Archive for May, 2011

Google SEO

Monday, May 23rd, 2011

Before we can adequately describe the role of Google SEO Consultants, the terminology associated with search engine optimisation (SEO) needs to be defined.

Google:

As most internet users know, Google is the best known and most used internet search engine on the planet. Founded in 1998 by two graduate students from Stanford University, Google is now used to carry out around 75 percent of all web searches. Its market share varies between countries, from around 85 percent in Western Europe, 40 percent in the USA and Japan where Yahoo has a strong presence, to less than 10 percent in China where Baidu is the market leading search engine. In order to be successful, a website needs to be high in the search engine rankings, particularly in Google’s rankings as a result of its dominant position.

Search Engine Optimisation:

Search engine optimisation (or optimization) is the technique whereby a webmaster optimises the structure of web pages so that they appear high in a search engine’s rankings.

Search engines operate ‘crawler’ programs that search for web pages across the internet and index the links between them. The search engines use complex algorithms to calculate the popularity of pages in order to create the all important rankings that are displayed when a user makes a search using Google or one of its competitors.

Emergence of the SEO Consultant

When search engines first appeared in the mid 1990s, webmasters could simply submit web page URLs (addresses) to the search engines, so that their websites would appear in the search engine listings. The early search engine algorithms used meta tag keywords included in web pages to calculate their rankings. Website creators quickly realised that carefully chosen meta tags could increase their search engine rankings. This use (and abuse) of meta tags led to the concept of search engine optimization, a term first used in 1996. In addition to the abuse of meta tags, unscrupulous webmasters have also attempted to improve their rankings by linking their websites to an increasing number of other sites, many of them bogus. To counteract the increasing manipulation of search engine rankings, search engine operators were forced to refine their algorithms, a process that continues to this day.

Google SEO Consultants

Research has shown that intelligent web design can significantly increase traffic to your website and that the services of a leading Google SEO consultancy can help increase your ROI.

Because of Google’s dominance in the search engine market, many website owners consider employing Google SEO consultants to improve the PageRank (Google’s web page ranking system) of their websites. The leading search engine providers are understandably secretive about the algorithms that they use because of the importance of the rankings to website owners. This is where the expertise of a skilled Google SEO consultant can really make a quantifiable difference to your website.

Google SEO Techniques

Search engine optimisation techniques used by Google SEO consultants can be broadly characterised into two types, White Hat and Black Hat – remember the old Western films!

White Hat SEO

SEO consultants who optimise websites using White Hat methods are unlikely to cause antipathy with Google and the other search engine operators. White Hat SEO follows search engine operators’ rules and aims to provide good rankings on a long term basis using legitimate SEO practices.

Black Hat SEO

The aim of Google SEO consultants who employ Black Hat methods is to increase websites’ PageRank by using techniques designed to deceive the search engine algorithms. This may result in short term improvements in rankings but could increase the risk of websites being de-listed by Google for using dishonest practices to manipulate the rankings.

SEO Consultants Relationships with Google

Google does not directly endorse SEO consultants, so consultants’ marketing claims regarding their relationship with Google should always be viewed with that fact in mind. Nevertheless, any reputable Google SEO consultant should be able to improve the ranking of a website without incurring the wrath of Google.

Tags: , ,
Posted in search engine optimisation | Comments Off

Google Panda

Tuesday, May 17th, 2011

The Google Panda update is a game changer in terms of search and website ranking. The last time Google updated their search algorithm this much was back in 2007 when the Google Florida update discounted links and PageRank and re-arranged the search results for thousands of websites. This time it’s no different.

Google’s update is a clear attempt to improve the organic search results by degrading the existing spam sites which pollute them. In order to do this it has upgraded its algorithm to look for specific ‘signature’ elements which now mark a site which has spam content.

By understanding what the characteristics of a spam site are from the perspective of the Google search engine you can reverse-engineer it and begin to understand what you need to do in order to stop your website from being adversely affected by the Panda Update.

What Google Considers now to be ‘Spam’ Websites

1. Websites with content that is not sufficiently original – it does not matter if your content is product description (which is iterated many times across the web) or you are reporting something which has happened and can therefore not take much liberty with it. Google now wants to see authority which means that originality is key.

2. Websites which are keyword stuffed and which are a little out of date in their content also flag up Google’s new filter for spam websites.

3. Scraped content or content which has been brought in from other websites is of particular risk as Google now values originality above the bulk of content in question. This penalizes, of course eCommerce sites with product descriptions which repeat specifications posted on hundreds of other websites and it penalizes anyone who has been working on a small budget to get in as much content as possible by buying it from Content Farm websites.

4. Websites which have poor navigability and high abandonment rate, all evidenced through Google’s anonymous gathering of Click Through Rates (CTRs) will also feel the might of the Panda hammer.

If your website does any of these you are tripping up Google’s flags and will probably see declining traffic. If you have a combination of one or more of these issues showing up on your website you really need to start thinking what to do about it and simply start doing it.

The ultimate message of the Google Panda update is that unless you are prepared to take fast, actionable steps to make your website appear live and of value to the web Google is going to pretend it’s invisible in which case it may as well be.

Tags: , ,
Posted in Google Panda | Comments Off

Why Is SEO So Important?

Monday, May 9th, 2011

So why is SEO so important? Millions of people every day search for information on search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo. For any given search term, there are anywhere from a few hundred to a few million search results that reference that given search term. Generally speaking, the search results are designed to be ranked in the order of their relevance to the searcher’s search term, or keyword (or keyword phrase).

Most people, when searching for a keyword or keyword phrase, will click on one of top 10 search results on the first page of the search results, or will initiate another search. Therefore in order to gain a reasonable amount of search engine traffic, a website should appear in the top 10 search results for a given keyword. Given the fact that there are for some keywords millions, literally millions of websites having some relevance to the keyword, it can often be a difficult feat, if not almost impossible, to get your webpage in the first 10 search results for a given keyword.

However, by learning the techniques by which the search engines decide which web pages should show in the top 10 search results of a given keyword or keyword phrase, and by optimizing your Web site, in such a way that your website outperforms other websites or web pages in the search engines algorithms, you can literally send your website or webpage to the top 10 search results in the search engines, surpassing many other web pages and websites, if you know what to do.

Although speaking from experience, SEO is not something for the faint hearted. If you are competent and you know what you are doing then go for it. But do be aware that you could possibly get your website sand boxed if you do the SEO incorrectly or use black hat techniques and once your web site has been sand boxed, it’s up to the gods at Google when you get it back! It could be a day…..or 6months. In my opinion, SEO is best left to the professionals, especially those with a proven track record like Onit Solutions.

Tags: , ,
Posted in Search Engine Optimization | Comments Off

Effective, Affordable Pixel Advertising.

Tuesday, May 3rd, 2011

In recent years there has been a massive drive in the business world to save on human costs by selling products online. For this reason millions of websites have popped up all over the internet trying to do just that. Whilst the internet does provide a chance for businesses to save money by cutting down on wages, many websites struggle to get the right volume of hits in order to kick start their website sales. What these businesses need to do is advertise their websites more effectively to increase awareness and hopefully generate more activity on the site.

If you’re looking to advertise your website online without spending a fortune then pixel advertising could be the solution you need. Pixel advertising is a cheap, effective and modern way to put your brand name, company logo or product information on a website than can direct traffic to your own website. Pixel websites display the advert you pay for on their website in the form of a link so anybody visiting the site who views your advert can be directed to your own site. Advertising in this way is not ludicrously expensive and pixel adverts can be bought for as little as ten pounds on many UK sites.

Adverts are usually charged per pixel, for example a ten pixel display may cost ten pound on a site that charges one pound per pixel. Adverts will appeal to smaller companies looking to keep expenditure on advertising to a minimum. Pixel advertising provides a cost-effective and modern alternative to the more orthodox and lucrative schemes such as T.V, Radio and Newspapers. In order to gauge the potential of such schemes one need only look to the success of people like Alex Tew and his website ‘million dollar homepage’. Pixel advertising may well be the future of web advertising and with the initial success of the idea catching on, now may well be the ideal time to invest in pixel advertising before costs shoot up.

Whilst a website is a great way to sell products, the website will only be successful if people are aware of its existence and the site is generating a lot of interest. In order to generate this interest pixel advertising is a great solution as the sites direct traffic to your website. Pixel Advertising is relatively inexpensive and appeals to small or start-up businesses as there are very little or no costs involved in setting up an account and you just pay for the size of the ad you want, in the position that you want it. Couldn’t be simpler!

Tags: , ,
Posted in pixel advertising | Comments Off