How to Build a Blog Optimized for Search Results in 2016
Having free organic search traffic is still one of the best ways to get visitors to your site.
Ranking in Google has become harder, however. Google continuously updates its algorithm. Each update comes with several websites seeing their traffic numbers tank. The tactics you may be implementing today may get you penalized tomorrow. Therefore, you need to find a sustainable strategy that can stand the test of time and shield you from Google’s algorithm updates.
Here are some simple strategies you can employ right away to build an SEO optimized blog:
Build a Solid Foundation
You need to use the best practices when creating your site.
Best practices are called best practices because they predictably deliver desired results almost every time they are used. By finding out what works then religiously implementing it, you are guaranteed to see dramatic growth in your search traffic.
Building a site that is optimized for SEO begins with choosing the right platform. WordPress is clearly the best choice as it is easy to install and configure and is also SEO friendly.
You also need to choose the right domain name for your business. Your domain name should be professional and easy to remember. Another important issue to pay attention to is the hosting provider. Your choice of hosting can influence your uptime and load speeds; two factors that can determine where you rank in the search engines.
Pay Attention to On-Page SEO
Most marketers, when executing SEO campaigns, focus their energies on off-page SEO while neglecting on-page SEO. You need to understand that without on-page SEO, all off-page SEO efforts are in vain.
On-page SEO helps you communicate to the search engines what your page is all about. When it is clear which keywords your page is targeting, Google will reward you with appearances in its SERPs for relevant searches.
The fundamental component of SEO is keyword usage.How you use keywords on your page communicates the subject matter being written about.
You can ensure optimal keyword usage by:
Starting your titles with keywords: it is not enough that you include your keyword in your title, you should strive to have it towards the beginning of the title. This ensures that the search engines assign enough weight to its importance and relevance to the content on the page.
Include keyword in the first paragraph or first 100 words: introducing your keyword earlier in the article makes the topic of your post clear to the search engines.
Use LSI keywords: LSI keywords are words closely related to your primary keyword. When you use LSI keywords, you make it easier for the search engines to gauge the relevancy of your content to the searches made by a user as well as the quality and depth of your post.
Write Quality Blog Posts
Quality writing will attract and keep readers. You will not be able to rank for long in Google if your content fails the quality test.
Google gauges how helpful your content is through user experience metrics like bounce rates and time-on-page. A poorly written and poorly designed page will have horribly high bounce rates, and Google will quickly figure out that your page is no good.
Besides the words on your page, you need to pay attention to the layout and general design of the page. People skim the online content. Your page layout should aid fast skimming.
You do this by:
- Using headers and sub-headers.
- Using bullets and lists.
- Having short paragraphs.
- Bolding sections of your content.
- Having lots of white space.
- Using images to break up the text.
Have Effective Calls to Action
You want to turn cold search traffic to leads and raving fans. You do this by having them take some particular action on your site such as joining an email list. A call to action is one of the most important components of your page.
There is a good and bad way to go about setting up calls to action on a page. To get it right, you need first to clarify the goal of the call to action. It could invite a visitor to download something, add a product to a cart, share a piece of content on social media, leave a comment, register for a free trial or even sign up for an account.
The things to pay attention to include the color and sizes of buttons, information passed and the language used. Size affects how a button interacts with the content around it. Go for simple and clear language on your calls to action. It should be clearly understood from the word go what action you want the reader to take.
Conclusion
When you build a blog optimized for search results right from day one, you give yourself a chance to win the SEO game.
If you’ve been at this for some time and are just starting to take SEO seriously, do not worry. You can make much progress quickly if you know what to focus on and what to ignore. The points in this article cover the fundamentals to get you started building a blog that is well optimized for search results.
Supernatural Hacks to Build the Best Checkout Process
I love rhetorics, and to me, shopping cart abandonment is like a person calling off his marriage on the day of the marriage. Imagine the mental state of his partner.
Cart abandonment puts shopping sites on the receiving end of a similar experience. Adding punchy headlines and improving the web form design are all quick-fixes. The permanent solution is to design an effective checkout process, so the customer retention rate increases and the rate of abandonment shoots down.
Identifying the challenges
First, marketers need to understand the severity of the problem. The abandonment rate is not 5% or 10%, it’s a staggering 67.75%. I deliberately made it bold, just to describe how big is the challenge.
And if that doesn’t frighten you enough, then here’s another shocker; the cumulative volume of abandoned merchandise is worth $4 trillion. The stat figures here indicate how difficult it is for a marketer to build an effective checkout process that facilitates conversion.
But difficult is one thing and impossible is another. It’s difficult undoubtedly, but it’s not impossible. To build the best checkout, first you need to understand the key reasons behind cart abandonment.
The reasons” alignment
The RRP principle advises us to withhold the price until a customer steps forward in the sales funnel. It has some benefits, but on the downsides, the customer’s reaction to the fine print remains unknown. The result of this is customers abandoning the cart due to a shipping cost that they least expected.
Issues with payment security can also be a reason, but not as impactful as the first one. The unimpressive design of site layout and the form section is yet another reason. Such design may confuse visitors, causing them to abandon the checkout process. Not having promo code may be an issue too.
Mandatory account registration is a big reason. Registration steps are long and tedious, more so, not all users feel comfortable sharing personal details. The strategies to build the best checkout process acknowledge the bottlenecks, stem from the reasons above and aim to solve them.
Here are some of those strategies:
Improving the design
It takes less than a second for a visitor to form an opinion about the checkout page. The problem is even one second is not enough to go through all the design elements. Besides, CSS files may not completely load and the visitor may form a negative impression about the page.
Many e-commerce sites (Nearly 24%) require the shoppers to open an account, which makes the checkout process lengthier and the usability guidelines are also not always followed by them.
These are all checkout page design bottlenecks. To overcome these bottlenecks, designers need to adopt the strategies below:
#Checkout progress indicator:
Cutting down on checkout steps is not always possible. A checkout progress indicator on the top of the site like the one below can give shoppers a definitive idea of how many steps are yet to complete:
Customers may feel a bit relieved after every step knowing they are moving closer to the final step.
Live chat assistance:
During the steps, customers may need help. Live chat support should always be available to them.
Save to cart option:
Due to something that needs urgent attention, a customer might have to leave the checkout process. The “save to cart” option allows him to complete the checkout later sometimes.
Account registration:
It should be optional and not compulsory.
Return policy:
The presence of a return policy assures customers that they could return the product if they feel so.
Checkout buttons:
The buttons should be prominent and have color contrast, so that customers notice them.
Order details:
Allow customers to view past and present order details. Allow them to write reviews too.
Studies have found that design issues account for more than 40% of usability issues and are causing the e-commerce segment to lose as much as $1 billion each year.
Product optimization challenges
Promotional claims often fly in the face of evidence. The online consumer review sites are here to supply evidence. According to statistical data,88% customers trust online reviews, 85% consumers read reviews before they purchase and more than 65% of them read as many as 6 reviews.
Make sure the product can stand up to the claims that you are making about it, and there’s no gap between the actual product experience and the ones that you claim to offer. Other solutions include:
Product photography:
Product photography is not optional, though many e-commerce brands think it is. Good product photography aids in marketing. An ordinary product, captured by a professional’s lenses doesn’t look ordinary.
Loading time:
A site’s loading time shape the product viewing experience. If the site takes too long to load, users will probably abandon it and turn to one of its competitor sites.
360° view:
This is the era of 3D and customers want to view a product from all angles. By dispensing a 360° view of the product, a brand can optimize the product experience.
Product video:
Stats indicate that more than 90% customers use video for running their campaigns and over 80% of them believe the use of video brings positive impact on their campaigns. The benefit of product video is the engagement is product-centric; users are driven to the product.
Availability indicator:
Customers want to know your inventory status. Show them what you have. The following is an example of availability indicator:
As you can see in the image above, all the available items and the online items are shown to customers during the checkout process.
Recommendation list:
The checkout process brings excellent cross-selling opportunities. Recommend customers other products and show them the recommendations in a detailed and listed manner. Here’s an example of this:
Listing recommendations increases the selling opportunities.
Back order:
What if a customer is searching for a product that’s not currently available? Allow back order. Tell the customer that he can order it. As soon as you have it delivered, it’ll be shipped. A back order request must be drafted in a very careful and humble manner.
Product optimization is perhaps the most important among all strategies. Other strategies are:
Payment optimization checklist
The popularity of promo codes is steadily on the rise. The strategic use of discount is a core element in the psychology of pricing. Promo codes lure consumers with discounts and increase customer footfall.
Customers are so taken with promo codes that 57% of them don’t shop from brands that don’t offer promo codes. Payment security is a concern for customers of all types. They carefully examine whether the checkout page is “HTTPS” enabled. Almost 60% consumers abandon the cart if their preferred mode of payment is not available, and 40% trust retailers that offer multiple payment methods.
The powerful payment optimization strategies include:
Discount deals:
Offering promo code is not easy for online shops. At the same time, not offering it may result in losing potential customers. Discount deals can offset the unavailability of promo codes.
Several payment options:
Having more than one payment option indicates earning customer’s trust and easing the payment process for them.
No hidden fees:
Nothing maligns a brand’s image more than hidden fees. This holds true for all kinds of brands, not just online retailers. Eliminating hidden fees benefits customers and helps the brand appear trustworthy.
Security options:
Customers are worried about possible security breach. Make sure the site is TLS verified and recognizes virtual cards. Follow the latest security guidelines to assure customers that your payment system is fully secured.
Successful delivery
The checkout process can never improve if shipping is not optimized. Shipping time and charges are what customers consider important. More than 50% customers will select a new retailer if the shipping charge is high.
24% customers feel the product should be delivered on the day of purchase. Most importantly, over 80% customers feel they’d shop more if no charges are associated with shipping.
An optimized shipping experience can be a leverage for building the best checkout process. Here are some tips to optimize shipping:
Shipping date:
Reveal the tentative shipping date. Customers don’t want to wait for the product with their fingers crossed. Give them a definitive shipping date and positively deliver the product on that date.
Different dates for different regions:
It’s not possible for an online shop to offer a product to an overseas customer on the date of buying, unless the shop operates globally. Hence, install a cutting edge PoS system to calculate the delivery time depending on geographical regions.
Tracking number:
All customers should be provided with tracking numbers so they can later check the status of their orders.
Free shipping:
For mid-size brands, it’s difficult to offer free shipping. They can put some terms and conditions. Don’t keep any of those terms hidden. Reveal them when the customer is in the middle of the checkout.
Feedback survey:
Customer feedback surveys can improve conversion. But customers don’t prefer this much. How about conducting surveys only to repeat visitors? Not bad as an idea.
Conclusion
The tips shared here are unique, in a sense that no online shop has applied all of them yet. Would yours be the first one? Let us know in the comment section.
Creating an Online Course? Avoid These Deadly Blunders
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Neil Patel Acquires the Keyword Suggestion Tool, Ubersuggest and Drastically Improves It
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Awesome Content Ideas for Ecommerce Blogs
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6 Common Ecommerce Blunders to Avoid
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Is Search Engine Submission Necessary?
The simple answer is no – search engine submission isn’t necessary. The majority of search engines nowadays (most notably Google) crawl and index pages by following links. Using that logic, a single inbound link from any already-indexed page will identify your page to the engine. Subsequently, if that page links to other pages within your site, they will also be indexed… and so on.
For this reason, inbound linking is very important. In fact, acquiring back-links may be the most important of SEO. In theory though, a website owner shouldn’t have to ’scout’ or ‘hunt’ for links. If the presented content is of interest, useful, and/or important, there is a natural tendency among web users to link to information. This is the basis for the Google PageRank algorithm.
With all due respect, submitting your site to the search engines can’t hurt. Plus, it only entails about 5 minutes of added work assuming you only submit to the big guys. And once is enough… you don’t need to submit your site more than once. It doesn’t help or get your site crawled any quicker or more often.
It should be noted that submitting your site to Google, Yahoo, MSN, and many others doesn’t cost a fee. Many SEO companies assert that you need to pay to be indexed. This isn’t the case and I would stay away from these companies. They are money hungry and aren’t looking out for your best interest.
Would you ever consider going on a vacation across the country without bringing a map? It is hard enough to find your way in some places with a map. How hard would it be if you tried this adventure without one? Yet, this is exactly what people do every single day in the online world. They tried to build their own businesses online without having a roadmap to success. Then, after months or years of just wandering around online, they give up in frustration and quit. They walk away saying that the Internet doesn’t work for them. The reason it didn’t work is that they didn’t pick up a map and follow it!
You don’t have to end up lost in the online shuffle. Below I will give you ten steps to help you map out your course and get you started in the right direction. It isn’t everything that you need to know by any stretch of the imagination, but it will give you a basic foundation to build upon.
Consider it your beginner’s map to Internet marketing profits.
1. Choose a targeted market
The biggest mistake most people make when starting a business is that they choose a product and then try to find people who want to buy it. If that is the direction you are starting from on your journey, then you are going the opposite direction from your destination. Wise businesses operate from a different concept. They pick a market first, and then they pick a product those people are searching for. In other words, instead of trying to find leads to sell their product to, they find targeted leads and then ask them what they are wanting to buy.
Don’t even consider starting a business until you know exactly where you are going to get your leads from. Think targeted customers first. Then, you can come up with a product for those individuals. Would you rather have 1,000 hits a day at your site of a general audience OR 10 hits a day of people who are desperate and willing to pay any price to buy your products? If you are smart, you will choose the people who are ready to buy!
2. Develop a Product
Next, you need to develop a product or service for this market. Don’t just jump on the bandwagon of affiliate programs when you come to this step. There are three major ways to selling a product online:
a. You create your own exclusive product.
This is the best opportunity you have. If you develop your own product, you can pick it’s price, sell reprint rights to others, set up an affiliate program, etc. Don’t tell me you can’t do this. Tens of thousands of innovative entrepreneurs have used their own information products to get their careers started. You can to.
Throughout your life, I am sure that there is something you have learned that you can share in a How-To product. Maybe you know someone else who has the right knowledge for a How-To product and you could offer to help them create a product if you both shared the rights to it. Don’t just jump past this opportunity and say it can’t be done.
b. You buy the rights to a product or you JV for an offline product.
You can buy the rights to successful products for $500 – $20,000. If someone else has created a product that you know your targeted market is interested in, offer them a large up-front fee for the rights to it. This way you can get your own product and never have to pay a penny in royalties. You can also search through magazines your targeted market reads and look for products people are selling. Then, give them a call and ask for the exclusive Internet rights to their product for a certain percentage of the profits or an up-front fee.
c. You join an affiliate program.
If you are just starting out online, this can be a good choice. You do have to keep in mind though that it doesn’t offer quite the profit potential that creating your own product or obtaining rights to one has.When choosing an affiliate program, make sure that it is something your targeted market cannot be without. They absolutely have to have it. Also pay special attention to the profits you receive from each sale.
If you are only be paid 5% commissions on the sales of $10 books, you will only be making 50 cents per customer. It would take 2,000 customers just to product $1,000 in profits. You cannot make money like this online! Look for higher priced products and higher commissions…especially commissions in the 25% or higher range.
3. Create a USP
Create a Unique Selling Position for your product or service. Too many companies are just trying to be me-too companies online. You cannot be just like the next guy and expect to make a profit in a global economy. Just going to the next guy’s web site to order is too easy for your customers.
You have to create a Uniqueness to your product or offer. What can you offer that no one else can? Can you offer better guarantees, better customer service, more technical support, faster shipping, or lower prices. Think of something that will set you apart from all of your online competitors and tell in complete detail what it is.
4. Pick a Domain Name and Hosting Service
The next step is to pick a domain name that describes your company, USP, and offer. Try to keep them as short and descriptive about your business as possible. Avoid using dashes or misspellings of your product. Both of these things will cause people to leave out part of your domain if they type it in. Someone else will be getting free traffic that you worked hard to obtain.
For hosting, I personally choose to use Virtualis since they have the Fastest customer service and technical support in the industry. Test them out. They will respond to you within the hour…anytime 24 hours a day. No other company I have ever been with has even come close!
5. Develop a Customer Friendly Site
The next step in the process is to develop your web site and put it up for the world to see. If you are planning to own a full-time Internet business, I recommend that you learn how to design the site yourself using one of dozens of programs which are readily available at any software store.
You will save so much money if you can do the work yourself on just the editing alone as your site grows. If your main business is offline and you are just adding a secondary income, then you may want to consider having a professional do your site for you.
When designing your site, keep the customer in mind always. Provide order forms for online credit card orders. Make all of the links easy to understand. Try to keep your site simple. Think like a customer, not the business owner.
Your customers are not nearly as interested in your business as you are. Make sure to put the benefits of your site and your USP right on top of the site. More than half of the web surfers never drop down past the first screen full of information. So, you have to give them the information they need as quickly as possible. The rules for any type of business are Benefits, Benefits, and more Benefits.
6. Offer a Freebie
One of the major keys to developing traffic and sales at your site is to always offer some type of freebie as a drawing factor. For example, I offer dozens of free reports, weather reports, news, and more. My greatest drawing factor throughout the past 8 months though has been the two free e-books which we offer on our site to people who subscribe to this newsletter.
You need to come up with a freebie no matter what type of business you are in. Create a free report and give it away. Add in a message board or some other type of CGI program on your site. Give a free demo of your software. Create something that you can give away for free on your site to draw in the visitors.
7. Start Your Own Opt-In List
Almost every full-time Internet marketer I know has developed their own Opt-in email list of some type. For most of them, it is a weekly newsletter they send out by email. For others, it may be a Tip of the Day. Other people might just have a list that they send out important updates to.
No matter what you choose to do, odds will be on your side if you concentrate on building a list of loyal email subscribers. Very rarely do customers purchase from you the first time they visit your site. Most of them will get on your list, hang out for a few weeks or months, and then they buy from you. They have to get to know you before they are willing to spend their money with you.
I have found that the most effective leads come from offline advertising. For example, you could purchase ads in a popular targeted magazine for your business. You could also purchase a postcard in one of the card decks. Start up a co-op and get 10 other people to advertise with you and run your own ads for free. Offline leads which come to your site often turn out to contain a much higher percentage of buyers than any of the online advertising methods.
Once you put our short 10 step outline together you have a basic map to creating your own Internet success story. You wouldn’t consider going on a trip without a map. So don’t try to go it alone online without a map.
Terry Dean’s Brand New Fr-e eBook, “10 Quick and Easy Ways to Increase Profits to ANY Web Site Overnight!” Reveals More Time Tested Proven Internet Marketing Secrets Than 99% of the Paid Products Available…Showing You Step-By-Step How to Increase Your Traffic, Drop Your Expenses, and Drive Your Profits Through the Roof
Can Any Inbound Linking Hurt My Ranking?
The answer is simple – inbound linking cannot hurt your search ranking. How is this known for certain? Well, for one, if inbound were to hurt your rank, your competitors would continually link to your site from link farms. Such a scenario is beyond your control. For this reason, Google cannot penalize your site for any inbound linking.
On the other hand, you can be penalized for illegitimate external linking. It is highly advised that you not link to any website or group of sites that may be involved in shady or unethical search practices. Doing so could result in being black-listed by Google, ultimately ruining your SEO strategy. Avoid this situation at all costs and ensure that all external links point to trusted and reliable sources.
Having been involved in the internet industry for a large part of my working life, I have spent a lot of time researching and browsing the internet and reading websites, mainly for client design research, but also for occasional personal use. The one thing that I find most disappointing, is the apparent lack of thought going into website creation and it’s purpose, which in turn creates a missed opportunity for many e-businesses to become successful.
My personal perspective on e-businesses and their websites, is that if they don’t take pride in their websites and show to their customers a passion for what they do, chances are, they won’t take pride in their products, and the passion for providing good customer service will also be missing.
What you must remember, is that your web site is a direct reflection of you and your business. The appearance of your site is the most important factor in determining your potential success rate. In short, if your site doesn’t look professional or pleasing to the eyes at first glance, the majority of people will assume your products and/or services to be of similar poor standard.
At the other end of the scale, you could fall into the trap of going overboard with the design and over complicate things with incorporating high costing flashy graphics. You may end up with a great looking and highly aesthetic web site, but the danger with this is that your site may prove unreliable and at times may take too long to load. There is nothing worse for a customer than trying to visit a slow loading site, and most will close the browser window in complete frustration. As i’m sure you will be able to work out, this will ultimately cost you business.
The other major consideration (if not the most important) when designing a website is your content. Not just links, but content with passion, relativity, and understanding to the customer. When someone is searching for something in particular and they visit your web site, they’re visiting for a reason. Your site has something they want, Whether this be your product, service, and/or information. If they are unable to obtain what they’re looking for, they move on to the next site and so on. To be able to get your visitors to stay and look around your website, you must give them a reason to. Providing them with quality content will achieve this goal.
There have been countless other lists and articles on the subject of website designing mistakes, but I have compiled my own list, from a designer’s perspective, of some pitfalls to look out for when considering either designing a website or purchasing a template. Remember that the simple, clear, informative and well designed sites are the most successful. If you are a current e-business and your sales aren’t what you had hoped, consider the above and take some time to look openly and honestly at your site. Spending money on improving your website is a much better investment than throwing money away on trying to advertise and market a site that just isn’t good enough to sell your product or services.
If you are looking for a template or a custom designed website, be aware of the above and be prepared to ask your chosen designer or template provider questions to ensure that your hard earned money doesn’t go to waste on an inferior design, which contains any of the above. Asking questions won’t cost you a penny, and in doing so could actually save you a lot of money over the long term. Getting your website right first time is vital in terms of saving money and time. The earlier your website is up and running properly, the quicker you will be able to reap the rewards of a successful e-business.
The prime mistake Newbies make is to put their website name into the Anchor Text. Unless your website contains your keywords this is a waste of a perfectly good link. Remember that Google puts a very big importance on those Anchor texts and they should always use your keywords.
The second mistake is trying to put every single keyword into your anchor text and give that to everyone. There are two mistakes with this technique. 1.) Google assigns weight to each word in anchor text so if there are a lot of filler words (common in long sentences), they will “dilute” your target words.
According to two recent surveys, conducted by Forrester Research and Gartner Group, ecommerce sites are losing $1.1 to $1.3 billion in revenue each year due to customers click- away caused by slow loading sites. If a page takes too long to load, your potential customer will not wait. Ultimately costing you business.
Make sure you include proper META tags in the HTML of each page of your web site. META tags are HTML code that enable the search engines to determine what keywords are relevant to a specific site. About 80 percent of all web site traffic originates from the eight major search engines. It would be a good idea to make sure you’ve done your homework and fully understand how to optimize your web pages prior to designing your site. This will save you a lot of headaches in the long run. For further information on META tags read the tutorial entitled, “Building Your Site.”
Be cautious when selecting your background and text colors. Busy backgrounds make text difficult to read and draw the attention away from the text. Always be consistent with your background theme on each page of your site. Your site should be nicely organized and uniform throughout. Keep in mind, colors affect your mood and will have an affect on your visitors as well. Bright colors such as yellow and orange, cause you to become more cheerful or happy, while colors such as blue and purple have a calming effect. Dark colors such as brown and black have a depressing effect. A good rule of thumb would be to use colors based upon the type of effect you’re trying to achieve.
Your main page should specifically let your visitors know exactly what you’re offering. How many times have you visited a site and never figured out exactly what they were selling? If your potential customer can’t find your product or service, they definitely won’t waste a lot of time looking for it. They’ll go on to the next site and probably never return. They’re visiting your site for a specific purpose. They want something your site offers. Whether it is information, a product or service.
Design your site to be easily navigated. Place your navigation links together at the top, bottom, left or right side of the page. Use tables to neatly align your links. If you are planning on using graphic buttons to navigate your site, keep in mind that with each graphic you add to your page, it will take that much longer for your page to load. If you only have a handful of navigational links, using graphic buttons will be fine. If you have over six links, it would be wise to simply use text links to keep your load time down.
If you must use frames, use them sparingly. Frames, if not properly used, can make your site look unprofessional. Avoid making your visitors have to scroll from side to side to view your content. This can be very irritating and cause your visitors to leave. If you must use frames, offer your visitors a choice. Frames verses No Frames. Try to keep the number of clicks required to get from your main page to any other page on your site down to four. Keep in mind, your visitors may enter your site from pages other than your main. Always have good navigational links on every page and place your company logo on each page.
Design a quality e-book to give to your visitors. It’s not as difficult as it sounds. If you can create a web page, you can create an e-book. The focus of your e-book should compliment your web site. Simply write about your passion. If your passion is sales, then you could share some of your knowledge and experience by designing your e-book to provide a complete sales training guide. If your passion is home based business, you could write an e-book about how to start your own home based business. If you’re writing about your true passion then you shouldn’t have any trouble coming up with something to write about. For further information on e-books, read the article entitled, “How to Create an E-book and Drive Massive Traffic to Your Site by Giving It Away.”
Having been involved in the internet industry for a large part of my working life, I have spent a lot of time researching and browsing the internet and reading websites, mainly for client design research, but also for occasional personal use. The one thing that I find most disappointing, is the apparent lack of thought going into website creation and it’s purpose, which in turn creates a missed opportunity for many e-businesses to become successful.
The Importance of Anchor Text in Back-links
The importance of anchor text with respect to a linking strategy cannot be overstated. Back-links are a huge part of the search engine algorithm. When initiating a linking campaign, it is vital that external sites link using the appropriate keywords and terms in the anchor text.
Almost always, linking candidates will use the company name as anchor text. This does not provide any type of description of the target company’s products or services. Sure, it may be great for branding purposes, but it isn’t usually needed. In most cases, companies already rank very high (if not first) for searches that incorporate their brand.
Here is an example using fictional company “Acme Plumbing Supplies”:
Most people will link simply using the terms “Acme”. This is alright, but it does not describe the company’s products or services, nor provide any context. By adding the word “plumbing” or term “plumbing supplies” (i.e. “Acme Plumbing” or “Acme Plumbing Supplies”), you may be able to drive additional traffic that may not have otherwise attained the corporate site.
Absolute Links vs. Relative Links – SEO Value
The debate between absolute links and relative links continues to live on in the SEO world. The individual significance of each has been contested, but it is widely regarded that absolute links provide better SEO value on the whole than relative links.
Many believe that absolute links have less potential for getting messed up when search engines index your page. It shouldn’t really make a difference, but many conclude that this is reason enough.
Furthermore, content scrapers and RSS services may ‘repurpose’ your content legitimately (or not). In either case, shouldn’t a proper back-link be attributed to your site? This situation favours absolute links. Although this is a minor argument, it’s still worth considering.
