by Mary Killelea, Dec. 8, 2009 

The Criteria the search engines use to rank pages can be categorized into two groups:

On page factors:  You control this

Off site factors:  This is where a internet marketing strategy is crucial

Onsite SEO:

Factors:

• Title Tag
• Words on your page
• Domain Name
• HTML design
• URLS

Offsite SEO:

Factors:

• Incoming Links
• Anchor text links
• Page rank of sites
• Authority Sites

Your marketing mix should consist of both .. first your onsite has to be addressed and then off site has strategies need to be implemented.

– Call for a quote 503-997-6935

by Mary Killelea Dec 8, 2009

1. Decide on the one search phrase you want your page to rank for.
2. Title your page with a variation of the phrase you want it to rank for.
3. Create a headline on your page that re-enforces the title of your page
4. Write your page content for consumers, but do also keep in mind it’s important to give the search engines what they need to rank you correctly for the terms you are targeting, so use the key word term phrases you are targeting in your content.
5. Create links to your page using link text that contains variation of your search phrase.
6. Get external links to your page that also use variations of your search phrase.
7. Continue to do this through out your site on each and ever page, targeting a unique key word phrase on each of the pages.

Good Luck!

by Mary Killelea October 28, 2009

Just like having a website it doesn’t matter if you have the coolest website or fan page you can’t expect people to just find you without putting in some effort .. you have to MARKET your business online. So here are some great tips on how to increase traffic to your fan page.Now this should go without saying but for those just getting into it.. REMEMBER is it very important to communicate regularly with the people who are interested in your company. Engage with them, respond and acknowledge them when they take the time to make a comment or to say hi.   If you are real and show them respect they will be more likely to share your business with their friends.

by Mary Killelea October 19, 2009

Let me begin with DON’T PARTICIPATE IN SPAM!  There are people out there that may try and lure you with empty promises or enticements that seem to good to be true. Stay away from them.

The simple explanation of spam is it’s a tactic of manipulation vs. optimization.  It’s deception vs. marketing

As an internet marketer your goal should be to create a successful online business that stands the test of time and is of high value to your clients and to the overall web.

Terms worth defining: 

White Hat Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Practices -  are ethical search engine friendly and adopted techniques and tactics that help your site get noticed by the Search Engines for the terms you are targeting. 

 Black Hat Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Practices - are unethical techniques and tactics that are highly frowned upon by the search engines. Deception is the intent of any one using black hat techniques like backdoors, cloaking, and other tricks to optimize sites.

Remember the search engines employ hundreds of scientist and have numerous resources to combat those that are developing spam techniques or participating in black hat techniques.

Avoid  Content spamming and Link spamming and play by the rules when optimizing your site. You will win in the long run.

For those looking at hiring someone to do your SEO avoid anyone who practices any black hat techniques they will only damage your online reputation.

by Mary Killelea October 19, 2009 

• Search Engines don’t store web pages, - they index the text on those pages
• Search Engines don’t search the web - they search only some within their index - so if you are not in their index you are not going to appear in their search results.
• Search engines don’t read a page and decide what it should rank for at all - they receive a search query and rank the pages that match that query - this means that a single page can rank for multiple terms (this matters when creating your keyword strategies)

by Mary Killelea, September 6, 2009 

One of the most important things is to check the Cache date of linking page and make sure Google has visited it recently.

Acquiring quality links to a site is a major part of any SEO effort.  If you are good at SEO then you take certain steps in acquiring links. The days of randomly acquiring huge number of links are over.

Follow these steps to get good quality links:

• Make sure the linking page is not from a “bad neighborhood”
• Check to make sure the number of links on the linking page isn’t too high
• Be sure the linking site is relevant to your topic
• Confirm the link anchor text is relevant to the keywords
• Look to see that the linking page has a good PageRank

In general, the quality of the link is established through several factors.

When and if the link passes all tests and is worth acquiring there is one final step make sure you check the cache date. Often, we go to great lengths to make sure the site is a real link, that it looks good, and isn’t “spamming”…that we fail to ensure Google is actually spidering the page.

Because if Google isn’t spidering the page then, the link is essentially worthless. This is probably the most vital step that too many Webmasters fail to check.

Think of the cache dates as a carton of milk in your fridge. Milk is generally good for about three weeks. Beyond that, you start running into “problems,” right? The same is true for indexing. If a page goes longer than three weeks without being spidered by Google, there’s a problem.

If it’s been a couple of months, there is a MAJOR problem.

It’s easy to check the cached date of a page. Just put its URL in the search box and if it is indexed it should show up at the top of the search results. Below the snippet you will find the link to the cached version of the page. Click on it and you will be able to know when it was last cached.

That’s it. It’s really simple, Yet so many link builders skip this step and end up linking to pages that have no link juice to offer.

Recommendation: Before you spend a lot of effort in determining the pedigree of a linking page, do a quick check of the page’s last cached date. If it is not very recent don’t bother enquiring further and move on to the next option.

Note: Be sure to check for Spam Links - especially in a Blog.

With malware infections becoming more and more common online these days, sites and blogs are being jepordized without the Webmaster even knowing it. Typically, the Spammer will place dozens, hundreds, or even thousands and links “hidden” in the code to their Viagra, Casino, Porn, etc. sites.

Here is how you can check to see if your blog has fallen prey to this:

Just do a site command in Google. For example:  site:lampshoppers.com casino

This will check the domain for any reference to the word “casino.” If you get a few hundred pages returned and you are NOT in the casino business, chances are VERY good you’ve been hacked.

Other phrases you should check would be:

porn , Viagra , cialis, casino

Another good tip is to set up a Google Alert for your own business so you can follow it and see it’s activity.

by Mary Killelea August 24, 2009 

Whether you are concentrating your seo on Local Search or not it is a very important segment of SEO that every business owner with or without a website should pay attention to if you want customers to find you.

Here is a link to David Mimh’s recent survey of several experts that gauged the factors most helpful for ranking well in the Google and Yahoo Local algorithms, as well as techniques to be avoided.  He has done a great job summarizing the survey and it’s a must read for anyone interested in gaining ranking in the local playing field. http://www.davidmihm.com/local-search-ranking-factors.shtml#results

When reading his article there were a few terms that I felt needed to be better explained for those not in the local search market trenches.  

survey glossary:

HCard Microformat – hCard is a simple, open, distributed format for representing people, companies, organizations, and places, using a 1:1 representation of vCard (RFC2426) properties and values in semantic HTML or XHTML. hCard is one of several open microformat standards suitable for embedding in HTML, XHTML, Atom, RSS, and arbitrary XML.   Want to get started with writing an hCard? Use the hCard creator to write up some contact information and publish it, or follow the hCard authoring tips to add hCard markup to your current contact page.

KML File - You can create KML files with the Google Earth user interface, or you can use an XML or simple text editor to enter “raw” KML from scratch. KML files and their related images (if any) can be compressed using the ZIP format into KMZ archives. To share your KML and KMZ files, you can e-mail them, host them locally for sharing within a private internet, or host them publicly on a web server. Just as web browsers display HTML files, Earth browsers such as Google Earth display KML files. Once you’ve properly configured your server and shared the URL (address) of your KML files, anyone who’s installed Google Earth can view the KML files hosted on your public web server.

If you’re new to KML, begin by browsing the KML Tutorial, which presents short samples of KML code that you can view in Google Earth and Google Maps. The KML Reference provides detailed syntax for all KML elements, with explanations and diagrams of how to specify them.  The Developer’s Guide contains in-depth conceptual material and examples.

Citations: a short note recognizing a source of information or of a quoted passage; “the student’s essay failed to list several important citations”; “the acknowledgments are usually printed at the front of a book”; “the article includes mention of similar clinical cases”  Or in the case of online Citations are mentions from other online sources.

UGC - user generated content

LBC - local business center

IYP - internet yellow pages

LBL - local business listings

Great resources to have handy: 

Most Important Data Providers + IYP Sites

1. infoUSA
2. Superpages
3. Localeze
4. YellowPages
5. Yelp
6. InsiderPages
7. Niche Industry Sites (BBB, Vertical Directories)
8. Acxiom
9. Yahoo
10. Citysearch

Other sites receiving significant votes: Niche Civic/Municipal Sites (Chamber of Commerce, Local Directories), Merchant Circle, UniversalBusinessListing, Yellowbot.

Most Important Review Engines

1. Yelp
2. InsiderPages
3. Yahoo
4. CitySearch
5. Google
6. Superpages
7. Niche Industry Sites (BBB, Vertical Directories)
8. TripAdvisor
9. Judysbook
10. Kudzu

Other sites receiving significant votes: Yellowpages, Merchant Circle, AngiesList. 

Also if you don’t know about it check out your site’s local listing on www.getlisted.org

by Mary Killelea, August 20, 2009

1. Don’t search for  “Keyword Phrase” and  “Submit Site” for potential links. Most, if not all results will be garbage
2. Avoid 3 way linking schemes. Google is getting better at detecting and discounting these links.
3. Reciprocal Linking.  It’s effective when done right. Instead of trying to get a ton of useless links, concentrate on getting links within the body of an article from a site in your niche or related to your niche.
4. Don’t just link to your home page, work on getting deep links - deep links are links to other pages are your site that are optimized for the linking text you are using.
5. Switch up your linking text
6. Services that guarentee links often have a number or network of sites they own. (usually just sites that are created for the sole purpose of posting links on — they are no good) Look at each and every link before it’s posted on your site and to see where you link to your site is posted.
7. Pace yourself when acquiring links. It will send a red flag to google if you get to many too quickly. The goal is to grow your links slowly and consistently.
8. Base the link on your visitors needs not on whether or not the site you are working with has a high PR if it’s unrelated it’s not beneficial.
9. Check the page has a cache date in Google three weeks fresh.
10. Write good articles and provide links to your site form the article bio section.
11. Don’t assume all links are being followed. Many now have No Follow Tags associated with them. Beaware.
12. Keep a log of where your links are and a contact name and email to follow up in the future if you link some how mysteriously disappears. 

Link Building is a tedius task but one that still seems to benefit your site so be persistent and keep plugging along there are some really great honest sites out there that want to share with their audience like minded sites that truly benefit each other. As always remember good content is king and people will want to link to you if you have good information or provide good service.

In order to be included in Yahoo’s Directory you need to pay for inclusion for them to guarantee you a listing. I am not an advocate for paying to get listed in any directory. However there are some directories that the pros just out weigh the cons and this is one of them.   

Yahoo currently offers two options of their paid inclusion program: Search Submit Express and Search Submit Pro. Depending on what your needs and the amount of control you want over your submissions will help determine which program is best for you, if any.

Search Submit Express is perfect if all you are looking for is to get a few of your URLs quickly spidered and into Yahoo!. The annual fee for Search Submit Express is $49 for the first URL, $29 each for URLs 2-10 and $10 each for 11 or more URLs.  Your URLs will be visited every 48 hours to keep the listings up to date; which is perfect if you have content that is frequently changing. Once your site is listed, you will incur a cost-per-click fee whenever a user clicks on your listing.  This may be a drawback depending on your ROI for that listing. The cost-per-click  incurred is either $.15 or $.30 depending on what category your Web site falls  into. For basic sites about things like education, music, sports, baby equipment, etc. your fee would only be $.15 per click. If your site is in one of the more popular shopping categories like apparel, electronics, flowers, and personal care, or travel, then the fee is going to be $.30 per click.

A great feature about Search Submit Express is the reporting that is available. Users can access up-to-date information on clicks, rankings and keywords,  as well as get tracking information to help them optimize pages for improved performance. Trend charts are also available so that you can track performance over a span of time.

Search Submit Pro is the 2nd option of the Yahoo paid inclusion program. Search Submit Pro offers more power over your submission and more tools for you. There is no annual fee for Search Submit Pro, but there is still a cost-per-click associated with your listings. Yahoo does not specify what the cost-per-click is for the different categories, but you can assume that the category breakdown is the same as Search Submit Express, with possibly a higher cost-per-click  fee. Yahoo does say that Search Submit Pro is best for those who have a marketing budget of $5000+ per month or for those submitting 1,000+ pages to Yahoo. Depending on how many URLs you want to include in the paid inclusion program, you will have to decide which of these two programs would be most beneficial to you at the lowest cost.

Some of the nice features of Search Submit Pro include the ability to create your own titles and descriptions to be displayed on Yahoo’s search engine results page. You can change these as often as needed to correspond with the changes
on your Web site. Pages are submitted through an XML feed and Search Submit Pro allows you to include pages that might otherwise be difficult for spiders to reach due to cookies, session IDs or dynamic pages. Your content is revisited every 48 hours, just like with Search Submit Express, or if your content doesn’t change that often you can choose to set a schedule for the spider’s visits. One other nice feature of Search Submit Pro is that you are assigned a dedicated account manager to help you with all of your questions, comments, concerns etc.

Similar to Search Submit Express, Search Submit Pro offers tools that give users insight to such things as search engine rankings, the number of times each listing was clicked on, and what keywords were used to trigger those listings. The reports are also customizable so that you only track what is useful to your business. Reports can be viewed online or downloaded to your computer. These reports give  you tons of info to the performance of your site and inof on the visitors to you site. By studying the data you will be able to tweak your submission to increase the click-through-rate and increase traffic to your site

Neither Search Submit Express nor Pro promise improves site rankings. Once you’ve submitted your URLs, your site is still subject to the Yahoo algorithm and will rank based on the content and its relevancy to the keywords. Yes, the paid inclusion program gets the spider to visit your site sooner, but just having spiders visit your site won’t get you rankings. Your site still needs to be optimized and have relevant content, be themed correctly, and  have no major server or spiderability issues.

Okay so you have a twitter account and you tweet often and have people you follow and others who follow you.  Really, whether you are a marketer or not, the idea of finding others who tweet about the same stuff you like is of interest.  Now if you are a marketer you definately want to get in on this!

As defined on www.hashmarks.org  Hashtags are a community-driven convention for adding additional context and metadata to your tweets. They’re like tags on Flickr, only added inline to your post. You create a hashtag simply by prefixing a word with a hash symbol: #hashtag. 

Twitter Fan Wiki explains, “Hashtags were developed as a means to create ”groupings” on Twitter, without having to change the basic service. The hash symbol is a convention borrowed primarily from IRC channels, and later from Jaiku’s channels. ”

hashtags.org provides real-time tracking of Twitter hashtags. Opt-in by following @hashtags to have your hashtags tracked.  Similarly, Twemes offers real-time tracking without the necessity of following a specific Twitter account.  Also, with their purchase of Summize, Twitter itself now offers some support of hashtags at their search engine: http://search.twitter.com

How To Use Hashtags

First, follow @hashtags on Twitter. They will follow you back automatically, and your hashtags will be tracked.

Next, start using hashtags in your tweets, preceding key words. It can be helpful to do a little research first, to find out if the subject you’re tweeting already has an established hashtag. Also, check Suggestions and Tips and Example Uses below for ettiquette and general usage.

Finally, track other tweets on the subjects you’re interested in (ie: those containing the appropriate hashtags) by browsing/searching at Hashtags.org or TwitterGroups. You can set it up with RSS feeds as well.

Origin and interesting fact: Hashtags were popularized during the San Diego forest fires in 2007 when Nate Ritter used the hashtag “#sandiegofire” to identify his updates related to the disaster. 

Fantastic resource and origin of most of this content came from http://twitter.pbworks.com/Hashtags  Essential for any avid user of twitter.   Now beware there are some who frown on adding Hashtags but I personally don’t think they see the true value of the idea and the over all benefits as a user and as a person sharing truly something of value.  Only time will tell.