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Posts Tagged ‘search rankings’
Saturday, May 29th, 2010
Google doesn’t usually go public with its search algorithm changes. Search marketers usually have to guess what they mean. And there are so many of them that trying to keep up with them all is a bit of a nightmare. However, Google has confirmed a recent update, which is being called Mayday.
SEO is not a zero sum game; however, some algorithm changes can seem to be that way. If I’m reading this correctly, large sites that aren’t reaching their full potential will get a boost under this change. That means other sites will have to fall – at least where long tail search phrases are concerned.
So my question to you is: Have you noticed any changes in search rankings in the last month? If so then it means one of two things:
- Your site is a large site that hasn’t done well in the optimization arena and so isn’t getting the attention that Google believes it deserves; in this case, you’ll see a boost in your search rankings.
- Or, maybe your site is a large site that has a good handle on SEO and you really need no help getting rankings; you might have seen some slippage in the rankings for certain long tail keyword phrases. If that’s you then depending on how many competitors got Google’s help, you could still be within the neighborhood for those keyword terms.
Now, do you see yourself in there?
I’d really like to know how many small businesses have been affected, either positively or negatively, by this change. Sound off, please.
Tags: google, search rankings
Posted in search engines | No Comments »
Wednesday, August 26th, 2009
Bing entered the search field with the usual pomp that Microsoft likes to display and by all accounts it is doing well. There have been several studies done comparing Bing to Google, Yahoo! and Bing’s predecessors and most of these studies put it ahead of everything except Google. One report from Marketing Pilgrim indicated that Bing was doing better than Google when it came to travel, retail and finance.
The latest study, published on Cuil, suggests that Bing has a particular liking for large sites, keywords in URL’s and keywords with the first letter capitalized. They are all interesting observations so it begs the question, if you are in a travel, retail of finance niche, should you be targeting Bing.
It would be interesting to see if a site from one of these niches started to rank higher in Bing if they were tweaked that little bit to suit its apparent preferences. Capitalizing the first letter of keywords and ensuring URLs were optimized with keywords. It would also be interesting to see what if any change there was in the ranking within Google after tweaking.
Bing is still young and is still going through a settling in stage. If Bing makes any inroads into Google’s traffic you can be sure Google will react to try and stop Bing’s progress. In the meantime, if you are from one of those niches, you could perhaps doing a little tweaking to see if there is any gain. Let us know if there is?
Tags: bing, google, search rankings
Posted in search engines | 7 Comments »
Thursday, February 19th, 2009
You’ve hired a web designer, paid for search engine optimization, made sure your keywords and keyword phrases are placed correctly within the content of your site, and you’ve even learned a thing or two about links–but what you don’t know is if all your hard work and cash outlay has paid off.
Can your small business website be found quickly?
There’s a great book by Marcus Buckingham and Donald Clifton, Now, Discover Your Strengths, which reveals that it’s much smarter to capitalize on your strengths, what you’re already doing well, than to attempt to work on your weaknesses. They’re weak for a reason–you’re not good at it.
So take that basic principle and apply it the success of your small business, and in particular, to the success of your website. One mark of a successful website is how well it ranks on search engines. The higher your website is placed on search engines, the easier it is for people to find you. Face it, how many times when you’re searching online, do you wander past page five? Not often.
The easiest way to check your site rank is to simply type in one of your keywords and see what comes up. Does your website come up on Google on page one? Two? Ten? Check some other search engines and see what happens. One way is to do an advanced search link on Google and check for your keywords, then scroll through a few pages and see if your site is listed.
There are other ways. As with anything on the Internet, you can pay to find out your site ranking.
There are several companies such as WebPosition.com, MarketPosition.com, and AllBusiness.com (some offer 30 day free trials), that offer software that can show you your rank on various search engines within minutes. If this interests you, you might also consider WebCEO.com and SEOReporter.com.
Why go to all the trouble and expense to find out?
Because you want to know what you’ve done right.
It’s vital to know how people find your website so that you can then repeat that process many times over! You want to know what search engines have given your site a higher rank, and you want to know what keywords brought them to you.
If you have a good web designer, you can ask them to view your logs and this will show how your viewers are finding your site. If you write a blog, many blog sites such as WordPress and Blogger will provide a log for you. You’ll be able to see what exactly what words and phrases were typed in, (very enlightening since you begin to see the problems or issues people have and what they are searching for).
You’ve already invested so much in your company and in your website and other online tools. It take time and effort to build your site ranking, and there’s nothing more motivating than to see progress.
By knowing your small business site ranking, you can continue to build upon your strengths.
Tags: keywords, search engine optimization, search rankings, Tracking & Analytics
Posted in SEO for Small Business, Small Business Internet Marketing, Tools for Small Business, Tracking & Analytics, Uncategorized, search engines, website development | No Comments »
Tuesday, September 16th, 2008
TheGoogleCache had a great post today about site re-evaluations and penalties. It’s interesting to note, and I agree, that just because you lose ground in the search engines it doesn’t mean your site is being penalized. Specifically, here’s one point I’d like to highlight:
Your site may have lost a handful of high-quality links. Websites disappear (especially older ones which may have been providing you a lot of PageRank pass-thru), other sites begin to implement No-Follow, blogs, comments and press-releases get auto-pruned. Because the quality of the link matters so much, you could track your back links and believe your site to be growing in Link Popularity, but actually be losing your most important links.
This re-pruning is exactly why you should not rest on your link building laurels. Just because you built 1,000 links in the last six months and those links seem to be helping your rankings, that doesn’t mean that they will benefit you two years from now. Old link partners fade away and the search engines change their algorithms. It is highly likely that you will have some pages lose PageRank and even search engine rankings at some point. That’s why you need to keep performing link building tasks over time. Because the more new links you add today the more you will benefit the next time Google decides to update its algorithms or completely re-evaluate your site. Old link partners will die, let the new ones rise.
Tags: google, link building, search rankings
Posted in link building | 1 Comment »
Friday, September 5th, 2008
The good folks over at ThinkEyeTracking.com have put together a great blog post on the importance of ranking well at Google. It’s based on comparisons between eye tracking studies conducted in 2005 and 2008. In a word, Google users’ search behavior has changed considerably during that time.
What was the change? We look at fewer results.
If you Google a lot then you have probably figured out that anyone not listed in the top 3 positions for most key phrases hasn’t done a good job of search engine marketing. Users today are more search savvy than they were in 2005. Anyone who doesn’t get to the top of the charts isn’t worth looking at – at least, that’s the popular notion.
What this study really means is, now more than ever, top listings are very important. The question is, how do you get there?
Tags: eye tracking, google, search rankings, SEO
Posted in SEO for Small Business, search engines | 1 Comment »
Friday, July 18th, 2008
Talking to some friends the other day I had someone say to me, “Don’t you have to pay to be on page 1 of Google?” My chin dropped.
It dawned on me that the typical user of the Internet who has no interest in running a business online and who may never run a business online has no idea how to get their website ranked in the search engines. They, first off, probably have no interest since they aren’t running a business. I guess that’s just the way it is.
But if you do run a business and you do want to establish a Web presence, the first myth you need to get out of your mind is that you have to pay to be listed in the search engines. You don’t.
We live a pay your way world. You have to pay for all your basic needs – food, shelter, clothing – well, I guess you don’t have to pay for self actualization. But some people do. They have therapists to help them get there. Others just take up yoga.
Online, however, the economy is different. You don’t have to pay to be No. 1. You just have to learn how search engines work and build a website that does all the right things. But that’s not as easy as it sounds. It does take work. Like mowing the lawn. It’s virtually free. You pay for the gas in your mower, but if you do it yourself your only expense is your time. Or you can pay the kid down the block $25 to do it for you.
When it comes to making sure that you achieve respectable rankings for your website, you can do it yourself – if you have the time. Or you can pay someone to guide you. But Google doesn’t need your money.
Tags: google, search rankings, SEO
Posted in SEO for Small Business, search engines | No Comments »
Thursday, July 3rd, 2008
The article caught my attention, that’s for sure. The promise was bold and incisive. It’s as easy as 1-2-3. Get high rankings at Google. All you have to do is three easy-to-do things. Only it’s not that easy.
Here are three things you have to do to get those high rankings (the author of the article promises):
- Pick the best keywords and place them in your web page content
- Then you need to “find, get, and manage” great inbound links
- Finally, you need to monitor your progress
I agree that these are the three things you need to do to rank well in the search engines, but it’s not so easy. It’s hard work.
Picking the best keywords is not so cut-and-dry. You have to do some research. You have to look at the availability of the keywords and not just their traffic value. The best keywords are those keywords that get a lot of searchers trying to find information on them and where few webmasters are targeting them. That isn’t too many keywords. Plus, to add a kink in the garden hose, it changes from month to month.
This month, “auto repairs” might be a valuable search term. Next month, it could “tire rotation”. I wouldn’t suggest you change your website content every month to capture the latest high value search term.
To be sure, constant keyword research is necessary and finding the best keywords isn’t always easy. Even if you find high value keywords with little competition, you still are going to do better with keywords that are relevant to your business and if those are the keywords with the most content you are in for a long, hard drive to the top of search engine rankings!
Inbound links. Yes, you need them. Getting links isn’t hard. Getting valuable links consistently is hard work. Directory submissions are good, but even better are relevant sites within your niche that have authority. Getting them to link to you voluntarily is a difficult task, but it can be done. And when you do it those links can help propel you to search engine ranking success!
Monitor your progress. This is actually the easiest step. The hard part is finding the best keywords, developing great content, and building valuable links. But once you get the hard part out of the way, monitoring what happens on your site and using that information to make important tweaks that benefit you is much easier.
Need help with your goals. Try an Internet Marketing Blueprint before you go too far.
Tags: content development, internet marketing, link building, search rankings, SEO
Posted in Local Internet Marketing, Small Business Internet Marketing, search engines | No Comments »
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