Image by ocean.flynn via FlickrAfter reading out the title you may have guessed , I would talk about search engine optimization.But in this post I would not say a word about it. I would not talk of keyword research or anchor text optimization or anything else about SEO. Instead I will talk of how you can apply SEO techniques to get more hits (not high search engine rankings).There is some difference between getting more hits and getting high search engine rankings.You will unfold the difference between the two somewhere in the following paragraphs.
Optimizing just your home page is biggest mistake-
I have seen many bloggers who have optimized their homepage quite well but if you take a look at inner pages they are poorly optimized.Even the best of your keywords can't drive loads of traffic if you have just optimized your main page.To drive more traffic from search engines you need to optimize many of your pages. Just create many entry points to enter your blog.
Let us take an example. Suppose you have one page beautifully optimized and it gets 50 visitors per day from search engines.50 visitors from one page is impressive ,isn't it?But since you have just one optimized page , you will not be able to go beyond that number. Will you? Now what happens if you have 10 such optimized pages.Do the simple maths and calculate.You will get 500 visitors and what if you have 50 optimized pages.My god!!! you have thousands of visitor just from search engines.....
So, the first lesson is optimize SOME OF YOUR inner pages apart from your home-page.
Optimizing all your pages is not easy (possible) either-
To succeed as a blogger you have to update your blog frequently, means, you have to write daily ,right? Right!! So, you are already in a pressure of writing daily and once you start optimizing each of your pages ,you will feel additional pressure. The pressure of doing keyword researches and building links for all your posts.
But all SEO experts told you to optimize your all pages, isn't it? Ok ,they are right. But they write for all the pages on internet and they most importantly write for websites which are not updated as frequently as blogs. So, a website owner can afford to optimize all of his/her pages but same can't be said about blogs.
So, What the hell should I do to drive traffic through search engines-
From above paragraphs it is clear that you can't drive traffic by optimizing just your home page and optimizing all your pages is not possible. So, the big question is - What you should do to drive traffic to your blog from search engines?
Here comes the secret-
Classify your blog pages into three tiers or strata. Your home page comprise the first strata ,some of your long, tutorial type posts (pillar posts) will come in the second strata and short posts and newsy posts in the third strata. I have shown this in the figure below.
Once you have classified your posts ,focus your attention on tier-1 and tier-2, that is, your homepage and your pillar posts.Optimize these two tiers with best keywords and get some links for them. Make sure all your pillar posts are accessible from your homepage and all relevant pillar posts exchange links between themselves.
So, what is the use of tier-3? Well, tier-3 (the short articles and newsy items) are just meant to provide internal links for your home page and your pillar posts. They feed your important posts with links without getting link from them.Thus, your pillar posts get one-way internal links from these posts. Isn't this cool.
If you write a pillar post each week, you will have 24 posts in six months and if you can manage to write two, you will have 48 pillar posts.If you can optimize all these posts you will create 48 entry points for your blog. Another good news , you will have a lot of newsy items or short posts to get your pillar posts linked.
Does creating entry points drives more traffic to blogs-
In the first paragraph i have said, "there is difference between getting more hits and getting high search engine rankings."I know you are getting confused here because you have been told that higher ranks mean more hits.OK let me clarify the things.
Let us suppose you are in the top ten (1st page) for a term in google results page.Well, you have 10 other sites to compete with even if you are in top ten for your targeted keyword. Furthermore, these competitors are often the toughest one.I know you can still get some traffic competing with them but my point is to leverage your high rankings to get maximum you can get from search engines.
How can I do this?
You have to simply focus your attention on search snippet. A search snippet looks something like this-
You can see here, a search snippet has two parts-
Both these parts are quite important as it reflects the stuff in your blog.Many people decide whether they should click the link or not on the basis of this snippet.Thus, if you can assure people that you have the stuff they were looking for ,you can make them to visit your blog.
Make sure you have written an intriguing and 'killing' title. Also , make use of meta tags to describe each of your page.This way you can get more traffic from search engines.
These are all little things but are most often not given the attention they deserve.If you have some fantastic ideas to share or otherwise my points were not clear to you then you are most welcome to start a discussion here in the comment section.I look in to every comment i get and personally answer those.
From personal experience i have found that people who try to increase traffic to their websites domain will at some point attempt a whole bunch of “optimisation techniques” without knowing if any of it really has had, or is having, any effect at all.
Some of the SEO techniques I have seen people attempt are, whilst quite useless, based on a good idea. Other methods continually surprise me. Perhaps people that try such things have heard spurious rumours of how to get their site into Google’s top ten listings from certain forums. Incidentally they are probably at such a point of desperation that they are willing to try anything to gain just ten more visits.
I am regularly inundated with the same questions such as: Is it worth submitting my site to 300 search engines? Will I be penalised for cross linking my sites? Should I pay to have high ranking sites link to mine? And what exactly does Google page rank do, if anything!?
Questions such as these have driven me into despair and consequently writing this article during which i will attempt to explain definitively the more common SEO myths, risks and pitfalls. In this article we will examine some of the more common beliefs.
Before we get to the list it is worth noting that I have not written it in a particular order and at times I have explained the topic the myth concerns before answering the question.
Link Building
Q)Will the more links that point to my website increase my sites placement in search engines?
Yes, It will definitely help your website as far as the major search engines are concerned. The most popular search engines (Google, Yahoo!) use the number of links aimed towards a website as an important factor in determining the sites placement. They look for a link(s) to your website to be coming from sites with; high traffic, quality content and a high page rank, amongst other things.
Do no cross link, do not spam your address in forums and on social networks and do not put it on irrelevant sites, or those that seem slightly dodgy. Take your time, aim for directories that are related to your website, aim for directories with page rank 3+ or aim for blogs or similar sites that are relevant to your content.
Q)Is it worth me buying a place on a high ranking directory?
So the idea with this is that, say, a directory has a Google page rank of 7 and is very popular. Any site on it will be getting a big rub off via a higher spot on search engine rankings. However the catch is the directory charges £50 a month for your listing. Is it worth it when there are so many free directories out there?
Personally I think it is worth it, as long as the site holds its high rank and doesn't have thousands of listings competing with yours on it. The added bonus with pay for listings is that they usually review and include your site very quickly (24hours), which by itself may be worth paying for. And if you could buy 10 spots on decent directories your site will most likely become highly ranked on search engine results.
There are problems with this though. Firstly, it is said to be against Google’s terms of service – paying to get a higher listing on Google’s organic results. (Google want their results to show the best and most relevant websites, not those with the most money behind them) They are however, unlikely to be too bothered even if they do find out.
The next problem is the cost. For a small company or personal website it is too expensive to pay monthly for many directories to list them, and possibly not worth it. Lastly, it is not guaranteed to help your website. It should, but does not always. I have paid for listings before and noticed very little difference, whilst other times it has made a huge contribution to my sites ranking. So it may be a risk, but it can pay off extremely well.
Q)Will submitting a video about my site or product to places such as Youtube be of benefit to me?
A recent link building trend has been to submit a short video describing the webmasters site or the service it provides, to as many video submission sites as possible. The theory behind this being that search engines give more weight in their results to pages with videos.
So if your site or product has a video on Youtube, when that product is searched for on the web that video will often come up in the top ten results. If this video has a link to your site in it, under it or as nearby as you can put it, it should be good news for you and your site. People find the video as it is ranked so highly in the results, watch the video, like what they see and then visit your site to perhaps purchase what they saw.
Does it work? At the time of writing, yes it does and it is probably worth doing. Make a video, even if it is just text, sound or a power point presentation, and then submit it to as many video and social networking sites as possible. People will find it and it will hopefully persuade them to visit your site.
The only real problem with this being that the search engines will not like all of the “video spam” now being posted on the internet and are likely to change (lower) the priority of videos in their results.
Google Page Rank
Q)Will having a higher Google page rank(PR) increase the number of visitors to my site?
Before we can answer that we will have to look at what exactly Google page rank is. Google page rank is a spurious form of measurement for site popularity that the company introduced fairly recently. It is unknown to everyone, except possibly Google, how exactly it ranks sites.
It is assumed however that its rankings depend upon links that are outside of your site that point in towards it. New websites may not have a page rank for many months. It is also possible to have a very successful website with thousands of visitors and sales and still not being ranked highly, if at all.
This is because Google only ranks pages once every few months, probably around once every three-four months. So if you start your website and straight off advertise heavily on high PR sites you might receive a high volume of traffic but it may still take months for Google to look at your site and rank it accordingly.
To see a websites Google page rank you can download the Google toolbar and then once it is installed right click on it and select show page rank. However this is only a snapshot taken once every quarter (roughly), so beware.
So back to the myth – Does having a higher Google page rank mean more visits to your site? Well, yes and no. No, because it alone doesn't actually have any effect on search engine placement and as such won’t increase your traffic. However, if you have a high Google page rank it means that your site has lots of quality links aimed towards it and as such you should already be ranked highly in search engine results and thus should be receiving increased traffic.
Purchasing Traffic
Q)Is it worth me buying 10000 hits for £££/$$$?
OK, we have all seen the adverts in our email promising thousands of targeted visits for an amazingly cheap cost. And at one point or another we have all been depressed enough to be tempted by them. But just say no.
The idea is, for say 100 pounds (or 200 dollars), a traffic company will direct ten thousand or so visitors to your site who are actually interested in your content. It sounds great and some companies will actually provide what they say as far as traffic to your site is concerned.
However I have never found one where the traffic is actually targeted and people even bother to look around my sites. Often it turns out to be a robot that is obviously not going to look or buy anything from me. If not it may be that thousands of unfortunate people have had a dozen pop up windows attack them as they bravely try to fight them off.
I may be generalising slightly with this, but usually the people that are directed or redirected to your website will want nothing more than to close it down.
It could possibly work for you if your site instantly captures people and most of your money is made off advertising that these people quickly click on before closing you down. However do not attempt to use bought traffic whilst using Google Adsense on your site as it is against their rules and your account might be terminated without warning.
Another possible benefit is that some search engines rank sites based on incoming traffic, thus 10000 more hits by anybody may actually boost your rankings. However, this is unlikely to fool search engines such as Google or Yahoo!.
Cross Linking
Q)What is Cross Linking?
Cross linking is a webmaster practice whereby a person owns many domains, uploads an identical site to each and then heavily links each domain to the others. For example, person A registers lotsofhits,com, but is not getting enough traffic. To fool the search engines into thinking it is a popular website he registers a hundred more domains, so each will have different web addresses but all have the duplicate page content of lotsofhits,com, and all of them link to one another.
This in theory should boost the pages rank, as Google, along with other search engines, determine the importance of a site based on links from outside websites pointing to it(along with a few other things). It would also mean that there are a hundred more sites on the web that sell the same product as lotsofhits, com that could all possibly be found.
Q)Will Cross Linking my site(s) be penalised by search engines?
This is not a myth - search engines often penalise or even temporarily ban sites that Cross Link. If Google detect completely duplicate content on even just two sites that link to each other, then they will at least lower your page and result rankings, if not ban both sites.
Q)I have heard cross linking is fine as long as the sites do not have completely duplicate content. Is there any truth in this?
If you are determined to Cross Link the safest way would be to own two or three domains that link to each other but each of which have completely unique content and link to other sites as well as one another. It is hardly worth creating two or more unique sites for the sole purpose of cross linking and I would not recommend doing so anyway.
SEO Software
Q.Is it true that there is no point in doing any manual search engine optimisation or search/site submissions when you can buy software that will do the job for you?
There is a little truth behind this, but not much. Whilst certain software might make for an excellent tool in assisting your SEO campaign, in the end there you will find there is no substitute for hard work. For example you can download a program that will submit your site automatically to 10000 search engines or put a link to you web page on 50 other sites.
The problems there being: only four major search engines exist and between them they take over 80% of all search engine traffic. Those search engines will find your site automatically and rank it according to, amongst other things, relevant and unique content – making the 10000 search engine submission promise redundant (even if it were true).
There are good tools available that will track your visitors (Google analytics), tell you how your site could be made more search engine friendly and software that even tracks how each of your keywords are ranked in major search engines. However, if you are purchasing such software, try to find a trustworthy independent review first so that you are sure you are not getting ripped off. Also try to make sure that any software you use does not go against Google’s terms of service.
So, whilst certain software can and will be useful to you, there is no replacement for hard work and unique content and regular updates. The search engine rankings should then take care of themselves.
Nicholas C Smith is the project manager at Breakfrom Limited, who specialise in affordable ecommerce solutions and general web design knowledge and advice.
For more information and advice visit http://www.breakfrom.com
Today I was going through one of the post on problogger on search engine optimization and came across something which I have never heard of from anyone else.
Take a look at the point I am referring to-
a recent patent by Google indicates that it now looks at the length of your domain’s registration in ranking it. It does this because many spam sites have short registrations and a longer one indicates that you’re building a site with substance and are in it for the long haul.
source
I had never thought of length of domain registration to be one of the players in search engine rankings.
Although Darren has not supported this point with any relevant link or any citation from google but I suppose a blogger like Darren would have sufficiently researched this before writing it on his blog.
I am researching on this topic and I will let you know about the results of the research once I reach to some conclusion.
I dug into this topic and find following points worth mentioning-
According to the patent awarded to google and as discussed by Darren ,google does consider the length of domain registration as one of the configuration to rank websites.According to google - if you registered domain for 10 years then you are more committed to your domain name and if you registered it for 1 years then you are not so committed to the domain.
Further, I found that length of domain registration is just a small player in determining the search engine rankings.Which means that if a domain has been registered for ,say, 100 years then this doesn't mean it will shoot up in the rankings in SERPs.Take a look at following lines-
keep in mind that this may be only a small boost (or a "tie-breaker" among two websites) when it comes to the actual search engine rankings. And, be aware that just because Google has a patent on the idea it doesn't mean that they're actually using that criteria now to rank websites. They, too, want to stay ahead of their competition (mainly Yahoo! and MSN).
-Source
I found one of the tip from search engine guide which says-you should monitor the length of domain registration of your competitors and register your domain for greater period than theirs.
The inference-Domain name length as configuration for search engine ranking has been patented by google but it is not clear whether google is actually using it to rank websites.To be on safer side,registering domain name for large period of time would be nice thing to do.
Read more.....
This is the 8th and last post of Organic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) series.The earlier posts in this series were-
In this post I am going to tell you about the anchor text and how it should be used to harvest maximum from your link building campaign.
What is anchor text?
Anchor text are the texts or words you use to link your blog pages. For example, I have used words 'part 1' , 'part 2' etc. to link to to my earlier posts of organic search engine optimization series.(look at the first paragraph of this post)
For long, webmasters were accustomed to use words like 'click here' or 'here' as anchor text.But that was the time when search engines were not programmed to consider anchor text to rank websites.But now things have changed.
Search engines algorithm has changed and now spiders consider anchor text as one of the player to rank websites.That is why, anchor text is so important.
Besides benefits from search engines point of view there is one more benefit of using anchor texts.By using anchor text , visitors get an idea about the link and the blog/site they are heading even before clicking.But for this a proper anchor text has to be used.
Now the big question comes here-
How anchor texts should be used in order to get maximum benefits?
I am listing several points you should consider to choose your anchor text. Apply all these points and I am sure your blog will get some benefits .
- Never use words like 'click here' and 'here'.
This will not help your cause.The biggest disadvantage of using these words as anchor text is , they don't tell your visitors and search engines anything about your blog/site.
Your anchor text should tell the theme of your blog.Let us suppose, you own a blog on 'beauty tips'.Then your anchor text should be "beauty tips " or "Beauty tips and Grooming" or "beauty and make-up tips".These anchor text tell the visitors and search engines what your blog is about.
- The anchor text should contain your keywords.
Search engines take a look at the anchor text you use to link to your blog and if you are incorporating your keywords in your anchor text then their is all liklihood that your blog will rank better for those keywords if you have done all other things right.
Lets take the example of "beauty tips" here.The probable anchor texts could be-
"Beauty tips to look better" and "tips to look good".
Note here,both the anchor texts are telling the theme of the site/blog but in the first case the keyword has been incorporated while in later it is not.For organic search engine optimization ,the former anchor text is clearly better than the later.
- Never use same anchor text for all your links.
Most of the SEO experts will tell you to do this.The reason is, search engines ,particlarly, google will sandbox all your links or just devalue them once you use same anchor text for all your links. So, better use different anchor text for your links.
It will be a nice idea to make three anchor texts containing your primary keywords and two other secondary keywords ,then use them in a ratio of 60% , 30% and 10% with anchor text containing primary keyword with 60% of share.Most SEO experts will tell you to do so.
This way you can harvest maximum from your organic search engine optimization (SEO) campaign.
This ends my post on anchor text and also the organic search engine optimization (SEO) series.
Happy optimization !!!!
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Uptill now I have discussed only the on page optimization factors in my organic search engine optimization series.From this post I will head to the off page optimization factors.But before I head to this one I would like you to read my earlier posts of this series if you have not read it yet.Here are the links of the earlier posts.
Part-1 , Part-2 , Part-3 , Part-4 , Part-5 , Part-6.
Now let us move on the topic ,off page optimization.Off page optimization consists of following interrelated factors-
- Link building
- Anchor text
In this post I will only tel you about link building.But before I tell you about link building , I would like to tell you about importance of off page optimization.
Importance of off page optimization-
A few years back it was on page optimization which really decided the search engine rankings.But with the rise of google pagerank, off page optimization has clearly taken lead over the on page optimization.Now,search engines ,particularly , google are more attracted towards sites with lots and lots of incoming links. So,learly much of your blog's search engine rankings depends on off page optimization
What are the ways to build links?
There are many ways a blogger can build links for his blog.Some of the ways are-
1)Through web directories and article directories.
2)Through comments and forums.
3)By exchanging links with the like minded bloggers.
4)By building a nice content.
Web directories and article submission-
Web directories and article directories are great sources of links for blogs particularly new blogs.Submit your blog to some quality directories like Dmoz and Yahoo and you can see the boost in the rankings once you get listed.
Refrain yourself from submitting your blog in below average quality blogs as it will only prove as a wastage of time.Only submit your blog to quality directories with good pagrank because search engines regularly visit directories with high pagerank like Dmoz and so, your link is picked up quite quickly.Also,a blog included in quality direcory is regarded as quality blog by search engines.
What hold goods for web directories also holds good for article directories.To get most out of article directories, you must submit quality articles to quality directories.
Should I use directory submission softwares for the purpose?
There is no harm in using directory submitter softwares as long as you are keeping the submission rate slower and gradual.I will advice you to submit your link to a dozen of directories per day.Never submit to hundreds of directories at once as it will get your links to be sandboxed in google and it may take months ,if not years, to get your links out of google sandbox.
Article submitter softwares submit one and the same article to many article directories.My advice here would be to submit one article to just one article directory as sooner or later google will find the duplicate content and the links will be devalued and will not be counted for calculation of your blog's pagerank.
Building links through comments and forums-
I have already discussed the topic in one of my post-"5 tips to get most out of comments and forums".I would advice you to read that article in order to learn the art of commenting on blogs and forums.
Exchanging links from other like minded bloggers-
You may request other bloggers to exchange links with you.Be humble while requesting for reciprocal links.It is always a good practice to place links of other bloggers on your blog first and then requesting for exchange with the details of the url where you have placed the links.The conversion rates using this technique is higher.
Building links by generating nice content-
This is proven and most effective way of building links.Once you generate good content on your blog,other bloggers will talk about your content in their blog and may reward you with a link.This way you are able to get links for your blog without raising a finger.
I think now you have fair idea about building links for your blog.
In the next post of this series I will tell you about the anchor text and importance of anchor text in organic search engine optimization.Links may not give you the desired results unless you use the right anchor text to get linked.So,check back soon for the next post or subscribe to my feeds to get the post right into your inbox.
Next and last post of this series is-
Organic search engine optimization (SEO)-Part-8 (Anchor Text)
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This is 6th part of a series of post on organic search engine optimization.I would advice you to go through the earlier part if you have not read them yet.In part-1 I gave a general idea on SEO and in part-2 and 3 I discussed about keyword research and internal linking of blog respectively.In part-4 and 5 I told you about different html tags and how to use them and site structure and architecture.
In this post ,I am going to tell you about navigation and sitemaps and what they can do to optimize your site.
Let us first start with sitemaps.
Sitemaps are very much important for search engines as they tell search engines about your pages and this helps in indexing your pages faster.
But the bad news here is most of the blogging platforms don't allow access to the root directory where your sitemap should be located.Does this mean that bloggers are not able to submit sitemaps in the search engines?Absolutely not.
In case you are not have access to your root directory then you can use your feed url as your sitemap.For example,for blogs hosted on blogger,like mine,the sitemap (feed url) is-
http://yourblogname.blogspot.com/rss.xml and
http://yourblogname.blogspot.com/atom.xml
You can use any of the two.
I would advice you to always submit our sitemap in important search engines like,google,yahoo and MSN.
Now let us quickly move on to naviation.
Navigation is not only met for human visitors but search engines also crawl through the links you have provided.While making your site make sure-
1)All your links are upto or less than 3 links deep.
It is said that , search engines don't crawl pages deeper than three links unless your site/blog is regarded as authority site by them.So, it is always advisable to make your all pages accessible within 3 links depth.
2)There are no broken links-Broken links are annoying to visitors as well as search spiders ,so, regularly check for broken links.
There are plenty of tools available on internet which can check broken links on your blog.
3)Make a links page and place all outgoing links there.
This ends my topic on sitemap and navigation of organic search engine optimization (SEO) series.With this post ,I have also completed the facors that affect on page optimization.In the next post,I have discussed about the off page optimization.Off paqge optimization is now considered more important than on page optimization and would highly recommend reading the next post of this series.
Next posts of this series are-
Organic search engine optimization (SEO)-
Part-7 ( Off-page optimization-link building) and
Part-8 (Anchor Text)
This is the fifth post of a series of post on organic search optimization (SEO).I would advice you to read the earlier posts before heading to this one. The earlier posts in this series were-Organic search engine optimization (SEO) part-1( introductory post) , part-2 (keyword research) ,part-3 (internal linking) and part-4 (usage of html tags).
Now, without wasting much time let us head towards the next portion ,i.e., architecture of the blog..
Let me ask a question before I start-
Why blog architecture is so important for organic search engine optimization (SEO)?
You might be knowing that search engine robots are very busy robots ,particularly ,googlebot because they have to crawl millions of pages daily.
So,every time a search engine robot visits your blog,it spends very little time (a few milliseconds) on your blog.
So,you have to present all your content in this small interval of time.As a blogger you must ensure that all your important content are crawled before robot leaves your blog.
This is where blog architecture helps you. Your blog should be designed in such a way that ,your most important content is delivered to search engines straightway.
Below I am showing you how to do it??
Your blog architecture is one of the player in your SEO campaign and you should design your blog carefully in order to get high search engine rankings. In the paragraphs that follows , I will tell you , how your blog should be designed to get maximum SEO benefits.
If you are using one sidebar it will lie either to the left or right of the main wrapper ,as shown in the figure. 
If you are using two sidebars then your blog may look like this-
Now if you are using a sidebar on the left of the main wrapper then search engines will crawl the sidebar first and then your main wrapper because search engines are programmed to crawl the left part of a site first.
This is real bad thing, because search engines should crawl your content (main wrapper ) first then other areas.So, how can they crawl your content first?
Some bloggers insist to use sidebars in the left as it is instantly visible in all browsers at all resolutions. For those who insist to use sidebar in the left ,I have got a trick. Look at the image below-
Here, I have just kept top block of the left sidebar empty. So, now search engines will crawl the left sidebar and find it to be empty and automatically crawl the content of your blog and again come to crawl the left sidebar only when they have finished crawling your content.
Isn’t this trick coooool !!!!
This is very old SEO advice but holds true even today. Search engines are blind for contents in the frames. So, if possible don’t use frames and if it is extremely necessary to use frames , just don’t include your important content in the frames.
Again, this is very much vital thing to do.The reasoning behind this is , since , search engines crawl the top portion first so present your top content at the top.Apart from this your visitors will also get your important points without need to scroll down.
So, I hope now that you have a clear idea about blog architecture and why it is important to design your blog to make it search engine friendly.
Next time ,I would come up with another topic of organic search engine optimization , sitemaps and navigation.So,check back soon to read out my post on sitemap and navigation or just subscribe to my posts.
Next posts of this series are-
Organic search engine optimization (SEO)-
Part-6 (Sitemap and Navigation) ,
Part-7 ( Off-page optimization-link building) and
Part-8 (Anchor Text)
Now I will move on to the next part of organic search engine optimization series, i.e., html tags.
I have senn many webmasters using javascripts to give their sites a beautiful look.But search engines are not able to read the javascripts, although they are increasingly been programmed to read javascripts but till date they are not able to read them.
My advice here is , never use javascripts on your blog just to make your blog look better.This is because, there is no use of a good looking site/blog when nobody is watching it.
Instead you can use html to design your website.You can learn html at w3school.org.
From organic search engine optimization point of view,there are certain tags which can boost your searchengine ranking for particular keywords.I am giving details of these tags below.
The heading tag, most fruitful tag for SEO
The important words of your blogpost should be included in the heading tag.The important portions of you blogpost include-
1) Your title with your primary keyword.
2) Your sub titles or subheadings with your secondary keywords.
The bold and italic tags,the booster of SEO campaign
Making the text bold and italic has various uses-
1)It makes your post scannable to the users as people visiting your blog can scan through your posts and get your important points if you have made it bold or italic.
2)Search engines take a look at the matter in bold and italic.So, if you are making your keywords bold or italic then you may rank high in search engines for those keywords if you have applied other SEO techniques correctly.I am giving you an example below to show you how to use heading ,bold and italic tag.
"alt" attribute,SEO technique to describe image
"alt" attribute is used to desribe your image.Search engines are unable to read images of your pages,this is where "alt" attribute helps you.By using "alt" you can describe your images.You can also use some of your keywords in "alt" text.Using key words in "alt" text is very much useful SEO technique.
Below I am describing the way to use "alt" attribute to utilize it for SEO benefit. I have shown what tags people use to show images and what should be used.
Look here,in the second instance I have used "alt" to describe the image. This can be picked up by search engines and help your SEO campaign.
Now , I think that you are able to understand the uses of different html tags and also use them for your benefit.
In the next post of organic search engine optimization series , I have described the proper architecture of your blog to maximize benefits from Sarch engines.By properly designing ,your blog can do better in search engines.Read out my next post to know what is proper designing of the blog.
Next posts of this series are-
Organic search engine optimization (SEO)-
Part-5 (Blog architecture) ,
Part-6 (Sitemap and Navigation) ,
Part-7 ( Off-page optimization-link building) and
Part-8 (Anchor Text)
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Just when you believed you had all your SEO tactics figured out, the web goes and changes on you. Not just the rules of the game but it takes the whole web platform right out from under your feet and changes it. What's a poor webmaster to do?
Web 2.0 changes the whole ballgame. It not only places the Internet user squarely in the middle of things, but it gives that user the means and power to create and manipulate data. Web 2.0 dramatically changes how we view and use the web. Actually, in many respects, it creates a whole new Internet.
What Is Web 2.0?
Just what exactly is Web 2.0? What does it mean? Is there a precise definition that all webmasters can get their heads around and understand? Not really, many believe Web 2.0 is just another one of those contrived buzzwords, signifying mostly marketing hype!
However, perhaps the simple definition can be found in the word "you"! Time magazine probably summed it up best by making reference to the "you" in user generated content. Web 2.0 is basically all the platforms that give us this brave new user-powered interactive Internet, generally referred to as 'social media'.
Web 2.0 can be seen or manifested in such sites as YouTube, MySpace, Del.icio.us, Digg, Squidoo... Web 2.0 uses scripting languages such as Python, Perl PHP, RSS... to construct interactive platforms that websites can use to create all this user-generated content.
Many refer to these evolving formats and scripting platforms under the name AJAX and no this does not refer to the popular cleaning agent under your kitchen sink! This AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) comes from Google and takes web based interactive programs such as Google Maps, something that's usually associated with desktop applications, but is now being applied on the web. If you have used Google Earth, you will realize how powerful and revolutionary these new applications can be, not to mention, they are a whole lot of fun.
Where Did The Name Web 2.0 Come From?
Many point to Tim O'Reilly, the constant innovator of many technological changes on the web. O'Reilly has been at the forefront in discussions and conferences on the nature and substance of the 'meme' open source platforms dominating the new social media.
How all this new media plays out is anyone's guess but all webmasters should optimize their sites for this new Web 2.0 and take full advantage of all the SEO possibilities presented by this brave new Internet.
Here are a few SEO suggestions you can try:
1. RSS/Blogging.
You must place a blog and RSS feed on all your sites. This is a fairly simple procedure to do with free server-based programs such as Wordpress. Having a blog and RSS feed will place your site into the whole tagging process. Each category you create in your blog will be seen as a tag by such sites as Technorati. RSS stands for 'Really Simple Syndication' and your RSS feeds will get your content distributed across the web. A simple and easy way to tap into the new Web 2.0 universe.
2. Create some Google Juice!
Join as many of these highly interactive sites as you can: MySpace, YouTube, Del.icio.us, Digg, Wikipedia ... my favorite is Squidoo, where you can create Lenses on different topics that interest you. User driven content that's utilized by all the major social media sites. Of course, link back to your sites in your posts and creations in these user-created content havens and watch your PR ratings go way up.
3. Use Interactive Scripts.
Place interactive JavaScripts and platforms on your own sites. Have membership forums, polls, blogs, feedback forms, user-contributions... to build unique content driven sites. Become the spider!
4. Tagging (Folksonomy).
Be constantly aware of the tags (keywords) you're creating with your blogs and sites. This can have a very beneficial effect on your traffic and rankings. Closely relate these tags to the content on your sites and build higher rankings in all the major search engines.
5. The Long Tail.
Especially important for affiliate marketers, you need to cover special niches where there is less competition and content. These narrow niches make up a large portion of the whole vast web, creating content in these unique areas will get your site included in the search engines a lot quicker and keep them there a lot longer.
6. Holistic Web 2.0!
Be constantly vigilant in placing your sites in the whole 'Interactive Game', building links and partnerships with the important YouHubs: MySpace, Del.icio.us, YouTube, Digg, Squidoo... the more connections you have, the more your own sites will prosper.
Be The Spider!
No doubt, Web 2.0 will play an ever increasing role in the development and evolution of the web. Make sure your sites are optimized and in the 'You' game. Create blogs, RSS feeds, interactive forums, membership areas, user-generated content and truly make your sites interactive havens in their own right. Just remember to tag everything and your sites will reap the benefits of this new Web 2.0 generated SEO gold rush.
The author is a full time Internet Marketer with numerous sites on the web, including two niche sites on Internet Marketing. His main site is http://www.bizwaremagic.com For the latest & most effective to boost your online marketing - try: http://www.marketingtoolguide.com 2007 Titus Hoskins.
Most of the bloggers don't internally link their blog properly,and so, they are not able to harvest maximum from their internal linkings.Here I am listing some tips to get maximum from internal linking.
Most of the bloggers will not agree with me on this point.But believe me putting archives on one of your inner pages will surely give a boost to your blog particularly your top post.Read on this post as I prove my point below.
As shown in this image,when you are using archives on the main page of your blog,you are passing some pagerank value to all your posts.Secondly,you are passing equal value to your all pages including your top pages while to be well optimized your top page should get more value than your other pages.Now, look at the image below-
Here in this image, your blog's home page is passing some pagerank value to your top post only and all other posts are getting links from your top page.So,you hae channelised your visitor from your home page to top post and then to other posts.This is also helping your top post to get more pagerank from your homepage and thus more visibility from search engines.
Let me take an example.Suppose you have a bucket of water and you haave to pour water in 10 pots then each pot will get little share of water but if you have to fill in a single pot then surely that pot will get more share.Similarly, by using archives on your main page you are passing value to all your pages(including top posts) and so, each page will get little share but if you are using only top posts on home page then share of top posts will automatically be greater than before.
I don't think there is any confusion in this point.Every blogger and SEO expert will advice you to do so and I am no exception. Suppose you are writing about keyword research and you have already written a post on wordtracker then you should link both these posts together as they are related.This not only helps in increasing your pagerank but also in rejuvenating your older post.So,always link your related posts together.
I have seen many bloggers using this technique.This is very good trick.This not only provides an immediate link to other posts once your readers have finished reading your post but also important fom Search engine optimization point of view.So,always give links of your related posts at theend of each post.
Once you write a new post it doesn't get indexed quickly.But if you are using recent posts link at your homepage then your new post gets backlinks from your homnepage (which has a higher pagerank) straightway and this helps your new post get indexed quickly.This is especially true when you are using a static page as your homepage.This also helps your regular revisitors to get on to posts you have written recently.
As a blogger you must pay attention on internal linking as proper internal linking can sometimes give results better than the external links.Just follow the tips I have discussed over here and see the results.This ends my topic on Organic search engine optimization (SEO) part-3 (internal linking).
HAPPY LINKING !!!!!!
Next posts of this series are-
Organic search engine optimization (SEO)-
Part-4 (html tags) ,
Part-5 (Blog architecture) ,
Part-6 (Sitemap and Navigation) ,
Part-7 ( Off-page optimization-link building) and
Part-8 (Anchor Text)
Read more.....
In this post I am going to tell you about keyword research.But before I start, Let me give you a quick recap of things I have said in Pat-1 of search engine optimization series.In part-1 of this series I have written an introductory post on SEO.I have told you about on page and off page optimization and factors to be considered for on page and off page SEO.Now in this post I will tell you about 1st factor of on page SEO, Keyword research.
Why Keyword Research is important?-
Keywords are the basis of search engines.The algorithms or programs may differ for different search engines but the basis remains same for every search engine.Infact keywords are the most important factor which should be considered in organic search engine optimization.If you have done everything right but ignored correct usage of keyword then it is unlikely that you would be ranking high in SERPs.
How one should do keyword research
Although there are many keyword research tool available on the internet but most of them are paid.Here I will tell you a method to research your keywords yourself without investing even a single penny.
You can do your keyword research with two free tools- Google Adwords keyword tool and google search.In the paragraph that follows I will exactly tell you how to do it?
Once you enter a keyword in Adwords keyword tool , the tool presents you with a big list of related keywords,with last month search volume,average search volume and search volume trends as shown below in the image.
(Click to enlarge the image)Now, choose keywords with high average search volume and increasing or uniform search trends.Increasing search trending will show up as increasing height of bars in search volume trends column while in uniform trending the height of bars will almost remain same.
Choose as many keywords from adwords keyword tool as possible.Once you have finished choosing keywords you should analyze those keywords.
Analysis of keywords-
Analysis of keywords is a bit tricky thing to do.But once you learn it will become easy for anyone.For analyzing keywords google search is single best tool.Make a search using each of your selected keywords.The search page looks like as shown below-
(click on image to enlarge)
Look at the top right of the page showing the number of webpages that are competing for that keyword.Note down the number for each selected keyword.In addition to number of webpages competing for each keyword ,you should also analyze following things-
1)Whether the webpage ranking on the top of SERPs for a particular keyword is a home page or some inner page.
2)The pagerank of webpage on the top of SERPs for a particular keyword.This can be done by google toolbar.Install google toolbar if you have not done so yet.
3)Whether the webpage on the top of SERPs is using exact keyphrase or semantic words.
4)Whether the keyphrase is enclosed in heading tag-h1,h2 etc. in top ranking webpage.
5)What anchor text the webpage is using in its external links.
Make a chart of your findings on a excel sheet or a piece of paper.Now you are ready to select your keyword.
1) Lower competition as shown by number on the top right side of SERPs.
2)The top webpage for that keyword is an inner page,has lower pagerank and doesn't usees exact keyword phrase in its heading or anchor text in its external links.
With this your keyword research is complete and you are ready to place those keywords in your posts.In the paragraph that follows I will tell you about the proper keyword placement.
Keyword Placement-
Keyword placement is as important as keyword research because if you are not able to place your keywords in your posts properly then all your effort of keyword research will be wasted.
Remember the following points while placing your keywords-
1) Place your primary keyword/phrase in the title.
2)Always use your primary keyword in the starting of first paragraph and in the last paragraph.
3)Use your secondary keywords in sub headings.
4)Sprinkle all your keywords within your post ,maintaining a keyword density of 3-6%.A keyword density of 3-6% means for every 100 words roughly use your keywords for 3-6 times.
With this I have come to an end of my post on Organic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Part-2 which was about keyword research..Now, I am sure ,you have got very good idea about keyword research and placement.In the next post ,I will tell you about internal linking pattern.So, just check back soon or subscribe to my feeds for my next post of organic search engine optimization series.
Next posts of this series are-
Organic search engine optimization (SEO)-
Part-3 (Internal linking) ,
Part-4 (html tags) ,
Part-5 (Blog architecture) ,
Part-6 (Sitemap and Navigation) ,
Part-7 ( Off-page optimization-link building) and
Part-8 (Anchor Text)
Read more.....
On most of occasions bloggers are on mercy of googlebot to get their blogs indexed in google.But there are ways to virtually dictate googlebot to index your blogs.One such technique,which is much talked about,is to place your link on a website with high page rank.But for this you have to spend some bucks because not even a single webmaster will exchange a link with a new blog.Here in this post I will tell you five tips to get your blogs indexed free and fast.With these tips google will index your blog within 24-48 hrs. and best part is its all free.You can use one tip or all five tips together.OK,then get yourself a fresh cup of coffee and read out this post.
How does it work?
The principal is simple.You placed you link on a blog or forum with high pagerank and then told googlebot that you have placed the link by pinging the page on which you have commented.
Let us suppose you commented on a page, www.exampleblog.com/post/html. Now go to autopinger.com and ping this url.Googlebot will come to crawl that url and while crawling it will find you link.Isn't this simple??
How Does it work?-
Google webmasters tool is completely free service.Once you sign up for a free account,you will be asked to add your site.Add your blog's url there.Then search for the verify link there and click it.Choose metatag as verification method.Gooogle will provide you with a metatag.Copy and paste that metatag into your template just beside opening "head" tag.
Now you are done.Just click the "Verify" button.Googlebot will crawl your blog to find the metatag you have pasted and in the process it will index your blog.
The working of this tip is pretty much similar to tip-2.Once you place tracking code in your template and hit "check" button, googlebot crawls your site to ensure you have placed the code right.Again in the process of checking, your blog is indexed.
You might get confused here but its true that you can use adsense for indexing your site faster apart from earning money.Let me explain things in some detail-
What happens when you sign up for an adsense account?You get a message saying-"Your site will be reviewed before acceptance in our program".Now,who reviews your site/blog.They are not human editors ,instead googlebot reviews the sites for adsense program.
Now you can guess it.After you sign up for adsense, google bot or spiders crawl your website to review it and also indexes it while reviewing.Normally reviewing is fast ,taking about 24-48 hours and in next 24 hrs. after a review your site is indexed. Isn't this cool !!!!!!
This tip is straight forward.Just deliberately make some minor changes in your pages and ping the permalink of the pages in which you have made modificatios.You can use any pinging services.I use autopinger.com for this purpose as they ping more than 50 pinging services on one click.
Important note:These tips work best when used in conjunction with each other.Best practice would be to use all 5 tips concurrently.
Now,I guess, you are able to dictate googlebot for indexing your blog faster and that too without spending a single penny from your pocket.
Enjoy !!!!!
Most of the successful bloggers get tons of traffic from comments and forums.But what most of the bloggers and SEO experts will tell you is to just drop a comment in some blog or forum and leave a signature with your blog/website url.But question here is , is that all you can harvest from commets and forums? The answer is, NO !!!! 99.99% of bloggers and webmasters underutilize the potential of comments and forums to drive traffic and increase page rank of their sites.In this post I will tell you 5 tips to milk most out of comments and forums.So,apply some glue on your seat and get ready to learn those tips.Here comes the tip no.1.
Why this is important-Let us start the explanation with an easy question.Why do you comment? Most of you would have answered this question like this-
"We comment to get traffic and increase google page rank."
Very well !! There is no doubt that this is correct answer.Now, what will happen if you are commenting in a blog or forum with low readership or those which use "no follow" tag? Yes, you guessed it right, you will not be able to get traffic and increase page rank.So, it is important to select blogs and forums before commenting.
How can we know that a blog has high readership or it doesn't uses "no follow" tag?- The answer to first question is easy.A blog or forum with high subscribers volume and comment volume has invariably high readership.To find out whether a blog is using "no follow" tags or not is somewhat tricky thing but I will tell you about this in some other post of mine.
So,now you have selected your target blogs and forums.Once your selection is complete just go on to tip no.2
While going through many blogs I come across many spammy comments ,like,
"Great post!!!! Keep it up."
And some even worse than this-
"Hey visit my blog www.example.com".
Most of the times these comments are not able to make their way out of moderation filter if blog author has kept moderation on.So,my advice here is don't spam, it will not help and sometimes even harm you.
How to make useful comments? A useful comment is one which starts a conversation between you and readers.There are three ways one can start a conversation in blogs and forums-
1) Ask questions relevant to theme of blog/forum post.
2) Write about some point which you think blog author has missed.
3) Throw away a tip or trick which you think can help the readers.
By doing this, you generate curiosity in readers mind and if they become curious enough they will visit your site for details.
While using anchor-text is very much important both for readers and search engines as it gives a basic idea about your blog/site, making anchor text bold is important generally for search engines.
You might be knowing that search engines give particular importance to text written in bold.So,when you make your link bold then that link will be treated as special by search engines and your site thus will get some extra weightage over others.
I don't know why people don't make their links in bold even when almost every blog and forum allow them to do so? Believe me this is a very good SEO technique which very little people know.So, next time whenever you are commenting on a blog just make your links bold.
Again this is very little known technique.I have seen most of the bloggers placing links of just their homepage.But I will suggest you to place links of inner pages also as this can boost page rank of your inner pages as well as homepage.
This is particularly true when you have successfully started a conversation.When you start a conversation you post comments on the same page time and again.There is no point placing one link time and again on same webpage.Instead place unique links every time you comment on same webpage or thread.
Here you might be thinking what pinging has to do with comments.OK, then let me explain things in some detail.Well, you have posted an excellent comment on a blog or forum and also placed a link of one of your pages.But this link will be of no importance in increasing your page rank unless search engines index that link.This is where pinging can help you.Pinging ensures that your link will be indexed and will be indexed faster.
Let us take an example,Suppose you have commented on a page ,say, www.example.com/2007/08/post.html.Once you have commented ,just go to any pinging service and ping this url.I use autopinger.com for this purpose as they ping about 50 pinging services at one click.
Now I think you will be able to get most out of comments and forums.I can assure you that these five tips will certainly prove beneficial to take your blog to next level.
HAPPY AND ADVANTAGEOUS COMMENTING !!!!
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There are only two ways to get traffic from search engines.One is through paid listings and other is to rank high in SERPs.I will leave about paid listigs as it is not affordable for everyone and is important only for websites selling something.I will kick off with the second option-ranking high in SERPs.
The only thing in the world which can bring your blog to higher ranks is Search Engine Optimization and this is reason why SEO is so much talked about.In this series of posts I will try my best to give you a basic idea and some SEO tips and tricks to optimize your blog.
In this first post of this series I will deal with just introductory parts of Search engine optimization.I will become more tech as I go on with this series of posts.
Two aspects of Search engine
optimization (SEO) :
There are two inter-related aspects of SEO-1)On Page Optimization :
On page optimization deals with things you do on your own pages to get maximum from search engines for targeted keywords.2)Off Page Optimization :
Off page optimization deals with things one do off page (on other websites) to get maximum from search engines.Factors considered in on page optimization :
Search engines consider a number of on page factors while evaluating a site.These factors are-
1) Keywords
2) Title tags
3) Tags ,such as, "h1.......h6" , "b" , "i" and "alt" attribute.
4) Keyword density
5) Site structure and architecture
6) Linking patterns and keywords used in anchor text in internal links
7) Sitemaps and navigation
I will write about each and every factor listed here in great detail in other posts of this series.For now I will quickly jump over to the factors considered in the off page optimization.
Factors considered in off page optimization :
Off page optimization is related with the inbound links your site/blog is getting from other website.Although search engine algorithms differ for different search engines but in general following factors are considered-- Which website is linking to you?
- How many websites are linking to you?
- What are the page ranks of the websites linking to you?
- What anchor text are being used to link to you?
- Is the link exchanged or one way?
- No. of outbound and inbound links on the page linking to you?
I have just given an introductory note on Search engine optimization in this post.I have discussed each and every factor in great detail in other posts of Organic Search engine optimization (SEO) series.
Next posts of this series are-
Organic search engine optimization (SEO)-
Part-2 (keyword research) ,
Part-3 (Internal linking) ,
Part-4 (html tags) ,
Part-5 (Blog architecture) ,
Part-6 (Sitemap and Navigation) ,
Part-7 ( Off-page optimization-link building) and
Part-8 (Anchor Text)
Read more.....