Posted on Mar 4, 2009
Footer links can be seen to be not very beneficial or useful for the following reasons:
- Footer links are likely devalued by search engines
- Footer links get low CTR
- Footer links are usually never the first link on the webpage
There has been mounting evidence that search engines, like Google and Yahoo are starting to devalue links that are included on the footer of websites. Many times these links and there anchor text keywords are not relevant to the content on the webpage, so these links loose some link juice for seo right there. Additionally, footer links are the last ones seen on the webpage by search engines and users; since they are the last links on the webpage, they are devalued even more. Since users see these links last because they are the least visible, they are unlikely to click on them and generate traffic to those webpages. Instead of adding links to the footer of your websites, consider placing them elsewhere on the page, so that they are more usable for visitors and valued more by search engines.
read more
Posted on Feb 24, 2009
Focusing on long tail keywords can be much more beneficial regarding seo than investing your resources on conventional keywords. There can be an enormous amount of competition for generic keywords; achieving and maintaining a high rank for such competitive keywords can be quite a challenge. Instead of battling to get a decent rank for a generic keyword, you might consider targeting the long tail keyword variations. For instance, instead of trying to rank for the keyword, “Webmaster”, a long tail variation, such as “Webmaster Blog”, will be much easier to rank for. In order to fully benefit from targeting long tail keywords, you should target a handful of variation instead of just one. It will be much easier to attain decent rankings for these long tail variations than for the generic keyword. Even though the generic keyword will produce more traffic than a single variation, the sum of the traffic generated from a handful, 10-20, of the long tail variations will outnumber that of the generic. By targeting long tail keywords instead of the generics, your website can benefit more from organic search by taking advantage of the lower levels of competition for long tail variations.
read more
Posted on Jan 28, 2009
AOL released the search data of 500,000 users over a 3 month period; however, this information was promptly removed from their website probably due to privacy concerns. None the less, the data still got out and from that data the below graph can be constructed:
This graph displays the CTR of users for the top 10 search engine rankings. At a glance, a webmaster can clearly see the importance of obtaining a search engine ranking of #1 for their website instead of #2 or #3. A #1 ranking brings ~4 time more traffic than #2, ~5 times more traffic than #3, and ~7-15 times more traffic than #4-10. As webmasters this tells us something very essential to taking advantage of organic search, it is vital to focus your efforts to attain #1-3 ranking for your targeted keywords. Instead of targeting a multitude of keywords and aiming to get them on the front page of the serps, you would be better off targeting a single keyword phrase and attaining a #1 ranking for it. Additionally, the next graph shows the differences in the serps pages 1-4:
Even if you are unable to rank in the top 3 rankings for your keyword terms, attaining a rank on the front page can produce noticeable improvements. A change in your serps from #11 to #10 will give you ~4.5 times more search engine traffic for that keyword phase. It is necessary that you account for search engine ranking CTR with seo. A single bump up in rankings can have a drastic effect on CTR. Be aware with seo on your website, so that you benefit the most from organic search.
read more
Posted on Jan 16, 2009
In contradiction to our last post: Content Is Not King?, we will give the reasons that content is the true way to create a quality website. When you make a website that has unique content of substantial quality, you’re site will grow and develop. Although it is possible to attain high search engine rankings through links, content can have a much greater impact on your rankings within search engines. Quality content will generate natural links and promotion through other websites once it is discovered. It may take time for your original site to be found, but once it is websites can grow at exponential rates regarding search engine rankings. One site might link to an article of yours, which will encourage another site to do the same, and this spread will continue throughout your niche. Content is king because if original, it gives users new ideas, can spread like wildfire, and can take advantage of organic seo. Spending time developing content has the advantages of link building with due time, but it also provides many more benefits. Original content will enables websites to grow to their full potential in a natural manner.
read more
Posted on Jan 6, 2009
Content is not king in the modern search engine era in which websites exist now. Links have a much greater impact on search engine results than one might want to acknowledge. Google bombing actually proves that links can play a much larger role than content regarding search engine ranking. Granted that in these Google bombing incident the results were later fixed and the sites return to their normal rankings, it still justifies the importance of linking. If a site that is unrelated to a keyword can rank first simply from links, then a site with related content to a keyword can easily rank first because of links. Acquiring the number of links to attain and maintain the first ranking may be a challenge but it is definitely a feasible option. Websites really do not need to have amazing quality content to rank first for their keyword and this can be seen in many Google searches. If you search a keyword phase, many of the sites in the top 10 ranking will likely address what you are looking for, but there are sure to be better more in depth website hidden further back in the rankings. Websites attain top rankings for keywords because of links and many websites remain as undiscovered paradises because they lack the links to achieve better rankings in the search engines. Content is not king and links are king, but we look at the other side of this issue in content is king.
read more
Posted on Jan 4, 2009
I recently realized on one of my sites that I needed to reoptimize my site for different keywords. Originally, long tail keywords were targeted with regards to seo, which consisted of the main keyword and 1 or 2 related search words. After glancing at my organic seo traffic report in Google Analytics, I noticed that I was actually getting more traffic from the main keyword than from all of the long tail keyword terms that I was targeting along with it. In Google, the site ranked 3-8 for the long tail keywords and ranked 17th for the main keyword. It was necessary to make some changes to the website in order to optimize it for the main keyword, which would greatly benefit the site regarding the traffic it would bring in. The title tag of the site contained the main keyword and the majority of the long tail keyword, which gave it a length of 6 words. To improve the seo of the website, the title tag was change to only include the main keyword. This was the only change that was made on the website, but the results were quite incredible. The website’s seo greatly improved for the main keyword to a rank of 9; although, the long tail terms did drop slightly to rank at 4-10. The amount of traffic that was brought in by this seo reoptimization definitely compensated for the small loss in long tail keywords ranking. It is sometimes necessary to look at a site’s optimization for keywords and the traffic that they bring. After comparing the keywords, it may be beneficial to reoptimize your website, so that you shift the keywords that the webpage targets. Even a small change can produce impressive results regarding seo while reoptimizing a webpages keywords.
read more
