Blog SEO Tips: Are keywords that important?
A few days ago I received a comment on one of Blogsessive’s older posts on SEO & keywords. That comment got me a little worried about the fact that due to people spreading incomplete information, or just putting out statements like “Google doesn’t care about keywords”, some of you might think that having a keyword strategy is pointless. This is what reader David Housman asked:
I thought that search engines had stopped factoring keywords into relevancy?
The source of this belief is probably a post published on the Google Webmaster Central Blog back in September 2009 in which Matt Cutts refers strictly to Google not making use of the keywords META tag in order to calculate a search result’s relevancy to the search query.
In other words, you could type 300 keywords of your liking there. Google will just skip them entirely and rather decide if the result is relevant only based on the content itself. This doesn’t mean that the Google bot will ignore your keywords. It means that it will consider only those keywords present on page, in the content. That’s why it is extremely important to write your blog post from both the perspective of a human reader and a search engine bot.
I’m not going to get any deeper into the topic of writing SEO friendly content. Just remember that it’s a must if you want to rank high for certain keywords and phrases. For more information please read some of the articles I have published here in the past:
- Using Keywords for Blog Optimization
- Advantages of Long Tail Keywords Optimization
- Top SEO Mistakes to Avoid
- SEO-Friendly Content is the Key
- How to check and improve your WordPress SEO
RockinSEO.com – A Free Keyword Tracking SEO Tool
A while ago I wrote about a cool project that allows users to check how their blogs and websites stack against their competitors, Review My Web. Today, I’d like to present you with another free (and so useful) tool, from the same developer: RockinSEO.com.
Free Keyword Tracker
Yes, that’s what you get with RockinSEO. You get to track your website’s results in Google, Yahoo and the recently released Bing for up to 20 keywords, for free. More than that, for the same keywords you can compare your results with those of up to 3 competitor websites or blogs.
The results are easy to read and interpret as you can see in the following screenshots:
Track search engine keyword position
Click here to read the full blog post!
Blog SEO Tips: Top SEO Mistakes to Avoid
If you’re a blogger, by now you have already found out that the majority of your blog’s traffic comes from search engines and social media & bookmarking sites. There is a lot of information available on any of these two traffic sources to help you get started in either optimization you choose to make, although I would suggest you do both, to diversify your incoming traffic.
I know that for many start-up bloggers, the blogs they manage are probably the first contact they had with a website from the role of an administrator, and surely the first contact they had with the concept of SEO (Search Engine Optimization). In terms of blog optimization, I have shared with you a few articles in the past that offer a good range of blog SEO tips, so, in case you need to refresh your memory, feel free to go through them again.
The problem is that even with the available information, those new to the concept of SEO tend to try anything and everything, without taking the time to decide what’s best and what could actually damage their rankings. In what follows I’m going to present a list of the top SEO mistakes you must avoid.
Click here to read the full blog post!
Advantages of Long Tail Keywords Optimization
When you want to attract more virtual footfalls and internet traffic volume that would translate into sales, you have to learn how to use relevant keywords to optimize for. The right keyword selection is the first and foremost criterion of search engine optimization – SEO.
Approaching the Long Tail Keyword Optimization Process
In order to succeed in search engine optimization you need to use informative, unique and keyword targeted content for optimum conversion.
Of relevant keywords, 60% to 70% of the net organic internet traffic experienced by a website is taken up by long tail keywords. And if you are an optimizer you must capitalize on long tail keywords because they bring in genuine customers and insure conversion.
The traffic brought in by long tail keywords is usually targeted for a niche clientele, and that results in high conversions rates.
Click here to read the full blog post!
Review My Web: Website Competitive Analysis Tools
One of the best learning methods is from experience, but sometimes, our own experience fails to provide us with what we need to know. That’s the moment when we need to look and learn from other people’s experience.
ReviewMyWeb.com is a fairly new website competitive analysis tool, but one that with a bit attention can turn into a very useful one.
Review My Web let’s you analyze your blog against two competitors and gives you access to a competitive report, covering:
- Traffic Rankings;
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO);
- Social Media / Blog Coverage;
- Detailed Website Analysis;
As an example, I decided to analyze ProBlogger.net against JohnChow.com and ShoeMoney.com. You can check out the results in the following screenshots.
Click here to read the full blog post!
Educated Clients Are Good Clients
I believe that educated clients, who understand your job as a SEO specialist, are good clients. That way you avoid misunderstandings, many frustrating situations for you and your client and you may work more efficiently.
A client that nods their head just to get rid of you. on the other hand, needs more time to work on, more time to explain anything and thus, you lose time that you could spend on implementing the SEO strategy. And even then, you are never sure if the client actually agrees with you or still wants to get to their own business. You simply waste time and money with that kind of attitude.
Teaching your clients about SEO
That’s why, before starting a SEO campaign, you should educate your client in SEO/SEM. I’m not talking about deep training, basic things should suffice. If you don’t work directly with your employer, but with a certain team (marketing or web design agency) you should focus on giving them a glimpse on what SEO is (and what is not).
Click here to read the full blog post!
Blog SEO Tips: SEO-Friendly Content is the Key
What is SEO-friendly content and why is it important? Where is the limit between helpful and spam? The answers to these questions are essential to producing high quality, high ranking web content.
What is SEO-friendly content?
Basically, SEO-friendly content is the type of content that is both interesting and helpful for your blog readers as well as attractive for search engine spiders, which leads to better rankings.
Think of this kind of content as the intersection of publishing high quality posts with the search user’s need to find that relevant, quality content. It’s the most basic search engine promotion you could do.
Click here to read the full blog post!
Blog SEO Tips: Boost Your Backlinks With Mixx
It’s a known fact that the number and quality of backlinks a page/site gets will affect its search rankings. SEO copywriters have always struggled to write not only search engine friendly content, but also creative content that would make people want to link back. Others chose the easier, but more expensive, way of the “link marketplaces”, such as TLA.
In what follows I’m going to explain one easy enough method to boost your number of backlinks and also improve your blog’s Technorati rank. All with the help of Mixx.
Initial considerations
Those of you familiar with social media, social networking and bookmarking services have surely heard of Mixx and are most probably registered users. For those that are not familiar with this service, I strongly suggest you try it.
Not necessarily because of the traffic that it could provide – which is currently way below services like Digg, Reddit or Stumble Upon – but mainly because is one of the few services that are still not “infected” with trolls, down-voters and spammers. On Mixx you can still find content worth reading and bookmarking and also, Mixx is of great help when it comes to what I’m about to share with you.
How can Mixx boost your backlinks and Technorati rank?
The answer is simple. All bookmarks added to Mixx are “do follow” links. Sure, they are marked with rel=”bookmark”, but that does not negatively affect the link.
So, what could you do to get and make better use of those links?
Click here to read the full blog post!
Blog SEO Tips: Importance of Domain Names & Hosting
When it comes to SEO (Search Engine Optimization) there are so many little things that can affect your blog’s ranking. We’ve talked about headings and titles, META tags and keywords, link building strategies, but how do we put to use our blog’s domain name and hosting to improve our rankings? This “SEO Sunday” episode will explain a few important things you should consider.
Choosing the right TLD
Some say that the TLD (Top Level Domain) – domain name extension – doesn’t matter. Most say it does and from my own experience I must agree with the majority.
First of all, let’s say your writing in your native language other than English. By choosing a country specific TLD (but not exclusively) you’ll tell search engines where your blog is based and to whom it addresses. For English written blogs, a .COM or a .NET TLD will most likely do the best jobs since the .COM is the most common extension and English the most used language online. Also, .COMs are a good alternative if your country specific TLD has already been registered.
Keyword domain names vs. Brandable domain names
A keyword in the domain name will definitely help your rankings for that specific keyword. Still, this doesn’t mean that a well optimized blog using a brandable domain name will not rank well. If your going for a brandable domain, try to play around a keyword, like I did with Blogsessive. It will add a bit to the value.
Dashes and numbers in the domain name
Unless strictly required (numbers are part of the identity, like Hi5), I would suggest to stay away from numbers. SEO wise they add no value. Also, if in the future you’ll be looking to sell that domain name, all the money you’ll get will mostly be based on the traffic that name received and its page rank (if it will be the case).
Dashes are still dropping the financial value, but in regards to SEO, search engines seam to accept them – even if with less value – and with the right on and off page optimization they could rank very well.
Click here to read the full blog post!
Blog SEO Tips: Using Keywords for Blog Optimization
One of the most basic, yet highly effective things you need to consider when doing blog optimization is using keywords to indicate search engine spiders what your posts are about. The more relevant to the page’s content, the better the search engine ranking.
Keyword optimization is part of on-page SEO, which means that it is a part of the optimization you’ll make on your blog’s code.
What you should know right from the start is that keywords can give your blog posts a boost in rankings or get your blog out of the first and most important search results. It all comes down to how well you’re using them and how relevant they are to your content.
Rules of keyword optimization
Since you’re reading this, I have no doubt that you understand how important well-researched keywords are and that you’re willing to make better use of them. These are some of the most important things you need to consider:
Click here to read the full blog post!
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