However, tonight something confused (even slightly angered) me.  I did a search for Villa near Disney (one of my clients key phrases) and to my amazement there were a couple of sites that quite clearly don’t adhere to the Google Webmaster guidelines relating to achieving a decent site ranking.

No I don’t know, and probably never will know if these sites are being actively SEO’d but what really grates is the fact that they are appearing so high up in the SERPs when they go against everything Google says about getting a good ranking.

We SEO’s spend much time creating quality content and gaining quality backlinks, whilst making sure that our web sites follow the guidelines / best practices as written by Google themselves, and then we get slapped in the face with things like this.

This isn’t the first time I have blogged about strange results and it probably won’t be the last either…….

Enjoy your Easter weekend!

Ian

The Internet is now an important tool for any business.  Due to the number of web sites and businesses that are now online, is it any wonder that there has been an increase in the number of SEO ‘Consultants’ over the last few years?   There is no doubt that the demand for good SEO practioners is high and personally I feel that the phrase ‘you get what you pay for’ is entirely relevant in this niche.

The problem with so many SEO’s is that simply don’t have the skills to effectively carry out an SEO campaign, and yet they still charge premium rates.  The other problem however, is that many businesses go for the cheaper option which ends up in tears as the campaign doesn’t live up to expectations.

So how do you choose the right SEO?

Firstly, check to see how their own web site ranks within Google.  If they can optimise their own site there is a good chance that they know what they are doing and their methods are effective.  This is especially true for SEO companies, who operate in a very competitive field in terms of search results.  The thing to remember here is that each industry is different.  That’s right.   Whilst techniques remain the same some industrys are considerably more competitive than others in the search engines – so will the cost of your campaign give you enough man hours to compete with the top dogs in the listings?

Does your potentional SEO offer just Google results, or do they throw other search engines into the mix aswell?  It’s important that they don’t just focus on one search engine – after all why cut off a % of searchers that might end up putting online business in your direction?

If you are a small business, with a small budget, then you should consider local SEO.  This would mean that you can get a presence on Google for localised search terms (e.gStaffordshire Plumber).  This route would probably see quicker results and ROI for you business than simply optimising for the term plumber.  After all, even if you ranked number one for the term plumber, is it likely that a search in Inverness is going to land you a job?  Highly unlikely.

There are a number of tricks and promises that you need to remember to stay away from.  Some of these include:

• Promises of certain positions within the search engines
• Submissions to 1000′s of search engines on a regular basis

Still not sure?  OK – when you speak to your SEO make sure you ask them a few searching questions:

• What sort of metrics do they measure the campaign on?
• Does the proposal look solid, built on common sense?  Have they offered suggestions on how their campaign will help your site or is it very much cloak and dagger?  SEO isn’t a secret so your consultant shouldn’t make it one.  Find out what techniques they are using.
• Do they promote silly gaurantees such as No.1 in 24 hours?
• Have they provided you with keyword research, showing you keywords that will actually drive you relevant traffic to your web site.
• Does the campaign include optimisation of your existing web pages, link building, social media, metrication and Search Engine Marketing or does it just pick certain elements out of these?

Dont be afraid to ask for samples of the consultants work.  See if they have any testimonials and if possible contact the companies that they have worked with to get a better picture of their methods.  Usually if the consultant refuses to give you references it’s a sign to walk away.

One of the bets ways to find the right consultant is to get a recommendation direct from an existing customer.  This is something that I have been very successful with in the past.

This post was written by Ian Sheldon, an SEO Consultant and founder of UK SEO Company, eSoftware Solutions.  If you are looking for help with your back link campaign then why not get in touch with us on 0845 838 8588 or email info@esoftware-solutions.com

If you have a new web site then the best way to get it indexed quickly is with relevant back links.  By relevant, I mean that the source of these back links comes from a web page that is topically relevant to your own.  For example we have just launched a site at www.destination-lanzarote.com and we have contacted property owners and tourism web sites to seek back links to our web site from them.

As the Google guidelines explain:

“The best way to ensure Google finds your site, is for your pages to be linked from lots of pages on other sites. Google’s robots jump from page to page on the Web via hyperlinks, so the more sites that link to you, the more likely it is that we’ll find you quickly.”

There are a number of different ways that you can create backlinks and promote your web site.  They don’t just have to come from 3rd party web sites.

For example, the following activities can help to build your backlink count:

• Write articles relevant to your website content and submit them to article directories.  Article directories normally allow for at least 2 backlinks in a resource box
• Submit your web site to web directories, but make sure you post the links in relevant categories to give your link some relevance
• Trade links with other site owners, again making sure that the source page is relevant to your site
• Write a blog, or contribute to existing blogs
• Participate in forums that are relevant to the topic of your website and put a URL link in your signature
• Use social media channels such as Digg, Twitter and Delicious

Link building isn’t easy, not surprising when you realise the value of a good back link.  It pays off to research and search the web for sites with relevant content.  It may sounds like a time consuming exercise but with SEO there are no shortcuts.

It is also very important to consider the anchor text of your back links.  You should always use your chosen keywords in your anchor text, and make sure they link back to a relevant page for that keyword (they don’t all have to go back to your homepage you know, deep links can be very useful).    The anchor text is the text that appears to be clickable to site visitors, for example:

Holidays in Lanzarote

Ideally, your link building campaign should be spread out over time.  This makes it appear like natural link growth to Google.  If you do too much too soon it could be flagged as SPAM which could seriously harm the chances of your site ranking well.

This post was written by Ian Sheldon, an SEO Consultant and founder of UK SEO Company, eSoftware Solutions.  If you are looking for help with your back link campaign then why not get in touch with us on 0845 838 8588 or email info@esoftware-solutions.com

Search made some great strides in 2009, and we saw alot of changes to the way that search engines deliver results to users.  The recent introduction of real time search (providing results from Social Media Channels such as Twitter) was probably the most significant change this year.

Search also became very personalised in 2009, with the introduction of Google Wiki.  This allows users to manage their own results (through promotion of or removal of) when they are signed into their Google account.  At the time this was seen as a potential problem for SEO consultants, but in fairness I think it has done more to enhance the experience of search for the end user.

Of course, its difficult to talk about 2009 and not mention the introduction of BING.   Even if you still haven’t been convinced or are not a big fan Bing seems to have had a clear influence on Google.  If it wasn’t for Bing we may have been still waiting for real time search results for example. 

It’s also hard to forget the Google broke its own search results (well, here in the UK anyway) during 2009.  Thousands of UK searchers were being delivered US relative results.  I know that this caused many SEO’s problems for a short period of time.

We have also seen the introduction of and extreme growth of many Search and Social Media Tools .  Twitter is probably the cherry on the icing on the cake, as millions of internet users and businesses ‘Tweet’ to make themselves heard.  Google Wave, a  personal communication and collaboration tool, was also introduced through ‘invitation’ to around 100,000 users.  We think that Wave will make great strides in the first quarter of 2010.

I am sure 2010 will be a very interesting year for search.

Happy New Year!

It’s that time when us SEO’s start to look forward to the new year, and what challenges and changes it brings to the world of Search Engine Optimisation.  2009 saw alot of change and revelations such as Google denying the duplicate content penalty, changes to Page Rank sculpting and the introduction of real time social media being included in search results.

So what challenges will 2010 present us with?  Here are my top 5 predictions.

1. Real Time Search will be huge in 2010 – but to what benefit?

The growth of social networking sites, such as Twitter, simply cannot be ignored.  Late in 2009 Microsoft started to include real time social media feeds in their results pages, and Google promptly followed.  However, this isn’t neccesarily good for SEO as it potentially detracts from the need for quality content and inbound links.  Why not just tweet about a topic in order to get noticed?   The flip side of this is that real time search surely can only show the results for seconds as live results will change nearly every millisecond.

2. Search Engine Results Evolution could me less traffic

What do I mean by this?  Over the last 6 months we have seen more and more results displaying additional information in the actual search engine listings.  For example, type in the name of a Football Club whilst they are playing a live game and you will probably see the actual realtime score in the SERPs.  Great for searchers who are looking for quick fire information, but maybe not so good for site owners relying on click throughs.

3. Organic  SEO spend will rise

More and more companies will turn to organic SEO in an attempt to increase traffic to their site.  Organic SEO continues to outpace PPC in terms of growth, and 2010 will be no different.  More and more searchers become ‘suspicious’ of PPC results whilst trust in the organic results grows.  This is surely a sign that the search engines have been doing the right thing when it comes to delivering results that searchers want to see?  What this might mean is that SEO’s are employed in house, rather than as an external resource.  Time will tell.

4.  The conversion metric will be king

2010 will see a greater emphasis on conversion.  In the past SEO’s have mainly focused on driving traffic, whilst the more dynamic SEO professionals will also have put a strong focus on conversions.  I personally beleive that 2010 will be the year of improving bounce rate and converting prospects to enquiries and enquiries to sales.

5. The Top 3 positions in the SERPS will become more valuable then ever

Generally speaking, sites that have been on the first page of the search results have tended to get the majority share of the traffic, but towards the end of the year we saw a trend that our sites in the top 3 ranking positions started to grow dramatically in terms of visitors.    This could be mainly down to the amount of information that Google is now trying to cram onto the first page of the SERPS since its ‘Caffeine’ engine was implemented.  Never the less, this makes SEO much more competitive and potentially more expensive for clients but the ROI from investment could also be much more rewarding.

In Summary

Of course, as we have seen with 2009, the world of Search Engine Optimisation can change on a regular basis and our friends at Google are quite happy to keep the majority of these changes under the hat and keep us all guessing.

What I am certain of though, is that 2010 will be a very big year for search, and with the right mindset and SEO company it could also be a very rewarding year for your business.

Have a very Merry Christmas and prosperous New Year from all of us at eSoftware Solutions.

Some, although not all, of the known black hat techniques can quickly get you to the top of the Google rankings for your chosen keyword.  In the short term you can yield some excellent results, enquiries and conversions, but you will find that eventually your site will drop like a stone or in the worst case scenario dissapear completely.

Why does this happen?  You have been penalised by Google for using black hat techniques to promote your site.

This is one of the most frustrating things to happen for any SEO, or web site owner.

Depending on how serious your violations are (against the Google Webmaster Guidelines) depends on how serious your penalty is.  In some cases you may only be blacklisted for a few weeks and you can correct your penalty by dropping your black hat techniques and working towards Googles Webmaster Guidelines.  In the most serious cases web sites have been known to dissapear completely from the rankings forever.

There are two major levels of penalty that have been reported, the -30 and the -950.

The-30 penalty basically does what it says on the tin.  It drops your web site ranking by 30 places.  Minus 30 penalty is one that filters for handling spam in Google algorithm.  The only solution to get around this penalty is to have unique content on your site, to get links from well trusted sites and to link to high quality sites.

The -950 penalty is a different beast altogether.  It only affects precise URLs for particular keywords.  However, the -950 is also the harshest penalty and web sites can be dropped to the bottom of the results for the given keywords. How can this be avoided?  The only thing you can do is to stick to the Google Webmaster Guidelines and stick to White Hat SEO tactics.

If you have been penalised by Google then don’t take it out on the Search Engine.  You have been penalised for a reason and it’s nearly always down to the techniques that have been used in an attempt to promote your web site.

Importance is determined by ‘votes’ and each link back to a page is seen for a vote for that page.  However, links do not just ‘come’ to sites.  You have to publish great content that people want to link to, so you need to shout about it (try using social media channels such as Digg and Twitter to start with).

One thing to consider is that you get links from relevant web pages.  Dont just go buying links from ‘link farms’.  Carefully source your web sites / pages and if possible get them from pages with relevant content to your own.  Naturally, links are valuable so dont expect people to just give them away!

Moving forward, each link to your page, or vote, passes a part of the page rank of the origin.  So if you get a link back from a web page with a high page rank (and few links) you will get a higher slice of the source ranking.  If your source page is cluttered with links then you will get a smaller slice of the pie.

However, if only it was as simple as just getting a slice of the pie.  There are now two other factors that Google has thrown into the mix.

However, it has gotten more complicated by the introduction of 2 new factors:

1. Relevance. If the link comes from a site that is on the same topic as the publisher’s site (or a closely related topic), that link is worth more than a links that comes from a site with an unrelated topic.

2. Authority. It is generally accepted that search engines attempt to measure how much they trust a site. If a site is highly trusted, its vote will count for more than if it is not that trusted.

These factors are the two single most important items you need to consider when building your back links.  Back links from bad neighbourhoods may provide you with a quick fix, but it wont be long until you find your site sliding down the listings.

So why does link building matter?  Done correctly, It helps your site gain page rank, and most importantly trust from the right neighbourhoods.

I have read numerous blog posts over the last couple of days that tell us that Google have made some changes to the way that back links with the nofollow tag affect Page Rank.   Not only have changes been made, but Google have not been forthcoming with any real communication or response to the changes.

• A large number of people queried the head of Google’s web spam team, Matt Cutts, about the issue. Responses ranged from “no comment” to “the PR team would like me to stay away from that.”
• Another member of Google’s team noted that PageRank Sculpting on unimportant pages like “register,” “login,” “privacy policy,” etc. is OK and shouldn’t hurt your site.
• A great many webmasters and SEOs are still shocked by the announcement because as recently as the last few days, they’ve still been seeing positive effects when employing the tactic.

So why have changes been made?

Im summary Google is getting pretty fed up with Page Rank sculpting (creative distribution of page rank around the pages of your web site).  Basically Google wants non-advanced web site owners to stop screwing around with their link graph and stay away from excessively using nofollow in ways that hurt indexing and relevance.

Have you seen changes to your SERP or Page Rank in the last week?

We got into an interesting debate about the fact that Google PPC ads have an affect on the organic listings of a web site. I have always been of the understanding and impression that the two are completely unrelated and I stand by that. For Google to take payment for sponsored listings and then allow these sites to take preference over non paid sites in organic listings is morally incorrect. As we know, 60% of searchers never click on PPC results, and alot of people I talk to never even look at them. The reason? They don’t trust them like they do the organics. Anyone can pay for a listing for any keyword – the site doesnt have to be relevant for it to be listed, where as the organic results are trusted to serve up content relevant to the search criteria.

If it was ever confirmed that PPC had an effect on Organic listings I would be beside myself with dissapointment, and maybe just a little but of anger towards the Search Engine giant!