5 mins of SEO to get your Twitter A/c to a Better Google Position.

Your Twitter account's Google position is very important. It may be the one thing that a customer finds when they are looking on Google for the kinds of services and goods you provide. So have you thought about doing some SEO (Search Engine Optimization) on it?

Here are three quick SEO wins that should take just 5 mins to do.........

1. Edit your Twitter profile and change your name so that it includes keywords that you want to be found on Google for.

2. Edit your Twitter account and change your username so that it includes keywords that you want to be found on Google for. You may have to try a few times to get one that no one else has, but Twitter will tell you whether a username has been previously taken or not, as you try different ones. Don't worry these changes won't effect your previous usage of Twitter or your followers etc.

3. Edit your Twitter profile and use all the 160 characters that you are allowed to use, to describe yourself and give a full description of what you offer clients and customers. Make sure that you start the descritpion with keywords that you want to be found for on Google and sprinkle them throughout your bio too (Sprinkle!! don't over egg the pudding now!).

Give it a try .. just five minutes work ... and watch yourself rise up the search rankings as you tweet!

BY SEO STEER

Befriend the Penguin for Good SEO

Google's latest update to their search algorythm is called Penguin. It's designed to weed out SEO techniques that are a little underhand, but have become stock in trade for so many practitioners of the arts of SEO. Many SEO techniques that have become standard practice will now actually harm your web sites search ranking.

To start with DON'T PANIC ....... Just focus on Quality and putting your intended audience (customers, clients) at the centre of what you are doing. If you've been producing Quality content on the Web then keep doing it ...... these Penguin updates are designed to help your web presence rise up the Google Search Rankings. If you haven't been producing  good quality content for the Web then start now. Trying to trick or spam the search engines is just pants and let's face it your know it inside. Good quality content will now be rewarded by Google and it will make you feel very virtuous, as you will be improving the Web and providing your cutomers with a better web experiece.

The new Penguin update will look for what it considers to be SEO tricks and behaviour that would not normally occur unless the content producer was obviously trying to get an unnaturally high ranking for particular keywords. Here are the ones that the Penguin doesn't like, so try not to use them in future if you want to improve or retain you search ranking. This also means making sure that any individual or organization that is using these techniques as part of their SEO service for you will refrain from doing so in future. For example here is one of the main things that the Google Penguin will frown upon.............

Using unnatrual linking text when linking to other web sites. The most natural way that people suggest links to another web site is to just put the URL of the page in the text.

Such as ..... 'if you want more information then go to https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/home '

or

they may link text to the name of the site such as ....... 'if you want more information then go to Google's WebmasterTools '

but

they would not naturally put Best SEO Tools

this is obviously an attempt to link the keywords 'Best SEO Tools' to the site being linked to and thus increase the Google Juice for those keywords on that site..

This has become almost standard practice in SEO but now thanks to the Penguin it will actually have a negative effect on your site's search ranking.

BY SEO STEER

Googel vs SEO. Do Google want PPC only for Commercial sites?

The latest updates to the Google Algorythims (Panda/Penguin) are designed to scupper the traditional ways of SEO (particulalry Back Linking Schemes) but does this mean that Google want to drive out SEO Specialists and Firms altogether? On Google's Webmaster Blog there is a very telling sentence ........ "We want people doing white hat search engine optimization (or even no search engine optimization at all) to be free to focus on creating amazing, compelling web sites". see the Google Web Master Article

So what is it?  do Google want people to practice SEO or Not?.....

I beleive that Google do not want people to practice SEO ........... for these reasons.........

I was trying to figure out what to do in order to be a good SEO Specialist in light of the latest changes to the Google Algorythims (Panda/Penguin) and a cracking idea started to form in my head ...... it was simple ... all a company would have to do, is create a ..... Portal of Power .... a Website containing well researched well developed and well written articles on the subjects that their customers would be interested in (not Web Spam Sites with little content) .....these would be centres of excellence on their particularl subject .... ideally rivalling and exceeding Wikipedias authority on particular subjects .... companies  would not advertise or even acknowledge the site ownership ..... but when they had established their excellence and appropriate lvels of Search Engine Ranking then direct links from the Portal of Power would got straight to the products of the company. This would work, not from a spammy backlinking point of view from a site of little and poor content ...... but from a genuine way of directing potential customers from a site of excellence and interest, on the associated subject, to a relevant product from the createor of the site. Therfore using Google's own guidelines of producing fantastic content for consumers and then creating a direct sales funnel to the products of the company that had created the website of excellence ........... EUREKA!!

Told my wife ........ but she said ....... "when I want to buy something such as Bike for example .... I don't put 'Bicycles' or 'Bike' or the 'History of the Bicycle' or 'Bicycle Information' into Google ........ I put 'Bikes for Sale' in!!!" So at that instant I realised..........

All that stuff about giving people  Better Quality Sites to find and a Better User Experience is just a smoke screen from Google ........ What they really want is ....... if you put 'Bikes for Sale' into Google ...... you get interesting articels on Bikes from non-profit organizations in the Organic listings .... AND GUESS WHAT ..... the PPC (pay per click) Ads from web sites that are selling Bikes.

As the Meerkat on Compare the Meerkat would say Simplezz ........ Google want to get  more PPC (pay per click) revenue from commercial organizations by clamping down on SEO. It's a simple correlation ........ money spent on SEO Specialists is effectively money not spent on PPC.

If this is the case ....... I think Google are being short sited ........ more from me on this soon.

All the best Dave.

BY SEO STEER

Post Penguin SEO – Stop Whinging – Start Changing

I have been thinking more and more about the implications of Google’s new algorithm designed to stop their Search Engine being fooled. Much of the Bellyaching coming from established SEO Companies is along the lines of “Our Web Site has lost it’s position on Google and it’s just not fair!!”. However these companies that used obvious linking schemes to promote web sites were trying to game the Google search Algorithms to get an unjustifiably higher search position for themselves and for their clients. Now Google is trying to fight back and give their customer’s an un-spammed search experience. Google are now calling this kind of Gaming “Web Spam” and the two main indicators of this Web Spam behaviour are Keyword Stuffing and Link Schemes. By calling this behaviour “Web Spam” they are linking it (can you see the Pun?) to the just as consumer painful experience of Viagra and Penis Enlargement driven email spam.

Lets have a look at keyword Stuffing. This is the BAD SEO technique that destroyed Google’s predecessor Alta Vista. Basically stuff as many keywords into a web page as possible and thus get it ranked higher. I thought this kind of SEO had died out years ago …… but apparently not ….. here is an example from Google’s Webmaster pages ………

and then there is the BAD SEO of Link Schemes. Google say that they consider Link Schemes to be characterized by ……..

• Links intended to manipulate PageRank
• Links to web spammers or bad neighborhoods on the web
• Excessive reciprocal links or excessive link exchanging ("Link to me and I'll link to you.")
• Buying or selling links that pass PageRank

That just about covers most of techniques used by established SEO companies!!

So what is the way forward for SEO? I Believe that the way forward (and from their Webmaster Pages so do Google) is through helping our clients to produce the best On Site On Page content they possibly can, aimed at helping and informing the Clients that they wish to aquire. Then I think that good On Page SEO should be used to emphasise the (well researched) targeted keywords to find these Customers, together with good Site Design that emphasisies fast load up times for a better user experience. Lastly use Social Media to connect to the world and advertise this content to the appropriate clients and consumers. I call this approach the 3Cs of SEO ….. Content …. Code …. Connectivity .

Have a look at the Google Webmaster’s Page thatinspired this Article. 

BY SEO STEER

Bad SEO: The Duplication of Content

The Duplication of content, in one way or another, is a factor that will reduce the SEO of your web presence. This is because Google and other Search Engines will normally consider duplicate content on the internet to be suspicious. Bear in mind that a Search Engine such as Google, wants it's clients to find original and informative content. So if it sees the duplication of content, then alarm bells will ring.  Generally speaking it will think that one of the following things are happening and downgrade you web presence accordingly ......

Bad SEO Firstly and more obviously, someone has just used copy and paste to copy an original article on the internet and paste it into their own web site or web presence, thus saving themselves the effort of writing something original from scratch. Good SEO Don't copy material from other web sites. Write your own material. Even if this means reading a really good article, that you find really informative, then writing it in your own words and your own style. Oscar Wilde said .... "Bad Writers Copy .... Good Writers Borrow" .. ;) Also if you have Printer Friendly versions of pages on your web site, make sure that for the Printer Friendly Pages, you have the robots.txt file set appropriately, so that Search Engines won't index those pages and then think they are duplicates.

Bad SEO On an e-Commerce site someone has copied the description of a product and merely changed the product name, price, code etc. Thus indicating that the product could be bought from the original manufacturer's web site and that the new web site is just offering exactly the same product with no additional customer service and help. This also looks highly suspicious from a fraud/con point of view. Good SEO Is as above i.e. write your own copy. Plus if you are selling something on the internet, that the original manufacturer is also selling on the internet, then you should seriously reconsider your Business Model. Are you offering a better Customer Experience / Back Up / Training than the original manufacturer? i.e. what is the Added Value that you are giving to the consumer? Make the description of the Added Value the core of the product description on your e-Commerce Web Pages.

Bad SEO Multiple domains are pointing at the same piece of information. This will make the Search Engines think that you are trying to game them. This is a Black Hat SEO technique that has worked well in the past, but now is a known Black Hat technique and will be punished accordingly. Good SEO Try and stick with one URL for each of your Web Pages and one overall domain for your main web site. However most web presences are going to have multiple domains for legacy or for URL memorability reasons and if this is the case make sure that 301 Redirects are used to point these other URLs to your main URL.

So remember for Good SEO don't Duplicate ... I said ... don't Duplicate!

BY SEO STEER

The 3Cs of SEO

SEO is far more than just Keywords and Backlinks nowadays. With the growing importance of Social Media and with Google tightening it's Search Engine Algorithms so that clever tactics, which aim at gaming and fooling their search engine, are given the heave ho.

Google became prominent over the old search engine favorite Alta Vista (Remember That) because Alta Vista was too easy to Spam with Keyword Stuffing and it’s Search Results became too much like phone book listings with AAAAAA Taxis being pipped to the post by AAAAAAA Taxis! So, along came Google with it's ability to trace backlinks and so It's results were far better than Alta Vistas. It became the Search Engine of choice and very quickly became the dominant force that it is today.

However,  the World's SEO Experts have become too good at Backlink Spamming and so Google have had to down grade the prominence it gives to such Spammy tactics. Now they are integrating the importance of Social Media in their listings. These are the so called Panda/Penguin/Farmer updates to Google. At the end of the day Google don't want to become the next Alta Vista. Their whole business model relies on people believing that the results they get when they search on Google are going to be relevant.

So it is my belief that the way forward for SEO Success in the post  Panda/Penguin/Farmer World is to follow the 3Cs of SEO ............. Content ....... Code ....... Connection.

Content. Since the very beginning of the World Wide Web the popular axiom has always been Content is King. This is truer now than it has ever been. Provide the best content you can on your Web Site, Blog, or Web Presence. The WWW was design as a means of providing and sharing information. That is what users of the WWW are expecting, either consciously or unconsciously. If you provide good relevant content,  people will return to your site for more often. They will also refer your site on Social Media and provide links to your site, either through adding links to their own site or through sharing mechanisms such as Shareaholic or though Social Media like a share on FaceBook  for example ...... thus providing natural and organic backlinking which Google will find far more authoritative than spammy links from link farms.

Code. There is however no getting away from the fact that the Google Search Engine is only a piece of software and it will inevitably have to have some kind of rules when it comes to favoring keywords in certain positions on the web page. Therefore you must learn what is generally considered to be the rules (Google would never tell us exactly) and use them on your own web page (presence) so that the Keywords that you want to be found for, are present and correct, in the right places. This is commonly known as OnPage SEO.

Connection. Connect with the people that you want to be your clients/customers/co-workers/colaborators. This is where Social Media comes in. Work out what types of Social Media are going to connect with the audience that you want to connect with and use it to advertise your content. Traffic flow to the content will bring about the organic back linking and referring which will improve your Search Engine Rankings. You will also be simultaneously Internet Marketing your site. By Internet Marketing your Web Page/Presence you will be performing SEO on it and by performing SEO on it you will be Internet Marketing it! ......... an Ongoing Virtuous Spiral of SEO and Internet Marketing which leads to the Ultimate Goal of Client/Customer Engagement.

So if you want to do the best SEO in the Post Panda World ……. Use the 3Cs of SEO ….. Content …Code … Connection!

BY SEO STEER

Five Keys to OnPage Keyword SEO

Once you have established the keywords you want to use to promote your website and the individual webpages that are part of it, you need to know where to place these keywords. Here are the Five Key Areas that will have the greatest effect on your OnPage Keyword  SEO.

Key 1 OnPage Keyword SEO: The Title Tag:

Key 2 OnPage Keyword SEO: The H1 and H2 Headings: 

Key 3 OnPage Keyword SEO: Link Text: 

Key 4 OnPage Keyword SEO: The Page URL: 

Key 5 OnPage Keyword SEO: Image Alt Text: 

Hope these Keys open some SEO Doors for you ...... Let me know! .... All the best Dave

BY SEO STEER

Keep your Eye on the Ball.... Five Easy SEO Wins

Here are five easy ways to get a higher Google search position for your Website......

1. Provide really good content. The old saying with websites was 'Content is King'. What this means is make your website as interesting as possible to your target audience. Another way of saying this is 'Just be Awesome'

2. Uses Images. People are attracted to images initially before they are drawn to text. Also name your images using the keywords that you want to promote. Google uses the names of images as part of it's search engine. So if someone does an image search they could find your website that way.

3. URL need your Keywords in your URL. If your are a cake shop in Cardiff .... try and get the URL www.CakeShopCardiff.co.uk or something similar .... Google gives great weight to keywords within your URL (Domain Name).

4. Local Keywords for Local People. Unless you think your going to dominate the whole world straight away then have at least one or two of your keywords as the local area you want to be known for first. So if you are Papa Lazarou's Wedding Venue in Cardiff you would probably want Cardiff and Wales to be two of your keywords to concentrate on. As well as You're My Wife Now Dave.

5. Keep your Keyword Concentration to about Five. The old saying is 'Two Priorities is no Priority' but  in the case of SEO keywords I would say..... do not try to promote more than five keywords on your site otherwise you will dilute the importance that the Goggle Search Engine puts on each of them.

Give it a try ........ Hope this is useful ........ yours Dave

BY SEO STEER

Don't be an eCommerce CopyCat it's Bad SEO

BAD SEO: Don't be an eCommerce CopyCat. Google have updated the way that their Search Engine looks at websites, because they really don't like it when it seems that a website is trying to Spam it's way up the Google Search Rankings. One thing that Google really hate ...... (and so do customers) is when a website just copies and pastes the manufacturers description of a product onto their own website when selling the product. This is BAD SEO because the Google Search Engine will spot where the original text came from (the manufacturers Website) and realize that it has been copied exactly and they will now (Since the New Update PANDA) penalize the web site using the copied material.

GOOD SEO: If you want a high ranking for your eCommerce website then read the manufacturers specification and then rewrite it in your own words and maybe add some extra helpful information for your customers from your own knowledge of what you are selling. This is GOOD SEO and it will be helpful to your customers and differentiate your website from your competitors.

BY SEO STEER

Like for Like is Good SEO

The Google Search Engine has been programmed to become more aware of Social Media when it ranks web sites on the internet nowadays. So if you have a Facebook page for your Business then the more people that LIKE it the more Google will think that your site is worth a higher search ranking and that includes you main web site if you have links from your Facebook Page to your web site (you do do that don't you??). Make sure you have a button for liking on your web site. I've got one on the right -------> you might even want to click it to see how it works ;) You can get this button from Facebook at https://developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/plugins/like/

Why not start liking others pages too ..... they'll probably LIKE you back ..... Liking other people pages want harm you .... and it will certainly help you if they LIKE you back!

It's all about being Social .... You Scratch My Back and I'll Scratch Yours ... LIKE FOR LIKE.

Or as Shakespeare would put it ...... As you LIKE it.

BY SEO STEER