google has since become a domain name registrar which gives them access to who is data and thus they can clearly see the age of a domain, who it is registered to, where it is hosted, etc. The older your domain is the more legitimate Google sees it and thus the more likely they are to rank it. Additionally, domains that are registered for longer periods of time are also seen as more legitimate and thus will tend to rank higher.
Content
Google is more picky than either Yahoo! or MSN when it comes to content. While the phrase, "content is king," may be overused it is still relevant. The more content you have on your site the more likely someone is to find what they're looking for when they get there. Thus, the more content you have on your site the more likely Google is to believe a searcher will find what they're looking for there. This does not mean that you should grab every bit of content you can find and build a 500,000 page site about potatoes. The content needs to be relevant and preferably well written. While a search engine spider may not be able to tell if your content is truly well written it must appeal to a human visitor. The reason for this will be made more clear below.
Keyword density is not as large a factor on Google as on Yahoo! or MSN however it is a factor and in the SEO "game" any factor that holds weight needs to be taken into consideration in all but the least competitive areas. While a site targeting a phrase such as "bed and breakfast in the middle of nowhere" can afford weakness in some of the areas most of us cannot. As noted in the articles on MSN and Yahoo! it would be unwise for me to specify an optimal keyword density here as the optimal levels vary by site type, topic, and fluctuate with the algorithm updates. Keyword densities need to be reanalyzed approximately monthly or any time an update is noted.
How it fares in the results
How your website fares in the results is a growing factor and will only continue to gain importance as time passes. If your website appears in the results for a specific phrase yet no one click on is your website will drop out of the rankings. Arguably worse, if your website is clicked however after a few seconds Google detects that the searcher has returned to the results to find a new site your site will drop. It is for this reason that it is important to insure that the titles you write for your website are both search engine and human friendly. You want Google to rank it highly and you also need humans to click it or Google won't rank it highly (circular logic I know but valid nonetheless).
You also need to make sure that what people see when they first land on your page either is the information they are looking for or alternatively, clearly indicates where that information can be found. This point may seem obvious simply from a usability standpoint however the number of sites out there that violate this basic principle is vast. As part of your SEO efforts you will want to take a look at your site from a user's standpoint or better yet, watch real users navigate it to see if they can find what they're looking for quickly. You have about 3 seconds to get a visitor's attention so make sure that your visitor can find what they want in that time. You may need to hire experienced web designers to bring your website up to speed however the cost of this is lower than the cost of losing rankings and business due to poor design and the falling rankings that will follow.
I likely don't even need to mention that Google is currently the largest of all the search engines with ComScore Media estimating this giant to be responsible for 42.7% of all online searches in March of 2006. For this reason people tend to view Google as the engine to rank on. While this point is debatable (let's remember that there's still 57.3% of searches that aren't done on Google) it's definitely an important engine to rank on. So how is it done?
The Factors
To optimize and rank highly on Google, as with any of the major engines, specific areas need to be addressed. On Google the most important of these factors are:
- Backlinks
- Age
- Content
- How it fares in the results
Backlinks
- The age of the links - Like domains, links gain weight with age. The longer your links have been on a web page the higher their value. Basically this means that your link building efforts today aren't going to pay off for a number of months. The weight seems to age gradually. In a month your link will hold partial weight, in two months it'll hold a bit more and so on. Links hold the majority of their weight after about 5 to 6 months.
- The location of the link - The physical location of your link on the page is an indicator to Google of its value. A link buried in the footer of a page will hold virtually no weight whereas a link near the top (i.e. where a visitor is likely to see it) will hold much more. Another location factor is how this link is situated relative to the content around it. A link that is located within content holds more weight than a link in a typical link-page or directory format with a title and description. The inline nature of the aforementioned location indicates that the link itself is more natural.
- The anchor text and formatting - The linking text used is obviously important. If you are targeting a phrase such as "seo firms" then using these two keywords in the anchor text is going to attach relevancy between your site and these keywords. Be careful though, building a thousand links using all the same anchor text is going to look suspicious. Vary your anchor text, perhaps include other keywords and you'll find your efforts rewarded. The formatting of the link is also relevant. A link that uses bold, italics, etc. is obviously meant to be seen by a visitor and is thus more highly regarded by Google.
- Relevancy - The relevancy of the site linking to you is of key importance. Getting a link on a health site if you're an SEO firm is going to hold little weight whereas a link from an SEO resource site will be much more valuable.
- PageRank - While the value of PageRank is arguably dropping when one is considering it's importance in link building it is still a factor. A link from a PageRank 5 page is worth substantially more than a link from a PageRank 2 page.
Age
In a patent application from back in 2004 Google told SEO firms (and anyone else for that matter) that age was an important factor. Google has since become a domain name registrar which gives them access to who is data and thus they can clearly see the age of a domain, who it is registered to, where it is hosted, etc. The older your domain is the more legitimate Google sees it and thus the more likely they are to rank it. Additionally, domains that are registered for longer periods of time are also seen as more legitimate and thus will tend to rank higher.
Content
Google is more picky than either Yahoo! or MSN when it comes to content. While the phrase, "content is king," may be overused it is still relevant. The more content you have on your site the more likely someone is to find what they're looking for when they get there. Thus, the more content you have on your site the more likely Google is to believe a searcher will find what they're looking for there. This does not mean that you should grab every bit of content you can find and build a 500,000 page site about potatoes. The content needs to be relevant and preferably well written. While a search engine spider may not be able to tell if your content is truly well written it must appeal to a human visitor. The reason for this will be made more clear below.
Keyword density is not as large a factor on Google as on Yahoo! or MSN however it is a factor and in the SEO "game" any factor that holds weight needs to be taken into consideration in all but the least competitive areas. While a site targeting a phrase such as "bed and breakfast in the middle of nowhere" can afford weakness in some of the areas most of us cannot. As noted in the articles on MSN and Yahoo! it would be unwise for me to specify an optimal keyword density here as the optimal levels vary by site type, topic, and fluctuate with the algorithm updates. Keyword densities need to be reanalyzed approximately monthly or any time an update is noted.
How it fares in the results
How your website fares in the results is a growing factor and will only continue to gain importance as time passes. If your website appears in the results for a specific phrase yet no one click on is your website will drop out of the rankings. Arguably worse, if your website is clicked however after a few seconds Google detects that the searcher has returned to the results to find a new site your site will drop. It is for this reason that it is important to insure that the titles you write for your website are both search engine and human friendly. You want Google to rank it highly and you also need humans to click it or Google won't rank it highly (circular logic I know but valid nonetheless).
You also need to make sure that what people see when they first land on your page either is the information they are looking for or alternatively, clearly indicates where that information can be found. This point may seem obvious simply from a usability standpoint however the number of sites out there that violate this basic principle is vast. As part of your SEO efforts you will want to take a look at your site from a user's standpoint or better yet, watch real users navigate it to see if they can find what they're looking for quickly. You have about 3 seconds to get a visitor's attention so make sure that your visitor can find what they want in that time. You may need to hire experienced web designers to bring your website up to speed however the cost of this is lower than the cost of losing rankings and business due to poor design and the falling rankings that will follow.
SEO for Yahoo
This article is part two of a four part series on optimizing your website for the the three major search engines. Part one, titled "SEO For MSN" covered optimizing your website to rank highly on MSN. In this article we will cover optimizing your website for Yahoo!
Yahoo! is the second biggest of the three major engines and includes an enormous network of websites. The algorithm is based on that of Inktomi which Yahoo! purchased back in 2002 as part of their plan to stop serving Google results to search queries. The algorithm itself can pose a problem for some SEO's as we optimize client websites to rank highly on multiple search engines due to the way that it deffers from Google and MSN. That said, any issue can be addressed provided that the right attention is given to the right details.
The Factors
Yahoo! is the second biggest of the three major engines and includes an enormous network of websites.
To optimize and rank highly on Yahoo!, as with any of the major engines, specific areas need to be addressed. On Yahoo! the major areas are as follows:
- Keyword density
- Site structure
- Backlinks
- Aging
Keyword Density
As noted in the article on MSN, it would be unwise for me to specify a keyword density for you to target on your website. There are two reasons for this. First, if there is a delay between the writing of this article and when you read it specific numbers could well send you off in the wrong direction. Second, you will need to analyze your specific competitors to determine what the best density is in your area and for your type of website. Optimal keyword densities are no longer a one-size-fits-all calculation. Your industry and site-type will affect the optimal densities and thus, a complete analysis using a tool such as Total Optimizer Pro will be necessary.
Additionally, optimal keyword densities change on a regular basis and so you will need to periodically reanalyze your densities and compare them with others in the top 10 to insure that your densities remain within the optimal levels. When using Total Optimizer Pro for the onsite analysis we generally aim our densities for the upper end of the top 10 results but not aiming to be the top. Generally you will see a range that appears much like a bell curve with a couple sites in the very low range (0.5 to 1.0%) and a couple site in the very high range (5.0 to 8.0%). The rest will generally fall in the middle. Ignore those in the very low and very high range and target towards the upper end though not the highest of the remaining sites and you will be on target.
Site Structure
On no other engine is site structure more important than on Yahoo! While having a good site structure is important for a vaiety of reasons, it was on Yahoo! that Beanstalk noted the most significant gains when we brought our homepage and key internals into compliance with W3C standards (the rest of the site will be brought into compliance as part of our complete redesign scheduled for launch on April 24th). While slight gains were noticeable on both Google and MSN they were so minor that they may well have just been part of the ebb-and-flow of the results. On Yahoo! however we noted a three page jump the day the changes were picked up. No other changes to the site were performed during this time.
The site structure is important for two key reasons. First, the site structure determines the order in which your page content gets seen by the search engines and thus, whch content will be given the highest priority. Content that occurs higher up in the code of your page (not necessarily in your browser) is given a higher weight than content lower down in the code. Second, a properly structured site will be lower in code through the use of CSS, reduced or eliminated table use, etc. The reduction in code will push the content higher up the page as far as a search engine is concerned and thus, it will be given more weight.
Backlinks
Like the other two major engines, having a solid backlink count from relevant sites using good anchor text practices is a major factor on Yahoo! for any reasonably competitive phrase. When it comes to calculating backlinks Yahoo! is far more similar to Google than MSN. Aspects of backlink counts that must be taken into consideration when optimizing your website for Yahoo!:
- Quality of site - like Google has attempted to do in the past with PageRank and is learning to do with TrustRank, sheer numbers aren't what will get you high rankings on Yahoo!, the quality of those links is more important. We must remember than PageRank is a Google calculation, not Yahoo! and so it alone cannot determine the value of a link when we are optimizing for this engine. It can be used as a quasi-benchmark however when determining if a link is a quality link on Yahoo! we are better off to considered whether it is from a site that is ranking well on Yahoo! for the same or related phrases, does it come from a site that it related to ours, does the site link to a site that is ranking well on Yahoo! and does the link come from a trusted domain. For these purposes a trusted domain can be considered any domain that is over 3 years old, has a solid number of backlinks coming from a wide variety of sites and which at least a solid number of are non-reciprocal links.
- Position of link - like all the major engines, the position of your link on the page is important. A link at or near the bottom of the page is less valuable than a link nearer to the top. Also, if your link is on a page with other links, the effect that link will have on your rankings decreases respective to the number of links on the linking page.
- Anchor text - the text used to link to your site will help reinforce that the keywords in that anchor text are associated with your site/page. Also, if that anchor text in in the midst of the content it will hold greater weight than if that anchor text is in a directory-style format above a description (i.e. link a standard links page)
- Non-reciprocal links - reciprocal links are certainly still valuable on Yahoo! however it is important to supplement these links with non-reciprocal links in the form of directory listings and other one-way links.
Aging
The bane of new websites is the aging delay. Many focus on Google's "sandbox" when they think of aging delays however Yahoo! employs one as well, though it is lighter and lasts a shorter duration of time. New sites and links are not given the same weight as sites and links that have been around for a while. The aging delay on sites has been extended over the past couple years however it isn't as severe as that imposed by Google. New sites can expect to find it extremely difficult to rank for competitive phrase inside of 6 months even if everything else is in place. To add to the difficulty is a delay on the value of links. When a new site launches it obviosly has no links. These links are subjesct to a delay that appears to be somewhere between 3 to 4 months before they hold their full weight.
The combination of these delays can make it very difficult for new sites to rank for competitive phrases inside of 8 to 12 months however because the restrictions are lighter than those imposed by Google one can expect to see rankings for secondary, tertiary and completely unexpected phrases far faster on Yahoo!
Yahoo! is the second biggest of the three major engines and includes an enormous network of websites. The algorithm is based on that of Inktomi which Yahoo! purchased back in 2002 as part of their plan to stop serving Google results to search queries. The algorithm itself can pose a problem for some SEO's as we optimize client websites to rank highly on multiple search engines due to the way that it deffers from Google and MSN. That said, any issue can be addressed provided that the right attention is given to the right details.
The Factors
Yahoo! is the second biggest of the three major engines and includes an enormous network of websites.
To optimize and rank highly on Yahoo!, as with any of the major engines, specific areas need to be addressed. On Yahoo! the major areas are as follows:
- Keyword density
- Site structure
- Backlinks
- Aging
Keyword Density
As noted in the article on MSN, it would be unwise for me to specify a keyword density for you to target on your website. There are two reasons for this. First, if there is a delay between the writing of this article and when you read it specific numbers could well send you off in the wrong direction. Second, you will need to analyze your specific competitors to determine what the best density is in your area and for your type of website. Optimal keyword densities are no longer a one-size-fits-all calculation. Your industry and site-type will affect the optimal densities and thus, a complete analysis using a tool such as Total Optimizer Pro will be necessary.
Additionally, optimal keyword densities change on a regular basis and so you will need to periodically reanalyze your densities and compare them with others in the top 10 to insure that your densities remain within the optimal levels. When using Total Optimizer Pro for the onsite analysis we generally aim our densities for the upper end of the top 10 results but not aiming to be the top. Generally you will see a range that appears much like a bell curve with a couple sites in the very low range (0.5 to 1.0%) and a couple site in the very high range (5.0 to 8.0%). The rest will generally fall in the middle. Ignore those in the very low and very high range and target towards the upper end though not the highest of the remaining sites and you will be on target.
Site Structure
On no other engine is site structure more important than on Yahoo! While having a good site structure is important for a vaiety of reasons, it was on Yahoo! that Beanstalk noted the most significant gains when we brought our homepage and key internals into compliance with W3C standards (the rest of the site will be brought into compliance as part of our complete redesign scheduled for launch on April 24th). While slight gains were noticeable on both Google and MSN they were so minor that they may well have just been part of the ebb-and-flow of the results. On Yahoo! however we noted a three page jump the day the changes were picked up. No other changes to the site were performed during this time.
The site structure is important for two key reasons. First, the site structure determines the order in which your page content gets seen by the search engines and thus, whch content will be given the highest priority. Content that occurs higher up in the code of your page (not necessarily in your browser) is given a higher weight than content lower down in the code. Second, a properly structured site will be lower in code through the use of CSS, reduced or eliminated table use, etc. The reduction in code will push the content higher up the page as far as a search engine is concerned and thus, it will be given more weight.
Backlinks
Like the other two major engines, having a solid backlink count from relevant sites using good anchor text practices is a major factor on Yahoo! for any reasonably competitive phrase. When it comes to calculating backlinks Yahoo! is far more similar to Google than MSN. Aspects of backlink counts that must be taken into consideration when optimizing your website for Yahoo!:
- Quality of site - like Google has attempted to do in the past with PageRank and is learning to do with TrustRank, sheer numbers aren't what will get you high rankings on Yahoo!, the quality of those links is more important. We must remember than PageRank is a Google calculation, not Yahoo! and so it alone cannot determine the value of a link when we are optimizing for this engine. It can be used as a quasi-benchmark however when determining if a link is a quality link on Yahoo! we are better off to considered whether it is from a site that is ranking well on Yahoo! for the same or related phrases, does it come from a site that it related to ours, does the site link to a site that is ranking well on Yahoo! and does the link come from a trusted domain. For these purposes a trusted domain can be considered any domain that is over 3 years old, has a solid number of backlinks coming from a wide variety of sites and which at least a solid number of are non-reciprocal links.
- Position of link - like all the major engines, the position of your link on the page is important. A link at or near the bottom of the page is less valuable than a link nearer to the top. Also, if your link is on a page with other links, the effect that link will have on your rankings decreases respective to the number of links on the linking page.
- Anchor text - the text used to link to your site will help reinforce that the keywords in that anchor text are associated with your site/page. Also, if that anchor text in in the midst of the content it will hold greater weight than if that anchor text is in a directory-style format above a description (i.e. link a standard links page)
- Non-reciprocal links - reciprocal links are certainly still valuable on Yahoo! however it is important to supplement these links with non-reciprocal links in the form of directory listings and other one-way links.
Aging
The bane of new websites is the aging delay. Many focus on Google's "sandbox" when they think of aging delays however Yahoo! employs one as well, though it is lighter and lasts a shorter duration of time. New sites and links are not given the same weight as sites and links that have been around for a while. The aging delay on sites has been extended over the past couple years however it isn't as severe as that imposed by Google. New sites can expect to find it extremely difficult to rank for competitive phrase inside of 6 months even if everything else is in place. To add to the difficulty is a delay on the value of links. When a new site launches it obviosly has no links. These links are subjesct to a delay that appears to be somewhere between 3 to 4 months before they hold their full weight.
The combination of these delays can make it very difficult for new sites to rank for competitive phrases inside of 8 to 12 months however because the restrictions are lighter than those imposed by Google one can expect to see rankings for secondary, tertiary and completely unexpected phrases far faster on Yahoo!
SEO For MSN
This is article one of a four part series on optimizing your website for the "Big Three". Part two will focus on Yahoo!, Part three will focus on Google and part four of this series will explain how to perform SEO on your website to attain high rankings across all three major engines. We are beginning with MSN as rankings are generally faster attained on this engine and thus it is a good place to begin, especially if you have a new site that is likely still in the sandbox on Google or are just at the beginning stages of link building.
Like all of the major search engines, MSN builds their index of sites using spiders to crawl the web finding new and changed information. This information is then processed by the MSN servers using complex algorithms to determine which sites are most relevant to the search query entered. This may seem like an extraordinarily complex process and it is however the resulting environment is simple: all search engine algorithms are mathematical and thus, there is a fixed set of rules and factors which, if addressed correctly, will result in a high ranking. In short, because it's math we have the benefit of knowing that if we take action x and action y we will get result z.
How to perform SEO on your website to attain high rankings across all three major engines. We are beginning with MSN as rankings are generally faster attained on this engine and thus it is a good place to begin, especially if you have a new site that is likely still in the sandbox on Google or are just at the beginning stages of link building.
The Rules For MSN
Assuming that you are following the right rules, the results you can achieve on MSN can be fast and solid. MSN does not apply the same types of aging delays that the other two engines do and thus, when you change your content the change in results can be realized as quickly as they reindex your site and as quickly as your incoming links get picked. This differs greatly from Google and Yahoo! in that those two engines age both domains and links requiring a longer period of time before the full effects of your efforts are realized.
As an additional note on MSN, users of MSN are 48% more likely to purchase a product or service online than the average Internet user according to a comScore Media report.
So what are the rules for MSN that can help us get top rankings? As with all the major engines, there are two fundamental areas that need to be addressed to attain top rankings. The first is the onsite factors, the second is the offsite. Because they are fundamentally different we will address them separately.
Onsite SEO Factors
The problem with writing an article about the onsite factors is that by the time many of you read this some of the weight these factors hold and the optimal levels noted may well be out-of-date. Thus, rather than listing overly-specific-and-sure-to-change factors we will focus on how to know what the factors are, how to get a handle on what you need to adjust and by how much, and how to predict what will be coming down the road. And so we'll begin:
How To Know What The Factors Are:
Unfortunately there's no one over at MSN Search calling us up weekly to let us know what the specifics of their algorithm are, we have to figure it out for ourselves with research, reading and playing with test sites. From all of this there is only one conclusion that an SEO can make: the details matter. When we're discussing onsite factors this includes:
SEO can make: the details matter. When we're discussing onsite factors this includes:
- the content of the page including keyword density
- the internal linking structure of the site (how the pages of your site are linked together)
- the number of pages in your site and the relevancy of those pages to your main topic and phrases
- the use of titles, heading tags and special formats
Page Content:
The content of your page must be perfect. What I mean by this is that the content must appeal to both the search engines and the algorithms.
Internal Linking Structure:
The way your pages link together tells the search engines what the page is about and also allows them to easily (or not-so-easily) work their way to your internal pages. If your site has an image or script-based navigation it is important to also use text links either in your content, in a footer, or both. The text links are easy to follow for a spider and perhaps more importantly, the text links allow you the opportunity to tell the spiders what a specific page is about though the anchor text and, in the case of footers, allows you to add in more instances of the targeted phrases outside of your general content area.
The Number Of Pages & Their Relevancy:
MSN wants to please their visitors. For this reason they want to insure that highest likelihood that a searcher will find what they need once they get to your site. When you are optimizing your site for MSN be sure to take some time to built quality content. Do a search on your major competitors to see how large their sites are, over time you will want to build yours to the same range through general content creation or the addition of a blog or forum to your site.
Titles, Heading Tags & Special Formats:
Titles are the single most important piece of code our your entire web page for two reasons. The first is that it holds a very high level of weight in the algorithm. the second reason is that it is your window to the world. When someone runs a search the results will generally show your page title in the search results. This means that a human visitor has to be drawn to click on your title or rankings your site is a futile effort (this isn't about bragging rights, it's about return on investment).
Offsite SEO Factors
With MSN, the offsite factors are much simpler to deal with than either Google or Yahoo! MSN will give you full credit for a link the day they pick it up so link building, while time consuming, is reworded much quicker on MSN. When dealing with MSN and offsite SEO there are two main factors we must consider when finding links:
- Relevancy. The site must be relevant to yours to hold any real weight.
- Quality is better than quantity. Because PageRank is Google-specific we can't use it as the grading tool for MSN however upon visiting a website it's generally fairly clear whether we're visiting a good site or not. Spending extra time to find quality is well rewarded. Also, finding one-way links as opposed to reciprocal links is becoming increasingly important and I'd recommend utilizing both in your link building strategies.
You will have to begin your offsite optimization by running link checks on your competitors to see what you're up against. This is also a good place to start for potential link partners though those of you using a tool such as Total Optimizer Pro or PR Prowler will find it far faster and more effective to use these too
Like all of the major search engines, MSN builds their index of sites using spiders to crawl the web finding new and changed information. This information is then processed by the MSN servers using complex algorithms to determine which sites are most relevant to the search query entered. This may seem like an extraordinarily complex process and it is however the resulting environment is simple: all search engine algorithms are mathematical and thus, there is a fixed set of rules and factors which, if addressed correctly, will result in a high ranking. In short, because it's math we have the benefit of knowing that if we take action x and action y we will get result z.
How to perform SEO on your website to attain high rankings across all three major engines. We are beginning with MSN as rankings are generally faster attained on this engine and thus it is a good place to begin, especially if you have a new site that is likely still in the sandbox on Google or are just at the beginning stages of link building.
The Rules For MSN
Assuming that you are following the right rules, the results you can achieve on MSN can be fast and solid. MSN does not apply the same types of aging delays that the other two engines do and thus, when you change your content the change in results can be realized as quickly as they reindex your site and as quickly as your incoming links get picked. This differs greatly from Google and Yahoo! in that those two engines age both domains and links requiring a longer period of time before the full effects of your efforts are realized.
As an additional note on MSN, users of MSN are 48% more likely to purchase a product or service online than the average Internet user according to a comScore Media report.
So what are the rules for MSN that can help us get top rankings? As with all the major engines, there are two fundamental areas that need to be addressed to attain top rankings. The first is the onsite factors, the second is the offsite. Because they are fundamentally different we will address them separately.
Onsite SEO Factors
The problem with writing an article about the onsite factors is that by the time many of you read this some of the weight these factors hold and the optimal levels noted may well be out-of-date. Thus, rather than listing overly-specific-and-sure-to-change factors we will focus on how to know what the factors are, how to get a handle on what you need to adjust and by how much, and how to predict what will be coming down the road. And so we'll begin:
How To Know What The Factors Are:
Unfortunately there's no one over at MSN Search calling us up weekly to let us know what the specifics of their algorithm are, we have to figure it out for ourselves with research, reading and playing with test sites. From all of this there is only one conclusion that an SEO can make: the details matter. When we're discussing onsite factors this includes:
SEO can make: the details matter. When we're discussing onsite factors this includes:
- the content of the page including keyword density
- the internal linking structure of the site (how the pages of your site are linked together)
- the number of pages in your site and the relevancy of those pages to your main topic and phrases
- the use of titles, heading tags and special formats
Page Content:
The content of your page must be perfect. What I mean by this is that the content must appeal to both the search engines and the algorithms.
Internal Linking Structure:
The way your pages link together tells the search engines what the page is about and also allows them to easily (or not-so-easily) work their way to your internal pages. If your site has an image or script-based navigation it is important to also use text links either in your content, in a footer, or both. The text links are easy to follow for a spider and perhaps more importantly, the text links allow you the opportunity to tell the spiders what a specific page is about though the anchor text and, in the case of footers, allows you to add in more instances of the targeted phrases outside of your general content area.
The Number Of Pages & Their Relevancy:
MSN wants to please their visitors. For this reason they want to insure that highest likelihood that a searcher will find what they need once they get to your site. When you are optimizing your site for MSN be sure to take some time to built quality content. Do a search on your major competitors to see how large their sites are, over time you will want to build yours to the same range through general content creation or the addition of a blog or forum to your site.
Titles, Heading Tags & Special Formats:
Titles are the single most important piece of code our your entire web page for two reasons. The first is that it holds a very high level of weight in the algorithm. the second reason is that it is your window to the world. When someone runs a search the results will generally show your page title in the search results. This means that a human visitor has to be drawn to click on your title or rankings your site is a futile effort (this isn't about bragging rights, it's about return on investment).
Offsite SEO Factors
With MSN, the offsite factors are much simpler to deal with than either Google or Yahoo! MSN will give you full credit for a link the day they pick it up so link building, while time consuming, is reworded much quicker on MSN. When dealing with MSN and offsite SEO there are two main factors we must consider when finding links:
- Relevancy. The site must be relevant to yours to hold any real weight.
- Quality is better than quantity. Because PageRank is Google-specific we can't use it as the grading tool for MSN however upon visiting a website it's generally fairly clear whether we're visiting a good site or not. Spending extra time to find quality is well rewarded. Also, finding one-way links as opposed to reciprocal links is becoming increasingly important and I'd recommend utilizing both in your link building strategies.
You will have to begin your offsite optimization by running link checks on your competitors to see what you're up against. This is also a good place to start for potential link partners though those of you using a tool such as Total Optimizer Pro or PR Prowler will find it far faster and more effective to use these too
Friday, March 16, 2007
Seo - Do You Have Enough Search Engine Friendly Content?
A discussion of search engine friendly content and how the problem with most websites is that they don’t have enough of it on their search engine optimized pages.
Is it possible to have too much SEO on your website? The answer is no. In fact the majority of websites are sadly lacking in true search engine indexable content. This is because almost half of most web pages consist of blank space that are read by the search engine spiders as being nothing. Remember too that the problem is worsened by the fact that most search engine spiders also read flash animation (as typically found with banners and graphics) and photographs as blank space too.
To be truly optimized experts say that your site should contain at least 200 words of keyword dense text. That is the minimum that you need on there to attract the attention of the search engine spiders that determine what content is indexable by the amount of text used on the page.
Yet another important thing to remember is that the impact of keywords on search engine spiders is maximized if the keywords that you use in this minimum 200-word length text also match your page titles. For instance a site selling psychic advice that is owned by a company called PsychicsRUs should have both psychic advice and PsychicsRUs somewhere in the body of the text.
Just how long is a 200 words. The above three paragraphs is 203 words which gives you an idea of the minimum chunk of copy that has to be on your website for it to be considered optimized. As you can see it is not a lot of copy. There is a big debate about whether or not you can overdo SEO text on a website page. To avoid overdoing simply make sure that whatever SEO copy you are writing is friendly for both humans and bots to read and that should weed out any keywords that are serving as “overkill.”
Is it possible to have too much SEO on your website? The answer is no. In fact the majority of websites are sadly lacking in true search engine indexable content. This is because almost half of most web pages consist of blank space that are read by the search engine spiders as being nothing. Remember too that the problem is worsened by the fact that most search engine spiders also read flash animation (as typically found with banners and graphics) and photographs as blank space too.
To be truly optimized experts say that your site should contain at least 200 words of keyword dense text. That is the minimum that you need on there to attract the attention of the search engine spiders that determine what content is indexable by the amount of text used on the page.
Yet another important thing to remember is that the impact of keywords on search engine spiders is maximized if the keywords that you use in this minimum 200-word length text also match your page titles. For instance a site selling psychic advice that is owned by a company called PsychicsRUs should have both psychic advice and PsychicsRUs somewhere in the body of the text.
Just how long is a 200 words. The above three paragraphs is 203 words which gives you an idea of the minimum chunk of copy that has to be on your website for it to be considered optimized. As you can see it is not a lot of copy. There is a big debate about whether or not you can overdo SEO text on a website page. To avoid overdoing simply make sure that whatever SEO copy you are writing is friendly for both humans and bots to read and that should weed out any keywords that are serving as “overkill.”
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Simple Website Design Principles for Internet Marketing
An essential element of the success of any Internet Marketing campaign is the ability to not only generate traffic to your Website, but capturing the interest of the visitor once he's on your site. The are a number of techniques that the best Internet Marketing Strategies employ to ensure that their Website Design encourages a user to linger.
To a great degree all Internet marketing strategies - article
marketing, blogging, search engine optimization and email
marketing, depend on the quality of your Website design to
close the sale.
As you design and continually refine your Website, maintain
constant focus on what you are trying to accomplish, what
message you are trying to communicate. All the principles
in the world are worthless without vigilance to your ultimate
objective.
Here are five fundamental rules of thumb to observe to make sure your Website performs well.
1) Do not use splash pages
Splash pages are the first pages you see when you arrive at a website. They normally have a very beautiful image with words like "welcome" or "click here to enter". In fact, they are just that -- pretty vases with no real purpose. Do not let your visitors have a reason to click on the "back" button! Give them the value of your site up front without the splash page.
2) Do not use excessive banner advertisements
Even the least net savvy people have trained themselves to
ignore banner advertisements so you will be wasting valuable Website real estate. Instead, provide more valuable content and weave relevant affiliate links into your content, and let your visitors feel that they want to buy instead of being pushed to buy.
3) Have a simple and clear navigation
You have to provide a simple and very straightforward
navigation menu so that even a young child will know how
to use it. Stay away from complicated Flash based menus
or multi-tiered dropdown menus. If your visitors don't
know how to navigate, they will leave your site.
4) Have a clear indication of where the user is
When visitors are deeply engrossed in browsing your site, you will want to make sure they know which part of the site they are in at that moment. That way, they will be able to browse relevant information or navigate to any section of the site easily. Don't confuse your visitors because confusion means "I'm outta here"!
5) Avoid using audio on your site
If your visitor is going to stay a long time at your site,
reading your content, you will want to make sure they're not annoyed by some audio looping on and on on your website. If you insist on adding audio, make sure they have some control over it -- volume or muting controls would work fine.
If you analyze every aspect of your Website Design and ask the question - 'does this contribute to my ultimate objective?' - you're Website should evolve into a significant contributor for your Internet Marketing efforts.
To a great degree all Internet marketing strategies - article
marketing, blogging, search engine optimization and email
marketing, depend on the quality of your Website design to
close the sale.
As you design and continually refine your Website, maintain
constant focus on what you are trying to accomplish, what
message you are trying to communicate. All the principles
in the world are worthless without vigilance to your ultimate
objective.
Here are five fundamental rules of thumb to observe to make sure your Website performs well.
1) Do not use splash pages
Splash pages are the first pages you see when you arrive at a website. They normally have a very beautiful image with words like "welcome" or "click here to enter". In fact, they are just that -- pretty vases with no real purpose. Do not let your visitors have a reason to click on the "back" button! Give them the value of your site up front without the splash page.
2) Do not use excessive banner advertisements
Even the least net savvy people have trained themselves to
ignore banner advertisements so you will be wasting valuable Website real estate. Instead, provide more valuable content and weave relevant affiliate links into your content, and let your visitors feel that they want to buy instead of being pushed to buy.
3) Have a simple and clear navigation
You have to provide a simple and very straightforward
navigation menu so that even a young child will know how
to use it. Stay away from complicated Flash based menus
or multi-tiered dropdown menus. If your visitors don't
know how to navigate, they will leave your site.
4) Have a clear indication of where the user is
When visitors are deeply engrossed in browsing your site, you will want to make sure they know which part of the site they are in at that moment. That way, they will be able to browse relevant information or navigate to any section of the site easily. Don't confuse your visitors because confusion means "I'm outta here"!
5) Avoid using audio on your site
If your visitor is going to stay a long time at your site,
reading your content, you will want to make sure they're not annoyed by some audio looping on and on on your website. If you insist on adding audio, make sure they have some control over it -- volume or muting controls would work fine.
If you analyze every aspect of your Website Design and ask the question - 'does this contribute to my ultimate objective?' - you're Website should evolve into a significant contributor for your Internet Marketing efforts.
Spam Blogs
Spam blogs, sometimes referred to by the neologism splogs, are artificially created weblog sites which the author uses to promote affiliated websites or to increase the search engine rankings of associated sites.
The purpose of a splog can be to increase the PageRank or backlink portfolio of affiliate websites, to artificially inflate paid ad impressions from visitors, and/or use the blog as a link outlet to get new sites indexed. Spam blogs are usually a type of scraper site, where content is often either Inauthentic Text or merely stolen from other websites.
These blogs usually contain an high number of links to sites associated with the splog creator which are often disreputable or otherwise useless websites.
There is frequent confusion between the terms "splog" and "spam in blogs". Splogs are blogs where the articles are fake, and are only created for search engine spamming.
To spam in blogs, conversely, is to include random comments on the blogs of innocent bystanders, in which spammers take advantage of a site's ability to allow visitors to post comments that may include links.
This is used often in conjunction with other spamming techniques including Sping.
The purpose of a splog can be to increase the PageRank or backlink portfolio of affiliate websites, to artificially inflate paid ad impressions from visitors, and/or use the blog as a link outlet to get new sites indexed. Spam blogs are usually a type of scraper site, where content is often either Inauthentic Text or merely stolen from other websites.
These blogs usually contain an high number of links to sites associated with the splog creator which are often disreputable or otherwise useless websites.
There is frequent confusion between the terms "splog" and "spam in blogs". Splogs are blogs where the articles are fake, and are only created for search engine spamming.
To spam in blogs, conversely, is to include random comments on the blogs of innocent bystanders, in which spammers take advantage of a site's ability to allow visitors to post comments that may include links.
This is used often in conjunction with other spamming techniques including Sping.
Link Farm
On the World Wide Web, a link farm is any group of web pages that all hyperlink to every other page in the group.
Although some link farms can be created by hand, most are created through automated programs and services.
A link farm is a form of spamming the index of a search engine (sometimes called spamexing or spamdexing).
Other link exchange systems are designed to allow individual websites to selectively exchange links with other relevant websites and are not considered a form of spamdexing.
Although some link farms can be created by hand, most are created through automated programs and services.
A link farm is a form of spamming the index of a search engine (sometimes called spamexing or spamdexing).
Other link exchange systems are designed to allow individual websites to selectively exchange links with other relevant websites and are not considered a form of spamdexing.
How To Make Google Trustrank Trust You
How To Make Google Trustrank Trust You
A discussion of Google Trust Rank and a look at the things you can do to earn creditability in the eyes of Google TrustRank.
The Google TrustRank is just one big algorithm that relies on a number of secret factors when it comes to elevating your pages in the search engines. However most Internet gurus will tell you that there are certain things that you can do to greatly increase your chances of being put in a more honorable spot by the famous search engine.
First of all you might try registering your domain name for a long time. That shows Google how serious you are about getting into business. Register your name for ten years and see what happens. A website that’s registered for a long time is probably going to be given priority over one that is only registered for a year.
Secondly make sure you are working with an SSL certificate on your site. This also tells Google that you are a serious merchant that cares what happens to its customers and that intends to treat anyone who visits the site fairly. It also helps to list a real mailing address with the site as opposed to a Post Office Box. Too many scam artists use P. O. Boxes so Google may ignore your site if it sees that you don’t have a “real office.” Also be liberal with your contact information on the site. This gives you credibility with TrustRank.
Yet another tip for gaining credibility with TrustRank is to only link with sites that Google might consider reputable. These are known as authority sites. If you link to crap then Google might see your site as crap too. This would be a big mistake. You are better to have a few quality links instead of scads of less then respected links even though internet experts will often tell you that the more links that you have on your page will help boost your rankings in the search engine pages.
A discussion of Google Trust Rank and a look at the things you can do to earn creditability in the eyes of Google TrustRank.
The Google TrustRank is just one big algorithm that relies on a number of secret factors when it comes to elevating your pages in the search engines. However most Internet gurus will tell you that there are certain things that you can do to greatly increase your chances of being put in a more honorable spot by the famous search engine.
First of all you might try registering your domain name for a long time. That shows Google how serious you are about getting into business. Register your name for ten years and see what happens. A website that’s registered for a long time is probably going to be given priority over one that is only registered for a year.
Secondly make sure you are working with an SSL certificate on your site. This also tells Google that you are a serious merchant that cares what happens to its customers and that intends to treat anyone who visits the site fairly. It also helps to list a real mailing address with the site as opposed to a Post Office Box. Too many scam artists use P. O. Boxes so Google may ignore your site if it sees that you don’t have a “real office.” Also be liberal with your contact information on the site. This gives you credibility with TrustRank.
Yet another tip for gaining credibility with TrustRank is to only link with sites that Google might consider reputable. These are known as authority sites. If you link to crap then Google might see your site as crap too. This would be a big mistake. You are better to have a few quality links instead of scads of less then respected links even though internet experts will often tell you that the more links that you have on your page will help boost your rankings in the search engine pages.
How Digg Can Be Used For SEO
How Digg Can Be Used For SEO
An examination of the social network called Digg and how it can be used as part of a successful search engine strategy.
One of the newest places to submit articles that you have written is Digg. This is a huge social network whose readers actually despise anything that looks like marketing. You probably won’t last two minutes on this site, which has a “burial” feature that kicks overt displays of advertising right off the sight. However if you are very clever about the way you position yourself on Digg you can use it as a marketing tool to bring more visitors to your site and that may mean potential link partners and advertisers. If you are successful at posting writing on Digg then you will likely experience a ton of traffic being brought to your site.
Digg is all about user powered content. Everything is submitted and voted on by the digg community. After you submit content, other people read your submission and Digg what they like best. If your story is popular and receives enough Digg vote, it is promoted to the front page for the millions of visitors to see. So how can you turn this into an SEO tool?
The first challenge is to get people to give a Digg vote to your posting. This means having an article on the top page or linking to someone who has a story on the top page. However even after you manage that you need to have a fantastic title and summary or the savvy, marketing hating readers on Digg may not even glance at any URL that is attached.
The main way that Digg can be part of a good SEO strategy is in driving a lot of traffic to your site quickly by getting in the top ten read articles on the first page of the site. This creates the kind of buzz and credibility for your site that just cannot be bought using keyword articles only.
An examination of the social network called Digg and how it can be used as part of a successful search engine strategy.
One of the newest places to submit articles that you have written is Digg. This is a huge social network whose readers actually despise anything that looks like marketing. You probably won’t last two minutes on this site, which has a “burial” feature that kicks overt displays of advertising right off the sight. However if you are very clever about the way you position yourself on Digg you can use it as a marketing tool to bring more visitors to your site and that may mean potential link partners and advertisers. If you are successful at posting writing on Digg then you will likely experience a ton of traffic being brought to your site.
Digg is all about user powered content. Everything is submitted and voted on by the digg community. After you submit content, other people read your submission and Digg what they like best. If your story is popular and receives enough Digg vote, it is promoted to the front page for the millions of visitors to see. So how can you turn this into an SEO tool?
The first challenge is to get people to give a Digg vote to your posting. This means having an article on the top page or linking to someone who has a story on the top page. However even after you manage that you need to have a fantastic title and summary or the savvy, marketing hating readers on Digg may not even glance at any URL that is attached.
The main way that Digg can be part of a good SEO strategy is in driving a lot of traffic to your site quickly by getting in the top ten read articles on the first page of the site. This creates the kind of buzz and credibility for your site that just cannot be bought using keyword articles only.
Thursday, March 8, 2007
Search Engine Optimization of the Future
Search Engine Optimization of the Future
If you've been involved in SEO (search engine optimization) for a while, you may remember the time when you could create a web page and get it ranked at the top of any search engine with little effort.
All you had to do was load up the page with the keywords you wanted to rank high for, make sure your meta tags were stuffed with those same keywords, submit the page and within a few days or weeks you've captured a top 20 or even top 10 result.
The major search engines were pretty easy to figure out. Some focused on the first 90 characters on a page, others gave more weight to the title tag in your HTML, another paid more attention to the overall content and finally some used a combination of factors to determine a page's rank.
If you were a search engine expert, you knew what each search engine looked for and it was pretty easy to optimize your site for a top 10 rank.
Back then, you didn't get penalized much for keyword stuffing, hidden text, and some of the other tactics that can get you into trouble in today's world.
The bottom line is search engine optimization for the average webmaster was almost like a cakewalk years ago.
That was then. This is now.
Times have certainly changed! Those same methods described above will not only hurt your rank, they can even get your banned from the engine permanently.
There are no shortcuts to search engine success anymore. You have to work it. All those lazy webmasters who steal other people's content or use the tricks mentioned above are now discovering that the search engines mean business.
Confidential Google Report Disclosed
A Google employee recently broke a non-disclosure agreement and revealed a report that shouldn't have gotten out to the public. Actually the information wasn't surprising by any means.
In a nutshell, all we learned is that Google is cracking down on spam and sites that offer little content - a.k.a. "thin affiliates".
A thin affiliate is one that offers very little information and the main purpose of their site is to send visitors to the affiliated merchant's site in order to collect a commission.
Often times these sites have more external links than they do actual content. They also may contain several doorway pages (more on those later) that do nothing but link to the merchant's website.
The report even revealed examples of live sites that Google considers "suspect." Trust me...this is NOT a place you'd want to see your site appear. You can bet these sites won't be getting much traffic from Google anytime soon.
This report seemed to indicate that Google has hired humans to evaluate the accuracy of Google's search results. Can you blame them?
Google has always said their main focus is to provide relevant results. The main reason the engine has been so successful is because it gives searchers what they want.
If you've noticed, you don't see lots of ads, banners and other distracting revenue-sucking techniques on their pages. They want their customer, Joe Surfer, to find what he is looking for.
They don't want their index to be turned into a hodge-podge of doorway pages made by those thin affiliates. They want unique quality content that offers valuable information to their customer - the web surfer.
Search engine spiders are not humans. They are programs. They can only do so much when it comes to weeding out the good and bad sites. It only makes sense to me that Google would help protect its reputation by hiring real people to ensure their results are as clean as possible.
Without going into detail over the report (I wouldn't want Google to penalize me!), I've just outlined a few of the topics that were touched upon. You probably won't be shocked by what you read.
In fact, none of this may be new to you. But if you are performing any of these techniques, stop now!
SEO Techniques to Avoid
Useless Link Exchanges
It used to be you could go scout out other websites that were related to yours and swap links to help boost your link popularity. These days the search engines are frowning on certain link exchange strategies.
The best kind of link exchange is one that offers a contextual link to both parties. So instead of creating a "page-o-links" that no one will even read, offer your potential link partner a contextual link in an article that is related to their site. Ask your partner to do the same for you. The search engines will see this link as a much better quality link than a link from a page chuck-full of other sites.
Let's say you have a website on dieting. Instead of creating a "list-o-links" page titled "Other Diet Resources" where you list 300 different partner links, write some diet-related articles and recommend a few of your link partner's sites within the context of the article.
I'm not saying avoid link directories altogether. There are some good ones like Yahoo, JoeAnt and The Open Directory to name a few. None of these directories require a link back to them and they all have a pretty high PageRank.
Doorway Pages
Doorway pages are small, keyword focused pages that mainly serve the purpose of getting the visitor to your affiliated web site. They usually offer no value to the website as a whole, and often times they are cluttered with several different affiliate links.
Google is smart and can scope those kinds of pages out. You may be penalized if it finds these on your site.
Hidden or Tiny Text
This is an OLD tactic and it amazes me people still use this.
Using white text on a white background or making your text so small it is hardly visible to the human eye is one of the oldest search engine tricks in the book.
Many people would use this technique to hide tons of keyword phrases they wanted to rank high for by hiding the text at the very bottom or top of the page and make it match the background color so they are invisible. Others would use a tiny font to add these keywords in various places all over the site. The human eye may have a difficult time finding them but the search engine spiders would.
So as you can see, the above info is not shocking by any stretch of the imagination. Those are all very bad optimization practices and will never work for the long run. You may get lucky here and there but the engines will eventually find you and penalize you for it.
Too Much Duplicate Content
It's OK to use some of the article directories (ArticleCity.com or EzineArticles.com) and reprint some of their content. That's what they're there for and they are useful if you want to add information on a topic you may not be well versed in.
However, if 90% of your site is from these sites or if you are illegally using copyrighted material without a webmaster's permission then you deserve any penalty that Google gives you.
Google loves relevant, unique content. After all, it's what drives their success. They don't want the same articles showing up in the results so they pay close attention to duplicates.
If you don't like to write, try hiring a copyrighter to do the writing for you. Trust me, it will be worth it in the long run.
What You Should Be Focusing On...
Unique content rules. Don't get stressed out about your meta tags, link lists, number of backlinks (sites that link to you), etc.
If you want the search engines to love you, build a website with lots of unique content, get a couple of high-quality sites to link back to you (Yahoo, The Open Directory, etc.) and develop a good link exchange program (described above).
That's it! Keep building content and make your site as useful as possible. Pretty soon people will link to you voluntarily and your link popularity will begin to increase.
Write for humans, not the search engine spiders. Forget about keyword density (the ratio of a keyword phrase to total body content), just write for real people. After all, Google is starting to use humans to review sites anyway!
Bottom line: Don't take shortcuts. Be ethical and work hard to build the best site you can. You'll be rewarded in the end.
"Make Your Links Work"
If you've been involved in SEO (search engine optimization) for a while, you may remember the time when you could create a web page and get it ranked at the top of any search engine with little effort.
All you had to do was load up the page with the keywords you wanted to rank high for, make sure your meta tags were stuffed with those same keywords, submit the page and within a few days or weeks you've captured a top 20 or even top 10 result.
The major search engines were pretty easy to figure out. Some focused on the first 90 characters on a page, others gave more weight to the title tag in your HTML, another paid more attention to the overall content and finally some used a combination of factors to determine a page's rank.
If you were a search engine expert, you knew what each search engine looked for and it was pretty easy to optimize your site for a top 10 rank.
Back then, you didn't get penalized much for keyword stuffing, hidden text, and some of the other tactics that can get you into trouble in today's world.
The bottom line is search engine optimization for the average webmaster was almost like a cakewalk years ago.
That was then. This is now.
Times have certainly changed! Those same methods described above will not only hurt your rank, they can even get your banned from the engine permanently.
There are no shortcuts to search engine success anymore. You have to work it. All those lazy webmasters who steal other people's content or use the tricks mentioned above are now discovering that the search engines mean business.
Confidential Google Report Disclosed
A Google employee recently broke a non-disclosure agreement and revealed a report that shouldn't have gotten out to the public. Actually the information wasn't surprising by any means.
In a nutshell, all we learned is that Google is cracking down on spam and sites that offer little content - a.k.a. "thin affiliates".
A thin affiliate is one that offers very little information and the main purpose of their site is to send visitors to the affiliated merchant's site in order to collect a commission.
Often times these sites have more external links than they do actual content. They also may contain several doorway pages (more on those later) that do nothing but link to the merchant's website.
The report even revealed examples of live sites that Google considers "suspect." Trust me...this is NOT a place you'd want to see your site appear. You can bet these sites won't be getting much traffic from Google anytime soon.
This report seemed to indicate that Google has hired humans to evaluate the accuracy of Google's search results. Can you blame them?
Google has always said their main focus is to provide relevant results. The main reason the engine has been so successful is because it gives searchers what they want.
If you've noticed, you don't see lots of ads, banners and other distracting revenue-sucking techniques on their pages. They want their customer, Joe Surfer, to find what he is looking for.
They don't want their index to be turned into a hodge-podge of doorway pages made by those thin affiliates. They want unique quality content that offers valuable information to their customer - the web surfer.
Search engine spiders are not humans. They are programs. They can only do so much when it comes to weeding out the good and bad sites. It only makes sense to me that Google would help protect its reputation by hiring real people to ensure their results are as clean as possible.
Without going into detail over the report (I wouldn't want Google to penalize me!), I've just outlined a few of the topics that were touched upon. You probably won't be shocked by what you read.
In fact, none of this may be new to you. But if you are performing any of these techniques, stop now!
SEO Techniques to Avoid
Useless Link Exchanges
It used to be you could go scout out other websites that were related to yours and swap links to help boost your link popularity. These days the search engines are frowning on certain link exchange strategies.
The best kind of link exchange is one that offers a contextual link to both parties. So instead of creating a "page-o-links" that no one will even read, offer your potential link partner a contextual link in an article that is related to their site. Ask your partner to do the same for you. The search engines will see this link as a much better quality link than a link from a page chuck-full of other sites.
Let's say you have a website on dieting. Instead of creating a "list-o-links" page titled "Other Diet Resources" where you list 300 different partner links, write some diet-related articles and recommend a few of your link partner's sites within the context of the article.
I'm not saying avoid link directories altogether. There are some good ones like Yahoo, JoeAnt and The Open Directory to name a few. None of these directories require a link back to them and they all have a pretty high PageRank.
Doorway Pages
Doorway pages are small, keyword focused pages that mainly serve the purpose of getting the visitor to your affiliated web site. They usually offer no value to the website as a whole, and often times they are cluttered with several different affiliate links.
Google is smart and can scope those kinds of pages out. You may be penalized if it finds these on your site.
Hidden or Tiny Text
This is an OLD tactic and it amazes me people still use this.
Using white text on a white background or making your text so small it is hardly visible to the human eye is one of the oldest search engine tricks in the book.
Many people would use this technique to hide tons of keyword phrases they wanted to rank high for by hiding the text at the very bottom or top of the page and make it match the background color so they are invisible. Others would use a tiny font to add these keywords in various places all over the site. The human eye may have a difficult time finding them but the search engine spiders would.
So as you can see, the above info is not shocking by any stretch of the imagination. Those are all very bad optimization practices and will never work for the long run. You may get lucky here and there but the engines will eventually find you and penalize you for it.
Too Much Duplicate Content
It's OK to use some of the article directories (ArticleCity.com or EzineArticles.com) and reprint some of their content. That's what they're there for and they are useful if you want to add information on a topic you may not be well versed in.
However, if 90% of your site is from these sites or if you are illegally using copyrighted material without a webmaster's permission then you deserve any penalty that Google gives you.
Google loves relevant, unique content. After all, it's what drives their success. They don't want the same articles showing up in the results so they pay close attention to duplicates.
If you don't like to write, try hiring a copyrighter to do the writing for you. Trust me, it will be worth it in the long run.
What You Should Be Focusing On...
Unique content rules. Don't get stressed out about your meta tags, link lists, number of backlinks (sites that link to you), etc.
If you want the search engines to love you, build a website with lots of unique content, get a couple of high-quality sites to link back to you (Yahoo, The Open Directory, etc.) and develop a good link exchange program (described above).
That's it! Keep building content and make your site as useful as possible. Pretty soon people will link to you voluntarily and your link popularity will begin to increase.
Write for humans, not the search engine spiders. Forget about keyword density (the ratio of a keyword phrase to total body content), just write for real people. After all, Google is starting to use humans to review sites anyway!
Bottom line: Don't take shortcuts. Be ethical and work hard to build the best site you can. You'll be rewarded in the end.
"Make Your Links Work"
Simple and Practical SEO Strategy
Simple and Practical SEO Strategy was written by Suresh Babu and writes "Like to get your website to rank well in search engines? By following some simple guidelines and Search Engine Optimization, SEO you can have your site easily included in Search Engine Page Results. For those
1. Check your HTML tags. Allow robots to follow your site to get a snapshot of your website
2. Avoid building a website with all flash
3. Have Text links for your navigation bar
4. Give a unique Title for each page. Include keyword in the Title
5. Have specific description for each pages, include keywords in the description
6. Try to have a clear HTML version of your home page
7. Have at least 250 words in your home page, include keywords, don’t overload your keywords
8. If using image, have alternative tags to images
9. Submit your website to directories
10. Write articles about your expertise
11. Keep your content fresh
12. Participate in forum, groups and discussions. Have a link to your website
13. Link to related sites
14. Get quality links referring to your site
15. Follow guidelines provided by major search engines
16. RSS feed plays a major role in tagging your site.
17. Tag your site.
18. Refer your site to your friends
19. Remind visitors to book mark your website
20. Include your URL in your email signatures
1. Check your HTML tags. Allow robots to follow your site to get a snapshot of your website
2. Avoid building a website with all flash
3. Have Text links for your navigation bar
4. Give a unique Title for each page. Include keyword in the Title
5. Have specific description for each pages, include keywords in the description
6. Try to have a clear HTML version of your home page
7. Have at least 250 words in your home page, include keywords, don’t overload your keywords
8. If using image, have alternative tags to images
9. Submit your website to directories
10. Write articles about your expertise
11. Keep your content fresh
12. Participate in forum, groups and discussions. Have a link to your website
13. Link to related sites
14. Get quality links referring to your site
15. Follow guidelines provided by major search engines
16. RSS feed plays a major role in tagging your site.
17. Tag your site.
18. Refer your site to your friends
19. Remind visitors to book mark your website
20. Include your URL in your email signatures
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