Search Engine Optimization
"SEO" Made Easy
by Brian Hawkins
SEO is a never ending battle!
So is SEO over-rated? I don't think it is. Some say that
Google's automated PageRank™ system and Alexa's Traffic
Rank system are losing ground. This may be may be true
to some point but the fact still remains that we want
at the top of the search results. And to achieve this
we need to educate ourselves and do the work or hire someone
else to the work for us.
Search Engine Optimization "SEO" is a term
we see all over the net. For those of you that are unsure
exactly what is meant by SEO, it's simply adjusting many
characteristics of your website to conform with what the
major search engines deem important. That's where the
simple stops. It's complicated only because no one other
than the developers themselves know all the rules and
even then the rules are constantly changing.
What I'll try to do here is cover the basics that have
fairly consistent lately. Keep in mind however there will
always be inconsistencies when it comes SEO. For example,
I recently read an e-book that said to imbed a few of
your primary keywords in the "alt" tag of your
logo graphic. The same day, I was reading an online article
of equal quality and this author cautioned against such
a tactic due to possible penalties by the search engines.
So which did I do? See for yourself by hovering your mouse
over the logo. I don't mind a little risk as long as the
risk is low and there may be nice benefits, but don't
get carried away. We certainly don't want to get banned
by any search engines. I get the heebie-jeebies just saying
it. That would simply end many of us. Because Google's
PageRank™ and Alexa's Traffic Rank systems are really
two different animals, I will focus primarily on Google's
PageRank™ system for now.
So lets get started in no particular order.
Link Popularity: I guess we can start with the hardest
part of search engine optimization. Link popularity. The
ultimate goal here is to gain the respect of the search
engines. And how we do that is by who we know or at least
associate with in the spiders eyes. We want as many quality
incoming links as possible with as few low-ranked outbound
links as possible. We need to consider several factors
when we approach any site to request a link exchange.
1. First of all, we want to focus only on sites that
compliment ours. By that I mean directly on indirectly
are in the same category or field or relating field as
our site without necessarily competing with our site.
I say not-necessarily because personally I have no problem
linking to competitors site as long as we both mutually
agree benefits. Some fear they'll lose some of their site
visitors but I feel the best way to keep visitors on your
site and get them to return is by providing a high quality
site with great original content.
2. Second we want to pay attention to their Google page
rank. To do this if you haven't already done so, download
Google free toolbar http://toolbar.google.com/ Once installed,
you can see the PageRank™ of any site you go to. You want
as many sites as possible with high PR's. Set a goal of
getting a few PR6 or PR7 sites. This will do wonders to
your rank. In fact one PR7 might do more for you than
hundreds on no or very low PR sites.
3. Third, the engines like to see incoming links from
what they consider on authoritative site. So aggressively
go after well established, high ranking sites that share
the some focus as your site.
4. Fourth on our list are the sites to stay away from.
Sites that generate artificially created links. Link farms
and even huge link exchange sites can even get your site
banned. I don't mean to make anyone nervous here. The
fact is, if you are generally doing the right thing for
the right reasons, you probably have nothing to worry
about. If you find yourself trying to hide something or
hoping an search engine doesn't catch something, then
you may want to re-evaluate your strategies.
Requesting a link. The first thing you should do when
requesting a link exchange is little research. Glance
over the site in question and consider where your site
link might hold the most relevance one their site.
This will benefit both parties. And then don't be afraid
to offer the suggestions when you contact the site administrator.
I have had sites accept my link on a suggested page even
though they have a section designed just for outside links.
I have even accepted links that I would have normally
rejected because the fit would have seemed wrong if they
hadn't shown a better fit.
Always add their link to your site before you make the
request and include the page url of the link when making
contact. Keep track of the contacts you've made and if
you haven't received a reply. Do a simple search on there
site to see if they added your link and forgot to reply.
At most, send one more request and be sure to include
the words link exchange in the subject line so they don't
delete your mail as spam. Then if you still don't get
a reply within a week simply remove theirs from your site
and move on. Don't send any more mail. Consider the lack
of response as a rejection and accept it. Don't take things
personal and send a negative e-mail. I have actually received
a couple of these and there's really no point. If you
do get a reply and a link send a short thank you note.
Always include the exact text of the link you want on
their site. Again, before you do this it helps if you
look at other links on their site. If they have a 3 or
4 word description with each link, you don't want to send
a whole paragraph in your links description. What you
do want to do is include your best key words. In fact,
a short description with the right key words can benefit
you far better than a watered down version. Keep it short
and sweet.
Make things as easy as possible for the webmaster. Include
the html code of your link so he/she can just copy and
paste if they decide to.
Sample Link Exchange Request Letter
Hi, I am the administrator and site owner of YourSiteHere.com
I would like to apply for a link exchange with your site.
I have already linked to your site, you can view it at:
http://reciprocal.YourSiteHere.com/
Basic exchange information
Site name:
Extreme Site Promotions
URL:
http://www.YourSiteHere.com
Site Description:
Extreme sit promotion techniques for internet marketing
campaigns, site promotion and internet advertising.
Category:
Internet marketing/Web promotion
Where our site reciprocates:
http://reciprocal.YourSiteHere.com.com/
Contact information
Name:
Your Name
Email address:
admin@YourSiteHere.com
Extreme promotions techniques for internet marketing
campaigns. Site promotion andinternet advertising. Feel
Free to download the supplied graphics located at http://www.YourSiteHere.com/graphics
and use them to link back to our home page. Our site can
only reciprocate with a text link.
Link/ Resource Page- If you decide to dedicate a page
or two to link exchanges, stay with the over all theme
of your site. And the best way to create a links page
is by doing it manually. An automated system can be less
affective and can even get you in trouble if not maintained
closely.
Organize your links into categories and set a limit of
about 50 links or so to a page.
Include on your links page an example of the link you
want used linking back to your site. Again, use your key
words. It might also be nice to offer a few graphics or
banners in case a site would prefer to use a graphic linked
back to you. Give them permission to download the images
and use them to link to your site. I always include a
comment such as,
"Feel Free to download the supplied graphics located
at www.YourSiteHere.com/graphics and use them to link
back to our home page. Our site can only reciprocate with
a text link."
I think it's better to provide a link to the graphic
page rather than sending attachments. In today's age of
viruses, you risk you email getting deleted right away
if it contains an attachment.
I have learned from experience that many sites aren't
going to play fair, and even more of them are not keeping
their sites updated. I have a nice link exchange program
that I've built over a many month period and a couple
months ago, a friend of mine let me in on a new link tag:
content="noindex,nofollow" He suggested that
I use it for links such as affiliate links and other non-reciprocating
links. Why let these sites suck up my page rank with nothing
in return? As I was adding the tags, I went to my links
page and began checking each site for a reciprocal link.
To my amazement, over 50% had no link back to my site.
This means that most of the 50% had removed the link after
a short period and maybe a few had squeaked by me without
ever adding one. Another reason I was surprised by this
is that about 75% of the links on that site were requested
by the other party. So what can you do? Ireined my system.
I added a note at the top of the page and I began making
these changes:
For every site that I couldn't find a like from, I added
the word "pending" and I also added the content="noindex,nofollow"
tag. This would reduce one sided benefit until I notify
each site and give them a chance to ad mine. I could have
deleted these links but this method is better for a few
reasons. First, it relays a message to future exchange
sites that we're paying attention. Second, it's possible
that I made a mistake and the link is there. And lastly,
they may have a mistake themselves. so each site will
be contacted individually before they are removed. A huge
project that I'm not looking forward to but it has to
be done.
As for the sites that did reciprocate, they get a double
benefit. They get the word "confirmed" next
to their link with a second link to their site going directly
to the page where our links resides. This will make life
much easier in the future when it comes to re-checking
reciprocal links. All I'll have to do is click on the
'confirmed' link and it should be there.
Brian Hawkins - Entrepreneur, Internet Marketer, Online
business consultant, Author. Site owner and administrator
of several sites including: http://www.extremesitepromotions.com/
and http://www.csc4u.com/
