SeoWebsite17

samedi 5 février 2011

How Google is going to fight spam sites in 2011

A few days ago, Google announced that they are going to fight search engine spam stronger than before:

"We're evaluating multiple changes that should help drive spam levels even lower, including one change that primarily affects sites that copy others' content and sites with low levels of original content.

We'll continue to explore ways to reduce spam, including new ways for users to give more explicit feedback about spammy and low-quality sites."

What exactly is Google going to do? Could Google consider your website spam?

1. Google might downrank content farms

Websites with low quality content that has been created to get clicks for AdSense ads might have a hard time in the coming months:

"As pure webspam has decreased over time, attention has shifted instead to content farms, which are sites with shallow or low-quality content. [...]

We hear the feedback from the web loud and clear: people are asking for even stronger action on content farms and sites that consist primarily of spammy or low-quality content."

If your websites mainly exist to display Google AdSense then your site might lose its rankings on Google. Google makes it clear that running AdSense ads won't help the sites to remain in the index:

"One misconception that we've seen in the last few weeks is the idea that Google doesn't take as strong action on spammy content in our index if those sites are serving Google ads. To be crystal clear:

Google absolutely takes action on sites that violate our quality guidelines regardless of whether they have ads powered by Google;

Displaying Google ads does not help a site's rankings in Google; and

Buying Google ads does not increase a site's rankings in Google's search results."

2. Google might enable you to tag other websites as spam

In an online discussion a user asks about the possibility for personal domain blacklists for Google accounts? Users might be given the option to remove sites from their own search results.

Google's Matt Cutts indicates that this might be an option for the near future:

"We've definitely discussed this. Our policy in search quality is not to pre-announce things before they launch. If we offer an experiment along those lines, I'll be among the first to show up here and let people know about it."

3. It will be more difficult to get high rankings with clone sites

Many spammers clone the content of websites to get high rankings for the long tail keywords that are listed on these pages. For example, some people scraped the contents of Google Groups and actually got higher rankings than the original Google Groups pages in Google's search results.

Matt Cuts also comments on that issue:

"I've been tracking how often this happens over the last month. It's gotten much, much better, and one additional algorithmic change coming soon should help even more. I'm not saying that a clone will never be listed above SO, but it definitely happens less often compared to a several weeks ago."

What can you do to make sure that your website won't be downranked?

If you have a regular website with regular content then there's nothing that you have to worry about. As long as your website has good content and good backlinks, Google will give it high rankings in the search results.

You should not try to game Google's algorithm with scraped content and you should not take any optimization shortcuts. Optimizing your website for users and search engines takes some time. If you want to get lasting results, you should use ethical search engine optimization methods.

Back to table of contents - Visit Axandra.com

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/free-seo-news/cXWx/~3/BlsBBJ5C46o/newsletter457.htm

Kiera Knightley Kim Kardashian Kim Kardashian Tape Kobe Bryant

vendredi 4 février 2011

Blekko: a new search engine with a new approach

Blekko is a new search engine that started a public beta test some days ago after a development period of 2.5 years.

Who are the people behind Blekko?

Blekko cofounder and CEO Rich Skrenta was one of the founders of the Open Directory Project and cofounder of Topix. Blekko has about $20 million venture capital from well-known angel and venture investors in Silicon Valley.

Blekko

What makes Blekko different?

"Blekko is a better way to search the web by using slashtags. slashtags search only the sites you want and cut out the spam sites. Use friends, experts, community or your own slashtags to slash in what you want and slash out what you don't."

The slashtags are Blekko's refinement tools. You can use them to filter the results by certain criteria. For example, a search for "global warming /conservative" returns articles about global warming, but only from conservative websites.

Which slashtags does Blekko support?

Blekko supports a variety of preset slashtags. These slashtags enable you to filter the results by date, topic or content type.

You can also search certain websites by using a slashtag. For example, the search "iceland volcano /flickr" searches for images on flickr.com. The same is available for amazon.com, blogs and some other sites.

Users can also create their own slashtags. Users can limit searches to a certain set of websites and they can also cut out spam from the results.

In the long term, Blekko hopes to improve the quality of search results with user generated slashtags. This concept is similar to Wikipedia.

Is Blekko here to stay?

It's hard to tell whether Blekko will be a success or not. Other well backed startups such as Cuil failed. The slashtag concept is rather difficult to understand for the average web surfer.

Google has a very large market share and it is so powerful that Yahoo decided to go out of the market and let Microsoft continue with the search business.

Do you have to act?

Blekko follows an interesting new approach. However, the search engine has an extremely low market share at the moment and you probably won't receive many targeted visitors from them in the near future.

Until Blekko becomes a major player, it is better to concentrate your search engine optimization activities on Google and Bing/Yahoo. Search engine optimization is not about getting listed on as many search engines as possible for as many keywords as possible.

Search engine optimization is about getting high rankings on the right search engines for the right keywords that deliver paying customers to your website. Make sure that your website is listed for the right keywords on major search engines to get as many customers as possible.

Editor's note:

Just like Google and Bing, Blekko is already supported by IBP's Top 10 Optimizer and IBP's ranking checker. IBP is always up-to-date and it works with the latest ranking algorithms to keep your website at the top of the search engine result pages.

Back to table of contents - Visit Axandra.com

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/free-seo-news/cXWx/~3/Z-NV86SFoj4/newsletter445.htm

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Watch Us Wax Our Nose Hairs ? If You Are Brave (Video)

Nose hair waxing. Oh, the pain.

As all true Internet marketers should be, we care about how we look and we do something about it. We won?t sit idly by and let the long hours in front of a computer turn us into grotesque creatures. To be good at our jobs, we have to be beautiful on the inside and out. We understand that. Our clients appreciate it. Our coworkers appreciate it. Our wives, husbands, girlfriends and boyfriends appreciate it.

And appreciation makes for happy and hard-working SEO Champions. An example of our dedication to personal beauty:

Tags: Nose hair waxing, pain, seo

Source: http://www.seo.com/blog/seo-nose-hair-waxing/

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How Long Does SEO Take?

This is a question I get asked all the time.� And the best answer is it depends.� There are many variables that can effect the time frame that you can expect results.� Here are 3 scenarios and my estimations on how quick you could start seeing jumps in rankings and possibly page 1 results.

Website 1 ? 30-60 days expect results

Older website online for more then 10 years
Over 100 pages
Keyword rich domain name and pages already indexed
10 or more pages directly relating to the keywords we are targeting
High ranking websites back linking to your website
High community exposure

Website 2 ? 30-90 days expect results

Newer website online for more then 2 years
Over 20 pages
No pages directly relating to the keywords we are targeting
A few high ranking websites back linking to your website
Low community exposure

Website 3 ? 90-180 days expect results

Brand new website online for more then 6 months
Roughly 10 pages
No pages directly relating to the keywords we are targeting
No high ranking websites back linking to your website
No community exposure

These are all rough estimates based off of hypothetical situations.� Many of these bullet points shift around and the time frame could vary.� Overall a brand new website is the hardest to rank, older websites with existing link popularity and national brands can be reformatted and retargeted rather quickly.� Older websites can sometimes rank on page 1 in as little as 30 days.� If you have a new website don?t get discouraged.� We have ranked newer websites that quick as well.� It?s just not as likely.� It?s more likely to rank a new website in 90 days if it?s properly optimized and you do very strategic SEO to boost your rankings.

If you are interested in how long I think it would take to rank you website, post a comment with this info and I will give you a rough idea.

Are your keywords competitive?
Age of domain
Number of pages
Do you have your keyword in your domain name
Do you have any pages on the keywords
Do you have any high ranking websites back linking to you? If so, how many?
Are you active in your online community?

Blog Homepage | Top of Page

Source: http://www.seogodfather.com/blog/how-long-does-seo-take/

Rascal Flatts

mardi 1 février 2011

7 Steps to Making a Great Landing Page for PPC

Written on September 29, 2010 ? 1:49 am | by Shell Harris |

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Landing pages are heavily used to attract customers to where you want them on your website: the sales payment page being the ultimate objective for most ebusinesses.� Like everything else in life, there are right ways to go about creating a landing page and a million wrong ways.� Creating a good landing page is vital because this is what many first time users are going to see of your web presence, and you cannot afford for it to be the last they see of you!

Here is our simple, 7 ?step program to creating a landing page which works:

Step One: Identify the USP

Every business and product will have a USP ? Unique Selling Point.� Your USP may be you are the cheapest company in your zip code for your product or service, provide the tastiest food, the coldest beer, the fastest, the cleanest, the loudest, the closest, the ?whatever? you do which sets you apart from the rest of the competition.

A USP will usually be combined in your primary headline, but it may be relegated to a secondary headline where you already have a short and sweet headline.� A good example is this one from Amazon:

?Earth?s Biggest Bookstore?

Step Two: Briefly Outline Benefits

Your USP headline attracts attention, but now you have to satisfy the customer?s initial curiosity.� You should have ONE paragraph, using BULLET POINTS to answer this question from your customer, ?Why do I care this product or service??

You are outlining benefits here ? what will this product do for your customer.� For example:

We are the cheapest which means you save money ? GUARANTEED!
You get the best quality ? GUARANTEED!
We deliver next day nationwide which means you don?t have to wait ? GUARANTEED!

Go back and edit this paragraph continuously until you have just bare bones, so taking line one:

We?re the cheapest so you save money ? GUARANTEED!

Step Three: Use a Picture

This is known as the ?Hero Shot?; think the cowboy in the Marlboro ads or the hunk in an aftershave campaign or the smiling couples for Viagra commercials.� They show the product in use, giving context which either forms an empathetic connection with the customer or appeals to their aspirations.

Typically, the hero shot will be a photo, but it can also be diagram showing where the product fits into an existing problem which is typically experienced by your target market readership, or it may be a chart showing where you rank with the competition (top!) or a simple graphic selling a number, e.g.? 50% OFF!?

Step Four: Set the Context of Use

Context of use is important, and this is closely related to step 3 and the Hero Shot.� Context of use provides the user with ?real life? application; for instance, if you are selling a beverage, show it being drunk ? if its beer, show it being drunk in a bar; if it?s champagne, show it being drunk on a yacht on a blue sea.

Obviously photographic imagery and video are excellent for doing this, but you can also invoke context of use by displaying a client list or by using testimonials.

Step Five: Get the Customer?s Information

Ask for the user?s email and/or contact information ? this is extremely important for all landing pages, but it is especially vital for landing pages selling to other businesses (B2B).� In this instance, a landing page?s primary objective will probably be lead generation and unless you gain the contact information, you fail!

The best way to get contact information is to ask for it, typically providing some freebie or promotional pricing for a limited period.� Use a privacy statement too ? this enhances your professionalism.

Step Six: Provide a 2^nd Chance Safety Net

Not every visitor will turn into a converted lead or sale and you will experience a substantial number of users who are interested in you but not ready to buy now.� Provide them with a second chance to do business with you, known as a safety net, and this can take many different forms:

Add a button for the user to subscribe to your Facebook profile, Twitter feed or other social media presence you maintain;
Offer to email a reminder;
Offer a freebie download such as a whitepaper; or
Bookmark the page.

Step Seven: The Call to Action

This is the ultimate purpose of the landing page ? the final act you want the user to perform and at some point you have to ask them to do it.� The call to action may be to buy your product, it may be to complete a survey, to navigate through to a sales page, to pick up a phone and call your sales team, to add themselves to your email bulletin?whatever it is that you want the user to do before they leave the landing page.

Examples include:

?Meet the World?s Best Browser? and immediately below is the download box for the Firefox browser

?Things Mac? placed immediately above a download box and a ?Purchase: Buy things Mac now? box

?NCover helps .NET teams all around the world deploy applications with fewer bugs? and placed below is a download box with an offer in it, ?Download NCover ? 21-Day Free Trial

Promotional Gift Uses (worldoftradeshowdisplays.com)
Common Themes in Vintage Advertising (vintagecatalog.net)
Ranking in Google is an Earned Privilege, Not a Right (bsfreemarketing.com)
3 Niche Business Social Media Sites Reviewed (bsfreemarketing.com)

Source: http://www.bigoakinc.com/blog/7-steps-to-making-a-great-landing-page-for-ppc/

George Lopez George Lucas Gisele Bundchen Glenn Beck

So Much Great New Stuff (On-Page Tool, More Accurate Rankings and a Linkscape Update!)

You might have noticed that SEOmoz has been heating up with some spiffy new changes of late. Our engineering and product teams are in a groove, and that means cool new stuff every 2-3 weeks. Last night, some really slick new features rolled out and today, Linkscape's updated too (our last one was only 21 days ago - meaning data is awesomely fresh).

Let's start with the fun part.

Our old term target tool has been dying for a long time. In fact, we've been wanting to replace it for so long that today, with it's demise and the birth of the new on-page optimization tool, we simply had to hold a wake.

Our customer service team wore black armbands and brought out a cart with old pictures of the tool, whisky and Guiness.

In fact, we might have gotten a bit carried away. I actually wrote a eulogy (which you can watch on video below thanks to Jamie's quick thinking):

Yeah, we're more than a little weird. But we're also crazy excited about the new On-Page Optimization Report tool:

It mimics the functionality of the web app's keyword recommendation system, but can be used on any page +�keyword combination on the web. For those of you working outside the web app's campaign environment sometimes, it's a lifesaver.

Next, we've changed the way rankings are gathered to remove the previous geographical bias that existed. When you run keyword searches through the web app to track your rankings, you'll now see geographically agnostic results. You can see a comparison below for the keyword "SEO"�on Google (both are from logged-out, non-cookied, non-personalized browsers).

We've been testing this system internally and with some of SEO friends and thus far, the results appear to provide a much more "universal"�ordering in the SERPs. For many keywords, this won't have any impact at all (as Google only geo-biases ~25%�of queries from what we can tell), but for those who've been troubled by the number of searches that contain suspiciously "Seattle-focused" results, this fix should help. Note that unfortunately, it's not yet in keyword difficulty or the classic rank tracking tool (separate from the campaign web app).

And last, but not least, Linkscape's index updated today with brand new link data which is now visible through Open Site Explorer, the classic Linkscape tool, the mozBar and the sweet new link analysis tab in your web app:

Statistics for this month's Linkscape update (index 37) are below:

URLs: 42,969,159,966 (43 Billion)
Subdomains: 393,943,689 (394 Million)
Root Domains:�110,533,726 (110 Million)
Percent of Links w/ Nofollows: 2.15%
- Percent of Nofollows that are Internal:�57.14%
- Percent of Nofollows that are External:�42.86%
Average Number of Links per Page:�61.96 (9.49 External)
8.31% of URLs crawled were 404 errors
6.05% of URLs crawled were 302 redirects
4.56% of URLs crawled were 301 redirects
3.57%�of URLs were blocked with robots.txt
2.54% of URLs used meta noindex

We've got a ton of cool new things coming to the web app and PRO�membership over the next few months, so please keep an eye out and thanks for joining us on this exciting journey. We hope to knock your socks off with releases�throughout the year!��

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/seomoz/~3/ucaBn__ODY4/so-much-great-new-stuff

Aishwarya Rai Akon Alec Baldwin Alex Rodriguez

Easy link building techniques

Written on June 28, 2010 ? 12:01 am | by Shell Harris |

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

If you spend more than twenty minutes on any of the large webmaster forums, you are likely to find a lot of posts and threads related to link building since this is a great way to improve a site?s search engine placement. Of course, link building is only one part of a successful SEO strategy, but typically gaining a lot of quality backlinks doesn?t cost a penny and requires only time and perseverance.

How can you build backlinks and increase your website traffic for free?

Write an e-book: believe it or not, you don?t have to be a professional writer in order to write a quality e-book that other people would find informative and useful. Almost everyone is an expert in one field or another: find a topic that you know about and that you are passionate about, find what most people want to know about this topic, take the time to do some research, and finally put together an e-book. Make sure that you link to your main site or a few of its pages from within the text and as long as your e-book is of good value, you will soon discover other people linking to your site from their own blogs or forums. You may also submit your eBook to sites like clickbank. That way you do not only increase income potential, but the affiliates will also have to link to your site when they direct their traffic to your money page. This will, of course, strengthen your website in the search engines resulting in even more traffic and customers.

Write articles and submit them to the article directories: there must be thousands of article directories out there that will gladly publish your well-written articles. It is up to you to narrow down the list to a manageable size, then write articles, submit them, and use this as part of your link building and SEO long-term strategy. The top article directories also rank very well on the search engines and if one of your articles starts receiving good amount of search engine traffic, at least some of the people that read it are likely to visit your site as well. Most internet marketers know about do-follow article directories like ezinearticles, articlesbase and isnare which are among the best article sites out there, but too few publish their content on Buzzle. In my experience Buzzle and ezinearticles are the two strongest article directories in terms of ranking the best in Google.

Offer quality content on your own website: the majority of people are getting online when they need to search for information, for a product to buy, or to entertain themselves. No matter what your site is all about, quality content is likely to keep people coming back, but is also a great way of link building: if you have a computer-related blog, write detailed and up-to date article on anti-virus protection, include a few links to the best anti-virus protection software, and you are likely to get dozens if not hundreds of links from various computer forums, blogs, and websites. Search engines are becoming smarter and smarter and if you browse the net you will probably notice that sites with good quality content rank better in the SERPs. As an example there are thousands of article directories on the net, but those that rank the best, like Ezinearticles and Buzzle, are those with the highest quality criteria. Those sites will manually approve your content and proper English is a requirement.

Submit your website link to directories and social bookmarking sites: you might hear people saying that this is an outdated link building technique, but they are wrong. Of course, the search engines give less weight to such links compared to a few years ago, but this is still an easy way of getting quality links and getting direct traffic as well. Don?t get lured by the services that offer sending your link to thousands of directories for just a few dollars: out of these thousands of directories, only a few dozen are actually worth submitting to and you can easily create your own list. Here are a few quality social bookmarking sites I use: stumbleupon.com, digg.com, propeller.com, del.icio.us, reddit.com, folkd.com, diigo.com, mixx.com and newsvine.com.

RSS feed directories: Although utilized by many link builders, it is not commonly known that submitting your site to RSS feed directories is an actual link building technique. Submitting your site to those will indeed help your new post get noticed by the search engines, but many of them actually creates a valid back link too. Sites like feedage.com, rssmountain.com and feedagg.com are high page rank sites willing to link directly to your site.

Link building, however, is more than just knowing how and where to build links it is also important to actually do it the right way. Timing is the keyword. You need links from a variety of sites like directories, blogs, social bookmarking, article sites etc. otherwise big G will regard your efforts as manipulation of SERPs. What I usually do is to build links slow but steady starting with a few social bookmarkings, then a few link directories. Do never use any software to make your job an easier task. Google will know if you have been using software like Onlywire.com. You WILL need to write unique title and descriptions for all your social bookmarks and link directories. If you use blog commenting make sure that the blogs are relevant. The next step is to create blogs and publish articles together with press releases. This technique has the greatest effects if used long term. Do not suddenly stop creating blog / web 2.0 networks, it will seem suspicious in the eyes of Google. Instead slow down your activity for a while before quitting. Here are some do-follow web 2.0 sites I use with high page rank: WordPress.com, Weebly.com, Squidoo.com, Hubpages.com, Blogger.com, Livejournal.com, Vox.com, Quizilla.com and Blinkweb.com. I have also found Yola.com sites to rank pretty well.

SEO strategies change constantly, but this shouldn?t discourage you from looking for new and better ways to build true backlinks to your site and it is almost certain that persistence and hard work will pay off sooner or later.

Guest post by Ronni Rebsdorf

What is your rank on Google? (seorichmondvirginia.com)
How Much Energy Does A Google Search Cost Infographic (infographicsshowcase.com)

Source: http://www.bigoakinc.com/blog/easy-link-building-techniques/

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