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By Sid Nelson in Google

The “Triangle of Relevancy” is used to describe the relationship between the text in a landing page, a sponsored advertisement and the keyword or phrase that’s entered into a search engine. Google places a premium on relevancy as it endeavors to ensure visitors have a positive experience by getting search results relevant to their search terms. I will outline specific steps an advertiser can take to maximize their landing pages and sponsored advertisements effectiveness in their search engine marketing endeavors.

Relevancy with Landing Pages
The product, if you will, of any search engine is the resulting landing pages. The page’s relevance to the search terms determines whether the page will show up in a search and at what position. Google’s algorithm scores each page and/or sponsored ad’s relationship to the keywords or phrase and uses this information to assist in determining the order in which the landing pages and AdWords ads are placed. The algorithm also monitors the amount of time a visitor spends on a page and includes this in the score.

Search engine optimization (SEO) techniques such as placing keywords in the page’s title and throughout the body of the page can sometimes affect the position of a page in the search results. But of greater importance to Google’s algorithm is whether or not the keywords are located on the landing page and whether they are randomly included simply to increase the density of the keyword on the page.

A common scenario is for Web developers to design a number of landing pages for the same product specific to certain keywords. Using this method you can end up with 10 or more landing pages for each of your products. This can be expensive, time consuming and difficult to maintain as regular updates are required on each page.

This can be much more efficiently accomplished by using a product entitled Search Chameleon. This product uses scripting on a landing page and a related sponsored ad to adjust the text in the landing page in REAL TIME according to the keywords entered in the search bar. The scripting can be used in the page’s title or anywhere in the body. This not only saves development time but makes page updates much simpler since you’re only working with one page.

It also assures your page will be relevant to the search regardless of the search term entered. This can be a compelling factor in a visitor’s decision to spend more time on a landing page. An advertiser is then able to maximize on the relevancy of their landing pages by automating previously manual processes.

Relevancy with AdWords and Sponsored Advertisement
The “Triangle of Relevancy” would not be complete without the search terms being included in the title and/or body of your sponsored ad. Google and most search engines will highlight the search terms in the sponsored ad anywhere it shows up. This allows your ad to stand out and draws attention to the visitor that your ad is relevant to their search.

So, in stead of loading your Adwords campaigns with numerous non-relevant keywords, your best bet is to use a single keyword or phrase that’s relevant to your ad allowing it show up in both the title and the body of the ad. This means you should write several ads specific to a keyword or phrase for your Adwords campaigns. This not only makes your ad more relevant but it pre-qualifies your prospect as the ad contains the specific key terms they’re searching for.

Another way to really boost your sponsored ad’s visibility is to have the keyword or phrase in the destination URL at the bottom of the ad. If you’re using an affiliate link, you may not get as good a click through rate as with a non-affiliate domain, because people will respond more favorably to your ad if they think you’re the product owner.

The best way to show you’re a professional is to use your own domain name as a redirect to your affiliate site. You can use the keyword or phrase in a successful ad as the domain name and your keyword will be highlighted in the title, the body of the ad AND in the destination URL!

The second best way to show youâ re a professional is to use a keyword as a sub-domain for a domain you already own, i.e., keyword.MyDomain.com. Notice the keyword is in front catching the eye of the prospect first. An alternative would be to add the keyword as a landing page name, i.e., MyDomain.com/keyword.htm. Using these two methods works best when you have a generic domain name like 123.com which will work with any product and does not conflict with the keywords.

In Summary
The “Triangle of Relevancy” is the most important aspect of a successful search engine marketing strategy. Google is very careful to ensure their visitors have a positive experience with their search engine so they reward the more relevant advertisers with a higher position in the search results and their AdWords ad placing. Both the landing pages and the AdWords ads should focus on specific keywords or phrases for maximum relevancy.

The search engine marketing landscape is continually evolving as new technology is introduced. Search engines are continually updating their processes as developers learn how to counteract them. One thing that probably won’t change is the triangle of relevancy with the search term, the sponsored ad and the landing page. People will always want specific answers to specific questions.

Author:  Sydney Nelson is a Microsoft Certified Professional and has a Bachelor in Information Technology. More articles on search engine marketing are available at http://blog.PromoBlackBoxZone.com

By Dave Davies in Google

A few years ago I wrote the article Ten Steps To Higher Search Engine Positioning. The article was well received due to the breakdown of the core requirements for ranking a website being reduced into simple steps. Well today we’re going to break it down into 5 steps. Is it even easier to rank a website today than it was a few years ago? More straight forward? Yes. Less time consuming? Not a chance.

As our company provides guaranteed SEO services for our clients, two things are necessary:

  1. We need to know that our tactics work
  2. We need to maximize efficiency so we’re not having to charge our clients unreasonably high rates

And so we’ve developed processes by which we can attain maximum results in the least amount of time through carefully developed stages. While we are interested in all the major engines, it is of course Google that we spend the lion’s share of our time studying (having never heard a client say, “I don’t care about Google, just get me ranking on Ask.com.”) Here are the steps we use to optimize websites (including our own) for Google.

Step One: Website Structure

The structure of your website affects the way search engine spiders see your site and thus, affects your rankings. I’m going to assume from the get-go that your site is in a position to be spidered and the internal links followed (i.e. none of the content is hidden due to poor development). This does not mean that the structure is optimized.

The way the code appears on your page affects the way the search engines prioritize specific content. For example, if your navigation appears higher in the code of your web page than the content then it is given a higher priority. The goal then is to make the core sections of your page appear higher in the code than the portions that are not critical to the optimization of each page. Generally the content area of your page contains the majority of the keywords and is more easily optimized and tweaked. For this reason, you will want the content of your page to appear higher in the code. This is especially true if you have image-based navigation.

The methods for doing this differ depending on how your site was initially built. If your website was built using tableless design practices (ideal) then the matter is “simple”. Now, I can’t get into all the details here as this is a huge area unto itself. There are many great sites, articles and forums on CSS that get into this area of structural optimization in detail and where you will find many helpful forum members willing to help out and answer questions. Or of course you could hire a professional developer who already knows how to do this in which case it will take a fraction of the time. This will depend on your resources, time and of course - whether you’re a do-it-yourselfer simply interested in learning another web development skill.

If learning a new development skill appeals to you, here are some useful resources you’ll want to check out:

If your website is designed using tables the solution is actually much easier though less ideal. As Beanstalk’s Mary Davies wrote about in her article on Table Structures, with table-based designs the issue is resolved by simply structuring the cell layout in such a manner that the spiders “read” the content before the navigation and/or other, less easily optimized portions on your page. Knowing that a picture is worth a thousand words I’ll resurrect the one used by Mary to illustrate how this is done.

We can see that a blank cell is placed above the left hand navigation. Because a search engine spider reads from top to bottom, left to right they will hit the top table (the header) and then proceed to the table cell down and to the left. With the vast majority of sites this will be the left hand navigation however, if the table structure illustrated above is followed this will lead a spider to a blank cell. The spider will then quickly move to the cell on the right which is the main content area of the page. It is only after seeing the content that the spider will move back to the left, crawl the navigation and then proceed down to the footer.

The Point Of This
The goal with site structure optimization is to create an environment where the spiders will crawl the most important (and most easily optimized) content as early on the page as possible. This will give increased priority to the content that matters most.

Step Two: Content Optimization

Content optimization is, for our purposes here, the optimization of the wording and formatting of the page and site content to maximize its effect on a site’s rankings. There are three defining principles to this stage:

  • Keyword density counts
  • The formatting of content matters
  • Overall site relevancy helps

So let’s discuss these in order:

Keyword Density

Keyword density is essentially the number of times the keywords are used on your page relative to the total number of words on the page. If you had a page that was 1000 words in total and you used your keyword 100 times you would have a keyword density of 10% (this is way too high by the way).

The optimal keyword density generally seems to hover around the 3 to 5% range. Of course the optimal level fluctuates with the algorithm however it’s been a long time since I’ve seen it leave this range. You will find sites that rank with higher and lower densities than this. Keyword density is not the only factor (or how easy would an SEO’s job be?).

If you want to check your density against the densities of your main competitors there are a number of tools you can use to do this.

The Formatting Of Content

Content in header tags as well as bold, italic, anchor text and other formatting options increases the weight this text carries. Now, this doesn’t mean to run out and bold every instance of your keywords in your content but rather to make use of this as you are trying to draw the visitor’s eye to the important content on your pages. Logically enough, if you are targeting a phrase on the search engines then it is highly likely that you will end up wanting to draw the visitor’s eye to these keywords periodically on the page. This is more about usability and conversions than anything else. If a visitor enters our site using the term “seo services” we want to make sure that they find this phrase quickly when they land on the page. This will make the visitor feel more comfortable and help them more quickly find the content they are looking for.

If a page we are working on has an overall keyword density of 4% we would target to attain roughly 25 - 30% of this in some sort of formatting outside of the standard of the site. That said, the visitor is more important than the engines and if doing this will take away from the visual appeal of the site then it is not recommended. We can make up any loss in other areas.

Overall Site Relevancy

The relevancy of your entire site is going to impact the rankings of an individual page. If your entire site is about mortgages for example, you’re going to find it easier to rank for related phrases than if you have a general site with a single page about mortgages. This is because the cohesion of content among the pages of your site builds the overall relevancy of the site to that topic. If we think about it, when Google is trying to determine if a searcher if likely to find what they’re looking for on a site are they likely to believe a site with a single page on a topic is going to give the searcher the information they’re looking for or are they more likely to assume that a site with many pages on a topic is going to prove more useful to the searcher?

So we’ll resurrect the overused saying “content is king”. Many pages on one topic will fare better than many pages on different topics.

Step Three: Link Baiting

The next step (and an ongoing one at that) is link baiting. Link baiting, as we discussed in our article on the topic, is the development of content/tools/etc. for your website with the primary function of attracting links to that page or to another page on the site.

Link baiting can be something as simple as a blog where updates are posted on a topic that others would want to link to (you’re of course going to have to market your blog to get these posts found so they work as link bait). Link bait can also be created in the form of tools, contests, humorous stories or cartoons, or really anything you can dream up that would inspire someone to link to your site. SEOMoz’s Rand Fishkin managed to make his proposal to the lovely Geraldine link bait.

While most link bait doesn’t inspire links being built directly to the homepage of the site they do work to build internal links which boost overall site strength as well as to build links to internal page which might themselves rank for phrases.

Link baiting is an ongoing process. You don’t simply build some link bait, get some links and move on. The more often you develop content that others link to the more often people will visit your site, the more content they will find and the more new links they will build. You will also want to test out different methods for marketing your link bait: Press releases, articles, blog feeds, etc. People won’t simply find your bait because you built it, you need to inform the world that it is there.

Step Four: Link Building

Ahh link building, perhaps the single most discussed aspect of SEO out there and also the topic shrouded in the most confusion. Do reciprocal links still hold value? Is it worth my time to post to forums from a link building perspective? Are articles really worth the time they take to write and submit? The short answer to all of these questions is “yes” but with conditions (isn’t there always a snag?)

Never wanting to give advice I wouldn’t take myself, Beanstalk applies a minimum of 3 different link building methods for each client. Now, exactly which methods we use for link building depends on the client, the type of site, and a number of other factors but the core reason that we use at least three different link building methods is the same for all: one link building method may increase or decrease in value with an algorithm shift. The sites that tend to skyrocket and plummet with algorithm shifts are those that use a limited number of tactics and thus aren’t safeguarded against changes in the way rankings are calculated. Sites that use multiple techniques are better shielded from these adjustments. And so you are left to ponder, which link building tactics will work for my site?

The link building methods you choose now are not set in stone nor should they be. Should you choose to go with three different link building tactics and settle on reciprocal link building, directory submissions and articles you are not locked into this forever. I generally recommend getting some of the easiest out of the way first. Directory submissions are a no-brainer and should be part of virtually every promotion so they make a good first round. If there are a lot of related sites in your industry (say, if you’re a real estate agent) then reciprocal link building makes a fairly simple second tactic to employ. Now, let’s be clear on reciprocal links. Reciprocal link building is not dead but it has been brought back to what it should be - an actual vote for a site. A link exchange between the mortgage site noted above and the Beanstalk site would hold little value for either of us. The sites aren’t relevant. That said, a reciprocal link between said mortgage site and a real estate broker would make sense to both the visitors and the search engines and thus, it is a good candidate.

So you’ve launched in with two link building tactics, let’s assume you decide to try your hand at publishing and submitting an article next. First you’re going to need to accumulate information and check around to see what editors are publishing and people are asking. This should (and likely will) lead you to forums. While you’re there you might as well answer some of the questions people are asking that you’ll be writing about. This is a good test of your material (but please, make sure your comments actually answer people’s questions and aren’t blatant ads - I visit a number of forums daily and nobody likes the ads and they don’t stay posted for long). So you’re in the forums gathering information and answering questions while writing your article (which has added a fourth link building method into the mix), now you’ve got your article published. The next step is to submit it.

A few simple searches on your favorite search engine will provide long lists of sites that publish articles, you’ll simply need to create an account and submit it. I recommend setting up Google Alerts to email you with a random sentence from your article. This will allow you to monitor where it’s being picked up and, of course, make sure the credits are in place.

So there you are, you’ve already employed four different link building tactics (and we’re not even including link baiting in this total). From this stage you need to keep on each of them to insure your link counts continue to climb but you can relax a bit and move on to Step Five.

Step Five: Social Media

The use of social media for SEO purposes is a fairly recent evolution in the community. While the links from social networking sites themselves do hold value, the larger purpose of social media from an SEO perspective is the effect that it will have on personalized search results. I wrote a very length article on personalization and so I won’t repeat all of the details here (if you’re so inclined you can read it after this. It’s titled, “Personalization & The Death Of SEO“).

Now, using social media as a traffic and SEO tool is a highly specialized area. To keep posted on this ever-changing field I recommend reading Neil Patel’s blog on social media marketing. In his blog he covers a lot more than social media as an SEO tool but I won’t get into that in this article.

Aside from the links themselves social media holds one basic function for SEO’s - building relevancy. Google, in their personalization-related patent applications, has been very clear that they will be looking at community and group similarities when personalizing search results. If I like site x then it is likely that if it shows up for a different search I will find it useful again. That is the current state of personalization. It is clear it is going to go further than this and evolve into a situation where the results will run on assumptions such as, if I like site x and my friend Jim likes site x then if Jim, on a different search, like site y - chances are that I will like site y if I run the same search. Now, this doesn’t work well in a micro, two-person universe however when the technology evolves to the point where the patterns of millions of users can be analyzed effectively the results will likely yield quite significant shifts in rankings. But what does this have to do with social media?

Social media is user-based votes wrapped into communities. If I find a site worth bookmarking in Digg and another SEO finds the same resource worth bookmarking, and so on - soon it can be assumed that people involved in SEO communities feel that a resource is worth saving and thus, that result will - when personalization evolves - rise in the rankings.

It is for this reason that social media is going to be an important factor in the ranking of websites down the road. This makes today the perfect day to get started; you don’t want to be playing catch-up to the sites that are currently employing social media tactics now.

Conclusion

So, as you can see, I was not being altogether accurate in the title when I called them “Easy Steps”. The tactics required to rank highly on Google can be complex and time consuming however the path itself is straight forward. If you are willing to spend the time it will take to do it right, success is virtually assured. If you are not, then prepare to make way for those who are.

Author:  Dave Davies is the founder and CEO of Beanstalk-Inc. Beanstalk-Inc provides guaranteed SEO services to an international clientele.

By Ryan Grabenstein in Google

Google Analytics, formerly called Urchin, is a free service offered by Google that allows website owners to track information on virtually every aspect of their website. To sign up, go to Google Analytics and get a free account. You will be provided a small JavaScript code that you place on the pages you would like to track. Once this code is live on your site, Google will begin gathering information on the visitors to your website.

Types of Information Tracked by Google Analytics

The Dashboard in Google Analytics provides a concise overview of your website statistics. Using a configurable date range, you can view graphs showing the number of site visitors, pages per visit, bounce rate, number of pages viewed, the average time they spent on your site and the percentage that are new visitors.

Also included on the Dashboard is a convenient map overlay showing the countries where your site visitors originate from. A pie chart shows the breakdown percentage of how many visitors came from search engines, how many were from referring sites and how many entered your site by directly typing your website address into their browser. The final Dashboard component is the content overview which shows the website pages with the highest number of pageviews.

The Money is in the Details

The Dashboard gives a brief overview of your website statistics, but where the real gold nuggets lie is in the information accessed from the left navigation. It is broken down by Visitors, Traffic Sources, Content and Goals.

Visitors Tab

The Visitors Overview tab includes information similar to the Dashboard, but with more detail. It gives the adjustable date range line chart of your website traffic, and also information on unique visitors, total pageviews, average pageviews, time spent on your website, bounce rate and new visits.

The Visitor Segmentation options delve into the details associated with each visitor, allowing you to see visitor languages, network locations and user defined options. Also available is browser information such as browser type, operating system used, screen color depth, screen resolution, and whether or not the visitors have Java or Flash support enabled on their browsers. This information is critical in determining how your site is designed and what technologies are used in the site.

The remainder of the Overview page is dedicated to a technical profile of the visitor’s browser type and connection speed. You can see if your visitors are still using slow dialup connections and adjust your site design accordingly.

The other left navigation tabs, titled Map Overlay, New vs. Returning, Languages, Visitor Trending, Visitor Loyalty, Browser Capabilities, Network Properties and User Defined delve into the information presented in the Visitors Overview more thoroughly, giving visual and graphical depictions of website traffic. The amount of information presented is somewhat overwhelming, but it allows you to fine tune your site to maximize the user experience.

Traffic Sources Tab

The Traffic Sources tab present information based on how your site visitors found your website. The submenu options include Overview, Direct Traffic, Referring Sites, Search Engines, All Traffic Sources, Keywords, AdWords, Campaigns and Ad Versions.

The Overview tab again displays a summary of the traffic source data, with the familiar line graph of traffic amount and a breakdown of the direct vs. referring vs. search engine traffic. The page concludes with a display of the top five traffic sources and the top five keywords bringing traffic into your site via search engines.

Each of the submenus breaks down the traffic source data ever further, and the AdWords tab allows you to track any AdWords campaigns your current have on your site, showing your goal conversion rates and AdWords click-throughs. The data calculates an impressive amount of AdWords data, including cost, click through rate, cost per click, revenue per click, return on investment and margin.

Content Tab

The Content tab on the left navigation menu again has an Overview page showing a detailed summary of the traffic patterns including the pages with the top content (based on number of pageviews), a navigation analysis showing how visitors found your content, landing page optimization data and a very nice site overlay which allows you to see your page and see which links are click the most frequently. This data is important for adjusting placement of paid ads and how visitors track through your site.

The other submenus for the Content tab include Top Content, Content by Title, Content Drilldown, Top Landing Pages, Top Exit Pages and Site Overlay. Each category further breaks down the data presented in the Overview page.

Goals Tab

The Goals tab is used to set specific usage measurements for your website and customize your data for specific marketing goals. Goals can be used to track funneled traffic through your site, by setting specific page URL’s and how you want to track the path the visitor takes to get to that page. By analyzing the results of your goals, you can fine tune your site design, navigation, PPC advertising, online e-commerce, and many other aspects of your site to maximize profitability.

Conclusion

Google Analytics is an easy to configure statistics tool that provides an enormous amount of visitor information. The fact that it is a free service makes it even more appealing. By including the small snippet of JavaScript code on your webpages, you can analyze almost any aspect of the user experience and make adjustments to your pages to maximize your return. Even small website owners can benefit from knowing who is visiting their site and how they got there. Easy setup, thorough statistics and zero cost make Google Analytics a must-have addition to any website owner or designer’s toolbox.

Author:  Ryan Grabenstein operates a Nebraska Web Design and advertising busineses specializing in small business promotion and internet marketing.

By Dave Davies in Google

Anybody who monitors their rankings with the same vigor that we in the SEO community do will have noticed some fairly dramatic shifts in the algorithm starting last Thursday (July 5th) and continuing through the weekend. Many sites are rocketing into the top 10 which, of course, means that many sites are being dropped at the same time. We were fortunate not to have any clients on the losing end of that equation however we have called and emailed the clients who saw sudden jumps into the top positions to warn them that further adjustments are coming. After a weekend of analysis there are some curiosities in the results that simply require further tweaks in the ranking system.

This update seems to have revolved around three main areas: domain age, backlinks and PageRank.

Domain Age

It appears that Google is presently giving a lot of weight to the age of a domain and, in this SEO’s opinion, disproportionately so. While the age of a domain can definitely be used as a factor in determining how solid a company or site is, there are many newer sites that provide some great information and innovative ideas. Unfortunately a lot of these sites got spanked in the last update.

On this tangent I have to say that Google’s use of domain age as a whole is a good filter, allowing them to “sandbox” sites on day one to insure that they aren’t just being launched to rank quickly for terms. Recalling back to the “wild west days” of SEO when ranking a site was a matter of cramming keywords into content and using questionable methods to generate links quickly I can honestly say that adding in this delay was an excellent step that insured that the benefits of pumping out domains became extremely limited. So I approve of domain age being used to value a site - to a point.

After a period of time (let’s call it a year shall we) the age should and generally has only had a very small influence on a site’s ranking with the myriad of other factors overshadowing the site’s whois data. This appears to have changed in the recent update with age holding a disproportionate weight. In a number of instances this has resulted in older, less qualified domains to rank higher than newer sites of higher quality.

This change in the ranking algorithm will most certainly be adjusted as Google works to maximize the searchers experience. We’ll get into the “when” question below.

Backlinks

The way that backlinks are being calculated and valued has seen some adjustments in the latest update as well. The way this has been done takes me back a couple years to the more easily gamed Google of old. This statement alone reinforces the fact that adjustments are necessary.

The way backlinks are being valued appears to have lost some grasp on relevancy and placed more importance on sheer numbers. Sites with large, unfocused reciprocal link directories are outranking sites with fewer but more relevant link. Non-reciprocal links lost the “advantages” that they held over reciprocal links until recently.

Essentially the environment is currently such that Google has made itself more easily gamed than it was a week ago. In the current environment, building a reasonable sized site with a large recip link directory (even unfocused) should be enough to get you ranking. For obvious reasons this cannot (and should not) stand indefinitely.

PageRank

On the positive side of the equation, PageRank appears to have lost some of it’s importance including the importance of PageRank as it pertains to the value of a backlinks. In my opinion this is a very positive step on Google’s part and shows a solid understanding of the fact that PageRank means little in terms of a site’s importance. That said, while PageRank is a less than perfect calculation subject to much abuse and manipulation from those pesky people in the SEO community it did serve a purpose and while it needed to be replaced it doesn’t appear to have been replaced with anything of substantial value.

A fairly common belief has been that PageRank would be or is being replaced by TrustRank and Google would not give us a green bar to gague a site’s trust on (good call Google). With this in mind one of two things has happened; either Google has decided the TrustRank is irrelevant and so is PageRank and decided to scrap both (unlikely) or they have shifted the weight from PageRank to TrustRank to some degree and are just now sorting out the issues with their TrustRank calculations (more likely). Issues that may have existed with TrustRank may not have been clear due to it’s weight in the overall algorithm and with this shift reducing the importance of PageRank the issues that face the TrustRank calculations may well be becoming more evident

In truth, the question is neither here nor there (as important a question as it may be). We will cover why this is in the …

Conclusion

So what does all of this mean? First, it means that this Thursday or Friday we can expect yet another update to correct some of the issues we’ve seen rise out of the most current round. This shouldn’t surprise anyone too much, we’ve been seeing regular updates out of Google quite a bit over the past few months.

But what does this mean regarding the aging of domains? While I truly feel that an aging delay or “sandbox” is a solid filter on Google’s part - it needs to have a maximum duration. A site from 2000 is not, by default, more relevant than a site from 2004. After a year-or-so the trust of a domain should hold steady or at most, hold a very slight weight. This is an area we are very likely to see changes in the next update.

As far as backlinks go, we’ll see changes in the way they are calculated unless Google is looking to revert back to the issues they had in 2003. Lower PageRank, high relevancy links will once again surpass high quantity, less relevant links. Google is getting extremely good and determining relevancy and so I assume the current algorithm issues has more to do with the weight assigned to different factors than an inability to properly calculate a links relevancy.

And in regards to PageRank, Google will likely shift back slightly to what worked and give more importance to PageRank, at least while they figure out what went awry here.

In short, I would expect that with an update late this week or over the weekend we’re going to see a shift back to last week’s results (or something very close to it) after which they’ll work on the issues they’ve experienced and launch a new (hopefully improved) algorithm shift the following weekend. And so, if you’ve enjoyed a sudden jump from page 6 to top 3, don’t pop the cork on the champaign too quickly and if you’ve noticed some drops, don’t panic. More adjustments to this algorithm are necessary and, if you’ve used solid SEO practices and been consistent and varied in your link building tactics - keep at it and your rankings will return.

Author:  Dave Davies is the CEO of Beanstalk Search Engine Positioning, Inc. Beanstalk offers search engine optimization services to business small and large as well as providing consulting, training, copywriting and link popularity programs.

By Brian Nash in Google

I am writing this for all those who have or influence a website, especially those who will never set up a custom search for themselves.  I first read about CSE in SitePro News and have been setting some up.  An article on the usefulness of CSE for the Webmaster, Blogger or Website owners in general is about due.

Let us clarify “Google Custom Search”. The word “custom” means individuals or groups are able to tweak the search process, according to their own specific interest.  Custom Search Engines can be simply customized by selecting suitable sites or quite advanced specific searches.  What unites them all is Google’s technology. The tweaks to the system are those Google has made available.  It works. Google did well.  

As of yet, nobody has coined terms for Google’s Custom Search Engine feature. Here are some basic handles;

1. CSE means a Google Custom Search Engine, *GOOGLE is a trademark of Google Inc.

2.  “Gateman” will mean the person(s) who have customized a search engine.  As much of the customization selects this is, ‘in’ or ‘out’.  If you are into electronics you know ‘logic gates’ control this. 

So basically; the technology is Google’s, the customization is the Gateman’s and the results are the work of the Webmaster’s of the sites found by the CSE search.

A CSE  uses the URL “Site List” collected together by the person building the CSE.  This is both the strong and weak point of a CSE.  The CSE site list is collected to match a specific interest of the CSE, unlike the [full] Google search which gives you the world.  Obviously the person or small group building the CSE can and will miss out, or not include some websites. When a CSE has the websites in its site list, each URL becomes a bigger fish in this smaller pond.   

First for your own interest or research, there is no need to ‘ re-invent the wheel’ if somebody has set up a CSE in your area of interest.  As might be expected computer subjects are well supported by CSEs.  

For the purpose of this articles I set up a CSE on CSEs, a rather introverted custom search.

-try this:  This is the Homepage of CSE on Custom Search Engines  

You are offered; 

•Use the search box to test the CSE for suitability for your interest.
A CSE has a cleaner performance because it is not searching the whole web. It is using Google indexes built by the Googlebot but only on the selected websites.  Other than the customization, CSEs feel much like searching Google.  You will find less of the; “same words - but I didn’t mean that” problem.  When Google advertisments appear, they follow your input search words.

Just type a word; “CSS”, “plants”, “steam engine” etc.  The high-lighter function on your browser will help here. 

•Search engine details,
Written by the person creating the CSE, I have put an Email & a Website address.

•Number of sites searched with last ones added to site list.

•Add this search engine to your Google homepage:
This allows you to have a CSE on your personalized Google Homepage, you can fit pages with several unique CSE search boxes.  Best to have signed in to your homepage before clicking the ‘ Add to Google’. 

•Add this search engine to your blog or webpage.
Check the terms and conditions. If you like the CSE and the terms are ok, change the search box size and margin colours to your requirements.  I found it an easy copy and paste operation.  It is Google that gives you the code without charge.

The potential of this is great, a website could put a CSE in as, a reference for a current topic, project, related interests, educational research, etc…  You could change a CSE every week if you wished. Use CSEs as content on fledgling sites.  A small complementary cluster of CSEs on a ‘ latest news page’ of a Website could be a little like magazines in a waiting room if chosen carefully to the interests of your visitors. (ed note: just be certain to update them more frequently than your GP does. - jh)

Create your own Custom Search Engine? Google does not charge you but it does take quite a bit of your time.  Its not the Google technology that is difficult, it is the time it takes to make your own decisions!  You choose of what goes in and which does not.  Though the Google claims you can, “set up a website in minutes”, you might find yourself spending two hours getting a colour or phrase just right. Budget enough time to make working with CSE worth it because by the end of the budgeted time, you’ll likely find working with a CSE is worth it.

Author:  Visit Brian Nash’s website http://www.custom-search-engines.brian-e-nash.me.uk/  which has been set-up to work with this article.

By Mike Tekula in Google

If you’re up-to-date on the latest in SEO news and developments you’ve been reading about Google Universal. Essentially, Google wants to bundle all of its data -blogs, images, videos, book content, products, etc - into its search results. This May they started rolling out the changes. Since Google has a huge lion’s share of the search market, and is the target of so much attention in the world of search engine optimization, the alarms are already sounding in the halls of SEO firms around the world.

Mike Grehan wrote a very affective article on the topic titled, “SEO Is Dead. Long live, er, the Other SEO.” People are actually scared. The response to his article was enormous - mostly in the form of arguments against his statements, and even one nasty response by an SEO who was, no doubt, feeling a bit angry about the news. Have hard-fought battles to the top of Google page one been in vein? Is this the end of SEO as we know it!?

Calm down.

One thing you can be sure of is that Mike Grehan knows how to seize upon an undercurrent of emotion and use it to write a good article that draws attention, links and traffic. That’s his job - he’s doing it well. The article may be sensational but it’s driving home a truth. Things are changing, but that doesn’t mean there’s any reason to be afraid.

When did things ever stop changing with SEO? It’s like any other industry. Technological advances change things, sometimes drastically. Companies and individuals who can’t keep up and don’t capitalize on those changes will be left in the dust. What else is new? It’s competition, and to stay competitive you need to be versatile.

It is yet to be seen whether users will even like Google Universal to a great extent. So far the consensus has been a general worry that the results could become rather annoying. Sure, we all would love to have everything just a click away, but “everything” can be a bit messy altogether on one page. That said, Google didn’t get to be Google by making foolish decisions about what users want.

It is most likely that Google Universal will be rolled out gradually and user opinions will be measured with great care. There will be no rash decisions or drastic and rapid changes. We aren’t going to wake up tomorrow and find that the folks who Grehan calls “SEO geeks,” which I tend to use as a term of endearment rather than insult, are suddenly begging change in the streets.

We’ll adapt. That’s what we do. When you think about it, SEO has always been something of a mysterious trade. The algorithms are out there in the ether somewhere, and to a certain degree we’ll always be playing catch up with Google. So long as they hold the bulk of the market for online search it will stay that way

So get out there and start experimenting with Google Universal, because you can be sure that others have already started.

Author:  Mike Tekula handles SEO, SEM, usability and standards-compliance for NewSunGraphics, a Long Island, New York firm offering Search Engine Optimization, Search Engine Marketing, W3C-Compliant web design using full CSS layouts and all things web design/development.

By Marc Rasmussen in Google

If you have any experience or background in SEO (search engine optimization) you know that Google likes website that have links pointing to it. A part of their search algorithm involves the popularity of the site determined by the number of other sites pointing to it via a link. With all else being equal Google will rank a website with quality links pointing to it higher than another website with no links. If you read Google’s Webmaster Guidelines (Webmaster Central) the very first bit of advice they give you is:

* have other relevant sites link to yours.

Google loves links and they admit it. Webmasters figured this out and came up with all kinds of different techniques for getting links to their sites - link baiting, reciprocal links, ninja links, 3 way links, one way links, contextual links etc. The problem is a lot of the techniques are frowned upon by Google. They want you to get links the natural way and not to try to cheat the system. Their guidelines say:

* Don’t participate in link schemes designed to increase your site’s ranking or PageRank. In particular, avoid links to web spammers or “bad neighborhoods” on the web, as your own ranking may be affected adversely by those links.

* Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings. A good rule of thumb is whether you’d feel comfortable explaining what you’ve done to a website that competes with you. Another useful test is to ask, “Does this help my users? Would I do this if search engines didn’t exist?

In one breath Google tells you to get links to your site and then in the other breath tells you not to participate in any link scheme designed to increase your site’s ranking. How do you know what a link scheme is? What is acceptable? What is not acceptable? I guess you have to ask yourself “Does this help my users?” It definitely is not a black and white situation and has plenty for room for interpretation.

Google has a web spam team headed by Matt Cutts. Their job is to enforce these Google Webmaster Guidelines and crack down on link spam. When he talks people listen. He frequently speaks at search engine conferences around the world.

I could not find it anywhere (didn’t really look long) but heard that Matt Cutts in the past has mentioned that he does not like the reciprocal linking that Realtors engage in. Supposedly, he had mentioned this several times over the last few years but has not done anything about it.

Real estate agents trade links with other agents around the country and world with the argument that we refer business to each other so therefore it is a legitimate link exchange and not done for the sole purpose of pumping up our rankings. This may be true in some instances but for the most part it is bologna. I would venture to say that 95% of the agents who trade links do so to achieve higher rankings in the results. That was the only reason I did it. What was the likelihood that a visitor to my Sarasota, Florida website was there to find an agent in Albuquerque, New Mexico? The only reason I ever traded a link with an agent outside Florida was to get to number 1 in Google.

In the beginning, when I knew absolutely nothing, I was told to trade links with anyone and everyone. I did that for awhile. Then someone told me to only trade with people in the real estate industry. So, I changed it up and did that. The link exchanging worked. I wasn’t number 1 but was on the first page for a couple key phrases.

Fast forward a little bit, I changed to a more search engine friendly website, traded links sporadically, added plenty of original content, included and updated a blog frequently. My overall goal was to become an authority site and build a valuable, useful website to people looking for anything real estate related in Sarasota, Florida. I simply wanted to make a website better than my competitors. Eventually, I became number 1 for the most sought after key phrases in my market and was on the first page for hundreds of phrases. I got there by having a better website than most. That is a great thing about the Google search engine. It generally does the best job of providing relevant results.

It dawned on me that reciprocal linking with hundreds of agents around the country was pretty useless to my visitors so I stopped doing it about a year or so ago. I did a couple contextual link exchanges with other agents in Florida. I figured that would be useful to someone looking for real estate in Florida but was not sure in what part of the state to look.

I had stopped paying attention to what was going on in the SEO world for awhile as I get paid to service buyers and sellers of real estate, not updating my website. I continued to post in my blog but that was the extent of it. So, I was out of the loop for 6 months or so.

A shot across the bow

Advanced Access is an enormous real estate website provider with around 30,000 Realtor websites. I am not up to speed on the details but apparently many or all of the Advanced Access users were penalized by Yahoo. Many of the AA users would trade links with each other and it was possibly viewed by Yahoo as one big incestuous link farm.

Advanced Access hired Greg Boser, a search engine guru, to solve their problems with Yahoo. His recommendation to AA users was to erase all state pages containing excessive reciprocal links. He viewed them as useless spam. Not all of the AA users took his advice. Many of the customers resisted because of the hundreds of man hours they put into accumulating all of the links. Others were probably ranking well and did not want to rock the boat.

In April of 2007 many high ranking Advanced Access websites were suddenly missing from the Google search results. Was it an algorithm change? Probably not since the AA website were the only ones affected. Ultimately, the consensus was that the AA websites were manually given a penalty by Google. Of course, no one was 100% sure because you can’t call Google on the phone or email them to get a definitive answer. Why would Google focus on only one website provider? Why the largest provider of real estate websites? Were they penalized for excessive reciprocal links? Probably. Evidently, Matt Cutts previously made warnings about it. Did the well connected internet guru, Greg Boser, have anything to do with the penalty? I don’t know. Some people believe that. He supposedly knows Matt Cutts.

[ed. note I: Greg does know Matt Cutts. I do too. Greg most certainly could NOT ever get Matt to interfere for commercial reasons. Matt doesn't do that sort of thing, nor does Google. - jh]

In the Advanced Access forums one participant noticed that some AA websites were penalized while others were not. Almost all of the sites had state pages and excessive reciprocal links. Why were some chosen and other spared? How did Google determine which websites to hit and why? The forum participant noticed that just about everyone who voiced their opinions, beliefs and thoughts in the forums were hit with the penalties while the site owners who were not active went penalty free. Did Google hand pick the loudest website owners?

In May, just over 30 days later, most of the AA sites had their penalties dropped and were found again in Google.

Real Estate Webmasters is another large and very visible real estate website provider. Many of their customer sites rank exceptionally well in Google. They also host a very active forum for webmasters. If someone (or Google) wanted to send a message through the real estate community this is a great place to do it. I found it interesting that Greg Boser, the well connected internet guru, became very active in the Real Estate Webmasters forum on April 27th. Just a few weeks prior to many of their websites getting hit with a penalty.

On May 9th, a number of high ranking Real Estate Webmaster websites were suddenly missing from the Google search results. Sites from all over country had been hit with a Google penalty. I own one of those sites and was probably penalized for state pages and reciprocal linking. The damn thing is that I deleted all of my state pages and links on the 4th of May. Google most likely pinpointed me as a violator before the 4th and it took until the 9th to employ the penalty.

It is interesting that Google would hit customers of another large and potentially loud real estate website provider with an active forum. Is Google trying to send a message to the real estate community about excessive reciprocal links? Maybe. Probably. Greg Boser became active in the forums a couple of weeks prior to the penalty. Did he have something to do with it? I don’t know. Possibly.

[ed. note II. Again, probably not. We will try to reach Greg for comment however we strongly doubt he was involved in having listings removed. It is possible he was warned or has received information regarding the penalty but extremely unlikely he was directly involved in its planning or execution. - jh]

Here we are 44 days later and almost all of the Real Estate Webmasters sites are still penalized. We all have deleted our state pages, reciprocal links, removed the URL’s through the Google webmaster tools and have asked forgiveness via a re-inclusion request.

Is Google waiting for us to spread the word throughout the Realtor community about the no-no’s of reciprocal linking? I don’t know. Is it fair that a small group of us were targeted while others continue to fill their websites with spammy reciprocal links? No, but life is not fair.

Rand Fishkin at www.seomoz.org recently interviewed Matt Cutts. You can watch the interview here http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-smx-diaries-iv-the-matt-cutts-interview. Watch the 2nd video and fast forward it to around the 5:30 mark. Matt acknowledges the Real Estate Webmaster thread discussing the recent penalties. He also mentions “a shot across the bow” technique of policing.

Isn’t everyone employed by Google a genius? Couldn’t they have come up with a better system to policing the real estate industry other than hurting a few mom and pop Realtors?

Lessons Learned:

* Don’t try to game the Google search engine. They will eventually figure you out.

* Don’t trade links with hundreds of Realtors around the country. Build links only for the benefit of your users, not your search engine rankings.

* Build a site with tons of unique content, provide lots of value to visitors and eventually links will come with time. I have received several one way links from the Sarasota Herald Tribune (my local newspaper) from articles they wrote about my website and blog. I imagine this is the way Google likes to see links built.

* Google isn’t perfect.

* If you rely on Google search results to feed you and your family you better have some money stashed away in the event you get penalized. Fortunately, I did this.

* If you do make money off the web keep at least one eye on what is happening in the search engine world to stay competitive.

* I rank fairly well in MSN and really don’t get that much traffic from it.

* Ranking very well in Google will bring tons of traffic to your website.

* Being penalized by Google sucks.

Author:  Marc Rasmussen is a realtor in Sarasota Florida. He publishes The Sarasota MLS website.

By Donald Nelson in Google

A lot of website owners are upset or puzzled when their website’s Google PageRank goes down or does not rise. Is it worth losing any sleep over changes in that green line and number that appear in a Google tool bar at the top of your browser? I think that excessive worry or thought about PageRank is not constructive, and it is better to put it all in perspective by taking a rational look at what PageRank is and what it is not.

First of all the concept behind PageRank is indeed at the heart of Google’s ranking process. The Google founders came from academia and they noticed that in many academic documents some sources were continually cited. They reasoned that if a particular document such as a book or research paper was mentioned in many places then it must be important. They applied this to the web and assumed that if one website links to another it is in fact, giving a “vote” for that site. A website that has many incoming links must have a certain degree of importance. In the current Google algorithm the quantity and quality of incoming links is certainly a factor in deciding the ranking of a particular website for any given search-query.

Think about it. In the early days of the web people would build websites and then they would tell their visitors to check out other “cool” sites and they would link to these sites. This is the process of natural linking and it still goes on. If you really have good content, people will link to you without letting you know. Similarly, if your name is Bob Dylan and your website is www.bobdylan.com, thousands of people will link to you without you having to send a cheesy email begging for a link.

Various government agencies, educational institutions, established companies and anyone else who is “big” in the “real world” is likely to also be big on the Internet simply by virtue of their previous fame and accomplishment. Google’s ranking system took this into consideration and this is one of the reasons why Google is currently the number one search engine. It gives better results and that is why people use it.

But, does that mean that only the big players can be seen on the net? Far from it. While there is a difference between one guy working in his house with one computer and a corporate giant with a whole staff, and this is indeed reflected in rankings, the Internet provides a much leveler playing field than in yesteryear. Prior to 1995, it would have been very hard for someone to spread their news and views far and wide as bloggers do today. It costs millions of dollars to publish a daily newspaper or to print and circulate a magazine, but it costs far less to publish a website or a blog, and lots of “little guys” have taken advantage of the power of the Internet.

But what about PageRank, how much of it do I really need to get my site noticed? For those who are not familiar with the PageRank system. Google supplies a tool bar which you can download and install on your browser. If you make a complete installation with all the advanced features, then every time you open a new website you will see a green and white bar with the label PageRank. Put your mouse on the bar and you will see a number from 0 to 10. If a website is not indexed by Google or banned by Google, the bar may be grey or all white.

But what do the numbers mean? I had a client who was worried about his number 3 PageRank figure and based on my observation I answered him with my unofficial view on the rankings. Here is how I currently see it:

PageRank 0-2 shows that a site does not have many links and needs work, However, and this a big “however,” it may not really affect your search engine rankings. I have a client with a page rank of 2 and his site ranks well, even number one, for several search terms in a fairly competitive industrial category. So PageRank is not everything; it may have an impact on your rankings and traffic, but in some cases it may not matter. In any case if you have a PageRank of 0-2, you can work on it through proper link building activity which I will explain at the end of the article.

PageRank 3 can be OK in some cases but in highly competitive industries you should work to improve it.

PageRank 4 is quite a normal number and indicates that you have enough links in either quantity or quality to make your site competitive.

PageRank 5 indicates that a site has many links or links from authoritative sites, and that Google has good “trust” in the site. It is a respectable and attainable PageRank.

PageRank 6 is very difficult to attain. This rank indicates that the site has many links and links from respected places. Remember the example of www.bobdylan.com, which I mentioned above; it has a PageRank 6, so you can get an idea of the difficulty involved.

PageRank 7-10 is usually earned by large and established institutions or websites which have tremendous authority, due to the quantity and quality of the incoming links. It is extremely difficult to attain this ranking. You really have to be special to get it.

So, don’t worry excessively about PageRank. First look at your traffíc, then look at your sales and finally at your bottom line. They are the important numbers to watch. If you want to íncrease your traffíc and also PageRank, then here are a few steps that you can take:

1. Add content to your website. Make your website so good and so useful that people will link to you without you asking for a link.2. Write articles and get them published on other websites and blogs with a link back to your site.

3. Distribute online press releases

4. Judiciously exchange links, or even better, exchange content (containing links back to your site) with other websites.

5. Get your site listed in online directories.

These efforts will certainly help you to build targeted traffíc, and they most probably will also help you to íncrease your PageRank as well.

Author:  Donald Nelson is a search engine optimization specialist and the publisher of the A1-Article Directory, a source of content for website owners and blog publishers.

By Brian Oritz in Google

I think Google is on to me - how can one person be allowed to download pictures of Jessica Simpson while simultaneously performing searches in different browser windows for “data recovery” or “New Haven lasik eye surgeon”? It’s pure genius, and true, you can do lots of neat things with Google, but can or even should a search engine optimization company guarantee you listings within the world’s most popular search engine. Let’s make sure we are all on the same page, first by getting some basic definitions and assumptions out of the way.

Guarantees can imply vastly different semantics depending on what context you are using. A real estate transaction or a debt obligation is one thing - in this article we are only concerned with guarantees as they relate to Search Engines, specifically Google - and organic search engine rankings at that. We’ll be clearing our minds of PPC, banner advertising, or any other form of online marketing as they are not the direct focus of this discussion.   
To begin, my current favorite definition of guarantee is “a written assurance or pledge that some product or service will be provided or will meet certain specifications.” Written and signed guarantees are typically enforceable in courts of law within the United States of America. Guarantees are also in most cases financially binding. If a guarantee is not met, there must be some benefit associated with the breech of agreement. A guarantee is different from a promise. In most cases a promise is usually verbal- it can be over the phone, in person, maybe even in some cases written in a text message or through instant messenger. Promises have no associated signatures attached to them and in most cases damages are difficult to recover in the SEO realm. The legalese definition (sorry guys) is in contract terms- a promise is essential to a binding legal agreement and is given in exchange for consideration, which is the inducement to enter into a promise. A promise is illusory when the promisor does not bind himself/herself to do anything and, therefore, furnishes no consideration for a valid contract. In layman’s terms, promises do not hold much water in disputes specific to hiring an SEO firm without both parties’ signatures.  
Ok, now our basic definitions are out of the way, so let’s read Google’s official commentary on offering SEO guarantees:

“No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google. Beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings, allege a “special relationship” with Google, or advertise a “priority submit” to Google. There is no priority submit for Google. In fact, the only way to submit a site to Google directly is through our Add URL page or through the Google Sitemaps program, and you can do this yourself at no cost whatsoever.”
The key take away here is:

Guaranteeing a #1 ranking in Google, means specifically that. There is no mention of first page rankings, conversions, aggregate traffic improvements, revenue, profit, branding, or other specific marketing goals or metrics.
 
We’ll make the assumption based on Google’s language that offering a custom SEO guarantee outside the scope of that Google commentary can be logical, reasonable, appropriate, and potentially viable for both client and SEO practitioner.

Prepping Your Guarantee’s Battlefield

Start with your business. Custom SEO guarantees should not be drafted without the SEO practitioner understanding your business, industry, and marketing goals. I cannot stress this point enough. A lack of information is equivalent to a surgeon operating with a blindfold. A SEO firm should ask pertinent questions and actually listen, record, and analyze your answers. What was your corporate revenue last year? What percentage of your revenue was driven from the website? What are your revenue goals for the next year? How much profit do you typically record per order or transaction? What percentage of your clientele are repeat customers? How do you rate your firm compared to your industry competitors? Where do you see your industry headed within the next few years? Where do you place your own firm within that industry? Why are you choosing to hire an SEO company? Are phone orders more important to you than web based orders? These questions are a sample set of the meat in which every SEO practitioner should get at before preparing a custom SEO guarantee - the questions might seem a bit intrusive at first glance, but they aren’t if you desire a solid working relationship.   

What Metrics Can A SEO Practitioner Reasonably Expect To Control? / Scope Of Guarantee

Now, it is the SEO practitioner’s job to really flesh out what goals are most important for your business- it then must be determined if the SEOer has direct or indirect control over those goals or parameters that are critical to you. Remember, internet marketing firms have no direct control over algorithms or search results, but they can do a lot to shake things up indirectly. Here are a few examples of potentially reasonable metrics that an SEO practitioner may be able to indirectly control:

1) Number of first page listings within Google given a specific sample set of keywords.  Your SEO practitioner should check competition levels, quality of competition, and state of affairs of your website.
2) Percentage of keywords listed within Google’s first page given a specific sample set of terms.
3) Search Engine visibility percentage increase (commonly used along side a third party program called web-position. If used, this program should be utilized responsibly, as it does query Google’s database automatically).

Here are some areas that are a bit grayer and may not be solidly under an SEO’s umbrella of control - hence, considering these metrics should be done with much caution.
 
1)    Aggregate traffic level increases throughout the website (having access to a real-time tracking system is critical).
2)    Overall revenue increases (an SEO practitioner should have a robust conversion tracking system) that are directly tied in to the specific internet marketing efforts.
3)    Overall profit increases (an SEO practitioner should understand business margins fully and must believe in the credibility of the client before entering into such an agreement).
4)  Form submissions (tracking each page where a form exists is highly recommended).
5)  Aggregate number of telephone calls (client should have a strict protocol in which phone representatives ask on every call where they found the website and what search term they typed in to find it. A guarantee along these lines is extremely difficult to track. Asking a lay person whether they clicked on a PPC ad or an organic listing might leave you with a particularly long phone silence. Again, use common sense before looking for a guarantee stipulation along these lines).

Minimum Expectations / Accountability

Another type of SEO guarantee can be deemed the minimum expectation guarantee. I am a huge fan of these because they are good for both the client and the SEO practitioner. What is better than knowing, given worst case scenario, what your SEO company is accountable to achieve.   

Remedy For Breech Of Agreement

Remedies for breech of contract should be specific, clear, and reasonable. Having dates clearly outlined also aids in minimizing confusion.

A good example of a remedy stipulation is below:

…If we do not achieve our ranking goals within Google, as mentioned within this agreement, our firm agrees to provide 30 man-hours of additional work per month to said client. We will include hourly reports on the specific nature and progress of this work sent on a bi-weekly basis. If after two additional months of contract goals not being met, client will receive a credit for 50% of monies paid out to SEO company over the course of the campaign. This credit will be issued within seven days after this non-performance deadline.  

An example of a poor breech of agreement remedy is below:

If contracted goal is not met, we’ll work diligently and thoroughly until we achieve the stated goal.

This remedy is nebulous at best. There is no mention as to a refund or any specific action or timeline. It is unreasonable.   

Paying For SEO Services That Contain a Guarantee

When paying for SEO- always use a major credit card – Visa, MasterCard, American Express, and Discover all have useful ways to protect their customers from failed expectations that are clearly outlined within an agreement. If your SEO practitioner fails to abide by contract stipulations, you can look to these credit card companies for assistance- they are typically fair in their assessments and genuinely look to make their clientele happy. Remedies for breech of contract if you used any form of check, wire transfer, or direct deposit payments may be limited to your local courthouse. These disputes can be much more involved and can cost you a tremendous amount of time, energy and money.  

Summing Up Custom SEO Guarantees for Google

A well crafted guarantee has a few key attributes:

  • Specific
  • Realistic
  • Offer custom guarantee only after researching or performing due diligence of your business, industry, and specific marketing goals
  • Make you feel comfortable
  • Mention both companies by official name
  • Adhere to Google’s SEO guarantee advice
  • Use clear language
  • Are explained slowly by an SEO practitioner to client before signing
  • Clearly state the nature and scope of the guarantee
  • Mention Google by name
  • Have a specific, reasonable, and clear remedy for non-performance
  • Is signed by both parties
  • Contains a time element

A poor guarantee also has a few key elements:

  • Nebulous or ill-defined
  • Unrealistic
  • Offer a boiler plate guarantee without researching or performing due diligence of your
  • business, industry, or specific marketing goals
  • Make you feel uncomfortable
  • Do not mention one or both companies
  • Violate Google’s SEO guarantee advice
  • Use vague language
  • Are never mentioned to the client before signing
  • Does not mention the scope or nature of the guarantee
  • Does not mention Google
  • Have vague and unreasonable remedies for non-performance
  • Are verbal
  • Does not contain a time element

Lastly, please remember that although the amount of effort put into crafting a custom SEO guarantee may seem a bit intensive, the long run advantages to having both you as a client and the SEO practitioner “on the same page” well outweighs the initial time investment. Taking your time and using common sense as a guideline will ensure a higher probability of a successful working partnership. 

Author:  Brian Ortiz is the CEO of SEOMatrix: Ethical Search Engine Optimization. He has been specializing in search engine marketing and most notably conversion analysis for both national and international clients for over five years. SEOMatrix is a Connecticut search engine optimization company. To receive a free optimization or conversion rate analysis for your website sign up for our www.seomatrix.com report. To receive Brians monthly articles sign up for our newsletter at seomatrix.com. 

By Darren Dunner in Google

It is the year 2007, and we have truly entered an era of revolution; a technological revolution that is.  That term has been overused to say the least, but it is nonetheless true.  Unlike the Baby Boomers and their social revolution of the 1960’s, we are wired, switched on, plugged in, turned on and tuned in, and it has been technological revolution that has made all this possible.  We can be better students, workers and employers because technology allows us to stretch our creativity far beyond what our predecessors ever imagined.  Because of this, you would think that as a human race, we would be more evolved, smarter, and productive.  More importantly, as a human race we must have obtained a higher degree of common sense than all the generations that have preceded us.  We would like to think so, but I am convinced that even though we have the added and remarkable benefit of advanced technology, we have lost a great deal of our common sense.  This fact has been proven by the actions of people and companies all around the globe.

Now, based on the title of this article you already know where I am going, but the slam is not just against Google, it is an overall observation.

Since the boom of the Internet, people have wetted their appetites with thoughts of global marketing.  Google has certainly cashed in on this.  Some have actually estimated their worth to exceed $150 billion dollars.  Let me say that again, $150 billion! The internet boom can be likened to the California Gold Rush.  Companies and entrepreneurs have scrambled to tap into the global market, and Search Engine Visibility has been on the forefront of their hearts and minds. It is simply phenomenal to think that I can sell my idea to the whole world. My mind starts racing along at breakneck speed and in my heart I realize I can take over the world!

Colossal search engines have emerged like Google, Yahoo, ASK, ExactSeek, MSN, AOL and many others who provide portals capable of filtering out websites so users can search and find exactly what they are looking for.  As for the website owners, they desire the impossible …. the coveted “first page” of the search engine. For those who have really done their research, it is obvious that the true “Money Making Spot” is on the hallowed grounds of Google’s first page.

Some years back it was really simple to get top positions in Google and other search engines.  Search engine visibility was simply attained by a few tricks and manipulations that went right past the Google bots.  Well, that didn’t last, and Google wised up and changed the whole nature of their search engine. Thousands of sites lost position and there was panic and uproar on par with the stock market crash of 1929. Then as time moved on, we learned that Google just wanted to make their search engine more user friendly and full of quality search results to make the end user happy.  Fair enough.  We understood Google’s perspective, and in response, many people changed their tactics and used blogging and link building campaigns in addition to quality content to bolster their sites. This opened up tremendous business opportunities for web masters as those new strategies created a whole new set of services designed to meet Google’s requirements.  It was the internet at its best: the creation of commerce through technology and ingenuity. Unfortunately, many web masters didn’t follow these guidelines, and instead they offered “Pre Google Florida Update” techniques. In my research, I have found pitifully few companies that offer legitimate SEO tactics.

Currently, there are those who post their sites to directories and this has proved to be a reliable and stable technique. These directory sites mostly come at a price and the cost for the service can vary greatly.  Some are priced moderately around $10 to $20, while others can gouge the customer of upwards of hundreds of dollars.  The fact of the matter is that these are people working to make a better way to receive one-way links, and they have to physically manage their sites in order maintain quality link directories. I had previously written in a few forums that some of these prices were too high, and that webmasters should not be greedy, but consistent.  It may not be a popular idea, but I don’t think any directory site should charge more then $15.00 for a listing.  Think about the economics.  Higher prices drive the consumer away, but by offering an affordable service, you will attract customers on a mass scale and make even more money than you would have previously.

In this regard, Google crushed search engine visibility when they announced that they were going to punish webmasters by posting negative results to sites that pay for links on other sites.  They have even given a way to “tattle tell” on these site owners.  Maybe it is just me, but I simply do not trust anyone who turns to the secret police for help.  That is just a little too much power for one company.  Maybe Google wants to teach the World Wide Web a lesson and get the word out that they will not stand for those greedy people who like to take advantage of search engines.  

That is an interesting position considering it is coming from a company valued at $150 billion dollars.  I suppose they have enough power now to decide how much the rest of us should make.  They own the internet after all.  Well Google, if you are going to teach such a great lesson, then you must follow your own guidelines. Hypocrisy should not be tolerated!  Should we start reporting sites using Adwords? I mean, heck… they are paying Google to get their links not only on their own search engines but on thousands of sites that webmasters have strategically placed Google ads on. Every time someone clicks those ads, someone makes money.  What it comes down to is simple extortion on Google’s part.  The only way to succeed is to bow down and kiss the ring of the Googfather, and pray that he does not whack you the moment you turn around.  

Search around and look at the trends.  Thanks to Google, search engine visibility has dropped for many sites yet again, especially directory sites.  Has their PPC dropped?  I don’t think so! I think we need to make a stand against this. Though I love Google because their search engine brings Great Results for us, they are making power moves by these statements and now 100’s of directory sites are sitting dead in the water, while leaving high ranking sites that no one wants to list out of fear of Google’s reprisals. This is wrong and I think Google needs to re-think this method.

So my appeal is to Google, remember your humble beginnings at Stanford University , and stop this nonsense.  You used to be a fun kid, now you’re just the bully of the playground who is intent on stealing the ball.  Stop making your great company look like web terrorist who strips money away from hard working business people.   If you want to make a point, why don’t you punish the sites actually guilty of taking advantage of the consumer?  Leave the rest of us small fish alone.  We are only trying to make a living.  As for reporting abuse, should we stoop so low as to become web snitches?  What if we take this so literal that we all start complaining against sites that use your own adwords? It is exactly the same line of thinking. I am just using good common sense here. Google, you have the power to make your point.  You also have the ability to help site owners from being ripped off.  Use your power judiciously instead of what you are doing now.

Now, to those site owners who are not sure what to do about gaining search engine visibility without the benefit of directory sites, listen up!  This is a must “need to know” strategy to apply until Google changes their ways. Start writing content for your sites and add a blog as well.  Make statements about your industry and convince readers that you know what you are doing.  Write articles and submit them all over the web as this can’t hurt you in the search engines.  My point is content, content, content!!! Google still loves content and still gives great rankings for this. So while we wait for the Godfather to make his next decree, try this strategy.  Google can’t outlaw content, especially original content. In fact, I will gain rankings in Google from this article alone!

Author:  Darren Dunner owns the web development company Internetzonei.com/. Based in Southern California, Internetzonei helps small to medium sized enterprises create and facilitate online communication strategies.

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