Wednesday, November 14, 2012

What Are The Qualities Of A ‘Perfect’ SEO Link?

As anyone who knows anything about search engine optimisation (SEO) would know, Google is constantly changing its algorithms, making ranking more difficult than it has ever been before. One of the best ways to improve your ranking is with external links, but how can you tell when the ‘perfect’ SEO link has come your way?
  • The link is embedded in the content
    Your links should always be inside (or surrounded by) content. Whilst unnatural links can be used to get a quick result, they are ultimately useless for SEO, as your ranking will drop eventually.
  • You have natural anchor text
    If you always use your main keyword when doing linking work, you are making a big mistake. This is because Google doesn’t like unnatural anchor text profiles – it can tell when you’re targeting a keyword too much, which impacts negatively on your SEO.
  • You have relevant content
    How much attention do you give a website with irrelevant content? Well, Google pays the same amount of attention to a website about travel that has SEO links for external websites surrounding baby supplies and online marketing.
  • You have relevant outbound links
    The SEO links that you choose to post on your website should be relevant to your content. If you were trying to sell party supplies, you wouldn’t link to websites about plants or finance, would you?
By ensuring that you have each of the above points covered, you can rest assured that your links are ‘perfect’ for helping you to achieve the ranking that you so desire. By failing to take even one of the above points into account, you could severely damage your SEO efforts or even see yourself landed with a penalty, which means that no one will see your website.

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

How You Can Sabotage Your Global SEO Strategy (And How You Can Avoid It)

When an online business is doing quite well – perhaps you’re getting a large number of sales and excellent click through rates – you might start thinking about promoting your website on a more global scale. One of the best ways to do this is through search engine optimisation (SEO), but it is important to remember that you can very easily sabotage yourself if you’re not careful.

  • Assume one keyword list will work for all countries
    Assuming that the keyword list you use for your Australian SEO strategy will work in England, the United States and India is a very big mistake on your behalf – you need to research your target audience in each country and cater a list of keywords that reflect this.
  • Add multiple languages to one page
    If you visitors to your website have to sift through dozens of languages to find one that they understand, they will quickly click the back button. This high bounce rate can have a very detrimental affect on the SEO of your website, as Google likes happy visitors.
  • Forgetting to take into account local competition
    When doing SEO research to determine your keywords for each country that you wish to market to, you should also do some research into who your local competition will be. There may be no other companies doing SEO, which is great for you, but if they are you could be in trouble.

There are, of course, dozens of ways that you could sabotage your own global SEO strategy; the three outlined above tend to be the most common ways that people do this, as well as being the easiest to avoid. All you need to do is thoroughly research your SEO strategy before embarking on it and be aware of what Google does and doesn’t like.

Monday, September 3, 2012

How To Choose A Domain Name For SEO Purposes

When it comes to search engine optimisation (SEO) for a brand new website, one of the vital first steps in the process is choosing a domain name. Whilst choosing your company name is often the first reaction, sometimes this is not possible (if a company or product in another country has the same name, for example), so a variation is needed. Use these tips for choosing a domain name that ensures SEO success:
  • Research and make note of all the important keywords and phrases associated with your company (you will need to do this for your SEO strategy anyway). Research how much competition exists for each of these keywords and phrases, then get rid of the ones that are too competitive.
  •  Try to pick a domain that is as short as possible – don’t try jamming 20 words into a single URL, as this will not be effective at all. An ideal domain has three words or less.
  • Think about what people might type directly into the URL search bar of their browsers. Try typing this in and see whether any other websites have already had the same idea. In terms of SEO, this could be a great boost of traffic.
  •  Always go for .com domain names. When it comes to SEO, .net and .org addresses don’t tend to rank as effectively, as many people believe that they are charity or government sites.
If you are yet to block a domain name for your company’s website, it is recommended that you meet with your hired SEO company and ask them for some assistance. They will be able to complete the required research for you and come up with a domain that suits both the name of your company and your SEO requirements.

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

How SEO can benefit your eCommerce business

So you've spent a lot of time and effort decorating your online store – in fact as much thought, creativity, energy and expense have likely gone into designing your website as would be required in the fitout of a non-virtual boutique or store – but where are your customers? Like any retail business venture, the profits of an online store can wax and wane in relation to the general economic climate, as well as shifts in popular trends, but, without an on-street presence, the approach to attracting customers needs to be slightly different. Although, as you will come to understand, surprisingly not too different...

While a regular store can acquire a great deal of business through casual walk-ins as potential customers pass the store-front and are captivated by sandwich boards and vibrant window displays or signage, an eCommerce business is situated in the virtual world of cyberspace. In order to attract new customers, eCommerce business owners need to employ the principles of seo because search engines are the equivalent of browsing strips and window shopping when it comes to the world wide web.

There's no doubt that search engine optimisation is critical for the success of eCommerce businesses, just as it is for any website and the same seo tactics are just as successful. For example, all of the written content on your eCommerce website should feature combinations of two, three and four word phrases that include the key words relevant to your business. You should also try to devise some unique word phrases that are not as competitive as the main key words in your industry, but are still likely to generate attention, and scatter these throughout product descriptions and section headings.

When revising an eCommerce website for seo, keep in mind that key words can be placed in page titles, within category names, and in the URL of each page as well as in text. However, while any key word placement boosts seo, it is important not to exceed four or five percent in key word density as higher percentages of occurrence may be considered key word ‘stuffing’ and earn penalties with important search engines.

Many other popular SEO techniques such as blogging, video and meta tags, can also prove a huge advantage when it comes to generating custom for eCommerce businesses. To guarantee that your online store is a profitable and thriving investment, seo is one area that cannot be overlooked.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Let's talk SEO

We've talked about SEO (or Search Engine Optimisation) in the past, what it is and what it does. In the following posts we'll take a look at some specific applications of SEO and how it works for you.

With Google's new Caffeine algorithm, it's easier to make changes to your website and see the results quickly, with websites being indexed much, much faster than in the past. The practical implications of this are endless, but one of the main benefits is that you can change things on your website and see how it affects your SEO almost instantly.

In this post we'll talk about internal linking and how it applies to SEO.

Internal linking is critical to SEO, and is something a web trawler will take into account when indexing your website. It is important to have a strong navigation system, not only for SEO but also for ease-of-use for the site, but there is more to linking than that.

Notice how almost every website you visit has a 'sitemap' page, but no one actually ever uses the map? That's because it is there to help the web trawler understand the website and find out what the most important parts are.

Another important part of internal linking is in text, like in this blog. Linking keywords like web design to their relevant pages builds a stronger linking system through your website – which trawlers like – and also increases the importance of those keywords, which helps you boost your SEO for those words.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Web design developments & Apple iPhone 4 – Part 3

With Web design & Apple iPhone 4 – Part 2 we finished listing the most important and impressive new characteristics of the updated device, but now let’s turn our attention to a few of the other little apps and upgrades and might be right for your business:

HD Video: You can now record video with your iPhone that’s of a much higher quality than with previous versions of the device, and even edit the footage right there with the upcoming iMovie app upgrade. Ideal if you’ve interested in creating video content for your website or business presentations.

Folders: You can now create folders for particular kinds of iPhone applications, making it much easier for example to switch between work mode during the day and the more fun apps you can play around with in your spare time.

iBooks: This will be familiar to anyone who paid attention to the launch of the iPad, with Apple now making the popular iBook app available in a version for the iPhone, making use of the amazing screen resolution and powerful operating system updates.

Read Web design developments & Apple iPhone 4 – Part 4 for further details about the pros and cons you can expect to encounter from the latest upgrade of this market-leading smartphone.

For more information about the Apple iPhone 4 and also about some fantastic web solution services including SEO, web designers Melbourne, website development, graphic design, eCommerce websites and online marketing, contact the experts at Infinite IT Solutions in Melbourne.