Posts

Guest Posting 13th August 2012 3:53 PM

Guest blogging is a great way to build relevant links to your website from authoritative websites within your niche - its been around for a while, but still going strong.

Bloggers are always in need of content, and many will jump on an opportunity to add great content to their blog that their readers will enjoy, and often you can get a good link back from a high PA / DA domain.

The most difficult part of using guest blogging as a link development strategy is the very first step - identifying guest post opportunities.

So, thought it would be a good idea to create a thread discussing this, One where we can share opportunities and ideas, and perhaps share guest post opportunities that we know of.

Thanks for this post:

Thanks from: Steve.Richardson

Strength of Google+ Backlinks? 13th August 2012 10:31 AM

Originally Posted by sjr4x4

“Just looked in the source code, and can't see any "nofollows"?”

Apparently the original thinking behind Google + using 'dofollow' was a tactic designed to attract webmasters to help it compete with Facebook on launch. I.e offer something of interest to get user numbers up. Once it has enough popularity the links will be turned to nofollow.

From what i've read up, on links in the comments have been turned to nofollow (I've not checked), and if that is the case then it will only be a matter of time before all links on G+ follow suit.

If this is the case, then what effect could this have on your site? Will any ranking benefit you have gained from G+ dofollow be stripped if they do turn nofollow?

Strength of Google+ Backlinks? 10th August 2012 2:25 PM

Originally Posted by enterprisepe

“do you think the size of your G+ following will affect the strength of the links?”

The bottom line is that the SEO effects of Google +, either links or 'likes', are very indirect. This means traditional SEO practices should not be ignored, but some activity towards G+ added into the mix.

SEO methods such as link building, keyword research/targeting, URL structure (and lots of other areas I've mentioned) have a more significant impact on page ranking.

I also don't think the volume of followers would effect anything other than CTR from your account.

However I guess Google + is still in its infancy, and more data needs to be gathered to draw a proper conclusion to its search benefits.

How PPC can help to bring traffic? 10th August 2012 1:54 PM

Originally Posted by rogerweavers

“Just to add to Paul's comments, once you have created the spreadsheet he mentions it is fairly easy to upload the data into your Google account using the free adwords editor software.”

Yep good point - You would need to install adwords editor and save your excel sheet as a .csv file.

Google Author - showcase your content round the web 10th August 2012 11:48 AM

Originally Posted by sjr4x4

“Now that's the truth, or are you manipulating me?

”

Being an SEO I've never manipulated anything...

Thanks for this post:

Thanks from: Steve.Richardson

Google Author - showcase your content round the web 10th August 2012 11:42 AM

Originally Posted by sjr4x4

“Clever, didn't realise you could use product images as well

Took us 12 months to originally get the review stars approved and show up in google, but whole process seems much quicker now. Author pics can show up in hours.

Noticed the review stars keep disappearing off one of our sites, and do worry if we have too much mark up on the pages. Plus review stars are no longer shown on home pages

I think this will be the next spam battleground and the golden age of rich snippets has now passed us by

Was great while it lasted though!”

Ha, anything good soon becomes a spam battleground. Its the SEOs that ruin SEO.

Article Writing Is It Still Worth Doing! 10th August 2012 10:03 AM

Originally Posted by sjr4x4

“In this post panda world, what are the rules now with article submission?

If you have a good quality article, would you just submit to one article directory? Or is it still a case of submitting to multiple directories? Just wondering about duplicate content.

Or is it a case submitting to a few gives you a better chance of getting your article picked up?

In the bad old days you would maybe rewrite or spin for different directories, but I'm guessing that's all ancient history now?”

Originally Posted by rogerweavers

“Article writing still works, it can improve your search engine ranking and also bring your website more traffic from people reading the article. Top article directories like ezinearticles.com provide stats so you can see how many people have viewed you article and how many have clicked through to your website.
Some of my articles for clients have produced thousands of views and up to 35% click thru rate (CTR).

I always summit my original article to ezinearticles.com first and then create different versions to submit to other directories. As Gilesfuchs says, just focus on the top 10.

Make sure you have a good headline, quality content and a call to action in your bio box for a good CTR

all the best”

It still works - to a point, with risks.

Article marketing was a great way to build links a while back, but since the invention of spinning and spamming using spinning techniques its something that's been killed - almost.

It can still play a part in the overall mix, and now and then you can get some traction if the articles good - but would you really want to waste a 'good' article in this way when there are much better, stable options for your article?

Plus, with article marketing you run the risk of loosing rankings if all your eggs are in that basket. I remember when the first grisly, polar er I mean panda update came out and it killed lots of well used article directories and stripped links pointing to sites loosing their hard earned ranks.

Even ezine was hit hard to a point where they had to restructure their own site to claw back what they had lost. So will that happen again - probably. Would I rely on article marketing on its own - no.

Google Author - showcase your content round the web 10th August 2012 9:53 AM

Originally Posted by sjr4x4

“Google brought this out a couple of months ago, and I've been having a play, but yet to see it show up in any results

But the theory is sound. Prove you are the owner of a particular blog, or content on a web page by linking it to your Google Plus profile.

Then in search results, you get a nice piccie of you by your content

Here's an example with Mr Google himself, Matt Cutts

On the top result (or at least when I saw it!) Mr Cutts has his pic to the right hand side of the results.

Social meets search!

Now obviously it stands out, because it's different, but once it's common place, I've no doubt we will tune out. Currently you have to have a head and shoulders shot in your Google Plus profile, so my forum avatars no good, and neither are company logos.

I like it, but Google needs to sort out it's policy for businesses, then I think this will really take off, with familiar logos to the right of content you are looking for. Weather that's a good thing or bad thing for the small website will depend on your viewpoint, but I see a boom for logo designers round the corner

But for the moment, any prolific bloggers have a great chance to not only get your name out there, but now your face!

You can get all the info you need to implement this from the below Google Link:
Author information in search results - Webmaster Tools Help

For wordpress site owners, here's a step by step set of instructions on how to implement it:
rel="author" and rel="me" in WordPress - Yoast

Be interesting to see if anyone has seen any success after implementing the author tag. has it directly related to increased targeted traffic/conversions?”

Great post Steve,

This can also be implemented using rich snippets for ecommerce sites, where a product image would be displayed (similar to Google shopping).

I am working, or rather my developer is working on this on the Christmas crackers site so i'll let you know when it eventually goes live, if it works

Thanks for this post:

Thanks from: Steve.Richardson

Page ranks in other than Google 10th August 2012 9:45 AM

Originally Posted by sjr4x4

“Not sure I understand you? PageRank is a Google marketing term, specific only to them.

Do you mean Bing or Yahoo equivalents? No doubt someone will correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think there is a Bing or Yahoo comparison?”

Steve is correct in this - Page Rank is a Google specific measurement.

However, don't be disheartened by this as having a decent Google PR doesn't mean that as Bing wont be influenced by this that it wont matter. Google and Bing are remarkably similar - so building two different sites/pages to separately target the two engines would appear to be a waste of energy.

Recent studies suggest that Bing seems to be moving much closer to Google over time - so how are they doing that? Are they looking at similar factors? Is their algorithm similar? If so, then the importance of your page as deemed by Google my well be influencing Bings results - although I find it hard to believe that a Google patented page ranking method would carry similar weight with Microsoft

Thanks for this post:

Thanks from: eastvantage, Steve.Richardson

DMOZ advice 10th August 2012 9:28 AM

Originally Posted by rogerweavers

“Some good advice above.

It could take months or years to get listed in DMOZ depending on the category.
Submit and forget.

Most general directories are no longer worth submitting to there are a few places that will help.

Local directories are great if you are a local business or specialist directories related to your business.”

It would depend on the quality of the directory, and whether its a human edited one or a 'free' one.

I'd steer clear of the majority of 'free' directories, as you will find SEO companies bombard these with submissions and the waiting times can be months, for little or no reward. Plus, most of these 'free' directories then offer you the chance to 'get fast tracked' - if you pay. So now I'm paying for this low quality directory submission? I don't think so.

Paid submission for directories is OK, when the directory is:

Yahoo
Best of the web
Joe Ant (although you can apply to be an editor and get a free listing)
Clora
Plus others (PM me if you want list)

Remember - keep it as part of your overall daily/weekly SEO tasks.