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Completing Optimization: Other Considerations

Redirects
If you need to use redirects on your site it is very important to use the correct one. If a page is moving to a new location, or being removed all together, it is very important to have this page redirected to either the new location or the next closest page using a Permanent 301 Redirect.

While rare, if a page is being moved to a new location for a short term, with the intent of it returning to the original location, then and only then, will you want to use a Temporary 302 redirect.

Non WWW Redirects
To help eliminate page rank split, and provide your site with a little extra value, implement a non-www redirect. What this redirect will do is change the URL to include the “www” whenever a URL is accessed that does not include it. This can help to consolidate links to the correct page and give your site some additional strength.

HTTP Headers
Check your page headers! If you have implemented any form of redirect on your site including mod rewrites, check your HTTP headers. You may be surprised at what you find. Some forms of redirects may use a 302 code where you really want a 301. By checking your headers you can ensure all is well, and troubleshoot problems. On our website we have added our own HTTP Header Checker for your convenience.

Home Page URL
Never have more than one URL for your home page. If your home page is available and displays on more than one URL, then utilize 301 redirects on all but the main URL you want to focus on – in most cases “http://www.xyzname.com/”. All your links pointing to the home page should direct to the exact same URL otherwise you will split the value of your home page into multiple duplicate URL’s.

Google sees “http://www.xyzname.com” and “http://www.xyzname.com/index.shtml” as different pages, but displaying the same content. This splits the overall value of your home page, and can decrease the chances of rankings. By keeping it consistent with a single URL, you remove this split and retain more of the strength.

In theory having your home page split like this could bring with it duplicate content penalties, however, I have yet to see this actually happen – that said, it is best to avoid the risk all together.

XML Sitemap
XML Sitemaps are great for ensuring that Google and the other engines are able to spider your entire site. While an XML sitemap will not directly impact your search rankings it can help as Google is more likely to see any SEO based changes more quickly, which in turn can have an impact.

Robots.txt
This is the first file all search engines look for every time they visit your site. While placing a blank robots.txt file in your root folder will not help with search rankings, it will help reduce 404 errors appearing in your log files.

It is also highly recommended that if your site utilizes an XML sitemap, to include a call to this sitemap within the Robots.txt file. Simply add the following line to ensure that the major engines (including Google) can find your sitemap:

Sitemap: http://www.xyzname.com/sitemap.xml

Potential Blockages
If you are finding that your site is simply not being indexed it is possible that you are blocking the spiders in one way or another.

Start with checking your main site navigation, if you are using Flash or some other fancy form of navigation that could be your problem right there. Next check your HTTP headers to ensure that your home page is returning a 2xx code which indicates that the clients’ request was successfully received. Finally take a look at your Google Webmaster Tools for any noted errors. If you are blocking Google, chances are you will be able to uncover the issue with these steps.

Duplicate Content
Duplicate content can be quite damaging to your rankings. Ensure that all content on your site is unique. Never steal or “borrow” content from another site, and never cut and paste large portions of text from one page of your site to the next. By keeping all pages of your site entirely original you stand the best chances of getting a thumps up from Google.

Fresh Content / Regular Updates
Update your content. In highly competitive markets, sites with old static content can often slip away. Keep your content fresh and updated to keep bringing Google back to your site. If they find new pages and updated pages with every visit, they will come back more often.

Site Age
The age of your site can also have an effect on search engine rankings. While there is little you can do (short of keeping the same domain) to help on this matter, remember that the longer your site is online, the better its chances for success. It pays to select the perfect domain right from the start and not to change domains mid-stream. Older sites that stand the test of time add a level of authority in Google’s eyes. New sites seldom see rankings for competitive terms in their first year.

Note: Site Age is determined not by the date the domain was originally registered by rather by the date Google first discovered content on your site.

Load Time
Load time can have an impact in your Google AdWords Quality Score but it is unknown for sure if it can also impact your organic search rankings. It is best to keep you load time to as little as possible. If it is not already a part of the Google Algorithm, it likely will be soon. Besides, it is also best in order to give your site visitors the best experience possible.

Server Up Time
This can be a rather significant issue. If you find that your web hosting company has a history of down time, change hosts. If Google comes to visit your site once and it is down, not to worry, they will come back, but if Google visits your site often only to find that it is unavailable, you can find yourself with drastically depleted rankings.

Google Local
If you have a traditional brick and mortar store, consider submitting to Google Local. While this will not directly impact your regular organic rankings, you may find your site ranking above the organic results with a “local business results” map listing. This tends to be most common when your business is near the geographic center of a city, and when the search phrase uses a geographic modifier.

W3C Compliant Code
There is much speculation as to if W3C compliant code can have a positive impact on search rankings, and the majority believe “maybe” with some saying “yes”. Regardless, it is definitely a good idea to have your site be W3C Compliant if at all possible. Not only may it help you in terms of search rankings, but having compliant code can decrease load times, and help to ensure cross-browser compatibility, all of which are good things. If at all possible, it is recommended that sites be made to be compliant.

Many experts who took part in the SEOMoz “Google Search Engine Ranking Factors” lean towards it not being a big contributor, however, it may be an issue if Google has difficulties indexing a page properly.

A code validation service is available at validator.w3.org.

DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME
I want to stress that this section is about things you should NOT do. These issues could be damaging to your rankings. If your site is implementing any of these, it may be best to remove it.

Hidden Text
This includes any text that you can simply not see when viewing the page. It may be text hidden in invisible div layers, text located below the fold with vertical scrolling disabled or even text on the same colored back ground (white text on a white background for instance). Whatever the case, hidden text can get your site into hot water and it is not recommended.

Excessive Keywords
Don’t go over board in placing target phrases within your body text. Stuffing keywords everywhere possible just because you can, is not only unlikely to help you achieve rankings, it could very well have the opposite effect.

Duplicate content
Large amounts of duplicated content or pages, as well as stealing or scraping content from other sites is one good way to get your site banned.

Doorway pages
Creating multiple websites or pages with nearly identical, yet slightly different content for the purposes of trying to grab some Google rankings is a good way to get your site into trouble.

If you have created pages of this nature for PPC campaigns, make sure that they are blocked from the search engines as to not get you into any hot water.

Cloaking
Simple – Don’t Cloak. In a nutshell cloaking is when you display different information to the search engines than you do to your human visitors. Google frowns on this, and if they catch you, watch out!

All Flash
Websites that are entirely flash based will not get you into trouble. The reason I have included it here however, is that they won’t do you many favors either. Sites that are all Flash, have little to no content for Google to digest and thus, drastically reduce your chance of rankings. If you must keep your “All Flash” site, it is recommended that you also create a secondary HTML version for the search engines and for those visitors who simply prefer it.

Frames (including iFrames)
Frames are also one of those things that won’t get you into trouble, but do significantly reduce your chances of rankings. If you want any chance of ranking in Google using a Frames site, be sure to copy your relevant content from each page into your ‘noframes’ tag. While this is far from ideal it may help you salvage some listings.

When it comes to including content through the use of an iFrame, remember, Google can not see any of this content located within the frame. It will be of no use to your rankings. If you rely on this content to help your listings, find another method such as a server side include.

TOOLS
In this article I mention a few items which can be made much easier with the help of available online tools. Here are some to help you on your way:

HTTP Header Checker
The StepForth HTTP Header Checker

Spider Simulators
XML Sitemaps, Search Engine Bot Simulator

Page Size and Load Time
1-Hit Load Time Analyzer

Google’s Cached Text Version
Click on “cached” next to your listing in Google, then click “Cached Text Version” at the top of the page. This is Google’s Cached Text version of your page. Substituting www.domain.com with your website will also bring up the cached version:

http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:WWW.DOMAIN.COM/&hl=en&strip=1

To see a larger selection of tools visit our SEO Tools page at the StepForth website.

SUMMARY
There are a lot of little pieces to getting a site to the top of the rankings in Google that I didn’t have time to mention here. In most cases not all items noted in this 3 part Google optimization series need to be in place to achieve top rankings, however, the more you can implement the better. Links, optimization, and content all play a significant role in Google rankings and the more competitive the term, the bigger the role they play.

If you have a site in a competitive market it is best to ensure that the site is entirely Google friendly and well optimized, while working on increasing links, and expanding on relevant content.

Patience is important and Google rankings are possible, but they do take time and effort. In nearly all cases it can take several months before you start to see significant results, although in cases where a site is just missing one or two pieces of the puzzle and those are put into place, rankings can come much quicker. If you have any questions about optimizing for Google try sending them to us here at StepForth and we will get to them as soon as our workload permits.

Scott Van Achte is the Senior SEO at StepForth Web Marketing Inc.; based in Victoria, BC, Canada and founded in 1997. You can read more of Scott’s articles and those of the veteran StepForth team at http://news.stepforth.com or contact us at http://www.stepforth.com

Post from: http://www.sitepronews.com/

LINKS
Links are very important in today’s Google rankings, but just how many links you need will depend on both the competitiveness of your target phrases, and the quality of the incoming links themselves.

Essentially the number one rule of links is to keep it relevant! Topical relevance is very important in order for inbound links to give your site the most value. If the page that links to you is relevant that is good, if the entire site linking to you is relevant, that is better.

First to get an idea of how many links you may need, take a look at the top 10 ranking sites in Google and record how many links Yahoo is noting for each site. (This is because Google does not display anywhere near all the links they have noted). The average of this count is often a good indication of how many links your site may need.

There are many different ways to get links to your site including the age old reciprocal link trade, directory links, article based links, and links from press releases.

Reciprocal Links
Reciprocal linking has seen its value drop considerably over the past few years, however, if the site you are trading with is relevant you can still receive value from these links.

Paid Links
Google frowns on paid links, however that is not to say that they don’t work. Often you can find highly reputable and relevant websites which are offering paid advertising spots. If these links are coded to link directly to your website without passing through any tracking redirects, you will in many cases see value in the form of both direct traffic and increased link densities and rankings.

Articles
Writing and distributing industry specific articles is a great way to help increase both your link counts and site traffic; for examples of such content see StepForth’s SEO Blog News articles. Consider writing articles on a regular basis and submitting them to some of the more popular services such as EzineArticles. Be sure to include a link to your site from somewhere within the article, or at the very lest within your bio. Try to use a target phrase as part of the anchor text for additional value.

Press Releases
If something of importance has happened to your company such as a new product launch, or other notable achievement – essentially anything news worthy, put out a press release. Submit this press release through services such as PRWeb or PRNewsWire. Again, be sure to include a target phrase as part of the anchor text.

There are also a number of places you can get links that have basically turned south, and are not generally recommended. These include signatures in form posts, guest books, and other typically free links.

Forum Posts
Forum posts can help to marginally increase your link counts; however, with this one you must be careful. Only add a link to your site in your signature if both the forum allows it, and you are a respected member of the forum. If you are a solid contributor and your posts have depth and meaning, and the forum is highly relevant to your site, then having a link in your signature may give your site some juice. Posting wildly to random forms will in most cases get yourself banned, and will be both a waste of time and potentially make you and your site look bad.

Guest Books
In nearly all cases, do not post your link to guest books. If you happen to stumble upon a guestbook that is highly relevant to your site, the other comments are relevant to your site, and you have something useful (and again relevant) to say, then perhaps consider it, but typically focusing on links from guest books is considered SPAM and is best avoided all together.

Blog Comments
Having a link from your blog comments is not necessarily a bad thing. If you find a relevant blog post of use, and have something relevant and constructive to say, don’t be afraid to enter your link into the “URL” field of the form, but don’t try stuffing links into the comment itself.

Link Farms & Bad Neighborhoods
These are sites that allow you to simply post your link no strings attached. They are mostly long scrolling pages with countless links. Stay away from them. If you see one, run in the other direction. These links are bad, will not help with your rankings, and in some cases can actually damage your rankings.

Stay away from sites that cross link with obvious spammers. These networks of SPAM sites are not ones you would want your site associated with, and if you achieve links from enough of these sites it can adversely impact your rankings. Even more important, NEVER link to any of these sites – as that will certainly tie in your connection to them and give Google reason to discount your rankings.

DMOZ, Yahoo and Other Directories
Directory based links can be of significant help, especially if they are from highly reputable directories, the two biggest being DMOZ.org and the Yahoo Directory.

Getting a site into DMOZ is like Gold. Google loves links from DMOZ and your site will reap the benefits. The big catch however is actually getting your site into the directory in the first place. Find the perfect category for your site and check to see if it has an editor. If you see a link “Volunteer to edit this category” try and find another relevant location. Pages without active editors take much longer to get listed into. Once you find the perfect directory submit your site every 4-6 months until listed. If you are lucky you will get in eventually.

Yahoo Directory is seen as an authority in the eyes of Google, and getting your site in will help your link reputation. This link does come at a price of $299 per year, but will play a role in helping your website achieve top rankings.

There are a number of other valuable directories out there that can help you with your search rankings. Before submitting to any directory the key is a combination of relevance and authority. If the directory is relevant and active it may be worth considering.

GOOGLE WEBMASTER TOOLS
Google Webmaster Tools can be very useful for your optimization efforts. It may not directly help you obtain higher rankings, but can help you trouble shoot if you are experiencing problems. It will also allow you to remove URL’s that you don’t want indexed and set various preferences such as your domain, crawl rate, and geographic target.

XML Sitemaps
This is the most common reason people use Google Webmaster Tools – the submission of their XML sitemap. While you can use your robots.txt to have Google find your XML sitemap, by submitting it directly to Google you can check up on the spidering status.

Error checking
Webmaster Tools is also quite useful for checking on various error URL’s that Google may know about. Under the Diagnostics > Web Crawl you can view any errors that Google has to report on your site. By cleaning up any errors you can help increase your chances of rankings.

Links
From inside Google Webmaster Tools you can get a much clearer look at what sites Google is noting as having links to you, and give you a better indication of the need, if any, to increase your link counts.

WWW Preference
Be sure to select your domain preference under Tools > Set Preferred Domain. In nearly all cases you will want to select the version including the “www”

SUMMARY

Inbound links play a significant role in successful Google rankings. By focusing on relevant links, as well as by diversifying where you get those links from, you can build a solid foundation for your search rankings today and into the future.

Stay tuned for How to Optimize for Google Part 3 (of 3) where I will discuss other considerations including redirects, HTTP headers, and a number of other factors which play a role in successfully conquering Google.

Scott Van Achte is the Senior SEO at StepForth Web Marketing Inc.; based in Victoria, BC, Canada and founded in 1997. You can read more of Scott’s articles and those of the veteran StepForth team at http://news.stepforth.com or contact us at http://www.stepforth.com

Post from: http://www.sitepronews.com/

In this three-part series on How to Optimize for Google we will touch on a number of important aspects for top Google rankings including website optimization, links, Google Webmaster tools, and a number of other considerations.

The focus of Part 1 will be with on page website optimization.

THE RIGHT KEYWORDS
This article is not about keyword research so I will not spend too much time on this topic, however, I felt it was important to at least brush on this slightly.

Make sure that your targets are achievable. If you select the wrong keywords it can make your entire optimization experience essentially a waste. Choose keywords that are attainable but yet still offer a reasonable search frequency for your industry. Your phrase selection should also be targeted to bring qualified traffic to your site.

Using the hotel industry as an example, targeting the word “hotel” would make very little sense but by narrowing it down to “Victoria BC hotel” you now have less competition, and a more qualified audience. Keep your targets in perspective and go after the obtainable rankings.

WEBSITE OPTIMIZATION
There are many on-site factors that play a role in your search engine rankings. Here are a number of those factors and what you can do to increase your chances of success.

Title Tag
The title tag plays one of the most important roles in search results at Google, and is almost always the heading Google chooses for each of its listings. Placement of your target phrase is best used near the start of the tag and repeated again in the middle or near the end. Three uses of your target phrase may be helpful in some instances, as long as it is not too overwhelming. For best results each page on your site should have a totally unique title tag.

It is also important to remember that because Google will use this title as the main heading for your listing, you will want to keep it attractive to potential searchers. Try to also add a call to action, or other wording to help make your listing appear attractive to searchers.

To help illustrate the fact Google takes this tag into consideration, simply do a search for your target phrase and take a look at the titles of the top 10. I tried a search for a rather broad term “hotel” and saw that all 10/10 listings had it in the title tag, and 6/10 had it as the very first word. A quick scan showed that the entire top 30 either had the word hotel, or hotels in their title tags.

If you do only one thing to your website, make sure that all your title tags are relevant, unique, and contain your target phrase for each page.

Meta Description Tag
The Meta Description tag is still occasionally used by Google as the description which appears in the search results themselves. While this used to be a more common practice Google tends to use it most often on sites with very limited content, or those which are flash based. I have seen it still used for content rich sites, however this is less common.

The Meta Description tag still has an impact on search rankings. Your best bet when using this tag is to keep it short and sweet with your target phrase close to the start and never repeated more than 3 times. Like the title tag, each page on you site should have its own unique description tag.

Meta Keyword Tag
When it comes to Google this tag is useless, and won’t influence your rankings. There is some speculation as to whether a spammy keyword tag can however, have a negative effect on Google rankings. As a result, if you do utilize a keyword Meta tag for the smaller engines, it is best to keep it clean and play it safe.

Density
Keyword density plays a role in overall rankings; however, it is not as cut and dry as it once was. Once upon a time there was a magic number that when used could almost guarantee top rankings.

This is no longer the case. Today the ideal density varies from industry to industry, phrase to phrase. To find out what density you should aim for, take the top 10 or 20 search results and see what percentage those sites are using. In most cases you will find that the majority of these sites have a very similar density to one another, and this average density is a good estimation of what you should aim for.

Body Text and Keyword Placement
The location of relevant text on your site will help establish the overall importance of your target phrase. While you do not want to overwhelm the engines and site visitors with a bombardment of target phrases at the top of the page, try to sprinkle in some instances as close to the top of the page as possible.

Synonyms
Be sure to include various synonyms for your target phrases within your body text on your site. Google will use these synonyms to tie in the overall relevance of the page for your main target phrases, which in turn can improve your odds.

To find possible synonyms you can use a thesaurus, but the best way is to search Google itself and see exactly what they consider to be similar. Simply search in Google for your target phrase preceded with a tilde, such as “~hotels”. Next scan through the search results for any text Google has bolded. These are all words that Google considers to be related. Using the “~hotels” example Google brings up phrases such as ‘travel’, ‘tourism’, ‘accommodation’, as well as various hotel chain names such as ‘Hilton Hotels’.

Keywords in Domain
There is still some speculation if having a target phrase as part of your top level domain (TLD) is of use to search rankings. From my experience, yes, there is value here, although, nothing like it was several years ago.

If you are starting off in the online world and are contemplating which domain to go for, consider one that uses your target phrase, assuming that it is both relevant to your business name, and uses no more than a single hyphen. While multiple hyphens in a domain can be successful, they are very common with highly spammy websites, so it is best to not take that route if possible.

While having a keyword located within your domain can offer some ranking juice, I would not suggest heading out and doing a domain swap. In most cases you would be better off working on your existing site than starting from scratch with a new domain.

Keywords in page specific URL
Using keywords for specific page URL’s can also help add a little bit of value to your site, providing you use them responsibly. Consider using a keyword as a directory name and as part of a file name where it naturally makes sense to do so. If you have a website that focuses on tourism and includes local hotel listings, you may want to consider the following structure for your page on the Hilton:

MyTourismSite.com/Victoria/Accommodations/Hotels/Hilton.html

Heading Tags
Placement of target phrases within heading tags helps to establish the importance of those given phrases. That said do not over do it, or abuse it. Only place target phrases within a heading tag if it makes sense to do so, and don’t flood a page with numerous tags. Heading tags are not as critical as they once were, but still a good contribution to a well optimized page.

Link Anchor text
This is the actual text you click on as part of a link. When full or partial target phrases are used within your text links they help pass on some value to the linked page for those phrases. This is also true when considering surrounding text. When the content around the link is also relevant, the link holds slightly more value.

While a link that simply states “click here” or “www.domainname.com” does have its place, they provide considerably less value than a link that would use “discount hotels” as its anchor.

Image Alt Text
While image alt text still plays a minor role, its biggest part is within the use of image based navigation. If you have an image linked to another page, the alt text will be attributed much the same way as standard link anchor text is.

Image Alt text should always be short and to the point and should accurately describe either the image itself, or the page the image is linking to. Do not use alt tags as a place to stuff keywords.

Inline Links
These are links that are found mid sentence or mid paragraph as opposed to a simple listing of links as found in a menu or possibly on a sitemap. Links found mid paragraph tend to pass on a little more value from the surrounding text and can offer more relevance to the linked page.

Site Navigation
It is absolutely imperative that your website be fully spiderable by the search engines. This may seem obvious, but often webmasters overlook Google’s ability to crawl a website. Google has become very advanced in what links it can follow and how it can spider a website, but there are still some things that can cause significant roadblocks.

- Flash: One of the most commonly made mistakes is the use of flash. If flash is used as a sole means of site navigation then you can count on Google not viewing your internal pages, and having a significant disadvantage in terms of site rankings.

- Java Script / DHTML: These days most Java Script and even DHTML menus can be spidered by Google, however, this is not always the case. If your site utilizes any kind of fancy navigation and you are wondering why Google has not indexed your internal pages, check out Google’s Cached Text version of your page. If you do not see any text links, then your navigation may be invisible to Google.

- Images: Image based navigation has been safe for many years now, but if your site uses this form of navigation it is essential to have brief, relevant alt text on all your buttons. This alt text will act much like standard anchor text for text based links. This is not only for the purpose of search ranking value, but take a look at Google’s cached text version of your page. If you have image based links that do not have alt text, those links do not appear. This doesn’t mean Google won’t follow them, but for anyone viewing your site on a text based browser, your links will be invisible to them.

URL Structure
Avoid long elaborate URL’s with extraneous characters. While Google has reached a point where they can index massive URL strings, it is best to avoid them if at all possible. For dynamic sites consider utilizing mod rewrites to significantly clean up the URL to not only make it more search engine friendly, but more user friendly as well.

MyTourismSite.com/?locid=”victoria”&catid=”accommodations”
&type=”hotel”&comp=”hilton”

stands a better chance if cleaned up to read:

MyTourismSite.com/victoria/accommodations/hotels/hilton.htm

SUMMARY
Basic website optimization is a critical component for successful placement in Google but is only part of the overall picture.

Scott Van Achte is the Senior SEO at StepForth Web Marketing Inc.; based in Victoria, BC, Canada and founded in 1997. You can read more of Scott’s articles and those of the veteran StepForth team at http://news.stepforth.com or contact us at http://www.stepforth.com

Post from: http://www.sitepronews.com/

That’s a heck of a commitment, isn’t it?

The worst part is that most of the time what the client was “buying” wasn’t clear.

Many of proposals read something like this:

“Acme SEO Consulting will optimize Client’s website for search engines using best practices and proprietary tools and techniques. Work may include the following:

• Title tag optimization
• Headline optimization
• ALT text optimization
• Keyword research
• Keyword density improvements
• Canonicalization corrections
• Crawl testing
• Robots.txt setup / maintenance
• Broken link scans
• Link building
• Competitor research
• Internal link optimization
• PageRank sculpting
• 301 redirects”

Whew, sounds pretty advanced, doesn’t it? For someone new to the world of SEO most of these deliverables may as well read, “Flux capacitor installation, GKC valve distribution correction, Removal of vermicious knids.”

The question most people are asking when they read a proposal like this: how do these things all add up to me getting a positive return on my investment?  How do they translate into more sales/leads/etc?

As an SEO I know that several of the bullet points above are often crucial optimization points. It’s my job to know which and when/where they’re required – and what the priority is to implement each one when it’s on the table.

There’s also a lot of muddy language in the example above that leaves the actual deliverables impossible to pin down. “Best practices,” “proprietary tools and techniques,” “work may include” – these are all nice ways of saying, “we’re not telling you exactly what we’re going to do.”

From an agency standpoint the argument is often, “well, if we give clients the detailed plan upfront won’t they just take the proposal straight to a low-cost competitor and get the same work for less?”

This is not a great attitude to take in approaching business relationships, is it?  ”Well, these people could be trying to screw us so let’s tell them nothing.”

It also misses an important point: Internet Marketing needs are different for every website.

Projects Must Be Tailored for Unique Needs

Believe me, it would be great if every client that picked up the phone and called us or contacted us through our website fit into a cookie-cutter mold for SEO and other Internet Marketing services. Everyone would get the same work at the same cost and, most importantly, they’d all see the same positive results.

Happy, prosperous clients = happy, prosperous agency

Unfortunately that’s just not how it works.

The truth is that your website and needs are unique.

• You’re in a unique market with unique competitors
• You’ve been in business for a unique amount of time
• You’re offering is one-of-a-kind (hopefully)
• Maybe you’ve got an in-house email list, maybe you don’t
• Maybe you’ve got an extensive profile of inbound links, maybe not
• Your website might need a design/usability overhaul, or it may be beautiful, usable and brand spanking new
• You could be running pay-per-click campaigns
• You might have a blog or articles on your website
• You may have web analytics installed or not – and for how long?
• Perhaps you have staff in-house who can handle website updates and creating new content – on the other hand, you might need to outsource these

Sure, many of the principles of SEO and Internet Marketing apply across all, or most, websites and markets. But with so many variables and unique characteristics the work (and budget) required to reach your goals are always particular.
It makes sense, then, that any Internet Marketing company, whether they’re proposing SEO, pay-per-click, email marketing, web design or all of the above, should customize their offering to the client’s needs, doesn’t it?

How to Know What You’re Getting Into

You can probably tell where this is going. Any project, whether it be SEO or another form of Internet Marketing, should have specific strategies, tactics and timelines geared for your particular situation.

If you’re looking to hire an agency, a project proposal should be a plan and not a reiteration of the agency’s selling points. The litmus test here: does the proposal focus on you and your needs, or does it reiterate why you’d want to hire the agency, some of their general methodology, their experience, etc. Sure, that stuff is important too, but a project proposal isn’t about the agency – it’s about the game plan and how it’s going to help you achieve your goals.

Some of the questions that should be on your mind when reviewing a project plan:

• What are the goals of this project?
  • More search engine traffic / exposure?
  • More leads?
  • More sales?
  • Do these goals make sense for your business model?
• How will the goals be achieved?
  • What strategy the agency is proposing?
  • What are the specific deliverables?
  • What is the timeline for those deliverables?
• Why will this strategy work?
  • What is the logic behind the strategy?
  • Has this strategy worked before?

Without the answers to these questions, isn’t it tough to know 1) what you’re aiming for and 2) how you’ll get there?

Imagine evaluating a year-long SEO project six months in. How are you going to evaluate the work that’s been done so far? How are you going to tell whether things are going well or not? If the plan or proposal was vague and listed lots of “possible” tactics/deliverables and no real timeline or goals it’s going to be pretty tough, right?

The basic reason most SEO projects fail

The essential reason most SEO projects fail isn’t because the work being done is shoddy (or the agency is just not worth their salt). That might be the case, but more often the cause of failure is the lack of a specific goals, strategy and detailed tactics/deliverables.

You can’t call something a “success” until you define that term. Take pains to understand upfront what your goals are for a project – and when an agency provides a quote make sure they’re addressing your goals, detailing the specific methods of reaching them and explaining logically why it’s all going to work.

About the Author Mike Tekula is the Director of Marketing at http://unstuckdigital.com/ – a results-driven Internet Marketing agency that provides SEO Consulting, SEO Training and other Internet Marketing services.

Post from: http://www.sitepronews.com/

1) Think before you tweet

It is always good to think for a second before you post a tweet. We should ensure that the content we are posting doesn’t target anyone personally. There have been many cases where people have got into trouble for tweeting something casually. Looking at the 7 tweets that got people into trouble, it is hard to believe that people have got sued and lost their jobs because of a small status update on this micro blogging platform.

2) Track Statistics

A good number of updates which we post on Twitter will be accompanied by an external link. Instead of posting the link directly it is good to use a URL shortening service like bit.ly or Tr.im. Apart from making the link shorter it will also help to track the statistics. This will help you to analyze what kind of content your followers like and what they don’t.

TIP: You can find the number of clicks on bit.ly links by adding a ‘+’ sign at the end of the link. This works not only for your own links but for all public links that are shortened using bit.ly

3) Provide A Description

Whenever you are posting an external link a small description letting your followers know what they are about to see will definitely help. If you can make the one line description interesting, more people will be interested in clicking the link.

4) Posting Audio/Video/NSFW content

While is totally fine to share interesting videos and audios on Twitter, appending [video] or [audio] at the end of the tweet is a good practice. A good number of folks use Twitter at work and having a sudden blaring audio or video in a silent work place is totally embarrassing. In some places video sharing sites may be blocked and this small practice will save them a couple of minutes. Similarly appending [NSFW] is really important while posting content/links which you may think may not be appropriate for all age groups and environments.

5) Repeated Content

We should avoid posting the same content again and again. Not only it is against the Twitter terms and conditions but it will also annoy your followers. Posting the same link repeatedly is a common practice among many bloggers who try to gain more visibility for their blog posts. While it is fine to post an important tweet a couple of times to cater to your followers across different time zones, exploiting it will definitely create a bad impression.

6) Credit The Source

It is always a good practice and also a good courtesy to credit the source. The most common way is to add a RT followed by the twitter handle of the referring person at the beginning of the tweet. Alternatively you can also add via @username at the end.

This guest article was written by Ramanujam, a grad student in the Department of Computer Science at Virginia Tech. Ramanujam is the editor of SocialCouch.com where he writes about social media and web 2.0.

Post from: http://www.johnchow.com/

The most powerful and credible links on the Internet are placed by individuals who have influence over your online target audience. Often, these are bloggers, editors, industry experts – those with numerous social media followers. Wouldn’t it be good to have an industry influencer who likes you and promotes your stuff by mentioning your business to his or her vast audience? In many cases, that’s the magic touch a business needs to step up to the next level.

Social media sites can be a great source for identifying these key individuals. They act as a virtual trade show, streamlining your ability to “meet” and build a relationship, and win them over to actually promote your ideas to their audience(s). If you’re in the sports industry, it’s kind of like having Michael Phelps or Tiger Woods (ahem) say good things about you. When this happens, you will have many new relationships, followers and links to your site.

Here are some of the keys to building relationships with influencers online.

1. Know what the influencer likes or wants before you introduce yourself. The fastest way to get ignored by the influencer is to try to sell them your idea before they even know who you are. (Think spam filters). Instead, get involved in the group and listen to what’s being said. If it’s appropriate, provide interesting, thought-provoking comments or responses. Some influencers aren’t a bit shy and will tell you flat-out what they are looking for. If you possess what the influencer is looking for, it’s time to make your introduction.
2. Introduce yourself by letting them know that you have something they might want and then give some details in a respectful way. Remember: you want to pique their interest, not bury them in details. If they’re interested, you’ll know it soon enough.
3. Wait for their response. If they don’t respond in a reasonable timeframe, find another way to introduce yourself: phone calls often work, but it’s best to speak face-to-face.
4. At this point, it’s assumed that you really do have what they want and that the influencer will act on it immediately. Otherwise, it’s back to step one again; in some cases, it’s over for your shot with that influencer.

In my industry of SEO professionals, getting in front of an influencer can be very tough, but I’ve done it several times by writing articles that deal with issues few others write about. In particular, I try to write articles that editors of well-known blogs will want to publish.

I recently contacted the editor of a popular blog because I learned that he was interested in good SEO articles. I provided a sample of my writing; he liked it and gave me access to his blog to post my next article.

A few weeks later when I posted my article in the drafts section, the editor liked it so much he asked if he could publish it in another blog he edited that was much more popular than the one I had already been approved for.

One thing that helped to get my article accepted involved closely reading and following all of the guidelines for guest blog posting. Don’t make an editor postpone your article because it didn’t meet one of the guidelines. I also used a professional copywriter to tweak the article after it was written. A professional can give your article that extra polish it needs to stand out – and get you noticed.

Within a few days of my article going live, my post was tweeted 15 times – by the editor as well as several other industry influencers – and I got some encouraging feedback in the comments section.

What about links? Not only did this blog post link to my site, but the post itself is linked from a few places, adding even more power to the links in the post.

For those of you who like to keep track, that initial successful relationship with an industry influencing blog editor yielded:

• My name and business on 2 blogs aimed at my target audience
• 15 tweets, and re-tweets from additional industry influencers
• Several high-quality links to my website
• Instant credibility within my industry (now I can boast a bit, “see my article on this respected industry blog”)
• A new relationship with an industry influencer (to get more quality links to my site)
• A foundation for building more relationships with influencers in my industry

Sure, it takes some work to figure out who’s who in your field, then to spend time with them socially, learning what they like (and want). But it can pay large dividends for your credibility and business.

Tom Shivers is an SEO consultant
(http://www.capturecommerce.com/seo-consulting.php) and president of Capture Commerce, Inc. – a professional SEO company (http://www.capturecommerce.com/about.php) focused on tailored Internet marketing since 2000.

Post from: http://www.sitepronews.com/

1. Duplicate Content/Sites – Do not set up multiple sites or site pages using basically the same content with a few different keywords spread around.  This does not fool the search engines.
2. Cloaking – Cloaking is when a website or webpage is set up to show different content for a search engine spider than the human visitors.   The cloaked page (for the spiders) is stuffed with keywords in an attempt to get higher rankings.  What it can get you is banned!
3. Linking to Bad Neighborhoods – Be careful who you link to because you can be found guilty by association.   Do not link to adult sites, gambling sites or link farms.  Also be careful not to link to sites that use any of the SEO methods mentioned here.
4. Title Stacking – This is simply trying to give each page more than one title tag so you can use more keywords to get higher rankings.   The search engines consider this a dirty little trick.
5. Doorway Pages – Doorway or gateway pages are pages that are set-up for one keyword topic but then they take you to different content.   These pages usually have little value in the way of content and have little to do with the rest of the site.  They are used solely to try to get a higher rank in the search engines.
6. Redirect Pages – Redirect pages are set up to rank high in the search engines but when you click on the page, it will take you to another page which is usually a sales page for a product or service.  So, what you see isn’t what you get!
7. Automated Submission Services – Do not use automated submission services.  They are against Google’s TOS and can get you banned.
8. Hidden Links – This is when a link is added to a page in such a small size that it cannot be seen by human visitors but can be picked up by the search engine spiders.   This might work for a time but when the search engines discover it, you will be penalized!
9. Keyword Stuffing – Keyword stuffing or spamming is simply being too repetitive with your keywords as to the extent of your content not being sensible.  For example if your keywords are cat food and your text reads something like this:  “When your cat gets hungry be sure to feed them this cat food because your cat will like this cat food.  This cat food comes in an easy to open cat food can and contains fish, chicken and healthy ingredients that all cat food should have.  So, when your cat is hungry for cat food, give them this cat food because this cat food is the best cat food for your cat!”   You can easily see why this kind of keyword stuffing should not be used.
10. Invisible Text – This is when you hide text by using the same color text and background.   The invisible text is meant for the search engines only and not for visitors.  This is done so you can stuff a lot more keywords on your page without wrecking your content.  The search engines will discover this and they will penalize you!

Be careful not to use these Black Hat SEO methods because it could cause you a lot of trouble with the search engines.  Be careful as well, who you hire to work on your site because some of these things can be done without your knowledge and cause your site to get banned or penalized.

A few things you should do to get higher rankings are:

1. Research keywords and use relevant keywords on your web pages and in your page title.
2. Add new content to your site regularly
3. Link with relevant, quality sites
4. Use a site map
5. Don’t use a lot of javascript or flash.  The search engines do not read these.

Following all of the above can keep you from getting banned and improve your rankings!

Terri Seymour (also known as “The eBook Lady”) has over ten years online experience and has helped many people start their own business.  Visit her site at http://www.seymourproducts.com for resources, $1 resell ebooks & software, free tutorials, affiliate programs, free ezine and free business ebook with Master Resell Rights. http://www.seymourproducts.com/free.shtml

I am even more amazed by the number of people who believe all they have to do is buy a domain, slap a few HTML pages together and place them on a web host somewhere. Then they expect everything else to just happen because their site or business is on the web!

It very rarely happens that way.

Creating an online business takes some planning and strategy if you want your site or business to succeed. You must have a plan of action, but most of all, you must have some fundamental marketing strategies behind your online site.

Now, I am speaking from experience here, because I also stumbled around on the web for 2 or 3 years like the people I described above. I foolishly thought just because I had a web site, I could do business on the web.

Well, not very much happened. I received very little traffic and very few sales. My site was going nowhere fast.

Fortunately, the theme I chose for my first site was Internet Marketing! I spent those first years studying all the online marketing material and information I could get my hands on. I gradually learned what to do and what not to do when it came to marketing online.

Mostly, I stumbled across some great Internet marketers like Marlon Sanders, Neil Shearing, Ken Evoy… true pioneers of online marketing. By studying those first class marketers and their marketing techniques I learned how it was all done.

Over time, I learned how to become very analytical with my sites and marketing. I started to create marketing strategies and put them into practice with my sites. This was all new to me because I have a background in education rather than marketing.

Now, I would like to share with you some of these marketing strategies and practices – just things I do and things I put into place which enable me to receive a modest but very comfortable online income.

So here are some things you can try:

1. Know Your Market Or Audience

First and foremost, you must know your market. Know who you will be targeting with your marketing? Know who will be buying your products or the affiliate products that you’re promoting on the web?

I keep my eyes open for hot trends or products which everyone is buying. You can use programs like Google Trends to see which products are becoming hot. For example, in electronics, which products are on everyone’s wish list? Is it laptops, PCs or netbooks? Are people buying smart phones, PDAs, Blu-ray Players or E-readers?

Just find out what products are hot? Find what products are being searched for in the search engines… do a check to see how many searches are made each month for your chosen product? Use WordTracker, or a free online site such as Seobook.com to see what products people are searching for on the web.

If there is a large demand/audience/market for your product or subject area, then you have a better chance of succeeding online. It is a simple marketing strategy that many first time marketers ignore – please don’t. So choose your products to match the demand that is out there for them.

2. Buying Mindset

One of the key elements to selling stuff online is finding people at the exact moment they are ready to buy. What some marketers refer to as a “Buying Mindset”. You find people who have their minds set on buying something when they reach your site.

This is much easier than you think!

A simple way I found to do this is to create sites which target keywords related to buying… such as gifts, coupons, bargains, deals and so on. For example, a site on wedding gifts will obviously attract customers who are interested in buying wedding gifts.

To give you a concrete example from my own site, I have a section on “Corporate Business Gifts” which offers special deals/coupons on corporate business gifts… someone searching for that phrase is more likely to purchase a gift. Just simple reasoning, but it works wonders for selling stuff online.

In the Info-Product market, many Gurus create a “Buying Mindset” by offering special bonuses and discounts if someone buys from their links. Another simple way to boost your sales.

3. Target Special Holidays

Along the same lines, I like targeting times when people feel obligated to buy. Using special holidays like Christmas, Mother’s Day, Valentine’s Day… in your marketing can be very effective.

There are occasions such as anniversaries, birthdays, weddings, graduations… when people feel they must buy something for a loved one or special friend. Targeting those occasions with your marketing can be extremely effective… people are looking for a birthday gift, a graduation gift or a wedding gift – you simply help them find what they’re looking for.

On one of my sites, I target the “Back To School” market which has proven very lucrative since I market high-ticket affiliate items such as laptops, PCs and netbooks.

4. Place All Your Emphasis On Supplying Information

The majority of people searching on the web are looking for information – first and foremost – even those who are ready to buy. They want information on the subject or product they’re searching for on the web. It should be your marketing strategy to give them this information.

All of my sites are based on supplying information to my visitors.

If you give solid information they will be pleased and take note of your site and a few will buy the products you recommend, but the information must come first.

Even popular selling sites like Amazon give loads of consumer information and feedback while selling their products on the web. Consumers want information on the products they’re buying. Supply this information and you will sell more products.

5. Target Long Tail Keyword Phrases In Your SEO

If you’re selling stuff on the web, it is extremely important that you have a SEO marketing strategy. You must use the search engines to bring in those quality visitors and potential customers to your site. You must rank high in the search engines for your chosen keywords.

I have found SEO is not easy but it is also not that hard to do. In order to rank high you must be persistent, have a six month or yearly plan… work at it over time, even years to build up your rankings. Most webmasters won’t have the patience or resources to stick to a long-term strategy for months, even years before they start ranking for popular, well-searched for keywords.

However, there’s another quicker and faster way to get quality traffic from the search engines. Instead of targeting highly competitive popular keywords, you target longer keyword phrases that have little competition. For example, someone searching for a particular brand and model is more likely to buy then someone searching for a general topic. Someone searching for “cars” compared to someone searching for “2007 Ford Mustang Shelby GT” – the last phrase will have very few searches but it can produce more targeted buyers.

6. Build Lists of Interested Buyers

One of my most effective marketing strategies is building simple lists of people who want to receive further information on the subject or product they’re considering buying. The web is a very temporary process since most people spend less than a few seconds on most sites. So it is important that you try and get them to opt-in to your mailing list, join your Twitter account or FaceBook group… and so on.

You must build lists of people who are interested in finding out more about your subject or product. This way you will have repeat visitors to your site and you will get the opportunity to sell to them again and again. If you build a trusting relationship with these contacts, they will respect your opinions and suggestions.

List building can have a very positive effect on your sales numbers so it is one marketing strategy you should definitely try if you’re not already using lists.

7. Sell Things You Can ONLY Buy Online

This marketing strategy is so simple – it’s almost laughable. But I quickly found selling stuff that can only be bought online do much better than selling stuff that can be bought at your local Walmart. If buyers can only find it online, then you will have a much better chance of selling it to them.

Therefore, marketing unique products or specialty items, which are only available online can prove very lucrative. This is a very simple marketing strategy but also a very effective one. Just try it.

There are no doubt, countless other marketing strategies you can use. But using some or all of the ones listed above will help increase your online sales. Again, just try them and see for yourself.

By Titus Hoskins: The author is a full-time online marketer who has numerous websites. If you want to find out more marketing strategies just download these: bizwaremagic.com/Free_Marketing_Courses.htm. For the latest web marketing tools try: www.marketingtoolguide.com/  Titus Hoskins Copyright © 2009. This article may be freely distributed if this resource box stays attached.

Post from: www.sitepronews.com/

Getting a top rank in Google may be your dream but you need to understand the keyword density for each of your article. The calculation for keyword density is critical. As a rule of thumb the keywords used should not be more than 5 % of your article. This to me makes perfect sense. Imagine reading an article with so many of the same words being repeated. It turns the readers off and is not good for your marketing. A naturally written article attracts more readers who would likely read to the end of the article before they decide to buy whatever it is that you are selling.

There are many tools that you can use to assist you in getting a top Google rank. Without a doubt, the most essential of all is Google Keyword Tool, a free web-based tool to help you find the right keywords and the number of searches made for that keyword in a 12 month period so that you can use the information to optimize your articles for a top rank in Google. There are also several paid keyword software tools that you can purchase but I find the free Google Keyword Tool is a great tool to start with before you progress to other multiple use software tools.

Original and informative content is what Google and the other search engines value highly. Why would they want to publish something that has already been written by someone before. The search engines are providing a service to the mass public on finding information and the more original and informative your information is with the right amount of targeted keywords, the higher is your chances of getting a top rank in Google.

Besides articles and information, your website has got to look like a normal website and not a sales page with just good copywriting. A normal website has the “about me” page, your contact details, privacy statement, categories, and pages. The more pages you have with the right keyword density, the more the search engines will love your website because they love content. The search spiders eat your content and will push you up the Google ranking if they love eating what you have to offer.

Once the spiders have crawled and you are listed by the search engines, you will need to optimize your site even further. Usually, you won’t rank on Google’s first page on the first crawl. Fine tune your articles with keyword density and build backlinks to your website. Backlinks that point back to your website are extremely valuable because it shows that your website is popular. You can build backlinks by marketing articles with your hyperlink in the resource box, joining forum sites and doing some social bookmarking on popular platforms such as Facebook, Digg and Twitter.

By Azmi Adnan

Azmi Adnan is an expert in SEO optimization and getting top Google rankings. Read more about his SEO strategies at his blog http://topgooglerankingtool.com

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