Keyword Meta Tag, Meta useless
July 30, 2008 | SEO, Uncategorized
One thing I really hate in SEO is the minor things that get made into big majors. Page Rank is one thing that springs to mind, the less said about that the better. The ultimate criminal has to be the Keywords Meta Tag. In fact it is so pointless it won’t make a blind bit of difference to Google whether it’s there or not. Annoyingly it’s something which just seems to have ‘hung around’ from the dark days of spammy SEO.
What’s the Keywords Meta Tag for?
Back in the early 90’s when Search Engines emerged on the scene to catalog and put some order on the growing number of web pages popping up, meta tags were used as useful way for a web site to tell the engine what it was about. Due to the popularity of Search Engines this system was readily abused and most web sites started having meta tags about popular subjects they had nothing to do with like “Britney Spears”.
That’s the simple history of the Keywords Meta Tag. In the mid 90’s some of the Search Technology which we see today started and one of the key changes was that the Search Engine Spider popped up, this is an automated program (bot) that would index pages.
In some cases your Keyword Meta Tag can actually damage your rankings so if you insist on using it here is a few pointers:
Don’t Spam - make sure all keywords are mentioned at least once in your main content.
Don’t use overkill - limit the number of keywords you use to no more than a dozen. ie don’t have an endless list, the less really the better.
Don’t be repetative - say if your site is about Dog Food don’t have Dog Food this, Dog Food that, Dog Food more, Dog Food even more.
Instead each keyword should be unique - Dog Food, this, that, more, even.
If, in the case of the above example, Dog is not always connected to Food have a comma between.
Don’t use overly specific keywords, if your targeting particular phrases you should include some general markets too
Make each page unique - variety is the spice of life, Google certainly think so.
Meta Description Tag
We should mention the meta description tag at this point, this is far more important (more on that in another post), so make sure your major keywords are mentioned here.
Link building of the future
July 18, 2008 | Link Building, Uncategorized, page rank
In the previous posting we asked the question does traditional Link Building work? The answer is no. The question is then how do we Link Build not just for today but tomorrow?
First point to make is traditional link building is no longer that effective because it deals with the web of yesterday. In fact if we look at the why our link building experiment failed the main problem is that directories deal with creating quantity, quantity in combination with other factors works but quantity in itself is not something that provides us with success. The overwhelming problem with web directories is they actually provide a way of passing link juice or Page Rank on mass but as we saw in the experiment most of the pages on most of the directories are totally ineffective at actually getting spidered by Google, they basically fail at the first hurdle.
If we go back to some previous posts about Page Rank. Recently we’ve had Guy’s PR rant and a great quote I read from Google’s Search Evangelist Adam Lasnik on Page Rank and there’s also an older post Better Page Rank.
If we look at Adam’s great quote then he states Page Rank was relevant to the web of yesterday, he stops at there are more factors but stops short of saying Page Rank is irrelevant but if he didn’t work for Google that’s where his quote would have naturally taken him. In Guy’s rant he asked the question do Google really care? If you look at our web site the answer is no. The answer to why that is get’s back to the point that they know it’s no longer relevant. We know our Blog should be doing much better than a 0 and our site much better than a 1, our rankings in Google tell us that.
Page Rank is dead! The king is dead, long live the king! So who is the next king?
Adam says a few key things that give us and idea of what that is:
- Relevance / Quality is now important not quantity.
- In fact the goal of the query is relevance.
- Audience factors are also key.
You may have heard the term Trust Rank before. This sumises the fact that Google is instead looking for links it trusts. What does that mean? It means Google are basically looking at four factors:
The site - does Google trust the site? Again if we go back to our experiment and we call this the first Google hurdle then web directories are mostly failing at this first hurdle. You may have heard sites described as Authorative or Hubs, these are the two key factors in determining trust for a site. Authorative sites have lots of links, particularly of quality to them and Hubs are sites that have lots of links to other sites again particularly of quality. Going back to web directories how many would we say are authorative hubs?
Content is the second factor, what’s the relevance between the content of the two sites is the question Google ultimately asks on this point. It doesn’t matter in what context you see a link, you may be reading a great piece of copy on a great site but if the content suddenly turns and say oh btw I know this great site selling viagra, then every web user on the planet, including Google defines that as spam. If it’s not in context don’t put it there.
Then there’s the link itself, why is it there? Again what’s the relevance.
Lastly we have age factors, no one knows exactly what the exact factor of age and timing is in the Google algorithm. We know age like a fine red wine is good. We know if new links are suddenly disappearing that’s not good. We also know that if your getting a bunch of links at the same time from the same old site that’s not good, in fact if this in combination with other factors comes back negative, again Google consider that spam. It’s old web, one link is no longer one vote. A bunch of links from the same web site in today’s web is one vote if your lucky. Lets put it into “web 2.0″ context say there is a user on Technorati that is only liking to the same blog, no one else links to it and they don’t link to much else either, do you think Google considers that spam? Well not really because Technorati also consider that spam as well as all their users, think about this your not just hacking of Google, your hacking of Technorati and your probably most important of all hacking of the people in social networking sphere - that’s a whole lot of hacked off people! What would you assume in this sitatuin? Well if your me your a user voting for your blog, more than that your not commiting to the ideal of social networking and what you can’t do is take and not give. Given that situation do you think one user still equals one vote. Well actually in these situations Google is going to give you a negative note. That’s right Google will take away one natural vote you’ve rightfully earned. Harsh? Not really!
We’re almost forgetting what I think is the most important element of quality link building. That is if you don’t have quality content who is going to want to link to it in the first place? Quality content not only makes generating quality links a whole lot easier but actually there’s a point where that process becomes natural. Ulimately if you want to link build and you want to do it properly in todays web that means focusing on your content should be your first step.
Online Video: How to Digg it
July 10, 2008 | Uncategorized
Following on from Guy’s Online Video post of his daughter (I swear I can just about hear Guy in the background running through a Web Marketing Manual!). Here is part deux.
The Power of Video is it’s:
Highly usable - with modern internet connections.
Highly portable - this post for example - I just stick a bunch of code (I know what is it but you don’t need to) from one box to another.
Inexpensive - ignoring quality then everyone has a camera in their pocket, to have a proper set up does not take too much expense either.
Highly popular - who hasn’t seen a video on the web?
Video is highly popular, also why spend minutes writing a post when you can create a video post that takes seconds and does the job much better. For example here’s a video i found from Digg on latest changes to the Digg platform:
Online Video
June 27, 2008 | Uncategorized
My Daughter making her first appearance on the blog! More on video SEO Coming!
Guest Article From Will Kintish
June 13, 2008 | Uncategorized
Will is a business development master, especially when it comes to networking and working a room. I have been on his training sessions quite a few times now, and see amazing value from each one. Here is an article he as written on business cards.
Business Cards are Priceless!
Do you think of these cards as…well… just business cards? If you do I’d like
you to think again.
“What is the most important thing about business cards?” I ask my audiences
Giving them out; making sure they are well designed and printed; make sure
you have lots with you are 3 regular answers I hear. I accept that all these
points are important, but not the MOST important.
The most important aspect is to ASK FOR THE OTHER PERSONS CARD
Why?
· To show interest in the other person
· To remind you of the persons name, just in case you have forgotten it
· To know how to get in touch with your new contact
Cards are an integral tool when networking, now generally acknowledged as
the most effective way to create business opportunities. Once you have the
other person’s card
· Read it carefully asking a question or making a comment about it
· Ask (where appropriate) if you can contact the person on a specific day the
following week
· Write down their answer so they know you are serious
· When you are out of sight write on the card…
Where and when you met them
Anything important they told you
Some detail they mentioned which you can remind them of when you
call the following week showing you were listening.
· Keep and file all cards carefully; you never know when you might need that
person
Offer your card if they don’t ask for it but do it softly, thrusting it at them early
on in meeting someone could appear to be too pushy in many cases.
BUSINESS CARDS?
If I’d followed my advice from the start of my career…ah well, who knows what
may have occurred?
If you want to find out more, visit the site of this networking guru
