Archive for May, 2008
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Strategy
5. Take advantage of trusted sites
There’s no doubt about it the fastest way to get traffic is not via organic SEO. However, while waiting to become achieve domain authority what you can do is to take advantage of the sites that have already achieved this. To do this the solution is still to somehow get linked to by a trusted site.
Spammers take advantage of sites with authoritative domains by inserting hidden links on the site. What you can do without resorting to spam tactics is to:
- advertise on the site;
- rent a page on the site (some sites allow this);
- get yourself on the site’s blogroll/listings;
- contribute content to the site and link to your site as resource site; and
- use other white hat link building tactics you know.
Note that by getting links from trusted sites will benefit you more than one way. The link will add to your site’s authority (not applicable for ad links that since the nofollow attribute is used in such cases), you’ll get more visibility for your site, and you’ll get traffic referred by the site.
Popularity: 84% [?]
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Strategy
3. Be age concious
This tip is fairly old since we all know that domain age is a factor search engines consider when ranking webpages. If you plan on buying an old domain make sure that it is AT LEAST 5 YEARS OLD. According to randfish the top 100 domains for any type of domain ending (.com, .biz, .net, .info, etc) are mostly older than five years.
4. Get links from .EDU pages
If you look at Google’s SERPs you will find that not all .EDU pages rank well, however, even then .EDU pages (even those that don’t rank that well) are still considered to authority/trusted sites. Because of this you would do well to get links from these pages. Of course links from .GOV are great too but it is harder to get links from government sites so you might as well focus on getting a link or two from a .EDU page. Again this doesn’t guarantee automatic authority for your page but it will still help boost your site’s authority.
Popularity: 84% [?]
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Strategy
2. When to Court Trusted Domains for Links
The answer to the question on when you should court trusted/authoritative domains for links is simple…You should court them if your domain is not yet a trusted domain.
The value of an inbound link increases if the linking site is consider by Google (and other search engines) to be authoritative, which is why most of us need it in order to increase our own domain autority. However, if your domain is already a trusted domain you shouldn’t have to bother trying to get links from other trusted domains. Of course getting links from them is still a good thing but since you are already a trusted site Google will still view your contents as relevant and will thus give you a good rank. Instead of spending your time optimising your site through link building you should instead focus your attention on other issues such as conversion rates and brand/reputation management. This doesn’t mean that you should completely forget search engine optimisation. You should always be aware of your standing with search engines and manage your site to keep it optimised and in good standing, in terms of search rankings, but since you’ve already achieved the goal of many sites, which is to rank well in SERPs, then you should be taking the next step.
Popularity: 84% [?]
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Strategy
Google clearly relies on domain authority when ranking websites, which is why SEOs work on building up a domain’s authority. However, many owners of smaller sites percieve authority building as an impossible task and so concentrate on other means to get the traffic they want and need.
In randfish’s post on “Google Spam Illuminates the Algo’s Reliance on Domain Authority” he outlines some things that can help you enhance your domain’s authority. Note that you should do your usual link building strategies and simply use the additional knowledge to get the results you want a bit faster.
Tips on achieving domain authority:
1. Use a single domain
Instead of using multiple domains for different content it is better to put them all under one domain. The reason for this is that with the more domains you have the more links you’ll need to build each one up. On the other hand, using just one domain will mean that all the links you gather for each content/topic will add to the overall number of links for that domain…and we know that the number of links is what really counts.
In my opinion though even if using a single domain is, as randfish put it, “universally wise” it is still better to use a different domain if your content are of very different topics. Remember search engines also favour themed sites since it helps them determine relevancy. Aside from that the relevance of the links you gather also counts.
The time to put all your content under one domain is when the content are related to each other. For example, put your SEO and SEM content under one domain but use a different domain for your fashion content!
Popularity: 84% [?]
published by Dan in Keyword Research | SEO Strategy
- discount computers - Just like for the search term “refurbished computers” you should optimise a special landing page that highlights the list of computers that are currently on sale. Note that you should not only optimise the page for the keyword so as to get traffic but that you should optimise the entire landing page to increase conversion rates. One way to do this for discount pages is to showcase the amount slashed off from the original price so as to make it more appealing.
- computer promos - Again the search term should be placed in the promo page and the page optimised accordingly. Note that discount computers and refurbished computers can be considered as falling under this category so provide a section and link to the two pages. Other other promos including freebies will be in the page. Make sure that if you plan on optimising this page for the search term in order to drive lots of traffic to it you always have at least one current promo customers can avail of. The reason for this is that while SEO will get you traffic an empty promo page will turn these very same people off. Even if its just a free mouse pad or a nice canvass tote for computer peripherals you should always have something there to entice the traffic you get from your SEO efforts.
- computer technologies - Even a website that sells computers and computer parts can benefit from traffic brought by people simply researching for more information about computer technologies. However, you shouldn’t opt to send people looking for information to a sales page but can bring them to a special pages that has computer articles or to a special page that provides useful links. The benefit of this is that even though these people do not plan on buying anything now by getting them to come to your website you will be able to develop brand recognition increasing the chances of them coming back to your site when they do need to buy a computer in the future.
Popularity: 100% [?]
published by Dan in Keyword Research | SEO
After discussing the purpose of the user for entering the search terms used as example for the previous post I will now discuss how knowing the intent should affect your decision regarding the placement of the keyword. I will be discussing the placement per keyword. Please refer to the previous post to re-check the user intent if you need to.
Before continuing with the discussion let us assume that the website being optimised for the keywords is a website that sell computers and computer parts.
- computers - Since this keyword is very vague as a website that sells computers my advice is to simply make sure that this keyword (both in the singular and plural form) be found ALL OVER the website. Being a very competitive term I would advice smaller websites not to bust their budget trying to make it to the top of SERPs with this keyword especially since users looking to buy computers usually enter more specific keywords.
- refurbished computers - Obviously this keyword should appear on the product description pages of each refurbished computer on sale. A wise thing to do would also to optimise a landing page for refurbished computers on sale. Although you would want your main page to contain the term refurbished computers so that people can still find it via the main page you should optimise the refurbished computers page for this search term more than you would the main page. Leading the user to a page with more specific information will encourage them to stick to that page since they information they need is right before them.
to be continued…
Popularity: 100% [?]
published by Dan in Keyword Research | SEO
Have you ever considered the role user intent plays when it comes to keyword placement? Let us take a look at a few examples for me to be better able to explain the role user intent plays. I’ll be giving some search terms and explain the probable intent of the user.
- computers - By entering a very vague search term the user shows that he’s probably just looking for information. If the user does intend to buy a computer in the near future he’s probably still in the looking/comparing stages and does not intend to buy one at that very moment.
- refurbished computers - The user probably plans to buy a computer and is looking at possibilities.
- discount computers - The user is probably plans to buy a computer and even has a specific budget in mind. Same level intent as someone looking for refurbished computer.
- computer promos - Some one looking for promos has an intention of buying a computer in the very near future if not at that very instant… but only if he finds a good computer promo that suits his budget.
- computer technologies - The user this time is probably searching for computer technologies to be able to learn more about computers. The purpose is research and not to buy anything.
As you can see the kind of keyword entered reveals something, even if not exactly, about the user’s intent. With this in mind you can optimise your web pages for certain keywords with the users’ intent playing a big role in deciding which keywords should be prioritised in which page. I will be discussing more of the keyword placement in my next post.
Popularity: 28% [?]
published by Dan in Keyword Research
One critical mistake commonly made is doing keyword research only once. After doing initial keyword research and choosing which keywords to optimise for many websites leave it at that and then refocus their attention on other things.
The thing with SEO, keyword research included, is that it is a continuous effort. What this means is that even though you already have a master list of keywords you should make review the list regularly. When you review your keyword list you should:
- see how well you rank for those keywords - You might need to exert extra effort and money on desirable keywords.
- check the quality of traffic those keywords bring - Although a keyword might be giving you lots of traffic the traffic it brings might not really be translating to the action you want - subscriptions, sales, etc. If the keyword brings low quality traffic you might want to refocus your attention on other keywords that might not bringing as much traffic but results in higher conversion rates.
- see if you need to include new keywords on your list - You should also see if you need to strike a keyword from the list. This is especially important for PPC campaigns because you don’t want to be spending money on non-performing keywords.
- see if you need to reconfigure you PPC budget - When it comes to monitoring your PPC keywords you might want to do this more frequently than the organic search keywords since you’ll be losing a great deal more money especially if bid prices for certain keywords are driven up by competition.
Popularity: 25% [?]
published by Dan in Keyword Research
Overlooking the competition - In school if you look at your seatmates paper during a test that is cheating. In the real world if you look at a competitors website before coming up with your own set of keywords its keyword research. Some people either still think they are in school and want to be good boys and girls or do not realise that they need to check out what the competition is doing and how well they are doing. It is very important that you check out your competition and assess their strengths and weaknesses to determine if you can take them on….to know if your business can survive with them as your competition. When checking out your competition you actually need to checkl them on different levels but since we’re talking SEO here all we’ll discuss are their keywords and SEO strategy.
In terms of SEO and keyword research what you should do to assess your competition would be to:
- If they actually do keyword research. They might be committing the very same mistakes listed here! That’ll be good for you if that’s the case.
- Figure out the keywords they’re targeting both for the organic search and in paid ads.
- Find out how well they’re ranking for those keywords. This will help determine how optimised their site is.
- Figure out how much effort and money they are pouring in to rank well for the keywords. This is more applicable to PPC campaigns and other forms of paid ads. This is important because you want to know if you can afford to spend just as much money and effort to replicate and even top their results.
- Note the websites that are doing well and try to figure out the elements that are contribute to their success both the SEO aspect and the web design usability aspect.
In some cases you will find that they are spending more than needed to get great results so at least by checking out the competition you can learn through their successes and mistakes and hopefully make smarter choices when it comes to keyword research.
Popularity: 25% [?]
published by Dan in Keyword Research
Having too many keywords - There are usually plenty of keywords to choose from and many become “trigger happy” ending up with a really long list of keywords they want to target. Targeting too many keywords is a big mistake because in most cases a lot of those keywords are either not used that much as a search term. This means that what happens is that you’ll be investing time trying to compete for keywords that won’t give you much in return. A waste of time if you look at it in the ROI point of view. Aside from this having too many keywords will make you spread your efforts to thinly. Choosing several really good keywords and focusing on building your rank for those words is better. Once you get the results you want you can start adding to the initial keywords. But don’t start neglecting the first batch of keywords you optimised for!
Sticking to vague single-word keywords - Targeting a single keyword such as “SEO” is not the best thing to do. In most cases single words are to competitive making the amount of effort, time, and money you need to rank among the top results for that keyword too much for most websites. That does not mean that you should remove that single keyword but that you should couple it with other keywords that make it more specific to your topic/theme. This one’s related to the error - looking at keyword popularity alone - that was discussed in the previous post.
Popularity: 25% [?]
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