SEO Blog » ryan

Free online resources for SEO

ryan — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 16:28:59 +0000

What is the best free online resource about SEO that you know?
– Mehdi S. M / Queens, NY

Google!!!!

Just Kidding. I wouldn’t rely on any one source, and no matter what you read, only your own experience, founded on exactly what you’ve done for a given website, serves you in making great choices for SEO activities.

Yahoo is now offering Bing results

ryan — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 13:16:55 +0000

News post on SEW regarding the launch.

Original announcement from Yahoo regarding the launch.

My comments:
Even assuming that bing uses this valuable data to improve results, making the user experience better both on bing and yahoo, is a sea change in order? Even assuming that they’re results are 110% satisfying and they draw users from Google, I sincerely doubt that their image can rise to the trendiness that is Google. Of course, as Google pursues anti-net-nuetral policies, they may encourage users to disassociate themselves with Google as a measure of “consumer choice”, speaking with the click/search if you will…

Are you eating poison?

ryan — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 13:51:03 +0000

The most important thing in SEO is current experience. With that said, we have discovered the most likely reason some companies have fallen in rankings since January, and are now experimenting with a cure.

Have you got a good SEO doctor? Maybe it’s time to call one?

“Web” alerts will become “Everything” alerts

ryan — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 20:47:43 +0000

Marcel Gordon, Product Manager of Google Alerts, sends an email as we’re walking out the door today letting us know that our trusty web alerts are changing.

You may receive more results after this change. If you find that you are getting too many results, you can change the “How often” setting to “once a day” or “once a week.” You can also change your search query. You can do this on the alerts management page (www.google.com/alerts/manage), or by removing the alert using the link at the bottom of each alert email and creating it again with different settings.

Interestingly enough, I’d bet that the reason they predict that this change will continue to serve the same results, or increase is because their results contain many more types of information, videos, forum/blog threads, news results, local business results, maps and, of course, web pages. The next step may indeed be to send videos and maps in the alerts themselves.

Preliminary Online SEO Analysis Tool

ryan — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 14:56:15 +0000

Is there any online tool to get website seo preliminary report?
– Hareesh M. M / Kerala, India

I suggest www.WebsiteGrader.com.

This will give you a quick overview of the vital statistics for a given website.

Effective and Affordable Link Building

ryan — Wed, 05 May 2010 14:19:47 +0000

Does anyone know a good and reasonable priced Link Building company? (SEO)

- Roy P. 27 / M / Tel Aviv, Israel

Hi Roy,

I’d introduce myself and my company for this service. We can do large packages or small groups, reciprocal links only. We also hire out one-way linking from other firms, but reciprocal linking we do in house because of the relationship development with new link partners.

Depending on your goals and assets (domain, ranking) I can provide you with a recommendation.

We are at www.3-PRIME.com, with link building info here.

Should blog post title tag match headline?

ryan — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 16:36:51 +0000

For purposes of SEO, should the title tag of my blog post be the same as the post headline?

- Patrick H. 35 / M / Stow, MA

Not necessarily, unless you want to rank for the exact phrases you use as your headlines.

I’d recommend to use the title tag do target 1-2 keyphrases containing in your headline, and use your headline to employ those keyphrases in a useful sentence, providing semantic usage of both the keyphrase and context for its usage.

Thanks Ryan. Would their be any harm in using the same?

No, my recommendation is just a better practice, not a necessity. For the sake of simplicity, you can definitely use the same info for both places with no harmful outcome.

Submission of Blogs to Google News – Response

ryan — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 15:04:27 +0000

Google Blog news Submission :: Response within 8 hours!

Re: [#610358489] Promoting understanding of the level and potential for political discourse as it relates to Connecticut’s 2010 Senate elections.

Thank you for your interest in Google News. We’ve received your suggestion and we’re unable to include it in Google News at this time. We don’t include sites that are written and maintained by one individual. We currently only include articles from sources that could be considered organizations, generally haracterized by multiple writers and editors, availability of organizational information, and accessible contact information.

If you have additional questions, please visit our Help Forum at:
google.com/support/forum/p/news?hl=en

We appreciate your taking the time to contact us and will log your site for consideration should our requirements change.

When I get organized, I’ll submit my blog to google news again and see if I meet their quality guidelines. check out the blog in question, fact-based report on CT 2010 senate election debates. It’s definitely a one author show so far!

Meta tags and Title Tags for SEO

ryan — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 16:42:46 +0000

where and how should I add meta tags in my html code to improve my SEO?
- Matias P. M / Montreal, Canada

Meta tags belong between the tags near the top of your HTML code.

The tags you definitely want to have are:

Title tag – Not technically a meta tag but definitely to be included, Most important tag for SEO and deifnitely includes your primary keywords for the page.

Description Tag – Second most important tag, use sentences, make a pitch if you can, but definitely include your keywords here.

Keywords Tag – Separate your keywords with commas, or group into phrases, lot of flexibility here and a lot of conflicting advice exists.

Robot Meta Tags
Primary Robots Tag – Instructs robots, or search engine software, to include your content in their search index and follow the links on this page to others in your website

Slurp No Yahoo Directory description tag – Tells Yahoo search engine to use your meta description instead of a description they find in the yahoo directory.

Google bot tag – Similar to robots tag, provides directions to Googlebot. It is not necessary but can’t hurt.

Note, the examples above use the XML-style closing tag. Leave out the trailing / if your page is not xhtml.

PPC Estimated Traffic, Clicks and Costs

ryan — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 17:37:59 +0000

How does Google calculate the estimated traffic and costs when using the keyword tool? How do they derive the minimum and maximum clicks you might get and the prices? Does it use average click thru rates etc in the calc? If so, what are they? thanks
- Mark O. M / London, UK

How does Google calculate the estimated traffic and costs when using the keyword tool?

Google is in excellent position to accurately estimate the traffic on keyword searches since they have 65% of the search market to extrapolate from. This is compared to WordTracker which historically used just a couple of directories that formed about 1% of the search market and extrapolated from there.

Costs are calculated based on competition for a given phrase and the amount of traffic on the phrase. Again, they probably base this on their internal data. The costs are per click, and should be based both on competitions and traffic as well as the current average bid amount for the phrase.

How do they derive the minimum and maximum clicks you might get and the prices?

Based on the price, they can conclude your average position in the sponsored links. Based on their internal data, they can estimate the number of clicks you’ll receive on your advertisement for that keyword. Of course it’s an estimate, your ad might increase your clicks if it is very attractive, which will increase your costs and click through traffic. Alternatively, if you have a lousy advertisement, or low quality score, you might get no clicks. They provide a range to give you an idea based on the knowns they have.

Does it use average click thru rates etc in the calc? If so, what are they? thanks

Definitely, again they are basing their estimates on historical data for people in and outside of your industry. As to what those CTR’s are, it depends on the keyword. I believe they provide you an estimate in the adwords ad builder.