The Think eBiz Blog

SEO Basics: lessons for the Bill Gates Blog

Bill Gates, of Microsoft fame and fortune, has boldly entered the social networking scene with his blog The Gates Notes and a twitter account. Leave it to Danny Sullivan to gently poke fun at Mr. Gates and yet provide a good lesson on the basics of search engine optimization (SEO). Even the rich and famous could use online help.

With his blog, The Gates Notes comes challenges we all might face - fakes and other pretenders that in fact could out-rank your blog or website. In fact, there are a number of fakes that are outpacing Bill Gates blog; all the more reason to focus energy on SEO.

Danny Sullivan makes it clear; there are basic elements that anyone can do to enhance their blog or website in terms of ranking. And for what appears when your site is displayed after a search. We have educated many of our clients that the title and meta description tags are your most important and easiest changes you can make.

The title tag, which displays content at the head of the browser is read first my the spider - but equally as important - can be the actual display on the search result. In Danny's example -Mr. Gates blog original title tag: "The Gates Notes" and recommends a change to : "The Gates Notes – Official Bill Gates Blog".

In The Gates Note example, there was no identified meta descriptions, so the search engine took any content it could find. Instead, by adding this tag, in most cases you are providing the sentences that will help your searcher decide to click on your site.

SEO contains many elements, yet there are a few basic constructs that can provide immediate benefits. Read Danny Sullivan's educational and fun article : "Some SEO Advice for Bill Gates".

Post Note: Bill Gates acknowledged Danny's advice on twitter:

"@dannysullivan, thanks for the advice - the people who work on the site are on this now, should see improvements tonight.."

SEO: Google might include Page Load Speed in Ranking Algorithm.

How fast your web site loads could become a factor in Google rankings. We think this is a positive addition to the search engine optimization (SEO) algorithm. Chris Crum of WebProNews, in an interview with Google' Matt Cutts, said that Page Load Speed may be added as a ranking factor in 2010 "Google: Page Speed May Become a Ranking Factor in 2010".

As readers of Think-ebiz know, we believe strongly that a well designed and content relevant site is a great destination for the search engines and (most importantly) the human visitor - and thus should be rewarded. Web sites that load slowly or incompletely present your audience with a poor experience.

This factor is not yet included in the SEO mix, yet it would be wise for site owners to evaluate their page load speeds for the benefit of their audience. However, we think Google should be careful in implementing this change, sampling the target site on numerous occasions to account for internet bandwidth irregularities or unexpected site delays.

Any change that forces a site owner to focus on their sites relevancy and performance is a positive step, we believe.

SEO, Blogs and Social Media: Creating a killer online strategy

The potential audience reach online has expanded exponentially in the last five years, primarily due to  Web 2.0 and the social aspects of the web. By focusing primarily on an Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy to build your sites awareness and ROI, your online success is doomed to fail.

Search Engine Optimization, in its purest state of meta tags, site design and site-based content management is only a one dimension strategy; in a multi-dimensional world.

Blogs, as we know, are great for linking building for a web site, yet many people leave money on the table when it comes to their blog management. Blogs have the potential of very rapid top ranking, especially in lucrative long-tail keywords. We have seen articles ranked high within 15 minutes of release - yea really!  Think about your content and links when creating blog articles - especially in terms of your anchor tagging.

Social media completes the strategy by providing a wealth of link building and brand visibility potential. Twitter (Bing scans, Google will soon), Flickr, YouTube, Linkedin and much more should all be including in your overall plan. Be sure to review these and implement a strategy that makes sense for your site and business objectives.

To learn more about building an effecive multi-dimensional online strategy, please read Lee Odden's "Social Media and SEO: 5 Essential Steps to Success" article. 

 

Think through your optimization strategy

#SEO Specialists - be wary, be careful.

Why is it so difficult to find real highly qualified search engine optimizations (SEO) specialists for small and mid-sized businesses? Why are their needs any different than a Fortune 1000 level company?

Recently I have encountered a multitude of search engine optimization vendors that were more snake-oil, less substance to the detriment of their clients. Each had their unique angle for "gaming" the rankings, although they didn't use that word precisely. None of these vendors would last two minutes in presenting their services to a corporation, so why allow them to service your small business needs?

Successful - and ethical - SEO is about providing visitors with a highly relevant experience. This is the foundation for Google. Good strong content, a nicely designed web site, relevant links all contribute to the success of the web site. Success - meaning not only high ranking but conversion ROI. SEO is about ranking and providing more and better conversions - both!

In other words, a highly ranked web site does not necessarily equate to the delivery of real conversion results. Tip: When discussing SEO with a specialist, ask about how their work will affect conversions - not just ranking.

One of these specialist followed an old and actually erroneous technique of adding lots of keywords under the footer - in a color that was nearly invisible on the page. This is not even black hat (evil SEO techniques), it's just an automatic ticket for getting your site blacklisted. But consider this; all this blank or light text below the footer does not render a pleasing experience for your visitors.

Another offered various "submission" packages, whereas they would submit your web site at key-times during the month so that it would be spidered and ranked. Here it is verbatim, after they updated the meta tags on your website (no mention of enhancing your site content):

The next step is submissions. We submit your site to all 14 major search engines twice per month. By timing our submissions to coincide with the search engines re-indexing routines, we are able to achieve a strong placement initially. This timing is extremely important and not something available through software based submission programs. Basically what we are doing in this part is letting the search engines know who you are and what categories to place you in.

Can you actually name '14' major search engines - and we are aware that we can submit sites to Google, Yahoo and MSN all day long - they will visit when they are ready to do so. Present frequent updates and  new content, refreshed and the spiders will come often - on their own.

And from this same specialist:

We need to increase your sites submission routines, but it must be done in a legitimate way. The use of doorways, gateways and mirrors are commonly used for this purpose, but can have negative results when found by a search engine. WE DO NOT USE ANY OF THESE TECHNIQUES! What we do is unique to our company. We use what is called "Directory Information Pages" , also known as D.I.P's. These pages are non-publicly viewed pages hosted on our own servers that are seen by the engines as completely unrelated websites.

I am glad they do not use any of those black-hat techniques - they have their very own! BUT the question to ask, how does all this enhance the user experience and help deliver more and better results? Perhaps their technique will temporarily cause an increase in ranking - but it could also be a quick ticket to the blacklist ball.

Finally, with this vendor, for nearly $3,000 set-up and $100/month - they...

Warrants top-10 ranking on at least 6 of the 14 major search engines.

My guess is that you will not see top ranking on Google, Yahoo and MSN, which represents nearly 94% of all searches. TIP: Ask for their success and warranty on these three major search engines.

Their proposal was totally devoid of any enhancement to the user experience - content and even relevant linking. Relevant linking is a means of getting related web sites to link to yours. If your web site sells car parts, having links from auto related blogs and non-competing mechanic/auto web sites will enhance your ranking.The key, these are related sites to yours.. and will actually deliver visitors as well from those sites to yours. The DIPS (good name eh) mentioned above is on non-public sites, so how will this help deliver qualified visitors?

We at Think-ebiz could go on and on about this subject - and may in additional articles as we uncover more snake oil. One last tip.

To rank high for a specific keyword is important - but do people actually search on that keyword? Ranking high on seldom used keywords is equivalent to having a fantastic billboard - in the middle of the woods.

Ask the specialist for samples of keywords they have ranked high or ones they project for your web site. Then do some simple homework. Visit the Overture Keyword selection tool and enter in the keyword. This easy to use tool will provides an estimate of the number of searches for the given keyword during the prior month (on Yahoo). If the result is at nor near zero, then you may be dealing with snake-oil. And also consider the level of competition for the keyword, expressed on Google as the number of possible results (top right of the search results page). Total results under 1 million are not very competitive, 1-10 million are moderate, 11-25 million are highly competitive and over 25 million is very competitive. It is relative easy to gain high ranking in the moderate category, and possible but may be expensive to reach high ranking in the highly or very competitive categories.

The following is a fun example of this last point, using the keyword Stephen Harris (click on image to view).

In this example, this keyword meets the requirements of an SEO specialist. The keyword is ranked #1 in a moderately competitive keyword and there are indeed 640 searches per month (on Yahoo) for Stephen Harris. Wow, am I that popular?

In conclusion - ask questions and always relate the service offering to how this will enhance my visitors experience - on the 'three major search engines' and deliver real results for your web property.

#SEO for SMB's - it's more about usability.

Search Engine Optimization practitioners won't like this, yet we believe there is too much emphasis and hype over SEO for the small and mid-size business segment. We love SEO and we know that achieving high ranking in your keyword segment can deliver real results for your company. Yet what is the value of a highly ranked web site that does not excite and motivate your human visitors?

We have working with small companies that demand high ranking. They hear the hype and want to be numbero uno in <name a highly competitive keyword>, yet their site is presented poorly - difficult to understand or navigate through. The visitor can, with one click, return to their search results and visit your competition. Click... gone....

We recommend developing our web site with SEO basic (title tag, h1/h2, strong content, meta tags...) while focusing on your site's usability. Present strong tight content and your visitors will come and do business! Keep in mind, the search engine spider never buys - unlike the human visitors you with to attract. Managing to both masters - SEO and site usability and your site will deliver real results for your business. This is how we recommend they spend their limited dollars - then circle back and increase their SEO focus to continue to increase their site's ranking.

To #Bing or not to Bing: Initial Reactions

Is Microsoft's revamped MSN Live Search engine, named Bing - a Google killer? Does Bing push the search game to a new level? Will Bing eat into the huge marketshare that is Google's?

We will admit, it took us a few weeks before we gave Bing a try. What we like is the very calm, easy on the eye results display. And we like the "related searches" that  is well presented on the top left of the page. However - these can be easily managed by Google, so no real news here. We can give or take on the images presented on the main Bing page.

When testing for relevancy, which we believe is the most important deliverable from a search engine - we don't see much different. In many Google searches, the related Wkipedia entry is often top ranked, yet it is 2nd or 3rd in Bing. And the actual returned results, in our limited (and unscientific test) was similar. However, we noted that Bing returned many more total results. For instance:

• Internet Marketing Executive - Bing returned 81 Million (now down to 36 million) results to Google's 20 Million (now 44 million).  
• Hawaiian Resorts - Bing presented 42 Million to Google 283,000. 
• Web 2.0 Technology - Bing returned 119 Million (now 147 million!) to Google's 5.8 Million (now 196 million)

The question we ask - is this is a better search experience? Has Bing delivered on the promise to deliver results that lead to a better decision (aka decision engine). At this early stage, we do not think so. In fact, we believe the results are similar to what we observed from Google 2-3 years back.

No doubt, in some instances, the results from Bing could be stated as superior - however in our limited and random checks, we haven't see this yet.

Our initial reaction, especially to the news that Bing has increased it's marketshare, could be accounted for because of it's strong publicity and marketing efforts. Do they stay and sustain Bing's marketshare - for now yes. Until Google reacts and provides added value to return to the dominant search player.

The last two thoughts: we like that "some" twitter feeds are being added to Bing, however it is limited and for now you need to include "twitter" into the search query. And, how does Bing affect the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) world. We want to understand Bing and SEO (and will report on this later), as our own professional website took a ranking hit on this Microsoft search platform:

• "Stephen Harris"  (Google #1, Bing #10)
• "internet marketing executive" (Google #1, Bing - Page 3)
• "online marketing executive"  (Google #2, Bing #4)

SEO Specialists - Snake Oil Sales People?

Recently industry guru Danny Sullivan was challenged by Jason Calacanis, who pronounced that 90% of SEO specialists are snake oil salesmen. Personally, I respect Danny and his views, and yet there is "some" credence to Jason's comments. We at Think-ebiz have held to the fact that a highly relevant website, based on clear content and appealing design will always do well in organic search - and conversions!

"Now, if you make great content, keep your page design clean, and stick with it you're gonna do just fine in the rankings."

We often get calls about "SEO" and turn the discussion back to effective web design. What good is a large scale SEO and/or paid click program that drives interested shopped to a web site that is un-usable, disorganized and generally unappealing. In other words, build a great site that well represents your brand and message, and the rankings will follow.

However, on Danny's side of the fence - we work within the confines of the Google and Yahoo algorithms and thus we know there are white-hat adjustments that can enhance the sites relevance and usability - even if it sounds like gaming the system. Adjustments to title tags, image alt-tags and site infrastructure are important (the latter for the spider, the former for the both). A qualified SEO specialist knows the balance between what the search engine spiders are seeking and the relevancy that the buying public requires. To not work with the search engine algorithms is foolish.

Do snake oil SEO sales people exist?  We believe that the answer is yes. We advise our readers and clients to focus on the quality of your site, and not get caught up in claims that are (in many cases) unrealistic. I had an email debate with an SEO person (who thought i was a possible client) and he made his case by showing me keywords where he had received a top ranking. However, a quick check and you find that virtually no one has searched using these words. I can do this too - try searching on Stephen Harris in Google, and see who is #1, just ahead of the Wikipedia entry for the Iron Maiden founder by the same name. Conversely if an SEO specialists guarantee's you will have a page one placement in a hot keyword like diamonds is also unrealistic and a disservice. Why?

There are over 50.7 Millions responses for Diamonds, yet only 3.5 million for Diamond Earrings. Where do you think the buyer will be more likely found - and any search term with 3.5 Million responses is one that you could achieve a solid ranking... in time.

A quick word on linking, where I think Jason is making is case. We prescribe to the relevancy, so if you have inbound links form related web sites and affiliations, you are playing by the rules, enhancing credibility and potentially driving sales. We think that over time as Google adjusts their algorithm and closes loopholes, sites with thousands of unrelated inbound links will sink, and those with prudent amounts of related links will rule the day.

For now, yes there are snake oil generated in inbound links...   but consider this. If you are the marketing officer for a retailer web site and focus your time and money on inbound links and not tackling relevancy and web site usability, you can brag about your page one ranking from the unemployment lines! Conversions are what matters to management and investors.

Link Building; will the rules change?

Content is king; but link building is the current Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy for successful SERP (ranking). With more and more articles and discussion on link building one must wonder when Google (and the other major engines) will change the rules once again.

In the eyes of Google, a site highly rank delivers the best most relevant experience to the visitor. At least, that is their intention. And for the site owner, a successful site is one that delivers highly qualified traffic. So with link building being more of a SEO play; does both relevance and site traffic suffer? Will Google recognize this as gaming and change linking strategy rules?

And are SEO specialist focusing on linking as a quick means of a successful SERP; without due diligence in content and overall experiential adjustments (tags, aesthetics and so on)? Recently I read about a "pyramid" linking scheme. This can't be good for relevance and traffic building; although it may be beneficial for ranking purposes. Does this in fact benefit the end user; the visitor?

Many open questions - so what is the next frontier for the SEO specialist, if linking rules are changed? I believe it will be back to content and a form of quality score; whereas frequently visited sites are given preference over those less traveled to. Focus on the searching visitor, delivering a highly relevant experience from the search to the click is what drives Google. If this were not the case, then users will defect to other channels to seek a better search experience. My suggestion; be prudent with your linking strategy but continually focus on your visitors - and then when Google does make a change - you're site will be ready.

Headlines. Need they be boring online?

How can a writer write headlines that satisfy a search engine spider sees and a human reader? These two audiences may seem different, but are they in reality?

The search engine spider has no means of interpreting humor, sarcasm - and cannot draw out analogies. Whereas there is always a danger in writing that the human reader won't understand these nuances in the manner desired by the writer. There is a middle ground, or perhaps a strategy that works for both types of readers.

The New York Times writes about the "boring headlines" required for search engine optimization (SEO), in an April 9th column by Steve Lohr. However, I believe that the extra thinking that writers and editors must now go through for their web based publications delivers a better product for the readers; human or otherwise. Relevancy is the central pinnacle of SEO. If the headline reflects the article, then there is a strong relevancy. Word the headline with both fact and some level of promotion (attract the reader to dive in) makes for a better overall experience.

Then there is the strategy devised by editors, whereas the main web page has a promotional headline, yet the actual story is much closer to the point (factual). The human reader is motivated to click the story from the main page, whereas the spider picks up the actual story page.

Although this strategy is sound, perhaps there is more common ground. In one example cited in the New York Times article:

Another headline meant to lure the human reader: "Tulsa star: The life and career of much-loved 1960's singer." One click down: "Obituary: Gene Pitney."

The first headline has very little perceived relevancy, and the second is mundane and yet highly factual. A common ground exists for both readers. On line headlines need not be boring. For instance:

Gene Pitney, a Tulsa Star; The life and career of a much-loved 1960's singer.

At the least, the offline world is trying, as they recognize the power of on-line publishing and the need to produce their writing with relevancy.

KinderStart attacks Google 4 Secret Sauce

KinderStart, a Silver Lake Ca., web company that provides parents with child care advice via their own search engine (www.kinderstart.com), is suing Google. The claim is that Google has punished KinderStart and dropped their rankings, enough so that traffic has been greatly reduced at this portal. This allegedly occurred in March 2005.

Currently KinderStart has no page ranking, and the complaint was not specific as to what keywords were vital to this business. Although a search for the word "Kinderstart" found one deep-link occurrence (ranked #4).

Unfortunately we do not know the details of this complaint. Was Kinderstart.com doing some "black-hat" SEO that put them into the sandbox or was it just poor technique? I doubt it was a personal vendetta.

I cannot see this being a very fruitful lawsuit. This suit follows the de-listing of BMW and others; a tough stance for rooting out black-hat gamers. And also a rash of bad news for the Googler's (fraudulent click payout, financial errors, a few extra PowerPoint slides in the deck, China, Privacy ...). No wonder Google's stock is now on taking the down elevator.

We'll watch the KinderCare suit with interest; but doubt we'll learn much from this legal course.