It is critical to be very careful when writing content.  Critically look at the top ten placements related to your specific keywords, specifically first 3 results. After analyzing them, take advantage of their weaknesses and strengths in order to leverage your site higher. The main two things to look at are Page Titles &  Quality Content

1) Quality Page Titles:

Take a look at the top 3 listings in the organic search results for your targeted keywords.  Check for relevancy in relation to the content. Moreover, listed titles like (10 steps, 8 ways, 3 reasons, etc.) take advantage over others in SERP’s. Make sure your page titles are  easier, faster, new, more comprehensive and better.
2) For Better Content:

Take a good look at the  first couple of SERP listings  and see what they are strong or potentially weak. Write carefully constructed in a fresh manner that promotes your targeted keywords.

• Include information that others don’t list
• Make sure it is well organized
• Get straight to the point.  Clearly written and concise content ranks better

Looking at these two aspects of content writing for keywords will perform better in the rankings and be a better converting tool to acquire new customers.

Google is constantly trying to keep their results pages spam free. They have now mapped out the way links are ranked according to importance:

Content Section: These are the most valuable links to utilize when looking at a link strategy.
Header Section: These links are also valuable, as most of the sites don’t engage in selling links here.
Side Navigation: Devalued due to the abuse of reciprocal links and other link strategies.
Comment Section: Not nearly important as they were previously because spambots tend to abuse these areas.
Footer Links: Not weighted near as heavily as they used to be, however they still serve a purpose.

Try getting links from the content section of the website as these are highly valued and have great impact on search engine rankings.

Ahhhhhhh……….keyword density! This is a term that has been repeatedly murdered by a select few who coin it unknowingly as a critical search engine ranking factors. Although you must target keywords in effective content writing, there is no fixed percentage rate of keyword density that is carved in stone. The perfect keyword density varies according to keywords targeted, niche, content, page and website etc. Yes, it’s important to have keywords appearing in what you write, however, it is more important to have relevant and NATURAL content.   While content writing, it is import to utilize both long tail and short tail terms with empahasis on stemming.  The goal is to produce a natural flow keeping in mind semantic structure and relationship.  Don’t focus on hammering a keyword so much as looking at different ways of building a theme with semantically related words.

I just met yesterday with a potential client, who shall remain nameless.  The interesting thing about this account is the short history of their website.  It has been live for three months.  They hired a search engine optimization firm, who shall also remain nameless, in Tampa.

For anyone who knows anything about SEO, a site that is three  months old is fighting an uphill battle against sites that have existed for 12 years plus.  As well, you cannot effectively evaluate an seo campaign until 90 days minimally have passed.  In the first 90 days the foundation is built…….that is where the SEO campaign is rooted, if done correctly.  An effective campaign really bolsters in the 6 to 12 month period after initial optimization.

The prospect researched one of my clients and found two rankings that were on the 3rd and 6th pages.  What she didn’t realize is that a year ago, that client had ZERO rankings in the top 100 pages and also had ZERO traffic.  Yes some rankings will not be as good as others.  She also didn’t realize that the client selected thirty keywords to promote.  She was arbitrarily typing in keywords and seeing where they rank.  This is amusing because she assumes that she knows which keywords are the traffic drivers.  She also didn’t realize that the client is now getting many quotes a week for a niche market, whereas they had none before.

I almost feel sorry for the current technician because he has not had the opportunity for his work to take root.  This is an example where a little information about ” What is good SEO” can be dangerous.  Yes, as an SEO firm…..our clients are the boss.  However, they need to realize they are not the “experts”.  I don’t take my car to a transmission shop and tell them how to fix it because it is not my area of expertise.  Enough said.

I recently was interviewing a guy for a sales position.  He wanted to check out the companies he was interested in before making a final decision on who he would pair up with in the coming days.  He informed me that his previous company did loans, debt settlement and a host of other things before diving into the world of SEO to see if it was profitable enough for them.  He also said that in the Tampa area alone there were 125 SEO companies and most of them were new.  I know my competition well and I can honestly say that I know of about 11 companies who are very reputable in the Tampa area.

Needless to say, this conversation disturbed me.  I have been in this industry for a very long time and I worked hard to build my company’s reputation one customer at a time.   Many companies are just appearing out of nowhere.  This scares me not only for the industry and it’s reputation, but primarily for the consumers in Tampa.  Just because a man says he is a doctor doesn’t mean that he actually is.

For consumers, I would suggest that you look at the rating of the company on the Better Business Bureau.  Ask for references and get a detailed proposal stating exactly what will be done.

For prospective SEO techs and reps, ask how long the company has been in the industry.  This is valuable information that may save you time and frustration.  As for the rep from the shady company, I can only hope that they didn’t try to train him in the industry after being newly inducted themselves.  That would be like sending an inexperienced sheep into a den savvy of wolves.