With the end of 2013 coming up a little more quickly than perhaps
we’d like, it’s time to start thinking about our resolutions for next
year. The top of the list might be working off those extra Holiday
pounds, but if you’re an online marketer, an equally important priority
will be revisiting your SEO techniques in 2014.
Search Engine Optimization really is an ongoing process. While the
coming and going of the years might bring in subtle changes, most of the
skills you’ve accumulated this year will translate fairly well into the
next. Stick with us here for a look at some important resolutions
you’ll want to commit to for another successful year of online
marketing.
Resolve to Learn Something New
The start of a new year might be just the kick in the pants you need
to look at your skill set a little more objectively. While you may be
perfectly competent and comfortable with your current success rate, web
marketing remains a fickle mistress. There’s always a new trick to
learn.
Case in point: Google. The big news in SEO in the second half of 2013
was Google’s new “Hummingbird” algorithm. Now that we’re living in an
increasingly mobile-first world, Google stepped up its game and
introduced new techniques to factor in the increasing number of mobile
searches being performed.
In other words, there are new tricks for marketers to learn in the
coming year and beyond. Hummingbird is taking into account the fact that
more searches than ever are being dictated in the form of a question;
as a result, subtle tweaks will need to be made to future content.
Due in no small part to Google’s influence, 2013 has been called the year of mobile search. More accurately, there will be multiple “years of mobile search,” and we’re right in the middle of them.
Resolve to Increase Your Conversions
This is what it’s all about, right? If you’ve found your conversions
lagging this year, 2014 is the perfect opportunity to revisit your
conversion process. You might think the biggest driver of conversions is
increasing organic search traffic, but that’s just the tip of the
iceberg. Quite frankly, the problem might be one that happens after
visitors have already made it to your site.
That’s where Analytics comes in. Whether you’re using Google
Analytics or something similar, resolve in 2014 to really dig into the
details to see what might be getting in the way of your website
conversions. Take a look at the keywords that are driving the most
conversions, as well as which pages have been most successful.
When it comes to eCommerce websites, there are a number of unique
problems that can arise. For example: an online retailer might be
struggling with cart abandonment. If this describes you, make a
resolution to get to the bottom of it. Revisit your checkout process and
iron out potential frustrations like compulsory site registration or
unclear pricing.
Resolve to Love Social Media
2013 may have been the year of mobile search, but it was also the
year of Pinterest. Throughout the past year, Pinterest has grown
significantly, boasting huge gains throughout the year and launching in
new countries.
In the third quarter of 2013,
Pinterest grew by a stunning 19.22%, while Facebook posted a gain of
14.78% and Twitter actually fell by nearly 8%. While this is certainly
indicative of the familiar cycle of social media platforms rising and
then falling out of favor, it’s still proof positive that marketers need
to have their ear to the ground in 2014 and beyond. Staying on top of
social trends will reveal new opportunities for growth.
That’s not to say that now-familiar social sites like Facebook and Twitter should be neglected. Twitter continues to evolve,
as seen in the new scheduling tool and ads retargeting. It has created
new opportunities for brands to set themselves apart from the crowd.
Meanwhile, Pinterest will follow in the footsteps of Twitter’s
promoted tweets by taking its first step toward monetizing its services.
According to Ben Silbermann, CEO of Pinterest, the site is going to be experimenting with promoted pins as they move forward into the new year.
The short version of this is that, as a marketer, it’s going to be
important to remember that social media is here to stay, offering new
challenges and opportunities all the while.
Resolve to Provide Higher Quality Content
It might actually be passé by now to echo Google’s mantra of “content
is king.” No matter how self-evident it might be, though, it’s still
easy to forget sometimes. As a marketer, chances are good you’ve made
use of guest blog posts from time to time, or you might even do so
regularly. This is a great practice in moderation, but it can be easy to
let sub-standard guest posts through the gates from time to time.
Link building is not to be taken lightly. If guest posts are a staple
of your web campaigns, resolve in 2014 to hold yourself to a higher
standard by being pickier when it comes to lousy guests posts.
Providing quality content to your visitors is also going to require a
better attention to detail when it comes to understanding the needs of
different types of customers.
For example: not everybody will be visiting your blog or website from
a desktop. As a result, your conversion rate might suffer among mobile
users if your site takes too long to load.
The phrase “responsive web design” will continue to be heard
throughout 2014, and one of the tenets of its design philosophy is to
provide an optimal experience to everybody, no matter their platform of
choice.
Via SPN
SEO Strategies for 2014; Rethinking
Showing posts with label SEO. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SEO. Show all posts
Local search optimization; How to get famous in your neighborhood
When it comes to local online marketing, there are four outlets that
control the sphere—Bing Places, Yahoo Local, Google+ Local, and Yelp.
Having a presence on all four is a great way to improve the visibility
of your site in your local area and attract engaged visitors. These
local channels can help your business make a big splash in the
neighborhood. Remember, the local audience is by definition a targeted
audience, so it’s well worth your time.
Unfortunately, many companies often just create a quick listing on only one of these local channels, say Yahoo Local, or Google + Local, and then focus their energy on something else. They lose interest. Although it might seem finished once you’ve added in your information and been approved, you do really need to optimize your listing just the way you would optimize your website. You won’t see much success without some management and optimization.
As you can see, the above example deals with restaurants in a specific area. It’s a common misconception that only business like restaurants and stores can really gain benefits from local listings. Although you might offer services to those not in your local area, those who are local are going to want to be able to find your business. Take the following example with the search query "local SEO services in Carlsbad." As you can see below, there is a varied list that makes it easy for users to find more information.
Local search and local listings are not specific to Google. All major search engines try to feature local listings in order to improve the relevancy of results for a particular searcher. The local sections of other search engines are called Bing Places, Yelp and Yahoo Local (more on this later). Below is a screenshot illustrating what local listings look like on a Yahoo search.
In the case of Yahoo, typing a specific location will most likely take you to Yahoo Local, which is specifically designed for local search results. It’s essentially a search engine dedicated to only local results. Yelp works the same way.
Those who benefit a little bit: If you work completely online, you might not have a local store or local office. Even if you work from your home, it might be worth it to create a business listing for your company just to improve your visibility. You don’t have to put your home address, of course, but you can still fill out a description and upload photos.
Those who benefit very little: Those who do not benefit nearly as much are websites that aim strictly to educate. Many blogs fall into this category. It would be hard to earn a space on a local SERP if you don’t have a business that people will want to search for based on location. Few searchers are going to type in queries like "How to start creating a website in Chicago." Rather, they would type in something like “Company in Chicago to help start a website.” With that second query, it’s those companies that offer that service that would benefit from local results (falling under that first category of those who benefit from local search a lot).
For example, our company Higher Visibility has a Google local listing that will pop up when anyone searches for something related to SEO in the Memphis area. We’ve earned several clients who have come from other places and were unhappy. They wanted something local so they could actually come in and speak with an account manager as opposed to over the phone, which was the only option they were given when working with almost all other companies.
· Google Places
· Bing Places
· Yahoo Local
· Yelp
Google Places:The information you include in a Google Places listing is the information that typically shows up on a Google SERP and the Google map; however the Google carousel has given Google+ a little bit more visibility (more on this later). When you create a Google Places listing, you will see a dashboard complete with all of the information from your listing such as hours of operation, description, photos, etc. This is the page you will verify by mail and where you can manage your AdWords efforts and business information.
Google+ Business Pages. Creating a Google+ Business page is all about the social features (think of it like a Facebook business page). It’s a page that you have specifically for your business on the social network where you can share your articles, connect with others in the industry, comment and engage with posts, etc. It has a post, about, photos, and videos tab.
Google+ Local. Here are where the changes come into play. Google has now revised their strategy to make things easier, so you can now manage your Google+ Business page within your Google Places dashboard. You must verify your Google+ Business page as well as your Google Places listing and then the two will combine to be managed in one place. You can visit here to see detailed instructions about verification. In the meantime, consider the below Search Engine Land screenshot that shows how you can manage both pages from the column on the left hand side:
Once you know why local search matters, understand some of the different Google terms, and setup your first business listing, the real fun begins—the optimization.
The difference here is one entry is taking advantage of all the features available, while the other is not. The second entry has one photo and one review, so the listing has been claimed; it just hasn’t been optimized. A few examples include a business description, contact information, possibly a sample menu, a phone number and hours of operation, whether or not your company offers Wi-Fi, etc.
Each local website has a different number of photos allowed, but the
rule of thumb is to add as many as you can without getting repetitive.
Upload photos of your actual store/office as well as photos of your
products or someone in your company.
*Rich Snippets: Rich snippets help your website jump off the page when it comes to a normal search, but they also work great when they reference a local place. According to Google, "by using structured markup to describe a business or organization mentioned on your page, you […] help Google surface your site in local search results." In other words, this is a great way to optimize your site. Rich snippets can be a photo of an author, a picture of food for recipes, videos, etc. Below is an example of a rich snippet using structured markup:
For those who are unfamiliar, structured markup is a way of labeling each piece of text on the page so that the search engine bots can understand your information more clearly. Sometimes things like date, phone number, address, etc. aren’t easy to read for search engine bots. You can learn more about getting started with structured markup specifically for local search here.
Get local!
Do you have a business listing on any or all of the local channels discussed above? What have you found to be an optimization tactic not to miss? Let us know your story and your thoughts in the comments below.
Photo Credit: localsurgemedia.net
This article was posted in wordtracker by Amanda DiSilvestro
Unfortunately, many companies often just create a quick listing on only one of these local channels, say Yahoo Local, or Google + Local, and then focus their energy on something else. They lose interest. Although it might seem finished once you’ve added in your information and been approved, you do really need to optimize your listing just the way you would optimize your website. You won’t see much success without some management and optimization.
How it works: the importance of local search
Understanding why local search matters and how it works is really the first step in getting started. You need to get excited about what local search can offer your company because it is going to take some management and some time. The screenshot below shows how local results can really dominate a page in Google search. In this specific case, there are no paid results, but the local results do come after three organic results (a typical occurrence):As you can see, the above example deals with restaurants in a specific area. It’s a common misconception that only business like restaurants and stores can really gain benefits from local listings. Although you might offer services to those not in your local area, those who are local are going to want to be able to find your business. Take the following example with the search query "local SEO services in Carlsbad." As you can see below, there is a varied list that makes it easy for users to find more information.
Local search and local listings are not specific to Google. All major search engines try to feature local listings in order to improve the relevancy of results for a particular searcher. The local sections of other search engines are called Bing Places, Yelp and Yahoo Local (more on this later). Below is a screenshot illustrating what local listings look like on a Yahoo search.
In the case of Yahoo, typing a specific location will most likely take you to Yahoo Local, which is specifically designed for local search results. It’s essentially a search engine dedicated to only local results. Yelp works the same way.
How local search can directly help your company: the Who, When, Why, and How
Once you have a basic understanding of where local results are found, you can really dive into who benefits, when, why it matters, and how to make it happen. It sounds like a lot, but it’s very straightforward once you get going:The Who
Those who benefit a lot: The companies that benefit from local search are typically those companies who sell something, such as a product or a service. Even if the work you do does not have to be local, you likely still have a local base (or many several local bases if you have several franchises). This local base is what you should include in your local listing. When someone is searching for something in the area, you will have a better chance of showing up in a Google SERP.Those who benefit a little bit: If you work completely online, you might not have a local store or local office. Even if you work from your home, it might be worth it to create a business listing for your company just to improve your visibility. You don’t have to put your home address, of course, but you can still fill out a description and upload photos.
Those who benefit very little: Those who do not benefit nearly as much are websites that aim strictly to educate. Many blogs fall into this category. It would be hard to earn a space on a local SERP if you don’t have a business that people will want to search for based on location. Few searchers are going to type in queries like "How to start creating a website in Chicago." Rather, they would type in something like “Company in Chicago to help start a website.” With that second query, it’s those companies that offer that service that would benefit from local results (falling under that first category of those who benefit from local search a lot).
The When
The cool thing about local search is the idea that you can get started anytime you have your website up and running. It’s best to start as soon as possible so you can start earning that authority and climbing to the top of local results (more on this later).The Why
As discussed above, local search is a way to connect with local customers faster. It positions local companies at the top of a SERP, which helps bring the competition down. It helps the web get a little bit smaller. Not only do you have a better chance of earning a top (or at least visible) spot on a relevant search, but you’ll also be connected with local customers. Local customers are more likely to opt for your company than customers across the country, so this audience is really where you want that visibility. Local search helps businesses make this happen.For example, our company Higher Visibility has a Google local listing that will pop up when anyone searches for something related to SEO in the Memphis area. We’ve earned several clients who have come from other places and were unhappy. They wanted something local so they could actually come in and speak with an account manager as opposed to over the phone, which was the only option they were given when working with almost all other companies.
The How
Getting started with local search is as easy as visiting the website, clicking "sign up," and following the directions. However, there are slight differences between all of the different local outlets (and as discussed above, try to remain active on all!). Below are the initial links you’ll need to click and get started, but for step-by-step guides, visit here.· Google Places
· Bing Places
· Yahoo Local
· Yelp
Google Places, Google+ Business Pages, and Google+ Local: a quick overview
This is one of the most confusing aspects of local search. SEOs and Google users all use the terms Google Places, Google+ Local, and Google+ Business Pages interchangeably, which has caused a great deal of confusion for businesses trying to get involved with local search. The truth is, a big part of the reason this is so confusing is because Google is currently undergoing several changes. Below is a brief overview of each of the terms that illustrates some of the changes occurring:Google Places:The information you include in a Google Places listing is the information that typically shows up on a Google SERP and the Google map; however the Google carousel has given Google+ a little bit more visibility (more on this later). When you create a Google Places listing, you will see a dashboard complete with all of the information from your listing such as hours of operation, description, photos, etc. This is the page you will verify by mail and where you can manage your AdWords efforts and business information.
Google+ Business Pages. Creating a Google+ Business page is all about the social features (think of it like a Facebook business page). It’s a page that you have specifically for your business on the social network where you can share your articles, connect with others in the industry, comment and engage with posts, etc. It has a post, about, photos, and videos tab.
Google+ Local. Here are where the changes come into play. Google has now revised their strategy to make things easier, so you can now manage your Google+ Business page within your Google Places dashboard. You must verify your Google+ Business page as well as your Google Places listing and then the two will combine to be managed in one place. You can visit here to see detailed instructions about verification. In the meantime, consider the below Search Engine Land screenshot that shows how you can manage both pages from the column on the left hand side:
Once you know why local search matters, understand some of the different Google terms, and setup your first business listing, the real fun begins—the optimization.
Optimizing for Local Search: Bing, Yahoo, Google, and Yelp optimization similarities
Plain and simple, understanding what optimization tactics work for all of the local platforms helps you get more bang for your SEO buck. Master the following optimization tactics and apply them to every business listing you own to help get you on your way:Complete all information including descriptions, hours of operation, etc
This should be a given, but many companies are still skimming over information that could be added on a business listing. Take the following two examples taken from Yelp. The company on the left has a business listing that’s okay, but the business listing in the right looks much better:The difference here is one entry is taking advantage of all the features available, while the other is not. The second entry has one photo and one review, so the listing has been claimed; it just hasn’t been optimized. A few examples include a business description, contact information, possibly a sample menu, a phone number and hours of operation, whether or not your company offers Wi-Fi, etc.
Add a great photo, or ten.
Even if your business isn’t one that takes a lot of photos (maybe you sit in what you think is a boring office), add a logo or picture of your team into your listing because the feature is available. People are attracted to photos, so part of optimizing your listing is going to be these photos. Consider the two automotive examples below from Yahoo Local. The photo on the left has great reviews, but it doesn’t just off the page because it’s lacking a photo. The listing on the right looks much more professional with four photo choices (not to mention they filled out all of their information!).Use keywords throughout your listings
Keyword usage works just as well for a business listing as it does your website. You want people and search engines to know what your page is all about, and keywords will help. Add in these keywords into your description and titles to help gain that edge over the competition. A note: The more content you have on your site, the easier the optimization (not to mention better usability for visitors).Local apps
With the growing use of smartphones around the world, local apps are also on the rise. In fact, a study by Pew Internet found that 74 percent of smartphone owners use location-based services. Part of optimizing your listing is being aware that people will be searching for your company on a local app. If you do pop-up, you need to make sure you have information that could help someone on the go (typically for restaurants or other companies that offer quick products like hair stylists, dry cleaning, etc). You need to do some research here.New landmarks on the local landscape
*Google Carousel: The Google carousel is a new initiative by Google that puts local results into a carousel format at the top of a SERP. According to studies by Ethical SEO and Local U, the majority of eyes went straight to that first entry on the left, in addition to the map. In other words, the organic results were secondary (remember that number one spot you usually want so bad?). Below is a screenshot from Search Engine Watch that details the study as well as a sample carousel shown for the query "pizza in Denver."*Rich Snippets: Rich snippets help your website jump off the page when it comes to a normal search, but they also work great when they reference a local place. According to Google, "by using structured markup to describe a business or organization mentioned on your page, you […] help Google surface your site in local search results." In other words, this is a great way to optimize your site. Rich snippets can be a photo of an author, a picture of food for recipes, videos, etc. Below is an example of a rich snippet using structured markup:
For those who are unfamiliar, structured markup is a way of labeling each piece of text on the page so that the search engine bots can understand your information more clearly. Sometimes things like date, phone number, address, etc. aren’t easy to read for search engine bots. You can learn more about getting started with structured markup specifically for local search here.
Get local!
Do you have a business listing on any or all of the local channels discussed above? What have you found to be an optimization tactic not to miss? Let us know your story and your thoughts in the comments below.
Photo Credit: localsurgemedia.net
This article was posted in wordtracker by Amanda DiSilvestro
The New World of Page Ranking
Google, and search engines in general, used to act as a
one-size-fits-all format. If person A and person B both searched for
“best chocolate in the world,” it used to be both individuals would see
the same list of rankings. Now we live in a world of customization,
where Google’s results reflect not just the search terms and keywords
used, but the complex personalization derived from a given user’s full
interaction with the suite of Google products. Since Google, and search
engines in general, are truly trying to give searchers exactly what they
want, the process has seen a genesis of customization.
One-size-fits-all no longer applies.
If your sole focus as a company investing in SEO is to see a high Google page rank, stop the obsession – now. High rankings don’t equate to a stellar business profile; revenues do. And now that page rankings are becoming varied, it’s much less reliable to equate a high ranking to full-scale success. So putting all your eggs in one proverbial basket is not only risky, it’s now completely illogical.
What should you focus on? Quality traffic, quality content, and a quality user experience. Yes, rankings factor in here, there’s no doubt about it, but it isn’t a means to an end. Quality is. That’s what will keep users returning, again and again. And since not all of your visitors are likely sent via a search engine, it’s time to consider the whole enchilada, and stop worrying about what Google might think.
The Role of Customized Search Results
Let’s say I’m an employee at a place called Company SEO. It’s safe to say I’m probably visiting that company’s web site often, and using related search terms on a frequent basis. If I do so while logged in to my Gmail account, or any other Google tool, this correlation begins to become apparent. It’s therefore more likely that if I search for a keyword or term targeted by Company SEO, I will see its results rank higher, as Google has correctly determined I am interested in what that company/author has to say.
Google’s results cannot be quantified in any meaningful manner. We’re seeing fewer and fewer ranking reports as a result. The rankings you see in any given search are not just based on the keywords — Google also incorporates your location, service provider, previous search history, and various other personal factors. Since we can’t predict a given user’s customization, it’s crazy these days to fully focus on a high SEO ranking.
Anyone who has traveled recently can attest to this shift. Search for “best chocolate in the world” in San Francisco and you’ll see a different set of results than if you’re traveling in Sweden. The point is, you can’t control rankings in the way we’d all like to anymore, so it’s time to shift focus.
Make Traffic and Conversions Your Top Priorities
This is not a call for all to give up the SEO game. It’s just a matter of adjusting how you approach the goals. By moving your emphasis to quality and consistency, you’ll still be aiming for the highest rankings, but in a manner that will yield better results.
Traffic and conversion rates are your best SEO friends, because they make the most of whatever ranking you are currently achieving. The more you capitalize on your traffic, the more retention and loyalty you’ll achieve, and customers will keep coming back. For instance, a site with high page rankings won’t maintain that status for long if they develop a high bounce rate. You can send 10,000 visitors to your site per day via Google, but if you can’t convert those into revenue generating visits, the eyeballs are costing you cash, not the other way around.
Generate Quality Traffic
As with everything in this world, quality trumps quantity. What you’re after are targeted links and referrals full of visitors that are truly after what you offer. Your marketing strategy no doubt contains a myriad of efforts to generate these quality visits. To really be a player in SEO these days, these campaigns should involve the following:
Pay attention to your analytics so you can understand where your site is succeeding and failing with regards to visits and conversions. Ascertain where the bulk of your traffic truly comes from (here’s a clue: it’s not always from Google) and adjust the list above accordingly. It may be that local listings or even offline strategies trump search in terms of what works best for your specific needs.
The point is simple: in the last few years, page rankings have become the Holy Grail, and it’s time to stop obsessing over a top page ranking. You can’t begin to control rankings from a personalization perspective, so stop losing sleep over your own ranking ebbs and flows. Instead, focus on the data you can control – namely traffic and conversions. If you’re aces at converting high percentages of your site’s visitors, you’re on a winning streak. It’s not a matter of being #1 for a search term, but in making your customers and visitors happy.
Original From SPN
The New World of Page Ranking
If your sole focus as a company investing in SEO is to see a high Google page rank, stop the obsession – now. High rankings don’t equate to a stellar business profile; revenues do. And now that page rankings are becoming varied, it’s much less reliable to equate a high ranking to full-scale success. So putting all your eggs in one proverbial basket is not only risky, it’s now completely illogical.
What should you focus on? Quality traffic, quality content, and a quality user experience. Yes, rankings factor in here, there’s no doubt about it, but it isn’t a means to an end. Quality is. That’s what will keep users returning, again and again. And since not all of your visitors are likely sent via a search engine, it’s time to consider the whole enchilada, and stop worrying about what Google might think.
The Role of Customized Search Results
Let’s say I’m an employee at a place called Company SEO. It’s safe to say I’m probably visiting that company’s web site often, and using related search terms on a frequent basis. If I do so while logged in to my Gmail account, or any other Google tool, this correlation begins to become apparent. It’s therefore more likely that if I search for a keyword or term targeted by Company SEO, I will see its results rank higher, as Google has correctly determined I am interested in what that company/author has to say.
Google’s results cannot be quantified in any meaningful manner. We’re seeing fewer and fewer ranking reports as a result. The rankings you see in any given search are not just based on the keywords — Google also incorporates your location, service provider, previous search history, and various other personal factors. Since we can’t predict a given user’s customization, it’s crazy these days to fully focus on a high SEO ranking.
Anyone who has traveled recently can attest to this shift. Search for “best chocolate in the world” in San Francisco and you’ll see a different set of results than if you’re traveling in Sweden. The point is, you can’t control rankings in the way we’d all like to anymore, so it’s time to shift focus.
Make Traffic and Conversions Your Top Priorities
This is not a call for all to give up the SEO game. It’s just a matter of adjusting how you approach the goals. By moving your emphasis to quality and consistency, you’ll still be aiming for the highest rankings, but in a manner that will yield better results.
Traffic and conversion rates are your best SEO friends, because they make the most of whatever ranking you are currently achieving. The more you capitalize on your traffic, the more retention and loyalty you’ll achieve, and customers will keep coming back. For instance, a site with high page rankings won’t maintain that status for long if they develop a high bounce rate. You can send 10,000 visitors to your site per day via Google, but if you can’t convert those into revenue generating visits, the eyeballs are costing you cash, not the other way around.
Generate Quality Traffic
As with everything in this world, quality trumps quantity. What you’re after are targeted links and referrals full of visitors that are truly after what you offer. Your marketing strategy no doubt contains a myriad of efforts to generate these quality visits. To really be a player in SEO these days, these campaigns should involve the following:
- Organic search
- Paid search
- External links, from articles, bloggers, news sites, etc.
- Press releases and other PR efforts
- Social signals from Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, etc.
- Local map listings
- Online advertising
- Direct traffic via offline strategies
Pay attention to your analytics so you can understand where your site is succeeding and failing with regards to visits and conversions. Ascertain where the bulk of your traffic truly comes from (here’s a clue: it’s not always from Google) and adjust the list above accordingly. It may be that local listings or even offline strategies trump search in terms of what works best for your specific needs.
The point is simple: in the last few years, page rankings have become the Holy Grail, and it’s time to stop obsessing over a top page ranking. You can’t begin to control rankings from a personalization perspective, so stop losing sleep over your own ranking ebbs and flows. Instead, focus on the data you can control – namely traffic and conversions. If you’re aces at converting high percentages of your site’s visitors, you’re on a winning streak. It’s not a matter of being #1 for a search term, but in making your customers and visitors happy.
Original From SPN
The New World of Page Ranking
How Your Visitors (Unknowingly) Send Quality Signals to Google
Since the initial launch of Google’s Panda update in 2011, the “Q”
word has become commonplace in SEO, copywriting and content marketing
circles. We should have been paying attention to quality from the
beginning (who wants to be known for publishing junk?). Now, more than
ever, it appears Google is looking to our visitors to judge whether our
site’s pages are worthy of rankings.
In one of its first posts about the original Panda update, Google’s Official Blog stated, “This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites – sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful.”
It goes on to talk about rewarding sites with quality content. Those two statements alone beg the question: how does Google judge quality?
Several months after Panda launched, Google provided a 23-point checklist with a bit of insight… questions they’ve been asking to determine which sites offer quality content/copy and which don’t.
Words like “trust,” “authority,” “value,” “share,” “expert” and “comfortable” appear numerous times on the list in relation to quality sites. On the other hand, we find repeated mentions of terms including “redundant,” “errors,” “mass-produced” and “excessive” when talking about low-quality sites.
Being a search engine, Google uses robots (bits of software) to travel around the ‘Net and gather information about billions of websites every day. While there is a human quality team at Google, they are only spot-checking sites – not evaluating every single one.
How Do You Train a Robot to Assess Quality?
By relying (at least partially) on quality signals from site visitors.
Wordtracker’s own Mark Nunney has done an excellent job with his Panda Update Survival Guide where (among other things) he points out several metrics Google may watch to determine the quality of a site’s content. Among these are:
And these signals are communicated to Google in the form of:
“It’s really hard to say for sure, but my feeling is that somehow Google is able to tell if a user gets to a page from search and then can’t easily find exactly what it was they were looking for (based on their Google search query) that it’s a negative signal to Google. They possibly can tell when a user clicks around a site a number of times and then comes back to the Google search results and tries another site. With the sheer number of sites using Google Analytics these days and Google’s Webmaster Tools, it seems that they can pretty easily gather this information.”
What else do you do, as a site visitor, when you find content that hits the nail on the head? Frequently, you might share it with others. This leads to social signals that Google could use to determine quality.
Video shares from YouTube, indicators from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and more show up in your Google Analytics account. This offers proof to Google that your content was well thought of and shared with others.
Take a look through your site’s copy and the content of your blog. Are they up to par? Measure your pages against the criteria in Google’s Panda checklist and Wordtracker’s Panda Survival Guide. Do you see any of the problems I mentioned above? Make a list of action steps you need to take in order to improve questionable areas.
The Panda update is a permanent part of Google for the foreseeable future. Taking some time now to fix issues can save you lots of headaches and rank reductions in the future.
Karon Thackston in SPN
How Your Visitors (Unknowingly) Send Quality Signals to Google
In one of its first posts about the original Panda update, Google’s Official Blog stated, “This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites – sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful.”
It goes on to talk about rewarding sites with quality content. Those two statements alone beg the question: how does Google judge quality?
Several months after Panda launched, Google provided a 23-point checklist with a bit of insight… questions they’ve been asking to determine which sites offer quality content/copy and which don’t.
Words like “trust,” “authority,” “value,” “share,” “expert” and “comfortable” appear numerous times on the list in relation to quality sites. On the other hand, we find repeated mentions of terms including “redundant,” “errors,” “mass-produced” and “excessive” when talking about low-quality sites.
Being a search engine, Google uses robots (bits of software) to travel around the ‘Net and gather information about billions of websites every day. While there is a human quality team at Google, they are only spot-checking sites – not evaluating every single one.
How Do You Train a Robot to Assess Quality?
By relying (at least partially) on quality signals from site visitors.
Wordtracker’s own Mark Nunney has done an excellent job with his Panda Update Survival Guide where (among other things) he points out several metrics Google may watch to determine the quality of a site’s content. Among these are:
- duplicate content in high quantities
- low amounts of original content
- page content not matching the Google snippet in the SERPs
- unnatural language (over-optimization) of copy/content (also a Penguin issue)
- boilerplate content
And these signals are communicated to Google in the form of:
- high bounce rates
- low time on page
- low time on site
- how soon (if ever) you return.
“It’s really hard to say for sure, but my feeling is that somehow Google is able to tell if a user gets to a page from search and then can’t easily find exactly what it was they were looking for (based on their Google search query) that it’s a negative signal to Google. They possibly can tell when a user clicks around a site a number of times and then comes back to the Google search results and tries another site. With the sheer number of sites using Google Analytics these days and Google’s Webmaster Tools, it seems that they can pretty easily gather this information.”
What else do you do, as a site visitor, when you find content that hits the nail on the head? Frequently, you might share it with others. This leads to social signals that Google could use to determine quality.
Video shares from YouTube, indicators from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and more show up in your Google Analytics account. This offers proof to Google that your content was well thought of and shared with others.
Take a look through your site’s copy and the content of your blog. Are they up to par? Measure your pages against the criteria in Google’s Panda checklist and Wordtracker’s Panda Survival Guide. Do you see any of the problems I mentioned above? Make a list of action steps you need to take in order to improve questionable areas.
The Panda update is a permanent part of Google for the foreseeable future. Taking some time now to fix issues can save you lots of headaches and rank reductions in the future.
Karon Thackston in SPN
How Your Visitors (Unknowingly) Send Quality Signals to Google
How PR Affects SEO
In the old days of SEO, the impact of PR on page rankings was rather
straightforward: It was all about building links. A good PR strategy
centered around the goal of enticing just about anyone on the web to
link to the company’s site and/or press release.
Today’s campaigns are in large part much more complex, thanks to Google’s ever-evolving algorithms. The current reality is that Google cares about the quality of content and credibility over a sheer volume of links and keywords. PR strategies must now cleverly incorporate the social stratosphere as well, leaving the two departments of SEO and Public Relations in a prime place to work together.
Successful SEO revolves around stellar content, and successful PR equates to an enviable network. Since SEO needs that network to thrive and PR needs great content to have something to crow about, the marriage of these two disciplines is now a no-brainer.
Networking and Citations: The Keys to Success
Many companies focus PR around two main areas: press releases and social signals. Both are critical to generating word of mouth, links, and overall buzz, but at the heart of success lies the quality of your network.
The first priority of any PR professional should always be networking. If your digital rolodex consists of a myriad professionals in your industry, with credibility and author rank galore, you are off to the races. It’s of course ideal to have journalists at national publications like The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times on your list, but this just isn’t realistic for many. That’s OK; what’s most important is that your network be brimming with experts in your niche that will favorably plug your site through targeted citations, press releases, and related content. Credibility is absolutely paramount.
In the world of SEO, Google has increasingly placed more emphasis on author rank, and less on keywords. Why? Keywords can be manipulated, and author credibility far less so. If a journalist with a significant readership who consistently blogs about fashion trends writes about your online jewelry store, you’ve acquired an ally worth far more than a bundle of less-relevant links or mentions.
The Power of a Press Release
Once you have a network of trusted and credible professionals (which admittedly is a never-ending task), it’s time to master the art of the press release. Ted Ives from Search Engine Land intelligently outlines why putting the cart (press release) before the horse (your network) is an unwise idea:
“Let me start by saying that a press release written, issued and leveraged properly, can result in word-of-mouth, articles paraphrasing the release, and at a minimum, at least some backlinks. But, a press release alone will get much less exposure than one coupled with outreach to individual journalists and bloggers directly prior to issuing it.”
In other words, don’t just launch a press release and hope the content is so engaging that the links will just start flooding in. Be proactive about engaging your network before launching your your campaign, and incentivize them to spread the word.
Writing an SEO-Friendly Press Release
One could write for hours about press release best practices for writing headlines, placing keywords, calculating reader drop-off rates, and crafting the ideal headline length, but these are really elements where practice helps make perfect for your specific brand and message. Instead, let’s go over the critical elements of a successful press release, especially as it relates to SEO.
First and foremost, think long and hard about the topics you deem worthy for a press release. Ensure they are truly newsworthy, and will be seen as valuable and interesting to folks outside of your immediate company’s sphere. There are many good reasons to send a press release, including website launch announcements, new products or services, executive hires and bios, survey or case study releases, and/or new corporate partnerships.
Make sure your headline clearly defines the key problem or benefit, or your SEO needle won’t move an inch. The headline of your press release is in many ways even more important than the content itself; not just for SEO, but to engage your network in linking back to you, and entice readers to go deeper. A subheading should further emphasize the point.
A great press release almost always includes credible quotes from related professionals too. The higher up (or well-known) the party with the quote is on the food chain or company you are discussing, the more credible the citation will be, to both readers and Google.
Remember to include a press kit or link to images and artwork. If you want others to link back to you, they may require company logos and the like to do so; make this as easy as possible for your network. Finally, ensure your company’s privacy policy, terms of use, contact information, executive listings, and other related information is current and accurate on your respective websites and release. This sounds like a small thing, but mistakes happen more often than you’d think, and for both credibility and SEO reasons, it’s an abysmal error.
Why PR and SEO Experts Should Work Together
As critical as it is to write a brilliant press release every time, it’s obvious that fine-tuning individual pieces of content is by itself a shortsighted strategy. PR pros should also be working hard to maximize their company’s website and social reach. SEO these days revolves around a user-friendly, content-rich website experience, so combining the analytical mind of an SEO whiz and the social, networking mind of a PR guru is a match made in digital heaven. Incorporating PR into SEO strategies is a tactic most companies are currently not utilizing.
PR Newswire VP Sarah Skerik puts it this way:
“In most cases I’ve seen thinking about SEO starts and ends with the optimization of a particular message, with the goal of getting the press release itself to rank in search engines. In reality, we should be thinking about how to help our brands’ web sites rank, not individual messages. PR sells itself short when the focus on results is too narrow.”
The moral of the story is simple: PR and SEO go hand-in-hand. Because they each adhere to the same three critical strategies – links, social signals, and citations/author rank – professionals from both disciplines should absolutely strategize together. SEO rankings don’t reach high levels without scads of social mentions, nor do PR campaigns. The same is true for link building and for creating a credible network of quotes and citations. By considering the big picture before you launch a press release or SEO tactic, you improve your chances for both areas to enjoy another bite of scrumptious success.
Tell us about your experience with press releases and your SEO success or failure in the comments section.
From sitepronews
How PR Affects SEO
Today’s campaigns are in large part much more complex, thanks to Google’s ever-evolving algorithms. The current reality is that Google cares about the quality of content and credibility over a sheer volume of links and keywords. PR strategies must now cleverly incorporate the social stratosphere as well, leaving the two departments of SEO and Public Relations in a prime place to work together.
Successful SEO revolves around stellar content, and successful PR equates to an enviable network. Since SEO needs that network to thrive and PR needs great content to have something to crow about, the marriage of these two disciplines is now a no-brainer.
Networking and Citations: The Keys to Success
Many companies focus PR around two main areas: press releases and social signals. Both are critical to generating word of mouth, links, and overall buzz, but at the heart of success lies the quality of your network.
The first priority of any PR professional should always be networking. If your digital rolodex consists of a myriad professionals in your industry, with credibility and author rank galore, you are off to the races. It’s of course ideal to have journalists at national publications like The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times on your list, but this just isn’t realistic for many. That’s OK; what’s most important is that your network be brimming with experts in your niche that will favorably plug your site through targeted citations, press releases, and related content. Credibility is absolutely paramount.
In the world of SEO, Google has increasingly placed more emphasis on author rank, and less on keywords. Why? Keywords can be manipulated, and author credibility far less so. If a journalist with a significant readership who consistently blogs about fashion trends writes about your online jewelry store, you’ve acquired an ally worth far more than a bundle of less-relevant links or mentions.
The Power of a Press Release
Once you have a network of trusted and credible professionals (which admittedly is a never-ending task), it’s time to master the art of the press release. Ted Ives from Search Engine Land intelligently outlines why putting the cart (press release) before the horse (your network) is an unwise idea:
“Let me start by saying that a press release written, issued and leveraged properly, can result in word-of-mouth, articles paraphrasing the release, and at a minimum, at least some backlinks. But, a press release alone will get much less exposure than one coupled with outreach to individual journalists and bloggers directly prior to issuing it.”
In other words, don’t just launch a press release and hope the content is so engaging that the links will just start flooding in. Be proactive about engaging your network before launching your your campaign, and incentivize them to spread the word.
Writing an SEO-Friendly Press Release
One could write for hours about press release best practices for writing headlines, placing keywords, calculating reader drop-off rates, and crafting the ideal headline length, but these are really elements where practice helps make perfect for your specific brand and message. Instead, let’s go over the critical elements of a successful press release, especially as it relates to SEO.
First and foremost, think long and hard about the topics you deem worthy for a press release. Ensure they are truly newsworthy, and will be seen as valuable and interesting to folks outside of your immediate company’s sphere. There are many good reasons to send a press release, including website launch announcements, new products or services, executive hires and bios, survey or case study releases, and/or new corporate partnerships.
Make sure your headline clearly defines the key problem or benefit, or your SEO needle won’t move an inch. The headline of your press release is in many ways even more important than the content itself; not just for SEO, but to engage your network in linking back to you, and entice readers to go deeper. A subheading should further emphasize the point.
A great press release almost always includes credible quotes from related professionals too. The higher up (or well-known) the party with the quote is on the food chain or company you are discussing, the more credible the citation will be, to both readers and Google.
Remember to include a press kit or link to images and artwork. If you want others to link back to you, they may require company logos and the like to do so; make this as easy as possible for your network. Finally, ensure your company’s privacy policy, terms of use, contact information, executive listings, and other related information is current and accurate on your respective websites and release. This sounds like a small thing, but mistakes happen more often than you’d think, and for both credibility and SEO reasons, it’s an abysmal error.
Why PR and SEO Experts Should Work Together
As critical as it is to write a brilliant press release every time, it’s obvious that fine-tuning individual pieces of content is by itself a shortsighted strategy. PR pros should also be working hard to maximize their company’s website and social reach. SEO these days revolves around a user-friendly, content-rich website experience, so combining the analytical mind of an SEO whiz and the social, networking mind of a PR guru is a match made in digital heaven. Incorporating PR into SEO strategies is a tactic most companies are currently not utilizing.
PR Newswire VP Sarah Skerik puts it this way:
“In most cases I’ve seen thinking about SEO starts and ends with the optimization of a particular message, with the goal of getting the press release itself to rank in search engines. In reality, we should be thinking about how to help our brands’ web sites rank, not individual messages. PR sells itself short when the focus on results is too narrow.”
The moral of the story is simple: PR and SEO go hand-in-hand. Because they each adhere to the same three critical strategies – links, social signals, and citations/author rank – professionals from both disciplines should absolutely strategize together. SEO rankings don’t reach high levels without scads of social mentions, nor do PR campaigns. The same is true for link building and for creating a credible network of quotes and citations. By considering the big picture before you launch a press release or SEO tactic, you improve your chances for both areas to enjoy another bite of scrumptious success.
Tell us about your experience with press releases and your SEO success or failure in the comments section.
From sitepronews
How PR Affects SEO
5 crazy SEO mistakes not to make in WordPress
There’s a nasty rumor going around that WordPress is beautifully set
up for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) “out of the box.” Now don’t get
me wrong - I’m a huge fan of WordPress - but the core software does need
a little nudge in the right direction when it comes to SEO. Tom Ewer
from ManageWP.
In reality, if your idea of optimizing your WordPress stops at hitting Publish on your latest post, you’re missing out on a lot of potential. But even those of you who feel that you are doing quite a lot in terms of onsite optimization are probably making at least one of the following mistakes (I know I certainly have done in the past).
So take a few moments to digest the following common SEO mistakes made by WordPress users - I’ll be offering straightforward solutions to each one!
But that’s not all there is to sitemaps. They can also be used to supply additional information about your website (such as how often you expect pages to be updated) and meta data relating to specific media types (such as the running time of a video). And if you are running a new site or one with only a handful backlinks pointing towards it, a sitemap can make a big difference in enabling Google to discover and index all of the relevant pages on your website.
In simple terms, a sitemap is simply a specifically formatted list of the pages on your site that you would like to be indexed by the search engines. You could create one manually if you like carrying out jobs that can be automated with ease. Otherwise I have a couple of suggestions:
Google XML Sitemaps: with over ten million downloads and an average rating of 4.7 out of 5, you can rest assured that this free plugin gets the job done.
WordPress SEO by Yoast: this free plugin has a number of SEO-related functions, one of which is an excellent XML sitemap generator.
The process of building an updating a sitemap is almost entirely automated. You set a few options as you see fit then let the plugin do the rest. Google says that “[most] webmasters will benefit from sitemap submission, and in no case will you be penalized for it.” With that in mind, why wouldn’t you create a sitemap for your WordPress website?
This is what you need to know about WordPress taxonomies: if categories are your table of contents, tags are your index When people try to tell me that tags are useless, I ask them of how many non-fiction books they have read that don’t have an index (I just checked five on my bookshelf and discovered that only one of them doesn’t).
Conscientious categorization and tagging of your posts will not only make it easier for visitors to find what they want (assuming of course you create an Archives page that makes accessing categories and tags simple) but it will also boost your onsite SEO. While Google may not rank category and tag pages high in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) (although it certainly does happen), it will be able to get a much better grasp on the keywords that are most relevant to your site by examining them.
Let me give you an example. Say for instance you run a site about zoo animals which has a particular focus on llamas. If you have a tag page for llamas that links to various pages and has various pages linking back to it, that is a strong indicator to Google that llamas are kind of a big deal on your site.
If you want to know more about how to categorize and tag effectively, click here
This is essentially a three step process:
But I’m not here to talk about social media strategization. Instead I want to focus on the concept of Google+ authorship and how it can be utilized to strengthen your position in the SERPs and boost click through rates.
If you’ve not heard of Google+ authorship before, you’ve almost certainly seen it. Every search result in Google that incorporates a profile photo of the author is an example. Astonishingly, that little photo has been proven to boost clickthrough rates in the SERPs by 150%. Further, an experiment by Cyrus Shepard from Moz resulted in an additional 56% increase in clickthroughs. In short, by incorporating Google+ authorship on your site, you can attract more search engine traffic with the same rankings.
Getting Google to verify your authorship is not an entirely straightforward process but it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes and will subsequently offer you ongoing benefits. In short, it’s well worth doing. My favorite tutorial is by WPBeginner
It is borne out of an ignorance of the importance of what searchers see on Google as opposed to simply where they see it. Although the placement of a website on the SERPs (ie, 1 - 10) is a key factor, people can often be drawn to lower rankings if the titles and/or descriptions are compelling. That is why you should optimize each of your posts to give yourself the best possible chance of attracting a good clickthrough rate.
There are two things that you should concern yourself with:
With that in mind, I’d love for you to share your wisdom in the comments section. What have you learned from your forays into the world of SEO that you think others will benefit from reading about? Fire away!
via wordtracker.com
5 crazy SEO mistakes not to make in WordPress
In reality, if your idea of optimizing your WordPress stops at hitting Publish on your latest post, you’re missing out on a lot of potential. But even those of you who feel that you are doing quite a lot in terms of onsite optimization are probably making at least one of the following mistakes (I know I certainly have done in the past).
So take a few moments to digest the following common SEO mistakes made by WordPress users - I’ll be offering straightforward solutions to each one!
1) Not Providing an XML Sitemap
Sitemaps are a way to tell Google about pages on your site we might not otherwise discover.I have a simple rule of thumb when it comes to learning new SEO strategies - if I hear it on the grapevine I take it with a hefty pinch of salt, but if I hear it from Google I take it as gospel. That’s why my position regarding sitemaps is simple: if Google says it helps them to find pages on your site that they may not otherwise discover, I’m going to give them one.
But that’s not all there is to sitemaps. They can also be used to supply additional information about your website (such as how often you expect pages to be updated) and meta data relating to specific media types (such as the running time of a video). And if you are running a new site or one with only a handful backlinks pointing towards it, a sitemap can make a big difference in enabling Google to discover and index all of the relevant pages on your website.
In simple terms, a sitemap is simply a specifically formatted list of the pages on your site that you would like to be indexed by the search engines. You could create one manually if you like carrying out jobs that can be automated with ease. Otherwise I have a couple of suggestions:
Google XML Sitemaps: with over ten million downloads and an average rating of 4.7 out of 5, you can rest assured that this free plugin gets the job done.
WordPress SEO by Yoast: this free plugin has a number of SEO-related functions, one of which is an excellent XML sitemap generator.
The process of building an updating a sitemap is almost entirely automated. You set a few options as you see fit then let the plugin do the rest. Google says that “[most] webmasters will benefit from sitemap submission, and in no case will you be penalized for it.” With that in mind, why wouldn’t you create a sitemap for your WordPress website?
2) Poor Categorization and Tagging
Few things bug me more than sites that do not utilize categories and tags (sometimes referred to collectively as taxonomies) properly. The simple fact is that categories and tags offer opportunities for increased engagement and traffic, but the bigger issue at hand is that poor use of categories and tags can actually persuade a visitor to leave your site.This is what you need to know about WordPress taxonomies: if categories are your table of contents, tags are your index When people try to tell me that tags are useless, I ask them of how many non-fiction books they have read that don’t have an index (I just checked five on my bookshelf and discovered that only one of them doesn’t).
Conscientious categorization and tagging of your posts will not only make it easier for visitors to find what they want (assuming of course you create an Archives page that makes accessing categories and tags simple) but it will also boost your onsite SEO. While Google may not rank category and tag pages high in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) (although it certainly does happen), it will be able to get a much better grasp on the keywords that are most relevant to your site by examining them.
Let me give you an example. Say for instance you run a site about zoo animals which has a particular focus on llamas. If you have a tag page for llamas that links to various pages and has various pages linking back to it, that is a strong indicator to Google that llamas are kind of a big deal on your site.
If you want to know more about how to categorize and tag effectively, click here
3) Not Defining Canonical URLs
If you have never heard about canonicalization before then brace yourself - it can be a slightly confusing concept. In order to define it effectively I will turn to Matt Cutts, Google’s Head of Search:Canonicalization is the process of picking the best URL when there are several choices, and it usually refers to home pages. For example, most people would consider these the same urls:Put simply, if you don’t tell Google and friends which version of a page to index and rank, they’re going to try to figure it out themselves. The last thing you want is search engines having to pick from multiple instances what is essentially the exact same page. The solution is to provide them with a canonical URL.
But technically all of these URLs are different. A web server could return completely different content for all them. When Google “canonicalizes” a URL, we try to pick the one that seems like the best representative from that set.
- www.example.com
- example.com/
- www.example.com/index.html
- example.com/home.asp
This is essentially a three step process:
- Tell WordPress how to present your site (i.e. http://www.yoursite.com/ or http://yoursite.com/).
- Tell Google (using Webmaster Tools) which URL type you want them to use.
- Use a plugin (such as the aforementioned WordPress SEO by Yoast) to ensure that canonical URLs are defined on each page of your site.
4) Not Optimizing Your Site for Google+ Authorship
Like it or not, Google+ is here to stay. You may be surprised to know that it is the second biggest social network behind Facebook, beating the likes of YouTube and Twitter.But I’m not here to talk about social media strategization. Instead I want to focus on the concept of Google+ authorship and how it can be utilized to strengthen your position in the SERPs and boost click through rates.
If you’ve not heard of Google+ authorship before, you’ve almost certainly seen it. Every search result in Google that incorporates a profile photo of the author is an example. Astonishingly, that little photo has been proven to boost clickthrough rates in the SERPs by 150%. Further, an experiment by Cyrus Shepard from Moz resulted in an additional 56% increase in clickthroughs. In short, by incorporating Google+ authorship on your site, you can attract more search engine traffic with the same rankings.
Getting Google to verify your authorship is not an entirely straightforward process but it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes and will subsequently offer you ongoing benefits. In short, it’s well worth doing. My favorite tutorial is by WPBeginner
5) Not Optimizing How Your Posts Look in the SERPs
This mistake is similar to the previous one regarding Google+ authorship, as it relates to your clickthrough rate in the SERPs.It is borne out of an ignorance of the importance of what searchers see on Google as opposed to simply where they see it. Although the placement of a website on the SERPs (ie, 1 - 10) is a key factor, people can often be drawn to lower rankings if the titles and/or descriptions are compelling. That is why you should optimize each of your posts to give yourself the best possible chance of attracting a good clickthrough rate.
There are two things that you should concern yourself with:
- The Meta Title: this is what will display on the SERPs in place of any headline you choose for the post onsite.
- The Meta Description: Google may choose to use this in place of an excerpt from your post (which can often be nothing more than a confusing mass of words).
What Mistakes Have You Made?
Let’s face it - we’re not perfect. If you haven’t made a few SEO blunders in your time then you’re simply not trying hard enough. In reality, this post could be called, “Top 5 SEO Mistakes I Have Made With WordPress.”With that in mind, I’d love for you to share your wisdom in the comments section. What have you learned from your forays into the world of SEO that you think others will benefit from reading about? Fire away!
via wordtracker.com
5 crazy SEO mistakes not to make in WordPress
Top 10 SEO mistakes
Over the past 13 years, Receptional
have carried out numerous SEO audits for a variety of clients’
websites. And in that time, we’ve seen it all. From poor website copy to
outrageous attempts to manipulate Google PageRank, I’ve whittled the
main offenders down to just ten.
Here are the top ten erroneous tactics on my SEO list of shame. Employ these at your website’s peril!
I can’t think of anything worse than poorly put together website copy. Website copy that is repeated over and over again just looks poor. I'm sure you hate to see bad website copy too.
Did you see what I did there? I’m not that bad a writer; I’m just making a point.
Keyword stuffing refers to the shady tactic of stuffing a web page full of words and phrases in an attempt to manipulate a site’s rankings in Google’s search results.
Repeating a word or phrase intentionally won’t boost your rankings. You’ll attract Google for sure, swiftly followed by a kick down the results pages.
Obviously anybody in their right mind would click a link that promised to make look 10 years younger, and then, argh! It’s broken!
Sites naturally accumulate broken links: however they’re a major nuisance to your visitors and Google doesn’t like them either. But, if they’re so natural, why does Google penalize you for them?
It’s because bad links will earn you a bad reputation. And people with online reputations aren't viewed as authorities on anything (apart from getting bad reputations, that is).
Anyway, Google downgrades rankings of sites with lots of issues like this, so don’t be a rebel without a cause. Do some regular housekeeping on your site.
When performing SEO audits for clients’ websites it’s common to find that another website has ripped off all of their original content. Or worse still, it’s the other way round.
Crafting unique, compelling copy can seem like a tall order. But stealing it from a competitor is not only illegal: Google can push your site so far down the rankings that no-one will ever find it, and in severe cases, de-index the whole website, so just don’t do it.
I’m talking about duplication within your own site, not stealing copy from other websites. Duplication happens in a number of forms so I’ve separated two of the most common types below.
Luckily these issues are easily solved, so don’t take an axe to your site just like that!
The most effective method to combat this is to implement 301 redirect rules from the lower quality pages to the preferred web page.
Sometimes CMSs (content management systems like Drupal and Joomla) auto-generate page titles, but that doesn’t mean you should let this continue. Many SEOs will tell you the title tag is one of the most important on-page SEO factors. Because it’s true!
Page titles should be unique and reflect the content of the web page so that:
This is the type of quality that you should focus your link building efforts on. Although it’s highly unlikely that I, a seven stone female, would be a good match for a heavyweight champion, it will be a lot easier for you to get a link from a credible source related to your industry.
Although links from quality sites are harder to get than links from directories, quantity should not be a substitute for quality. A link from an authoritative blog is more likely to boost your rankings and traffic than a couple of hundred links from low quality sources.
Meta keywords can be found in the header element in a website’s HTML code:
They’re an inadvertent way of publicizing your digital strategy to rivals who can take the keywords, input them into a pay per click campaign and steal your visits, so don't use them. Ever.
After you’ve implemented your terrible tactics, why not neglect to measure your website’s data?
Seriously, if you’re not measuring your website’s data then you cannot possibly have any business objectives. Surely you’ll want to know which areas of your site are performing well and not so well in order to grow and optimize your site better?
Setting up conversion goals and weekly reports are only the beginning. You’ll need to monitor which phrases are converting, rather than terms that are driving most traffic.
Make sure you have Google Analytics and Google Webmaster Tools configured to your website, so you’re able to analyze your data in specific detail.
Once you’ve built your website or blog, you’ll need to populate your pages with words that not only suit the purpose of your site and match the products you sell: they should also be the words that reflect what people actually type into search engines.
So if you’re a party planner, for example, you probably don’t want to describe yourself as an “organizer of social gatherings” on your site.
It may seem obvious to write website copy that will reflect your customers' vocabulary, but you’d be surprised how many companies try to rank for totally unrelated keywords. They’re either enormous fans of Magritte or they REALLY don’t want people to visit their site.
Aim to be as specific as possible. Using broad keywords may yield large amounts of visits but it may not be the type of traffic that converts.
In a video about basic SEO mistakes Cutts explains that if you make your content difficult for a search engine crawler to find, Google can't index it and won’t rank it.
By configuring Google and Bing Webmaster Tools to your site, accessibility to it is constantly monitored.
Discover all you need to know about Google spider
Creating cleverly phrased anchor text links is a coveted skill in the SEO world because they’re the main source of food for a search engine crawler.
Going from page to page, a crawler uses links as indicators of the theme of the pages it’s heading to – and how to rank them. So whenever I see click here used as an anchor text link, I see a wasted opportunity to build a link.
Tailoring your anchor text links to include keywords that you want to rank for can be tedious, and you’ll have to vary the pattern of anchor text so as to not attract suspicion from Google – but it’s something that you should definitely get into the habit of.
At Receptional we see all manner of errors including thin content, bought links and illogical navigation. All of these and more contribute to a poor user experience and low rankings.
If you think you may have committed crimes against SEO, Receptional can perform an SEO site audit to get your site performing better in organic search.
Original post in http://www.wordtracker.com
Top 10 SEO mistakes
Here are the top ten erroneous tactics on my SEO list of shame. Employ these at your website’s peril!
1 Keyword stuffing
I can’t think of anything worse than poorly put together website copy. Website copy that is repeated over and over again just looks poor. I'm sure you hate to see bad website copy too.
Did you see what I did there? I’m not that bad a writer; I’m just making a point.
Keyword stuffing refers to the shady tactic of stuffing a web page full of words and phrases in an attempt to manipulate a site’s rankings in Google’s search results.
Repeating a word or phrase intentionally won’t boost your rankings. You’ll attract Google for sure, swiftly followed by a kick down the results pages.
2 Broken links
A broken link is the name given to a hyperlink that no longer points to its intended destination. You’ve been won over by an article’s sales spiel and you’re desperate to see what’s on the other side of the link, like the example below:Obviously anybody in their right mind would click a link that promised to make look 10 years younger, and then, argh! It’s broken!
Sites naturally accumulate broken links: however they’re a major nuisance to your visitors and Google doesn’t like them either. But, if they’re so natural, why does Google penalize you for them?
It’s because bad links will earn you a bad reputation. And people with online reputations aren't viewed as authorities on anything (apart from getting bad reputations, that is).
Anyway, Google downgrades rankings of sites with lots of issues like this, so don’t be a rebel without a cause. Do some regular housekeeping on your site.
3 Copied copy
Do you remember instances from your school days when a student copied another student’s work? It was considered the sin of all sins. There were sharp intakes of breath when little Johnny cheats-a-lot stole Perfect-Pat-with-a-cherry-on-top’s work.When performing SEO audits for clients’ websites it’s common to find that another website has ripped off all of their original content. Or worse still, it’s the other way round.
Crafting unique, compelling copy can seem like a tall order. But stealing it from a competitor is not only illegal: Google can push your site so far down the rankings that no-one will ever find it, and in severe cases, de-index the whole website, so just don’t do it.
4 Duplicate content
I’m talking about duplication within your own site, not stealing copy from other websites. Duplication happens in a number of forms so I’ve separated two of the most common types below.
Luckily these issues are easily solved, so don’t take an axe to your site just like that!
4 Duplicate content that appears in more than one location
This type of duplication is detrimental to SEO, but often happens on large sites or ecommerce sites that have several pages listing the same set of products. Multiple pages with the same content present a search engine with a number of problems:- Which version should I retrieve for the search query?
- Which versions should I include/exclude from my indices?
- Which version should I direct the link juice to? Or should I just spread it across the variations?
The most effective method to combat this is to implement 301 redirect rules from the lower quality pages to the preferred web page.
Non unique title tags and meta descriptions
This is a repeat offender. I regularly see websites with the same page titles on many, if not all of their web pages.Sometimes CMSs (content management systems like Drupal and Joomla) auto-generate page titles, but that doesn’t mean you should let this continue. Many SEOs will tell you the title tag is one of the most important on-page SEO factors. Because it’s true!
Page titles should be unique and reflect the content of the web page so that:
- A search engine crawler can index it correctly
- It tells a searcher that your content is relevant to what they're looking for
- It makes sense and looks click-worthy in tweets
5 Links from non-credible sources
Links to your site are like votes of confidence. Imagine George Foreman telling you that you have a pretty good right hook. You’d feel like a champ. It’s a real compliment coming from someone who actually knows a thing or two about boxing.This is the type of quality that you should focus your link building efforts on. Although it’s highly unlikely that I, a seven stone female, would be a good match for a heavyweight champion, it will be a lot easier for you to get a link from a credible source related to your industry.
Although links from quality sites are harder to get than links from directories, quantity should not be a substitute for quality. A link from an authoritative blog is more likely to boost your rankings and traffic than a couple of hundred links from low quality sources.
6 Meta keyword tags
Webmasters who still use meta keywords are like someone insisting their nylon tracksuit is a credible fashion statement. At one point, long ago, search engine algorithms took meta keywords into account, but now they have a negligible impact on SEO.Meta keywords can be found in the header element in a website’s HTML code:
They’re an inadvertent way of publicizing your digital strategy to rivals who can take the keywords, input them into a pay per click campaign and steal your visits, so don't use them. Ever.
7. Avoiding analytics
After you’ve implemented your terrible tactics, why not neglect to measure your website’s data?
Seriously, if you’re not measuring your website’s data then you cannot possibly have any business objectives. Surely you’ll want to know which areas of your site are performing well and not so well in order to grow and optimize your site better?
Setting up conversion goals and weekly reports are only the beginning. You’ll need to monitor which phrases are converting, rather than terms that are driving most traffic.
Make sure you have Google Analytics and Google Webmaster Tools configured to your website, so you’re able to analyze your data in specific detail.
8. Not optimized with the right keywords
Once you’ve built your website or blog, you’ll need to populate your pages with words that not only suit the purpose of your site and match the products you sell: they should also be the words that reflect what people actually type into search engines.
So if you’re a party planner, for example, you probably don’t want to describe yourself as an “organizer of social gatherings” on your site.
It may seem obvious to write website copy that will reflect your customers' vocabulary, but you’d be surprised how many companies try to rank for totally unrelated keywords. They’re either enormous fans of Magritte or they REALLY don’t want people to visit their site.
Aim to be as specific as possible. Using broad keywords may yield large amounts of visits but it may not be the type of traffic that converts.
9 Not allowing your site to be crawled
Matt Cutts, Head of Search Spam at Google, recently cited this as one of the biggest mistakes people make when creating their websites.In a video about basic SEO mistakes Cutts explains that if you make your content difficult for a search engine crawler to find, Google can't index it and won’t rank it.
By configuring Google and Bing Webmaster Tools to your site, accessibility to it is constantly monitored.
Discover all you need to know about Google spider
10 Irrelevant anchor text links
Anchor text is the name given to the clickable hyperlink text on a web page.Creating cleverly phrased anchor text links is a coveted skill in the SEO world because they’re the main source of food for a search engine crawler.
Going from page to page, a crawler uses links as indicators of the theme of the pages it’s heading to – and how to rank them. So whenever I see click here used as an anchor text link, I see a wasted opportunity to build a link.
Tailoring your anchor text links to include keywords that you want to rank for can be tedious, and you’ll have to vary the pattern of anchor text so as to not attract suspicion from Google – but it’s something that you should definitely get into the habit of.
Additional SEO mistakes
These terrible SEO tactics are by no means ranked in order of consequence – nor is the list exhaustive.At Receptional we see all manner of errors including thin content, bought links and illogical navigation. All of these and more contribute to a poor user experience and low rankings.
If you think you may have committed crimes against SEO, Receptional can perform an SEO site audit to get your site performing better in organic search.
Original post in http://www.wordtracker.com
Top 10 SEO mistakes
20 Useful and Convenient SEO Tools
Doing your websites SEO is a
constant battle and a constant hassle. Everybody wants to hit the top
spot and everybody is trying their best to come up with a new way of
ramping their website up the search engine results.
Many times the tools we use for SEO are helpful in some way, but a lot
of the time they are just fun. We spend so much time playing with and
tinkering with our websites that it is fun to see a few vital statistics about it. It is fun to see where your website ranks in America, or how many of your web pages have search engine friendly redirects. Here are few tools that will raise a dry smile as well as help you to optimize your SEO efforts.
1 – Mixxr : This tool will help you to see where you stand on the search engine results pages and will show you who the other major players are in the game. The results are formatted in a very convenient manner.
Mixxr
2 – SEOmoz’s Term Extractor : You can use this to scan your site. It will then show you the keywords that are being used in your website the most. Just because a word appears with a higher frequency does not make it one of your keywords, but there is a good chance that Google will think that it is.
SEOmoz’s Term Extractor
3 – Google FeedBurner : You can manage your RSS feeds with this tool. It enables you to keep track of the blogs that you may wish to link from. You can also find feed stats and other things to optimize your own RSS feed searches.
Google FeedBurner
4 – Yahoo! Site Explorer : You can see how many links are pointing at your website with this tool. It is good for seeing how well your link building campaign is going, and good for seeing which links you have installed/made were actually followed by the search engines.
Yahoo! Site Explorer
5 – HubSpot Website Grader : You may have to grade your website at some point and there are a lot of tools to choose from. This tool is a good starting point. It will show you a few of the SEO things you need to consider if you are going to improve your websites grade.
HubSpot Website Grader
6 – Google Toolbar : You can use this to check the rank of your website and see its PageRank. It uses Google‘s PageRanking algorithm and shows you how good and how optimized your page really is in the eyes of this massive search engine.
Google Toolbar
7 – Google Alerts : People do not understand the beauty of this system. Yeah you can use it to look for blogs and apps on certain topics, or you can use it to point out whenever a blog post runs on your website’s topic so you can link from it.
Google Alerts
8 – Google Webmaster tools : Here you can find all of the tools that you need to run your websites SEO campaign, but you can find them under one roof (so to speak), with the added benefit that they are free to use.
Google Webmaster tools
9 – Google Analytics : This is one of the best and free online metric measuring systems ever. It will correctly measure up to one hundred pages for things such as page views, numbers of visitors, number of clicks, etc. It is free with no obligation to buy further services to improve its performance.
Google Analytics
10 – SEOmoz : This is another SEO tool that you can use to check up on the SEO effect of your website and then improve the SEO of your website. It is good for SEO research and for SEO analysis tasks.
SEOmoz
11 – Instant Domain Search : This tool will give you an Ajax-y interface that will allow you to brainstorm a lot of domain names in very quick succession. It is very good if you already have a basic idea of what domain name you desire.
Instant Domain Search
12 – Caphyon Advanced Web Ranking : This is an SEO ranking tool that will show you how good your SEO really is, and show you ways that you may improve it. The websites itself boasts that thousands of webmasters use this tool to improve their websites SEO.
Caphyon Advanced Web Ranking
13 – GetListed : This will show you the local search engine results pages for the relevant traffic regarding your website. You can improve your online presence with the help of this little tool.
GetListed
14 – TweetMeme Retweet Button : You can use this to Tweet and Re-Tweet content, which is good if you are trying to gain a little SEO boost through social media marketing. You can Tweet and Re-tweet your content that has your links on it.
TweetMeme Retweet Button
15 – Yahoo! YSlow : This is a Firefox add-on you can use to view web page and websites. It will show you information regarding bandwidths and bottle necks of the sites you look at. You can then speed up your website with the information you find.
Yahoo! YSlow
16 – Facebook Share Button : This is going to help you to convince other people to share your content on Facebook. If it has a link to your website then it may have an SEO boost within it that will help to rank your web pages up the search engines a little more.
Facebook Share Button
17 – Google AdWords Keyword Tool : You can use this tool to find some really great keywords for your website and affiliate adverts. It gives you a massive suggestion of keywords if you enter one or two first to get it started. It also shows you how popular some of the words are too.
Google AdWords Keyword Tool
18 – The Web Robots Pages : Adding a robots.txt file into your root directory is not going to boost your website rankings. But when you run your SEO analysis the tools will tell you that you don’t have a robots.txt file, and so this will help remove that annoyance.
The Web Robots Pages
19 – Google Insights for Search : This has actually merged with Google trends now to show you search patterns stretched over a number of months or years. It also tells you where some keywords are the most popular.
Google Insights for Search
20 – SEO Book : This is a Firefox tool you can use to see what sort of rank that the website you are looking at has at the moment. It also tells you things such as page age and incoming links. Just the usual junk that people doing SEO want to know.
SEO Book
Written by Sonia Jackson. in http://idealtechblog.com
20 Useful and Convenient SEO Tools
Top On-Site SEO Strategies to Raise Your Rankings
Effective SEO inherently encompasses two main areas of execution:
Off-site efforts that include things like link building and media relations, and on-site tactics that include every nuance your content must embrace to garner Google’s attention. You can have scads of fantastic off-site SEO techniques, but you won’t achieve the rankings you dream of without equally stellar on-site strategies.
So what are the core things your site must display in order to rank well? Read on for all the details.
On-Site SEO Basics
Great SEO strategies always start with the basics. Without a few core site elements, no amount of crafty marketing will ever boost your ranking.
Here are the on-site must-haves:
1) XML SiteMap – Your site needs to have a XML sitemap that displays all your content pages in a format search engine bots can read. This page should already exist in the root directory of your site, but if it doesn’t, you can use tools like the XML Sitemap Generator to create one quickly and easily.
2) Robots.txt – While you’re at it, double check that your site has a Robots.txt file in the root directory as well (look for yourwebsitename.com/robots.txt). This is a file invisible to your visitors, but it communicates to search bots what pages on your site should be indexed.
3) 404 Error Pages – It’s quite all right for users to occasionally hit a 404 error page on your site, but it’s not OK for this page to be generic and create a dead end. Error pages should be customized with your logo, have playful text and images to lessen the disappointment, and include links to other potentially relevant areas of your site. Include a search box as well so they may redirect their efforts to find what they’re looking for. If you don’t feature these options, users are likely to close the window and abort the visit all together. Not only will you lose valuable traffic, but search engines will also ding you for a poor user experience.
4) URL Structure – Search engines like Google love shorter, keyword rich slugs (the last portion of your URL.) Avoid URLs that are over 3 directories deep, as flatter slugs tend to index faster after the page is published. Shorter URLs are also a lot easier for users and bots to comprehend. The cardinal rule is no more than 100 characters for your URL, and 3-5 words for each page’s slug. Keep them descriptive, and avoid stop words like ‘in’, ‘a’, and ‘the’.
5) Page Titles – Each title on your site should be descriptive and concise. Titles need to communicate exactly what the page contains, in the shortest form possible. Optimal length is 70-100 characters, including spaces.
6) Headings – It’s also important to include headings (H1, H2, H3) on your site’s pages. These help to divide the content into coherent sections, providing more value to search bots trying to decipher the content. Headings should also include your page’s key terms, and while they don’t need to be as concise as the other components, they should still express topics in a somewhat brief manner.
7) Site Speed – Users and search engines love fast loading sites, so make sure your gorgeous content doesn’t have high file sizes that bog down load times. Use a free tool like GTmetrix to regularly test your site’s speed.
8) Meta Data and Rich Snippets – While it’s true that meta descriptions do not affect your rankings, they do help the click-through rates of your listing. Rich snippets and accurate meta descriptions increase your opportunity to get a visitor’s attention, and therefore should not be ignored.
Monitoring Your Site’s Success
Once you have the basics covered, and begin publishing quality content to your well-designed site, consistent monitoring of ranking changes is imperative. SEO is an ever-evolving process, so it’s important that you stay on top of your site’s rankings week to week.
For starters, create an account on both Google’s Webmaster Tools and Bing’s Webmaster Site. These will be your gateways into seeing the latest ranking results on each search engine. Once your account is created, you’ll need to formally submit your site’s XML sitemap. From here, you can monitor the latest rankings and gain access to webmaster tools to help increase your performance.
These days there are also dozens of excellent tools that help you monitor your search engine statuses and determine why your results might be less than optimal. Install a good crawler (SEOmoz is well-known and reputable) so you can track your changes, site errors, warnings, and other useful metrics on a daily or weekly basis.
Finally, make it a point to scan your site on Google each month to make sure it’s indexing all the pages you intend. To do so, type in [site:www.yourdomain.com] to the Google search box, and browse through the results. You should see all your site’s pages listed. Look for any warning boxes or missing results, as those are excellent clues that tell you changes are needed.
SEO Tactics for Site Updates
Websites are dynamic creations, and you will no doubt make scads of changes and additions over time. Be very methodical and thoughtful as you do so, however, because you can undo great SEO results by changing the data search engines see. As an example, if you change your site’s URL structure, it’s imperative that you update your XML sitemap, and set up redirects from the old to the new pages.
You should also be monitoring your site’s analytics on a weekly basis. These metrics will tell you tons about the performance of your best and worst pages, site speed, bounce rates, and repeat visit percentages. Tools like Google Analytics provide an invaluable sneak peek into the behavior of your visitors – use this data to help determine what changes are needed to increase conversion, visit lengths, and overall traffic.
You are now armed with an excellent starter course on creating fantastic on-site SEO results. By following all the basic structure protocols, and employing regular monitoring of your site’s performance (with a willingness to make changes as needed), you stand an excellent chance of achieving admiral rankings. Remember that nothing is as critical as the quality of your content, but applying these tactics along with a stellar, user-friendly website is your ticket to Google greatness.
A Post in SPN
Top On-Site SEO Strategies to Raise Your Rankings
Off-site efforts that include things like link building and media relations, and on-site tactics that include every nuance your content must embrace to garner Google’s attention. You can have scads of fantastic off-site SEO techniques, but you won’t achieve the rankings you dream of without equally stellar on-site strategies.
So what are the core things your site must display in order to rank well? Read on for all the details.
On-Site SEO Basics
Great SEO strategies always start with the basics. Without a few core site elements, no amount of crafty marketing will ever boost your ranking.
Here are the on-site must-haves:
1) XML SiteMap – Your site needs to have a XML sitemap that displays all your content pages in a format search engine bots can read. This page should already exist in the root directory of your site, but if it doesn’t, you can use tools like the XML Sitemap Generator to create one quickly and easily.
2) Robots.txt – While you’re at it, double check that your site has a Robots.txt file in the root directory as well (look for yourwebsitename.com/robots.txt). This is a file invisible to your visitors, but it communicates to search bots what pages on your site should be indexed.
3) 404 Error Pages – It’s quite all right for users to occasionally hit a 404 error page on your site, but it’s not OK for this page to be generic and create a dead end. Error pages should be customized with your logo, have playful text and images to lessen the disappointment, and include links to other potentially relevant areas of your site. Include a search box as well so they may redirect their efforts to find what they’re looking for. If you don’t feature these options, users are likely to close the window and abort the visit all together. Not only will you lose valuable traffic, but search engines will also ding you for a poor user experience.
4) URL Structure – Search engines like Google love shorter, keyword rich slugs (the last portion of your URL.) Avoid URLs that are over 3 directories deep, as flatter slugs tend to index faster after the page is published. Shorter URLs are also a lot easier for users and bots to comprehend. The cardinal rule is no more than 100 characters for your URL, and 3-5 words for each page’s slug. Keep them descriptive, and avoid stop words like ‘in’, ‘a’, and ‘the’.
5) Page Titles – Each title on your site should be descriptive and concise. Titles need to communicate exactly what the page contains, in the shortest form possible. Optimal length is 70-100 characters, including spaces.
6) Headings – It’s also important to include headings (H1, H2, H3) on your site’s pages. These help to divide the content into coherent sections, providing more value to search bots trying to decipher the content. Headings should also include your page’s key terms, and while they don’t need to be as concise as the other components, they should still express topics in a somewhat brief manner.
7) Site Speed – Users and search engines love fast loading sites, so make sure your gorgeous content doesn’t have high file sizes that bog down load times. Use a free tool like GTmetrix to regularly test your site’s speed.
8) Meta Data and Rich Snippets – While it’s true that meta descriptions do not affect your rankings, they do help the click-through rates of your listing. Rich snippets and accurate meta descriptions increase your opportunity to get a visitor’s attention, and therefore should not be ignored.
Monitoring Your Site’s Success
Once you have the basics covered, and begin publishing quality content to your well-designed site, consistent monitoring of ranking changes is imperative. SEO is an ever-evolving process, so it’s important that you stay on top of your site’s rankings week to week.
For starters, create an account on both Google’s Webmaster Tools and Bing’s Webmaster Site. These will be your gateways into seeing the latest ranking results on each search engine. Once your account is created, you’ll need to formally submit your site’s XML sitemap. From here, you can monitor the latest rankings and gain access to webmaster tools to help increase your performance.
These days there are also dozens of excellent tools that help you monitor your search engine statuses and determine why your results might be less than optimal. Install a good crawler (SEOmoz is well-known and reputable) so you can track your changes, site errors, warnings, and other useful metrics on a daily or weekly basis.
Finally, make it a point to scan your site on Google each month to make sure it’s indexing all the pages you intend. To do so, type in [site:www.yourdomain.com] to the Google search box, and browse through the results. You should see all your site’s pages listed. Look for any warning boxes or missing results, as those are excellent clues that tell you changes are needed.
SEO Tactics for Site Updates
Websites are dynamic creations, and you will no doubt make scads of changes and additions over time. Be very methodical and thoughtful as you do so, however, because you can undo great SEO results by changing the data search engines see. As an example, if you change your site’s URL structure, it’s imperative that you update your XML sitemap, and set up redirects from the old to the new pages.
You should also be monitoring your site’s analytics on a weekly basis. These metrics will tell you tons about the performance of your best and worst pages, site speed, bounce rates, and repeat visit percentages. Tools like Google Analytics provide an invaluable sneak peek into the behavior of your visitors – use this data to help determine what changes are needed to increase conversion, visit lengths, and overall traffic.
You are now armed with an excellent starter course on creating fantastic on-site SEO results. By following all the basic structure protocols, and employing regular monitoring of your site’s performance (with a willingness to make changes as needed), you stand an excellent chance of achieving admiral rankings. Remember that nothing is as critical as the quality of your content, but applying these tactics along with a stellar, user-friendly website is your ticket to Google greatness.
A Post in SPN
Top On-Site SEO Strategies to Raise Your Rankings
Top 40 SEO Myths You Should Know About
Myth #1: Only the First Rank Matters
Many ebooks and other resources that business owners use will place an important emphasis on the need to be at the top of search results, whether that be on Google Search, other engines, or even in places like social media. But surveys have shown that people quite often will look at other results and they will scroll down through the page. Being on top of a second page, for example, can be quite beneficial for traffic. Also, search ranking is only one part of the puzzle. Now Google places other results on the page like social recommendations and local results as well, which means there are many more avenues open to you, and being in first place is no longer as crucial as it once was.
Myth #2: You can do SEO Without Outside Help
Doing SEO simply means that you follow a set of techniques and procedures to improve the chance that web users will go to your site. It is true that anybody can learn these techniques, and, if you are a web site owner and you want to do your own SEO, then you can spend the time to learn and apply those techniques. But SEO can be complex and touches many areas such as marketing online, coding, technical aspects and PR skills. Most business owners simply do not have everything required to do a great job at SEO, and that is why so many agencies exist that offer help. An IT worker or online marketer is often not enough if you want truly good results.
Myth #3: META Tags are Very Important
It used to be that every page on your site needed Meta tags in order to rank well. Those are small pieces of code that would give Google a list of keywords and a description. The search engine would use those to find out what your web site was about. Now however, those do not affect your ranking at all. Both Google and Bing stopped caring about META tags awhile back. However, Meta tags are not useless. For example, the description tag is the text that often appears next to the link that shows up in the search results, so it still serves a useful function.
Myth #4: Keyword-Rich Domain Names are Ranked Higher
Back in the dotcom days, it used to be that the URL you used was very important. Google placed a lot of importance on the domain name, and if you could get a name that had your keyword in it, you would gain a big advantage over other sites. This is why a lot of companies in the late 90′s bought domain names for a lot of money. But now, the indexing process only looks at the actual content of your pages, and not the domain name. The domain name is still important, because people still get to see it, but it will not give you a higher rank.
Myth #5: You have to Submit Your Site to Google or Other Search Engines
All search engines used to have URL submission forms where you could send your site to Google and others. In fact, they still do, but that process is unnecessary. The crawlers that these engines use now are sophisticated enough that any new site will be found in a matter of days, if not hours. The only time you would have to worry about submitting your site is if for some reason it was not indexed automatically after a couple of days.
Myth #6: Submitting a Sitemap will Boost Your Rankings
Google offers a webmaster interface and from there, you can submit a sitemap, which is a XML file containing links to every page on your site. Some site owners take the time to submit such a file every time they make a change, but that is not necessary. Submitting a sitemap does not change your rankings. All it does is add pages which may not have been indexed already. If your site is typical and has links to all your pages, then it is not needed.
Myth #7: SEO has Nothing to do with Social Media
Before the advent of Facebook and Twitter, SEO was the one and only technique to get traffic in an organic way. But now, social media is everywhere, and the line is quickly blurring between the two. While some marketers still consider SEO and social media to be different beasts, the truth is that they are very closely linked. For example, Google now places their own social network, Google Plus, into its search results. If you can get enough influential people to talk about your product and link to your site, then their recommendations will show up in any Google search result that their friends do. This clearly affects SEO. On the flip side, Facebook has also entered search, by recently introducing their Open Graph engine, which searches based on friends and interests. So the two spheres are closely linked, and they are becoming closer all the time.
Myth #8: Google does not read CSS Files
The Google bot used to be fairly primitive and only saw text, which is why many people concentrated on the text part of their web site. But now that engine is very sophisticated and reads JavaScript, CSS, and more. The crawler can definitely see whether your site’s presentation is appealing to users or not. For example, if someone searches on a mobile device and you have no mobile layout on your site, you may be missing out.
Myth #9: You Need to Update Your Home Page All the Time
Some people think that by updating their home page content all the time they will rank higher, or by not updating it their ranking will drop. In most cases that is not the case, because if you have a sales page that offers a product, then there would be no reason to update that page unless something about the product changes, and Google expects that.
Myth #10: The H1 Header has Greater Value than the Rest of Your Text
The structure of your page is seen by Google and other engines, but you have to realize that many sites are structured very differently. As such, no one specific tag has more value than another. An H1 tag is simply a header that corresponds to a CSS entry in order for the user to see your page a certain way. It does not make Google rank your page any differently if you use H2 tags instead, or if your keywords are mostly in the text and not in a specific CSS tag.
Myth #11: Linking to Other Highly Ranked Sites Helps Your Ranking
Some sites try to link to many other high authority sites in order to help their rankings, but that does not help at all. Google uses PageRank to decide how your site will rank, and that algorithm is based on how useful your site is to others, and as such it will only look at how many other people link to you. Whether you link back to them is of no importance. Otherwise, any site could rise to the top simply by linking to millions of sites, which is simply not the case.
Myth #12: Using Automated SEO Methods is Always Spam
Many people use automated SEO methods that do not fall into the spam area. Many companies have very big sites and they use automated scripts to do a lot of the grunt work of SEO. Whether or not a method is spammy is based on what the result is, not on how automated it is.
Myth #13: PageRank is the Only Factor that Matters
The algorithm that Google uses to rank sites is PageRank, which determines how useful a site is to others. But according to Google, search result rankings are also affected by hundreds of other inputs. Some of these inputs are easy to see, like having your site being recommended by others on Google Plus. This proves that not only PageRank matters. The company is staying tight-lipped on how many inputs there are and how important each is, but it is clear that there is more going on than just PageRank. With that said however, it is still widely believed that PageRank is the most important factor, and a PR10 page is always better than a PR3 page.
Myth #14: The Title Tag is Hidden from Search Engines
Most of what Google sees on your site is the text that is visible to users, such as what appears on the screen and is rendered in a web browser. As such, it would be easy to think that the title is not picked up. However, your title is very important for SEO, because it is the text that appears on the link people will click on. Not only is Google using it to help your ranking, but people will also see it when they go to click on your site.
Article by Mikhail Tuknov. Infatex.com
Top 40 SEO Myths You Should Know About
Many ebooks and other resources that business owners use will place an important emphasis on the need to be at the top of search results, whether that be on Google Search, other engines, or even in places like social media. But surveys have shown that people quite often will look at other results and they will scroll down through the page. Being on top of a second page, for example, can be quite beneficial for traffic. Also, search ranking is only one part of the puzzle. Now Google places other results on the page like social recommendations and local results as well, which means there are many more avenues open to you, and being in first place is no longer as crucial as it once was.
Myth #2: You can do SEO Without Outside Help
Doing SEO simply means that you follow a set of techniques and procedures to improve the chance that web users will go to your site. It is true that anybody can learn these techniques, and, if you are a web site owner and you want to do your own SEO, then you can spend the time to learn and apply those techniques. But SEO can be complex and touches many areas such as marketing online, coding, technical aspects and PR skills. Most business owners simply do not have everything required to do a great job at SEO, and that is why so many agencies exist that offer help. An IT worker or online marketer is often not enough if you want truly good results.
Myth #3: META Tags are Very Important
It used to be that every page on your site needed Meta tags in order to rank well. Those are small pieces of code that would give Google a list of keywords and a description. The search engine would use those to find out what your web site was about. Now however, those do not affect your ranking at all. Both Google and Bing stopped caring about META tags awhile back. However, Meta tags are not useless. For example, the description tag is the text that often appears next to the link that shows up in the search results, so it still serves a useful function.
Myth #4: Keyword-Rich Domain Names are Ranked Higher
Back in the dotcom days, it used to be that the URL you used was very important. Google placed a lot of importance on the domain name, and if you could get a name that had your keyword in it, you would gain a big advantage over other sites. This is why a lot of companies in the late 90′s bought domain names for a lot of money. But now, the indexing process only looks at the actual content of your pages, and not the domain name. The domain name is still important, because people still get to see it, but it will not give you a higher rank.
Myth #5: You have to Submit Your Site to Google or Other Search Engines
All search engines used to have URL submission forms where you could send your site to Google and others. In fact, they still do, but that process is unnecessary. The crawlers that these engines use now are sophisticated enough that any new site will be found in a matter of days, if not hours. The only time you would have to worry about submitting your site is if for some reason it was not indexed automatically after a couple of days.
Myth #6: Submitting a Sitemap will Boost Your Rankings
Google offers a webmaster interface and from there, you can submit a sitemap, which is a XML file containing links to every page on your site. Some site owners take the time to submit such a file every time they make a change, but that is not necessary. Submitting a sitemap does not change your rankings. All it does is add pages which may not have been indexed already. If your site is typical and has links to all your pages, then it is not needed.
Myth #7: SEO has Nothing to do with Social Media
Before the advent of Facebook and Twitter, SEO was the one and only technique to get traffic in an organic way. But now, social media is everywhere, and the line is quickly blurring between the two. While some marketers still consider SEO and social media to be different beasts, the truth is that they are very closely linked. For example, Google now places their own social network, Google Plus, into its search results. If you can get enough influential people to talk about your product and link to your site, then their recommendations will show up in any Google search result that their friends do. This clearly affects SEO. On the flip side, Facebook has also entered search, by recently introducing their Open Graph engine, which searches based on friends and interests. So the two spheres are closely linked, and they are becoming closer all the time.
Myth #8: Google does not read CSS Files
The Google bot used to be fairly primitive and only saw text, which is why many people concentrated on the text part of their web site. But now that engine is very sophisticated and reads JavaScript, CSS, and more. The crawler can definitely see whether your site’s presentation is appealing to users or not. For example, if someone searches on a mobile device and you have no mobile layout on your site, you may be missing out.
Myth #9: You Need to Update Your Home Page All the Time
Some people think that by updating their home page content all the time they will rank higher, or by not updating it their ranking will drop. In most cases that is not the case, because if you have a sales page that offers a product, then there would be no reason to update that page unless something about the product changes, and Google expects that.
Myth #10: The H1 Header has Greater Value than the Rest of Your Text
The structure of your page is seen by Google and other engines, but you have to realize that many sites are structured very differently. As such, no one specific tag has more value than another. An H1 tag is simply a header that corresponds to a CSS entry in order for the user to see your page a certain way. It does not make Google rank your page any differently if you use H2 tags instead, or if your keywords are mostly in the text and not in a specific CSS tag.
Myth #11: Linking to Other Highly Ranked Sites Helps Your Ranking
Some sites try to link to many other high authority sites in order to help their rankings, but that does not help at all. Google uses PageRank to decide how your site will rank, and that algorithm is based on how useful your site is to others, and as such it will only look at how many other people link to you. Whether you link back to them is of no importance. Otherwise, any site could rise to the top simply by linking to millions of sites, which is simply not the case.
Myth #12: Using Automated SEO Methods is Always Spam
Many people use automated SEO methods that do not fall into the spam area. Many companies have very big sites and they use automated scripts to do a lot of the grunt work of SEO. Whether or not a method is spammy is based on what the result is, not on how automated it is.
Myth #13: PageRank is the Only Factor that Matters
The algorithm that Google uses to rank sites is PageRank, which determines how useful a site is to others. But according to Google, search result rankings are also affected by hundreds of other inputs. Some of these inputs are easy to see, like having your site being recommended by others on Google Plus. This proves that not only PageRank matters. The company is staying tight-lipped on how many inputs there are and how important each is, but it is clear that there is more going on than just PageRank. With that said however, it is still widely believed that PageRank is the most important factor, and a PR10 page is always better than a PR3 page.
Myth #14: The Title Tag is Hidden from Search Engines
Most of what Google sees on your site is the text that is visible to users, such as what appears on the screen and is rendered in a web browser. As such, it would be easy to think that the title is not picked up. However, your title is very important for SEO, because it is the text that appears on the link people will click on. Not only is Google using it to help your ranking, but people will also see it when they go to click on your site.
Article by Mikhail Tuknov. Infatex.com
Top 40 SEO Myths You Should Know About
The Reasons Your SEO is Failing
If you listen closely, you can almost hear the lamented cries of
business owners across the globe every day as they watch their search
engine rankings crash and burn. Too often those who are the most sincere
and determined do not see their efforts come to fruition, and this
usually transpires in a fit of confusion. If you are one of the many
perplexed and frustrated online entrepreneurs trying to understand why
your SEO efforts keep falling flat, read on and take an honest look at
which of your decisions cause Google to send you to the back of the
line.
1) A Website That Can’t Convert
Before you dive into link sharing, keywords and various other external tactics, it’s crucial that you first examine what’s not working with your own website. All the clever SEO tricks in the world won’t move your revenues if your site fails to convert visitors. So before you throw all your efforts into rankings and traffic, first ensure your website is ready to welcome the masses. If your current conversion rate is lackluster, targeted marketing efforts will only expose this all the more. Make sure navigation is intuitive, your homepage is compelling and informative, there are no content dead ends or other bad user experiences, and that your ecommerce experience is fluid and flawless.
This may seem like common sense, but it’s staggering how many business owners don’t realize their problems start at home. If you have a website worth shouting about, only then is it time to call in the marketing hounds.
2) Doing Everything Yourself
It’s tempting to take on SEO (and just about every other role) yourself when you’re stepping into an entrepreneurial position, but think twice if you want professional results. You likely know already that the world of SEO is complex and extremely dynamic. Staying on top of trends and your own site’s current rankings is a huge undertaking. Those who do SEO halfway get results to match, so as soon as it is possible, hire a consultant or staff member that spends at least half their day focused on your SEO and social marketing efforts. You’ve got many other aspects of your business to manage.
3) Using Outdated Strategies
Another sure-fire way to decrease your rankings is to follow archaic strategies. According to a recent report from RivalIQ, over 50% of companies still use meta keyword tags, even though Google has not used them in their algorithms for years. Not only is this a waste of time, but it also publicly reveals your keyword strategies to your competitors. This is further evidence that you shouldn’t own SEO responsibilities yourself, unless you are aces at staying on top of trends.
4) You’re Not Playing Nice with Others
Many business owners are hesitant to link to other sites for fear they are sending traffic to their competitors. While it is essential to choose your link share partners wisely, building content in a silo will not get search engines to notice you. Google and company like businesses that clearly play well with others, so targeted links to and from your site are essential to great SEO. Likewise, as we recently emphasized in a separate article on link sharing, if you’re linking to any site that has shady partners of any kind (spammers, link builders with no content, etc.) you, too, will be punished. So play nice, but choose your partners wisely.
5) Guessing at Your Keywords
Most site owners work hard at predicting which keywords their customers will most likely use to find their site. While a little guesswork is necessary pre-launch, it is far more important to watch and see how traffic finds you once you’re live. Failure to optimize your content and keyword strategy based upon these real-world results will definitely cripple your ranking efforts. Most SEO tools have a “search in reverse” function – make this your best friend once your site is live.
Even better, integrate your tool with your analytics source (like Google Analytics), so you can see how well your site is optimized for the keywords that are driving traffic. Don’t assume you know the best keywords for your content. It’s a game of psychology, ultimately, and your users will tell you how they are attempting to find your content. The key is to listen, and respond accordingly.
Achieving envy-worthy search engine rankings requires the perfect marriage of a great website, stellar content and savvy marketing tactics. Failure to excel in any of these areas will not produce top tier results. Typically, business people who are most frustrated about their lackluster search rankings are focusing too much on one area, and are not embracing the need for balance. Google’s ultimate goal with all their algorithms and best practices is to give their users the best possible experience when they search for anything on the web. So your first step is to make sure your site does just that.
Once you have the confidence that what you have created is top-shelf, then (and only then) is it time to get the attention you deserve. Results-oriented SEO is not about magic tricks and pixie dust – it’s about stellar content and smart, honest marketing and connecting. Without this balance, Google will continue to look right past you.
Article by Tina Courtney-Brown in SPN
The Reasons Your SEO is Failing
1) A Website That Can’t Convert
Before you dive into link sharing, keywords and various other external tactics, it’s crucial that you first examine what’s not working with your own website. All the clever SEO tricks in the world won’t move your revenues if your site fails to convert visitors. So before you throw all your efforts into rankings and traffic, first ensure your website is ready to welcome the masses. If your current conversion rate is lackluster, targeted marketing efforts will only expose this all the more. Make sure navigation is intuitive, your homepage is compelling and informative, there are no content dead ends or other bad user experiences, and that your ecommerce experience is fluid and flawless.
This may seem like common sense, but it’s staggering how many business owners don’t realize their problems start at home. If you have a website worth shouting about, only then is it time to call in the marketing hounds.
2) Doing Everything Yourself
It’s tempting to take on SEO (and just about every other role) yourself when you’re stepping into an entrepreneurial position, but think twice if you want professional results. You likely know already that the world of SEO is complex and extremely dynamic. Staying on top of trends and your own site’s current rankings is a huge undertaking. Those who do SEO halfway get results to match, so as soon as it is possible, hire a consultant or staff member that spends at least half their day focused on your SEO and social marketing efforts. You’ve got many other aspects of your business to manage.
3) Using Outdated Strategies
Another sure-fire way to decrease your rankings is to follow archaic strategies. According to a recent report from RivalIQ, over 50% of companies still use meta keyword tags, even though Google has not used them in their algorithms for years. Not only is this a waste of time, but it also publicly reveals your keyword strategies to your competitors. This is further evidence that you shouldn’t own SEO responsibilities yourself, unless you are aces at staying on top of trends.
4) You’re Not Playing Nice with Others
Many business owners are hesitant to link to other sites for fear they are sending traffic to their competitors. While it is essential to choose your link share partners wisely, building content in a silo will not get search engines to notice you. Google and company like businesses that clearly play well with others, so targeted links to and from your site are essential to great SEO. Likewise, as we recently emphasized in a separate article on link sharing, if you’re linking to any site that has shady partners of any kind (spammers, link builders with no content, etc.) you, too, will be punished. So play nice, but choose your partners wisely.
5) Guessing at Your Keywords
Most site owners work hard at predicting which keywords their customers will most likely use to find their site. While a little guesswork is necessary pre-launch, it is far more important to watch and see how traffic finds you once you’re live. Failure to optimize your content and keyword strategy based upon these real-world results will definitely cripple your ranking efforts. Most SEO tools have a “search in reverse” function – make this your best friend once your site is live.
Even better, integrate your tool with your analytics source (like Google Analytics), so you can see how well your site is optimized for the keywords that are driving traffic. Don’t assume you know the best keywords for your content. It’s a game of psychology, ultimately, and your users will tell you how they are attempting to find your content. The key is to listen, and respond accordingly.
Achieving envy-worthy search engine rankings requires the perfect marriage of a great website, stellar content and savvy marketing tactics. Failure to excel in any of these areas will not produce top tier results. Typically, business people who are most frustrated about their lackluster search rankings are focusing too much on one area, and are not embracing the need for balance. Google’s ultimate goal with all their algorithms and best practices is to give their users the best possible experience when they search for anything on the web. So your first step is to make sure your site does just that.
Once you have the confidence that what you have created is top-shelf, then (and only then) is it time to get the attention you deserve. Results-oriented SEO is not about magic tricks and pixie dust – it’s about stellar content and smart, honest marketing and connecting. Without this balance, Google will continue to look right past you.
Article by Tina Courtney-Brown in SPN
The Reasons Your SEO is Failing
Top SEO Plugins for WordPress Sites
If you run one of the 70 million websites built with WordPress, you
are likely concerned about SEO, and overwhelmed by your options. These
days, there is no shortage of plugins built to assist with SEO and
social sharing, but it’s hard to find the gems in a sea of widget
madness. Read on for advice on which are truly helpful in boosting your
search engine efforts!
WordPress SEO Basics
Before you start installing a plethora of plugins, you’ll want to tackle a few basic SEO tasks on your WordPress site. These are must-haves for Google-friendly sites, and are a great place to start your strategy.
1) Map Out Your Site’s Structure
All you need to create an easy to follow site flowchart is a great MindMap tool. Mind42 makes an excellent one, and it’s totally free too. The tool will help you create a site guide that compartmentalizes navigation sections and lets you see a snapshot of the entire flow.
2) Setup Your Permanent URL Structure
First, set your preferred permalinks format in the WordPress settings; you’ll have several options to choose from, but none are completely SEO friendly. To rectify this, download the WP No Category Plugin, which will then remove the <word>/category sections of your URLs. This makes them clean, concise, and keyword rich.
3) Specify Which Folders Can and Cannot Be Crawled
Chances are there will be sections of your site that you would rather not allow search engines access to. To manage this process, create a Robots.txt file in the top-level directory of your site. For full instructions on how to add one to your site, visit the ‘Robots.txt how-to guide’ (http://www.robotstxt.org/ robotstxt.html). Once created, you can specify any folders that search engines will thereby ignore, and keep others from spying on this private content as well. It’s also a great solution for hiding duplicate content. Don’t forget that users can still access the pages through the direct URL.
4) Create a Sitemap
Many of the tools listed below will help you quickly generate a sitemap. When this is complete, don’t forget to submit it to Google Webmaster Tools and Bing Webmaster Tools as a request to start crawling your content.
The Best WordPress SEO Plugins for Wordpress
1) SEO Ultimate
This puppy is a meta data powerhouse, with access to controls for descriptions and keywords, Google Webmaster Verification, and integration with Google Analytics. If you have a lot of pages with separate titles, Ultimate will help you manage all this data with ease.
2) Local Search SEO Contact Page
Perfect for those just beginning their quest for great SEO, Local Search allows you to add all business information to your site’s contact page, and will also include an embedded Google map, which links to your Google+ Local account.
3) WordPress by Yoast
Yoast helps determine what your current SEO score is, and in tandem, lets you monitor the areas that require some improvement. Yoast will let you know if your keywords are missing from title and H1 tags, and looks at your content and metadata too. This tool is rumored to be the most-used WordPress SEO plugin, and for good reason. It assists in setting up XML sitemaps, helps you map out all title and description templates, and truly enables you to stay on top of all the SEO must-do’s. If you only have one SEO plugin, this should be it. It’s regularly updated too, which is a big bonus.
Top SEO-Friendly Image and Content Tools for Wordpress
1) SEO Friendly Images
This plugin does exactly what you’d expect – ensures all your images have alt attributes, title tags and all other relevant search engine data. There’s also a premium version that unlocks a myriad SEO features, like XML sitemap generators and custom settings.
2) SEO Content Control
If you’ve got a lot of content on your site, you need this tool to help you identify the weakest links. Options for SEO Content Control include viewing a list of all pages/posts that have lackluster (too short) text, missing meta data, and missing keywords.
Must-Have Analytics Plugins for Wordpress
1) SEO Rank Reporter
Rank Reporter is an awesome tool that allows you to monitor your Google ranking through your WordPress dashboard, and it’s updated every three days. This plugin will help you assess if and when more SEO improvements are needed. When your ranking slips, you can use the other tools to identify why this may have occurred, and then set out to address each one.
2) Google Analyticator
If you’re a fan of Google Analytics, download this plugin now and integrate the data directly into your WordPress dashboard. You’ll be able to view your top performing pages, referrers, and keywords, among many other invaluable metrics.
Top-Notch Social Plugins for Wordpress
1) Sociable
Sociable is a superior sharing plugin that is jam-packed with
customization options. It features an excellent default setup,
with the options to use all your own personal icons and images.
It’s super easy to connect to most WordPress themes, and makes
your social sites immediately accessible to your users.
2) Social Media Tabs
This one is a unique plugin that allows you to add a social media widget to your site in a tabbed format, showing data from your major social sites. It currently supports Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Google+, YouTube, Flickr, and RSS.
You are now armed with a gaggle of excellent, functional and easy-to-use WordPress SEO tools. Go forth and enjoy your increased rankings!
Article by Tina Courtney-Brown in SPN
Top SEO Plugins for WordPress Sites
WordPress SEO Basics
Before you start installing a plethora of plugins, you’ll want to tackle a few basic SEO tasks on your WordPress site. These are must-haves for Google-friendly sites, and are a great place to start your strategy.
1) Map Out Your Site’s Structure
All you need to create an easy to follow site flowchart is a great MindMap tool. Mind42 makes an excellent one, and it’s totally free too. The tool will help you create a site guide that compartmentalizes navigation sections and lets you see a snapshot of the entire flow.
2) Setup Your Permanent URL Structure
First, set your preferred permalinks format in the WordPress settings; you’ll have several options to choose from, but none are completely SEO friendly. To rectify this, download the WP No Category Plugin, which will then remove the <word>/category sections of your URLs. This makes them clean, concise, and keyword rich.
3) Specify Which Folders Can and Cannot Be Crawled
Chances are there will be sections of your site that you would rather not allow search engines access to. To manage this process, create a Robots.txt file in the top-level directory of your site. For full instructions on how to add one to your site, visit the ‘Robots.txt how-to guide’ (http://www.robotstxt.org/ robotstxt.html). Once created, you can specify any folders that search engines will thereby ignore, and keep others from spying on this private content as well. It’s also a great solution for hiding duplicate content. Don’t forget that users can still access the pages through the direct URL.
4) Create a Sitemap
Many of the tools listed below will help you quickly generate a sitemap. When this is complete, don’t forget to submit it to Google Webmaster Tools and Bing Webmaster Tools as a request to start crawling your content.
The Best WordPress SEO Plugins for Wordpress
1) SEO Ultimate
This puppy is a meta data powerhouse, with access to controls for descriptions and keywords, Google Webmaster Verification, and integration with Google Analytics. If you have a lot of pages with separate titles, Ultimate will help you manage all this data with ease.
2) Local Search SEO Contact Page
Perfect for those just beginning their quest for great SEO, Local Search allows you to add all business information to your site’s contact page, and will also include an embedded Google map, which links to your Google+ Local account.
3) WordPress by Yoast
Yoast helps determine what your current SEO score is, and in tandem, lets you monitor the areas that require some improvement. Yoast will let you know if your keywords are missing from title and H1 tags, and looks at your content and metadata too. This tool is rumored to be the most-used WordPress SEO plugin, and for good reason. It assists in setting up XML sitemaps, helps you map out all title and description templates, and truly enables you to stay on top of all the SEO must-do’s. If you only have one SEO plugin, this should be it. It’s regularly updated too, which is a big bonus.
Top SEO-Friendly Image and Content Tools for Wordpress
1) SEO Friendly Images
This plugin does exactly what you’d expect – ensures all your images have alt attributes, title tags and all other relevant search engine data. There’s also a premium version that unlocks a myriad SEO features, like XML sitemap generators and custom settings.
2) SEO Content Control
If you’ve got a lot of content on your site, you need this tool to help you identify the weakest links. Options for SEO Content Control include viewing a list of all pages/posts that have lackluster (too short) text, missing meta data, and missing keywords.
Must-Have Analytics Plugins for Wordpress
1) SEO Rank Reporter
Rank Reporter is an awesome tool that allows you to monitor your Google ranking through your WordPress dashboard, and it’s updated every three days. This plugin will help you assess if and when more SEO improvements are needed. When your ranking slips, you can use the other tools to identify why this may have occurred, and then set out to address each one.
2) Google Analyticator
If you’re a fan of Google Analytics, download this plugin now and integrate the data directly into your WordPress dashboard. You’ll be able to view your top performing pages, referrers, and keywords, among many other invaluable metrics.
Top-Notch Social Plugins for Wordpress
1) Sociable
Sociable is a superior sharing plugin that is jam-packed with
customization options. It features an excellent default setup,
with the options to use all your own personal icons and images.
It’s super easy to connect to most WordPress themes, and makes
your social sites immediately accessible to your users.
2) Social Media Tabs
This one is a unique plugin that allows you to add a social media widget to your site in a tabbed format, showing data from your major social sites. It currently supports Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Google+, YouTube, Flickr, and RSS.
You are now armed with a gaggle of excellent, functional and easy-to-use WordPress SEO tools. Go forth and enjoy your increased rankings!
Article by Tina Courtney-Brown in SPN
Top SEO Plugins for WordPress Sites
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