Abstract: So you're tired of the poor rankings of your website - even after many months of 'proper' search engine optimization? You are even more frustrated to see your dollars disappear into the Internet money vacuum, and still stubborn enough to spend more? Not so fast. A varied array of options exist. Read below to find something that works for you. Additionally, the free 5-day email course on PPC may be just what you need for your search engine marketing (SEM) projects and we hope you are open to try our free SEO tools.
Before You Begin
First, compare prices, every estimate and background check any of the top 10 SEM/SEO companies. Next, take our free SEO email course and find out how much you know about the SEO techniques, and compare the results. Once you have decided on course of action, download our complimentary SEO whitepaper for a fast track to Search Engine Optimization success.
For readers that go beyond the interest in just savings, terminology, company comparisons and search engine ranking factors, read our additional SEO articles where we really spell out how to get better search engine placement and more. All this without spending an arm-and-a-leg and soon seeing a return on your investment. Your goal is to be in the "top 10" SERPS (search engine results pages) for your keywords and phrases. Our free guides, tools and SEO articles can get you there..
Competition Defined.
Competition is described as "one that competes", "a rival", "selling or buying goods or sevices in the same market as another", and even down to the biological level - "an organism that lives in competition with another".
SEO & Web - Competitive Landscape.
Increasingly, web surfers are using search engines to find companies, services and goods. Big and smaller companies, are using search engine optimization and search engine marketing techniques to beat their competitors. On the Internet, we are dealing with virtual entities - and we all compete in increasingly tougher and user-aware market places. Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing focuses on building traffic and allowing you to leverage your websites, services and products. Through competitive research, optimal keyword strategies, quality content, link-back neighborhoods and educating yourself on Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing (SEM), you should be well positioned to beat the competition -- over time. .
Create an 'edge'.
Create an edge and be smart - with SEO and SEM.
Today, you must have a service or product in a niche marketplace to create success on the Internet. You need to understand that niche marketplaces is how you get there, along with sound search engine optimization and search engine marketing principles, quality content, backlinks, advertisting programs and CRM (Customer Relationship Management) processes.
On and off-page optimization.
First of all you need to create a web site that is a related to a niche marketplace. (You already know who your customer is, right!?) It is very important that you do your keyword research first. In fact, competitive research as an action step is missed by over 98% of the online marketplace. There are many great keyword tools and many are free. Keep in mind that Google 'owns' over 50% of the search marketplace. (Yahoo receives about 30% and MSN about 20%). Google is a very important search engine for you to focus on, and I suggest you start with it (even though MSN and Yahoo are great resources - especially the newly launched MSN Adcenter).
Competitive SEO Research:
Try the following on yahoo and google (make sure syntax is correct): site: www.competitor.com. (replace 'competitor' with real name). It will show you how many pages that each search engine has indexed from the competitor’s site. Depending on the site, many results could be returned. Look to see if each page has a title and description associated with them. You will then be able to determine whether each page within your competitor site has been individually optimized.
When you start researching keywords do not start with the most common keyword. For example, if you are selling Canon products, do no start researching or optimizing for the word 'Canon'. You need to break it down - for example - to 'Canon power shot'. Even better -'Canon power shot SD400 memory sticks'. This way, you have created a niche keyword structure (many permutations from these keywords) within a larger category, and you will able to better optimize keywords for this area. With this in mind, go to Google and start typing in specific keywords and phrases to see where the competition is. As you are doing this, you should understand the page rank algorithm. It is Google's way of giving specific value to how popular are popular your web site is. It's essentially based on the number of votes of other web sites that have cast votes up for your web site. Votes are generated when another web site places a link on their web site that is pointing to your web site. The more votes you get, the better your chances are for good ranking. Try SEO tools and give yourself a kick-start.
To view the page rank, install the Google toolbar (toolbar.google.com). As you look at the competition, recognize that we talk about on-page and off- page optimization. On-page optimization are things like proper use of H1 header tags, using main keywords in the title tags, keywords and phrases are bolded underlined or italicized, using image tags and placing correct keywords within that tag. Many place keywords at the very beginning of the text, and once at the very end of the copy, with other sprinkled throughout the company. It's an "hour glass" type of a concept. Keywords at the top, less in the middle and again repeated at the end. Do the things that the competition is doing just do it a little bit better - this is one way to get one step ahead of them. The "least imperfect" site wins.
Cool Tool: Curious to see what SEO/M users search for? Click: SEO Search
Tags are important.
In our example, when we open the Canon landing page you need to start with the page title for your web site. The page title should only include the main keywords. (Do not ever say welcome to our web site!) Try to combine the keywords in your title. Make sure you use the H1 header tag early in your body text. Also, when Google reads the web page it uses the text from the top left-hand side of the page to the bottom right hand side of the page.
Next, you would need to create H2 header tags. You can think of that as the sub heading for a web page. This is a very common used tag, so it's best to place the primary keyword in your H1 tags and your secondary keywords into your H2 tags.
Now you need to actually create the content for the page. When you try to write the contents, sprinkle your main keywords throughout the copy. But don't overdo it, just make it a natural effort. Once you have written the copy you should then go back and bold underline or italicize some of the keywords. Only one time each, maximum. There are many HTML site building tools out there that use the Bold (B) tag for bolding keywords, and has been overused. Google doesn't penalize you for it, but in fact, by using the tag STRONG it provides higher quality content for search engines. You can also add some images for your users, and when you do this you need to properly include the keyworded image tags. So for example, if we have an image on our web page called 'oneshot.jpg' you would include code that adds that ALT tag and text about that specific memory stick (from our Sony example).
Also, Google views your web page from top left to bottom right. Well, in general they do. However, you want to make sure that you code your HTML to compliment or support this, specially if you have non-related navigational elements to the left of page. There are techniques to do this, which is explained in a email series, try the Free SEO 5-day Email Course.
Off page SEO - Competition Goodbye!
You have come up with your niche marketplace and associated keywords and phrases into your page. You will have completed proper approach to tagging from titles through the body content, including H1's, H2's and ALT tags. You are then ready to get your site indexed. Your first rule, is to never use the Google submission form. There are better and faster ways.
The first approach
You need to know how a search engine finds you in the first place. They will visit one web site that is already in their index and if they follow the link to that new site, it could be yours. For example, if you have a new site and you have a partner in this 'Canon' business space, and he puts a link to your page and he's already visible on the Internet at Google, they'll crawl to that site and find your link and get you into the index. Now what if you don't have a partner in this space in your are brand new, you still can get into the index. There are article directories that you can submit to, places like PRWeb.com. Others are - goarticles.com, buzz article.com, article fever.com and many more. These are excellent sites for you to write something about your services or products. The engines will pick you out, and Google will find you.
The second approach (and to quickly get listed in the Google index)
Go see your competition. Type in the search terms you are competing with and find web sites that have a page rank of five or six or higher that you will notice in the green bar from the Google toolbar (above). Find six or 10 of these sites and locate their contact information. We have found that e-mail works - of course - but picking up the phone and commenting on their site and how discussing how a link partnership could benefit each others, rates higher. Top ranking sites may ignore you, and it's certainly tougher persuade somebody to add your link to their web sites. You must give them a good reason to do this. Contact sites that are related to you and are complimentary - those are the best. Find good and great link neighborhoods within your topics. And always think of a way that you can give them something that they would benefit from. Think of this as an emotional bank account. You make deposits, and you (later) may make withdrawals. If you can manage to get at least one PR 6 web site to link your web site, you'll be off and running. You should be indexed in under three days. If you get a PR 7 web site link to you - in most cases you'll be there in 24 hours.
The third approach (and why you must be careful here!!)
Purchase links from high Page Rank websites. The easiest and fastest way to do this is to visit one of the many link purchasing websites. Here are a few of the better ones: a) http://www.linkadage.com, b) c) http://www.textlinkbrokers.com, d) http://www.text-link-ads.com. (NOTE: Only buy one/month, or you may get seriously penalized). Many times you can purchase 1 PR7 link for a 1 month time period for, say, $150. After the month is up, there is no need to renew because you are already in Google's index. Paying $150, and you can be indexed by Google quickly and with little to no work on your part.
Immediate SEO Techniques Applied.
Tip #1:
Add a Google sitemap (XML). You can easily do this with free tools or directly via a Google account. You should also check the competitor sites for http://URLname/sitemap.xml. It's the default for Google, and if the competition has it (it will load in your browser or reader) - you can be assured they are pretty agressive and informed about Search Engine Optimization techniques.
Tip #2:
Discover how many pages the competition has online. You can use free tools again, and the Xenu's Link Sleuth is free - and fast - a good tool to keep close. The 'Stats for Managers' at the bottom of page is the important data for statistics.
Tip #3:
Use the 'link: sitename.com' syntax in Google to locate number of backlinks within a competitor site. Google and Yahoo have different estimates here, but it's vital information from both. (Yahoo use 'linkdomain: sitename.com').
Much is written on the blogs' approach to SEO rankings. We believe it has its place, but in moderation and always pertinent to your business. Blog spamming can get you penalized as well. The Microsaw Web 2.0 blogs are here, and recently a new service was launched at PayPerPost, written up in Business Week.
SEO, revenue increased & more.
A) Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing are two fantastic ways in which you can get visibility on the Internet as we've mentioned. Additionally, you can and must include email marketing strategies, with complete CRM and backoffice processes. You can increase visibility and competitive edge many, many times over. Great content with an intelligent link strategy is vital.
B) Affiliate Marketing Programs. Join and promote these (Mr. Jeff Bezos at Amazon is famous for this). Create one for your company - with potentially exciting and lucrative results. (The merchants, or you - offer affiliates commissions for sales activity generated by the affiliate's web sites).
C) Adsense. A sophisticated affiliate online advertising program from Google. Complimentary Adsense Training Videos are worth a look. However, without search engine marketing and search engine optimization, you are missing out on other huge opportunities for smashing the competition and making large sums online.
D) Adwords. A break-through ad ('sponsored advertising') system from Google that can bring traffic (quality) to your site within 1/2 hour! The complimentary adwords email courses show ways to beat the system, and lessen the frustration on your part. It can get expensive fast.
Continue the search engine optimization and search engine marketing work, and expand your strategy to include email marketing, affiliate, on / off-page optimization, along with traditional means for online marketing (keyword) dominance (print/media). Always provide great content, but that alone will not do it. Off-page strategies are very important, but may work too well. For example, check out the top result on Google for the search term miserable failure. It is not in position one because that web page had been optimized for that search term. The web site is in position one because huge amounts of web sites link to it with the text miserable failure in the link text. Can you guess which site it is?
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