Ethical SEO Consultant

Archive for the ‘SEO’ Category

I have just created a page titled SEO for Dummies on my freelance website.  I have tried to describe SEO in simple terms for those that just can’t get their head around it.  I will be adding to this page over time so that everything is covered.

So if you want to understand SEO in Laymans terms head over to that page.  If you still don’t get some of it, give me a call as I offer free advice.

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Being a successful SEO freelancer is easy if you love SEO and are prepared to work hard. Also it helps if you’re good at it and understand the fundaments of how search engines work.  There are far too many SEO’s that don’t really know what they are doing.  I would class myself as a successful SEO freelancer.

How to be successful?
It’s like any business.  To be successful in business you have to be organised, disciplined, focused, and consistent.  And of course provide a great service.  Perseverance helps but if you’re passionate about your business and work hard, only success will be achieved.

How I did it
After graduating from University I worked for an SEO company.  I was there for 2 years and this was enough to learn about and get good at it. I worked hard and learned so much. A few months before I left I set up my freelance website and optimised it for the keywords ‘SEO Freelance’.   It soon hit the top spot and I was getting enquiries.  Within a year of setting up that website and two months after doing if full time for myself,  I had enough clients to live a very comfortable life.

My Business Plan
When I say business plan I don’t mean page after page of waffle on objectives and keys to success etc. This would be necessary when starting up a business where funding is needed.  There is no funding needed to become and Freelance SEO.  My business plan was simple.  I just told myself to make sure I did a great job on every website/client I work for.  This I did and continue to do.  If you do something well you will get talked about and easily get work.   Lots of work has come through referrals and of course in this game, it helps being number one in Google.  This means I never have to chase work.  I did have plans to do networking and get into talking at conferences but I have never had the chance.  Work snowballed and I now have a waiting list and can pick and choose clients.  If I needed the ego boost I could get offices and stuff, but I don’t.

Out Source
Once you get a few clients your admin and booking keeping will double.  This is the time to outsource.  Outsourcing the actual SEO I wouldn’t recommend.  I have always done the actual SEO for my clients.  I sometimes outsource content writing, but that is about it.  I go through websites and optimise them myself and source the links myself.

For a while it will be tough as you will get lots of little jobs which are only a couple of hours a week and more trouble than they are worth.  But if you persist you will soon get bigger brands knocking on your door.

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I am pleased to announce I am now the official SEO for http://www.visitsealife.com.  Sealife is run by Merlin Entertainment Ltd and they have approached me to help them with their online presence.

Merlin Entertainments Group Ltd is a British operator of some of the top amusement parks and attractions in the UK.  It is the largest company in Europe and globally the second largest after Walt Disney Parks and Resorts.

This is very exciting for me as it’s the first corporate site I have worked and could lead to more work within the company.  I am also keen because I love wildlife and the subject is of interest to me.  They do a lot of conservation work and run a few Seal Sanctuaries in the UK.  They have a Gweek seal sanctuary, and Oban Seal Sanctuary and a Hunstanton Seal Sanctuary.  It’s good to know that my work will also benefit the wildlife in our country.

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CMS are great for websites and for SEO but picking the wrong one can turn your ecommerce dreams into a nightmare.  There are many web companies out there charging the earth for CMS they claim to have made themselves and is the best and so on.  But very few are SEO friendly, and furthermore the best ones are free anyway and take no time at all to install.

Here are some guidelines that a CMS must adhere too, to be classed as SEO friendly.

Meta
You need the ability to add/edit a unique title and meta description to each page. Also helpful but not essential is the ability to add additional meta tags. What is bad in SEO is if each page is titled with your business name.

URLs
You  need static customisable URLS.  No dynamics if possible.

Images
You need the ability to add your own Alt Tags (alternative text) to an image and add an appropriate description of the image.

Unique Headers
You want to be able to add and edit page headers (H1, H2 tags).  Each page should have a unique H1 tag.  You want to be able to edit the header without it changing another field e.g. title.

Body Text
You need to be able to add bold/italics, bulleted lists, just all the basic word processing functions.   You also want to be able to add hyperlinks to link to other pages.  Flexibility is key.

Navigation
You should be able to easily update your site navigation so you can ensure all pages are crawlable.

Redirects
The ability to redirect pages is beneficial.

RSS facility
The ability to show your content via rss.

Sitemaps
You need the ability to create and update sitemaps.  Ideally one for the site to help people navigate , but also an XML one to help with indexing.

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To get strong links pointing to your site you need to make your website the best it can possibly be.  Content is king and always will be.  If you learn nothing else about online marketing, remember that the content/text you place on your website and the effort you put out on SEO will determine how successful you are with online marketing. Your website needs lots of unique text rich pages with a minimum of 300 words. 

Link popularity is what you need to come up top in Google.  It is like being popular at school.  The more friends you have the more popular you are, so the more credibility you have.  The more links you have the more popular you are.  But if you had say 80 links and your competitors only have 40 it could be that some of their links are strong than yours.  It would be similar to someone having 80 friends, but the person with 40 had half a dozen famous friends like Posh and Becks or Madonna.  So it is not always about numbers but quality links.  Some of your best links could be from your competitors sites.     Finding the links is the tricky part.  Some webmasters have a fairly high standard for linking.  If your entire website looks like an advertisement you will struggle to get strong links.  There is nothing worse on a website than flashing banner ads.  And even more annoying than the actual look of them is that many site owners use adverts which are not even relevant to that market.  So as well as having an annoying banner that is putting you off reading the web page, the actual banner is totally irrelevant to you.  If you must have ads go for text ads as they blend better into the content of the site which creates ad blindness.

Website owners need to look more at their competition.  If your competitors are coming up top in Google there is a reason for it, it’s down to thier good content which gives them good inbound linking.  But you can’t get the inbound linking without good content.  This is why content is king and always will be.

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I am sometimes asked why some websites drop for certain keywords and the answer is one of 3 things.  You need to remember your site hasn’t dropped, but other sites have moved up.  Your site is in competition with every other site out there, so websites will go up and they will also go down.  The only way your site will stay at the top is if it is the best site out there, or you are paying more than everyone else to market it.

Some of the reasons why a website has dropped in rankings are:

1) It could be some of the links pointing to your site which previously had been providing a significant amount of PageRank could have been removed or deleted, or the PageRank of the originating site has dropped possible for similar reasons.

2) Search engines are always changing the methods they use to rank websites so they can improve the general quality of their search results.  So there could have been a recent algorithm change. Google is constantly changing its algorithm.

3) Several new web pages that also target your keywords could have been recently created and indexed making that keyword/phrase more competitive.

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‘Organic’ or ‘natural’  SEO is a term in search engine optimisation to describe the unpaid algorithm-driven results of any particular search engine. In other words all of the sites listed in Google or any other search engine which are NOT sponsored ads.  These listings are known as organic or natural.  The sponsored ads are known as PPC which means ‘pay per click’ which is exactly what you do, pay for every click you get.  If your site is listed naturally at the top UNDER these sponsored ads it this means your site is the most popular, most relevant and has the highest score in the algorithm. This is where 80% of users click, NOT the google ads.  This is why smart savvy business owners concentrate their marketing strategy to being listed here and hiring SEO experts to market their sites.  You get far better conversions from organic SEO and it is an investment on your business, unlike PPC, when you stop the site remains in that position.

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A website without SEO is like a car without an engine.  It will site there, look pretty but it wont move.  The same can be said for websites.  You need to spend as little as possible on the design of your site and as much as you can on the SEO and the SEO is an ongoing activity which should be part of your marketing strategy.

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Ever wondered what the hashtags are for in twitter?

eg. #hashtags How hash tags help your tweets get found?

Well they were originally created by Twitter users as a way to categorize messages. They help people find interesting tweets.

To use hashtags you simple put the symbol # before relevant keywords in your Tweet.. This helps them get found when someone searches for that keyword.
If you click on a hashtag in a tweet it will show you all other tweets in that category. Some hashtagged words that become very popular are often Trending Topics.

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There are loads of SEO software you can buy and I am often asked to review some.  Most of them are the same and offer the same, but whats different is the price.  I have never bought any as I know all the tip and tools and they are free anyway.

When it comes to keyword tools the best tool I believe is Googles.  As 90% of all searches are made via google it makes sense to use it.

Google offer many other tools, more than enough to help with your SEO efforts. So never waste money on SEO software as they are just using what is already there and free for everyone to use…

Googles Keyword Tool

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