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SEO Myths and Facts

SeoCenter — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 13:53:18 +0000

In the decade since the engine was first invented, the field of search engine optimization has evolved. Some old information and old wives’ tales “still exist, and these can damage your ranking.
Myths and outdated techniques fall into several broad categories:

- Keyword density: There are many number of magic formulas touted on the internet, claiming that if you reach the perfect number of keyword instances per page, your rankings will go up. While you do need to have the keyword somewhere in your text in order to have your stated keywords considered relevant, artificially inflating the number of instances is a bad plan. First, it simply decreases the quality of your content. Second, the search engines may begin classifying your site as too spammy, and actually downgrade your rating.

- Tags and META: Search engines used to use Meta-tags to rank sites – search engines now use 100’s of variables including title tags, content, freshness of content, keyphrase density and links. Meta-tags have little if any influence on rankings. Loading keywords into your page headers and the meta data of your site is also an old trick that’s now likely to get you classified as spammy. Only keywords that are relevant to your content and specific to what your users are searching for should be included.

- Links: Some fraudulent SEO services, and some outdated pieces of advice, will associate your website with link exchange systems and link farms. Since the search engines keep track of these farms and exchanges, and using them is considered trickery, being part of them can actually significantly downgrade your rating.

- Submission to search engines: Once upon a time, submitting your site to search engines was a long and arduous process, which was nonetheless necessary to get a good place in the rankings. These days, search engine submission is generally not needed at all, since the engines automatically search for new sites. If they don’t find yours quickly, manual submission is quite easy and there are a few top search engines that have most of the market share.

- Analytics is Free: Yes Google Analytics is free, but setting up an account, implementing the code correctly, building filters and profiles, creating custom reports, providing support, and more takes time and more importantly expertise. If you want to ensure that the data you are reviewing is complete and a true representation of what is happening on your site you should be using a Certified Google Analytics Consultant. In addition once you have the data, what does it mean and what should you do with it, are questions that are better answered by seasoned Internet Marketers.

Conversely, there are a few relevant and current strategies for climbing the ranks of search results. (It should come as no surprise that these are broader and more difficult or time-consuming to implement than the myths would suggest.)

- Unique content: Consistently offering high quality content that is valuable to your users, unique on the web, and from original sources is by far the best way to attract users – and search engines – to your site. If your site consists of copy, providing a unique value in information filtering, commentary and analysis, or other user-friendly services.

- Website-designers should know how to rank websites: Website-designers know how to create aesthetically pleasing websites – they want the website to look good. Many designers do not have the time, expertise or interest to be knowledgeable about Internet marketing techniques. Internet marketers are concerned with driving traffic to sites and ROI – designers are concerned with creating attractive sites.

- Voice of authority: Along with unique content, offering an authoritative voice is a good way to increase your links and therefore your page ranking. Either become an authority yourself or offer interviews, quotes, or guest content by noted authorities in your field. If well-respected people and organizations recommend or reference your site, your popularity will rise.

- Professional networking for link sharing: As a web master, blogger, marketer, or business owner, professional contacts matter for a wide range of activities. Additionally, you may ask these people to link their sites with yours, or to provide expert and authoritative content for your site.

- Crawler files: As robots. list file is updated, accurate and properly configured to make your site more easily in the catalog correctly. Site Build architecture in a robot-friendly way to give your site a slight advantage, which could be worth pursuing.

Remember that search engine developers are connected with their customers and serving them relevant content. They are smart enough to outsmart the most technical tricks.

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SEO Simple Facts

SeoCenter — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 13:43:27 +0000

Unfortunately, there are many marketers who simply do not put enough effort into preparing their web site for the search engines. The following guidelines will help you to start seeing results in the search engines. Your first step is simply choosing the right keywords.

Choosing the Right Keywords

Often times, people make the mistake of optimizing for very general keywords like used cars or online marketing. Although these terms get lots of traffïc, it is very unlikely that you will be able to rank highly for them. Then, even if you do, this type of traffïc produces very low conversion rates because they are not targeted prospects. For example, if you are selling hiking backpacks, it would be much more beneficial for you to target the phrase ‘hiking backpacks’ rather than the extremely competitive keyword ‘backpacks’. It would be even better to target the phrase ‘camelbak commander’. This is a specific type of backpack and therefore will attract more buyers than searchers. In fact, according to Jupiter Media Metrix, 28 percent of searchers will type a product name into a search engine. Nine percent type in a brand name and 5 percent type in company names.

The more targeted your keyword phrase, the more likely they are to buy. A person who types in ‘backpacks’ may be looking for school backpacks or snowboard backpacks. This lends to useless, un-targeted traffïc.

However, a person that searches for a specific brand of backpacks knows exactly what they want and they are much further along in the buying process. Once you have determined the best possible keyword phrases to target, you must nöw optimize your page for those specific keywords.

Optimize Your Page for Targeted Keywords

There are many factors that will determine how your web pages rank. However, one of the most important ones is that of a good title. The title tag appears at the very top of the head section. The words in the title tag will appear in the clickable link on the search engine results page (SERP).

Your title tag should contain targeted keyword phrases that reflect the copy on the page. The most important keywords should appear near the beginning of the title tag, You must also keep in mind that this should be a compelling title that would attract searchers to want to know more.

Your title tag should focus on your primary keyword, but it should also deliver a message. Use your title to mention benefits, make an attention-grabbing statement, ask a compelling question, or anything else that would set you apart from all of the other pages competing against you. Your title should include the main keyword you are targeting on that page as well as entice visitors to clíck on your link.

Following the title tag are your Meta description and Meta keyword tags.

You have probably heard that meta tags are dead and for the most part that is true. However, you should still include them in your web site because they allow you to control the description of your listing in some of the search engines. Your meta description can make the difference in someone clicking on your link or choosing your competitor. The meta description tag should be used for marketing purposes, enticing people to clíck on your link as opposed to one of the other 9 search results.

Meta keywords tags are a different story. Google pays absolutely no attention to this tag: a result of spammers. As for the rest of the search engines, meta keywords may be taken into account, but they are still of very little importance. Use this tag for misspellings, technical acronyms and synonyms. Using this technique, you may be able to bring in some additional traffïc for people looking for related, but less popular keywords.

Creating Quality Content

Next, you will want to focus on the visible content of your page. Many people online today are creating content that is written specifically for the search engines. However, I would advise you to optimize your content for your readers. Your readers are the most important. To rank for your targeted keyword phrases, you must include them within your copy, but you must first ensure that your content is appealing to your visitors. After you do this, you can then weave your keywords into your copy.

You’ll especially want to have your targeted keyword phrase in the very first paragraph of your text. Some other places you will want to include your keywords are in the image alt attributes and within your heading tags. Place all of your subtitles into header tags with your targeted keyword phrases.

Internal Linking

Creating quality content for your visitors is crucial. However, proper navigation and site structure can be just as important. The search engines cannot fully index your site if it is not properly linked together. Every single page on your web site should be no more than 2 clicks away from the homepage. Before you create your site, decide on which internal pages are the most important in terms of ranking. Once you have gathered 15-20 of your most important pages, you will need to place them at the side and bottom navigation of each one of your web pages. This will ensure that the most possible pagerank is transferred to those pages.

Each of these links should contain descriptive anchor text, preferably targeted keyword phrases that you are wanting to rank highly for. You should nevër make your web site visitors guess what’s on the other end with a link that says, ‘clíck here’. Be as descriptive as possible and your visitors will thank-you.

One of the best ways to structure your site is through the use of hub pages. This is very similar to hubs on a spoke. At the center is your homepage. On the homepage, you have a link to each of the hub pages. The hub pages are basically small site maps that are built into the navigation. Each hub includes a set of information on a particular keyword or phrase. This is often referred to as content layering. You can layer your site through the use of sub-folders.

Inbound Links

Once you have finished optimizing all of the on-page factors, you must focus on some crucial off-page factors. To have a truly successful search engine optimization campaign, you have to go beyond on-page factors. Your overall link popularity is a crucial ranking factor. Some of the best techniques for getting quality in-bound links are syndicating articles, exchanging RSS feeds, submitting your web site to directories, syndicating your podcast, sending out press releases, and simply having a link-worthy site. When you have a site that is full of wonderful, useful information, other sites will start naturally linking to you. You have probably heard that content is king on the internet. However, this is simply not true. QUALITY content is the true king.

In review, keep in mind that the most important places to use your researched keyword phrases are in your title tags, the visible body of your text, and in onsite and offsite links. Successful SEO takes time. If you continually put all of these strategies into action, you will begin to see the benefits in due time.

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