Ugh!!'s Greymatter Honeypot » SEO

The secret to gaining SEO Juice for your website

Owen — Wed, 19 May 2010 22:48:38 +0000

We all know that ranking high in search engines is the best way to drive traffic to your websites. So, what techniques can you use to help push your way up the list? Well, incoming links are the most valuable resource that SEO professionals use to help influence search engines into give you a good rank. Here are some places you can get links from:

Blog Links
Social Media and Bookmarking
Press Releases
Directory Submissions
Local Search
Select Authority Link Leasing

This list comes from an SEO company called Globe Runner who can help with link building services should you need them. But if you read up about the techniques used, it’s not really rocket science.

What techniques do YOU use for link building?

BCS (Isle of Man) Talk: Search Engine Optimisation

Owen — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 16:53:33 +0000

I’ve organised a talk for the Isle of Man Chapter of the BCS this week that will focus on search engine optimisation. We’re having dotPerformance come to speak to us a bit about the SEO in general and about the work they do for their clients. We took a different approach to this one by going out and asking our members what sort of questions they would like to see answered. Here are some questions we got back:

How much does page content need to relate to the metadata and page title?
Does website content need to change frequently to ensure good SEO?
Link strategy â€“ whatâ€™s the best way forward and what works best?
Does it help if the website has an RSS feed?
Any tips for successful SEO?
Flash and Shockwave files: is there a place for them in SEO? Can they be optimised successfully?
What are the best strategies when dealing with highly competitive keywords, eg prescription, mortgage. What about awkward ones like: alli weight loss, live video casting solutions or prescription swimming goggles.
What would you change about the way google indexes stuff? and Why?

If you’re interested in having some of these questions answered (and live in the Isle of Man), come and join us at Ballakermeen High School on Wednesday 29th October 2008. Doors open at 18:00. More information on the BCS website. (it’s free)

P.S. Thanks to Sherrilynne for spreading the word

SEO: Is it really fair on the consumer?

Owen — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 20:13:10 +0000

I’ve just come from an interesting post on FuelMyBlog’s blog entitled: SEO wins gold, silver and bronze. It’s an interesting post that compares SEO to the Olympics and The Guinness Book of Records. Here’s a snippet from the post:

A lot of SEO technology is used to make sure weaker content makes it to the top. Some SEO techniques are allowed, some are not, some are dirt evil and some evil performance-enhancing techniques are still not being detected â€¦

I find the post particular interesting because in my mind there’s a big distinction between making your website more readable/indexable by search engines and trying to figure out how search engines work so that you get ranked before other sites which may be more valuable for the reader.

For example, let’s say I’m looking for information about a clothing company called Nautica. Assuming there are no other companies with that name, search engines should be able to tell me straight away about websites that can give me that information. However, if someone tries to elevate that keyword because they are selling, say Nautica watches, that page may have a high SERP for that keyword. Was that useful to me as a consumer? Does all this fighting for position really benefit the searcher?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not calling anyone who works in SEO a snake-oil merchant, however I think it’s only fair that they set their client’s expectations of what can be achieved. I’m sick and tired of receiving spam from people claiming to be able to make my websites rank first on search engines. At the end of the day, I’m sure decent search engines (that only really includes Google at the moment) can figure out what is relevant and what isn’t; and provide me with exactly what I’m searching for.

Get some keywords

Owen — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 20:16:07 +0000

Howâ€™s your imagination? Well, if youâ€™re trying to think of new keywords for your website, youâ€™re going to need lots of imagination. Alternatively, check out the Google Adwords Keyword Tool. It gives you loads of suggestions of keywords you can used, based on all the research Google has amassed. It has some nice features too in that you can point it at at web page and let it figure out the keywords from the content on the page. So, next time youâ€™re looking for keywords for aÂ funny website or music score, give it a try.

Analyze your backlinks

Owen — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 20:44:09 +0000

My mate Carlo just sent me a link to a website you can use to analyze your backlinks. Analyze Backlinks, as the site is so aptly called, let you specify a URL, and comes back with a list of pages that reference the URL.

Using it is simple, just pop the URL in the text box specified, select the options you want, click Begin and just sit back comfortably in your massage chair (if you have one that is). Within a few instants it will come back with up to 1000 URLs that point at your page. I would have preferred getting some sort of indication as to the quality of the links, but itâ€™s a good way to start.

What are you waiting for, Analyze your Backlinks now.

Page Rank dropped? Maybe I can explain why ..

Owen — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 10:36:29 +0000

I noticed something interesting today. I was playing with some SEO tools to understand how Google ranks sites a bit better and decided to check how many inbound links Google thinks this site has. I fired up Google and tried:

link:http://www.u-g-h.com/

Google reported a grand total of 248 websites that link to my home page. Now, I don’t think of myself as being vain, but I remember back in the days when my PageRank was 5 that I had tens of thousands of inbound links. So I popped off to ask other search engines what inbound links they though I had:

http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/search?p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u-g-h.com&bwm=i&bwmf=u&bwms=p&fr=FP-tab-web-t&fr2=seo-rd-se

Well, Yahoo thinks I have over 33,000 links spread over almost 8000 pages.

Now, I suspect this might have something to do with relevance. It’s possible to ask Google what websites it thinks are related to you:

related:http://www.u-g-h.com

gives a list of websites that Google thinks are related to this one. Which means Google has the ability to figure out what box to put your website in. My theory is that the drop in incoming links could come about from Google only caring about inbound links from related websites. So, if you had a website that lets you search for videographers for example, an inbound link from a website selling acne treatments might not count. I’m not saying this is a bad thing for the searching public as it increases the relevance of the searches. However it does mean that using Page Rank to gauge the value of a website is probably the wrong metric to use.

This theory could explain some things I considered strange on my website. For example, my Comment Email Responder page has a PageRank of 0, even though there are hundreds of bloggers out there who wax lyrical about the plugin. But, if Google thinks the page is about PHP development (which is what it really is), and all the bloggers talking about it don’t run blogs about PHP development (which I’m pretty sure most of them don’t), then Google wouldn’t count those links. What do you think? Does the theory hold water?

The bottom line is that I believe PageRank is really just an internal measure that Google uses to figure out relative relationships between pages in a certain theme and is useless for comparing one webpage to another. Would love to hear your feedback

Page Rank on the move – Currently Google has a Page Rank of 1

Owen — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 21:33:58 +0000

Looks like Google‘s datacentres are in the middle of another Page Rank update. Google does this from time to time to update it’s published values for Page Rank used by third party services (for example the Google Toolbar) and every internet marketing company keeps a look out for that. Anyway, while the Google Dance is ongoing you can see some interesting results. Here’s what Google.com showed up as on a PR checker:

(As you probably realise, that’s a bit tongue-in-cheek. Sites will be getting erratic readings until all updates are complete)

Grab an expired domain

Owen — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 22:50:47 +0000

Here’s a great idea for getting a great domain name. If you keep an eye on domains that have just expired, you might manage to get your hands on one that the owner has forgotten to renew. You’d be surprised how many domain names like this end up back in the pool for other people to register. The problem, as always, is grabbing them before anybody else does; and unless you know they’re available, you’re not going to try and get them.

This is where Network Solution’s new tool comes in. They have a domain name RSS Feed that lets you filter domain names and only show expired domains. So, for example, if you wanted a domain name with “SEO” in it; you can set up a search for that expression and subscribe to it. That way, when a new one comes up, you’ll know about it straight away.

The other great thing about newly expired domains is that some people believe they carry Page Rank with them. So it’s a great way to start a new site. Just jump onto an older one. Personally, I don’t have any empirical evidence to back this up, but hey, it can’t hurt to try, can it?

Optimising for the Long Tail

Owen — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 21:40:15 +0000

What is the Long Tail and why is it important for Search Engine Optimisation. Well, the term “Long Tail” was coined by Chris Anderson in Wired magazine and relates to the impact of focusing on niche strategies and how this is a viable competitive model. I came across a great post that applies this to the Search Engine market, entitled: Search Engine Optimising for Long Tail Search Results. It’s an insightful post by a company focusing on SEO (Search Engine Optimisation), and talks about the strategy of focusing on niche terms which, in large volumes, can positively impact traffic to your website originating from search engines. Well worth a read and while you’re there, check out their services. If you’re looking for an SEO expert, they may be able to help.

Paid Search is a lot like Dating

Owen — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 11:50:23 +0000

Just came across an excellent post that compares Paid Search to Dating and draw some interesting conclusions. The analogy seems to work pretty well, putting forward some great advice like, including realising that listening (campaign monitoring) is important and usually many guys are after that one attractive girl (keyword competition). I particularly like the “meeting the parents” analogy, where search engines are compared to a girl’s parents who will judge and rate the quality of your character.

The blog pulled me in to eVisibility’s website. They are an Internet marketing company working to bring brand recognistion and search engine placings to their clients. I like the way they stand out from other Internet Marketing companies by publishing a number of case studies on their website showing some of their methods and results. It’s nice to see a Search Engine Optimization company that seems to work by providing value to their client’s propositions rather than. You can read a bit more about what they did for MacDonalds and LEI Financial.

There are some other great posts on their blog, very much targeted at people looking to learn more about search engine optimisation. There’s an excellent Newbie Guide to SEO (Where do I start) and How to Target your Press Release with Google Trends. Very informative, I’ll be subscribing to that one.