Last night at Campfire One, Google launched the Google Apps Marketplace, where developers can create apps that integrate with Google Apps and sell them to users. According to Google, they can reach over 2 million businesses and 25 million users.

Right off the bat, the Google Apps Marketplace launched with over 50 applications from companies like Intuit and Atlassian, with more coming soon from companies like NetSuite and SuccessFactors, a Google spokesperson tells WebProNews.

"Once installed to a company’s domain, these third-party applications work like native Google applications," explains Google Apps Marketplace Product Manager Chris Vander Mey. "With administrator approval, they may interact with calendar, email, document and/or contact data to increase productivity. Administrators can manage the applications from the familiar Google Apps control panel, and employees can open them from within Google Apps. With OpenID integration, Google Apps users can access the other applications without signing in separately to each. The Google Apps Marketplace eliminates the worry about software updates, keeping track of different passwords and manual syncing and sharing of data, thereby increasing business productivity and lessening frustrations for users and IT administrators alike. That’s the power of the cloud."

This is the 2nd big move by Google regarding the cloud and Google Apps in less than a week. Late last week, the company acquired DocVerse, which "makes Word, PowerPoint and Excel Work like Google Docs," as the DocVerse title tag explains.

Developers can get more info about the Google Apps Marketplace at Google’s Developer Programs site. The company will also be talking about developing apps for the enterprise at Google I/O in May.

Last night at Campfire One, Google launched the Google Apps Marketplace, where developers can create apps that integrate with Google Apps and sell them to users. According to Google, they can reach over 2 million businesses and 25 million users.

Right off the bat, the Google Apps Marketplace launched with over 50 applications from companies like Intuit and Atlassian, with more coming soon from companies like NetSuite and SuccessFactors, a Google spokesperson tells WebProNews.

"Once installed to a company’s domain, these third-party applications work like native Google applications," explains Google Apps Marketplace Product Manager Chris Vander Mey. "With administrator approval, they may interact with calendar, email, document and/or contact data to increase productivity. Administrators can manage the applications from the familiar Google Apps control panel, and employees can open them from within Google Apps. With OpenID integration, Google Apps users can access the other applications without signing in separately to each. The Google Apps Marketplace eliminates the worry about software updates, keeping track of different passwords and manual syncing and sharing of data, thereby increasing business productivity and lessening frustrations for users and IT administrators alike. That’s the power of the cloud."

This is the 2nd big move by Google regarding the cloud and Google Apps in less than a week. Late last week, the company acquired DocVerse, which "makes Word, PowerPoint and Excel Work like Google Docs," as the DocVerse title tag explains.

Developers can get more info about the Google Apps Marketplace at Google’s Developer Programs site. The company will also be talking about developing apps for the enterprise at Google I/O in May.

Despite our best predictions with SEO, you can never pin-point with accuracy which keywords from a title tag, meta description or combined occurrence of a keyword on a page search engines will use to return a relevant query.

This is why it is imperative to promote as many relevant shingles as possible for returning a page as a relevant hit for a “specific” or “broad match” search queries through using succinct titles, naming conventions or meta descriptions.

We can create all of the multiple layers in advance, but each metric will be scrutinized for trust, depth and popularity and authority, and depending on how it fares from these algorithmic litmus tests determines what degree of visibility the page receives.

Typically one of two things occurs (1) it flies to the top 10 unchallenged, feels its way out and is assessed by metric such as click-throughs and relevance (sort of like a test to see if it belongs there) or (2) the ranking crawls its way up over time and in a few months finds its home in the top 10 if combined with other pages via internal linking or get a few deep links from other pages.

What I can tell you is that the signals gleaned from (a) the volume of content in your site about each of the topics / keywords in the title and (b) how well they are linked together or have an influx of deep links do affect the buoyancy of any related page.

Both phases (the initial spike) and the buoyant balloon effect should be predicted and anticipated.

Depending on the barrier to entry (how much competition is saturating the keywords in question) will determine just how much traction a new page gets out of the gate.

Much like a wave form, there is often a burst of SERP (search engine result page) positioning that occurs as the new page/content acts like a beacon to release the pressure of relevance that percolates under the surface.

It is like a concentrated topical fulcrum that serves to propel the newly released content into a favorable trajectory and then based on search volume, click-appeal and what other pages are challenging that page for relevant supremacy determine the extent of its exposure.

The more competitive the root or key phrase, the longer it typically takes to reach the top of a more competitive keyword combination.

Although a page can rank for multiple variations (depending on the authority of the root domain), it is better to assign a pecking order to the page to emphasize which keywords you would like it to be found for or settling into as the primary path for relevant traffic.

For example, if I create a new page and use a relevant title and meta description such as:

SEO Business Consulting Services

Business consulting services by “company x”, provides SEO [keyword 1], service [keyword 2], and summary [plural usage of alternative keywords combined]…

This page could rank for any portion of any of  the relevant keywords contained/presented in this crucial / summary.

This is your first line of coherence for each page, structure this well and you can ensure that search engines take heed and will often use this as the default snippet/description to promote click-throughs from interested parties.

The description tag should always support the title, ( a slight bit of redundancy/relevance) doesn’t hurt, but it should also contain your secondary keyword or a few alternatives as well to promote “cross pollination” of keywords which occurs naturally when a page gains age, support from other pages (via internal or external links).

A degree of transference is anticipated, so, the meta description allows you to steer that process into a conversion objective by sculpting the aggregate ranking factors and giving them stability as a heading for search engines to adhere.

Going back to the example above and filling in the blanks for the sake of continuity:

SEO Business Consulting Services

Business consulting services by “marketing solutions”, provides SEO, landing page optimization, internal link optimization and link building services for search engine optimization.

If you then had headings on the page for the topics mentioned:

SEO, Landing Page Optimization, Internal Link Optimization and Link Building Services then this page would be a self fulfilling prophecy and rank across any keyword combination over time.

For example, search engine queries such as:

Landing Page Consulting
Search Engine Optimization Consulting
Business Optimization Services
Landing Page Optimization
Internal Link Optimization
Business Consulting Services

Would all be “a relevant hit” as part of the root phrases/shingles implied by the title and meta descriptions.

If you add enough internal links from any of the keyword combinations above from other pages (that already have relevance for those keywords) and you will create a dynamo of keyword stemming that can pass along ranking factor to the new target page.

For example 10 links internally from the keyword “Search Engine Optimization Consulting” from a page that ranks already for some shingle in the keyword combined with 15 deep links (links from other sites) would provide enough transference to put this page on the map for that keyword.

If it appears in the top 100 from not in the top 1000, then you know you have crossed the tipping point for some of the most crucial metrics.

From there, you need to (1) reinforce it over time with additional internal or external links and (2) give it enough time to stem and settle into its purpose as a designated landing page and gain on page authority.

In other words, a page can rank from 1 or two words on the target page, if (a) there is enough internal links to support the transference of link weight and authority and (2) if the page is groomed as a relevant candidate from the continuity between the content, title and reputation that page has within the hierarchy of your website.

---

Jeffrey Smith is an active internet marketing optimization strategist, consultant and the founder of Seo Design Solutions Seo Company http://www.seodesignsolutions.com. He has actively been involved in internet marketing since 1995 and brings a wealth of collective experiences and fresh marketing strategies to individuals involved in online business.

Original Post

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

%%Optimizing Meta Titles and Descriptions%%

Optimizing Meta Titles and Descriptions

Among SEO professionals, there isn’t always consensus on precisely which and to what degree site factors contribute or detract from rankings on Google because the factors actually vary by industry. There are indeed, a number of contentious issues: markup and content quality, use of title tags, site organization and even arguments that Google Analytics data factors in to site rankings. Not likely (yet), but certainly up for debate among SEO professionals.

However, there are some Google ranking factors that most professionals agree affect site positioning on Google SERPs. However, these are opinions, find out for yourself how these apply to projects you’re working on.

Recommended Steps to Improve Google Ranking

1. Use keywords in HTML title tags. Probably the most significant factor for a site regardless of the competitive landscape, the title tag must be consistent with content in the page for best results. The more keywords in your title, the less effective this factor, be judicious.

2. Create quality anchor text for inbound links. At one time, according to some SEO professionals, quality anchor text was an essential component of a well-ranked site. After all, this is the text the user opted to see by clicking a link on another site. Most SEOs still contend that quality anchor text is a highly significant, positive ranking factor. If not for spiders, for visitors clicking in as well. Obviously the text should be relevant to the destination page for best results; that’s where your on page optimization comes in to play.

3. Increase link popularity. Link popularity takes into account the number of inbound links present. Link authority has less relevance, though it is still a factor depending on the competitive landscape. Link popularity is based on a global count of links from all sites. However, quality links are still critical to creating site authority; authority means ranking for more phrases than you intentionally target.

4. Hang in there. The age of a site is an important positive weighting factor according to many SEO professionals. It’s certainly a reasonable assumption. Failed sites are dropped as soon as the hosting subscription ends. If a site has been around for 10 years, the owners must be dong something right, especially if link popularity is steady developed over the years. Unfortunately for site owners, there’s no way to speed up the aging process – except hanging in there.

5. Increase the popularity of internal links. These links direct visitors to helpful, related content. They’re important in providing visitors with a positive on-site experience. Search engines view on-site link popularity as a sign that visitors like what they see and want to learn more.

7. Build deep links. Deep links are relevant to the topicality of the target page or keyword. The relevance of these inbound links matters to a site’s Google ranking. However, please note point 3. The sheer number of inbound links is a factor as well. Quality deep links carry more weight and add credibility to a site.

8. Connect with sites selling to the same demographic. Create a number of links with sites within your topical community. This helps visitors further their searches – something Google likes very much.

9. Keep old links. Google looks for web stability. The older the link, the more trust it has. It indicates a happy relationship with the site owner linking in who recognizes the value of sending visitors off-site. Google watchers suggest a three to four month time window for spiders to determine that this is a well-established, long-term link that has value to visitors of both sites.

10. Use keywords in body text. Make sure that keywords receive prominent display in headlines, headers, sub-heads. It’s important that the keywords used in HTML text on page match with keywords used in the site’s meta data and title tags.

Not Recommended

1. Don’t use session IDs in URLs. It sounds like a good idea on the surface, an easy way to track customer information, but here’s the problem. Each time a spider crawls the site, a new URL with session ID is created. The spider now has two, or three or more URLs all showing duplicate content. Go back to Go, do not collect $200. Don’t confuse this with pages that may have a couple GET variables in them; avoid that when you can, but just avoid having your pages containing session IDs.

2. Choose a reputable web host. The most potent negative ranking factor is server accessibility. If your server, located in Timbuktu, is inaccessible to spiders, it’s inaccessible to visitors. Down time soon becomes down and out time.

3. Avoid duplicate content. Googlebots employ filters to detect duplicate content. Now, if you opt to post some syndicated articles, you’re providing a service to visitors. However, a bot will recognize that content (it’s already appeared on 400 sites) and you’ll see a drop in traffic rank.

4. Jettison low-quality links. Google assesses the character of your site by the company you keep so keep good company by unlinking from (1) links farms, (2) sites with absolutely no quality content and (3) otherwise low-quality sites; e.g. FFA (free for all) sites.

5. Avoid any kind of links deception. Googlebots aren’t smart, but they can detect some paid links and a variety of links scams, including generated links. If a Googlebot suspects links fraud, your site may be penalized and sent to the basement or banned altogether.

6. Avoid a log-in before visitors and bots access “the good stuff.” Log-ins can easily confuse a bot who won’t be able to access quality content hidden behind a log in. Even though users with Google toolbars will be unknowingly suggesting new URLs to be crawled as they surf about, having teasers for the content your monetizing by subscription will help your SEO.

7. Avoid using frames. Horizontal and vertical framesets <frameset> are commonly used by designers to present more than one page of a site on the screen at the same time. However, frames are also bot traps. They can get in but they can’t get out, making it impossible for them to index a site – at all! Tell your developer to look at using iframes if possible or absolutely necessary.

8. Avoid duplicate title/meta tags. Title/meta tags are a valuable resource for site owners to expand access points to a site. Using title tags ensures that more pages are indexed and listed in Google’s SERPs as distinct links. All good. Unfortunately, too many duplicate title tags on pages in which the content topic hasn’t changed, is redundant and a waste of the bots time. Use tag your pages uniquely and judiciously.

9. Do not keyword stuff. Even though search engines no longer give much weight to keyword tags, keyword stuffing continues. Select 20 to 30 keywords – top-tier and long-tail – and focus on them. Keep keyword density in body text at no more than 3%. The old 5% rule still led to on-site gibberish – obviously these figures vary by competitive landscape.

10. Do not let quality slip – even for a day. Spiders crawl sites with greater frequency and sophistication and index updates are common as changes to a site are implemented. During periods of construction, be sure to keep spiders out of staging areas that have yet to be completed <nofollow> or block with robots. These works-in-progress may cost you points in the ranking sweepstakes.

Google controls 46% of all searches. Doesn’t it make sense to give this search engine exactly what it wants and delete what it doesn’t want?

Rhetorical question.

Use the right software

Selecting the right software for blogging can go a great way in making you stand out among the crowd. Custom blog software would be very useful, since users can customize it themselves.

Blog hosting

Always host your blog on your own domain. If you place your blog on another domain, it may not be able to attract public attention, build confidence, and improve rating in search results. So using a different domain is the biggest mistake one can ever make.

Title tag

Whenever you put a title tag, make sure that it is relevant to the subject matter, and is not just a random one. You put a title to attract your visitors, so ensure that it is short, and snappy.

Article marketing

Notwithstanding which area of article marketing for your blog you have ventured into, there are many public forums for that topic, which you must actively participate in. There are quite a few online communities, where you can post messages or initiate a discussion to increase your visibility, and attract a huge community of people to your website.

Tagging

Tagging is very important. You can visit Technorati for this purpose. If you have many tags on your page, then it will show in the search results.

Technorati

Testing Technorati is extremely important. You must notify Technorati whenever you have made a comment on a blog. For this purpose, you will need to ping Technorati, or else, you may take the help of Ping-o-matic, which automatically alerts Technorati whenever a comment is posted by you.

Boosting blog’s visibility

To increase your and your blog’s visibility, it has become clear that commenting on other people’s blog is extremely important. But a primary concern is that you must comment on a subject which you are comfortable with. You need to search to get across a proper blog where your comment will be appreciated.

WTF at Technorati

Bloggers are allowed to comment on why few of the topics are a hot favorite. This can be done on a Technorati feature known as WTF.

Rate and ranks

Technorati can rate and rank any blog, based on the links to the blog. That is, your blog will get a higher ranking if other blogs link to your blog.

Blog commenting

Commenting on other blogs has also become important because others will then comment on your blog. A blog becomes dry and dull if there are no comments on it.

Choose your blog topics

There are people who simply join in the bandwagon without much knowledge on what it is all about. If there is some great news about something related to your industry, it does not necessarily mean that you should jump to cover it, or even mention it. Yes, that does help to increase your popularity, and sharing something is always good. But if you don’t feel the need for doing it, simply leave it!

Intelligent linking

If you link things in your blog, then do so in an intelligent manner. Don’t link each and every issue that you want to, but maintain a fine balance between linking important topics. Both under-linking, as well as over-linking, are not good. So conventions and creativity should be used only when the circumstances so warrant.

Invite contributors

You may invite a famous person to contribute something to your blog. It may be something that he specializes in, but that will surely add sheen to your blog. by doing so, other people become aware that you have an association with famed people, and invariably, your blog will get more hits. Also, the celebrated person will feel flattered on the status you provide him or her.

Interaction

Make your blog interactive. Mere textual data becomes monotonous after a point of time. So use graphics, images and charts to make the blog appealing to the readers.

Provide answers!

Whatever niches you might be in, there are always some questions whose answer remains vague. So you can focus on those important issues and provide a concrete answer for those questions.

Tracking visitors

Software which tracks visitors can analyze the areas most frequented by visitors, the ones which hardly get any hits, etc. so these vital information can be used for betterment of your blog. Feedburner is very good for RSS purpose.

Charisma

Online, as well as offline, charisma is always valued. The voice presenting something in a blog is extremely important, as people appreciate honesty, compassion, empathy and other emotions associated with it.

Proper archives

Proper archives need to be maintained. Sorting them out date-wise or subject-wise always helps. Generally, archives must include every article that has ever been posted on the blog, but from the usability point of view, you can just link interrelated topics in a blog post.

Blog URL

URL’s are also important as it gives the readers a view of what lies on that page. The best URL’s should be short, but having enough information regarding the content of that webpage.

Sharing information

An open source on the internet is always welcome. Sharing private information on the internet is always considered a good marketing strategy.

Don’t go overboard

If you over-market all your blog posts, negative sentiments will prevail. So be cautious on this front.

Link bait

Capitalize on linkbait, if you have got it. Your website needs to be very much presentable if it hits the front page of Reddit, Digg or any other place where a constant flow of visitors will be ensuing.

Writing style

Your readers will personally take your style of writing and your focus on subjects. If you constantly modify that style, you will disappoint those segments of people who rely on you for that subject or style.

Branding tool

Building a brand is very important. A good brand is one which people feel pride associating themselves with, so such a brand must be built.

Blog submission

Blog submission to blog directories is very important. BlogCatalog.com, blogarma.com and bloggernity.com are some famous blog directories.

Yahoo feed

You must create a feed on Yahoo! This option is available under the “My Yahoo!” tab.

Google Adwords

Google Adwords is expensive, but a great marketing tool nonetheless. A low-cost option is also available with them.

Blog name

If you can, buy a domain name for the blog, which costs about $10 annually. You won’t even have to shell out money for hosting.

Frequency of blog posts

Regularly update your blog.

Signatures

Make it a habit to use signatures. Put a link of your blog in your signature, and use it while sending emails, posting on forums, etc.

---

Brett Schaefer has been involved in Internet Marketing for a number of years and writes on a variety of topics. If you’re interested in learning how to monetize your blog then visit http://www.AtomicBloggingWorld.com

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Traffic Tactics For Your Blog

Among SEO professionals, there isn’t always consensus on precisely which and to what degree site factors contribute or detract from rankings on Google because the factors actually vary by industry. There are indeed, a number of contentious issues: markup and content quality, use of title tags, site organization and even arguments that Google Analytics data factors in to site rankings. Not likely (yet), but certainly up for debate among SEO professionals.

However, there are some Google ranking factors that most professionals agree affect site positioning on Google SERPs. However, these are opinions, find out for yourself how these apply to projects you’re working on.

Recommended Steps to Improve Google Ranking

1. Use keywords in HTML title tags. Probably the most significant factor for a site regardless of the competitive landscape, the title tag must be consistent with content in the page for best results. The more keywords in your title, the less effective this factor, be judicious.

2. Create quality anchor text for inbound links. At one time, according to some SEO professionals, quality anchor text was an essential component of a well-ranked site. After all, this is the text the user opted to see by clicking a link on another site. Most SEOs still contend that quality anchor text is a highly significant, positive ranking factor. If not for spiders, for visitors clicking in as well. Obviously the text should be relevant to the destination page for best results; that’s where your on page optimization comes in to play.

3. Increase link popularity. Link popularity takes into account the number of inbound links present. Link authority has less relevance, though it is still a factor depending on the competitive landscape. Link popularity is based on a global count of links from all sites. However, quality links are still critical to creating site authority; authority means ranking for more phrases than you intentionally target.

4. Hang in there. The age of a site is an important positive weighting factor according to many SEO professionals. It’s certainly a reasonable assumption. Failed sites are dropped as soon as the hosting subscription ends. If a site has been around for 10 years, the owners must be dong something right, especially if link popularity is steady developed over the years. Unfortunately for site owners, there’s no way to speed up the aging process – except hanging in there.

5. Increase the popularity of internal links. These links direct visitors to helpful, related content. They’re important in providing visitors with a positive on-site experience. Search engines view on-site link popularity as a sign that visitors like what they see and want to learn more.

7. Build deep links. Deep links are relevant to the topicality of the target page or keyword. The relevance of these inbound links matters to a site’s Google ranking. However, please note point 3. The sheer number of inbound links is a factor as well. Quality deep links carry more weight and add credibility to a site.

8. Connect with sites selling to the same demographic. Create a number of links with sites within your topical community. This helps visitors further their searches – something Google likes very much.

9. Keep old links. Google looks for web stability. The older the link, the more trust it has. It indicates a happy relationship with the site owner linking in who recognizes the value of sending visitors off-site. Google watchers suggest a three to four month time window for spiders to determine that this is a well-established, long-term link that has value to visitors of both sites.

10. Use keywords in body text. Make sure that keywords receive prominent display in headlines, headers, sub-heads. It’s important that the keywords used in HTML text on page match with keywords used in the site’s meta data and title tags.

Not Recommended

1. Don’t use session IDs in URLs. It sounds like a good idea on the surface, an easy way to track customer information, but here’s the problem. Each time a spider crawls the site, a new URL with session ID is created. The spider now has two, or three or more URLs all showing duplicate content. Go back to Go, do not collect $200. Don’t confuse this with pages that may have a couple GET variables in them; avoid that when you can, but just avoid having your pages containing session IDs.

2. Choose a reputable web host. The most potent negative ranking factor is server accessibility. If your server, located in Timbuktu, is inaccessible to spiders, it’s inaccessible to visitors. Down time soon becomes down and out time.

3. Avoid duplicate content. Googlebots employ filters to detect duplicate content. Now, if you opt to post some syndicated articles, you’re providing a service to visitors. However, a bot will recognize that content (it’s already appeared on 400 sites) and you’ll see a drop in traffic rank.

4. Jettison low-quality links. Google assesses the character of your site by the company you keep so keep good company by unlinking from (1) links farms, (2) sites with absolutely no quality content and (3) otherwise low-quality sites; e.g. FFA (free for all) sites.

5. Avoid any kind of links deception. Googlebots aren’t smart, but they can detect some paid links and a variety of links scams, including generated links. If a Googlebot suspects links fraud, your site may be penalized and sent to the basement or banned altogether.

6. Avoid a log-in before visitors and bots access “the good stuff.” Log-ins can easily confuse a bot who won’t be able to access quality content hidden behind a log in. Even though users with Google toolbars will be unknowingly suggesting new URLs to be crawled as they surf about, having teasers for the content your monetizing by subscription will help your SEO.

7. Avoid using frames. Horizontal and vertical framesets <frameset> are commonly used by designers to present more than one page of a site on the screen at the same time. However, frames are also bot traps. They can get in but they can’t get out, making it impossible for them to index a site – at all! Tell your developer to look at using iframes if possible or absolutely necessary.

8. Avoid duplicate title/meta tags. Title/meta tags are a valuable resource for site owners to expand access points to a site. Using title tags ensures that more pages are indexed and listed in Google’s SERPs as distinct links. All good. Unfortunately, too many duplicate title tags on pages in which the content topic hasn’t changed, is redundant and a waste of the bots time. Use tag your pages uniquely and judiciously.

9. Do not keyword stuff. Even though search engines no longer give much weight to keyword tags, keyword stuffing continues. Select 20 to 30 keywords – top-tier and long-tail – and focus on them. Keep keyword density in body text at no more than 3%. The old 5% rule still led to on-site gibberish – obviously these figures vary by competitive landscape.

10. Do not let quality slip – even for a day. Spiders crawl sites with greater frequency and sophistication and index updates are common as changes to a site are implemented. During periods of construction, be sure to keep spiders out of staging areas that have yet to be completed <nofollow> or block with robots. These works-in-progress may cost you points in the ranking sweepstakes.

Google controls 46% of all searches. Doesn’t it make sense to give this search engine exactly what it wants and delete what it doesn’t want?

Rhetorical question.

Among SEO professionals, there isn’t always consensus on precisely which and to what degree site factors contribute or detract from rankings on Google because the factors actually vary by industry. There are indeed, a number of contentious issues: markup and content quality, use of title tags, site organization and even arguments that Google Analytics data factors in to site rankings. Not likely (yet), but certainly up for debate among SEO professionals.

However, there are some Google ranking factors that most professionals agree affect site positioning on Google SERPs. However, these are opinions, find out for yourself how these apply to projects you’re working on.

Recommended Steps to Improve Google Ranking

1. Use keywords in HTML title tags. Probably the most significant factor for a site regardless of the competitive landscape, the title tag must be consistent with content in the page for best results. The more keywords in your title, the less effective this factor, be judicious.

2. Create quality anchor text for inbound links. At one time, according to some SEO professionals, quality anchor text was an essential component of a well-ranked site. After all, this is the text the user opted to see by clicking a link on another site. Most SEOs still contend that quality anchor text is a highly significant, positive ranking factor. If not for spiders, for visitors clicking in as well. Obviously the text should be relevant to the destination page for best results; that’s where your on page optimization comes in to play.

3. Increase link popularity. Link popularity takes into account the number of inbound links present. Link authority has less relevance, though it is still a factor depending on the competitive landscape. Link popularity is based on a global count of links from all sites. However, quality links are still critical to creating site authority; authority means ranking for more phrases than you intentionally target.

4. Hang in there. The age of a site is an important positive weighting factor according to many SEO professionals. It’s certainly a reasonable assumption. Failed sites are dropped as soon as the hosting subscription ends. If a site has been around for 10 years, the owners must be dong something right, especially if link popularity is steady developed over the years. Unfortunately for site owners, there’s no way to speed up the aging process – except hanging in there.

5. Increase the popularity of internal links. These links direct visitors to helpful, related content. They’re important in providing visitors with a positive on-site experience. Search engines view on-site link popularity as a sign that visitors like what they see and want to learn more.

7. Build deep links. Deep links are relevant to the topicality of the target page or keyword. The relevance of these inbound links matters to a site’s Google ranking. However, please note point 3. The sheer number of inbound links is a factor as well. Quality deep links carry more weight and add credibility to a site.

8. Connect with sites selling to the same demographic. Create a number of links with sites within your topical community. This helps visitors further their searches – something Google likes very much.

9. Keep old links. Google looks for web stability. The older the link, the more trust it has. It indicates a happy relationship with the site owner linking in who recognizes the value of sending visitors off-site. Google watchers suggest a three to four month time window for spiders to determine that this is a well-established, long-term link that has value to visitors of both sites.

10. Use keywords in body text. Make sure that keywords receive prominent display in headlines, headers, sub-heads. It’s important that the keywords used in HTML text on page match with keywords used in the site’s meta data and title tags.

Not Recommended

1. Don’t use session IDs in URLs. It sounds like a good idea on the surface, an easy way to track customer information, but here’s the problem. Each time a spider crawls the site, a new URL with session ID is created. The spider now has two, or three or more URLs all showing duplicate content. Go back to Go, do not collect $200. Don’t confuse this with pages that may have a couple GET variables in them; avoid that when you can, but just avoid having your pages containing session IDs.

2. Choose a reputable web host. The most potent negative ranking factor is server accessibility. If your server, located in Timbuktu, is inaccessible to spiders, it’s inaccessible to visitors. Down time soon becomes down and out time.

3. Avoid duplicate content. Googlebots employ filters to detect duplicate content. Now, if you opt to post some syndicated articles, you’re providing a service to visitors. However, a bot will recognize that content (it’s already appeared on 400 sites) and you’ll see a drop in traffic rank.

4. Jettison low-quality links. Google assesses the character of your site by the company you keep so keep good company by unlinking from (1) links farms, (2) sites with absolutely no quality content and (3) otherwise low-quality sites; e.g. FFA (free for all) sites.

5. Avoid any kind of links deception. Googlebots aren’t smart, but they can detect some paid links and a variety of links scams, including generated links. If a Googlebot suspects links fraud, your site may be penalized and sent to the basement or banned altogether.

6. Avoid a log-in before visitors and bots access “the good stuff.” Log-ins can easily confuse a bot who won’t be able to access quality content hidden behind a log in. Even though users with Google toolbars will be unknowingly suggesting new URLs to be crawled as they surf about, having teasers for the content your monetizing by subscription will help your SEO.

7. Avoid using frames. Horizontal and vertical framesets <frameset> are commonly used by designers to present more than one page of a site on the screen at the same time. However, frames are also bot traps. They can get in but they can’t get out, making it impossible for them to index a site – at all! Tell your developer to look at using iframes if possible or absolutely necessary.

8. Avoid duplicate title/meta tags. Title/meta tags are a valuable resource for site owners to expand access points to a site. Using title tags ensures that more pages are indexed and listed in Google’s SERPs as distinct links. All good. Unfortunately, too many duplicate title tags on pages in which the content topic hasn’t changed, is redundant and a waste of the bots time. Use tag your pages uniquely and judiciously.

9. Do not keyword stuff. Even though search engines no longer give much weight to keyword tags, keyword stuffing continues. Select 20 to 30 keywords – top-tier and long-tail – and focus on them. Keep keyword density in body text at no more than 3%. The old 5% rule still led to on-site gibberish – obviously these figures vary by competitive landscape.

10. Do not let quality slip – even for a day. Spiders crawl sites with greater frequency and sophistication and index updates are common as changes to a site are implemented. During periods of construction, be sure to keep spiders out of staging areas that have yet to be completed <nofollow> or block with robots. These works-in-progress may cost you points in the ranking sweepstakes.

Google controls 46% of all searches. Doesn’t it make sense to give this search engine exactly what it wants and delete what it doesn’t want?

Rhetorical question.

Today, (with slight hesitation in fear of giving away too much) I am electing to share an effective SEO method which incorporates the use of sitemaps, subdomains and site architecture. As a result, you will have the capacity to develop robust websites with colossal proportions using a coherent site and link architecture to virtually zero in on competitive rankings and long-tail keywords alike.

This involves the use of subfolder / naming conventions, SEO friendly titles, relevant semantic descriptions, pretty urls, subdomains and sitemaps.

By employing this strategy, it is similar to targeting the roots of a tree (the keywords stemming from a topic) to reach the leaves (top 10 rankings) by giving them a value (page) and then implement an internal link / irrigation system capable of producing its own secondary and tertiary ranking factors as a result of link cultivation.

Sitemaps do not have to have a passive (just for crawling) in contention to SEO. In fact, think of a sitemap as a two way street. On one hand, you can use sitemaps to increase crawl frequency and get more pages in a search engine’s index. On another level, you can use sitemaps as a ranking tool designed to “reverse funnel” ranking factors to the pages that need added link weight to hone in on competitive rankings (much like a powerful pipeline).

In order to take this tool which was considered passive and turn it into a very powerful internal link sculpting tool, you only need to apply a few fundamental protocols to implement this tactic.

When you look at a Wikipedia ranking, try looking beyond the topical layer and attempt to observe the infrastructure of why and how it got there. The topical layer (landing page) represents a relevant triangulation of on page relevance (title) with keyword / search term is prominent and first – brief descriptor and site referral loop (Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) to round off the title tag /naming convention.

In addition, the keyword is also translated into a URL string on a sub domain [en.wikipedia.com/wiki/keyword] to truly concentrate the ranking factors. The tactful use of Sub domains is one SEO method to (a) expand the exact match domain / url to encroach on a more relevant keyword making a domain more specific to a topic.

There is virtually no limit to this on page SEO tactic as you can essentially expand the focus of any website to broaden the relevance funnel using the sub domain tactic. This means, with the right amount of links and content, you virtually scale the content and links pointing to each page in a website to function as the preferred landing page by consolidating internal and external links. This is known as the threshold or barrier to entry for that keyword, and each keyword has a unique tipping point until it gains momentum and ranking power.

An example of how Wikipedia employs site architecture for optimal SEO value is:

* Topic1.domain.com as the base – which will require a sufficient amount of links to stem.
* Topic1.domain.com/wiki/topic1-keyword (the wiki folder is where the magic happens).
* Topic1 Keyword becomes first shingle in the title tag.
* Topic1 Keyword becomes H1 header tag to emphasize relevance.
* Topic1 anchor text from other pages all link to Topic1.domain.com/wiki/topic1-keyword

Yet, there is a hidden layer of SEO (the wiki folder) that most do not witness that is responsible for the prominent rankings based on site architecture the site produces.

What I am referring to is the other pages in the subfolder and non indexed pages responsible for shifting ranking factors that allow the webmaster to add one more layer of relevance by controlling the anchor text that feeds the main silo/ subfolder or landing page.

Naturally this can be implemented on semantics alone or a simple PHP script will suffice to concentrate ranking factors in your websites content management system. The only thing you need to maintain buoyancy for hundreds or thousands of pages is a pipeline capable of shifting link weight from page to page, in this instance the subfolders within the subdomains become the preferred landing page.

In this instance, using the http://en.wikipedia.org sub domain (as an example) for English provides them with the ability to funnel ranking factors from page to page, yet still keep the english from the spanish version, and so on and so fourth.

In the past, the downside of this strategy is that each sub domain is considered its own site. Now, this becomes an asset as you can essentially determine how you feed your pages and subsections (all based on a keyword) from one to the next. Also, which type of anchor text you use to feed the specific landing pages will determine how they fare in the search engine result pages.

For example, by using custom sitemaps (based on semantic clusters) you can funnel specific anchor text to specific pages to elevate prominence and relevance. For example, all pages corresponding to a particular keyword could be fed with a second / alternative modifier or qualifying term to promote keyword stemming.

The site:yourdomain.com keyword site operator can provide ideas for semantically themed pages that correspond to a virtual site architecture within a website.

Once you have a list of semantically coherent pages (based on keyword research) you can then nurture them in one place to implement the primary point of convergence (the sitemap) or hub page.

By using robots.txt or the noindex, follow meta tag, you can use sitemaps and landing pages designed to group clusters of concepts, keywords, other landing pages or subjects in one central place where you can feed multiple pages from one entry point.

Through managing the supporting pages (which all link up to the top level landing page to transfer their authority) you can sculpt up to 70% of the ranking factors for any given keyword. As a result, the transcendental ranking factors begin to spill over and strengthen the domain they are hosted on (which in turn feeds more pages which rank higher, etc.).

Eventually you have dozens, hundreds or thousands of pages in a site that all have page rank or the ability to pass ranking factors from one page to the next. By their very nature (the individual pages) they are optimized from the onset and when combined represents a ranking juggernaut as each page develops trust rank and authority.

The aggregate ranking factors for each page begin to stem and expand (which means it can be found for any two or three word combination’s on that page) if a related search query is executed in search engines.

What you have at that point is a website capable of ranking for multiple keywords simultaneously and showcasing the tip of the iceberg (the ideal landing page) built specifically as a consolidation of the keyword / topic capable of ranking on a fraction of the links required by a website that does not employ superior / coherent site architecture.

To summarize, internal links fueled by external links to one concentrated point and then augmented by deep links to the top level landing page have the ability to rank on fumes compared to a website employing that employs less efficient site architecture.

Which means that (a) the more topical information you have on a topic the better (b) that you can elect which pages are SEO savvy and appear (as a result of internal linking) and (c) there is virtually no limit to the size of reach of the websites semantic theme.

Obviously the more concentrated it is, the better (as it will require less links to cross the tipping point). You must understand that content and or external links both produce ranking factors, so it is possible to a website such as this to produce 60-80% of its own ranking factor by default (with more pages gaining strength, page rank and stemming daily).

So, the takeaway for the tactic is:

1) Group landing pages or themes virtually by using a sitemaps to stand in as pipelines to funnel link flow.

2) Build it properly from the onset, or consider mapping out a more conducive site architecture and 301 redirecting legacy pages to the new themed and silo’d pages.

3) Group primary keywords along with secondary supporting pages in miniature sitemaps to concentrate on a core group of keyphrase shingles.

Taking point 3 from above, you could take keywords like; SEO consulting, SEO consultant, SEO consulting services and feed them by a virtual sitemap linking them together (regardless of their location in the site architecture).

However, if the pages were in a subfolder (consulting) within a subdomain (SEO.domain.com) for example and used internal links which all point to the sitemap and the sitemap to them, each page would share a percentage of total link flow for that topical range of key phrases and modifiers to essentially exceed the threshold of relevance on all layers.

Then add deep links (links to each respective landing page) and you have the ability to catapult them all to the top of their respective shingles using a fraction of the links your competition is using.

And, how do we know this you might ask? Let’s just say we have done this before “with stellar results”…the next layer would be to implement a series of RSS feeds based on the same type of infrastructure to publish related content whenever new information was added, linked to or layered to promote buoyancy for laser-focused keywords and key phrases, yet that is another post in itself…

Jeffrey Smith is an active internet marketing optimization strategist, consultant and the founder of Seo Design Solutions Seo Company http://www.seodesignsolutions.com. He has actively been involved in internet marketing since 1995 and brings a wealth of collective experiences and fresh marketing strategies to individuals involved in online business.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

SEO, Subdomains, Site Architecture and Sitemaps

I started in SEO working for an agency that required an annual contract. Clients who wanted to hire them had to be prepared to pay in full upfront for 12 months of service.

That’s a heck of a commitment, isn’t it?

The worst part is that most of the time what the client was “buying” wasn’t clear.

Many of proposals read something like this:

“Acme SEO Consulting will optimize Client’s website for search engines using best practices and proprietary tools and techniques. Work may include the following:

• Title tag optimization
• Headline optimization
• ALT text optimization
• Keyword research
• Keyword density improvements
• Canonicalization corrections
• Crawl testing
• Robots.txt setup / maintenance
• Broken link scans
• Link building
• Competitor research
• Internal link optimization
• PageRank sculpting
• 301 redirects”

Whew, sounds pretty advanced, doesn’t it? For someone new to the world of SEO most of these deliverables may as well read, “Flux capacitor installation, GKC valve distribution correction, Removal of vermicious knids.”

The question most people are asking when they read a proposal like this: how do these things all add up to me getting a positive return on my investment?  How do they translate into more sales/leads/etc?

As an SEO I know that several of the bullet points above are often crucial optimization points. It’s my job to know which and when/where they’re required – and what the priority is to implement each one when it’s on the table.

There’s also a lot of muddy language in the example above that leaves the actual deliverables impossible to pin down. “Best practices,” “proprietary tools and techniques,” “work may include” – these are all nice ways of saying, “we’re not telling you exactly what we’re going to do.”

From an agency standpoint the argument is often, “well, if we give clients the detailed plan upfront won’t they just take the proposal straight to a low-cost competitor and get the same work for less?”

This is not a great attitude to take in approaching business relationships, is it?  ”Well, these people could be trying to screw us so let’s tell them nothing.”

It also misses an important point: Internet Marketing needs are different for every website.

Projects Must Be Tailored for Unique Needs

Believe me, it would be great if every client that picked up the phone and called us or contacted us through our website fit into a cookie-cutter mold for SEO and other Internet Marketing services. Everyone would get the same work at the same cost and, most importantly, they’d all see the same positive results.

Happy, prosperous clients = happy, prosperous agency

Unfortunately that’s just not how it works.

The truth is that your website and needs are unique.

• You’re in a unique market with unique competitors
• You’ve been in business for a unique amount of time
• You’re offering is one-of-a-kind (hopefully)
• Maybe you’ve got an in-house email list, maybe you don’t
• Maybe you’ve got an extensive profile of inbound links, maybe not
• Your website might need a design/usability overhaul, or it may be beautiful, usable and brand spanking new
• You could be running pay-per-click campaigns
• You might have a blog or articles on your website
• You may have web analytics installed or not – and for how long?
• Perhaps you have staff in-house who can handle website updates and creating new content – on the other hand, you might need to outsource these

Sure, many of the principles of SEO and Internet Marketing apply across all, or most, websites and markets. But with so many variables and unique characteristics the work (and budget) required to reach your goals are always particular.
It makes sense, then, that any Internet Marketing company, whether they’re proposing SEO, pay-per-click, email marketing, web design or all of the above, should customize their offering to the client’s needs, doesn’t it?

How to Know What You’re Getting Into

You can probably tell where this is going. Any project, whether it be SEO or another form of Internet Marketing, should have specific strategies, tactics and timelines geared for your particular situation.

If you’re looking to hire an agency, a project proposal should be a plan and not a reiteration of the agency’s selling points. The litmus test here: does the proposal focus on you and your needs, or does it reiterate why you’d want to hire the agency, some of their general methodology, their experience, etc. Sure, that stuff is important too, but a project proposal isn’t about the agency – it’s about the game plan and how it’s going to help you achieve your goals.

Some of the questions that should be on your mind when reviewing a project plan:

• What are the goals of this project?
  • More search engine traffic / exposure?
  • More leads?
  • More sales?
  • Do these goals make sense for your business model?
• How will the goals be achieved?
  • What strategy the agency is proposing?
  • What are the specific deliverables?
  • What is the timeline for those deliverables?
• Why will this strategy work?
  • What is the logic behind the strategy?
  • Has this strategy worked before?

Without the answers to these questions, isn’t it tough to know 1) what you’re aiming for and 2) how you’ll get there?

Imagine evaluating a year-long SEO project six months in. How are you going to evaluate the work that’s been done so far? How are you going to tell whether things are going well or not? If the plan or proposal was vague and listed lots of “possible” tactics/deliverables and no real timeline or goals it’s going to be pretty tough, right?

The basic reason most SEO projects fail

The essential reason most SEO projects fail isn’t because the work being done is shoddy (or the agency is just not worth their salt). That might be the case, but more often the cause of failure is the lack of a specific goals, strategy and detailed tactics/deliverables.

You can’t call something a “success” until you define that term. Take pains to understand upfront what your goals are for a project – and when an agency provides a quote make sure they’re addressing your goals, detailing the specific methods of reaching them and explaining logically why it’s all going to work.

About the Author Mike Tekula is the Director of Marketing at Unstuck Digital – a results-driven Internet Marketing agency that provides SEO Consulting, SEO Training and other Internet Marketing services.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Why Most SEO Projects Fail and How To Fix Them

In today’s online world search engine rankings can make your business succeed, and while rankings in Yahoo and MSN are very valuable, their combined market value is still less than that of Google. This makes achieving top rankings in Google that much more important.

In this three-part series on How to Optimize for Google we will touch on a number of important aspects for top Google rankings including website optimization, links, Google Webmaster tools, and a number of other considerations.

The focus of Part 1 will be with on page website optimization.

THE RIGHT KEYWORDS
This article is not about keyword research so I will not spend too much time on this topic, however, I felt it was important to at least brush on this slightly.

Make sure that your targets are achievable. If you select the wrong keywords it can make your entire optimization experience essentially a waste. Choose keywords that are attainable but yet still offer a reasonable search frequency for your industry. Your phrase selection should also be targeted to bring qualified traffic to your site.

Using the hotel industry as an example, targeting the word “hotel” would make very little sense but by narrowing it down to “Victoria BC hotel” you now have less competition, and a more qualified audience. Keep your targets in perspective and go after the obtainable rankings.

WEBSITE OPTIMIZATION
There are many on-site factors that play a role in your search engine rankings. Here are a number of those factors and what you can do to increase your chances of success.

Title Tag
The title tag plays one of the most important roles in search results at Google, and is almost always the heading Google chooses for each of its listings. Placement of your target phrase is best used near the start of the tag and repeated again in the middle or near the end. Three uses of your target phrase may be helpful in some instances, as long as it is not too overwhelming. For best results each page on your site should have a totally unique title tag.

It is also important to remember that because Google will use this title as the main heading for your listing, you will want to keep it attractive to potential searchers. Try to also add a call to action, or other wording to help make your listing appear attractive to searchers.

To help illustrate the fact Google takes this tag into consideration, simply do a search for your target phrase and take a look at the titles of the top 10. I tried a search for a rather broad term “hotel” and saw that all 10/10 listings had it in the title tag, and 6/10 had it as the very first word. A quick scan showed that the entire top 30 either had the word hotel, or hotels in their title tags.

If you do only one thing to your website, make sure that all your title tags are relevant, unique, and contain your target phrase for each page.

Meta Description Tag
The Meta Description tag is still occasionally used by Google as the description which appears in the search results themselves. While this used to be a more common practice Google tends to use it most often on sites with very limited content, or those which are flash based. I have seen it still used for content rich sites, however this is less common.

The Meta Description tag still has an impact on search rankings. Your best bet when using this tag is to keep it short and sweet with your target phrase close to the start and never repeated more than 3 times. Like the title tag, each page on you site should have its own unique description tag.

Meta Keyword Tag
When it comes to Google this tag is useless, and won’t influence your rankings. There is some speculation as to whether a spammy keyword tag can however, have a negative effect on Google rankings. As a result, if you do utilize a keyword Meta tag for the smaller engines, it is best to keep it clean and play it safe.

Density
Keyword density plays a role in overall rankings; however, it is not as cut and dry as it once was. Once upon a time there was a magic number that when used could almost guarantee top rankings.

This is no longer the case. Today the ideal density varies from industry to industry, phrase to phrase. To find out what density you should aim for, take the top 10 or 20 search results and see what percentage those sites are using. In most cases you will find that the majority of these sites have a very similar density to one another, and this average density is a good estimation of what you should aim for.

Body Text and Keyword Placement
The location of relevant text on your site will help establish the overall importance of your target phrase. While you do not want to overwhelm the engines and site visitors with a bombardment of target phrases at the top of the page, try to sprinkle in some instances as close to the top of the page as possible.

Synonyms
Be sure to include various synonyms for your target phrases within your body text on your site. Google will use these synonyms to tie in the overall relevance of the page for your main target phrases, which in turn can improve your odds.

To find possible synonyms you can use a thesaurus, but the best way is to search Google itself and see exactly what they consider to be similar. Simply search in Google for your target phrase preceded with a tilde, such as “~hotels”. Next scan through the search results for any text Google has bolded. These are all words that Google considers to be related. Using the “~hotels” example Google brings up phrases such as ‘travel’, ‘tourism’, ‘accommodation’, as well as various hotel chain names such as ‘Hilton Hotels’.

Keywords in Domain
There is still some speculation if having a target phrase as part of your top level domain (TLD) is of use to search rankings. From my experience, yes, there is value here, although, nothing like it was several years ago.

If you are starting off in the online world and are contemplating which domain to go for, consider one that uses your target phrase, assuming that it is both relevant to your business name, and uses no more than a single hyphen. While multiple hyphens in a domain can be successful, they are very common with highly spammy websites, so it is best to not take that route if possible.

While having a keyword located within your domain can offer some ranking juice, I would not suggest heading out and doing a domain swap. In most cases you would be better off working on your existing site than starting from scratch with a new domain.

Keywords in page specific URL
Using keywords for specific page URL’s can also help add a little bit of value to your site, providing you use them responsibly. Consider using a keyword as a directory name and as part of a file name where it naturally makes sense to do so. If you have a website that focuses on tourism and includes local hotel listings, you may want to consider the following structure for your page on the Hilton:

MyTourismSite.com/Victoria/Accommodations/Hotels/Hilton.html

Heading Tags
Placement of target phrases within heading tags helps to establish the importance of those given phrases. That said do not over do it, or abuse it. Only place target phrases within a heading tag if it makes sense to do so, and don’t flood a page with numerous tags. Heading tags are not as critical as they once were, but still a good contribution to a well optimized page.

Link Anchor text
This is the actual text you click on as part of a link. When full or partial target phrases are used within your text links they help pass on some value to the linked page for those phrases. This is also true when considering surrounding text. When the content around the link is also relevant, the link holds slightly more value.

While a link that simply states “click here” or “www.domainname.com” does have its place, they provide considerably less value than a link that would use “discount hotels” as its anchor.

Image Alt Text
While image alt text still plays a minor role, its biggest part is within the use of image based navigation. If you have an image linked to another page, the alt text will be attributed much the same way as standard link anchor text is.

Image Alt text should always be short and to the point and should accurately describe either the image itself, or the page the image is linking to. Do not use alt tags as a place to stuff keywords.

Inline Links
These are links that are found mid sentence or mid paragraph as opposed to a simple listing of links as found in a menu or possibly on a sitemap. Links found mid paragraph tend to pass on a little more value from the surrounding text and can offer more relevance to the linked page.

Site Navigation
It is absolutely imperative that your website be fully spiderable by the search engines. This may seem obvious, but often webmasters overlook Google’s ability to crawl a website. Google has become very advanced in what links it can follow and how it can spider a website, but there are still some things that can cause significant roadblocks.

- Flash: One of the most commonly made mistakes is the use of flash. If flash is used as a sole means of site navigation then you can count on Google not viewing your internal pages, and having a significant disadvantage in terms of site rankings.

- Java Script / DHTML: These days most Java Script and even DHTML menus can be spidered by Google, however, this is not always the case. If your site utilizes any kind of fancy navigation and you are wondering why Google has not indexed your internal pages, check out Google’s Cached Text version of your page. If you do not see any text links, then your navigation may be invisible to Google.

- Images: Image based navigation has been safe for many years now, but if your site uses this form of navigation it is essential to have brief, relevant alt text on all your buttons. This alt text will act much like standard anchor text for text based links. This is not only for the purpose of search ranking value, but take a look at Google’s cached text version of your page. If you have image based links that do not have alt text, those links do not appear. This doesn’t mean Google won’t follow them, but for anyone viewing your site on a text based browser, your links will be invisible to them.

URL Structure
Avoid long elaborate URL’s with extraneous characters. While Google has reached a point where they can index massive URL strings, it is best to avoid them if at all possible. For dynamic sites consider utilizing mod rewrites to significantly clean up the URL to not only make it more search engine friendly, but more user friendly as well.

MyTourismSite.com/?locid=”victoria”&catid=”accommodations”
&type=”hotel”&comp=”hilton”

stands a better chance if cleaned up to read:

MyTourismSite.com/victoria/accommodations/hotels/hilton.htm

SUMMARY
Basic website optimization is a critical component for successful placement in Google but is only part of the overall picture.

Scott Van Achte is the Senior SEO at StepForth Web Marketing Inc.; based in Victoria, BC, Canada and founded in 1997. You can read more of Scott’s articles and those of the veteran StepForth team at http://news.stepforth.com or contact us at http://www.stepforth.com

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

How to Optimize for Google – Part 1 of 3

If you’re obsessive about SEO you likely already have a domain name that contains one relevant keyword, an entire keyword phrase or even a targeted search term. This is a great practice if you have a website that is highly targeted to one topic or set of keywords, but there is a lot more you can do that will help to boost your search engine ranking position (SERP) and possibly outrank the sites that DO have your keyword in their domain name.

The keyword appearing in the URL is important, but more important than that is the keyword appearing in the title tag. Somewhere in between or just underneath is something called the H1 (which is not surprisingly followed in importance by H2). Naturally your keywords should also appear in the content here and there (not everywhere). If you write about your keywords on a daily basis you are probably already on top of your SEO situation, but if your blog is more relaxed topically and you like to drift and touch on anything you like, then you may benefit from doing a few SEO best practices for Wordpress.

1) Title Tags

The title tags are the most important thing. It may not be most important to the Search Engines, but it certainly is to the reader. Even if something is the #1 result in Google, a reader wont likely click on a title that has nothing to do with what they are searching for. That is why it is good to serve your post headline in the title tag instead of just the blog name.

You can do this by editing your header.php to include the appropriate Wordpress template tags within the HTML Title tag. This may also mean using an IF statement to determine what type of page is displaying and what tags to use.

2) The H1 Tag

There is a high degree of confusion circulating the web on the proper use of h1 tags with Wordpress. The basic purpose of h1 is to let the search engine know what a page is about. The last thing you want is more than one h1 on a page. This confuses the heck out of search bots and, as a result, drops your SEO score.

The typical belief is that serving your blog title in the H1 tag is proper. This makes sense because you have your keywords in your blog title, but what about the individual posts? Aren’t the post titles more relevant than the name of your blog?

If you have a post on your blog about “99 Ways to skin a cat” isn’t that particular page about skinning cats rather than your blog’s title, which may be “catskinners.org”?   The solution here is that you want to have your post titles on the single post page inside the H1 tags. Since there shouldn’t be more than one H1 per page, this means you need your title or logo inside a div.

If you have more than one post on your homepage (which most people do) then you should place your post titles’ inside of H2 tags and your logo in an H1. This tells the SE’s that your homepage is about whatever your title is, and the post headlines are the next most important thing. Once a user clicks through to a single post the most important thing becomes the title of that post.

3)Inbound/Outbound links

A huge part of blogging is sharing the link love and creating conversations between one blog to the next. It is typical in the blogosphere to see someone quote a post from another blog, add their own 2 cents and then link the blog where the topic started. This is a fine thing to do and it will even help you gain a few links yourself as your own sharing attitude encourages others to share. You just have to be careful not to have too many links out and balance it with your links from your blog pointing to your own blog.

People often forget that a link to your blog from your blog still counts as a link to your blog (how was THAT for a sentence?). Since one of the best things you can have linking to your blog is some good relevant anchor text that contains your keywords, why not go ahead and link any of those words within your posts back to your homepage?

Here are some more things you can do to make the best use of your internal links:

• Linking from your posts to older posts (when relevant)
• Linking from your posts to your homepage (whenever possible)
• Keep your navigation consistent across the whole site
• Link every page to your homepage at least once (more is ok too)
• Use a sitemap template that includes all your single posts and pages as well as the date and category archives

4) Anchor Text and Keywords

You probably already know at this point that one of your main goals in offsite SEO is to get links with your keywords in the anchor text (the text that makes up the active link). This is one of the single most important factors to both your SE for your determined keywords and your PR. The more links you have, the better your PR. The more links you have containing your keywords, the better your SERPs for those keywords are. It is healthy to mix them up and use different combinations of your keywords to help monopolize your grip on a given topic.

We’re almost finished. There is one more important spot we need to place our keywords. If I were a keyword where would I be? In this blog post! You can have all the SEO you want on your Wordpress template but it isn’t going to matter much if you don’t talk about your keywords in your blog posts. You obviously don’t want to come off as a spammer so be wary not to simply randomly throw in long and short-tail keywords in every single sentence. However, there is nothing wrong with using your full keyword search term whenever the opportunity arises. For instance, if you have the option to use a pronoun or the actual keywords you should choose the keyword.

You can optimize your Wordpress for search engine rankings quite simply by sticking to some of the concepts we’ve covered here. It can be done over time or all in one shot. However, it would be handy to come back to this little guide each time you are setting up a new installation of Wordpress. Remember that not all Wordpress themes are search engine optimized so you may have to get your hands dirty and shine up the code of each template you use on your blog.  A good start is making sure the markup is semantic and Google recommended.

Written by Ryan Edmunds from Needless Productions

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Search Engine Optimizing your Wordpress installation