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Like it or not, search engine
optimization plays an important part for any online business,
and more so for new and small businesses. On cash-strapped
budgets, we don't have the deep pockets to buy expensive
links on high-traffic websites, and extensive PPC spending
(I'm talking about over $100 a day) is beyond us, at least
at the start.
So
the rest of us are, in the end, left with getting traffic the (free)
cheap way - building links, regularly adding
content, optimizing our pages and trawling through SEO forums for
that next big breakthrough in SEO strategies that will give us the
edge over our competition.
In
other words, we are all caught up in the SEO rat race. And there
seems to be no end in sight.
At
times like these, it's a good idea to step back and look at the
situation from a more "detached" perspective.
Forget about your website, forget about your online
business, forget about making money from the Internet while
sitting at home and sleeping in on Mondays.
Instead, I want you to have only one thought, just four words
in your mind:
| What does Google really
want? |
Why
Google, you ask? What a stupid question, you might also ask. Well,
let me explain myself. However, while I do so, keep this
question in mind and try to answer it alongside
me.
Now.when you reduce search engine marketing to its basics, it
is all about doing what is necessary (and acceptable by the search
engines) in order to get a high ranking in search engine results
(SERPs). So our SEO strategies depend directly on
what works best in the search engines.
Now, let's take that thought a bit further - how do you know
what works best? Well, the search engines keep their ranking
algorithm secret, and no one really understands how
rankings "really" work. Sure, we can all approximate, and some of us
have made (and will continue to make) millions by getting it
"right". But in the absence of cold and hard facts from the people
running the search engine traffic, there's no way to know for
sure.
What the search engines do tell us is pretty
vague - your website content must be unique, useful, and should be
fresh. Targeting your website to a particular industry helps as
well. Links? Search engines sure like them. In fact, search engines
like them quite a lot. But hey, that's not all to search engines, is
it? What about quality content?
The
truth is that in the age of super-instant gratification (ever
met a cliché you liked? ), links are your "easy"
ticket into search engine rankings. In face of the "simplicity"
of getting other websites to link to yours (made even easier
by SEO tools), good content takes a
VERY distant second place.
The
search engines can be blamed for placing too much
emphasis on links, although in the last year or so, led by
Google, the search engines have gradually moved away from giving
links too much importance and have started looking at relevance and
user feedback (read personalized search) Even then, SEO campaigns
takes a familiar shape:
- Do some keyword research and build a
master list of keywords.
- Write "keyword optimized" articles
for the search engines.
- Build links to your website using keywords
in the anchor text (and choosing link partners in the same niche
(to win on the relevance factor).
Tip: Use a tool like SEO
Elite to build links quickly. See demo video by clicking
here.
- Rinse. Lather. Repeat.
In that formula, somehow, somewhere, people started
taking shortcuts. First, there was link
spamming to trick search engines into ranking their
websites higher. Then, there were
"content-generating" scripts - the poor man's
version of obscene levels of keyword stuffing carried out only for
manipulating search engines.
Maybe it's unfair to call this tactics trickery or
manipulation. After all, there is a system, there's a way of
cracking it and getting to the top of it without much effort, so why
not take the quick and dirty shortcut and move on?
On
the surface, the debate seems to be between "ethical" and
"unethical" methods (or, as they like to say, between white hats and
black hats) of SEO. In reality, your morality, or the color of your
headgear, does not matter. At all.
What DOES matter is the question I asked you earlier. What
does Google want?
In
fact, replace Google with the search engine of your choice.
Take Yahoo. Msn. IceRocket if fancy strikes you, but the point
remains the same.
Find
High Paying Adsense Keywords!
| Whar are the search engines
really looking for? |
Search engines, believe it or not, are looking to
keep their visitors.
Surprised? Shoot, why not, it makes sense, doesn't it? Search
is as much a business as selling widgets or owning a roadside café,
and in a business, getting and keeping your customers (searchers) is
your top priority. No searchers = no money, and
that's the bottom line.
So
how do the search engines get, and keep, their visitors? Once you
start thinking of search engines as being businesses, everything
falls into place. Building customer loyalty is a crucial factor for
any successful business.
| Be the best at what they
do |
For
search engines, this means being the best at what they
do, and to offer the most complimentary services. Leaving
SE accessories (like Yahoo's portal or Google's various services)
aside, the only way search engines can get and bring back searchers
is by giving them what they want.
Searchers (much like you and me) want
information. They want it to get to it fast. They want it
to be right. Most importantly, they want it be right the
first time around. That's a difficult ask for
the search engines (isn't that an understatement),
and they are bound to screw things up along the way.
Now, it suddenly becomes clear (it will to you as well, just
hang on). It doesn't matter what "algorithm" a search engine is
using, or what particular SEO tactic seems to be working best this
month (or week). In the end, search engines will always be working
towards providing users "better" results - where
better invariably translates into useful and updated information for
the searcher. You can go through ten thousand search engine updates,
but the end goal remains the same.
This is certainly no revelation. Search engines (and many SEO
gurus) have been saying this all this time. Quality content
is the best way to build search engine rankings - it is the
only guarantee towards an organic linking campaign, and along with
user feedback (personalized search) it has fast become the focus of
search engine "updates".
That's not to say that link building does
not work - in fact, link building still remains the easiest
way to get search engine rankings. However, quality content
(and the $5 an article that most webmasters pay on RentACoder
is not quality , no matter what your standards)
serves your business in so many different ways that it seems
almost foolish, and certainly short-sighted, of webmasters to
not invest in it.
Learn how
I quadrupled my Adsense earnings!
- Quality content helps with conversions -
people will buy more from you if you help them in their quest for
knowledge, and they will come back for more if they like what you
are telling them.
- Quality content does wonders in search engines
- despite the fact that search engine rankings are
automated, good writing is written for the readers and thus not
over-optimised - over-optimization is a big problem for webmasters
and it's something that search engines have been penalizing for a
while now.
- Quality content is your surest guarantee for
building links organically, or naturally -
someone comes to your website and likes your website so much that
they link to it on their blog, resources page or anywhere else on
their website (it happens all the time).
- Quality content is also the best bet to get one-way
links in your link building campaigns without having to
pay for them - webmasters are more likely to link to a website
that is actually useful than just for the sake of building their
links page.
Finally, and most importantly, quality content is what
searchers are looking for. It's what search engines
are trying to provide (to their users). In short, that's what the
search engines are looking for: quality content.
Makes sense to do what the search engines are looking for,
and THEN build your SEO strategy around that,
doesn't it?
So
the next time you're stuck in a rut, and are despairing about your
search engine rankings, stop what you are doing, take a step back
and ask yourself this simple question:
"What DOES Google want?"
All
the best,
Brad Callen
Professional SEO
Purchase SEO Elite: SEO Software
