In the previous post, we took a look at one blog type that – despite the blogger’s good intentions – may not be as appealing to readers as one would have previously thought.  We talked about how having too many anchor text links can take away (A LOT) from the value of a blog.  Now let us take a look at another kind of blog that you should stay away from.

I am talking about a blog that is rife with ads and somehow tricks readers into clicking on them.

Now don’t get me wrong – I have nothing against ads.  After all, ads serve a purpose and everyone involved (blogger, advertiser, and reader) can gain something positive from their presence.  What is irritating, however, is when you have “fake” links within the posts themselves.  I say fake because what normally happens is that a reader would see an underlined word or phrase (sometimes they have double underlines) and think that it was a link to additional relevant information.  When he clicks on the link though, he would be redirected to an advertisement.  Now isn’t that just irritating?

It would be better if one were to disclose that he has ads on his blog.  What would happen then is that the reader would consciously click on an ad because he wants to, not because he was duped into thinking that he would find something else.

What is your opinion on this matter?

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Have you ever visited a blog and then found yourself being disappointed, even irritated, that you visited that blog?  Let us be honest – there are many blogs out there that fall into this category.  For one reason or another, these blogs do not really offer much to their readers or perhaps they do but their presentation does not entice people.  Of course, you wouldn’t want to have these kinds of blogs, would you?  Let us look at a few examples.

Too many anchor text words
Some experts have actually pointed out these blogs to be “anchor text spam.”  What do I mean by this?  Think about those blogs which seem to have too many links within the posts.  Now, let me make it clear that links within blog posts are very important.  They help readers get more information without having to search for it themselves.  But then, blogs that have an excess of such links within anchor texts are irritating.

I am sure that there are some bloggers who may not be aware that they are providing too many links and anchor text in their post.  Perhaps their idea is to offer as much assistance to their readers as they can – by providing the links to as many sources of information as they can.  This does not have to be the case, though.  Imagine reading through a 250-word post and having 10 links!

I suggest that you provide 2 or 3 links which are of the highest importance in relation to your post.  That should be enough to provide your readers with the necessary information.

(to be continued)

Photo courtesy of sparktography

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I love blogs.  To be honest, though, I used to NOT care about blogs at all.  Yet when I started reading some really good blogs and then I started maintaining my own blog, I realized just how fun they can be.  But have you heard of some web site owners who have turned to blogging merely for SEO purposes?

The truth is that blogging has been touted to help one’s SEO program get started.  I have heard people saying that if you want to be a success in SEO, then your main web site should have a blog.  Now I am not denying it – blogs do play a role in SEO.

The basic premise behind a blog is that you provide fresh, relevant, and timely content on a regular basis.  Your ultimate goal is to help improve your search engine rankings.  What I have noticed, though, is that some blogs do not do this – they do not present well-written, relevant, and timely content.  Indeed, sometimes blogs made SOLELY for SEO purposes are not interesting.

What am I trying to say in this post?  It is really simple.  Jump into the blogging bandwagon NOT ONLY because you are thinking of your SEO strategy.  When you start blogging, think about your readers, how you can entice them to read, keep reading, and stick with your blog.

In the next post, let us look at some types of blogs that are examples of blogging solely for SEO purposes.

Photo courtesy of Daniel Greene

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If your answer is an adamant NO, then you might not be ready to take on SEO.  Well, at least according to Chris Bloggs, who wrote something about SEO being a lifelong engagement.  According to him, getting on the good side of Google is more than a one-time fix.

I have always thought the same thing and it is nice to read about experts saying the same things.  Even though this idea has been repeated time and again, it is still a good thing to be reminded of the effort and patience that is needed to get results from SEO practices.

All too often, we see and hear of new bloggers or new web site owners who want to make it big overnight.  They have this great concept for their web site and they think that it is so great that they should see results almost at once.  Of course, we know that this is all but impossible.  Even the best SEO practitioners will not guarantee such results within such a short period of time.

SEO is more than giving it your best shot once, twice, or even thrice.  SEO is all about having an overall plan and identifying specific goals.  SEO is all about having definitive steps as to how to reach these goals.  SEO is all about working regularly to achieve results over a period of time.

Indeed, SEO is all about the long, a lifelong engagement. Your thoughts?

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I just learned something new today.  After writing the post on long tail keywords, I tried to do more reading on keywords in general.  What I discovered was quite surprising, though.  I have always been a Google fan.  Despite the fact that they are way too harsh on paid posts (at least in my opinion) I think that they still deliver pretty good products.  So I thought that the Google Keyword Tool would be really good and useful.

According to Smackdown, though, it is not really that useful.  How so?  Here is an excerpt from the post:

Recently there was a bit of a hubbub surrounding Google’s Keyword Tool External (the keyword suggestion portion of AdWords that was made public a couple of years back). It started when a few people, like Barry Schwartz from SERoundtable, noticed that the tool was showing specific numbers for search terms instead of just green bars. Even though at first the numbers only appeared intermittently for people, the official Inside AdWords blog reported the change as a permanent one later that night.

The problem is, however, that those numbers are meant for people doing research into PPC traffic. The numbers shown have very little to do with what people actually search on using Google.com. I learned this the hard way about a year and a half ago, when I decided to try and use AdWords (the internal tool, the one that would actually show me estimated clicks based on position) to pick keywords that I might want to try and optimize for. I identified 3 phrases that I figured would be fairly easy to rank for (which they turned out to be). According to Google, being in the top 3 ad spots (which is as narrow as Google will estimate) I would get an estimated 141 to 180 clicks per day from all three phrases combined. Since natural serps get a slightly better CTR than ads usually do, I figured I would be golden if I could SEO my site to the top for those phrases. Not a ton of traffic, but with the conversion ratios I had on that site for targeted traffic, it would be more than worth it to spend the effort required to get those three phrases to the top.

What does this mean for us?  Perhaps we shouldn’t rely too much on this tool then.  Maybe Word Tracker is better?  Share your thoughts on this?

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We all know how important keywords are to SEO.  Even though they may tend to be abused and overrated, they still hold a crucial place in the world of search engines.  What most of us are familiar with, however, are short tail keywords.  At least, I am speaking for those of us who are not “experts” in the field.

So what is the difference between short tail and long tail keywords anyway?

Basically, short tail keywords are those words which are the most popular.  They are the ones which are highly competitive.  So for example, if you use one of those SEO tools to determine which keywords are the most used for your niche, you will find the short tail keywords.

On the other hand, long tail keywords are those which are less popular.  Another thing about long tail keywords is that they are normally 3 to 6 words in length, as opposed to short tail keywords which are usually 1 to 2 words.

You might be asking, why should anyone interested in SEO practices waste their time on keywords which are not popular?  Isn’t that quite the opposite of what we are trying to achieve anyway?

The fact is that though long tail keywords are not that popular, they are still being used by a good number of users all around the world.  This fact is what SEO practitioners should focus on.  The fact that long tail keywords are not as popular means that not too many web sites are trying to target them.  This means that using this long tail keywords can help you rise to the top of SERPs in this regard.

Photo courtesy of SoloSEO

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It is known to many that there are a lot of tools that one can use in order to get that much needed boost for a web site. The trick, I suppose, is in knowing about these tools and determining which tools in particular could be useful. In a recent post, we took a look at Google Alerts and how this Google product can become a useful tool for you.

How about Google Web Site Optimizer? Have you heard of this Google product? Probably. To be honest, I have heard of the Google Optimizer for quite some time now. However, I have not really dabbled with it. I have focused more on Google Analytics.

Upon reading an entry over at No Doubt Marketing, however, I think I shall give this a try. They describe their experience with the Optimizer:

By far, this tool is one of the most powerful and it is free to use. You will need to set up a Google account to access it, but it is well worth it. You can use this tool to test out various configurations, layouts and page content to determine how effective they will be. Set up a test page, run the optimizer and it will provide you with the tips you need to perfect that page. With multiple test pages, you can easily see which one will have the best projected ROI.

Yup, as with many Google applications, this is for free. More so, the chances are that you already have your Google account, so there is no need to create a new one. I can’t wait to play with this tool!

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We all get irritated when we click on a link and it redirects us to the 404 page.  I am pretty sure that the average Internet user has encountered this page at least once.  From the standpoint of the provider – the web site or blog owner – the 404 page should not be disregarded.  This is a case of taking advantage of what you have to work with.  Though users curse the 404 page, you can still use it to your advantage.

Think about it, though the user does not get anything from the 404 page, you can optimize that page to bring them back to the relevant pages in your web site.  The 404 page may very well be an inevitable page so why not simply exploit it?

How do you do this?  More than using the default content for the 404 page, tweak the content to be shown in it.  Make your own text explaining what the 404 page is and why the user was redirected there.  Use keywords relevant to your site even.

Don’t stop there, though, make sure that the users can find their way back to your main site.  You can do this by including your main navigation bar and including a link for the user to click on.  This link can be to your main page.  Better yet, this link could be to your site map, if you have one.

By doing so, you can point users who wander off to the 404 page back to your main pages.

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I have a disclaimer before I say anything else – I am not that knowledgeable when it comes to Google Alerts. Oh, I have used this feature every now and then but I have not really played around with it much. I think that it is my loss – especially after reading about how Google Alerts can help you a lot when it comes to SEO.

So what is Google Alerts anyway? Google says:

Google Alerts are email updates of the latest relevant Google results (web, news, etc.) based on your choice of query or topic.

Some handy uses of Google Alerts include:
• monitoring a developing news story
• keeping current on a competitor or industry
• getting the latest on a celebrity or event
• keeping tabs on your favorite sports teams

Basically, you will automatically be updated on the areas of interest that you indicate when you create your account. At this point, you should already be seeing the potential that Google Alerts brings from an SEO standpoint.

Let’s say you want to monitor the web sites that mention your own web site, blog, or product. You can do so by using specific key words and letting Google Alerts do the job. For your web site, for example, simply indicate in your search term your URL or domain.

Another aspect would be monitoring your competitor. If your web site or blog is about your business, then you can find out what they are up to using Google Alerts.

Based on the data that you receive, you can then work out your SEO plan even more efficiently.

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I guess now is a good time as any to have some fun on this blog.  I was browsing other SEO-focused sites and ran across a very amusing cartoon on Jason Calacanis.  See for yourself:

If you do not know who Jason Calacanis is, here is a bit of information on him.  I got it from his site because to be honest, I didn’t know much about him either.

Jason McCabe Calacanis is CEO and co-founder of Weblogs Inc., a network of widely read blogs including Engadget – ranked # 1 by Technorati – Joystiq, Autoblog, and Blogging Baby. Founded in January of 2004, Weblogs, Inc. became a wholly owned subsidiary of AOL in November of 2005. Calacanis, who was appointed a senior vice president of AOL, maintains editorial supervision over Weblogs, Inc. In June of 2006, Calacanis and relaunched Netscape, the iconic browser owned by AOL and was named its general manager.

Prior to forming Weblogs Inc., Calacanis was CEO and founder of Rising Tide Studios, a media company that published print and online publications including the Silicon Alley Reporter, a must-read monthly that chronicled New York’s internet and new media industries. The company also produced of high-profile industry specific conferences in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. After the industry consolidated, the company’s flagship publication changed its focus and became Venture Reporter, which was purchased by Dow Jones.

I am sure you know all about Engadget – who doesn’t?  Suffice it to say that Jason is a well-known person in our world.

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