The edge of blogs

Blogs may seem simple enough to do, and you are right. When you know how to use it, it just might become one of your most precious marketing and SEO tools.

Blogs have evolved form being chiefly personal or political into high commercial and corporate, and this is precisely why blogs SEO is quickly becoming a very important aspect of web campaigns. Why are blogs such hits? Here are some reasons:

1. Blogs SEO experts say that blogs are friendly to search engines by design – they are meant to always contain new content that are abundantly interlinked. This certainly explains why there are some very successful blogs that land on the first page of search engine results (for commonly searched terms) without even trying.

2. Blogs are also of the most inexpensive ways to promote a site. Blogs SEO practitioners usually just hire a competent content writer to maintain their blogs (if they cannot do it themselves). Blogs may either be hosted by the website itself of diverted another blog server (which are also usually free of charge).

3. Blogs are also more ‘personal’ and interactive. The very fact that readers can react to the entries posted through the ‘comments’ functionality shows just how powerfully communicative blogs are compared to static content. Blog SEO experts say that businesses should give more premium to the feedback mechanism inherent in blogs – potential and actual customers can readily give comments and suggestions and even ask questions after reading an article. This kind of below-the-line business intelligence is indispensable to any organization of any size.

4. Finally, blogs are fairly easy to maintain. Absolutely anybody can run a blog. It is very easy to update and edit blog text, to add or remove links from its pages, etc. Blog SEO is by far the most easy-to-manage, straightforward, undemanding and cost-effective way of aggressively improving three important things in one go – search engine ranking, online feedback mechanisms and product or service sales.

Google optimization through linking

The main aim of Google optimization is to boost your Google rankings. To do this, you need to underrated Google’s PageRank technology is – the system that determines how significant and popular your website (or a specific page inside it) is. Google PageRank works by reading your links – the more websites and individual web pages link to your site, the more ‘important’ your site is deemed to be.

The key is to therefore build ties with popular websites. Once they link you back, your Google optimization improves a little. Beware, though — do not just link to any site if its content is not even remotely connected to yours. Do not fall into ‘link farming,’ which is overuse of unrelated links for the purpose of artificially jacking up rankings. Google interprets your link farms as ‘spam,’ and as a consequence, your site ranking may plummet down, or worse, you may get reprimanded for it.

Google optimization through keywords

Google’s auto-readers called Googlebots interpret your web content to determine your site’s significance to a specific query. To help the Googlebots ‘read’ your texts, add in relevant, specific and accurate keywords and/or key phrases into your text. In Google optimization, it is important that you repeat these words throughout the article as much as you sensible can. Do not overdo it, though, or Google may interpret it as spam.

Google optimization experts offer advice on what keywords related to your product or services are searched most often by search engine users. Knowing what these high-value keywords and phrases is key to Google optimization – if you effectively incorporate these into your web content, you can improve your Google ranking, target your intended audience, increase traffic, and possibly even boost sales.

Google optimization experts likewise advise that you pay very close attention to the titles you give your content. Google considers the title to be the most important of all the texts, so be sure to include the main keywords or phrases in it. Be cautious of your title’s length though – Google optimization experts say that titles should be less than seven words.

Why you should submit to web directories

If you do it right, submitting your URL to an effective web directory may be the best thing you do for your website. Web directories can get you very strong one-way links that enable search engines to spider your site faster and more accurately.

Choosing the right web directory

The most popular web directory these days is Dmoz.org – and it’s not surprising why. Dmoz has built the reputation of making noteworthy bearing on the Google rankings of the websites submitted to its directory. Google is using Dmoz data, which explains this significant effect. Some experts argue that Dmoz may not last a very long time, though, because it is run by volunteers and because its data is open to exploitation. Still, this web directory is worth mentioning, and definitely worth submitting your sites to.

You should also link up to web directories that cater to your site’s specific category. It might be a good idea to submit your URL to sites such as Business.com, for example, in order to network with other business sites and possibly even gain new clients. The MSN small business directory is also a good place to start – it is cheaper to submit to this web directory than to any other web directory, and it definitely has a powerful platform. The MSN web directory also provides members with a personal page where you can endorse your business.

The cost of submitting to web directories

Be prepared to spend anywhere from about $10 to as high as $300, depending on what web directory you decide to submit your site to. Opinions on how much a webmaster should spend on web directory submission vary. Web directory experts say that you should think twice about forking over $200 on submitting to web directories because their impact on your search engine rankings is not worth the money. Still, some entrepreneurs have managed to quickly get back their investments in web directory submission, and some find more expensive price tags (such as $300 for the Yahoo directory) reasonable.

The choice is entirely up to you. Have realistic expectations and weigh the costs against the benefits wisely. Remember that web directory submission is not the key to high search engine rankings – they certainly help, but are many other factors. If you simply want to build up decent web presence, though, then submission to web directories can surely contribute a lot.

The ‘good’ SEO company

A genuinely professional SEO company uses only the ethical methods of improving your site’s ranking, ‘ethical methods’ being techniques deemed acceptable according to search engines guidelines.

An ethical SEO company will typically improve your site’s structure and content in order to get you to the top pages. They usually install mechanisms to allow search engine spiders to access your site while protecting some of your directories, for example. They will also optimize your graphical content (including Flash animation) so that search engines can decipher the information.

They may also use frequently-searched strings of words to name your pages, add relevant meta tags (without off topic words or comments, of course), and design a sitemap so that all your page links are easily ‘spidered.’ A good SEO company will also establish beneficial links to your site by promoting it and getting high-ranking websites to want to link to it. Adding relevant keyword-rich content is also considered an ethical SEO method, so good SEO companies will likely use this, too.

The ‘bad’ SEO company

On the flip side, there are so-called ‘bad’ SEO companies that use SEO techniques deemed unethical. Keyword spamming or stuffing is one such dirty tactic – the SEO company may insert concealed, random text on the page to increase the keyword density. This cunning technique can be done by simply encoding the text in a color that blends with the page’s background, or by placing text ‘at the back’ of an image (through CSS “Z” positioning).

Bad SEO companies likewise trick search engine algorithms by using ‘Spamdexing’ (a combination of spam and indexing) to promote irrelevant pages. ‘Cloaking’ is yet another tactic of bad SEO companies – they find ways to make search engine spiders detect a page that is completely different from what will be seen by human users. Other bad SEO company tactics include mirroring sites, creating doorway pages, and filling pages with irrelevant links.

The ‘ugly’ SEO company

There are literally thousands of phony SEO companies that guarantee you top 10 placements on chief search engines, but most of them never deliver. Some of these fake SEO companies even claim to have special relationships with top engines like Google and Yahoo. Do not be fooled by promises that are too good to be true – remember that improving search engine ranking does not happen overnight. A fool-proof SEO strategy can only be delivered by an honest SEO company with a long-term plan and ethical methods.

What are the different types of search engines?

A search engine is actually a user-friendly program that indexes websites in a database to help users locate sites and pages relevant to what they are searching for. There are three different kinds of search engines: (a) crawler-based search engines, (b) human-powered directories, and (c) hybrid search engines. Each type works differently, and you therefore need to know what tactics to employ to make sure you rank high in any kind.

A crawler-based search engine (such as the ever popular Google) works without human intervention. It literally crawls or ‘spiders’ the internet based on keywords (especially titles) to generate its listings. The process is fully-automated, so if you make changes to your website, Google finds it robotically.

Getting high rankings in crawler-based search engines entails skills in “Search Engine Optimization’ or SEO, which should be easy if you happen to have a solid background in programming. If you don’t however, it may be best to seek professional help. There are companies who specialize in optimizing your website for crawler-based search engines. While their services can cost a good deal of money, your investment almost immediately pays off in the form of increased site traffic and sales.

Another type of search engine comes in form of human-powered directories. As its name implies, this type of search engine relies on humans to manually add to its listings. Depending on the search engine company, you can either (a) submit your site details yourself, or (b) talk to their editor to write an entry for you.

Note that if you modify your site, you need to manually submit the changes to the search engine. Things that are important to crawler-based search engines (such as metafiles and keyword-rich content) have little or no importance to a human-powered directory. If you want editors to notice your site and put it in the top ranks of the search engine, you just have to improve its quality and usability.

Finally, there are hybrid search engines that are very prevalent today. An example of such a search engine is MSN. How does this kind of search engine work? By combining crawler-based technology and human-powered listings, MSN uses LookSmart to lead users to sites of general queries, but also uses Inktomi for more ambiguous search engine queries.