Whether you are new to the online world or you've been here for years, things are changing. There have been some dramatic changes in SEO recently. In addition, there have been some changes in the online climate as well as in the way in which things are accomplished. People may tell you that SEO is dead and buried and that no matter what you do, it's not going to make a vast difference in the outcome.
Realistically, nothing could be further from the truth. SEO is alive and well, but it is most assuredly a different ballgame. The various components of SEO that mattered once still do matter today but the way in which we accomplish it is unique and different. In order to stay abreast of the algorithmic changes which Google, Bing and other search engines have made, we've had to make our own changes in our methodology. For the beginner, some of these changes are difficult to understand. Further, it's quite difficult to discern new information from old when you are delving into the online world seeking out good SEO advice. Many of the postings are from years past, still more are from website owners and SEO's who are lost in that past and will send you out to accomplish things that simply won't help you or your website.
The moral of the story is to seek out a good SEO in whom you can place your trust to do what is good for your site, or failing that, to use common sense and good judgement to accomplish the rudimentary SEO yourself.
Backlinks-Do They Still Count?
The answer is a yes, qualified by some mitigating factors. If you're looking for a wide range of page rank to come to you from your inbound links, you need to ensure that your links are both relevant to your site as well as honestly come by. Trying to game the system and to set yourself up with purchased links or links that use only high money keywords as anchor text, or you have inbound links that number in the dozens coming in every day, the search engines see those as unnatural. They will engender penalties rather than higher traffic or page rank for you. That said, page rank is not the be-all and end all. Yes, it's nice, but as the saying goes, you can't eat page rank. If you have to choose between links that will offer you page rank or links that will send you well targeted traffic, the best option will always be the traffic. Page rank doesn't guarantee conversions.
If you can get solid, relevant inbound links that afford you good traffic and reasonable page rank, brought about by guest blog posts or other methods, carefully check out the site that offers the link and determine that it will give you what you want before you accept it. Offer guest posts that will benefit the site which is linking back to you rather than to simply write an article that benefits your site and you.
Conversely, if you see someone linking to your site who is offering more than one link, do follow links on a sidebar or in the footer, ask them, as politely but as firmly as you can to please remove the inbound links to your site. This kind of link doesn't offer you quality and can net you a penalty over time.
Social media-What's the Score?
Google, Bing and some other search engines have begun to take social media and social signals into account when looking at your pages. If you've got thousands of people visiting every day, but no one is talking about you anywhere else, such as the main social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Wooxie.com, you're going to be less visible in search and less noted. Social signals count. Make your presence felt in the main social media sites. Get custom Twitter pages, set up a Facebook page, and start a Pinterest account and work them at least weekly. Get noticed in social media and you'll get noticed in search.
The importance of content-The biggest and most important part of any website is what you offer to your customers. The reason they came is to buy a product or a service and to learn how to use it. This means that your content is more important than any other part of your website. Make sure that you are writing or buying quality content. Get light keyword use, incorporate LSI, create content with good grammar, good spelling and good quality. The difference that the content alone will make to your website will be nothing short of amazing to you. Add ten articles to your website and watch your rank and traffic rise.
Black hat/white hat-Not everyone knows what white hat and black hat seo is. The difference is how ethically you or your SEO company do your SEO. Black hat includes trading links, buying links, spamming email and other sites, and a wide range of less than ethical methods of gaining links. Google in particular, with Panda and Penguin, addressed how well that worked and many sites fell because of it. White hat SEO on the other hand, tends to be an ethical and natural method of arriving at new inbound links and offering quality content. If you're asked or offered something less than ethical, look at it like a roulette game. For a while you may win, but losing is losing in a big way.
Helpful websites for Beginners
There are a few websites that can help you to find the right keywords, the right rules, the right content and the right methods. Most of them offer free tips on SEO and search engines, some give you free SEO tips, while others offer you quality website content writers for a very good price. Among those which are going to be helpful to you are these:
Googlekeywordtool.com
A free keyword tool to help you to find the best and most useful keywords for your site.
Seoprofiler.com
View your website competition and get a complete guide on what to do to get on the first page of Google.
NeedanArticle.com
Quality website content which starts at just a penny a word.
Seomoz.org
SEO tips that can be a big help in getting you started on the right track.
NoGravityConsulting.com
No Gravity is an SEO and consulting company that offers low priced SEO help as well as free tips on the way to accomplish your own SEO. Additionally, they help you to determine by a free website audit if your site can benefit from additional SEO and free SEO articles.
Google alerts are also a great way to keep up with what is happening related to your specific area of business. Setting up alerts for your keywords and main business focus can lead to daily opportunities for blog and forum posts as well as comments of high PR newsfeeds and articles. Using Google Alerts in conjunction with netvibes and hootsuite for Facebook and Twitter keywords and phrases will also add to your campaign strength.
Website submission sites like Yell and Freeindex provide you with a business profile and also social media links and links to parts of your business for products and services. There are a few good ones that are free and worth the 5 minutes it takes to fill the details out.
Website submission sites like Yell and Freeindex provide you with a business profile and also social media links and links to parts of your business for products and services. There are a few good ones that are free and worth the 5 minutes it takes to fill the details out.
The Golden Rules of SEO
There are no strict rules from or for SEO, but the single most important aspect of your SEO and your site has always been and should remain, to build for the customer first. If you are creating a site that you are proud of, which offers good information and quality services to the customer, and you offer it good rudimentary SEO, and the important basics such as your sitemap, easy and clean navigation, and outstanding content, the search engines will note that and your rank will rise.
Your SEO is an important part of your overall site, but your first and most important task will be to ensure that after the basics such as metas, keywords, robots and sitemap are accomplished, is that you attend to the needs of the people who will be visiting and viewing. If you do that you're going to have the kind of site that need not worry about changes in algorithms. Your quality will speak for itself.
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