30 SEO tips 2013

30 SEO tips in 30 minutes
Mostly basics, some advanced tips, followed by Q&A

Jaspal Sahota
jaspal@websearchone.com

@JaspalX

Basics

SEO is mostly Google - know the rules!

 Search engines have very clear guidelines:
 Don’t buy links and then try to hide that you’ve
bought those links

 If in doubt, think ‘what would be best for visitors
to my site’ rather than ‘what would be best for
Google’

 Check out Google’s webmaster guidelines (see
the links in http://bit.ly/30seotips)
If an offer sounds to good to be true…especially in SEO
land…it probably is
Image credit: ehsweb.wordpress.com
Get the links at: http://bit.ly/30seotips


@JaspalX 3

Basics

Google Webmaster Tools

 Sign up for this at https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools

Alerts you to problems with your site, gives basic SEO info

@JaspalX 4

Basics

Make it easy for Google to crawl your pages

 Site structure, get the foundations right
 Try to keep all content within three clicks of home page

 Google is not great at finding links and
content insides Flash and JavaScript

 Test using text browser like seo-browser.com

Simpler is usually better!

@JaspalX Image credit: www.civilengineergroup.com 5

Basics

Why do website pages rank well?

Social
promotion
Content
(on page & site)
Links
(to page & site)

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25%

These factors account for around 70% of why a page ranks

@JaspalX 6

Basics

Quality content…or at the very least unique content

You have expert knowledge and insight into your
industry and customers….share it!
 Survey 25 customers – think of a set of questions
 Explain a complex process simply (e.g. pictures are
good for this)
 Create a history of a product or industry

 If you don’t have the time to do this, get some help.

Google wants to rank the ‘best’ pages, make sure your
content is relevant and valuable to your audience
@JaspalX 8

Basics

Content: map your keywords to pages

 E.g. say you’re selling washing m/c parts
 Home page: ‘washing machine parts’
 Bosch page:
– ‘bosch washing machine motors’
– ‘bosch washing machine parts’

Try to limit yourself to one, two or three phrases per page

@JaspalX 9

Basics

Make each page relevant to the keywords you’ve targeted

If you want Google to recognise that your page
is about ‘blue widgets’ make sure you mention
blue widgets are few times on the page!

 Good page titles are essential!
 Include your keywords and variations in the
text
 An image and/or video about your keyword is
a very good idea

www.seomoz.org/blog/perfecting-keyword-targeting-on-
page-optimization
@JaspalX 10

Basics

Use a blog or news pages to target extra keywords

Most websites tend to be fairly static. Use a blog or


news announcements for:
 Time-sensitive content (Valentine’s
day, Christmas, etc.)
 To highlight your top sellers
 Answer questions customers often ask

Write blog posts about subsets of products or special items
e.g. ‘socks with cats on’
@JaspalX 11

Intermediate

Create keyword variations and build content for them
Dad of young kids
Mum of young kids
Teenagers with money
(TV) sports fans
Pizza
Personas: Pizza delivery
A handful of written Pizza take away Fast pizza delivery
‘sketches’ of people you pizza restaurant Fast pizza delivery in Solihull
want visiting your site Pizza delivery in Knowle
Pizza delivery in Dorridge
Pizza for parties
Seed phrases:
Short phrases relevant
to your searcher personas
Create variations: use
adjectives, adverbs, plu
rals, locations
@JaspalX 12

Basics

Links: they’re like votes – more are usually better

Anchor text – tells Google what your links are about. Anchor text is the


bit of text you click on.

 Rule of thumb:
 two brand links for every keyword link

Prefer links from high quality sites and sites that are about
your industry
@JaspalX 14

Intermediate

Links: spy on learn from your competitors

 Use tools to look at competitor links:
 www.OpenSiteExplorer.org
 www.majesticseo.com
Learn what kinds of links they’re getting and
think about doing the same/better.

Note, those are paid tools, but do offer some
free data too.

Not all competitor links may be valuable…prefer quality

@JaspalX 15

Basics

What is a ‘quality’ page?

 Would you trust this site or page with your credit card details?
 No:
– It probably isn’t worth getting a link from
 Yes, then look at other factors, e.g.:
– Does the content look unique?
– Does it link to other good content?
– Would you be happy if your customers
saw your site mentioned on the page?

Links from ‘dodgy’ sites are at best useless and at worst
harmful
Image credit: wikipedia
@JaspalX 16

Basics

Getting links: the press can be great for links

 Don’t expect to get links if you just…
 Send a press release to your industry press or the
papers
 Do
 Think about what you read in the media you’re
trying to get covered in…is your story good
enough?
(Moving office is usually not newsworthy!)
 Pick up the phone

Do mention your website or the page on your site that will
support the story…don’t just ask for a link!
@JaspalX 17

Basics

Getting links: directories

 Generally directories are not very
valuable, particularly the SEO-oriented large
‘free for all’ directories.
 Usually, but not always, paid-for directories are
best.
 On-topic, curated lists are usually best. If you
sell buttons and someone manages a list of
online button resources, that’s a valuable site!

Think about whether your prospects might actually use the
directory before thinking about its SEO value
@JaspalX 18

Intermediate

Getting links: outreach

Make lists of bloggers or news organisations that


cover your industry, then:
 Review their site(s)
 Make sure they link out from articles/news etc.
 Work out what content you can give them
 Pitch your content, learn from rejections and
refine your future pitches
 Make sure you meet any deadlines for providing
articles/news/comment

Good content earns links, but only if people know about it!

@JaspalX 19

Intermediate

Links are valuable, two main types

Good for SEO Less good for SEO

Followed No-follow
Facebook, Wikipedia, Twitter, s
ome blog comments, most
social media sites.

No-follow links can bring valuable visitors
(Links in JavaScript and Flash can behave like no-follow)
@JaspalX 20

Basics

Local: if you have a local business, consistency is key

Make sure your business name, address and phone number (NAP) is


consistent anywhere it appears online.
 0121 222 4444 is not the same as (0)121 222 4444

More consistency means your site is more likely to appear in these


maps results:

@JaspalX 22

Basics

Local: fill out your Google Places listing as possible

 Claim your listing:
www.google.com/placesforbusiness
 Fill out your business description
 Use the categories
 Specify opening times
 Add images/video
 If you have a ‘service area business’ (as of
early 2013), do not migrate to a Google+
local page

Follow the Google quality guidelines (see the links)

@JaspalX 23

Basics

Reviews aren’t just good, they’re very good

 If you have:
 Google Shopping feed (products)
 Google Places page (location)
 Then:
 Get customer reviews!

 Be wary of:
 Creating a sudden spike in number and/or ratings of reviews
 Reviews all coming from the same location (IP address)

Product reviews: require changes to your website.
Places reviews: you just need a Google Place listing
@JaspalX 24

Intermediate

Local: check how search results look in other towns

Coventry

Google personalises results so different people may see
different results
@JaspalX 25

Basics

Analytics can tell you…

Where are sales coming from? Where are visitors coming from?

What do people who spend
more than average look at?

How important is mobile?

What content should I
be creating?

Google Analytics is free

@JaspalX 27

Basics

Analytics: tracking visits…more important than rankings?

 Strongly recommend installing Google Analytics
 Setup goals to monitor conversions:
– Admin / your site / goals

 Filter out your visits:
– Admin / your site / filters)

 Find organic search visits:
– Traffic Sources / Sources / Search / Organic

Remember to exclude your own computer/company (filters).
Check out ‘advanced segments’ in Google Analytics
@JaspalX 28

Basics

Analytics: value of sponsorship/offers on other sites

 Placed an offer on another site?
 Look at ‘referrals’ in Google Analytics,
 See how many referred visits are:
– Bounce rate (higher is worse)
– Pages/visit and Avg. visit duration (higher
usually indicates engaged visitors)

You can use ‘advanced segments’ to zero in on specific kinds of
traffic
@JaspalX 29

Intermediate

Analytics: use site search to identify what visitors want

 Use the search box within your own site to work out what content
visitors want…then build it or make it more prominent!

Find site search settings in GA under Admin / your site / profile
settings
@JaspalX 30

Basics

Ecommerce & product sites: stand out

Make your pages stand out from the
competition.
 Make your descriptions unique, don’t just
copy manufacturer text
 Use multiple images – your own if at all
possible
 Add customer reviews to your product
pages
 Build up your category pages, not just the
product pages

Build links to category pages…links help individual product
pages
@JaspalX 32

Advanced

Ecommerce sites: use product markup

Ask your website developer to help you with the
database:
 Create a product feed for google shopping
 Use schema.org markup to tell Google the
names, prices etc. of products
 Encourage follow-on sales at checkout with
social referrals, e.g. www.ownedit.com
Data feeds

Google shopping feeds can be very effective (though
changes coming around March 2013)
Disclosure: Owned it is a Vitis PR client
Image credit: glenn-packer.net Get the links at: http://bit.ly/30seotips
@JaspalX 33

Advanced

How much should I invest in SEO? (I sell ‘blue widgets’)
Rank Volume Visits Sales Conversion rate Value
10 1000 10 1 10% £100

Rank Volume Visits Sales Conversion rate Value
1 1000 ~180 ~18 10% £1,800

@JaspalX Source: Slingshot SEO study 2011 of 342 keywords 35

Advanced

Got a problem? Don’t panic about rankings

 If you’re rankings have suddenly dropped, and:
 Your site is still working fine
 You haven’t been engaging in any ‘suspect’ SEO
 You haven’t changed anything on the site
 Do the following:
 Check SEO blogs/news for any info about Google
updates
 Just wait a week or three…it might recover

If things don’t get better after two/three weeks, get some
professional help
Image credit: appleinsider


@JaspalX 36

Basics

Setup alerts to monitor the health of your site

 http://www.google.co.uk/alerts?hl=en
 Create an alert like this:
 site:yoursite.com ("pharmacy"|"cialis"|"viagra"|”porn"|"levitra")

replacing yoursite.com with your own site's address.

You’ll get an email alert if any of those words appear on your website
(e.g. if your site gets hacked)

@JaspalX 37

Basics

Read SEO blogs

If you want to do this yourself, you’ll need to spend some time studying
it:
 www.seomoz.org/blog
 www.searchengineland.com
 www.searchenginejournal.com

 Start here:
 http://www.seomoz.org/beginners-guide-to-seo

Google changes its algorithms hundreds of times each year
SEO is always evolving
@JaspalX 38

Thanks

 Any questions about SEO, your or a competitor’s website?

If you’d like a free ‘SEO site clinic’ for your website today, please add


your details to the list at the front to book a slot.

@JaspalX 39

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