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Home > Tips > Search Engine Tips  > Webmaster Secrets

 

Webmaster Secrets for Top 10 Search Results in Google, Yahoo and MSN

Here are three simple steps of the SEO equation to remember:

1. Choose to target search terms that convert prospects into customers and make sure there is room in the market for you to gain a Top Ten ranking in 90 days or less.

2. Optimize your page content and HTML code for those terms.

3. Actively seek external, one-way, incoming links with variations of the targeted key terms as the anchor text.

Most webmasters make a key mistake in not testing their researched keywords to make sure the visitors targeted actually convert. So, they end up with good traffic but no buyers. Test your keywords through a PPC campaign first before you ever spend time optimizing.

There are a few convenient tools around for selecting your search terms. One that I have been using since 1999 is WordTracker.

The most logical page to optimize is your homepage, but that could be a mistake. Website home pages are generally the worst converting page of the site. There is generally just too much to distract the prospect. Instead, focus on an internal page, or create one.

Your website should include three important tags in the head. They include title, meta description, and meta keywords. Stuffing your head tags with other metas and clutter such as lengthy javascript can only harm your search engine results page ranking (SERPs); <head> clutter will never improve your ranking.

Many SEO experts stress over the importance of the Title Tag, and some even use the Meta Title Tag as a way of beefing up the ranking. Our tests show no indication of this and while I state the Meta Title tag is optional, I would advise not to use it.

Search engines see tags such as <h1>, <h2>, <h3>, <strong>, <em>, <u> and <a href> as prominent indicators of topic relevancy. Use them with care and purpose.

Now for a list of Don'ts

* Don't bother optimising a page that redirects. Don't use robots.txt or meta tags to impede search engine access to your optimized pages.

* Don't use same color text and background. This makes the text look invisible to the visitor and search engines view it as "Spam".

* Don't Spam keywords with immediate repeats.

* Don't force any text to appear at 4px or under.

* Don't use frames.

* Don't fill your pages up with internal scripts. Where possible, use links to external scripts.

Don't trust automatic linking software. It's far, far too easy to get listed in link-farms and garbage directories when using automatic submission software. You want to ensure that you have a certain level of control over who and how your site gets linked. The most valuable links you can get are from highly respected sites that are theme-related to your optimised page content.

Directories, directories and more directories. This is a good place to start. Many directories will give you a free link without the need to reciprocate. Do a Google search for directory + 'your business category'.

Here's a list of some high ranking directories. Start at the top and work your way down.

Free Classifieds. Search for sites that allow you to post free or cheap classifieds with basic html enabled. Get your key terms in the classified ad as the anchor text for the link to your optimised web page.

Discussion Forums. Start hunting for discussion forums with a solid community with lots of active posts. Avoid those which just have a high Google PageRank but look like a "ghost town". The forums must allow for links in your account signature. When making the sig, be sure your key terms are the anchor text for the link/s to your site. Once registered, start posting your little heart out and be sure to enable your signature to be attached to your post. Just make sure you are benefiting the forum community or you may be labeled a Spammer and kicked out.

Press Releases. Do you think you have something newsworthy to say? Then write up a news story and be sure to include a link (don't forget keywords = anchor text) in the body or by-line. Submit the article to related sites in exchange for prominent links. Submit to all the major web news sites. Each website that publishes the article is another incoming, one-way link with your key terms as the guiding light.

Do backlink searches on your competitors. Back link searches are search criteria which asks for sites linking to a page that do not include the page's domain. For example, at Google a back link search for www.acmehosting.com would be link:www.acmehosting.com -site:acmehosting.com. Duplicate your competitors efforts and get your site linked where ever they've managed to. A great tool to use is Brad Callen's SEO Elite.

On a finishing note, there's one important thing to realise about Google SERPs, the "Sandbox" effect. It's theorised that Google filters new domain names out of all searches except for their own domain name for a period of 6-9 months depending on the popularity of the site's targeted key-words. Google PR rank and SERPs are inter-related but are not the same thing. Your site can enjoy a Google PR of 7 yet still be sandboxed and appear nowhere in the results for your targeted key terms. The only thing you can do is work on your external linkage and optimise more pages of your site. The hard work will pay off on steady incoming traffic and high ranks at MSN and Yahoo etc. When Google finally releases your domain, then you'll enjoy similar SERPs to the other majors and reliable, incoming qualified traffic.

 


 
Jerry West - The Voice of Reason
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