My keywords are hurting my business!

2009-06-26T21:12:56.882-07:00

Hey, you say, aren’t keywords supposed to be good for me?We know that keywords are the foundation on which any SEO strategy is build. The pages you will create are optimized around the keywords, the content you will create will be focused around those keywords, the links you build will be to those keyword pages, and you will syndicate and promote those same keyword pages across relevant user, web and social communities.So this brings us to the conclusion that choosing the right keywords can make or break your SEO campaign ahead.Some examples of wrong keywords:1. The keyword has very little or no traffic2. The keyword has not been searched for in the past 2 years3. The keyword shows a downward trend over the years4. The keyword has nothing to do with your business, or the services/products you offer5. The keyword is VERY competitive (you don’t want to spend the next few years chasing akeyword)6. The keyword cannot translate into a conversion for your businessHow to choose the right keywords?Choosing keywords has nothing to do with your understanding of your business. While this is a bold statement to make, choosing the right keywords is more about studying statistical, analytical and factual data of the keywords performance and user behavior over years.So let’s see how we can overcome the wrong keyword traps.1. The keyword has very little or no trafficThere are many tools that let can help you understand the traffic potential of the keyword you plan to choose. Google Adword gives a free tool (https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal) that can be very useful in understanding the traffic potential (volumes in last month, local volume, and global volume) for your keyword. In addition you can check out the competition you will probably face in targeting that keyword. You will also find various permutations and combinations of your keyword and their traffic potential, and decide to choose a better keyword that is a traffic puller as well as has minimum competition. If the keyword does not show up with traffic numbers (as in case of keyword with very low volume), then it’s time to analyze your keyword again.There are a variety of paid tools as well, but I am mostly an advocate for the free stuff.2. The keyword has not been searched for in the past 2 yearsIf your keyword has not been search for in the past, it’s unlikely that the keyword will suddenly start attracting traffic, unless you have some inside information into a new trend.Using Google Adword tool in point above, and using another tool like Google Insights (http://www.google.com/insights/search/) you will get an idea into the history and performance of those keywords. Google Insights gives you keyword volume percentage, and a graph which shows the trend of keyword usage from 2004 till date. It can also tell you which countries show maximum usage of the keyword, and permutation and combinations of the keyword with traffic volume. I have found many right keywords using this tool.3. The keyword shows a downward trend over the yearsIf the keyword you plan to choose is showing a downward spiraling trend, its best to avoid that keyword. Targeting a keyword takes a long time, effort and patience (not to forget money), and in that time the keyword could become worthless.Using Google Trends (http://www.google.co.in/trends) you can predict rising or falling interest in your keyword, industry, geography, business etc. Used in combination with Google Adword and Google Insights you will be more capable of predicting the traffic potential of a keyword.Another great place for checking the trends is on a site like Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/). There are millions of people talking about everything under the sun. Search for your keyword and see if people are talking about it, and what they are saying. Some very useful keyword hints can come out this effort, not to mention some good contacts.Enter your keyword in the search box. Check if there are any Blogs, Lenses, and Forums etc about the topic. Spending some time on these sites can give you insightful infor[...]

The Right SEO Strategy Ahead

2009-05-31T20:17:53.259-07:00

Why do you need to have an SEO Strategy?What comes to your mind when you think of SEO; Is it link building, Meta tagging, keywords discovery, higher traffic & conversions, social bookmarking, making money online, social media, article submissions, Twitter, reputation management, web directory submissions, Google, optimization of pages, blogging …While the SEO process includes all the elements mentioned above, what’s missing in this puzzle is how they all come together as a “focused strategy” to ensure the success of your online business.Now there are many paths to SEO success, and all may work and show results (some temporarily), so how does one decide what’s the “right strategy” for their business?The Right SEO Strategy for Your Business:- Does your SEO strategy make common sense?- Is it consistent?- Is it immediate? Syndicate and Promote your Content- Is it delivering “constant value” for the users?- Can your SEO strategy be sustained over the lifetime of your business?- Does it reflect the values and ethics of your organization?Winning keyword strategyIdentify winning keywords which users are using to reach your website. Check traffic potential and competition of those keywords. Finalize on 10 to 15 primary keywords with maximum traffic potentialFinalize on 12 to 15 secondary keywords each Month and write articles to target those keywords as well as support the primary keywords pages on the website. These are long tail versions of the keywords.Start with targeting city centric keywords (seo expert mumbai), and after some success, move to the country centric keywords (seo expert india), and finally global keywords (seo expert).On page optimization strategyFocus your pages i.e. page name, title, description, other relevant Meta tags, and the body content around a specific keyword. What this means is that you create ONE PAGE of content themed AROUND one KEYWORD you want to target, and include the keyword in your page name, title, description, and other relevant Meta tags on that page.Identify current site structure, and keyword mapping possibilities.Optimize each page of the website. Create better titles, description and tweak other relevant Meta tags for the existing pages.Set up Google Local account/ Google maps.Set up Google Analytics/ Google Webmaster (if not already done so)Content strategyWrite 3 to 4 innovative articles each week, for posting to the Blog/ Article section on the website. The articles are written around specific secondary keywords we want to target. Blogging strategyWe will be adding 3 to 4 articles on the blog each WEEKSubmitting blog to 10 relevant blog search engines and 15 blog directoriesGet 4 – 5 prominent bloggers to do a review on the website every 2 Months Weekly strategy (this is the heart of the activity)Natural Link Building, Social Media & Reputation ManagementBe consistent in creating unique, compelling and resourceful content in the form of articles/ blog posts - 3 to 4 a WEEK. The articles will be provided by the client each week. The article topics will be focused around keywords we want to target.Be consistent in building internal links and external links on the article pages. Internal links will be used from within the content to point to (with combinations of anchor text) another page of related information or the primary keyword pages on the website, and external links point out of your domain to other useful sites and resources. In moderation both are useful in determining the PR (Page Rank) of that page.Be consistent in syndication of the articles to 10 relevant and popular article submissions sites each WEEK. (Build Author Reputation, Traffic, Natural Links)Be consistent in promotion of the same content links across 10 – 15 relevant and popular social bookmarking sites each WEEK. (enhance Social Reputation, Traffic, Natural Links)Be consistent in attracting 3 to 5 user thumbs up/ reviews for same content each WEEK. (Enhance Social Reputation, Traffic, [...]

Be Consistent, Be Immediate, Be Successful at SEO

2009-05-26T21:57:41.929-07:00

The online business model is changing the way we do business in the 20th century. The search engines played a big part in bringing about this change, enabling millions of users to have access to real time information on news, products, services, businesses, entertainment and people. This presented smart entrepreneurs with an opportunity to sell products and services, information and entertainment, in a way that would never have been possible with traditional business models.

SEO too has seen many changes over the decade, and much to my surprise is still veiled in secrecy and confusion as to the standards and values that are applicable for the success of your online business and brand. In my previous posts – What I have learnt about SEO so far, and Seperating SEO Myths and Reality, I had covered some very important misconceptions about SEO and Lessons learnt. It will help you get bigger picture before I delve deeper into the not-so -known “value” attributes that search engines are paying more and more attention too.

What differentiates one SEO professional from another? if both could help you achieve search rankings in the same time, at the same rate? The answer lies in the “value” that’s being created for the users.

Your online business is a reflection of your values and business ethics. And in delivering consistent “value” your online business is on a path of success.

BE CONSISTENT

1. Be consistent in creating unique, compelling and resourceful content in the form of articles/ blog posts - 3 to 4 a WEEK.

2. Be consistent in syndication of the same to 10 – 15 relevant and popular article submissions sites a WEEK (Build Author Reputation, Traffic, Natural Links).

3. Be consistent in promotion of the same content links across 10 – 15 relevant and popular social bookmarking sites a WEEK (enhance Social Reputation, Traffic, Natural Links).

4. Be consistent in attracting 3 to 5 user thumbs up/ reviews for same content each WEEK(enhance Social Reputation, Traffic, Natural Links).

5. Be consistent in participating in 3 to 4 relevant blogs, by blog commenting and forum postings each WEEK.

6. Be consistent in ALL OF THE ABOVE each WEEK

BENEFITS: Enhance Social, Web (Page Rank) and Link (Natural and Diverse links) Reputation by participating in relevant social, user and web communities. Increase Traffic. Higher Ranking for your Keywords.

BE IMMEDIATE

1. Be immediate in syndication of your 3 – 4 articles to the selected and relevant article submision sites.

2. Be immediate in promoting the same articles to select and relevant social bookmarking sites.

3. Be immediate in posting the link to Twitter, and Stumble Upon

BENEFITS: Faster delivery of your content/brand/message across relevant channels. There is no news lie fresh news.

Separating SEO Myths from Reality

2009-05-17T22:29:50.278-07:00

SEO has been around for a decade, and is still somehow lost behind veils of myths and secrecy. I am here to remove the sugar coating that surrounds SEO.The Faith MythIf I build it (a website), they will come? The answer to that is NO. If you create unique content, actively syndicate and promote that content to selected sites, and participate in social, web and user communities – Then they will come.Do I need a SEO guru? The answer to that is NO. Anyone who claims to be a Guru is a normal person with SEO knowledge, but he likes to flaunt it to people who don’t know anything about SEO.Do I need a Technological Wizard? The answer to that is another NO. SEO is based on online branding, marketing and selling strategies, and is not a programming code. Yes, a good website needs a tech wizard for other things, but that will not help with search rankings.Do I need an in-house SEO expert? The answer is YES, if you have the budget to hire the “Best”. But if you don’t have the budget you can outsource to a SEO expert at half the cost (minus the employee benefits).Do I need a top SEO company? Working with a company has its advantages and disadvantages. The main advance is that a team of SEO’s will be working on your project. The main disadvantage is that the team of SEO’s working on your project will probably have just 1 to 2 years of experience. SEO is more about creating constant value for your users, following your intuitions, and keeping a look out for opportunities. Will this company be attentive to these?Do I need a Link Builder? The answer to that is NO. Amazed! The era of paid link building, reciprocal linking, and link building requests is OVER. Natural link building is based on the merit on your content, and syndicating and promoting your content on relevant and popular web, user and social communities.What you need is a SEO expert who is a willing partner with your online success, can assist build a long term SEO / SEM strategy, and take responsibility for the success and failures. It’s a journey to your online success, so partner with someone who is willing to go the distance.The Rate MythAre all SEO services the same? NO they are not. While the foundations principles remain, each SEO expert follows their own process to higher rankings based on their own unique experiences and knowledge. It’s a case of many roads all leading to one. Ask the SEO expert to explain his strategy. If it does not sound like common sense to you, it’s probably nonsense. Hiring a SEO expert is expensive? YES they are expensive, but not as much as the “Losses” you are making right now because your competitors are stealing your business.Cheap SEO services are cheap? NO it’s not necessary. It’s not about the price, it’s about value. A SEO expert who is constantly dedicated to creating value for the users, and actively promoting your products/ services across diverse web, user and social communities is bound to succeed.What you need is to “outsource” to a SEO expert who can “be part” of your core online team. Get the best of both worlds. Find a SEO expert who is ready to work on a fixed monthly remuneration (plus some nice bonus), and if he/she is good, then don’t let go.The Time MythIs 6 months enough for SEO? The answer is NO. Do you plan to be in business for 6 months only? I though not. Then SEO and Internet Marketing needs to be a part of your core marketing activities till the time you plan to be in business.Is 3 to 4 months enough to see results? The answer is NO. The reason is search engines are now valuing consistency and quality over a period of time. In 3 to 4 months you will become a serious contender in the search rankings but emerging a winner (convert your traffic into leads and orders) can take 6 months to a year depending on the keywords and the competition. The faster I build links the better? Speed is not the key here, its consistency that’s the new mantra. Are 500 web directory submissions in 15 days better [...]

How much time is SEO time?

2009-05-08T22:37:25.757-07:00

This is one question from the clients that almost makes liars of most of us SEO experts. Why? Because we know that SEO takes time, patience and perseverance, and a client with a wallet full of Greens a business full of Dreams (pardon the poetry here) expects to see his money work for him immediately.The pitch “In the next 6 months to a year we will build a strong foundation for your online business using on-page and natural link building strategies, create content and syndicate content that your users will love, cultivate a buzz about your brand, product and services, target keywords that will translate into conversions, and bring in new customers” is loved by most clients except the 6 months part.The problem I feel lies in the misconception that SEO is an easy and fast, money making devise. If that were the case, all us SEO experts would be rich – now wouldn’t we? SEO is not about making money online. That is just the after-effect of executing a well planned and researched SEO/SEM strategy over a period of time. Consistency it seems is soon becoming the most valuable ace card up search engines sleeves.Many clients come to us when they fail to create a successful online business, or are starting a new website, or want to grow their online business further and don’t know how to do it. SEO and SEM then becomes a beacon of hope for the future of their business. While that is good, it also becomes a cause for higher expectations from the clients in terms of time to deliver.Here is how one conversation with an eager client went:Client: It all sounds great, except the time you mentioned. I need results in 2 to 3 months. Can you not put in more efforts and reduce the time, or hire another 2 people to help you. I could even pay you more.SEO expert: I understand your need for speed. But a successful SEO strategy shows results only after a few months of consistent effort, creating value for your users, and participation in relevant web, user and social communities. It’s the search engines way to deter websites that feel that they can walk right in, and become top dogs by using some secret SEO techniques, or spending a whole lot of money.Client: I see what you are saying, but still let’s get the time down to 4 months. Six months is too long a time, and who has seen what happens in six months. I could be out of business by then :)SEO expert: That’s the same reason why search engines are valuing consistent effort, quality content, and websites that are going to be around for a long time. We need to build your online reputation, link reputation and social reputation, and not just speed through to the higher rankings bit.Client: Ok, I get it. You tell me what all is possible in 4 months, and after that we can evaluate and take things further. I am sure there will some results to show for in 4 months.SEO expert: Definitely there will be many measurable results. Let do it for 4 months, and then we can plan ahead…Incidentally, this client is still one of my best customers over the years.So did I lie about the 6 months in the first place, or did I just give-in to the clients demands for doing it in lesser time? It was neither.What I did was start a relationship with the client, teach him about SEO along the way, assist him in creating value for his potential customers, and helped him build a successful ongoing weekly SEO strategy that constantly adds value for his users, increases brand awareness and recall, promotes his products and services, drives in new customers every day, and increases his business profits every quarter.[...]

What I have learnt about SEO so far!

2009-05-05T22:50:48.316-07:00

Hi friends, I run a successful SEO/SEM consultancy with clients across the globe, mentor and share my experiences with Internet marketing strategies in my Zen of SEO Blog, and assist individuals and companies run successful online businesses. I have highlighted my rankings below, not as an example of what a top notch cool SEO guy I am, but rather, as a benchmark of a journey that took a year to accomplish, and the core lessons I learnt.My website (www.seo-optimization-experts.com) ranks in Google:# 1 for the keyword seo expert mumbai (No #1 spot for past 6 months)#4 for the keyword seo experts in india (4 lac competing links)# 7 for the keyword seo expert india (4.5 lac competing links from SEO’s and SEO companies in India)My Blog (www.seo-optimization-experts.com/seoblog.html) ranks in Google:# 2 for the keyword seo expert mumbaiIt’s been an exciting journey since I started my SEO Expert Consultancy Company about a year ago. There were many lessons learnt and strategies that worked that I have been sharing with all my readers in my blog posts over the past year, and I thought I would compile all my posts into one not-too-long neat post which shares - What I have Learnt about SEO So Far.Naturally I can’t cover everything in one blog post, but I have covered the most important aspects of my understanding of SEO.Naming your businessIts best to include your primary keyword in your domain name, but if you have a built brand, or a well known business, you should use the domain for your brand or company.Don’t have too many hyphens in your domain (it’s a mistake I had made by keeping a long domain www.seo-optimization-experts.com, and I guess I will have to live with it), it’s better to keep www.seooptimizationexperts.com, in case a smaller domain name was unavailable.Keep away from using underscore ( _ ) in your domain name or page namesEg. www.xyz.com/seo_services_company.htmlIf you can’t have your keywords in your domain name, another technique is to include your keyword by creating sub domains. Eg. mumbai.seo-optimization-experts.com to target by location, or ppc.seo-optimization-experts.com to target a new pay-per-click service. Use sub domains for 3 – 4 important keywords you want to target, and don’t overdo it by creating sub domains for every keyword in your list.In the beginning there was a word – it was called a Keyword.Keywords are the foundation of your online business. It all begins with selecting the right keywords for your business. The on-page optimization, the content creation and all future link building campaigns will stem from the keywords you select.There are various statistical and analytic tools available on the net for keyword suggestions, and many of them are free, so use them. Keywords discovery is based on hard facts, trends, and history of performance of the keyword; it’s not an estimated guess!Don’t underestimate the competition. Analyzing your competition for keywords they use or don’t use is a step you don’t want to miss. If your competition is on page # 1, they must be doing something right.Don’t fight the big boys. No matter how hard you are willing to work, or pay a SEO expert to do that work for you, it will take time, patience and money to go after the big keywords. Set optimistic goals and start with keywords that have lesser competition, and yet good traffic potential. These types of keywords can be researched into, also called long tail keywords; they can be identified once you understand how your potential customers search for information on a product or service like yours. Eg. Create keyword centric topics – articles, blog posts, how-to guides, FAQ’s etc.Start with city centric keywords. It makes sense to start with keyword combinations that include your city of business Eg. Seo expert mumbai. Once your keywords are ranking well in your city, it’s time to expand your business with country specific keywords Eg. seo e[...]

Seo Expert Guide to Search Engine Optimization

2009-03-16T03:34:13.654-07:00

Welcome to the Zen of SEO, a unique meeting place where the Search for who we are, where we are at, and to where we want to go, is an unending passion. It’s the Search of the human spirit that 'motivates us', and what relevance the Search has in our lives that 'drives us'.The Seo Expert Guide to Search Engine Optimization is a culmination of my personal experiences with Internet Marketing Strategies and SEO techniques to get my website and blog ranked no #1 in Google (No 1 position for the last 3 months) for the keyword 'seo expert mumbai'. These seo strategies helped me create a sucessful SEO consultancy with clients in India, US, Canada and Gulf, and it will assist you in getting higher rankings for your online business.Chapter 1 - Keywords Basics & AdvancedMumbai SEO Expert Series - Keywords Part 1 Mumbai SEO Expert Series - Keywords Part 2 Mumbai SEO Expert Series - Keywords Part 3Mumbai SEO Expert Series - Keywords Part 4 Mumbai SEO Expert Series - Keywords Part 5 Keyword Placement StrategyAre your keywords attracting window shoppers or prospective buyers? SEO Expert Secrets: Going Beyond Keywords Seo Expert Secret: The Long Tail of Keywords Chapter 2 - Content MattersAre you leveraging your content?Create new Gateways to Targetted TrafficIs Content the King? SEO Guide to Article Writing What's in a Title? Chapter 3 - Link BuildingLink Me Up Scotty! The Link Building Matrix (Reloaded) SEO bad links, good links and great links How to win at SEO amidst strong competition Revisit your Content for Link BuildingChapter 4 - Reputation ManagementYour online brand reputation matter! And how to tackle negative publicity Chapter 5 - SEO Path to SuccessSEO Expert – The Success Path (Part 1) SEO Expert – The Success Path (Part 2) Is your competition beating you with SEO? Fine Tuning SEO for Recession Obsessive Ranking Disorder (My Wakeup Call)Optimizing your Video Content Tag Newsworthy Events for Traffic The Soul of the SEO SpecilaistA SEO Expert thats right for you! Journey of SEOChapter 6 - Blogging for SuccessWhy Search Engines love Blogs? And so should you! My Love and Hate relationship with Blogging Why Blogging for Business is here to Stay!The Bloggers Guide to SurvivalGet your New Blog Noticed (Part 1) Get your New Blog Noticed (Part 2) Get your website reviewed by prominent BloggersLeverage by Commenting on Relevant Blogs (Part 1)Leverage by Commenting on Relevant Blogs (Part 2) Last Blogger Standing Still have questions:Ask the Seo Expert(Ask me any questions related to seo techniques and Internet marketing strategies) [...]

Your online brand reputation matter! And how to tackle negative publicity

2009-03-06T21:20:06.703-08:00

We work hard to run an honest business and build a good brand, but there will be times when even the most sincere brands will face a disgrunted and unsatisfied customer.In the olden days this customer would write angry letters to the CEO, and spread the bad word about your brand and services through his network of friends and peers. The damage they could do as an individual was relatively low.Today, this customer can easily start a negative blog about your company (e.g. yourbrand.blogspot.com), or initiate a new topic on a public forum to trash your brand, and even use the services of online customer complaint websites like http://www.ripoffreport.com/, http://www.complaintsboard.com/ to hit you where it hurts most.Now, not all negative publicity starts with the customer, your brand could easily be a victim of a brand-hijacking or spam attack orchestrated by your competitor to drag your goodwill down the drain.Either way, your brand image and reputation online is at stake here.How does this affect my brand?Today online buyers of products, services or information, often search for your brand name to check for negative reports and previous complaints before deciding to do business with you. So when a potential customer is searching for your brand, other than finding your website, he will find the negative branding and complaints as well listed on the search results page.Search engines give a lot of ranking prominence to complaints, and to sites like ripoffreport.com etc to protect their users from the many fraudulent brands and ill-managed companies online. Since these complaint sites have a high page rank and reputation, they are often misused and can cause damage to your brand reputation.An easy way to check if your brand is under “attack” is to type your brand name, or brand name.com in the search box and see the results. You can also track your brand reputation by setting up a Google Alert for your brand name/s, so when there is any news about your brand, you get the information immediately, and can take corrective action.What to do when facing negative publicity? Is preparation is better than cure1. Assuming you are a sincere company, first always try to talk to the customer and see if you can sort out the problem, even if the customer has already been taking extra effort to spoil your brand reputation. Something it’s as simple as listening to your customer’s complaints and trying to resolve them can make the bad publicity go away like a bad dream. Plus you have a happy customer now, who will be more than eager to retract their negative comments from their personal blog, public forum or complaints sites.2. If the customer is not responding to your requests to make peace, then try and reduce the affect of the negative comments by telling your side of the story, with a little peace offering (discount coupon, gift certificate etc) for the irritate customer. Other users will see this as a positive thing – that your brand is willing to take an extra step to resolve issues with unhappy customers.3. Sometimes you can’t please everyone no matter how hard you try, and it’s time to take corrective measures immediately. “The best way to beat negative publicity is to increase the positive publicity”.4. Get your happy customers to give you a testimonial, and display the testimonials on your website and blog. People always say good things and bad things about any brand; the idea is to get more of the good stuff visible for other potential customers to see.5. Creating great content that can rank highly will surely push the negative stuff further down the search listings.6. Participate by writing on prominent article submissions sites like ezinearticles, articlesbase, goarticles etc. Create an account with your company name, and give your company profile in the space for author, and a neat link back to your website.7. Build you[...]

What is your SEO Diet?

2009-02-25T01:22:05.120-08:00

I was recently reading a book on fad diets and why they don’t work. The primary reasons the author gave was that all diets are short term, usually done when your body reaches a desperate situation, and once you stop, you end up in the same soup (sometimes worse). The solution lay in creating a suitable diet that works for you, is fun to do, and can be sustained over a lifetime.

Clients generally get a wakeup call after having spent thousands of dollars in building a great website with great content only to find no business coming to it. That’s when they decide it’s time to go on a quick SEO diet.

The SEO recipe goes something like this:

On-page optimization (10 days) + Link building (2 to 3 months) = Top 10 Spot on
Search Engines

Now while the above recipe is not entirely wrong, it’s the shortsightedness of this that bothers me. So what happens after 2 months and 10 days? If I was reciting a fairytale I could have ended this post about now with “And it Ranked No #1 Happily After”, but such is not often the case.

Search engine optimization is about identifying the right keyword combinations (with traffic potential), optimizing your content around those keywords, and syndicating and promoting the content pages to build quality links across relevant, popular and diverse web, user and social communities. You also have the competition to watch who may be trying their own SEO expert strategies to defeat you.

And then targeting some new keywords, and building great content around it, and so on … Does this seem like something that should be done for 2 to 3 months?

So why do clients want to go on a crash SEO diet? I guess it’s more difficult to stick to a diet that works for your business, is fun to do, and can be sustained over the lifetime of your online business with growing returns.

So what is your SEO diet?

Seo Strategy, Revisit your Content for Link Building

2009-02-20T04:58:11.354-08:00

It’s been said many times before, that creating unique and compelling content in the way of articles, FAQ’s, how to guides, eBooks, user testimonials, blog posts and innovative videos, and taking the time to syndicate that content across relevant user, web and social communities, is the best way to get people to link back to your content. This is also termed as “link baiting”.Having said that, if you have been sincere in creating and promoting your content over the last 6 months to a year, and in building quality and diverse links to your website with relevant anchor text, then a neat seo opportunity lies in revisiting your past content archives.Sometimes we SEO experts get so caught up in building external links and battling it out with the competition for our clients, we forget to make ideal use of internal link building to get a boost in rankings.External links tell a search engine that there are other websites and communities (other than you) that think your website to be of some value, in the same way, internal links tell the search engines which pages you think are most important by counting the number of links pointing to that page.While building a link matrix of external links with relevant anchor text is important to search engines, the internal link structure and anchor text also plays a big part in a successful search engine optimization strategy. In addition good internal linking makes it easy for the users and search engines to understand your content better with category and sub category pages that link to the deeper pages of your website.Expert SEO TIP: Tweak your Content for Higher RankingThey say that the answers we seek lie in the past “going back to the roots”. In revisiting your past and looking at it with a new perspective you can begin to understand the mistakes made, the underlying fears and insecurities developed, lessons learnt, and maybe some answers for the present moment.By revisiting your past content, and looking at it with a fresh perspective, you can find innumerous SEO opportunities. I have listed a few of them below:1. The Title - Can the title of the content page, article (or blog post) be improved, or better written to incorporate the keywords you are targeting currently?2. Internal Linking - Many times when we revisit old content pages we find opportunities to include anchor text links to the important pages (focused around our primary keywords) of our website and internal links to relevant newer content pages. This helps in building relevant internal links and gives users a choice to navigate through your content easily by clicking on the link/topic of interest.3. External Linking - Revisiting old content also reveals many opportunities for creating relevant external links. An external can be given if the external link provides some additional value to the topic being discussed. External links should also be given to authoritative sites and to relevant sites in your industry. An external link tells the search engine and your users that you are helpful and not afraid to link out (sometimes even to a competitor’s site). Become a hub for resource links in your industry.4. The Tags - Do you need to tweak those tags (or Meta tags) to make them more focused? Are there some keyword variations you want to add to the list? Remember to keep it simple!5. Improving the Content - Did you find grammatical errors (hopefully not) that need to be corrected? Do you have some new insights into the content that was originally created? You can always add value to the original articles, and maybe make a new article out of it (the link juice can be passed down to the new article, cross linking possibilities and its new content for search engines). Also revisiting your content is a great place to find new content ideas, and missi[...]

Infinite Power of Search Marketing

2009-02-15T04:02:10.539-08:00

We are all searching for something in life, whether it’s true love, fame and fortune, or money and power. A few people that search for meaning, passion and purpose will be the ones that will be able to give something back to this world, and will become leaders of the new economy.

So The Search plays a pivotal role in human existence, and it’s The Search that drives us, and motivates us to reach newer heights. In the same way Search Marketing can play a pivotal role in the success of your online business.

Other forms of advertising and marketing are now being seen as intrusive and aggressive by the consumers and this trend will continue. Advertisers end up spending a whole lot of money, and consumers have to unnecessarily suffer in-the-face campaigns that tell them what to do, and what to buy. It’s a no win situation for both parties.

In Search Marketing you not only sell what your customers wants, but you also sell it while they are actively looking for it. So it’s the customer that chooses you at their own time, convenience and when they actually need you. Now this is a very powerful marketing tool for an online business if they knew how to make themselves easily available to this customer.

There are billions of consumers who are searching on the Internet. Do you know how many of them are searching for a product or service like yours? Normally once I give the hard numbers to clients, they are often amazed at the number of people that are actually searching for something they are already marketing.

What’s even more amazing is when I tell the clients what keywords people are using to reach a product or service like the ones they are offering. Once I arm the client’s with statistics, trends and numbers, they like any smart individual recognize the potential business (which they are not getting) out there.

So what potential customers are out there searching for your Internet business? What keywords are they using to reach you? What is the traffic potential for those keywords? How much is that traffic worth to your business? How much are you willing to spend to get that business? What conversions are you expecting from your marketing efforts? Are you doing what’s necessary to get that business? Have you shortlsited a SEO expert who will help you achieve your goals?

In finding honest answers to the above questions, you will find solutions to harness the greater power of Internet Search Marketing for your online business. Whether you are a home business, a house wife, an online maverick, a small business, a big brand, or a mega corporate, Search Marketing may be just what you need to get new customers, even in an economy that faces recession.

The customers are out there and they are searching for you, but are you ensuring they find you easily! If this strikes a chord in you, then SEO or search engine marketing may just be the answer you are searching for.

Dedicated to The Search (May we all find what we are searching for)

Are your keywords attracting window shoppers or prospective buyers?

2009-02-13T02:26:32.833-08:00

If you are ready to take an honest look at your traffic and analyze the same, many of you may find that you are attracting more shoppers to your website than prospective buyers. What this means is that even though you are getting good traffic on your website (and assuming your content copy and services have been well presented), a very few are converting to actual sales.If you have a website that’s not selling anything, and traffic is your goal, then there is no problem. But if online sales are the goal of your website, then the problem could lie in the “keywords” you have selected.A shopper - is one who finds you because they are looking for some information, but they may not be ready to buy as of yet. A shopper generally uses generic search terms like ‘cameras’ or ‘new cameras’ because they are not exactly sure of what they want, but are interested in knowing some more information. Now, not all shoppers are bad, because even though they may be just looking now, they could get interested in what you offer or return at a later date as a prospective customer.Eg. Kate is interested in buying a camera, but is not sure which one to buy, or what features she wants. Kate uses a generic search term like ‘cameras’ or ‘new cameras’ and finds thousands of listings right from the definition of camera, to an online shop selling cameras, to a site selling used cameras, to a site offering user camera reviews, to a blog by a photography enthusiast, and even a YouTube video about the best camera one can buy. Kate browses through many websites to find more information so that eventually she can make an informed decision.Now if your website was selling cameras, and you rank well for the keywords Kate used, then Kate would have visited your website, and the website offering user reviews on best cameras, and an eBay link for camera for sale... By the time Kate would have decided on which camera to buy, and what features she likes most, you have lost a customer today.A buyer – is one who reaches your site because they are looking for something specific, and they enter a specific keyword phrase to find the product, service or information they are looking for. A buyer generally uses specific search terms like ‘seo expert india’ or ‘affordable internet marketing services’ or ‘how to hire a seo expert’ or ‘free seo training’ to find something they want. The buyer searches are a lot more specific, often with key modifiers like affordable, cheap, free, best, or location like mumbai, india to narrow the search to find what they are exactly looking for. The need of the buyer is more urgent (it reflects in the specific search phrase they use) and the chances of conversion of this user can be high if the page that opens can resolve the buyers specific query.Eg. Kate wants more traffic on her website that sells designer shoes online. Kate wants to find a seo expert that can help her achieve this. Kate also has a very low budget and wants to read up some information on search engine optimization so that she would be in a better position to choose the right seo expert for her business. Kate’s needs are very specific. Say she enters ‘how to hire a seo expert’ in the search box, and finds a link to an article on your website that offers tips to evaluate the right seo expert. She finds the information very useful, and finds her way to your seo services page and order form. Kate could also have entered ‘seo expert in india’ if she was looking to outsource her seo needs to India (since she had heard that outsourcing to India is affordable and that is one of her requirements). Since the buyer reaches your website with a specific need in mind, and has entered a specific keyword phrase to reach you, and your page res[...]

How to win at SEO amidst strong competition

2009-02-10T21:35:35.946-08:00

Are you tired of seeing you competitor’s links on the first page of search results, while your website on the other hand is flailing behind somewhere on Page 11 or 18?Are your competitors stealing your traffic? And if they are, are you ready to fight back? Does your SEO expert shy away from targeting keywords which face stiff competition? And offers no viable strategy to combat the same?The reasons for this could be many.A few key ones that came to mind are listed below:1. Yours is a new website (or new domain)Websites with new domains generally have a hard time getting indexed and ranked in search engines. The reason for this is that search engines do consider the age of the domain as an important factor while calculating rankings. Even in the real word if someone has been in the business for a year, they will have more credibility than a startup.What to do about it? Well prove it to the search engine that you are credible (don’t forget on-page optimization) by creating fantastic content (search engine friendly content) and then syndicating that content across popular user, web and social communities. If other websites and users deem your website/ content as of value, eventually so will the search engines.Stat a blog! Yes, it’s an easy way to get noticed by search engines in a short span of time. Search engines love blogs, and so should you! Update your blog frequently with interesting and informative content, and use your blog to create relevant links back (with proper anchor text) to your primary keyword pages. Don’t forget to promote your blog across blog search engines, and blog directories. Write articles! This is a great way to build credibility, popularity and quality link backs without the fear of getting trapped by the duplicate content filter. Write articles that are focused around topics/ keywords you want to target. Write your article to resolve the query of the user who typed in that keyword to find something they were looking for. Promote your articles by posting them on your site or blog first, and then syndicating them to various popular and credible article submission sites.Find long tail keywords! You may think you know your business, products, services and customers dam well, but that still does not ensure you any traffic. There are keywords (and keyword combinations) that people are using right now that you may be unaware off. Spend maximum time in finding the right keywords, tweaking those pages around the keywords (keyword placement), and in analyzing the traffic potential of those keywords. Expert SEO’s use various projection tools, analysis, statistical and research tools to do this.Make a creative video! Wondering how to get a traffic and ranking boost with the least effort? Make a creative and innovative video, post it on your website or blog, and then syndicate to popular video submission sites like YouTube. If this sounds easy, it is, you just need to know how to optimize your video content for search friendliness. Keep in mind this is not an alternative to good on-page optimization, and quality link building.Build those links! This is the most important aspect of getting higher rankings for your select keywords. If you have a new domain, start with building links across popular web directories and announce your new website/product/service using online PR network services. It’s the easiest way to start building some good links. In parallel you can use social networking and bookmarking to spread the good word through friends and colleagues. Join communities and forums that are relevant to your business and industry, and participate in them. Comment on relevant blogs.Find sites that are relevant to your business and market, and request for links with your [...]

SEO - A Journalist’s Perspective

2009-02-03T02:19:31.164-08:00

Once upon a time to be a good journalist or a good editor all you needed was two simple qualifications – intense curiosity and a good command over the English language. The computer age has, however, changed all that.

Today a journalist or an editor needs to make their presence felt online. A good online article has to have great content, crisp language, and SEO friendliness. This is because the article is not only targeting the net user but also the search engines.

In India SEO is at a nascent stage. Only when a journalist or an editor is writing for a blog or online media the need for better understanding of how SEO works is felt. Journalists / editors working for web media should develop SEO skills. This skill should be developed from both, writing and technology perspective. This is because SEO is the heart of a blog or a website. Companies or organizations having only online presence are totally dependent on SEO to drive traffic or visitors to their site.

Today most large and medium and even some small companies in India have online presence in some way or the other. This has created new opportunities for journalists / editors to exhibit their skills. At the same time it has also increased the need for these people to acquire or brush up their SEO skills.

Thanks to recession companies are competing more intensely than ever for better visibility among the internet users. Only those companies which use SEO efficiently and provide unique content and ideas will be able to hold their interest. Only such companies will survive and tide over the recession.

More and more non-IT professionals are waking up to the potential of online presence. They are also becoming aware of the crucial role of SEO in ensuring visibility of their online assets.
Both amateur and professional websites and blogs need services of SEO consultants or develop in-house SEO experts.

The SEO expert has to understand search engine patterns and user behaviors, and search keywords in detail and customize the site or blog content to suit such patterns. Such SEO exercise is not a one-time process but an ongoing process.

No matter how good your website is in terms of content or features, it is the SEO skills which decide that the world knows and acknowledges what you already know to be true about your website.

About G. Rajesh

G. Rajesh is a blog editor at www.siliconindia.com, a professional networking website. As the editor, he is responsible for developing new strategies to promote blogs, selecting and featuring best blogs and bloggers. He also provides guidance to bloggers having trouble posting the blogs online.

Optimizing your Video Content

2009-01-31T10:05:09.153-08:00

We know that video content has far better prominence in search engine listings, and a couple of good quality videos (with innovative content), if promoted well, can generate traffic and affect your websites ranking for your keywords.The main reason for this is the wide popularity of video sites like YouTube, Meta Café and the likes, and search engines showing preference to video content rather than textual content. And yet, there are some important points to consider before you can go ahead and optimize your videos for search engines and promote them.Since universal search started favoring video content, many SEO experts started using videos as a strategy to get quicker rankings for keywords (some even with strong competition) that otherwise would have taken months to achieve, not to mention the hard work involved in optimizing the site, and building links. Now this is not an alternative to building your regular content and links, but rather an additional boost to the existing seo efforts.A simple method SEO’s use is to publish the video on their client’s websites and then upload it to sites like YouTube. When a search engine would find the same Meta tags in YouTube, as that of a video hosted on the client’s site, it would pass on some link juice immediately, impressing the client to no end to see his video ranked top for his keyword.But keep in mind, video content is treated like any other content as far as search engines go, and things like having your keyword in the Meta tags, Title and the Synopsis is equally important. Since the search engines cannot understand the content of the person speaking in the video, they look into the title, the Meta tags, and synopsis of your video to take clues as to what the video is about. One good idea is to create a text transcript of the conversation of the video on that page as well.The title of the video needs to be given a lot of prominence! Other than ensuring that your keyword/ keyword phrase is included in the title, you have to create a title that is captivating enough so that users come watch it (and recommend it).Now that you have your videos optimized, the next big question is “where to host your videos”? Well that would depend on what do you want to achieve. If you are looking at increasing the traffic to your website, then it’s better to host the video on your website first before submitting to the big video sites. But if your objective is to spread brand awareness and want to create a viral, then you can safely host it on sites like YouTube.Once the optimized video is live, then the next step is to build some links to your video content. You must think the video content you have created is very useful to the users, so why not announce this across social bookmarking sites, and even sites like Twitter. The more users like your video, the more traffic will reach your website.One word of caution; you could find yourself in a situation where you are battling with your own content. What this means is that if you host a video on your site, and then submit the same video on sites like YouTube with the same title, and Meta tags, you could find yourself competing with YouTube for your keyword. Since YouTube has much more credibility than your site, it could happen that your content gets lost somewhere in search listings. To avoid this you can upload the video with the title and Meta tags around your primary keyword on your site, and then tweak the title and Meta tags of the video around another secondary keyword you want to target before you submit to sites like YouTube.A lot of automatic video submission software’s are becoming popular, and sites like Tube Mughal can submit your video to[...]

Interview with G Rajesh, Blog Editor (Silicon India)

2009-01-30T00:28:56.361-08:00

In an exclusive interview with G. Rajesh, Blog Editor of http://www.siliconindia.com/ who talks about the state of SEO in India, and the impact of recession on online businesses. What is the state of SEO / SEM in India?In India, a very few people know about SEO/SEM in comparison to other countries. The reason being is that SEO is still perceived as a technological devise of tweaking some keywords and meta tags, and not like a marketing devise that needs a long term strategy. A seo expert needs to be skilled in online marketing techniques, seo techniques, project management, content management, strategy management, as well as understand the search engines changing algorithms. The emergence of various local e-commerce, social and professional networking sites has helped in the evolution of online business in India. I feel that SEO still has a long way to go in India because its potential is yet to be tapped by people and organizations here.2. How is SEO / SEM helping organizations tide over recession?Recession has lead to intense competition amongst companies. Only the fittest will be able to emerge out as winners. With the decreasing marketing budgets on traditional media channels (like television, outdoor, radio and print), companies are looking for better and cheaper alternatives like online marketing. In these difficult times, a SEO expert can assist these companies in getting their keywords on the top in search listings, thus driving additional traffic and business. 3. What is the future of SEO / SEM (in India / globally)?SEO’s future is very bright provided it is used appropriately. I personally feel lack of awareness amongst companies about SEO is basic reason as to why it's limited to few. For the better future of SEO in companies worldwide, employers needs to realise it's benefit in the long term. Refinement in search to get desired result is one thing which will definitely have an impact on the future of SEO.4. What do you look for in an SEO expert / SEO consultancy before hiring?Given an opportunity to hire an SEO expert I will look at how well they have done in ranking for their keywords (e.g. if I want to hire a seo expert from mumbai, and I type 'seo expert mumbai' in the search box, the seo expert or seo company I plan to hire should rank in the top 5 in major engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN), and for their clients websites as well. Other things like good knowledge of social bookmarking, article writing, and link building will be an added plus.5. What is the core expertise of Silicon India?Core expertise of http://www.siliconindia.com/ lies in providing its users what they look forward to in a professional networking site. We update professionals with recent happening in technological and professional both in terms of quality and quantity.7. What features are available and what new features do you plan to add to the site to improve its USP and provide better values to your userbase ?We are India’s largest professional networking website, we aim at giving right direction to power of networking. Popular feature include:News ( Latest update of both technological and professional front)Blogs ( Enabling professionals to share their expertise for the benefit of the readers)Communities ( Linking like minded professionals under one head)Q& A ( A platform to get all your queries answered by professionals)Training Videos ( Get accessed to collection of video by Industry Experts)Education (Giving MBA aspirants a platform to find all relevant information pertaining to MBA)Job & Careers (Get the information of Jobs not listed any where else)[...]

Only Genuine Sites Top Search Ranking by Vijay Dalwani

2009-01-28T19:59:52.481-08:00

Create your website by keeping your user or customer in mind. Do not create a website by keeping the search engine in mind. Search engine says more keywords give better weightage to your page. However, if you put more keywords and your content is not accurate or not readable then the customer will go away unsatisfied. In this case, even a good ranking by the search engine does not help your business.

Successful companies mostly rely on SEO experts to increase traffic to their sites. The company’s SEO expert first understand the search engines. They study how successful companies manage their listings. They figure out how search algorithms work by studying the sites listed in top 5 thoroughly.

SEO / SEM has a single objective. Their purpose is to provide more visibility to your website on the net. This can be achieved by getting higher ranking on the search engines by executing smart SEO activities for a long period of time.

Blogging can be a very useful SEO tool if used effectively. Blogs help business stake holders talk about their area of interest or areas of interest beneficial to the business. Blogs are a subtle attempt to influence the readers by convincing them about your point of view instead of directly telling them to come and buy your product.

Social networking too is a formidable SEO device. It helps you rally a group of people around a common idea. Now instead of you talking about your product, you have a large group of people talking about your product and expand the visibility of your product and your organization on the net.

Affiliate marketing is a pure SEM device. It uses a straight approach of telling the customer to come to your site and buy your product. However, in this case, not only you but all your affiliate partners are selling the product for you and sharing the profit. This is an effective way to increase your online sale.

Using genuine devices like blogging and social networking to increase traffic to your site helps you beat search algorithm changes in the long run since the basic criteria for top ranking remains the same. Algorithms change not to keep out genuine sites from the top but to filter out sites using unethical means to reach the top.

Giving Direction to the Power of Networking

2009-01-27T21:06:19.798-08:00

There are hundreds of social & professional networking websites. The most popular ones also happen to be the ones that are most effective in terms of building a real network on a local and global level. Professional networking sites appeal not only to the budding professional but also to those having years of experience in their respective field of expertise.

Good professional networks provide many features which help professionals fine-tune or update their skills and stay in synchrony with the current market demands. India’s Bangalore-based www.silionindia.com is one such website I frequently visit. Now there are many reason for this and I would like to share them with the readers.

Career growth means different things to different people. For some professionals, it means reading about the latest developments in their industry or sector in the form of news. For some, it means finding out the current expertise or skill sets in demand and developing them for better prospects. This information can be obtained through job and career as well as educational content.

For yet another group of people, career growth means connecting with peers as well as industry experts. This is made possible by communities, blogs or Q & As on specific or niche topics.
SiliconIndia not only allows budding professionals to get tips about how to get manage their career better but also helps them assess their knowledge in different areas from programming to communication skills by taking well tailored online tests.

Another feature of SiliconIndia is the mentorship programme. Here a fresh graduate from any field or new employees of an organization can enroll themselves as apprentice. CXOs of various fields working in reputed organizations register as mentors to help out the apprentice online and shape their career. This method allows for querying and resolutions of very specific issues. SiliconIndia communities too are of a wide range from computers and internet to business and finance as well as entrepreneurship . The featured communities in each section too cater to niche or specialized sectors.

The overall model of siliconIndia looks sound. It caters to the mass in the form of online magazines, blogs and newsfeeds. It caters to individual and specialized needs through communities and Q & As. Professional education and skill sets are imparted with well designed educational articles and training videos. All this as they have earned the trust of hundreds of CXOs who have registered themselves on the site.

Recession will force innovation in SEO industry by Shashank Sathe

2009-01-27T19:41:05.322-08:00

It is a well known fact that the entire IT industry including the web / portal business is heavily affected by recession. However, we can take inspiration from industry leaders like Hulu and Veoh which are making a profit inspite of such turbulent times.A closer look at these sites reveals that their content is truly the king. It ensures that their customer come out satisfied in terms of content, quality and freshness. They use cutting edge technology to provide a rich multimedia experience. And of course they weave all this around well designed and intelligent SEO / SEM activities.Recession will introduce and many good practices in SEO / SEM business domain and force businesses to aggressively adapt them. Online businesses already realize that occasional SEO / SEM activities do not give immediate or long lasting results. Businesses today are look within themselves in order to develop SEO expertise or are form strategic partnerships with good SEO / SEM firms or consultants. This helps them design and implement prolonged SEO / SEM activities which can be measured.To reduce cost organizations today are readily accepting “Do it yourself” SEO toolkits. This trend is making professional software companies look for ways to build more intelligent and efficient automated SEO / SEM solutions.Web portals are already integrating SEO friendly logic in their system architecture itself. The moment the content goes online, SEO related information is automatically generated. The SEO specific information gets auto updated every time the content of the page changes. This totally removes the need of SEO / SEM expert and automatically monitors and measures the results in real time.New exciting fields are emerging in SEO / SEM domain. They help the business identify and understand its customer, products and services in a better way. They also help the business gain a better insight as to what is the best way to convert the customer visit to sale. The emerging fields includes keyword researching, conversion rate optimization, handling of international and multi-language issues from SEO / SEM perspective, link building social media and identifying emerging traffic sources.Innovation in SEO / SEM will not only help organizations and business tide over recession but also help them develop sustained growth for years to come.About the Author:Shashank Sathe is the VP - IT and CTO of Rajshri and is currently dveloping DAM, Ad Server, Mobile + Web + IPTV + PVR, STB compiant web, API's to interact seamlessly with all the top video delivery domain leaders. He is known as "Mister Solutions" as he firmly believes in the motto "If you can think it - I can make it". He also holds patents on face finding, recognition, matching algorithms. Shashank has 15+ years of experience in core information technology management. He has been a pioneer in the development and deployment of internet and e-banking applications in India. He possesses extensive specialized knowledge of core e-banking, finance, e-trading, ERP, E-CRM, CAD, CAM and cross platform technology architecture planning and deployment. In addition he has hosted corporate workshops and discussion forums on a number of cutting edge technology issues. Shashank holds multiple masters degrees in computer applications, information systems, management, statistics and operations research and business management from IIM - Ahmedabad, Wellingkars, Narsee Monjee Institue of Management Studies and NCC - UK. He also holds a degree in Para-Psychology and Human Psychology. He is currently pursuing Ph.D. in Advanced Holographic Stor[...]

SEO bad links, good links and great links

2009-01-22T21:16:04.110-08:00

From a SEO’s perspective once you have identified winning keywords, and your content strategy is in place to target those keywords (while ensuring that the optimized content is easily accessible to search crawlers with no error pages, broken links, redirect and 404 errors), the next and most important step to higher rankings is building quality links to that content.Link building is probably the most time consuming and difficult task at hand for the seo expert. Little wonder there is so much attention, hype, mystery and stigmata that is surrounding link building strategies.Now there are many link building companies who make promises of 1000 links in 1 hour, or link exchange programs that assert to miraculously pass link juice to your website. We also know that search engines frown at such behavior, and yet they may not be actually penalizing such manipulative sites for now.I have seen many sites that blatantly ignore search engines on-page guidelines, and having links from sites that are obviously manipulating for links, but we are not here to evaluate these exception cases or judge the search engines. In addition, search algorithms have a lot more variables in place now to evaluate a link from being worthy of passing on the link juice or not. All this adds to the general confusion for companies planning their link building strategy, budgets and what constitutes a bad link, a good link and a great link.A bad link, is bad link building …Now we don’t know if the search engines actually wean out certain links as bad links or if they penalize a site which is getting a link back from such a website, but we do know that search engines value those links that come from popular and credible sources.The advice I give to clients who are in a hurry to get linked-up is - why play hide and seek with the search engines when sooner or later you will be found. Why take a chance to be penalized, or worse, banned from a search engine?So what is a bad link? A bad link can be defined as a link that comes from a source that has little or no content, is not popular, is involved in black hat seo, link exchanges, and is basically trying to deceive the search engines and the users into believing it to be of some value.Good link building can take time and patience …Good links can come from social, web and user communities the seo expert targets by specifically submitting the website/ content to these websites manually. If a website which are popular (have a good page rank) and a good link reputation gives a link to your website/content pages then it can be counted as a good link.One can submit to web directories (make sure they are managed by human editors and not automated), article submissions sites, social bookmarking sites, Google knoll, Yahoo answers, Wikipedia (in some cases), and relevant blogs (and by commenting on the blogs) that have a high page rank.Good links can also be earned by taking the effort to find other sites that have relevant content to yours and painstakingly requesting them to link back to your website. Try not to participate in reciprocal linking (one way links are the best, as search engines assume that you have gotten the link purely on credit and not favor). You can also see your competitions links, and then try and attract some of those good ones for yourself. The bad news is that you are playing “follow the leader” with your competition.Many impatient link builders prefer buying links from websites by offering the owners some money in exchange for a link. I leave this one to you!Give me Great li[...]

Seo expert predicts the future of your online business

2009-01-21T23:43:23.252-08:00

I had a dream…

Suppose the search engines change their entire algorithms overnight, how would that affect the future of your website and online business?

While some seo experts have mastered the art to avoid this topic like a plague, some think of it as a myth, or an X-files episode, but many know of us know that the possibility of this happening is more real today than ever before.

The truth is out there

With personalized user search preferences are the search engines giving in their powers to the users? If this were to happen then search rankings would soon be obsolete, as each user would get a different personalized view of the search page depending on preferences and history etc.
All the smart gimmicks, link exchanges, and magic seo strategies from Gurus could eventually fail! So why do we still keep optimizing?

For ONE, the seo or search marketing is not about applying the magical arts to appease search gods who will start flooding your website with high value traffic.

I will survive … in a world with no search engines

I am not being egoistical out here, nor do I have some secret knowledge. Allow me to explain why…

1. I want to run a successful online business
2. I will keep building unique, resourceful and informative content
3. I will make this content accessible to the users
4. I will promote this content across web, user and social communities
5. I will syndicate my content to article or video submissions sites

Well this may very well be a dream I am having, but when I awake, the search engines still rule the online world. Either way I will survive :-)

Experts Speak on SEO/SEM in India

2009-01-28T20:24:47.299-08:00

Well I hope you have enjoyed reading what the experts have to say about SEO/ SEM in India.

For those who have missed the series of expert interviews, here goes...

1. Deepak Chauhan, CIO

>> SEO is your best friend in recession by Deepak Chauhan
>> Paradox of SEO / SEM in India

2. Shashank Sathe, Visiting Technology Lecturer

>> How to become a SEO expert
>> Recession will force innovation in SEO industry

3. Vijay Dalwani, Director (Operations)

>> SEO/SEM is more Marketing less Technology
>> Only Genuine Sites Top Search Ranking

Did you get a chance to have a look at the free seo training guide? If not, do so, as there is valuable information in there based on my personal experiences working with seo strategies for my websites, my blog, and for other clients, and will help you in understanding what factors influence your online business. Best of all it’s for free!

SEO is your best friend in recession by Deepak Chauhan

2009-01-21T02:31:30.188-08:00

The mere mention of the words SEO / SEM makes people think about technology and the complex processes involved in implementing it. However, this is a misconception. Technology is only the last mile and plays only 10 percent role in the actual SEO / SEM activities.By using SEO / SEM on your website, you are acting as a guide or a friend to your customer. You are actually helping the customer find their desired information, product or service. You are doing this by understanding the customer’s search pattern as well as onsite behavior. In the next step, you are educating the customer and informing them that you have what they want, how they want and that too at a reasonable rate.SEM activities results in direct response by the customer to your business or website. There is immediate traffic. But care must be taken to ensure that you are able to satisfy the user expectation that is built by your SEO / SEM activity. Acquiring a customer or even a visitor to your website is costly. Reacquiring a disillusioned customer is even more costly because they not only do not come back easily, but may even have negative influence on many more prospective customers.SEO is a long term strategy and is mainly used for building the brand and increasing user / customer confidence in the product or service.SEO activities can include everything from identifying and using the right keywords to building up social networking, blogs as well as other community based activities. It is a subtle way of creating positive brand image and having an entire niche community on your side doing your PR and marketing at no cost.Whether you hire third party SEO /SEM experts or develop inhouse expertise, the most important thing is to be true to your business and to your customer. Provide all the necessary features and information needed by the customer for a pleasant web experience. Structure the website for better usability. Identify your target audience properly. Define the right keywords which will help the user / customer find necessary information on your website. Carry out SEO activities on a long-term basis and regularly monitor its progress.Genuine websites are invariably rewarded even by search engines because they too are fighting for relevancy and they too do not want to list something irrelevant and antagonize their users.About the Author:Deepak Chauhan is the CIO of DMCL, an Essel Group of Company which focuses on Internet and Mobile Entertainment solutions. He has more than 14 years experience in Internet domain, especially related to Entertainment. eCommerce and Online Brand consulting.He has worked with B4U Television before joining Essel Group. He is better known for motivating his peers and his team and taking them to productive heights. Deepak is instrumental in the successful implementation of DMCL's flagship entertainment portal http://www.mypopkorn.com/ and prestigious http://www.veria.com/.[...]

How to become a SEO expert by Shashank Sathe

2009-01-19T00:41:04.827-08:00

SEO / SEM plays the role of a bread winner for portals and websites. It is even more crucial for organizations that do not have brick and mortar presence in the real world. The performance and visibility of your site is totally dependent on the hard work done on the SEO front.

A good SEO / SEM professional has an in-depth knowledge of both, marketing and technology. On technology front, one has to understand how to make friends with the search engine crawlers. The crawler is the heart of the search engine. It is always on the lookout for good quality content. It identifies and isolates such content and then ranks it for accuracy and readability. It also identifies the context or USP of a particular portal at page level and also determines the repute of the source of the content as well as its freshness. A good SEO activity helps the crawler get positive information from all your web pages.

An SEO expert is well conversant with at least one programming language not because he is expected to code, but because it helps him understand how the search engine handles programming code and logic. Knowledge of SEO /SEM industry is also a must.

Helping the webcrawlers takes care of more than 80 percent of your SEO activity. The remaining tasks like SEM, blogging, social networking and other activities can be undertaken at alongside to make your site 100 percent SEO friendly.

Do not forget to submit your website to prominent directories because it guarantees sure links to those directories. It is always prudent to submit your website to niche directories as they carry more weightage and help you get better ranking on the basis of content relevancy.

Increase the number of back links to your competitor websites and also try to get your link on their site. This, too, helps improve the ranking on search engines.

From marketing perspective, the SEO expert is expected to have the ability to draft search friendly and creative website content which appeals to both the user and the webcrawler. It is preferable if a SEO person develops advertising or mass communication skill sets. He also needs to understand where the customer is coming from and what he will be looking for on the website.
In troubled times, an SEO expert is the person most equipped to justify the work he’s doing by providing measurable results that may make all the difference between running a successful business and bankruptcy.

SEO/SEM is more Marketing less Technology by Vijay Dalwani

2009-01-14T02:54:09.411-08:00

SEO / SEM is not really about technology. Of course there is a bit of programming and technology involved because you are creating a website which needs computers, but this is a very small part of the actual SEO / SEM exercise.

If you look at it from the technology perspective, the person is just selecting a few keywords and putting them in the title, description, meta-tags, starting of the paragraph and in the content. This is because somebody has taught you that this is where the keywords must be present.

SEO / SEM activity however is a fine art which covers marketing and in-depth understanding of the business, product, services and the target customer. First of all, know the product you are marketing. The next step is to ask yourself why you have created the product and for whom. Set the vision for your business or organization. Now you are ready to look for the right market and the right customer.

You can now ask your SEO expert whether you have the right keywords. Will it get more people on your website? Can you effectively combine a few keywords to create a more powerful keyword? Keep asking yourself and your SEO / SEM expert team how can you make people come to your website while searching for a keyword? Linking the interest of the customer with the interest of the business and making it a common interest is the heart of any SEO / SEM activity.

Whether you have in-house SEO / SEM experts or you hire a seo consultant, see if the person is able to understand your business and your customer properly. A proper SEO / SEM expert can tell you accurately what your business is all about, and who your target customer really is. They may even suggest new customer segments that you have missed or never thought of. All that remains is to use the right technology to increase the traffic and reach. This is inevitable if you have already pinpointed what your business product and target customer is all about.