Which premium search engine optimization software do I use?

I’m asked this quite a bit - and the answer, usually, is “none”

If you were to ask “which premium SEO software do you own”  then, my reply would be “most of them” but I really don’t tend to use search engine optimisation software on a regular basis.

I’ve used SEO elite, Web CEO, Web position Gold, and quite a few others - and although they all have nice features that speed up certain parts of search engine optimization, I’ve got to the point now where I can do everything I need to do really quickly, manually - and using a program to do it, just doesn’t feel the same.

Even when it comes to checking positions, I prefer to do it manually if possible, because I just prefer it, and I get information when searching manually that I wouldn’t get with using SEO [...] Continue Reading…

I’ve had a few people (mainly in the US) mention that I spell search engine optimization wrong - as I spell it “search engine optimisation”

Also optimise vs. optimize.

This is just the UK / US spelling difference, in the UK we tend to spell most “ize” words “ise” instead.

Language is pretty complex when you look into it, but basically words derived from classical Greek with the letter “zeta” in their suffix were rendered ‘ize’ in English - but more modern UK publishers prefer the more modern Latinate rule which renders these words ‘ise’ instead.

Both optimization & optimistion are actually correct english spelling, as are realise & realize, so most publications just pick one version & stick to it.

You’re probably aware of this - but it doesn’t seem everyone is.

Anyway, was a darn good excuse for some keyword rich content

Regardless of how to spell it - search engine optimization / [...] Continue Reading…

I’m writing this post today in response to a comment made to my blog post titled “Who Cares About Google Pageank?

industrial adhesive Says:

interesting perspective on pagerank. it is considered by many to be the “currency” of the internet due to its far reaching influence. but i do tend to agree with you that it is somewhat overrated. what really should be the measuring stick to a site’s success is the relevant traffic it draws.

I’ve replied briefly to this comment, just to say that PR shouldn’t be seen as currency, as a currency it’s losing value even faster than the pound is at the moment - but I just wanted to delve deeper into why Google pagerank is no longer a currency worth investing in.

Firstly - Google pagerank is NOT ours to buy or sell.

When Google started to show us an indication of link popularity with the toolbar pagerank [...] Continue Reading…

This is just a quick one..

We all agree that Twitter is a good SEO tool?

For those who’re not sure - I’ll write another longer post shortly about this,  or join my search engine marketing tips newsletter (form over there on the right hand side) but basically, getting your URL into tweets doesn’t have immediate SEO benefit as the links have the NoFollow tag on the tweet, so the search engines ignore it - but, there are a couple of places that these links do actually go to, that don’t have the nofollow attribute, and that do have an SEO benefit.

This is one of the reasons you should make your tweets as good as possible, and the pages / blog posts you’re including in the tweet, as high value as possible, so more people will re-tweet.

Anyway - for now just know that there is an SEO benefit from including your [...] Continue Reading…

I’ve not been on twitter long, like many people I kept putting it off until just a few weeks ago - and now I’m really into the twitter phenomenon.

I recently doubled my followers within a couple of days using a very clever little idea called tweet success (a way to automate this process - but in an ethical and non spammy manner, it just vastly speeds up what you would usually do manually) and I’m gaining many new twitter friends on a daily basis.  I’m making lots of connections, I’m learning from people - I’m helping people, it’s fantastic.

There’s one thing that I see people doing quite often with twitter, that always confuses me - and that is, holding back on following, in an attempt to build an account which is far heavier on followers than following.

Why?

As far as I can tell, most of the people that do this, [...] Continue Reading…

One thing that I’m constantly telling people, is that SEO isn’t just about search engine positions / search engine ranking.

Yes, of course it’s about SE rankings, but it’s not JUST about ranking / position.

Firstly - it’s about positions for the right key terms, so it’s about keyword research to ensure that the keywords you’re working on achieving good ranking for, are going to bring you a return on your time invested.

The biggest mistake that I see, is bad choice of keyword selection, either focusing on key terms that the website is unlikely to gain good ranking for within a reasonable amount of time, targeting key terms which are unlikely to bring good volumes of traffic, or targeting keywords which are unlikely to result in targeted traffic which will convert into sales.

Secondly - it’s about click through rate. There’s no point having top search engine positions if no one is [...] Continue Reading…

Which search engines should we target our search egine optimization / optimisation, towards?

Google is the obvious answer - but Google isn’t the only search engine, there’s Yahoo & MSN/Live & Ask (and the rest of the main search engines get their results from yahoo or Google) .

But when we’re optimising our websites, should we focus on one specific search engine?

My opinion, is yes we certainly should - although there are a number of other search engines, the search engine that most of the traffic comes via, is Google - and while Google is the biggest single source of search engine traffic, we should focus our efforts on Google - it’s as simple as that as far as I’m concerned.

Yes, it’s nice to also have our websites listed on the other search engines, but with over 80% of search engine traffic coming from Google, it really does make sense to [...] Continue Reading…

So you know that you need a higher quantity & quality of targeted search engine traffic, and you’re thinking about hiring a search engine optimization / optimisation company. Which company, or which kind of company should you choose?

First of all, this depends on budget. If you have a budget of a few thousand pounds per month or more, then you’ll more than likely want to look towards one of the SEO agencies.

SEO agencies employ teams which handle search engine optimization for their clients, many offer a range of services including ppc management, web design & development, and other  marketing solutions.

Larger concerns would usually hire an SEO agency, in the UK the main agencies include brands such as Amaze, Latitude , MediaVest, Code, Clickthrough Marketing, Guava, Big Mouth & Just Search.

If you’re a small to medium size business with a smaller marketing budget, it’s unlikely this budget is going to [...] Continue Reading…

Haha - I might write to Harry Hill & ask him to have an SEO vs PPC  fight on the “TV burp” show

Joking apart, this post is been made in reply to : contactdubai.com/internet-marketing/seo-or-ppc-which-one-should-you-use by one of my twitter friends leif_n

I have seen this post as a good chance for a friendly debate on the argument between SEO & PPC.

Main Plus points for PPC :

Almost instant traffic.
Little effort - A campaign can be started very quickly, without putting in a great deal of time or effort.
Great stats - allowing you to test & tweak effectively to increase click through rates.
If conversion tracking is used, you can work out which keywords are converting keywords, and which ones are not. Major plus!

Main minus points for PPC:

Yes traffic is almost instant - but paying is just as instant, and to begin with on a [...] Continue Reading…

Search engine website  marketing isn’t all about search engine ranking.

Yes, of course you want your website to rank highly on the search engines, but there is more to SEO / SEM than just ranking.

All methods of search engine marketing, including search engine optimisation, are about increasing sales.

When setting up a pay per click campaign, it’s obvious that it’s not just about bidding for the top spot, it’s about click through rate, conversion & return on investment - When working on SEO, it’s still just as much about click through rate, conversions & ROI, but many people forget that & focus purely on ranking.

So when you’re working on search engine ranking for your website, keep in mind that it’s not just ranking that’s important, it’s sales, and profit - and return on time invested.