Archive for January 14th, 2010

SEO For Any Sized Business

Thursday, January 14th, 2010

SEO For Any Sized Business
There seems to be 3 types of people in the business world when it comes to SEO work Those who love it and live by it, those who think it is a waste of money, and those who don’t know/care about it I would like to take a minute to say those who are in the “Love IT” category, we need to do a better job of letting others know about all the great things that can happen from SEO . .One of our clients can’t stop talking about it For the mere $500-$700 a month that they spend on AdWords (and this is the ONLY form of marketing they do) they see an average of 4-7 new clients a month!! It is not unusual for them to see income double or triple what they spent on AdWords PER CUSTOMER!! So for the $500 that they spent on AdWords per month, they see $10,500 in new revenue Not a bad ROI if you ask me . .For those who don’t know/care about SEO, let me try to explain briefly what you are missing out on In a nutshell, a consumer goes to the Internet looking for a service or product in a certain geographical region So they type in “widget fixer in Kickapoo” and the search engine crawls the web looking for those words buried in content on the web and list the results . .If you have a good web presence, and content that carries those exact words, you might make it to the first page If not, you could be on the second, third, or farther down the line As a consumer, do you research ALL the companies listed? Nobody does, and that is why search engine optimization (SEO) is so important If you used SEO and AdWords, and were the best widget fixer in Kickapoo, we would make sure you are on the first page every time, potentially even the very first (and most often clicked) web listing . .Finally, for those of you who think it is a waste of money, I apologize It sounds like someone took advantage of you, or didn’t work with you well enough to make sure you needs were met .
Source: www.rsstnx.com

The Five Most Common Seo Mistakes
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the art and science of improving a site’s ranking on search engines like Google, Yahoo! and MSN’s Bing Many companies try to improve their sites’ rankings with basic techniques such as keyword rich copy and link exchanges Some techniques (like link exchanges) are minimally useful, not useful or actually hurt site rankings Others are effective, but can’t overcome common mistakes GILL Media is an SEO firm that provides complete marketing solutions After years of working with businesses, they’ve identified the following five most common SEO mistakes These are errors that GILL Media’ developers often have to fix to help clients hit the coveted first page of search results . .SEO Mistake #1: Image Headers . . .Search engine spiders can only read text and Meta data Image recognition is in its infancy Unfortunately, many sites persist in using images for headers Search engines can’t read pictures of words Even if you have a big, clear image banner that clearly says "welcome to my home page" the spider just reads the file name of your jpeg or gif Switch to real text headers or use them in addition to image banners Otherwise, search engines can’t clearly associate your site with keywords and categories Spiders assign weight to text headers using the H1, H2 and H3 tags, so make sure your header text accurately represents the site . .SEO Mistake #2: An SEO Unfriendly CMS . .Joomla, WordPress and other content management systems (CMS) can make it very easy to add and change site content - but it can interfere with your SEO efforts, too For example, if your CMS automatically sets up your headers, URLs and page titles you can’t adjust them to fit your target keywords Some CMS offer "SEO friendly" items that automatically pick your keywords, but these don’t work very well either Either go with a pure web design from the ground up or customize your CMS to let you choose every title, header and piece of Meta information An SEO that never creates a page more than one layer deep is also highly recommended because search spiders index sites more easily when they don’t have to crawl through too many subfolders . .SEO Mistake #3: Blank Titles . .Page titles (as listed in the top bar of your browser) are perhaps the single most important Meta information field on your entire page The title becomes the text for the page’s search engine link, and is given significant weight by search engines when they associate pages with specific keywords If your page’s title is blank or uses default information it will almost always rank behind a site with any title If your site has a title that incorporates your keywords you greatly increase your changes of ranking higher . .SEO Mistake #4: Other Blank Meta Data . .Titles are only one piece of Meta data Meta keywords are not as important as they were, but are still useful - they can act as "tie breakers" between two sites with similar authority levels Meta descriptions often appear in search results Image alt tags are invaluable; search engines can’t see pictures, so they rely on you to describe them Leave any of these blank and you’re not doing everything you can to improve your site’s rank . .SEO Mistake #5: No Target Pages . .Don’t try to improve rank for every single web page, and don’t use a "cookie cutter" approach for every page on your site You don’t want your privacy policy or user login pages to rank and when they do, they use up site authority that should be channeled to pages that are designed to attract new visitors Each site only has a limited amount of authority to spread around, so you don’t want to waste it on pages that don’t drive business Use commands such as robots txt and nofollow tags to exclude pages that aren’t meant to generate new business and pick a few pages to be your specific SEO targets Give each one its own focus and strategy .
Source: www.rsstnx.com

When Seo Meets User Experience
SEO gets a lot of talk and attention these days Everyone seems to understand the importance of high search engine rankings, everyone seems to be optimizing their sites or investing into SEO services and SEO software And there’s no denying that SEO is crucial for any business big or small that wants to succeed online However this laser focus on search engine optimization often makes webmasters and business owners forget about one critical thing - user experience . .User experience is the second set of wheels that spin a website to success If you only do SEO you’re driving a two-wheeled car which won’t take you far But as soon as you start thinking about the ways to optimize your website for human visitors not just search engine bots you’ll find out that SEO and UE (user experience) go well together Here are some tips you can take away and apply to your website to make it more search engine and user friendly . . .Use Short Logical URLs . .There are a number of reasons why logical (and preferably short) URLs are better then extremely long ones with multiple parameters An URL that reads logical and conveys a meaning like www somesite com/sport-cars html is a) more likely to rank for the keywords contained in it b) is more likely to be clicked because users understand what the page they will be taken to is about c) is more likely to be linked to Now compare it to something as awkward as this: www somesite com/index php?u_id=321&sid=3ec32444 5356hdfgssdfg45 would you click or share such link? . .Revise the URLs on your website and see how you can improve them . .Keyword-Driven Navigation . .We seem to understand the importance of keyword research perfectly well We target the right keywords that speak the language of the searchers because they won’t find our website otherwise Yet as soon as the visitor gets on our website he’s supposed to guess what exactly we mean by the names of our categories and site sections . .It’s a much better idea to stick with the logic we use when picking the keywords and use the same names for all the navigation on the site First, because this way the users will easily find the info they are looking for, second, because this will give us an extra boost in the search results . .Fix Broken Links . .No one likes broken links: your visitors don’t like them, search engine spiders don’t like them and I’m pretty much sure you don’t like them too Have you checked your site for broken links yet? Then it’s high time you did . .Create Sitemaps . .Having a sitemap of your site that you can feed to the search engine crawlers to make sure all of your web pages will get indexed is an important task on every SEO’s checklist But it’s an even better idea to create two sitemaps: one for the search engine bots and one for your visitors There sure are pages you want to show your visitors and hide from search engine bots and vice versa . .Customize 404 Error Pages . .Whenever your users get redirected to a non-existent page they get a 404 Page Not Found Message You can customize this page to add some navigational links that will take the users to the pages they seek or will help them return to a relevant section of your website . .These simple tips will help you add some points to the user experience and SEO rating of your site Try to plan your all your SEO activities with the same approach keeping your users in mind and seeking ways to improve their experience on your website .
Source: www.rsstnx.com