http://www.esolute.com Fri, 04 Jun 2010 07:07:54 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.5 en hourly 1 How to choose the right keywords for your web site http://www.esolute.com/keyphrase-research/choose-the-right-keywords-for-your-web-site.html http://www.esolute.com/keyphrase-research/choose-the-right-keywords-for-your-web-site.html#comments Tue, 22 Dec 2009 06:31:16 +0000 admin http://www.esolute.com/?p=103

Many businesses recognize that search engines can bring volumes of highly targeted prospects to their website, typically at a fraction of the cost of traditional marketing.
Unfortunately, these same companies often overlook the most important part of their search engine marketing campaigns, which is key phrase selection and evaluation.
Key phrases (those phrases that potential customers are using to find products or services on search engines) are the building block of any search engine marketing strategy.
It is essential that they are chosen carefully, or else the remainder of the campaign, no matter how effective the implementation, will likely be in vain. What follows is a three-step process that goes over the process of compiling, selecting, and evaluating the ongoing performance of key phrases for search engines.
1. Compiling a key phrase list:
Usually, companies are sure that they already know their ideal key phrases. Often, they are wrong.
This is typically because it is very hard to separate oneself from a business and look at it from the perspective of a potential customer (rather than an insider). Compiling a key phrase list should not be, despite common practice, a strictly internal process.
Rather, it is best to ask everyone outside of your company for their input, especially your customers. People are often very surprised at the key phrase suggestions they get- and sometimes dismayed to realize that an average customer doesn’t speak the same language that they do.
Only after you have put together a list of likely phrases from external sources do you add your own. As a last step, try to add variations, plurals, and derivatives of the phrases on your list.
2. Evaluating key phrases:
Once you have compiled a master key phrase list, it is time to evaluate each phrase to hone your list down to those most likely to bring you the highest amount of quality traffic.
Although many individuals will base their assessment of key phrase value based only on popularity figures, there are really three vitally important aspects of each phrase to consider.
a) Popularity
By far the easiest of the three to judge is popularity, since it is not subjective. Software like WordTracker gives popularity figures of search phrases based upon actual search engine activity (it also gives additional key phrase suggestions and variations).
Such tools allow you to assign a concrete popularity number to each phrase to use when comparing them. Obviously, the higher the number, the more traffic that can be expected (assuming you are able to obtain good search engine positions).
However, this number alone is not good enough reason to pursue any particular key phrase, although key phrase analysis too often stops here.
b) Specificity
This is more abstract than the sheer popularity number, but equally important. For example, let’s assume that you were able to obtain great rankings for the key phrase “insurance companies” (a daunting prospect). Let’s also assume that you only deal with auto insurance.
Although “insurance companies” might have a much higher popularity figure than “auto insurance companies”, the first key phrase would also be comprised of people looking for life insurance, health insurance, and home insurance.
It is very likely that someone searching for a particular type of insurance will refine their search after seeing the disparate results returned from the phrase “insurance companies”.
In the second, longer key phrase, you can be reasonably sure that a much higher percentage of visitors will be looking for what you offer- and the addition of the word “auto” will make it much easier to attain higher rankings, since the longer term will be less competitive.
c) Motivation of User
This factor, even more abstract than specificity, calls for an attempt to understand the motivation of a search engine user by simply analyzing his or her search phrase.
Assume, for example, that you were a real estate agent in Atlanta. Two of the key phrases you are evaluating are “Atlanta real estate listings” and “Atlanta real estate agents”.
Both phrases have very similar popularity numbers. They are also each fairly specific, and your services are very relevant to each. So which phrase is better? If you look into the likely motivation of the user, you will probably conclude that the second is superior.
While both phrases target people looking for real estate in Atlanta, you can infer from the second phrase that the searcher has moved beyond the point where they are browsing local homes or checking out prices in their neighborhood- they are looking for an agent, which implies that they are ready to act. Often, subtle distinctions between terms can make a large difference on the quality of the traffic they attract.
3. Evaluating Key phrase Performance:
Until recently, judging the performance of individual key phrases was a dicey proposition. Although it is possible to tell from your log traffic analysis how many visitors are getting to your site from each key phrase (valuable information, but unfortunately not enough to do much with), it was very hard to decipher which phrases were bringing you the most quality traffic.
Recently, however, some sophisticated but affordable tools have been developed that allow you to judge the performance of each individual key phrase based upon visitor behavior.
This new software makes it possible to periodically analyze which key phrases are bringing your site the most valuable visitors- those who buy your products, fill out your contact form, download your demo, etc.
This type of data, rather than the sheer number of visitors from each search phrase alone, is invaluable when you are refining your search engine marketing campaigns, since you can discard and replace non-performing key phrases and put increased effort toward the phrases that are delivering visitors that become customers. This kind of ongoing analysis is the final piece of the key phrase puzzle, and allows you to continually target the most important phrases for your industry, even if they change over time.
Conclusion:
Key phrase compilation, evaluation, and performance are all vitally important to any search engine marketing campaign. While high rankings in search engines are an admirable goal, high rankings for poor key phrases will consistently deliver poor results.
Integration of this key phrase process into your overall search engine marketing strategy can dramatically improve your website performance (and thus your bottom line).

Many companies recognize that search engines can bring volumes of highly targeted prospects to their website, typically at a fraction of the cost of traditional marketing.

Unfortunately, these same companies often overlook the most important part of their search engine marketing campaigns, which is key phrase selection and evaluation.

Key phrases (those phrases that potential customers are using to find products or services on search engines) are the building block of any search engine marketing strategy.

It is essential that they are chosen carefully, or else the remainder of the campaign, no matter how effective the implementation, will likely be in vain. What follows is a three-step process that goes over the process of compiling, selecting, and evaluating the ongoing performance of key phrases for search engines.

1. Compiling a key phrase list:

Usually, companies are sure that they already know their ideal key phrases. Often, they are wrong.

This is typically because it is very hard to separate oneself from a business and look at it from the perspective of a potential customer (rather than an insider). Compiling a key phrase list should not be, despite common practice, a strictly internal process.

Rather, it is best to ask everyone outside of your company for their input, especially your customers. People are often very surprised at the key phrase suggestions they get- and sometimes dismayed to realize that an average customer doesn’t speak the same language that they do.

Only after you have put together a list of likely phrases from external sources do you add your own. As a last step, try to add variations, plurals, and derivatives of the phrases on your list.

2. Evaluating key phrases:

Once you have compiled a master key phrase list, it is time to evaluate each phrase to hone your list down to those most likely to bring you the highest amount of quality traffic.

Although many individuals will base their assessment of key phrase value based only on popularity figures, there are really three vitally important aspects of each phrase to consider.

a) Popularity

By far the easiest of the three to judge is popularity, since it is not subjective. Software like WordTracker gives popularity figures of search phrases based upon actual search engine activity (it also gives additional key phrase suggestions and variations).

Such tools allow you to assign a concrete popularity number to each phrase to use when comparing them. Obviously, the higher the number, the more traffic that can be expected (assuming you are able to obtain good search engine positions).

However, this number alone is not good enough reason to pursue any particular key phrase, although key phrase analysis too often stops here.

b) Specificity

This is more abstract than the sheer popularity number, but equally important. For example, let’s assume that you were able to obtain great rankings for the key phrase “insurance companies” (a daunting prospect). Let’s also assume that you only deal with auto insurance.

Although “insurance companies” might have a much higher popularity figure than “auto insurance companies”, the first key phrase would also be comprised of people looking for life insurance, health insurance, and home insurance.

It is very likely that someone searching for a particular type of insurance will refine their search after seeing the disparate results returned from the phrase “insurance companies”.

In the second, longer key phrase, you can be reasonably sure that a much higher percentage of visitors will be looking for what you offer- and the addition of the word “auto” will make it much easier to attain higher rankings, since the longer term will be less competitive.

c) Motivation of User

This factor, even more abstract than specificity, calls for an attempt to understand the motivation of a search engine user by simply analyzing his or her search phrase.

Assume, for example, that you were a real estate agent in Atlanta. Two of the key phrases you are evaluating are “Atlanta real estate listings” and “Atlanta real estate agents”.

Both phrases have very similar popularity numbers. They are also each fairly specific, and your services are very relevant to each. So which phrase is better? If you look into the likely motivation of the user, you will probably conclude that the second is superior.

While both phrases target people looking for real estate in Atlanta, you can infer from the second phrase that the searcher has moved beyond the point where they are browsing local homes or checking out prices in their neighborhood- they are looking for an agent, which implies that they are ready to act. Often, subtle distinctions between terms can make a large difference on the quality of the traffic they attract.

3. Evaluating Key phrase Performance:

Until recently, judging the performance of individual key phrases was a dicey proposition. Although it is possible to tell from your log traffic analysis how many visitors are getting to your site from each key phrase (valuable information, but unfortunately not enough to do much with), it was very hard to decipher which phrases were bringing you the most quality traffic.

Recently, however, some sophisticated but affordable tools have been developed that allow you to judge the performance of each individual key phrase based upon visitor behavior.

This new software makes it possible to periodically analyze which key phrases are bringing your site the most valuable visitors- those who buy your products, fill out your contact form, download your demo, etc.

This type of data, rather than the sheer number of visitors from each search phrase alone, is invaluable when you are refining your search engine marketing campaigns, since you can discard and replace non-performing key phrases and put increased effort toward the phrases that are delivering visitors that become customers. This kind of ongoing analysis is the final piece of the key phrase puzzle, and allows you to continually target the most important phrases for your industry, even if they change over time.

Conclusion:

Key phrase compilation, evaluation, and performance are all vitally important to any search engine marketing campaign. While high rankings in search engines are an admirable goal, high rankings for poor key phrases will consistently deliver poor results.

Integration of this key phrase process into your overall search engine marketing strategy can dramatically improve your website performance (and thus your bottom line).

]]> http://www.esolute.com/keyphrase-research/choose-the-right-keywords-for-your-web-site.html/feed 0 The correct SEO tactic for low and high competition key phrases http://www.esolute.com/general-seo/seo-tactic.html http://www.esolute.com/general-seo/seo-tactic.html#comments Fri, 18 Dec 2009 01:28:49 +0000 admin http://www.esolute.com/?p=92 Depending on the keywords for which you want to get high rankings, you have to employ different tactics. Keywords with less competition require different tactics than keywords with high competition.

The effect of different SEO tactics on the position of your website in the search results

If you target long keyword phrases with little competition, then the relative value of on-page web page optimization is very high.

For example, if you want to be listed for the search term “buy black adidas samba sneaker in knoxville” then it is enough to optimize one of your web pages for that search term because the competition for that search term is not high. You don’t need many inbound links to get high rankings for that keyphrase.
The more competitive the targeted keyword is, the higher is the effect of inbound links on the position of your website in the search results:

inbound links on the position of your website in the search results

The importance of an SEO tactic is not the same as its relative effect on your search engine positions

By taking a look at the chart above you might get the impression that web page optimization is not important to get high rankings for very competitive keywords. That is not the case. Optimizing the contents of a web page is the essential basis for high search engine rankings.

By optimizing a web page for a key phrase, you tell search engines that the web page is relevant to that key phrase. If more than one web page has been optimized for that key phrase (which is usually the case) then the web page with the best inbound links will get the highest position in the search results.

For example, the website www.cnn.com has 46,600 inbound links according to Google. Although CNN.com has so many inbound links, they do not rank for the keyword “buy black adidas samba sneaker in knoxville” because the website has not been optimized for that key phrase.

If you want to get high rankings for a key phrase, the first step is to optimize one of your web pages for that key phrase. Then work on the links that point to the optimized web page to outrank other websites that have been optimized for the same keyword:

Then work on the links that point to the optimized web page to outrank other websites that have been optimized for the same keyword

Which tactic should you use for your website?

1. The best web page optimization tactic:

When you optimize your website, optimize different pages of your website for different key phrases. Start with longer keyword phrases that don’t have much competition and then proceed with more competitive keywords.

For example, start with the keywords “buy sneakers in knoxville”, “buy cowboy boots in knoxville”, “buy pumps in knoxville”, “shoe shop knoxville”, etc. When you have managed to get high rankings for many of these key phrases, Google will know that your website is relevant to the topic “shoes”.

As soon as Google knows that your website is relevant to the topic, it will be much easier to get high rankings for more competitive keywords such as “buy shoes” or even “shoes”.

The more pages of your website you optimize for different but related keywords, the better.

2. The best link building tactic:

It’s not always necessary that you have more links than your competitors. You need better links.

Try to get links to your website that use the targeted key phrase as the link text (also called anchor text) and that point to the web page on your website that has been optimized for that key phrase.

Don’t focus on quantity, focus on quality. Getting hundreds of links from a link farm won’t help your website as much a few dozen links from relevant web pages with authority.

If your website has both optimized web pages and good inbound links then it will be easy to outrank web pages that only have one factor.

]]> http://www.esolute.com/general-seo/seo-tactic.html/feed 0 How to outrank your competitors in Google http://www.esolute.com/google-seo/outrank-your-competitors-in-google.html http://www.esolute.com/google-seo/outrank-your-competitors-in-google.html#comments Tue, 17 Nov 2009 08:27:46 +0000 admin http://www.esolute.com/?p=87 To get high rankings on Google, you don’t need have everything that Google expects from a great website. You website just be better than your competitors.

If you have a website with optimized web pages, it is usually the quality of the links that make the difference. The following tips will help you to get better rankings than your competitors:

Step 1: Find out your competitors

Search for five of your main keywords on Google and write down the URLs of the websites that rank best across these keywords. These websites are your main competitors on Google.

Step 2: Check the anchor texts of these websites

The next step is to find out how many of the links to your competitors contain your target keywords.

Required action: Your website should have more inbound links that contain your target keywords than the websites of your competitors.

Step 3: Check the PageRank spread of these websites

Although the official PageRank number that Google displays in its toolbar is a flawed metric, it can still help you to find out why some websites rank higher than others.

You can find some free pr checker software on the internet.

Required action: If your competitors have more inbound links from web pages with a high PageRank than your website then you should try to get more high PR links.

Step 4: Check the top level domains of the inbound links

If you want to get high rankings on Google.com.au then it might be important to have many inbound links from .com.au websites.

Required action: If you target local Google versions (Google.com.au, Google.co.uk, etc.) then your website should have more inbound links from websites that use the corresponding top level domain than your competitors.

Step 5: Check the content of the linking pages

Google prefer’s websites that get links from related websites. If you sell shoes then a link from a fashion blog is much better than a link from a website about puppies.

Required action: Your website should have more inbound links from related websites than the websites of your competitors.

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