Is Your SEO A Bad Guy?
You've heard the derogatories: Blackhat, Scumbag, SEO. In some people's eyes they are all the same thing. But are they? Let's face it. Mike McDonald has a point. SEOs are manipulators. But is that really a bad thing? I do agree with his conclusion in the end. It's not certain that Google would penalize a high profile search engine optimization expert, or any SEO, for promoting a product that happened to have resulted in a lot of inbound links for the SEO or his sponsor. It's not certain they wouldn't either. But when it comes to paid links, well, if you get caught paying cash for those then Google will nab you. We know that for certain. But, here's the pickle. Only if you get CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
How Much Anchor Text Do You Need?
When it comes to link anchor text it is best to use it in moderation. One of the corollaries of link building is what we call link diversity. It's the idea that you want your links coming from a variety of sources, but also you want them to use a variety of anchor text. The search engines, particularly Google, call it natural link building. The idea is to produce an effect that looks natural. In other words, if you left the link building to its own devices, would people you have no control or sway over link to you naturally the way that you are trying to do it, using the same kind of anchor text and the same page sources? It is really difficult to "look CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
Which Content Is Best For Link Building?
Link building is a tough task yet every time you publish a new page on your blog or web site you increase the potential for inbound links. If you think about it, if there is no content then there is little to link to; the more content you have, the more links you can attract. That doesn't mean you can publish just anything and expect others to link to it. You need to provide a reason for that link and it all comes back to that one word - content. There are many different types of content but three standout as ideal link building elements: Humor - everyone loves a laugh and if you can provide the right humor at the right time then you can CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
Should You Build Multiple Sites And Cross-Promote Them?
It may seem intuitive. You need relevant inbound links. They need to be relevant. They should come from authoritative sites within your niche. Why not just build a bunch of sites within your niche with different domain names and link them together? There are some dangers in doing this. First, if all of your sites are hosted through the same web host then it is likely that they will exist on the same web server. That's a big red flag where the search engines are concerned. Several sites linking to each other and that exist on the same server are too closely related to be of any good to each other. They are likely owned by the same person or group of people so it's like CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
Why Buying Links Is Bad (Even If You’re Not Google)
Sometimes we get an e-mail (or a blog comment) from someone who says their PageRank declined because they were buying links. This happens often enough that I thought I'd write something about why buying links is not good for search, period. It isn't because Google is some mean, rotten pig. I mean, it actually makes sense. Think about what Google's job is. It's to return the most relevant search queries for a particular search based on the parameters that searchers enter into a query box. What would happen if the top 10 search queries were there because someone paid for them to be there? Suppose you had to pay $10,000 to be in position No. 1 and each subsequent position below that cost just $100 CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
Will The Future Be Built On Inbound Links?
In a recent interview with Aaron Wall, legendary "black hat" SEO Fantomaster commented that Google's PageRank algorithm is based on a fallacious view of links. Is he right? Let's review what PageRank is and how it is calculated. If you've been around on the Internet for awhile then you know that PageRank is based on the concept that inbound links count as "votes". The system was devised as a way for Google to examine a website's authority based on how many other websites were linking to it and the quality of those links. Over the few years that this system has been in place, the algorithm has changed and shifted from merely counting numbers of links to analyzing several factors related to the quality CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
How To Use Twitter For Building Links
Twitter isn't a link building service. In fact, aside from the one link you get in your 140-character limit bio, there isn't a whole lot of potential for building links through Twitter. At least, not directly. However, there are some indirect methods for building links. We've written about pinging your Twitter stream before. But what we haven't talked about is how to use Twitter as link bait. You want to build links to your website, right? Well, you have to promote it then and Twitter is a great way to promote your website. A GREAT way. Here's one method you can use to get Twitter's help in building inbound links to your website. Build up a massive Twitter following. There are several online tools available to CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
How To Get Media Links That Benefit You
You know that .gov and .edu links are some of the most valuable links you can get. But what about media links? From a search engine optimization point of view, media links hold no special value, but from a traffic and authority point of view they hold a lot of value. The reason is quite simple. If you get a link from an authoritative media website then it is seen by the majority of readers as a strong vote of confidence in your authority. But it isn't easy getting media links. Perhaps the best way to ensure you get that coveted media link is to send a press release. But you should make sure you send it to the right person at the right media company. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
7 Alternatives To Squidoo For Building Awesome Links And Driving Traffic
Squidoo is all the rage, but you don't need a lens to make the world a better place. You can build great links and drive traffic to your website using other UGC sites. In fact, I highly recommend it. Here are 7 alternative sites that allow you to post articles or share your knowledge, drive traffic back to your website, and build great inbound links: eHow - eHow is a very popular site that allows anyone to teach others what they know how to do. Articles are generally short and snappy and "go by the numbers". WikiHow - The wiki version of eHow. Only better. Instructables - The new kid on the blog, Instructables gives you an opportunity to CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
How To Go From Page 3 To Page 1 In Days
If you work in an area where good white hat search engine optimization means hitting page 3 with your on-page efforts but you just can't seem to get your pages ranked any higher then it is possibly to push those pages further up in the listings. You need to undertake an ongoing relevant link building campaign. Link building is not as difficult as some people make it out to be. It isn't enough to seek out a large quantity of links. Quality links are just as important and developing a "trust factor" for your company. But what is meant by "quality link"? The quality question in link building is not so easy to answer. Like on-page SEO, there are a number of factors that affect a link's CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
Do You Have A Way Of Finding New Directories?
Web directories are a great source of link building as part of your long term blended approach to search engine optimization. They always have been and always will be. And there are always new directories popping up to take place of the old ones that are dying. Most directories just don't stick around for long. So you can build 100 back links from online directories and within two years half of those are no longer in existence. They've died because the directory owner has decided to maintaining a directory is too hard and time consuming. Many directory owners go in it for the money and when they find out that you can't make a lot of money from a directory without putting in some really CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
Google’s 100 Link Limit (Limit? What Limit?)
Does Google have a 100 link per page limit? No. Not according to Matt Cutts. In fact, Google's never really had a 100 link per page limit. As Matt says, the reason Google gave for that 100 links per page thing was because of a limitation in Google's indexing quality. That limitation no longer exists, but even if it did that's not the point anyway. Spam. That's the point. User experience. That's the second point. Link farms used to be quite popular and after awhile they quit being effective because too many users would show up on a web page, look at massive amounts of links, and leave. No clicks. No scans. No reads. Just bounces. Google figured out that users didn't want to see CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
How To Use Twitter To Build Links
It's no secret that Twitter links are nofollow. Andy Beal wrote a great blog post about how Google won't crawl those Twitter links and how that hurts all of us. But Andy's such a swell guy he offers a suggestion to both Google and Twitter: Kill the nofollow! Good idea, but until it happens we all are sitting here sucking our thumbs wishing Twitter links were dofollow. I know how you can make them dofollow. First, you have to get out of Twitter and into the rest of the blogosphere. But how do you do that? There are a number of ways, really. Any of them are legitimate, though one or two may be circumspect. Still, get those links out of Twitter and somewhere else CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
Can Social Media Optimize Your Website?
If you haven't heard by now, the Mars brand candy Skittles made a courageous effort to include social media user-generated content (UGC) on its website, but its effort has blighted its colorful face with a few ugly punches. It was a valiant effort, and to answer the question: Yes, this kind of UGC can help you optimize your website for your important keywords. But at what cost? Well, that's what Skittles found out. Any time you open your company website up to the entire Web to come in and say anything they want, they will. Do you really want that? Is that the cost you're willing to pay for search engine optimziation your website the easy way? The comments page CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
Traffic, Links, and Article Sandwiches
Doing business online boils down to two things real - traffic and links. Traffic is important because without it you can't close any sales. It takes traffic to make conversions. Where you get your traffic from isn't as important as getting targeted traffic. If you drive traffic to your website that is qualified and ready to buy then you have good traffic. It's the most important thing for any website. Links are a means of driving traffic. With links you can build a solid base of targeted traffic that shows up at your doorstep over and over again, day in day out. Where you place your links is very important in the overall scheme of things because if you put them in the wrong places you CLICK HERE TO READ MORE...
SEO Journal is Written by
Brick Marketing Founder,
Nick Stamoulis:
Nick Stamoulis - SEO Bio.
Tel. - 877-295-0620
nick@brickmarketing.com
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