Small businesses are growing more aware of the need to understand and implement at least the basics of search engine optimization. But if you read a variety of small businesses blogs and Web sites, you’ll quickly see that there’s a lot of uncertainty over what makes up “the basics.” Without access to high-level consulting and without a lot of experience knowing what SEO resources can be trusted, there’s also a lot of misinformation about SEO strategies and tactics.

1. Commit yourself to the process.
2. Be patient.
3. Ask a lot of questions when hiring an SEO company.
4. Become a student of SEO.
5. Have web analytics in place at the start.
6. Build a great web site.
7. Include a site map page.
8. Make SEO-friendly URLs.
9. Do keyword research at the start of the project.
10. Open up a PPC account.
11. Use a unique and relevant title and meta description on every page.
12. Write for users first.
13. Create great, unique content.
14. Use your keywords as anchor text when linking internally.
15. Build links intelligently.
16. Use press releases wisely.
17. Start a blog and participate with other related blogs.
18. Use social media marketing wisely.
19. Take advantage of local search opportunities.
20. Take advantage of the tools the search engines give you.
21. Diversify your traffic sources.

Each one explained in detail here

(1 votes, average: 5 out of 5)

 Loading ...

My mobile phone company in the UK is T-Mobile, and I had to laugh when I was flipping through the latest in-house magazine I got from them. Apparently, as the headline of an advertorial tells me, “Search Engine Optimisation vital to enable business to compete online.” And to learn more, I’m told to check out the Google UK business area that features prominently (though not solely) AdWords.

Really, I was most intrigued by the text of the ad. Here are some pullouts:

Why not ask your web designers or content management team if your site is getting the best from Search Engine Optimisation.

Maybe because someone who does SEO might understand SEO better?

You can improve your ratings in web searches by making sure that your site and its contents are search-friendly. For example, keywords relating to your business should appear regularly in the content, titles and in your ‘meta’ data — the tags and labels inserted into the HTML code.

OK, it doesn’t explicitly says to use the meta keywords tag — which Google doesn’t use — but it gets kind of close

Overall, it’s not a bad ad. Just kind of funny to see Google pushing SEO, rather that AdWords.

(1 votes, average: 5 out of 5)

 Loading ...

Danny Sullivan reported this morning at the Search Engine Roundtable that UK Google AdWords advertisers are being notified by Google that they can no longer accept ads for any kind of gambling site. That includes gambling sites that are just for fun, have tutorials on gambling and content related to gambling.

In an email, Google said, “We will no longer take ads for sites that promote gambling related content or gambling tutorials or whose primary purpose is ‘playing for fun’, gambling or casino games of skill.” Google added that these new rules are “simpler for everyone to understand and more in tune with users’ wishes.”

(1 votes, average: 5 out of 5)

 Loading ...