Archive for the SEO
Why Does On-Page SEO Work so Well?
December 20th, 2010
On-Page SEO has actually been with us for a long time. The term is used to describe all the options that are used on a single page of the website in order to heighten its chances with the search engines. There is a large divide between On-Page SEO and Off-Page search engine optimization, but marketers more often than not prefer the former because of diverse reasons.
Fundamentals of On-Page SEO
On-Page SEO covers the fundamentals of making the most of the exposure of your keywords and phrases to the search engine bots through a proper usage of HTML markup. Methods such as keyword optimization, using the proper titles, using alt tags for your images, using the right formatting for your titles, including your logo and graphics in the right format, placing your advertisements in the right position, keyword density and so on. These are things that need to be done on your website's pages to try and improve their visibility in search engines. On-Page SEO excludes anything outside the webpage, such as submitting the link to directories, sharing links with other websites, article marketing, blogging, opt-in advertising and so forth.
Example of On-Page SEO
I have used this article as an example of On-Page SEO in action. As you can see I have used the keywords "On-page SEO" in the page title, keywords and description of the post. You can also see that I have used the header tags <h1>, <h2>, <h3>, etc.. You can also see that we have a link within the article which uses the anchor tag <a>. It's also essential to use the alt tag if you are using images within your post and try to use the keywords within the tag as well.
Other important elements included in On-Page SEO that are often overlooked by many bloggers, writers and webmasters. They include such things as putting your keywords in italics, bold and underlined. As you can see in this article "On-Page SEO" has been put in bold, italicized and underlined. Every little aspect gets you closer to the 100% optimization that will get you on the first page of search engines. Another element to improving your On-Page SEO is ensuring your keyword density is at the optimal percentage. An ideal goal is to be around 5% is for your keyword.
Manual or Help
So now that you know what On-Page SEO is, you can either do it manually or use a software program to help you. We came across an amazing plug-in for WordPress that automatically tells us what needs to be addressed in every post we write and cuts down the time to implement this strategy drastically. It's called SEOPressor.
SEOPressor depends on a factor known as the SEO Score for calculating the worthiness of a particular website. What it will do is it will take some parameters into account and decide whether a particular website will rank well on search engines or not using On-Page SEO factors. This score is a very unique aspect of SEOPressor and the best thing about it is that its results correspond exactly with what a superlative tool such as Google Analytics will show you.
Any On-Page SEO strategy that you follow should become a long term addition to your webpage. Knowing that this is something that functions well, you should able to maintain it easily on the website. So, if you have found out the optimum keywords to use on your webpage, you can utilize them forever, without requiring to go through the research for a second time.
Search Engine Optimization Basics – Part II
October 12th, 2010
In the second and final part of this article I will cover the remaining 5 areas that relate to solid Search Engine Ranks for particular number of key phrases. Again, this will apply to any type of website, on any industry you are targeting.
Lets review the last 5 areas:
Provide a road map of your web site, and search engines will follow it.
Called the "sitemap", this very simple page contains links to every page on a web site and serves one very important purpose. That is to get your sub pages crawled, and into a search engine's index.
Search Engines look for the robots.txt file, so make sure you have it.
As its name implies, this is a text file that tells robots what to and what not to index. Its content consists of so-called records. Only mention files and directories that you don't want to be indexed. All other files will be indexed normally if they are linked on your site. Having a proper robots.txt file gives your pages the rankings they deserve. If search engines know what to do with them, then they can give them good ranking.
Submit your site to related categories in niche directories.
Internet directories have become very important because they represent an easy path for inbound links creation. Now, when you submit your site to related categories in your industry you get that extra link factor, quality. Links from these categories can have a very positive effect on the search engine rankings of your web site.
Writing articles about your site, a great way to get new content.
This will help you get good positioning on search engines and quality incoming links as well. Always keep your articles as informative as possible. Other web sites will link back to your articles if you do. Write about the topics that your visitors are interested in, and don’t forget to send them to syndicate sites. They will in turn offer them to others. Just make sure that you always have a link back to your web site so that all sites who publish your article will automatically link to you.
Become an authority in your field. Visit relevant forums and blogs.
Only join forums and blogs that are relevant to your industry. Use your expertise as a site owner in your industry to give information and advice. Of course, put your URL into the signature of your posts. Being the authority is simply knowing your industry, and giving people the information they need to trust you and your site.
So always remember that SEO should be an important part of your long term traffic and marketing strategy.
Search Engine Optimization Basics – Part I
October 6th, 2010
The first thing you should know about SEO is that Consistency is the “keyword”. Because of that, in this first article I will cover the immediate things that relate to solid Search Engine Ranks for particular number of key phrases. This will apply to any type of website, on any industry you are targeting.
Lets review first 5 areas:
Search Engines Rank web pages, not websites.
You should have unique Titles, Descriptions and Keywords in your pages. Therefore,
there should be only one page per keyword phrase you are targeting, highly focused
on that phrase. You can also target as many related combination's of your phrase as searches are using to find it, as long as you have individual pages focused for them.
Your website has to be relevant to searchers, not just the search engine.
One very important area of SEO is to be well-balanced. There many variables that
matter when it comes to optimizing a site, there is not a specific area were all the
effort should be on. Instead focus on achieving a Top 10 Position, and here is why:
It is OK to be number 5 or number 3 in any given rank… If you are in the 1st spot and you are clicked simply because that spot gets more clicks, are you really going to get more of whatever your site’s goal is just because you are the number 1?
Less is more, when it comes to targeted keywords.
If you have like most, an average site, focus on 5-10 keywords. Build your entire site around these keywords. Remember to be relevant to searches using these keywords. You should rather have one keyword for which your site is on the Top 10 (first page), than ten that are on secondary pages. Put those keywords in your Title, Description, and Keyword areas, and remember the uniqueness factor.
Build real content for people, not for machines.
It is said that “content is king”, and for a good reason. When two sites highly optimized in a particular industry for a particular key phrase compete, this is
one of the most important areas Search Engines evaluate for relevancy, and
therefore positioning. Keep your content updated either by adding new, or by
editing existing one. The relation between content and its freshness is a must.
Tell me who links to you, who you link to, and I will tell you who you are.
Yes, linking is that important in SEO. You must have incoming links, but what really matters, is that you must have quality incoming links, and you must build them all naturally. Search Engines reward sites when their links are build steadily over time.
4 Tips For Raising Your Search Engine Rankings
December 5th, 2009
Search engine rankings are an important factor to consider when you have a web site that needs more traffic. If your web site doesn’t have a good position in the rankings then it will be hard to find.
Since most searchers click on the first few results, you need to make sure that your web site is ranked highly enough so that people can easily find it on the first page of search engine results. Although no search engine optimization company can guarantee a high rankings for your site permanently, often times hiring a web marketing company will pay off many times over. For those of you doing it yourself or those of you that want to ensure your marketing company is doing a good job, here are some tips for raising the search engine rankings of your web site.
1. Content
Content is an important factor in high search engine rankings. Make sure that you have plenty of content throughout your site with your target keywords in the articles. It’s also worth doing a search for web sites similar to yours and taking a look at their articles for ideas. Keywords are an important factor and they should be used throughout the content of your website.
2. Web Site URL
Your web site’s URL can help you rank higher with the search engines if it contains your keywords. However, don’t think that naming your site after your keywords will always help your rankings – you need to do more than just that. But still, it is one of the factors in improving a search engine ranking.
3. Search Terms
Search terms should be written out in text, instead of graphics. If you use pictures, be sure to give them alt tags. If you want a good rank in search engines then these things that may seem small should be considered, as search engines can read the text but not the graphics.
4. Page Title
The title of your page is very important, and if you choose the title properly then it can surely make a big difference in search engine ranking. Terms such ‘free article on safe children's toys’, or ‘contact the children's toy expert today’ are good to use as titles on pages containing such content. The titles themselves are very specific to the page and also may not have much competition being as specific as they are. The title area is the most important place to include your keyword phrases, so make sure that you utilize it.
Master these four tips and you’ll be on your way to getting free traffic. Look for other tips to keep your site moving up.
A Simple And Free Way To Skyrocket Your Search Engine Ranking
May 5th, 2009
What can you do right now, to increase your search engine ranking?
Well for starters, incoming links play a huge role when it comes to placing high in the search engines. The more links that point to your site from other websites the better. To the search engines, each incoming link counts as a vote for your ranking. The higher a site ranks, the more the its vote is worth.
It's also important that these sites that have a similar theme as yours. For example, if your site is built around photography software, you would want to get your link on sites that deal with camera equipment or photography tips.
There is a simple and free technique that you can start using this minute to get tons of incoming links to your site. After reading this article of course 
Try this, open your favorite search engine and type in the following phrase with quotations marks: "fishing" "add url" . Hit the search button and the results will turn up numerous sites that allow you to add your website link to their directory.
Some of these sites will add your link right away and some might require a reciprocal link which means you add their link to your site. Reciprocal links can also help your ranking by positioning you as an authority if you link to other quality, similar themed sites.
Apply this technique to you own site by substituting the keyword "fishing" with whatever keyword applies to you niche. To find even more sites that allow link submission, play around with different combination of keywords in between the first set of quotation marks.
Examples:
"football" "add url"
"football gear" "add url"
"fishing gear" "add url"
"hockey equipment" "add url"
"weddings" "add url"
"wedding merchandise" "add url"
"golfing equipment" "add url"
"golfing secrets" "add url"
"fitness products" "add url"
"adventure tours" "add url"
Next you can expand you search even more by replacing "add url" in between the second set of quotation marks with other phrases like "add link" or "submit a url". Get creative and try every possible combination you can think of.
Examples:
"add website"
"add your link"
"add a link"
"add a site"
"submit url"
"submit a site"
"submit site"
"submit link"
"link submission"
"suggest a link"
"suggest a url"
"recommended a site"
"suggest your site"
"link directory"
"add-a-link"
"cool sites"
As a side note, sometimes these link directory sites will have another text link that you must click to find the submission form. In cases like this, look for things like "click here to add your site" or "add your url" etc.
Search Engine Optimaization Tips
April 1st, 2009
Search Engine Optimization uses a combination of techniques, tools, and technical know-how to get results .Search engine optimization (SEO) is a set of methodologies aimed at improving the visibility of a website in search engine listing. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) involves the careful optimization of corporate web sites to effectively increase their visibility in the major search engines such as Google, Yahoo, Alta-Vista,and many others. The higher a Web site ranks in the results of a search, the greater the chance that that site will be visited by a user. The higher a Web site ranks in the results of a search, the greater the chance that that site will be visited by a user.
• Meta Tags
• Navigational links
• Rich Content
Meta Tags:
Meta Tags are very important for your website's visibility. Many search engines read them from your site when you submit it to them .Major meta tags that you can use:
Meta Title
The only resource type that is currently in use is "document" This is the only tag that you need to put in for indexing purposes.
Meta Description
Depending on the search engine, this will be displayed along with the title of your page in an index. "content" could be a word, sentence or even paragraph to describe your page. Keep this reasonably short, concise and to the point.
Meta Keyword
Choose whatever keywords you think are appropriate, separated by commas.
Navigational links:
at the right or at the bottom, but not on the left, of the page. When the search engines "read" your site, they read from the top left to the bottom right. Search engines place an emphasis on the first 100 words or text on the site. You do not want these words to be navigational links or Javascript. Ideally, you want to have your heading tags with your keywords in the beginning of your page. This being said, placing your links/JavaScript on the right or bottom of your page ensures the search engine spiders get to the text first, giving more weight to what's important on your page.
Rich Content:
The more content you have on your site the more likely someone is to find what they're looking for when they get there. Keep your site very content rich. Have a lot of pages.Update the site even twice a day if you have the time. Updating your site does not mean that you copy paste content from other sites.That will only push your rankings further down. Don't have any duplicate content. At the same time ,dont spam multiple content across the same website. When a search engine views or reviews a website, which they do at least every few months, it looks for specific characteristics found in the content of website landing pages.
