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SiteProNews Blogs

• Darren Dunner
• Jerry Bader
• Kalena Jordan
• Matt Jackson
• Mel Strocen
• Titus Hoskins

Why SEO Should Never Be An Afterthought

By Jeffrey Smith in Featured

SEO should never be an afterthought, there are essentially two ways to rank (1) as a result of clear planning with deliberate intent and a master game plan developed over time or (2) hey is it too late to fix this site and eek some performance out of it?

How many times have you ever thought, if I only knew what I know now years ago (when you first started your website) and wished you could simply turn back the clock and start fresh, then you are not alone.In case you ever wondered how to essentially rank for everything in your niche, then you could take a few pages from the SEO play book of the site we stumbled across earlier today. In fact, it was so inspiring, I had to write about it to commend them on a job well done.

Search engine optimization is constantly evolving and with it the semblance of design, content and site architecture are fusing into “the ideal delivery system” to entice traffic, user engagement, viral marketing and conversion.

This mutation / new generation of hybrid sites (part e-commerce, part blog, part affiliate site) are emerging frequently and blazing a trail to the top 10 of multiple industries. Webmasters (much like scientists) understand that when you properly combine the right elements and streamline content, links and information architecture for a common goal, the result is an authority site designed with a distinct purpose that gains momentum daily.

You can learn a great deal from looking beneath the hood of other websites (to see which layers are worthy of emulating or modifying from other SEO’s or web developers). Here is an example of a site that is truly a masterpiece built to virtually dominate its industry through layers of overlapping optimization, content development and site architecture.

The site, www.like.com holds top ranking positions for thousands of brands, has millions of pages indexed, hundreds of thousands of links and yet has a cool demeanor and impeccable design with a strong visual call to action. All of the components were so balanced, that I simply could not shake the sites blueprint after observing the amount of thoughtful planning and advanced SEO tactics that went into developing and maintaining such a pristine web creation.

This is clearly an example of SEO done right. If anyone ever told you that a theme cannot be modified to encapsulate multiple product lines within a broad market category, then this site is an excellent case study, not to mention, it has style to boot.

The fact is, acquiring positioning for each and every keyword is a task unto itself. Each page should be treated as its own site (then again you never know how many sites were 301 redirected into this one). In any case, it is important for a site to constantly utilize the mechanisms of self-referral (internal linking) to cement relevance from within.

This when combined with an optimized CMS (content management system), the proper use of titles and tags and links results in a ranking juggernaut that expresses itself like a dynamic time-released capsule through SERP (search engine result page) domination.

Each page that is created is another asset to the site as a whole, over time when each page ages, it gains its own authority which then reciprocates back to strengthen the whole, which strengthens the page again and so on and so fourth. This cyclical momentum is the secret to ranking for multiple keywords.

The real challenge is, to get over the hump and systematically create relevance through the proper balance of (1) chronology of content through themed content development, (2) the appropriate balance of internal to external links per page and to the root domain (3) the proper use of interlinking the sub folders to create dynamism as a whole for all of the topical categories.

The whole reason this rant about SEO being the starting point rather than an afterthought is, if you have a clear objective, understand the amount of work involved and can scale the workload, then it is possible to rank for any competitive term with the right tactic, link popularity, structure and proper content. Hats’ off to the team who put that site together as well as those who maintain and keep such a finely-tuned machine in perfect working order.

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

Don’t Spend a Fortune on SEO. Be Your Own SEO Guru!

By Scott Jason in Featured

SEO has been around for almost as long as search engines have. And for good reason. Everyone wants free advertising. But a lot has changed over the past thirteen years and with SEO gurus charging upwards of $1,000 per month, to small startups, just for maintenance you really can’t call it “free advertising” anymore.

Why is SEO so expensive? Because it’s worth it. Back in the day, you could get top ranking for just about any search term you wanted just by using tricks like keyword stuffing, invisible text and cloaking. Try any of that today and Google will kick you to the curb.

Flash and SEO: Like Oil and Water

By Scott Buresh in Featured

We often deal with clients that are planning to “revamp” their sites with Flash, with SEO having already generated tremendous gains in their sales. The thing that we most dread to hear is that they’ve hired an experienced “Flash designer” that will be taking their websites to the “next level.” Unfortunately, that “next level” is often the basement - at least in terms of SEO results.

The bottom line here is that a site built entirely in Flash still faces huge obstacles. While there have been recent moves from Google and Yahoo! to try to index the content from combined Flash/SEO sites, those moves have not yet, from my experience, translated into SEO results or success (at least when compared to html sites).

Own The Internet

By Darren Olander in Featured

The Internet is like a pie, and anyone who has put any content on the Internet owns a piece of it. Some companies own the majority of the Internet because their services are in such high demand. Most people own such a small fraction of the pie that their share is not even worth a penny. Where do you stand?

Whether you own a big chunk, or just a sliver, the truth does not change. The more high quality content you put out into the Internet equates to more ownership of the Internet. If you want more exposure and more people to know what you or your company is all about then you need to create a ton of fresh quality content. If you are pumping out content like a factory pumps out products you will start collecting visitors, and ultimately the more income you will make.

What are some ways you can create content and visitors to that content? Let’s dive right in.

1) Start your own website. Again, the more web pages you have on the Internet translates into owning more of the Internet. So the more web pages the better. Instead of trying to get your search engine optimization perfect with keywords and tags, try creating multiple pages with different variations. The websites that dominate the Internet have a mind boggling amount of pages. For example Social Networks like MySpace the users create the pages, all Myspace does is provides the service. If you can find a way for users to add content to your site for you then more power to you, otherwise always try to keep adding more content packed pages onto the Internet.

2)Start a blog. This is one of the easiest ways to start adding content to the Internet. One free blogging service is Blogger. Write on a regular basis to keep your content and site fresh. If your blog does not already do this automatically for you, make sure to use a service like Ping-o-matic to ping the search engines so that they know you have updated your site.

3)Dive into Social Media. Social Media sites are huge and can help you create and distribute content easily. Start using social bookmarking sites like Digg, StumbleUpon, and many others to bookmark and share your content with others. Use Twitter and Social Networking sites like Facebook and MySpace to create pages and connect with other marketers. Use Squidoo, HubPages, and others that help you create pages that get indexed into the search engines really well already.

4)Write Articles, E-books, etc. Like I’ve said many times, no matter who you are you are capable of writing content that other people will find valuable. Manually submit articles to article directories or get a service to do it for you. If you write an e-book or free report you can have people download it and that will attract more people to you.

An important note I’d like to make is this. Just creating a bunch of useless content will do you no good. It doesn’t matter how much content you have if people don’t care for it, want it, or need it. However, if you focus on helping spread knowledge and quality content onto the Internet then you will be a contributor, and contributors are rewarded.

Still, a simple fact is that if you are not creating any content then your ownership is not growing. One major critical factor that everyone who is successful has is the ability to adjust. If you don’t know how to do something then there is no better time to learn than now. Adjust to the market and to what people need. If you do you will find that success is actually attracted to you.

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Darren Olander is dedicated to teaching others how to create a success online through internet network marketing strategies. He is a site owner, article writer, coach & marketing consultant enjoying the benefits of working full time from home. Learn more about him at http://www.darrenolander.com

Website Analysis: SEO Starts with a Thorough Analysis

By Jeffrey Smith in Featured

SEO starts with a thorough analysis of the website to conclude which aspects of your site need optimization. Why let coding errors or poor site architecture impact rankings for the worse? With search engine algorithms changing daily, there are no guarantees that the immunity you have today (from a favorable pat on the back) will pass value tomorrow.

A typical website analysis SEO sweep would look for things like:

Link Optimization - Links leaving each page (even if pointed at other pages in the site) should all have something link worthy to communicate. A link that says “click here” is a candidate for a makeover to something more consistent with the topical theme of the site, such as click here for more information about “main keyword and qualifier” as the link instead. 50% of your link profile is up the the webmaster, make good use of internal links.

5 Free Must Have SEO Tools

By Titus-Hoskins in Featured

Let’s face it, we all want higher
rankings for our targeted keywords.
So here are 5 Free SEO Tools you can
use to help you achieve those rankings…

5 Free Must Have SEO Tools

Unless you go the PPC route and pay for your
traffic, SEO or Search Engine Optimization will
play a major role in the success or failure of
your website. Therefore, it’s in your best interest
as a webmaster to learn everything you can about
SEO and use the right SEO tools to achieve an
advantage over your competition.

Needless to say, SEO or getting high rankings
for your keywords is extremely competitive,
especially for popular lucrative keyword phrases
which bring in the big bucks. You must be at the
top of your game if you want to compete.

One important factor in winning the SEO battle
is using the right SEO software or tools. Major
online companies use expensive software, hire
SEO firms and have whole departments devoted
entirely to search engine marketing - so you
know your work is cut out for you.

You’re probably asking yourself how can the little
guy compete against such stiff competition? Well,
it is not as difficult as you might think or believe.
For starters, you can use some simple SEO tools
which will help give you a slight advantage if you
use them properly.

Surprisingly, all of these SEO tools are free and
any webmaster can take advantage of them in their
ongoing SEO endeavors. I believe all webmasters must
learn and master SEO in order to succeed online or
get someone else to do it for them.

Over the years I have built up a passable knowledge
of SEO due mainly from running 9 or 10 sites and working
as a full-time online affiliate marketer. My livelihood
depends on me achieving high rankings for my lucrative
keywords in the search engines, mainly in Google. Also the
daily running of two websites on Internet Marketing Tools
has played a small part as well!

Along the way I have used countless SEO tactics and
tools to try to increase my keyword rankings. Here’s
a short list of my most helpful Free SEO tools that
I use on a daily basis in the running of my websites:

1. SEO Book Keyword Research Tool

http://tools.seobook.com/keyword-tools/seobook/

This tells how many searches are made each day
for my targeted keywords. Invaluable information
to have for Search Engine Marketing and for choosing
your keywords. Most experts suggest you go for the
mid to low range keywords if you’re just starting out
and targeting long tail keywords (three or four words)
yields the best returns.

2. Detecting Online Commercial Intention

http://adlab.msn.com/Online-Commercial-Intention/Default.aspx

This MSN tool tells me the probability (percentage)
someone clicking my chosen keywords is likely to buy.
Another great tool for picking keywords if you’re trying
to earn revenue from your sites. Higher the percentage,
the more likely you will make a sale or earn revenue.

3. SeoQuake for Mozilla Firefox

http://www.seoquake.com

This is an addon for Firefox and gives you
invaluable SEO information on any site you’re
viewing. All the important info is here:
Google PageRank, Number of Links, Traffic Rank,
Whois, Keyword Density, NoFollow links… used
in conjunction with Firefox this tool will prove
invaluable.

4. Google Alerts

http://www.google.com/alerts

This is a great SEO tool if you use it to track
and build your links. Just create Google Alerts
for all your major keyword phrases and Google will
keep you updated on current links being formed/indexed
on your keywords. Also great for tracking articles,
urls, competitors… and staying up-to-date in your
niche.

5. WordPress

http://www.wordpress.com

This free blogging software lets you place very
SEO friendly blogs on your sites. Social media,
blogging, tags, RSS feeds… are becoming increasingly
important for online success so you must get your
sites into this whole mix in order to compete.
WordPress is a valuable SEO tool for improving
your keyword rankings. Blogger and Bloglines
are other blogging alternatives you can use.

I use many more SEO tools but these are the top five.
Try some of these handy tools and see if they can
improve your own keyword rankings like they did mine.
No harm in trying and you may be pleasantly surprised
at the results.

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SEO, Online Marketing, Recession and ROI (Return On Investment)

By Jeffrey Smith in Featured

With recession and (ROI) return on investment staring each other face to face, being brutally honest about the profit and return on your search engine optimization or online marketing campaign has never been so important.

For those who may not have noticed, various industries typically replete with activity in the market-place are coming to a screeching halt as result of inflation and the value of the dollar plummeting on a global scale. The trend for consumers to spend less on impulse items, auxiliary products or services and more on bare essentials continues to escalate as a result of a weakened economic state.Online sales are just one region taking the hit as the sales cycle and the consumers within this cycle are looking for greater value at the fair price. Needless to say, due diligence has taken on an entirely new definition as the business with the best offer, sale or SEO promotion gain the favor of the masses. To appease such value-conscious times, refining your content to represent the most compelling and tactful value proposition is necessary to supplement slouching sales and traffic (less money equates to less spending).

Despite this economic recession, observing the latest trends in competitive verticals while forecasting demand to convert new prospects into customers has become as much of an art as a science.

Incentives and promotions for cross-market exposure are just one example of businesses with larger budgets attempting to infuse and find the ideal hybrid shopper and capitalize on the vulnerability of other markets. Sign up for Product A (from one market) and receive a free 30 day trial period, or get 15% off your favorite movie, etc. from Industry B. In summary, the emotional triggers that incline consumers to purchase are evolving as well as those who are crafting the offer.

This is because tactics that may have worked 6 months or a year ago online or promotional methods based on years of success and stability from traditional offline channels no longer hold their sway over the masses as value is subjugated to the rules of survival of the fittest.

Is it the fact that A) the market is evolving, B) that money is tighter, C) the fact that online consumers are savvier than ever or D) a combination of all of the above? Typically, those with larger budgets (like publicly traded companies) wield the spoils of a collective advertising and marketing campaign piggybacking promotions on industries with less favorable returns (much like trickle-down economics).

This is not to suggest that smaller more nimble companies do not stand a chance, it is merely that the scalability of an advertising campaign designed to optimize 1000 keywords for example vs. a smaller company who may only have the budget to target 10 leaves a margin of opportunity and exposure that unfortunately provides advantages that the smaller firm may not be able to grasp due to budgetary constraints.

Now is the time to take advantage of narrow-casting instead of generalized broadcasting your message to reach the audience with the most likelihood for conversion.

Business is business and opportunity and expression determine the course of action for websites that need to produce a profit to survive. While being a highly trafficked site may be great for the ego, having a highly trafficked site that sells thousands of products, generates dozens of sales leads a day or has viral appeal to social networks is even more better.

In summary, make sure you identify your audience, growth is nice but stability amidst crisis is even better. Looking for greener grass instead of tending the yard you have can leave your marketing plan depleted and out of focus. It’s better to have 10% of something than 90% of nothing, so make sure before you extend your scope of the market to reach new prospects, you reap the equity of the authority and presence you have developed in your primary niche.

Healthy margins are the bottom line, so if you have them, then this message is not nearly as crucial as it is to those who are feeling the impact of a languishing economic crisis in their industry. SEO is a valid solution, but also being aware of the trends and circumstances that impact everyone in an economy can shed some light on why some periods are more fruitful than others. The key is not to get flustered and diversify your tactics to spread the risk and reward for your online campaign.

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

The Web Emperor Has No Clothes

By Jerry Bader in Featured

If you’re in business, you’re in sales; that’s just the way it is. We are all salesmen; we all have something to sell, a product, a service, an idea, a cause, or maybe just an opinion. And if you’re in business you have a website intended to communicate the value of that which you sell.

So if you’re in the business of selling something, and your website is the vehicle you choose to communicate your sales pitch, then shouldn’t your main concern be how effectively you are communicating that message?

Communication or Analytics

Instead of concentrating on effective communication, many businesses put the emphasis on search engine statistics: how high they rank on Google, MSN, and Yahoo, with the assumption that the higher they rank, the more traffic they’ll generate, and the more traffic they generate, the more sales they’ll get. At least, that’s what we are led to believe.

Here’s the problem: almost all the rank-generating strategies are aimed at search engine spiders, not people, so you have to ask yourself, who exactly is my website communicating to, robots or human beings?

The Secret Formula Doesn’t Exist

Why are today’s business owners and executives so mesmerized by this whole search engine thing? It reminds me of the story of an infamous Hollywood movie mogul and studio head who was caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Instead of firing the guy immediately, he was retained for some time for the simple reason his movies made money; and the dirty little secret in Hollywood is that nobody really knows why some movies are hits and others are bombs. So you keep paying the guy you think is making you money, no matter what he does, because maybe he knows something you don’t.

What we have today is a new generation of business leaders who came of age with the Internet. These Internet technology geeks and boffins are the new Web-wizards and wunderkinds: the guys with the secret formula. But like the movie industry, nobody really has a foolproof search engine recipe for success, but since most of the technical stuff is ever-changing, and over most entrepreneurs and business executives heads, they buy into it; that is until somebody tells them the emperor has no clothes.

What’s A Web Entrepreneur To do?

You heard the old expression, “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing,” well it has never been so true as it applies to website marketing. The simple truth about websites is that success is based on a site’s ability to communicate a marketing message that makes sense, and is understood in an easy to digest format.

Jerry Bader is Senior Partner at MRPwebmedia, a website design firm that specializes in Web-audio and Web-video. Visit http://www.mrpwebmedia.com/ads, http://www.136words.com, and http://www.sonicpersonality.com. Contact at info@mrpwebmedia.com or telephone (905) 764-1246.

Search Engines and Link Reputation: What’s Yours?

By Jeffrey Smith in Featured

Since links are the fabric of the web and they allow us to move from page to page and site to site, they also play a crucial role in deciphering the context of your site when analyzed from outside sources (particularly from search engines).

Call it osmosis, link transference or what you like, the fact remains that “what other sites say about you” meaning “how they link to you” (or how you build links) matters.What percentage of inbound anchor text (the text in the link itself) variety does Google and other search engines deem as a significant percentage vs. your on page factors to assess the context of your site? Do they look at your content or your site reputation more when assessing where to rank your content?

(CMS) Content Management Systems, SEO and Link Building

By Jeffrey Smith in Featured

Here is a brief synopsis of integrating SEO, Link Building and a (CMS) Content Management System for optimal results. After studying the top ranking sites in multiple niches, one thing is resolute regardless of the industry.

• The introduction of consistent, fresh content.
• A pliable content management system
• Intricate naming conventions supported by a logical semantic infrastructure
• strong internal linking
• A method to encourage external links (RSS, Social Media, Forum participation or large user base) external link popularity.

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