I’ve just read an article by Axandra, the people who make IBP the do-it-yourself SEO software. This article is a concise and easy way to explain to customers the different approaches needed in SEO depending on the level of competition. It also outlines the importance of links when trying to achieve a top ranking on a competitive term.

It reiterates the importance Google places on incoming links, so let me repeat again, if you want to go after a competitive keyword term then you better have a lot of high quality links. For help on link building visit our link building packages.

Enough talk, go and read the article.

Google has released a statement about having low quality backlinks to your website. In typical Google fashion it’s not very specific, however I’m reading that having a heap of low quality links to a site that doesn’t hold a lot of weight can effect rankings. Read the article here: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2009/10/dealing-with-low-quality-backlinks.html

I’ve been ignoring Bing as a search engine, mostly because it’s made by the evil Microsoft. However, it’s now overtaken Yahoo for most of our clients sites as the second largest search engine referrer. That is no threat to Google as the Big G still takes about 90% of the search engine credit, but I’m surprised it’s overtaken Yahoo so rapidly. It could still be the novelty factor, but it could also indicate real competition.

So, not to be left out in the cold, the key factors for number one websites in Bing seem to be:

• having an old domain name
• having quality inbound links, specifically from pages that have the same keywords in the title
• then the usual good amount of quality content (I’ve read Bing likes more than 300 words on a page), clean code and a sitemap

If you’ve done a good job of optimising your site for Google then your rankings shouldn’t be too different for Bing. If you’ve got loads of spammy links holding your website up in Google then these won’t help you in Bing. Bing seems to like better qualified links than Google – it’s about time!

Read more over at Bing

We are pleased to launch stand alone link building services. With Google finally admitting link building a significant factor in getting a high ranking, we thought it was time to offer these services to the general public, instead of just our SEO clients.

From Google:

“In general, webmasters can improve the rank of their sites by increasing the number of high-quality sites that link to their pages.”

We do recommend you carry out SEO on your website before engaging in link building as the end result will be much better. Prices start at $AU450 per month. Click here to order now.

I think one of the hardest aspects of our industry is making the client understand what you are doing. Having just had a conversation with prospective client this morning, she was at a loss to really understand what is good SEO and what is bad. She’s been using an SEO guy for about six months who appears to have done nothing to her website at all, but just provided her with automated reports, but since she didn’t understand them they weren’t passed on to her webmaster.

I sympathise with her. For a small business owner, you should not be expected to know the technical details about SEO, you should be able to trust the person or agency you’ve engaged to increase traffic to your website and they should be able to demonstrate this with monthly reports.

I’ve since emailed her a number of links to try to demystify SEO somewhat and thought they would be really useful to a lot of small business owners. Obviously you don’t want to know all about SEO, but you are going to have to know the basics if you want to avoid getting ripped off.

Google have provided a lot of information to dispel myths. Don’t forget to download and read their Search Engine Optimization Guide.

I recommend you start reading here, these provide good background information:
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=70897&cbid=1qsbnd1hhxbgs&src=cb&lev=topic
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=40349&cbid=-1jjfbjsqd41j6&src=cb&lev=topic
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=34432&cbid=1gbt9m2gel4jv&src=cb&lev=topic

The link below has more links to relevant information about appearing in Google. If you click the link below, I would suggest reading the link, “Site not appearing in search results, or appearing lower“.
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/topic.py?topic=8524

This link also has a list of articles that are relevant to you:
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/topic.py?topic=8522

From the above link I recommend you read the General guidelines: “Search Engine Optimization (SEO)“. Actually this is probably the most important link. It will provide you with information about what to look for in an SEO agency and when to run away from a dodgy one.

Don’t forget to ask questions if you don’t understand. Your agency should be able to help you to understand what is needed to be done to improve the ranking and traffic of your website. You should get some information about their past success, either written references, data or be able to speak to some of their clients.

Once you’ve done that, check us out. We provide ethical search engine optimisation packages and link building services.