How Does Google Feel About SEO Services?

It is important to know that Google actually endorses SEO related services when they are done correctly. On Google’s webmaster central they have a series of bullet points that should be a concern for every person or business of acquiring some sort of search engine optimization services for their business. They cover some of the [...]

It is important to know that Google actually endorses SEO related services when they are done correctly. On Google’s webmaster central they have a series of bullet points that should be a concern for every person or business of acquiring some sort of search engine optimization services for their business. They cover some of the most important points I have been stressing for many years.

“No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google.
Beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings, allege a “special relationship” with Google, or advertise a “priority submit” to Google. There is no priority submit for Google. In fact, the only way to submit a site to Google directly is through our Add URL page or by submitting a Sitemap and you can do this yourself at no cost whatsoever.”

Right from the mouth of Google! If you speak with an SEO company that is guaranteeing search engine rankings I would walk in the opposite direction because nobody can guarantee any sort of rankings when it comes to search.

Be careful if a company is secretive or won’t clearly explain what they intend to do.
Ask for explanations if something is unclear. If an SEO creates deceptive or misleading content on your behalf, such as doorway pages or “throwaway” domains, your site could be removed entirely from Google’s index. Ultimately, you are responsible for the actions of any companies you hire, so it’s best to be sure you know exactly how they intend to “help” you. If an SEO has FTP access to your server, they should be willing to explain all the changes they are making to your site.”

There are no secrets with SEO. It is simply the process of marketing your business and in return you generate great search rankings over time as your efforts age to help build visitors to your website. You have to develop trust in the search engines and prove you are a legitimate brand and business and over time you will be rewarded with improved search engine rankings. Don’t believe anyone that claims they have the “secrets” to SEO because it doesn’t work that way. When Google comes out and tells you that it is a very distasteful approach to take you need to listen and adhere to their warnings so that you don’t get burned by any SEO firms.

http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com

Will the SEO Bubble Burst?

Being in the in the SEO industry for quite a while I have seen the industry speed up and grow extremely fast over the last five years and absolutely explode over just the last few years. Recently some are starting to understand that SEO is really a marketing approach and not a science project geared [...]

Being in the in the SEO industry for quite a while I have seen the industry speed up and grow extremely fast over the last five years and absolutely explode over just the last few years. Recently some are starting to understand that SEO is really a marketing approach and not a science project geared towards just achieving search engine rankings. It is good that some businesses are starting to realize that this is the right approach that everyone should be taking and shifting their focus, but many are still clueless, dumping hundreds of articles and press releases per month, taking spammy approaches just to fill in the search engine results. What happens to all those companies that have been taking a science project approach and only worrying about rankings when Google and Bing drop the hammer on the SEO bubble? Will it ever happen? Who knows, people used to laugh when they heard the real estate industry would implode. Who’s laughing now?

The search engines are clearly changing and I still see businesses everyday taking this horrendous approach to their SEO simply to achieve rankings. Google has come out and has clearly stated that personalized search will be making much more of an impact in the near future. When someone is logged into their Google account personalized search has already started taking shape. You can even read more about how personalized search works directly on Google’s official webmaster blog. I think the problem is that most people have a hard time changing and the search engine marketing industry is very fast changing and fast moving industry that can quickly leave people behind if they don’t pay attention to what is going on around them. SEO companies pop up over night with inexperienced individuals make shotty promises and performing subpar search engine marketing techniques just adding to that bubble. As this continues that bubble keeps building and eventually sites like Google are going to drop the hammer on the whole search engine optimization industry. I can see the similarities between the SEO industry and the real estate industry clearly. The greed and the money symbols in some people’s eyes are inflating this industry leading it to it’s demise. The worst part about it is that many of us professionals are left with a tarnished image from all the bad apples. Too many businesses out there have already been burned leaving it very difficult for the ones that do it right to really get the credibility they deserve and to pass on their experience and industry knowledge to their Clients. I guess with every tool comes abuse it is just unfortunate to see it have gotten to this point.

Eventually this bubble is going to pop, where will you be when it happens? Will you have changed your ways and your techniques to cushion the blow? Or are you going to be scrambling around and trying to find out how to adapt at the 11th hour? It will be too late at that point. Like everything in life, what comes up must come down sooner or later and the search engines are getting ready for a much needed clean up. This clean up will happen sooner than later piercing through the bubble and showering the industry with some upset individuals and firms. The problem stems from a lack of knowledge and not enough outside the box thinking. Outside the box thinking like how to put together a nice solid link bait campaign and not figuring out how to control the search results with a not so news worthy press release. Google is dropping a very large algorithm change towards the middle of 2010 which I strongly believe could be the first stages of not only speeding up the efficiency but eliminating the trash that makes its way into search results.

This could very well be the very first attempt to shifting people’s focus away from just rankings and shifting it over to simply marketing their business online the right way. The search engine industry is just getting started but it is growing very very quickly. Unfortunately there needs to be a shift in focus and I think we are starting to see that now. Customers don’t become customers by bumping into one of your hundred articles that you released in one day. They become customers by trusting online brands over time.

http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com

SEO Blackhat Video from SES London

At SES London there was an interesting video about how current SEO people perceive the black hat SEO community. They asked 50 SEO’s how they felt about the black hat community and received many different responses. It was interesting to hear that some of them said they are innovative and push the edges of the [...]

At SES London there was an interesting video about how current SEO people perceive the black hat SEO community. They asked 50 SEO’s how they felt about the black hat community and received many different responses. It was interesting to hear that some of them said they are innovative and push the edges of the algorithms like it was a positive thing that they do. That is all great but what happens when rankings are not as important as they once where?

Check out the video below from SES London about black hat SEOs:

The overall consensus was that they hurt the industry more than they help it. I am all about innovation and finding new ways to communicate your business online, but building a business online requires more than search manipulation which is mostly what black SEO individuals usually target. They are techniques that often times push the technical boundaries not the marketing boundaries which are two vastly different areas to focus on. Search engine marketing in my opinion should be done with a focus on brand building and not a focus of rankings. Search engine rankings will happen naturally over time as you build your business and your links naturally over time. When you force rankings you force yourself to cut corners which over time could come back to bite you in the you know where! Anyway, that is my 2 cents on this topic :)

http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com

Search Marketing is More Than Search Results

Search engine marketing and optimization is not just for increasing search engine rankings. It is important to understand that once you believe in the power of SEO your mindset will begin to change and evolve into something much different. Eventually your thought process will move past just reaching search rankings and really building your business [...]

Search engine marketing and optimization is not just for increasing search engine rankings. It is important to understand that once you believe in the power of SEO your mindset will begin to change and evolve into something much different. Eventually your thought process will move past just reaching search rankings and really building your business online. SEO is about building your brand and your business online.

Here are some advanced topics to increase your online brand building efforts:

Niche Industry Forums – Forums where one of the oldest forms of internet communication and still hold a tremendous amount of marketing and SEO value. Since many forums are much older your URL will be sitting on a nicely aged domain which is a great benefit. Some forums are still very heavily trafficked and if you find threads that you can really answer and participate in the conversation you can deliver some really nicely targeted website traffic to your website.

Video Sharing Sites – I know many of us have video sitting on video sharing websites already but how many of you actually use the features of the video sharing websites? YouTube and Vimeo both have powerful networking capabilities. Both have the ability to make friend requests and both have the ability to become highly visible in search results. It will take some time to sift around through the data but try making your way through the field of contacts on YouTube and Vimeo and start connecting with your audience in a different light.

User Generated Content – If you have an established website that already receives a generous amount of traffic user generated content can bring you loads of great SEO benefits. Everything from guest blog writers to product reviews can really help you increase your content amount along with generating a great deal of new web traffic.

Business Blog – Every website can benefit from have a business blog integrated into the structure of the site. Even if it is only updated a few times a month it allows a website to grow in size and strength. Over time that size and strength will allow the website to be much more visible in the search engines.

Search engine optimization does not stop at just rankings any longer. Years ago that was the name of the game but now you must take an advanced approach to marketing yourself online. SEO has become a branding game now so marketing your website as a business is vital regardless of what you offer.

http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com

What Great Content Really Means

You’ve heard the entire search engine optimziation world repeatedly talk about how you need to create compelling or “great” visitor focused content. We all have heard many times that once you have great content then you will magically make you a lot of money or boost your search engine rankings like a magic carpet [...]

You’ve heard the entire search engine optimziation world repeatedly talk about how you need to create compelling or “great” visitor focused content. We all have heard many times that once you have great content then you will magically make you a lot of money or boost your search engine rankings like a magic carpet ride. :) Well, there may not be any magic involved, but you should always produce the best possible content for every page of your website. If you spend the time writing (or hiring a great content copywriter) content for every page of your website, generally speaking it can help your website achieve great results.

These results are not only from the search engines but having great content on your website helps in several key ways, including the following:

  • Great content helps deliver your message to the audiences of your website.
  • Great content (with excellent call to action) helps generate your conversion (leads, sales, etc).
  • Great content keeps people on your website as long as possible.
  • Great content keeps them coming back.
  • Oh yeah, great content can be naturally optimized to generate the right type of targeted visitors from the search engines to your site.

Keeping clients coming back does not necessarily mean to your website, but it does mean to your business. Once you’ve sold them you’ve just got to keep them and that means good customer service (that’s a different blog post). Keeping people on your site means closing the sale. But you have to keep them long enough to make your case (or sales pitch) by having great call to actions on your website.

Another question that I always get asked is, how much content do I need on each page of my website? The answer to that question as far as I am concerned is quality over quantity is the best policy. If it takes 200 words to accomplish your goals and deliver the message on a particular page then so be it. If it takes 100 words of great content to describe a product, then that works too. Be in tune with your audience and understand what is too much or too little content.

Great content is no magic trick. It’s just good copywriting. If you can’t do it yourself, hire someone who can!

http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com

Is This Smart Marketing For Pepsi?

WebProNews reports that Pepsi will not buy TV advertising during the Super Bowl, opting instead for social media. Is that a smart move?
I think you can argue both sides of this question.
On one hand, nearly half of all U.S. households will be tuned in on Super Bowl Sunday. On the other hand, using social media, [...]

WebProNews reports that Pepsi will not buy TV advertising during the Super Bowl, opting instead for social media. Is that a smart move?

I think you can argue both sides of this question.

On one hand, nearly half of all U.S. households will be tuned in on Super Bowl Sunday. On the other hand, using social media, Pepsi has the potential to reach a wider audience worldwide. While there will be a lot of eyeballs glued to the screen during the Super Bowl, most of that audience will be in the U.S. The rest of the world considers football a game played mostly with the feet, what we call “soccer”.

Still, how many people are watching is a moot point when you consider that Pepsi has a huge budget for the Super Bowl. I’m betting they can get a lot more social media mileage for the same money. And if their social media advertising goes viral – which it very well could considering the height and depth of the PR that will be surrounding it – Pepsi could come out a big winner.

Another pro for social media is the long-lasting effect. Super Bowl advertising is effective for a limited time. The ads run then they’re gone. If they happen to be good enough then they’ll be etched into the minds of watchers for a little while before forgotten.

By contrast, social media links stick around forever. Done right, a savvy social media campaign could also turn into a huge link building campaign, giving Pepsi a big boost in search engine rankings for their keywords.

What do you think? Is this a smart move for Pepsi?

http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com

Geo Targeting Techniques in Google for SEO

It has been observed by the SEO community over a number of years that search engine rankings in Google are influenced by a so-called geo-targeting aspect of the domain TLD and registrant s background location and its hosting location. In this article we ll look into those factors that affect Google s geo-targeting aspects so you can put them to work on your own web site….

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It has been observed by the SEO community over a number of years that search engine rankings in Google are influenced by a so-called geo-targeting aspect of the domain TLD and registrant s background location and its hosting location. In this article we ll look into those factors that affect Google s geo-targeting aspects so you can put them to work on your own web site....
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http://www.seochat.com

Your SEO Has No Control so Grab the Wheel!

When shopping around for a search engine optimization firm or SEO service provider it is important to realize that there are some things that will always be out of the control of any person regardless what they say to you over the phone. As marketers we have the knowledge of what search engines really like [...]

When shopping around for a search engine optimization firm or SEO service provider it is important to realize that there are some things that will always be out of the control of any person regardless what they say to you over the phone. As marketers we have the knowledge of what search engines really like to see but nobody has the power to changes things in the search results as they please.

Here are five things that no SEO person has control over regardless of what they might tell you:

1. Search Results: Any honest search engine marketing person will tell you right away that they don’t have any control of search results or even the search engines as a whole. You won’t know how many people I speak with that say that someone else told them they had a “special” relationship with Google and when they need a website to rank it does, not a chance. Run as far as you can from anyone that says this.

2. Visitors: SEO is not paid advertising. We cannot control how many people visit your website. Search engine optimization does not work this way nor can we put a number on this question. We can see how much search volume exists for certain keywords but that is about it. Nobody can guarantee how many visitors you will get to your website for performing search engine marketing efforts.

3. Sales: If your website conversion factors are not completely in place than nobody is going to buy anything. It is important to understand that you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink so if your product is flawed or your website structure is off than all the marketing in the world won’t get a person to pull out their credit card and make a purchase.

4. Search Engine Rankings: You cannot predict when your website is going to get the rankings you desire. You have to be realistic with your expectations as well. If you are trying to rank for a very highly competitive keyword phrases and you just launched your website it just not realistic to expect you will be on the first page of a search results in two months.

5. Success: You can’t expect to grow your entire company from just hiring an SEO company. If you are waiting for your entire business to grow just from your SEO that you just started you might want to rethink that approach. Search engine optimization works best when many different wheels are spinning trying to grow the business. Don’t put your eggs into one basket and just wait for the search engine optimization efforts alone to grow your business.

It all really comes down to understanding exactly the type of relationship that you are looking for with you service provider or if you have the ability and time to learn how to optimize and build your SEO efforts on your own. Either way the bottom line is be realistic and diversify your online and search marketing efforts!

http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com

The Most Essential SEO Data To Measure

If you are doing your own search engine optimization or even you have have hired an SEO firm, then you’ll want to make sure that you measure certain data to determine whether or not your SEO efforts are paying off. There are all sorts of data that you can measure, but I’ve narrowed down the [...]

If you are doing your own search engine optimization or even you have have hired an SEO firm, then you’ll want to make sure that you measure certain data to determine whether or not your SEO efforts are paying off. There are all sorts of data that you can measure, but I’ve narrowed down the list to the ones that absolutely are essential data sets for every business owner or marketer to measure.

  1. Sales, Leads aka Conversions – At the end of the day all of your online and offline marketing efforts come down to increasing and generating sales for your business. Often many times people tend to loose sight of this key aspect and how truly important it is. The only difference is that search engine optimization is a long term and on going. Have patience and measure your sales and conversion increase over time.
  2. Organic Website Visitors – Tied directly into increasing conversions, over time the key measurable area is how many visitors is your website receiving as a result of your SEO efforts. This means out of all of the keyword phrases that you targeted on your website how many organic (from the 3 major search engines) visitors is your website getting. A simple way to break down the return on investment for this is to add up your monthly SEO service fee or your time (if doing your SEO on your own) and divide the into the money spent. Along with sales this is a good way to gauge how well things are going. I often explain to my SEO clients that if you are spending $5 on average per click for your PPC advertising (although not directly apples to apples with SEO visitors) but if you organic visitors on average cost $.25 then things are looking pretty good!
  3. Keyword Rankings – By keyword rankings I mean the actual search engine rankings of each page on your site for each keyword that is important to that page. If you have a 10-page website and each page has a primary and a secondary keyword that it has been optimized for, that’s 20 keyword rankings you should concern yourself with. Over the past several years keyword positioning has started to diminish as a key goal (I am so glad!). With universal search, social search and the keyword rankings that fluctuate sometimes daily based on datacenter and visitor location, this is still an important measurement, but 3rd on my list.
  4. Indexed Web Pages – How many pages you have indexed at each search engine is important. If your website has 100 pages published and you have 90 pages indexed at Google, 94 pages indexed at Yahoo!, 52 at Bing, and 87 at Ask, you’ve got a red flag. That 52 pages at Bing needs to be looked at more critically. Why only 52? Why isn’t Bing indexing more pages? Keep an eye on this metric and make sure that your pages are getting indexed.
  5. Inbound Links – Finally, the number of relevant inbound links your site has, and each page has, point to it. Obviously, link building is important so make sure your links are getting counted by Google webmaster tools. Also, be sure to build your links the right ways, through highly relevant incoming links from many different sources, over time.

http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com

SEO Tutorial: Practical SEO Training Tips and Tactics

The conundrum about ranking for specific keywords using search engine optimization (SEO) to rank higher in search engines is based on a trinity of crucial metrics.
This SEO tutorial covers SEO tips and techniques that you can apply to your website(s) to develop more authority which in turn can produce the necessary ranking factors needed to [...]

The conundrum about ranking for specific keywords using search engine optimization (SEO) to rank higher in search engines is based on a trinity of crucial metrics.

SEO Tutorial on Developing Website Authority

SEO Tutorial for Developing Rankings and Authority

This SEO tutorial covers SEO tips and techniques that you can apply to your website(s) to develop more authority which in turn can produce the necessary ranking factors needed to produce targeted search engine rankings.

Those metrics or rather variables are (1) relevance (2) continuity and (3) popularity. What business owners, affiliates and marketers alike should understand is that (a) you can chase after rankings or (b) create them as a byproduct of website authority; the choice ultimately is up to you.

Time and Technique Distinguish You From Competitors

The main divisible distinction between your own website, the keywords it contains and the person ranking in the top 3 results for those respective keywords is time, relevance, page authority, domain authority and on page and off page popularity.

By addressing each on of those metrics, you can elevate your individual pages and / or your entire website asynchronously to achieve leaps and bounds over your competitors as a result of systematic optimization. This involves creating a hierarchy of relevance, enough topical content or links and allowing the results to acquire trust over time.

Overcoming Algorithmic Obstacles

The barrier to entry however is (1) the time it will take to build up enough content or links to be viewed as an authority on a topic or (2)  acquiring the right type of algorithmic signals necessary to transcend topical relevance and build a website capable of ranking for multiple topics, keywords and key phrases (such as Wikipedia) by default.

The common thread that runs through all authority sites is that they have relevant site architecture, impeccable internal linking and have all managed to acquire a sufficient degree of authoritative links and citation from other sites.

The authority process occurs through a method called peer review and / or acquiring enough links, mentions (citation) from other sources on the web, that their online footprint indelibly left a large enough mark to elevate the site to authority status.

As a result, any mention of a semantically related keyword query, based on the semantic cluster of related terms is considered a “relevant hit” when mentioned either sparsely on a page, in a meta title or description or in a link back to the site in question.

One of the lesser known facts about search engine optimization is; a website with a robust online presence (over 600 pages) has the ability to provide a type of algorithmic ranking credit, which can be spent on other consolidated areas of interest.

The Ultimate Search Engine Optimization Secret

For example, if a sub folder containing 25 articles on a topic all has a link to a specific / preferred landing page and each of those 25 pages/ articles managed to acquire an average of 15 links each with a variety of inbound anchor text to themselves.

This ensures that each page will pass along ranking factor to any of the other pages it links out to (even within the same website). This solidifies which keywords the target / preferred landing page can rank for.

When the same keywords are present in inbound links to a page (either from within a site or from other websites), the target page can rank for all of the collective variations (between the on page and off page SEO factors).

I have alluded to this fact in greater detail in a previous post SEO Rankings and How to Create Them as well as our paper on Theme Density. Both are great follow up papers to read in addition to this strategy.

This tactic, if approached deliberately implies that each of the pieces of the puzzle in a silo [ a range of semantically optimized pages] has the ability to (a) rank to some degree for a more competitive keyword or variation as well as (b) pass that collective ranking factor along allows you to through a manor of positioning acquire virtually any keyword.

For example, the top level keywords (TLK) should be segmented and built into the site architecture itself, to facilitate a natural progression of relevance over time.

The process of SEO from this level implies that the focus is (1) getting or creating authoritative links to the top level landing page and (2) getting enough deep links to the subordinate pages (while optimizing them to appear for exact match or less competitive keywords) to out position competitors an various levels simultaneously.

Post-Click Persuasion and Conversion

Ironically, driving traffic only represents 50%  of the equation, the missing ingredient is post-click persuasive copy, clear problem solution / benefit oriented value propositions or a structured / segmented call to action to facilitate the highest return on investment for your pages.

This tactic takes time to realize, but the unquestionable momentum generated from a website with hundreds or thousands of pages on either one topic or multiple topics is a force to be reckoned with in the SERPs (search engine result pages).

This process is like a ranking juggernaut which feeds itself every time you add more content on the topic. Through using a method called theming and siloing (creating landing pages or categories at the top level, then using subordinate articles and / or pages to reference the preferred landing page to topple competitive keywords) you can systematically devour a niche whole as a byproduct of content development.

All other, less competitive keywords can be acquired as a result of virtual theming (internal link and deep link structures) which are easy enough to implement, but require consistency over time.

Your Website Can Build Its Own Links

Instead of trying to “build links, did you know your own website can build it’s own? Quality is the crowning achievement of this tactic, if you write context worth sharing, others will promote it in a viral fashion.

For example, by using RSS feeds for really simple syndication you can position your content in a way that it is appealing for the masses to (a) search for (b) link to (c) reposition or re-purpose and propagate.

This means that you can use methods such as RSS feeds, social media or web 2.0 positioning to get enough quality links to your tiered pages (which then send that pagerank upwards to the top level pages closer to the root folder).

The tip for this tactic is to (1) use Google Trends (2) search for hot topics (3) conduct a few searches for the keyword is root form and then (4) look for additional keyword modifiers you can integrate into your titles or tags.

People often use bots for surfing the web to find hot topics or use search operators or tools to return an array of relevant results for created related news stories or aggregating similar topics on their own authority sites.

If you understand the relevant buzz words in any given industry and use relevant keyword usage in your titles, on page content or tags, changes are someone will latch on to your page or post and (a) either create a trackback or ping or directly link to your post.

These links add up and *the larger your website is, the less links it needs from others for results to (a) rise to the top (b) stay buoyant in search engines for related keywords for extended periods of time or (c) gain pagerank and start ranking from day one.You can always redirect those pages later or use them for internal linking to funnel additional SEO ranking factors to other pages more appropriate for conversion.

You just have to be tactful on creating compelling content, titles and tags to entice aggregators to add you to the mash up for critical keywords you are seeking conversion from in search engines. If you know which keyword triggers are hot, then links are built as if on auto-pilot as a result of your contribution to the topic.

Positioning Implies Optimizing Intersecting Keywords

Profit exists between the correlation of supply and demand, SEO is based on that fact. The trepidation about search engine positioning and creating relevant intersections for search engine rankings boils down to (a) using simplistic “exact match” keywords for content (b) relevant landing pages (with multiple keywords ) or (c) broad match / long-tail triggers to consolidate on page relevance.

Both can be leveraged for conversion through tactful positioning, affiliate marketing (sending the traffic where it can best convert) or sending the traffic to a page more fitting to convert on your own website.

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