by admin on November 24, 2009
SEO content creation is a simple process, but you need to know exactly where the pitfalls lie.
1. Get your title tags right–insert two or three of your major keywords and repeat them in the text on the page for best effect.
2. Write quality content. Make sure it’s useful, well-written, easily readable and in the right place so that people can find it. If your title tags don’t match the content you’re doing it wrong.
3. Use H1, H2 and H3 tags for your page titles and sub-titles.
4. If your title tags and description meta tags are the same, or almost the same, you will gain huge points with Google.
5. I don’t believe in ‘keyword density.’ You obviously need to put your keywords in the text, but don’t overdo it. Let things flow naturally and you should be fine. If you put your keywords in too many times Google may decide you’re spamming. The very last thing you want to happen.
6. Try to encourage linking in to your article. People are more likely to do this if you have an interesting list. At the very least make sure you’re linking to your own pages, in a relevant way. This can be highly effective.
7. Link out to other websites that have quality articles. If you get this right you’ll be doing your own site a huge favor. Major hint: your links should come in a sentence, using words from your sentence as anchor text, and not as stand alone links.
8. Make sure you have highly readable content. I know I’ve already said it, but content is king and this cannot be over emphasized. Hire a writer if you aren’t confident in your own abilities. You won’t regret it.
by admin on September 30, 2009
A screenshot of Thesis WordPress theme in its raw state
Sick of WordPress Plugins?
Optimizing your WordPress blog can be tedious, especially if it’s a large blog with many posts that has been going for some time. If you’re like most bloggers you’ll be getting tired of having to install so many plugins and make so many ‘tweaks’ in order to get the look and feel you want, as well as please the search engines so that all your hard work is not wasted.
If you’ve been blogging with WordPress for any length of time you’ll almost certainly have heard of Thesis. You may have checked it out and been turned off because you have to pay for it. Why would anyone pay for a theme when there are so many really pretty ones that come free, right?
Let me just explain why that’s so wrong.
Perfect Code
Thesis is a theme for WordPress that has been created with perfect–or at least near perfect–code. This is reason #1 why you should sit up and take note. Sloppy code is a major reason why some WordPress blogs just don’t seem to do so well.
Thesis is, in its raw state, pretty basic, and that’s just how some of us like our blogs to look. But the beauty of this theme is that you can customize it however you want so there are thousands of Thesis users and no two of them have an identical-looking site. How amazing is that? I can say without reservation that Thesis is simply THE most customizable WordPress theme out there.
SEOclass.org Gets Dressed in Thesis!
When we decided to upgrade SEOclass.org we agreed pretty quickly that we should continue with WordPress. We looked at a few attractive themes, but despite the fact that Thesis is more work (initially) than other themes, we decided Thesis would be the best solution for us since SEO is obviously very important. Just looking at the number of top SEOs who have opted to use Thesis should be enough to convince anyone that it IS the way to go for superbly-optimized WordPress.
One advantage to using Thesis is that you can do away with the countless SEO plugins that are otherwise required to optimize a WordPress theme. This is good for two reasons: your site will load that much more quickly, since every plugin you use weighs things down. You will save a lot of time not needing to select settings and upgrade unnecessary plugins, which will leave you with a lot more time to run your blog.
Once you get set up that is.
It has taken me a couple of days to make some changes that I feel are more in line with how our site should look–and I’m still not finished.
If you are a beginner with the Web, you will most likely need some help with your Thesis theme at least to start with. Thesis support forums are great but still time-consuming. You may find that all the options offered on the Thesis panel are overwhelming. I wish they’d gone a bit further: why, for example, can’t we choose the color of fonts while we’re choosing anyway?
Here are just a few of the blogs that I admire who also happen to use Thesis:
Conversation Marketing
CopyBlogger
Thinking of Switching to Thesis?
If you’re thinking of switching to Thesis, remember that it will be upgraded regularly to keep pace with WordPress developments and more. What you pay for this theme will be an investment in your web success. So far, simply no other WordPress theme does as much to help you on your way towards blogging at the top.
by admin on September 28, 2009
Guarding Your Reputation
As with anything in life, taking precautions to protect your reputation before there’s an attack makes the most sense. However, we all know how easy it is to get complacent so that when an individual or group attacks us, we’re taken completely off-guard.
There is no one thing you can do to practice proactive reputation management yourself. Rather it’s a process:
- Be nice when you deal with people online
- Never publish an attack against another individual/group–be sure those chickens will come home to roost
- In business, take great care that you give your customers their money’s worth: it’s no secret that the vast majority of reputation management problems are actually well deserved.
- Stay away from ‘undesirables.’ You can damage your reputation by association really easily online.
Don’t Panic–SEOclass.org Has Answers!
Most website owners tend to panic when they realize there are unflattering or even downright aggressive web pages about them published on the Web. It’s a fact of human nature that we’re morbidly attracted to the negative, so it’s no real surprise that bad news tends to rise to the top of a search pretty quickly.
But what can we do about it? First you need to address the problem if there is one:
- If there is substance to accusations, fix it fast. Don’t quibble: the best chance you have of getting negative commentary removed from the Web is to remove the reason for it.
- Once you have addressed the problem make sure you get your side of the story out: tell everyone you’ve fixed it. On your website, on forums, social media platforms and wherever else you can think of.
- Issue a press release citing your actions. If you don’t know how to do it properly–ask a professional.
The trick is to introduce as much positive information about your brand, from as many different sources as possible in the shortest time frame you can manage.
This is a mighty tall order for most of us. But SEOclass specializes in creating flattering, legitimate Web pages that will push down those nasty pages within a matter of days–weeks at most.
If you don’t employ a professional for anything else online, you will need one for effective reputation management if you run into trouble. This is no time to think about saving pennies: bad branding can cost you your business!
by admin on September 27, 2009
Acquiring good SEO services is one of the most important things you’ll ever do for your business. SEO is not hocus pocus: it is straightforward, almost scientific, and highly effective. You could definitely do it yourself if you have about five years to learn the ropes! Seriously, we can save you a great deal of wasted time and money.
Actually, what we plan to do is make you money. Lots of it. Take a look at our testimonials to see what we’ve done for others just like you.