Website Promotion Blog

Link Schemes and Google

Ever wonder what Google thinks of your links? There are a number of ways to see who links to you, but what does Google think of those links? Visit the Google 'Link Schemes' page for a few answers.
Read more » Definition of Link Schemes From Google

SEO Cheat Sheet

Web Developer's SEO Cheat Sheet - a handy 4 page cheat sheet with SEO tips including best practices, html elements, hyperlinks, http staus codes, canonicalization, mobile commands, multiple language commands, sitemap syntax (xml sitemaps), robot commands, metadata for facebook, twitter, and google +. Very cool!
Read more » SEO Cheat Sheet

Internet Marketing Firm Being Sued

An internet marketing firm is being sued for using spammy tactics that violate Google's webmaster guidelines.
As we have always said, it doesn't pay to use under-handed methods to try and 'fool' Google and the other search engines.
In the end, you will be sorry for it.
Read more » Internet Marketing Lawsuit

Google Changes Are Coming

According to Google (via Matt Cutts), changes are coming to how it tabulates search results.
Keep it clean and white hat, never spam.
Its easy to rank well.....good titles, good content, and quality and authoritative links pointing to your website.
It's easy peasy.
Read more » Google Changes

Link Networks

Like we've said along, you can't obtain good links in an automated, lazy, or impatient way. It takes a lot of work, done manually, to find good links. You want reputable sites to link to your site, not junk sites and certainly not link networks.
Read more » Link Networks: House of Cards

Facebook Announces a New Search Feature

It's called Graph Search and you will see it at the top of the page, just like the search bar Facebook uses now, only bigger.
This is Facebooks attempt at competing with Google.
Instead of a web search, Facebook will search its own database. This means that it is even more important than ever to make sure your business Facebook page is SEO'd and contains the keywords that Facebook users will search for.
Make sure you will be found in Facebooks new Graph Search feature!
Read more » About Graph Search from Facebook

The Importance of Google +

If you have a local brick and mortar business, then you MUST have a good listing in Google +.
These listings generally show up first in the regular Google search results, and can cause a ton of business to come your way.
Many people will use their Smartphone to search for your type of business, so having a strong local listing in Google is essential.
Here are some tips to ranking higher in Google +: Make sure your listing is in the correct categories Upload photos of your business....the more the better Upload a video of your business Encourage satisfied customers to write a review (very important!!!)
Read more » Google + Tips for Business

Getting rid of bad links pointing to your site

Google has introduced a new tool for disavowing "unnatural links" that point to your site. This can be helpful in improving your ranking, because this tool will essentially wipe out the bad links (in Google's eyes anyway). Google will ignore the links you it tell to.
Of course, one must be careful.....don't disavow good links! You will need to do a little research on the links you think may be bad. There is a very helpful Q&A at the bottom of the page, so be sure to read that first.
Read more » Google Disavow Links Tool

MySpace Reboot

It looks like Myspace ain't dead yet!
Myspace is going through a redesign which promises to be a more trendy and sexy version of it's old self. According to Ian Steadman of Wired magazine who said "Once-dominant now-withered social network MySpace has returned with new owners and a new design -- and, in all honesty, it looks pretty cool." We remember Myspace as being 'the' place for social interaction on the web, and welcome the reboot.
Read more » Myspace Redesign Article from Ad Age

Speed Up Your Website

Want to know how fast your webpages load?
Google has a free tool for it. It analyzes any webpage, then gives suggestions to make the page load faster.
Read more » PageSpeed Insights from Google

Google Places is now Google +

Your local listing in Goggle will stay basically the same, only now it will be listed in Google Plus, and not in Google Places. So, when users find you in Google under your company name or local keywords, your new Google Plus listing will be shown, and your old Google Places listing is no longer available. Google has already seamlessly transferred your Places listing to the new Plus listing. It makes sense more now than ever to make sure your local Google listing contains the info, photos, videos etc. that pertains to your business, in order to stand out from your competitors.
Read more » 'Google Places Discontinued' from PR Newswire

Why Links Matter

What is a link, and who cares anyway? You should! Linking is an important part of good SEO. In point of fact, Google was founded on the aspect of linking (their pagerank feature), and the analysis of each link. This has evolved into quite a formula these days, and search engines (Bing, Yahoo, Google etc.) now place a heavy emphasis on who is linking to your site.
Read more » 'Why Links Matter' from Search Engine Watch

Definition of Keywords

An informative guide to choosing keywords for your website, and their effect on positioning your site in the search engines including Google, Bing and Yahoo.
Read more » Definition of Keywords

Google Penalizes for Excess Ads on a Webpage

Google has a new algorithm that tests your web page for too many adds above the fold. Google will down grade or penalize your site in the rankings if your ads are interfering with the content of a page. In other words, your ads shouldn't be taking away from a users ability to peruse the actual content of a web page.

Google Penalizes Itself

Google has decided to scale back its search results for its own Chrome browser, when the word 'browser' is searched for.
Google apparently went against its own webmaster guidelines by launching a campaign using bloggers to post low quality content related to the Chrome browser.
This clearly violates Googles own rules, and to their credit, Google has penalized the Chrome link in their search results.
Read more » Google Demotes Chrome

Free Website Promotion Guide

New to SEO and want to learn more about it?
We have authored a few articles about basic website promotion. Crammed full of good tips, and its free!
Read more » Free Website Promotion

Google Ranking Drop?

If you have noticed a drastic drop in your rankings in Google, it could be for any number of reasons. Was your site penalized, either manually or automatically (through googlebot) by Google? Outspoken Media has a helpful article on the subject, and also explains how to contact Google for reconsideration. The reconsideration effort does work, and Google does listen.
Read more » Google Reconsideration Requests

How Smart Are Search Engine Robots?

SEO Moz offers an interesting read on Googlebot and Bingbot.
Read more » How Smart Are Search Engine Robots?

B2B Yellow Pages

B2B Yellow Pages offers free listings for business-to-business sites.
Read more » B2B Yellow Pages

SEO for Google +

Read this article for some great tips on SEO for Google Plus. Improve your profile and your visibility.
Read more » SEO for Google +

Google Dumps Twitter

Google + is a new social networking site. Google also has suspended its Twitter results in real time search. Guess this means Google will show Google + results instead of Twitter.
Read more » How Google + Will Affect SEO for Your Website

SEO Moz Google Ranking Factors

SEO Moz releases their bi-annual list of what Google looks for when ranking a website. Very informative and interesting.
Read more » SEO Moz Google Ranking Factors

Google Panda and DaniWeb

Recently DaniWeb took a hit from the Google Panda update. Why? Duplicate content or something else? Read what steps DaniWeb took to make things right.
Read more » DaniWeb Steps

Google AdWords Strategy

A basic primer for AdWords. AdWords can be a bit confusing with so many parameters and choices. Hope this helps!
Read more » Google AdWords Strategy

Google Panda Update

Google's latest update to their algorithm (how Google ranks a site) has caused many websites to drop in rankings. This update, which has been named the 'Panda' update, went after websites that had backlinks in susceptible places, such as article sites, or other link farms (link farms are sites that have a collection of links on them). You should make sure that your SEO company is not using link farms to obtain links for your site.....there is a good chance you have been penalized by Google.
Read more » What is a Link Content Farm?

Google Penalizes Overstock.com

Another big retailer (this time it's Overstock) hit with a penalty in Google for black hat SEO linking tactics. This time its for link baiting on educational sites.
Since Google gives more relevance (and higher rankings) to educational sites, it is desirable to have links there. However, according to this article, Overstock offered students and teachers discounts, in return for links. Now they have been busted, and their rankings have fallen.
Read more » Overstock Link Scheme

Google Penalizes J.C. Penney Website

Google penalizes JC Penney site for link building scheme. This is what can happen when using aggressive link tactics.
Read more » J.C. Penney Link Scheme

Bing Sting

Google performs a sting on Bing.
Apparently, Google inserted their own special listings in their ranking results, to see if Bing would take the bait.
Read more » Google Stings Bing

Google Hotpot

Google now has a local review feature.
Google Hotpot - Use Hotpot, in conjunction with Google Places, to give reviews of local business, and find reviews your friends have given.
More local review sites include: yelp, ivouch, insider pages, merchant circle, rate it all. Make sure your site is listed in all of them for greater exposure on the net.

Google Webmaster Help

Google presents a YouTube channel for Google 'webmaster resources that will help you with your crawling and indexing questions.' Great resource for any questions you may have when trying to get your site ranked high in Google!
Read more » Google Webmaster Help

Google Follows Facebook and Twitter Links

Google now states: "We do use Twitter and Facebook links in ranking as we always have in our web search rankings" This means that Google does follow links on Facebook and Twitter. However, be sure that your privacy settings are adjusted to include everyone in your status updates, not just friends. Be sure to list your website on both Twitter and Facebook, it's an easy (and free) way to promote your business!
Read more » Google Follows Facebook and Twitter Links

Beware Who Links To You

Do you receive those annoying emails from people who want to exchange links with you? I'm not a proponent of link exchanges to begin with (one way links are much more effective). However, if you are going to exchange links with another website, be sure you're doing it the right way. Where your link is listed is VERY important, so don't exchange links with a poor site.
Read more » Beware: Not All Link Exchanges Are Beneficial

Google Car

From the 'What the?' department comes Google, testing an umanned car around the streets of California. It's interesting to think how this can be accomplished, especially with Google's current knowledge of locations, data centers etc. Very interesting indeed!

What Does Your Competition Know That You Don't?

Stoney deGeyter writes "When it comes to on-page optimization, you can learn a lot from your competitors by looking at their websites. How they organize their navigation (their categories and sub-categories) can tell you a great deal about your audience. Or... it can lead you down the wrong path. This is where it is important not to look at one competitor only, but to look at as many as possible."
Read more » What Does Your Competition Know That You Don't?

Google Instant

Google has rolled out its new search feature, called 'Google Instant'.
Google explains: "Google Instant is a new search enhancement that shows results as you type."
In other words, as you type each letter, several keyword phrases will be presented to you, giving you helpful ideas to narrow your search, or just get to the phrase you want quicker. There is a lot of talk about Google Instant being a game changer for SEO, which it certainly is. But as any good SEO will tell you, they are optimizing a site for many keyword phrases, not just one. So, as Google is giving you instant suggestions, you should have your site optimized for many of them. You shouldn't be losing any traffic to your site from Google, if your site is optimized....you could even receive more traffic. However, if you have concentrated on just one or two keyword phrases when promoting your site, then Google Instant may affect you in a negative way. But if your whole site is optimized (as it should be), for a variety of keywords phrases (as it should be), you will be fine.
Read more » Google Instant

Effective Link Building

An easy to understand article on getting good links to your website, for the novice.
Learn how to find good links, the best kind of links, and the information needed to get started.
Read more » Effective Link Building

Definition of Keywords

So, you have a website, but how do you bring people to it?
It all starts with choosing the right keywords, and what you do with them.
The first step is to research the keywords that apply to your services or products.
The second step is integrating them into your web pages in an effective way.
The third step is to sit back and watch your sales rise.
Learn about how to find your best keywords, and how to increase your traffic flow.
Read more » Definition of Keywords

Internet Reputation Management

Internet reputation management is the process of getting the good word out about your company on the web in a positive way.
People will read about your company and what you do....including any positive aspects you may want to emphasize, such as awards, community involvement, expansions, announcements, news etc. Take advantage of this powerful way of making your company grow!
Read more » Internet Reputation Management

Google Webmaster Central

Google has an informative section on technical, design and content guidelines for websites.
Read more » Google Webmaster Central

Submit Your Content To Google

If you are looking to increase your exposure, Google has a very helpful section on doing so. Everything from submitting your site to Google, submitting your video to various sources (YouTube, News, Books), Google Maps (if your business has a physical location, you gotta be here!), real estate property listings and items for sale.
Read more » Submit Your Content

Google Caffeine

It looks like Google Caffeine is being rolled out. We are seeing a BIG jump in rankings for our clients sites. Google said it would implement it after the holidays, and they have not disappointed. I was looking forward to this update, as it is very favorable to white hat SEO. Good one way links, good use of keywords in the text of webpages as well as the Titles....the ticket to doing well in Google. Celebrate!

Update: (3/4/10) Things have settled down with the Caffeine Update. Honestly, our rankings, and the rankings of our clients sites, have settled back to where they were before the update. I would still like to see Google put less emphasis on paid and reciprocal links...perhaps in the next update?
Update: (2/17/10) It looks like Google has settled down a bit. Rankings have essentially stayed the same for a week or so now. Is it the end of the update? Stay tuned...
Update: (1/29/10) Not much movement in rankings, and no word from Google on when the new update will be utilized. Expect twitter, facebook and other social media to become part of the listings in Google when the update comes out.
Update: (1/12/10) Rankings have settled back down for a week, now they are creeping back up again. Expect full rollout of the update soon!
Update: (1/14/10) Rankings now back to close to original, as before the update. Still tweaking the algo.

Duplicate Content in Google

In a move to relegate duplicate content in their SERPS, and to allow owners of websites with multiple domains and the same content more flexibility, Google has announced the use of the rel="canonical" element. Although the 301 redirect is still preferred, not all servers will allow it. So, using rel="canonical" is a way around this.
Read more » Google Webmaster Central
Read more » Interview with Matt Cutts from Google

This is a good move by Google, as I have had a hard time in the past with some of my clients servers that won't allow the 301 redirects. Although still not as good as a 301, it does offer a simple and easy way to effectively tell Google that we are not doing anything untoward, and it's also a good way to get the domain we want listed in Google, since Google will only rank the oldest domain in their SERPS (search engine results), and not any domains that come after (with the same content).

Twitter in Google

Google will be including 'tweets' in its search results, and also will use social media results in searches via your Google friends list. This means Google (and Yahoo apparently) will search Twitter for keywords, and include them in their search results.
» Read more: Twitter Marketing

Internet Reputation

There are a lot of sad stories on the internet and some involve the use of the web to slam an individual or company. Not only can comments on forums, social media and various complaint related sites be harmful, in some instances the complaints and rantings are unfounded. Once these comments are on a site, they can and will be propagated throughout the web, being picked up by one site after another. As an example of how one blurb can propagate all through the internet, I present a cautionary tale. I have a friend who lost her daughter to a tragic accident. The related news item was published online by the local newspaper, which is fine, but then that news item was picked up by various other sites and kept propagating, until eventually it was everywhere. A constant reminder for my friend of the tragedy.
» Read another example: New York Times
Of course the internet should be kept free of any censorship, my point is that one hurtful item can become a giant one.
The biggest problem of slander on the net is the inability to address the comments, or even know who made them. It could be a jealous friend, enemy or a competitor. There are no consequences for this type of behavior, except of course for the one being slammed.
Just as road rage is easy, because of the safety of being in a car, removed and isolated from the 'offender', so is slamming someone via the web, safe and secure behind a computer with no way of being found out. People will say things about another that they would never have the bravado to say face to face.
There are companies that can help. However, removing the negative comments is next to impossible. All that can be done is to try and 'push down' the negative listings with new and positive listings using social media, press releases and the like, and also creating websites about an individual or company that the search engines will see as more 'important' than the negative ones, thus listing the positive higher, and lowering the negative in the rankings, pushing them beyond the first three pages of the major search engines. It is an uphill battle to be sure, but eventually the negative can be replaced with the positive.
» Read more: Internet Reputation Management

Local Search

Google Maps, Bing Maps and Yahoo Local
Local search is becoming more important these days. Increasingly, the public carries the internet around with them in their pockets via the use of PDA's, blackberry's, iphones etc. This emphasizes the fact that our world is becoming more mobile with the information available to us. Phone books, yellow pages, 411 operator assistance etc. are all going by the wayside because of the easily accessible information now available to people via their PDA's. Just as the cell phone replaced the need for public phone booths, PDA's (personal digital assistants) are replacing the need for the old ways of gathering information.

Google Maps, Bing Maps and Yahoo Local are becoming the prominent way to access local information. If we want to find the nearest place to get a latte, we simply use our home computer or PDA to find it. So, if we typed in 'coffee bar boston' in Google, then Google will give us a list of coffee bars in Boston via their local search. We can narrow this even further by giving the street name or section of town we are in, and Google will give us more targeted results in those areas. So, the importance of being listed in Google Maps, Bing Maps and Yahoo Local becomes very important in pulling in customers that are visiting, working or living in a particular area.

Not only is it important to be listed in local search, but it's also important to use keywords in the description, categories and service areas a business offers.
» Visit our Local Website Promotion for more info.

Social Media Optimization

In the ongoing and exploding world of social media, it makes sense to optimize the way we use it. If you are networking yourself or your company via social networking or media such as Facebook, Linkedin, YouTube, Twitter etc., then you should do it in a way that will make the search engines stand up and take notice. Use your good keywords in the titles and copy of your social listings. Make sure you include a link to your website. You should be updating your network listings in a semi-constant manner. This will give you more followers, thus more visitors to your website, and will also give you higher rankings in Google, Bing and Yahoo for your related keywords.
» Read More: Social Media Optimization