A free SEO guide to ranking
In this week's show I take a look at what Google REALY thinks about article marketing. . I've also done a quick review on 3 viewers sites for SEO and there were some common elements that were missing from their sites
1. Keyword Analysis
Remember keyword analysis is essential, get it wrong and you've wasted all your time and effort. Use Google Insights for search, Google Suggestions and Google's keyword research tool for Adwords, although I have found this last one a little unreliable over the years.
2. Page Title
Put the phrase EXACTLY as you want to target it in your page title. If possible make sure it is the only phrase. The more focused you can be the better.
3. No one cares about your company name
As you will see from today's video most web designers put the company name in the page title. It's a waste of space. Usually a company name will be unique, it has to be in most places or else you wouldn't be able to register it. This means it should be the easiest thing to rank for as it will be on your pages somewhere and in most cases, your domain name, so it is not required in your title for ranking. We have it in our home page title at the end but no where else. It dilutes the strength of your other phrases.
4. Phrase in URL
For a target page, make sure it's file name is the target phrase. WordPress, Joomla and other CMS do this very well. If you don't have a very big site, it's even easier. Just rename the pages. If you do rename them, make sure you follow the instructions on redirecting.
5. Phrase in a heading
If you want to rank for a phrase, make it the heading of your article. Then USE it in your article. If the phrase is important to you, you need to be relevant for it. The way to be relevant for it is to actually write about it. I've seen a lot of sites that want to rank for a phrase but it does not appear on the page they are trying to rank.
6. Link the phrase
Put a link to your target page off the front page of your site, using the target phrase. DO NOT link the words "read more" unless you're actually trying to rank for "read more"
7. Get some external link love.
A couple of easy ways to do this is to tweet the link out or put a Facebook like button on the page. If your using WordPress, don't worry, the CMS will automatically ping Google to let them know there is new content.
That's it! Happy ranking :)
{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
Jim,
As you know – I’m a big fan!
Just one comment – you mentioned in the video to use a p.o.box in the Google local listing – Google is now suspending many accounts becuase of that – here is a quote from the Google guidelnes:
“Business Location: Use a precise, accurate address to describe your business location.
* Do not create listings at locations where the business does not physically exist. P.O. Boxes are not considered accurate physical locations. Listings submitted with P.O. Box addresses will be removed. ”
Jim, thank you for all those great videos,
Take care,
Oron Raviv
Hi Oron,
Yep I am aware of that. However these days there are a lot of home based businesses and I would not recommend ppl list their home address in GPlaces. There are plenty of examples where Google is using the PO Box entry to determine geo-relevance. Just look at the example in the vid. Sure Google may remove these entries at some point but I think it is more likely they will change their policy as it presupposes someone doing a Geo search wants to travel to that location. Think mobile mechanic, mobile hairdresser or courier. If you look at the searches in insights, they are often accompanied by a place name. Any micro business that travels to see their clients doesn’t necessarily want customers arriving on their doorstep. However they are still relevant to the geo search. I think Google will certainly punish biz who do multiple PO boxes all leading to the same address though.
Thanks good points.
excellent, as usual. thanks Jim
Hi Jim,
I was wondering if you could clear something up for me? I have read in artlicles and books and listened to several boffins about SEO on how Google treats links (that are unrelated to your business theme or general keywords). I see at the bottom of your page you have links to many sites that are clearly unrelated to your business, am I correct? How do your links therefore sit with Google?
Can you give some general advice in this area?
Avid fan, love your work,
Big Ranker, John Duffield
Hi John
Google doesn’t seem to mind. My attitude is you only worry about those things if you are having problems with ranking. We have over 400 pieces of content on the site, so those outbound links have less of an impact than what they would on a much smaller site.
That is a list of some our clients who we are very fond of and would recommend highly and we love their web sites
Link exchanges – OUT
Comment spam – OUT
Purchase of links – OUT
Now Article Marketing is presumed OUT and I imagine Press Releases will be next.
Article Marketing was damn hard work and quite frankly shouldn’t have been done for the backlink but to generate traffic to the author’s site first and foremost from highly trafficked article sites.
Perhaps now that Google has almost finished systematically destroying methods of obtaining backlinks they might discount them. After all, we really only chase them because they value them in their ranking systems. So is Google the one guilty in the end of all these backlink problems? Cause and effect!
Cheers mate
Yeah the thought has crossed my mind. Matt Cutts keeps with the “just create good content and the links will come” mantra though. Totally agree with you on article marketing.
for business address’s as opposed to PO boxes try MBE service, much better! great vid Jim
V
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