Countless millions of individuals and business enterprises are vying for high-positioned search results on the Internet and Google Search Engine Results Page 1 is the Holy Grail of search engine optimization today. Read on to find out how my SEO implementation is achieving those results without incurring any cost.
Regardless of your personal or business/professional endeavors, if you host your own website or blog the single most critical element of that site is web traffic. Without site visitors you might as well be sitting in front of a mirror talking to yourself…you will be neither seen nor heard. I have referred initially to Google search results positioning because Google has such a dominant role in virtually every aspect of what we do online in order to establish a voice and brand that people will want to refer to again and again. Google’s frequent algorithm updates, which are the benchmark for our online presence, interactivity and ranking, demand our focused attention in terms of search engine optimization best practices and how we present ourselves in many aspects of our content development, its marketing and more. Don’t forget the other major search engines as key components to the equation; Bing, Yahoo, Ask, AOL, WOW, WebCrawler, DuckDuckGo, Qwant, Yandex to name but a few. They all have an important role in our online lives and although each has its own search visibility and ranking criteria their principle algorithmic nuances emulate Google’s relatively closely. So how did I achieve 8 out of 10 Page 1 search results on Google with a new website, four first page search results on Bing and more without spending a dime? For many, landing first page positioning on search engine results pages (SERP’s) would indeed seem as elusive as the search for the Holy Grail. My search terms achieving these results were local and regional search terms for ‘document editing in penticton’ where Penticton (British Columbia, Canada) is my home office location. The results are no accident. Effect implementation of search engine optimization takes time, extensive research and exacting execution of best SEO practices. Scour the internet through targeted searches to find actionable on-page and meta description tagging practices that will get your site visible to the search engines and seen by users searching specifically for what you have to offer. SEO Authority Sites To say that SEO is a constant learning curve is an understatement. Search engine algorithms are frequently changing and that means that we must be informed of those changes as they occur and be prepared to implement changes to our websites and blogs, social media content metrics and more without delay. Stay informed. Easier said than done and it is a tireless, unwavering effort and if you cannot execute what leading industry experts are telling us, regardless of the reason, be sure to engage someone who will do it for you. Over the years I have subscribed to numerous authority websites in order to learn new techniques and stay informed. Establishing a web traffic online means much more than developing engaging website or blog content. It also means effective marketing through social media, paid advertising and other means addressed in other articles here. The best way to stay up to date on all the pertinent news as it happens is to subscribe to authority website blogs through their email subscribe links or RSS feed links. I subscribe to SiteProNews for the latest technical, social media, search engine news and more, an excellent resource site. Other such sites include Moz, Search Engine Land, and too many more to list here. Also refer to webmaster resource directories for essential sources of SEO insider information. I favor SPN Webmaster Resource Directory for a broad range of authority website listings. Is Your Website or Blog Search Engine Visible? If you haven’t taken effective steps to properly implement search engine optimization and updating those SEO elements on your website or blog as new algorithm updates occur you are at serious risk for total obscurity…your website invisible to users searching online for what you have to offer. High quality content is extremely important and many experts would argue that it should be your first and foremost priority. Still, effective ongoing SEO techniques and updating currently ranks first or second place depending on who you call on for advice today…and that is not about to change any time soon. Nuts & Bolts of My Search Engine Optimization Success I should preface by indicating that by virtue of the nature of my company services I have a global reach in terms of client engagement. I monitor very closely how each individual client has found me whether it be through online search engine queries, free and paid advertising, industry directory listings, client referrals, professional networking and more. Once we acquire new customers it is absolutely critical to know how those valued clients went about finding us and the deciding factors that told them that my company was right for their own specific needs. There is absolutely no sense in spending valuable time, money and resources for methods that are not producing results. EMULATE SUCCESS ~ DO NOT TRY TO REINVENT IT Emulate Successful People & Companies Look at award winning websites. It sounds cliché but it is perfectly true. Research through online search queries to find individuals and companies in your industry that are successful. Study their website thoroughly…the overall layout of their site, their content, their internal and external links, their visual content, textual wording and message conveyance, their subscribed following, their customer testimonials, ease of site navigation, their company name, page titles, headlines, sub-headlines and their effective body content. Read their blogs and articles and see how they effectively present their contact page and how effective they have conveyed what they are all about within seconds of arrival on their home/landing page. Emulate researched and demonstrated successful website development…don’t wing it and expect that because the side looks good and your story sounds good that people will flock to your site in droves. Create high quality content and implement an effective and current search engine optimization strategy. Website Development Keyword & Keyword Phrases: Keywords effectively placed throughout your website or blog content is critical. Research online for best search engine optimization techniques. Incorporate a keyword density of no more than 3%. That is to say that you should carefully and strategically infuse your keyword elements throughout your site content with a frequency or ratio of not more than three (3) words for every one-hundred (100) words of content. Stay as close to the 3% density as possible. Expert advice will vary to a degree with some suggesting up to 7 or 8% as a reasonably safe keyword/keyword phrase content saturation without risking negative response from search engines. Start at the 3% benchmark and gauge your results gradually. Where to Include Keywords: Be very clear on this issue as it is a critical factor in the SEO process:
FIND YOUR NICHE & DIFFERENTIATE It is critical that you establish right away who you are, what you offer and why you are the consumer’s best choice…why should they come to you for help or a product/service they need or want? You MUST establish your own niche – what you are good at doing – AND that what you offer is in some special way unique, something that everyone else IS NOT OR CANNOT offer themselves. THAT is ‘differentiation’…setting yourself apart. CONTACT ME TO FIND OUT MORE For a free consultation to find out more about how I can help YOU with your website or document/manuscript content development needs, click on the link above. LET’S TALK TODAY! Please share this post through the share buttons provided below in support of the author/poet and Creative Arts. Thank you! SUBSCRIBE TO THE KEY WORD BLOG VIA EMAIL OR RSS LINKS FOUND IN THE SIDEBAR…NEVER MISS A POST! © Don MacIver, Author, Poet 2015; All Rights Reserved Don MacIver Poetry © 2015 Author’s Publications © 2015 By: Don MacIver; Website & Document Content Editing & Development
We have all become aware of the ever-increasing importance of the need to produce the best possible quality content with critical consideration given to its ‘readability’. This has never been more evident than it is today. Search engines are clearly looking for that exceptional quality in terms of the information we are providing our reading audience and also how that information is presented. In this article I will share how ‘content readability’ plays a significant role in the information that we produce on our websites, in blogs and articles, especially given the dynamics of Google’s recent changes to the game plan. Google, in particular, has been a catalyst and driving force for that imperative quality in our content for years now. We want to avoid falling short with highly relevant, quality-focused content that reads back in a clear, concise and uncluttered language that speaks to our broadest and most targeted audiences alike. As Google’s algorithmic formula has evolved over time we continue to discover the essential touch points arising from their updates. With each successive Google update it is critical that anyone seeking high visibility in search engine results pages and a voice online that people will engage in must adhere to relevance, quality and readability standards set by Google and their counterparts. Think of readability from your reading audience perspective. Statistical analysis of this in-depth subject suggests clearly that for the broadest range of general audience reach, a clear majority of that reading audience is engaging in what they read at a Grade 7-8 level. The language we use in our content for that large general audience should therefore be written accordingly as opposed to a document or article to be presented to those accustomed to content in a much more complex, analytical/statistical format. Best Practices for Web Content Readability Today When planning for the best possible experience for our readers we need to be ever-conscious of not only the logic and comprehension of our content but also the visual readability comfort level as well. A positive readability experience will include the use of language understandable and recognized by our target audience, use of shorter words, sentences and paragraphs and consistent use of white space on each page. In a nutshell, we want to write for our audience with content that they are comfortable with and easily understand. Convey critical message and perspective but don’t load your content with complex jargon that will be less meaningful or understood to a general audience. Save the jargon for those who are accustomed to reading and absorbing that jargon. Shorter words and sentences in turn make for shorter paragraphs. The longer that paragraphs become the greater the chances of our reading audience becoming fatigued and more easily distracted. We are much more comfortable absorbing information in short spurts of two to four sentences of modest length per paragraph (roughly a six line paragraph). By following the first two elements reflected above we will automatically generate more ‘white space’ in our content. Space between paragraphs is ‘white space’. There are a multiple of purposes for this type of writing structure but in a general sense white space compliments shorter paragraphs by providing not only a psychological ‘break’ between ideas expressed but also gives the eyes momentary relief as well. Inception of the Readability Scoring Concept In 1948 Rudolph Flesch, PhD Eng. and John P. Kincaid developed The Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level Readability Formula which takes into consideration numerous factors of English language presentation as they relate to degree of readability. In their article The Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level Readability Formula, Readabilityforumulas.com presents the calculation factors of the formula which is built into the MS Word application. Where To Find the Readability Scoring in MS Word Once content has been written into a MS Word document, take the following steps to determine the readability grade level standard that you have established through your writing:
Interpreting Readability Scores MS Office Support provides the following excerpt in support of Understanding Readability Scores: Understand readability scores: Each readability test bases its rating on the average number of syllables per word and words per sentence. The following sections explain how each test scores your file's readability. Flesch Reading Ease Test: This test rates text on a 100-point scale. The higher the score, the easier it is to understand the document. For most standard files, you want the score to be between 60 and 70. The formula for the Flesch Reading Ease score is: 206.835 – (1.015 x ASL) – (84.6 x ASW) where: ASL = average sentence length (the number of words divided by the number of sentences) ASW = average number of syllables per word (the number of syllables divided by the number of words) Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level Test: This test rates text on a U.S. school grade level. For example, a score of 8.0 means that an eighth grader can understand the document. For most documents, aim for a score of approximately 7.0 to 8.0. The formula for the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level score is: (.39 x ASL) + (11.8 x ASW) – 15.59 where: ASL = average sentence length (the number of words divided by the number of sentences) ASW = average number of syllables per word (the number of syllables divided by the number of words) Understand how languages affect readability scores: The languages that you use in a document can affect how your Office program checks and presents readability scores.
The bottom line for all document and online content is to first establish who our targeted audience will be for any given on or offline content and proofread and edit our content carefully to make sure our intended audience readily understands and engages in that content...and ultimately wants to see more. Audience readability must be our first consideration at all times and build on that reading experience through high-quality content for the best possible informational experience. Please share this post through the share buttons provided below in support of the author/poet and Creative Arts. Thank you! © Don MacIver, Author, Poet 2015; All Rights Reserved Don MacIver Poetry © 2015 Author’s Publications © 2015
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How best do we as business groups or individuals and those who have products and/or services to sell most effectively get the message out to the masses in an efficient, targeted way so that we are not simply throwing darts aimlessly in the air instead of highly focused, targeted audience reach for that ever-elusive bullseye? The time and cost factors involved are crucial to our success. Whether a small business startup, a corporate entity, a publishing author, writer or an individual wanting to gain exposure for what it is we have to share through our online presence, our websites and blogs, the challenge of how best to market our content, how best to strategize going about getting the word out is foremost in our minds. In this article I will share a host of articles, as posted by Social Media Examiner, an outstanding resource for maximizing our social media tools and strategy to our best advantage, through their article post 31 Must Read Social Media Marketing Articles. Perhaps the single most important lesson that I have learned over the years is that through researching those who have succeeded and achieved levels of expertise in their respective industry we discover through process and execution of those proven methods that it is much better to emulate success rather than attempting to reinvent the wheel in terms of marketing for brand awareness and recognition. Adaptability to change is key to moving forward as the dynamics of search engine algorithms change with frequency. Optimization of our website content, the website or blog itself, article titles, headings, subheadings and body text, meta tag descriptions and more all have to change as new search parameters are introduced. Much as most of us would love to see this as a one-off effort on our part, far from the reality. From the 31 articles shared in the linked post by Social Media Examiner we find a generous resource of best practices written by experts in the social media marketing industry who share ways to zero in on what will work best for our respective targeted audience. Here is a shortlist of ten of the thirty-one articles found in the post and all thirty-one of the informative articles are most certainly worth a read and actionable response:
Social media continues to be an effective tool in our content marketing strategy and the content we share on our social media space also must evolve in best practices and be optimized for critical market and search exposure. If we do not establish solid search engine visibility our site ranking will suffer terribly and we will be virtually invisible to the searching community that wants what we have to offer. Please share your thoughts on this post and the linked articles through comment below. What were your highlights from the articles presented? If you have found this article useful please share it with others. Best wishes are extended to all marketers in their endeavours and if you have any questions feel free to submit them through our contact form on the Contact page and I'll be happy to respond. One of the most fundamental aspects of brand awareness and recognition in 2015 is the effective implementation of a solid search engine optimization campaign on our websites. Seo strategy and solid, quality content that informs, inspires and fully engages go hand in hand with the current dynamics necessary to ensure that our products or services website is highly visible in search engine results pages. I'm introducing a series of articles on this complex and challenging subject along with expert videos that will help you gain insights for moving forward with your own game plan, to improve upon your own online experience and website exposure results. What these experts share are critical steps to take to ensure that you are satisfying Google requirements and increase your site rank experience. Interestingly, it would seem that experts are somewhat at odds with the best formula for success yet in the end it would seem that content continues to win the day and elements within that content need to include keyword and keyword phrase implementation effectively situated within our article/blog titles, headlines and subheadlines and within the context of our body text where the meat of the story is conveyed. Getting a handle on what is needed in terms of our website SEO, to what extent and how we will work the implementation side of the equation...whether to research extensively and develop our own strategy and implementation or outsource this critical aspect of our website visibility for search engines and getting highly positioned on search engine results pages...without both of these elements of SEO working well our online presence is just not going to happen. As a business entity, can you afford to be restricted to an audience of one? Keep in touch to find out more by subscribing to the Key Word Blog. Take a look now... SEO in the here and now is a reality better left out of sight, out of mind you say? What is SEO anyway? Run a Google search using the term “search engine optimization” or “SEO” and the results are in the dozens of millions and for many it may read like science fiction but it is the cornerstone of search engine visibility today more than ever.
In this article I’ll talk about SEO and why it plays such a critical role for the successful engagement of your website and how search engine visibility comes into play. I can’t tell you how often I come across client websites that are seriously lacking in SEO for organic searching. When I raise the issue with those clients my initial question is most often followed by a moment of silence. Mammoth search engine mogul Google leads their industry by a landslide and their ‘algorithms’, essentially a set of rules for online presence which are defined by problem solving in a finite set of steps such that when followed as best practice by anyone with an internet purpose, define how we develop our website and related online content and brand marketing. Clients frequently ask me questions about whether on page SEO is really all that important or that effective and if it is so important, how do they go about changing their website and marketing content to achieve better results. Are you, like those clients, extremely frustrated that you have invest so much time and energy into developing an attractive website with stellar product or services content presentation and you simply are not getting the website traffic that you had expected? SEO Works Rest assured that employing SEO techniques does indeed work. There are critical steps to follow in developing your online content effectively incorporating SEO strategy and the results are telling. Research from the experts will help guide you through the steps to ensure a sound organic search optimization framework is in place. If it all seems just too complicated and time-consuming consider hiring a professional to get the job done. SEO is an ongoing process and you need to understand the basic principles to apply. You will also need to stay abreast of the frequently changing dynamics of the algorithmic playbook or risk falling perilously behind. SEO Is Here To Stay For the foreseeable future SEO will remain on the forefront of online technology and critical best practice. Search engines have their differences when it comes to the whole subject but Google being the powerhouse that it is, the other players march pretty much the same tune and regardless, if you want to be visible online (and isn’t that everyone’s greatest desire?), playing by Google’s rules becomes essential. ‘Keywords’, the buzzword on everybody’s lips in recent times, is the online language application that makes search engine visibility become a reality. Without effective development of keywords and keyword phrase implementation throughout our websites and all related online presence including blogs, marketing articles, our social media and professional networking platforms and more, the search engines cannot effectively connect with our content as it is interwoven online like a complicated web of intricate touch points all relative and relevant to our hub web and blog site locations. And without essential keyword implementation those touch point locations do not interconnect in a meaningful way that display collectively in organic search results. SEO Return On Investment When comparing costs related to implementation of effective SEO with various other available methods of online marketing including paid advertising, social media marketing, lead generation through purchased leads for email marketing platforms, we find that search engine optimization generates a considerable ROI. Given that we can even develop skills necessary to implement SEO independent of professional services, that ROI can become incrementally more productive in terms of ROI. Search Engine Reliance on Product/Service Decisions A huge majority of pre-purchase decision making now begins with customers referring to online information including product and services reviews. The internet has evolved into our daily resource for virtually every aspect of pre-purchase research in terms of which products best suit our needs to who offers those products and services and where they are located whether locally or through online purchase and shipment. In that regard, just consider for a moment where your web content needs to be in terms of visibility to capture a solid market share of your own vs. staring at a telephone that rarely rings. Without putting SEO into place wherever you exist online you will experience great difficulty getting found and that being the case internet searchers will simply go to your competitors instead. Mobile Devices and Local Search The reality of the day is that use of mobile devices has exploded. Take a look at percentages of those using their mobile technology to search for markets of interest, especially locally, is astounding though not at all surprising. People’s lifestyles today are fast-paced and demanding. They don’t have time to locate a phone book, especially where publicly telephone service is virtually non-existent. They are carrying their mobile devices for fast and ready communications and as a reference tool of choice. When they want something they want to find it fast, connect with the merchant and make a fast, informed purchase. The bottom line here is to make sure your website or blog are mobile friendly with high quality, ‘responsive’ content that has suitable presentation for the mobile technology that is quickly coming to dominate the marketplace. Quality Content Rules A close suitor to search engine optimization is the need for high quality content that is optimized with keywords, keyword phrases and anchor text. Keep your site and marketing content updated, fresh with new and relevant, useful information that site visitors can take action on right now. Suggested keyword density of 3% of overall content quantity is the current standard that should be followed. Exceeding that density level will run you the risk of negative search engine ranking and even being penalized for perceived keyword ‘stuffing’ or spam-like activity. Loading up your content with keyword elements virtually without restriction was once an acceptable practice but not anymore. Beware of best SEO practices to avoid costly penalty that could render your online presence virtually nonexistent. Make sure that you have carefully researched for best and most relevant keyword implementation as it directly applies to your market, otherwise your online presence will show up in non-relevant search results which again looks bad to search engines. Ensure that your content is carefully thought out in advance, informative and reads in a way that captures your viewer’s attention and compels their response in a positive way. Dull, overloaded content laced with redundancy only serves to frustrate a reader who typically skims through content to first of all determine if it is what they are looking for and secondly whether or not to read on and make a decision to contact you for more information or make a purchase decision. Remember, Google and the various other search engines crawl your content with frequency to evaluate your relevance and search visibility. SEO Practices; An Ongoing Process Keep this principal in your sights moving forward. Keep you content updated, highly relevant and informative and make sure your content follows best practices of the day in every respect including SEO algorithm standards. Stay abreast of new trends and necessary practices online. If your business is not developing in a positive direction you are falling behind and your competitors are moving full steam ahead. Stay sharp and innovative…don’t copy, be creative, relevant and exceptional. Know your marketplace and your competitors, offer value and differentiate yourself and what you offer with something of value that your competitors do not or cannot offer in kind. Keyword Planning Effective SEO planning and implementation begins with finding the right keywords to adopt for your own product or service orientation. Make sure your keywords are creative yet highly relevant. Do not rely simply on your imagination to establish a list of best-use keywords and keyword phrases. There are a number of effective keyword planning tools available online. One such tool is the Google Adwords Keyword Planner Tool. While the Adwords element of this Google service is paid, the keyword planner tool is free. As with any such tool, it takes a little practice to understand the dynamics of the tool and how best to manipulate your keyword search for best results. This Google keyword essential tool in the webmaster arsenal produces a host of single word and keyword phrase combinations, their relative monthly frequency in organic searches, their level of competition, suggested bid level for PPC campaigns and more. While in the early stages of your online presence, the time when you are a relative unknown, best practice suggests that you opt for those keywords from the planner tool results that are frequently/most commonly used in search terms AND which are relatively medium-level in terms of competition rating. Both of these values are stated in the keyword results page(s) which will also deliver keyword results in terms of relevant groups to target. Understanding the dynamics of this tool’s best keyword parameters to suggest and ensuing results is critical to finding and implementing the best possible keyword content for your online optimization. Where To Effectively Place Keywords/Phrases Just as important as finding the best keyword and keyword phrase combinations to implement is where to place your keyword elements. Website and Blogs: Titles and Headings/Subheadings – Including keyword elements within the context of titles and headings/subheadings on your website and blog are essential elements of website SEO. Make sure that where keywords are applied in these elements they read back naturally (as a natural component of the sentence or title/heading structure). If on reading back an optimized title or heading the keyword seems unnatural or out of place then you MUST re-phrase until that natural read is achieved, otherwise the search engines will penalize you for perceived spam-like content/keyword stuffing activity. Make such content highly relevant and compelling. The title and headings are the starting point for capturing your reader’s attention. Make the best out of creative, captivating title and heading content that compels your site visitors to want to read on rather than click out. Body Text – Incorporate carefully planned and executed keywords and keyword phrases within the context of your content, ensuring that the keyword elements are highly relevant to the subject matter. Maintain that ‘natural’ integration of your keyword elements wherever they are placed within your content. SEO analysis takes into account which keywords and phrases are used and where they are placed for greatest effectiveness in that natural presence within the context of your content. Exceed the current suggested guideline of a maximum 3% keyword density of your content to your detriment. Remember, the search engines are keeping track! Remember too, that long tail keywords work very naturally within the context of sentences. Also an effective SEO application is the use of keyword synonyms, words that are similar to primary keywords and are also picked up and favoured by the search engines. Content Tags – Content tags are a critical element of search engine optimization. As the name would suggest, content ‘tags’ are essential content identifiers that are picked up by the search engines and help to ensure that your content shows up in organic search results. Play down the importance of careful tag selection. Web writers often rush this element of content publication online having completed the blog post or article itself and feeling that the tags are insignificant or non-essential. Give tagging as much attention as the determination of keyword selection and make sure that some of those top keywords (always highly relevant to the content itself) are found in the tags as well. Tag keyword elements are as critical as implementation within body text and post titles or headlines. Meta Tags – Where you have access to your website or blog meta descriptions in your site’s dashboard, editor or settings controls, make sure your site’s top keywords are included in your meta tag descriptions. Incorporating this critical element of website SEO is extremely important. Search engines continue to include the meta tags as one of the key identifiers of online content. While some search engines give this element less significance, it continues to be a barometer of measure in the search visibility process. Sidebar Content SEO – Another often overlooked element for SEO opportunity is sidebar content. While there is less opportunity for inclusion of keywords in your narrower sidebar fields, don’t exclude them from the optimization strategy. Whether within the brief context of a sidebar element or its title/heading, infuse that content with relevant keywords as well. Always be mindful of the overall site keyword density when adding SEO to sidebar elements. Site Navigation Bar – Keywords can also be used in page name tabs within the navigation bar and site maps. Tab names are normally very brief in length, a matter of one, two or three words. Ensure the page name so tabbed reads highly relevant and natural. Header Text; Headings & Sub-headings – Whether stand alone within the header element of a website or blog or as a text overlay in the header, here is another perfect opportunity to apply keyword elements…in moderation. Headers should not be cluttered with excess textual content...case in point our own homepage header. Keep your header clean, attractive, visually pleasing and always relevant to the site’s purpose and conveyance. Maintain a high level of quality and in a few well placed words identify to the site visitor exactly what your site is all about…this is NOT the place to fall short in that respect. A brief call to action can also be effectively well-placed in the header to prompt the visitor to find out more. Remember that statistically, you have but a few minutes to engage your website visitors – they must be able to clearly identify what your site is about and what you offer with a quick scan of your homepage and within no more than five or six minutes, preferably sooner. The growing trend in the day is minimal website or blog visitor tolerance for fluff or ambiguous content. They want to know within a few minutes of landing on your site that your content will provide them with what they are looking for…or they will click out fast and never return. Anchor Text – Within the context of your article or blog body text incorporate a few words of sentence wording as ‘anchor text’ linking to related content or elements on another page of your site just I did above with “our own homepage header” linking to this site’s homepage. Anchor text linking is yet another form of on page SEO which actually helps search engine crawlers understand the mapping or site layout dynamics by linking your various site pages in this manner. Anchor text is an easy application of natural SEO writing and content strategy. Social Media Optimization – Often overlooked, social media locations are yet another critical element of your SEO strategy and implementation. Start your SEO right on your social media profile whether Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Pinterest, Instagram and more. Make sure to extend your SEO strategy to your professional LinkedIn profile as well. This cannot be understated. Carry your SEO across your entire online presence using the same essential keyword group to ensure that an online correlation of all of those elements are picked up by the search engines. In conclusion, webmasters want to be ever-mindful of SEO implementation and the various elements of your web content to incorporate keywords and keyword phrases to your best advantage. Post a list of these critical elements for SEO best practice in a conspicuous location above or reasonably close to your computer as a constant reminder every time you update your site with a new post or refresh your site’s flagship elements that will drive traffic to your site. For any website owner or business professional/entrepreneur with a commercial enterprise for which they endeavour to establish brand recognition and a growing, sustainable position in the marketplace, one thing is for sure; getting on board and staying informed of near-constant changes in the SEO industry is critical. In the past five years alone the roadmap for best SEO and marketing practices has changed tremendously. Don't expect the heady pace of industry and search engine dynamics to change in the foreseeable future. We simply need to keep up or fall miserably behind. SEO & Content Marketing Trends Primary focus in terms of search engine optimization (SEO) moving forward will be more on the technical side with essential search visibility elements for web marketing while content marketing will drive search engine ranking. Effective SEO will require thorough keyword research, clean indexing, strong meta tag descriptions and more while content marketing with high quality content, carefully planned and designed wording specifically centric to targeted audience groups, will be a critical factor in search engine visibility. Dressing For Success With Website and Mobile SEO The major search engines, Google in particular, are placing critical emphasis on website optimization and a clear majority of web browsing today is done on mobile so it is imperative that web owners and administrators have a clear focus on website and mobile visibility and usability. Google now has resources dedicated to mobile usability in their Google Webmaster arsenal to help website owners align their content accordingly. Once mobile friendly, websites need to be tested on mobile devices to make sure user functionality and strong visual elements are achieved, error-free, otherwise Google will penalize those sites who are not compliant and mobile user engaged. Forbes 10 Steps For Mobile Optimization provides sound information relating to this critical web user issue. External and Back Linking Our linking practices to external websites and also backlinking from relevant sites of authority or expertise to our own site has taken on greater significance. Research carefully on best practices for establishing backlinks and your own external linking. Google looks very carefully at what we are linking to and there has to be a direct correlation or relevance between our own website and those we link to and with. It should also be a carefully graduated process so that we are not perceived by the search engines to be artificially linking or 'stuffing' our site specifically to our own advantage. Socials Signals & Ranking Industry experts are now anticipating that social media signals are beginning to generate Google attention where the search giant has maintained a denial that they gave any consideration to social marketing in relation to their ranking algorithm process. Greater evidence of the social factor is anticipated in 2015. Shift in Strategies for Ranking Leading industry experts are anticipating that networking and relationship building is quickly becoming a critical factor and even surpassing the importance of the technical aspects of optimization. Web marketing going forward will mean that business proprietors and marketings are going to have to embrace much greater emphasis on the human connection as a key factor in the success of their audience reach and engagement. That shift in marketing focus has already begun with trending indicators that we must reach out and interact directly with potential clients or customers and in order to humanize our brand we need to stand out by reaching out, even on a one-on-one basis. Marketing success today is more and more about establishing a relationship and trust with prospective customers. Blogging campaigns and building genuine relationships with brand advocates and influencers and interactive engagement one-on-one in social media circles are showing positive results in this regard. Today's Marketing Integration In such a hugely competitive and evolving brand marketing environment, the focus for effective marketing implementation today means pulling together each of the various strategies and tools in our arsenal to work in tandem, converging to realize the same positive results. Marketing and SEO specialization is evolving quickly to a more 'content marketing strategist' centric focus moving forward. Not only is how we reach out ever-changing but equally important who we reach out to. Previous marketing emphasis was often more on a broad form blanket reach approach but it stands to reason that with any successful marketing, especially online, we need to know who our potential market is and how we effectively target that more specific market. The major search engines today are focusing more and more attention on providing us with the means to determine our best market reach through keyword planner tools, powerful website analytics and more. Knowing the dynamics of those searching online, including age demographics, geographical dominance, language, interactive dynamics and the most used search terms for particular industries, products and/or services are all coming into critical play for achieving greater results in our brand marketing efforts. How we establish that all-important human connection is quickly becoming the defacto element of focus as we move forward with our audience and influencer reach strategy and marketing solutions. THE BUSINESS OF HELPING OTHERS Please Share This Post (vertical post share bar down left side of page) As this feature post reflects through its title, I am in the business of helping others. I won’t allow this to sound or feel pitchy but I am reaching out to each and every one of you…and beyond. Through my services business Lasting Impressions Editing, I am helping clients around the globe to raise the bar in terms of their website, document and book manuscript content quality and reader engagement. In a nutshell, here’s how I help those clients: · Content writing, editing and proofreading · Websites, personal and professional documents, book manuscripts · Content Search Engine & Social Media Optimization · SEO & SMO strategy & services, consultation and coaching/training · Website content strategy & development for increased visitor engagement, web traffic and response growth, increased followers/subscribers/customers and sales, search engine visibility and better site ranking Today’s business and publishing climate is such that content perfection is critical and demanded. I help clients everyday who are frustrated by the lack of visibility they have on the internet, the lack of new customer development and a general lack of revenue for all their tireless efforts at GETTING NOTICED. PLEASE SHARE this feature on your own social and professional media pages, to your friends, colleagues…anyone who might benefit from talking to me…no obligation. If you have any questions feel free to contact me here. **My social media links are on my website…let’s connect** Special thanks to all! View Our Services or Contact Us To Find Out More By Don MacIver, Writer, Editor Lasting Impressions Editing Are you frustrated by a lack of traffic to your website or blog posts? Are your older posts no longer sustaining fresh reads? Are your readers commenting and sharing your posts with others? If your answers to any of these questions is not fully positive read on. Like many business professionals, writers, authors and marketers of products and services, you may well feel like you're languishing in the background with minimal results for your tireless efforts to be seen and heard in a sea of countless competitors. Your tireless efforts just aren't gaining traction and your bottom line is quickly becoming a huge disappointment. In this feature post I'll share with you effective ways to capture attention where others fall short. Quality content is essential and that means you need to generate highly relevant, unique and informative, 'evergreen' content for your website and blog that stands out, is value added, useful and tells your readers why they should look to you for their next purchase. Plan each of your website articles or blog posts in advance with a strong focus on the following:
Blog posts and website articles are an increasingly critical element of content strategy and development and the textual and visual elements should be given equal consideration as they engage our readers in tandem. Stop for a moment to consider the rapidly increasing popularity of sites like Pinterest amoung social and professional networking circles and how they in turn are being utilized for increased web traffic generation. The power of words and visuals cannot be understated. Want to learn more about how to increase your website and blog reach and visitor engagement? By Don MacIver, Owner, Editor, Writer, Author © Lasting Impressions 2015 Wouldn't it be nice to see your website or blog show up in the Top 10 positioning on search engine results pages? Top 10 is the ultimate gold when it comes to where our web pages are going to show up when people are searching for our products or services and if we want to see meaningful results for all of our tireless efforts to get our websites or blogs seen we need to make sure that the content we create for our sites will be highly visible to search engines. That all seems pretty daunting and for many a frustrating part of online website marketing. The thing is that we simply cannot aimlessly practice online website content writing without including keywords and keyword phrases that will be recognized by search engines AND commonly used words and phrases that are most often used by people when they do online searches. Online document and website content strategy is a critical part of increased reader engagement and web traffic. We may have the best products or services available today but if we don't understand search engine optimization and social media optimization our sites will never be seen by the majority of those searching online. As equally important is writing high quality, clean, concise, informative and compelling content that will thoroughly interest and engage our readers and leave them with an immediate desire to find out more. Search engine visibility and website or blog site ranking by the search engines is extremely important for anyone marketing their products, services or non-commercial sites online today. Without being an expert in SEO practices there are tools available online to help find the best words and phrases to use in our web content. Google continues to be the largest search engines by far and our ultimate goal is reaching that Top 10, page 1 search results positioning on Google as well as the other major search engines. Google.com Webmaster Tools: Start off by registering for Google tools and resources. I signed up for a Gmail account and have access to Google's powerhouse webmaster tools that help guide website owners through their various tools and resources for search engine optimization and more. Google Adwords Keyword Planner: Once you have access to Google's treasure chest of resources go the the Google Keyword Planner tool site linked here. If you want to use Google Adwords there is cost involved but to simply research keywords and keyword phrases the keyword planner tool itself is free. The tool landing page shows a number of options to choose from and you want to go to the first option provided which is "search for new keyword and ad groups ideas." Next you will see a search campaign box where you need to enter what product or service (or type of site content) you are offering. Think carefully about the commonly known names or phrases that most people would use to search for your site...never use highly technical jargon/language...keep it simple. Then enter your full website address ie http:www... followed by entering your product, service or website/blog content category. Again, think in terms of the most commonly known terms for the category that would best describe what you offer on your site. What follows those first three primary fields is 'Targeting' and 'Customize Your Search'. In these two sections you want to focus carefully on geographic regions you are targeting an audience in, their language, search engine options and keyword search filters. There is a small question mark icon located just above these two fields for brief helpful information on what you need to focus on here. Once this form is completed click "Get Ideas". What you will see on the results page that follows are a series of keyword or keyword phrases which are the most commonly used terms used by people searching on the internet, a count of the number of searches made for each keyword or phrase, a competition rating and more. Important: From the results described above, you want to choose keywords and keyword phrases that will serve your own objectives best. If you are a new business startup (just getting started with a new/first business) choose the keywords and phrases that are medium competition and number of searches. Choosing higher competition ranking and the highest number of searches produces search results to highly established and ranked websites that place them in the Top 10 or 20 (Page 1 and 2) search results positions and even if you have a small search engine visibility, because of the much higher ranked sites for the chosen keywords/keyword phrases your site will never get seen (because your site is listed a multiple of pages deep in the search results). Remember that most people only click on sites listed on Page 1 of search results and a very small percentage will ever go into Page 2 results. Keyword Density: How many times you include keywords and keyword phrases (collectively) within each paragraph or web page is somewhat subjective but very close attention needs to be taken here. Google is frequently changing its methods and tolerances for acceptable use and volume of keywords within our content. If overused, and when identical keywords or phrases are repeated, Google now looks upon that practice in a very negative way, commonly referred to as "keyword stuffing" and you can expect that in doing so Google will penalize your site ranking heavily or render your site essentially invisible through poor ranking and search visibility. There was a period of time where volume of keywording on a website was acceptable but NOT anymore...do so at your own peril. Search engines establish 'algorithms' for search ranking and visibility criteria which are essentially the rules that must be followed if we want people to be able to find us in search queries. Ignoring such rules is very risky and will most likely eliminate any chance we have of getting noticed, gaining a following, achieving reader engagement and ultimately our targeted new clients, customers and sales. Keyword Density Target: To ensure that your website stays in the 'safe' zone for search engine visibility and ranking you should target a keyword density of approximately 1% - 3% of your total article/web page content. In other words, for every 100 words of content, use a maximum of 3 keyword or keyword phrase applications. To easily calculate this density, while your MS Word document is open, look in the lower left area of your system tray at the bottom of your monitor screen. You will see a page count ie 'Page 1 of...' and then 'Words' which tells you how many words there are in your open article. To calculate the percentage of keywords and phrases that occur in the article, count those keywords/phrases in total and then divide that count number by the total number of words in the article. If you have more than the recommended 1% - 3% keyword density, remove some of those keywords (or other content reworded) until you are back to the density limit suggested. There is more to website ranking and search engine optimization for increasing search visibility and website traffic results than can reasonably be covered in this article but the essentials outlined above will give you a good start at improving how visible your website or blog will be in search engine queries and help those sites begin to establish ranking by the search engines. The key to establishing best results is to make sure you stay current on the methods best applied for your site as time passes and search engines change their algorithms and rules of engagement. Test Your Search Results and Ranking: Remember to frequently monitor your website/blog search results by running your own organic searches on Google, Yahoo, Bing and other search engines. For myself, I would use search terms like "website editing, Peachland, BC" or "document proofreading in Peachland, BC" or "social media optimization in Peachland, BC". When you see your own site search results placed on Page 3 or higher you know you're on the right track. Always use 'organic' search terms like I have illustrated here for my own searches. Don't use your site title as the vast majority of people searching don't know you or your site title and they won't get results that include your site. Keep tweaking your keywords and phrases and other relevant content wording until you succeed in Top 10, Page 1 search results position...and celebrate! Now you're talking!! Social Media Optimization: Similar keyword and phrase practices apply to social media posts. It's easy to forget keyword content in social media site posts (Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LiveJournal, Tumblr, Pinterest etc.) and professional networks like LinkedIn but optimizing our social media content is equally important for generating website and blog traffic. Also make sure that your profile on each of those networks has keywording because it helps users of those networks to find you (and your related website/other locations) in their searches online. When you connect or get followers make sure you interest with them individually through post comments, sharing, Tweeting and private messaging. Resources: As a website or blog owner or administrator/marketer, make sure you do research on all aspects of writing website and online document content by doing internet searches. Find the experts online that can help guide you through the processes. Emulate success...do what successful people do. Don't try to reinvent the wheel. Find others who are successful on the internet, learn their methods and apply those successful methods for best results. For years I have consistently referred to two highly successful websites to learn current best practices and I have seen very positive results with my own website, blog and social media presence. SiteProNews is an excellent resource for breaking technology, social media and search engine news. SocialMediaExaminer is an outstanding resource for social media marketing, newsletters, events, networking tips and resources and live podcasts hosting interviews with many of the social media and business marketing giants of today who share how they have achieved lofty heights and their methods. Practice what these successful folks have done and you will save yourself an awful lot of wasted time attempting to get it right. Ultimately you need to decide whether to apply keyword and keyword phrase content on your website or blog yourself or hire an expert in that service discipline to do it for you. It will take some time to achieve best results on your own. Remain patient and focused! Monitor your website or blog data through analytics as you make changes to keywording to see what positive or negative affect new (or eliminated/updated) keywords have on your website's visitor traffic and engagement and search visibility. Most important of all....always focus on reaching that treasured Top 10 page 1 of search results! That is when the most significant results begin to happen! |
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Active Search Results AddURL.nu Editors Association of Canada Darlene Elizabeth Williams Grammarly Handbook Keyword Planner Tool Louise Harnby Proofreader MOZ SEO SEMrush SiteProNews Social Media Examiner Wordstream Advertising Writer's Digest Writers Market Writers Net Website & Document/Manuscript Analysis, Editing, Proofing, Writing & SEO High quality, engaging and actionable web and document content is critical now more than ever. Highly positioned visibility in search engine results pages ... |
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