What is SEO?

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)-

the practice of improving the ranking of a website in organic (natural, non-paid) search results for specific keywords and phrases that relate to that website.

Archive for SEO Tips

How Can I Keep My SEO Rank When I Change My Domain?

by Darrell D.
September 15th, 2011

So you’ve worked hard to build your domain (www.Example.com) but now you need to change your domain (www.MyNewExample.com). You’ve earned ranking with Google and other search engines with content on your www.example.com site, and you want that rank to automatically carry over to your new site. Is that even possible? The short answer is “No.” BUT there are some key steps that can be taken to carry over a lot of rank so that you are not starting over from scratch.

Moving from one house to another house is never easy or fun, but if you properly prepare, the transition can be made smoother. And if you label everything carefully when you’re packing, when you get to the new house everything will be unpacked easily and put in it’s proper place. Moving a website to a new home is very similar.

Here are some tips to help make a smooth transition to the new domain. First, you need to set up 301 redirects for every single page, post and link. You want to set the 301 to link to a specific page on your new domain.  Do not set them all to simply redirect to the new homepage (MyNewExample.com).  Set the 301 to go to a very comparable page on your new domain. If that page does not exist, it’s probably worth creating. I don’t think it’s a big deal if a few of the 301 redirects point to the same place on your new domain, but try to make it as much of a 1:1 transfer as possible. If you’re using WordPress, a great redirection plugin is called Redirection by John Godley.

You’ll probably want to plan on keeping your current domain (www.Example.com) up for 120 days or so. This will give ample time for all the 301 redirects to really take root. Once all of your 301s are set up, sign in to Google Webmaster Tools and fill out a Change of Address Form. It’s under the Site Configuration section of your Dashboard.

One other thing I would suggest is contacting the people that link to your current domain (www.Example.com). You can find a list of links to your site in the Google Webmaster Tools dashboard too. Look through it, and if you see a lot of links from a site, contact them. Thank them for linking to your site and let them know that you want to make sure they’re providing the most up-to-date and accurate info to their visitors, and tell them what the new link should be. They just need to change their URLs to the new one. No 301 is necessary.

One final suggestion. Create new content on your new domain that is rich with the keywords you want to rank for. The fresh content will go a long way to giving you the rank you need. This is similar to what I suggested above, but make this content fresh and unique from the content you copied over from your current site. This step is not necessary if you did a fresh rewrite of the content you bring over from your current site. But if you do a straight copy of the content, make sure you write some fresh stuff too.

Good luck with your move!

Categories SEO Tips
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What Are the Best SEO Tools?

by Darrell D.
August 8th, 2011

What are some of the best SEO tools?  Fortunately, there is no shortage of SEO tools available today.  Unfortunately, there are some really uninformed “SEO Experts” out there.  Here are a few of my favorite SEO tools and websites from people who know what they’re talking about.

1. Google Webmaster Tools-This is an invaluable resource.  If you have not yet signed up for Google Webmaster Tools, stop reading and go sign up right now! Once you get your site set up, you’ll be able to track many useful insights such as Google +1 Metrics, Crawl Stats, Link to Your Site, Site Performance and MUCH, MUCH more! In addition to this page, there is a Google Webmaster Tools Help page that is also invaluable. At the very least you should download and read the Google Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide.

2. Another great SEO Tool from Google is the Google Webmaster Central YouTube Channel. Here you will find hundreds of videos filled with tips, insights and listener-submitted questions. Each video is hosted by Google Search Engineer, Matt Cutts.

3. One last very helpful SEO Tool is the website SEO Book. SEO Book has more SEO resources than any other website I’ve found. The information at SEO Book is very well organized and easy to understand. They do have a paid service, so most of the information at SEO Book is not free. However, there are still some VERY useful videos, blogs, and training resources available at no cost. At the very least, make sure you visit the SEO Book Tools page. It provides several valuable resources such as the SEO Toolbar for Firefox, Rank Tracker Firefox extension and SEO for Firefox extension. These three tools are free and provide much of the insights provided by expensive SEO software.

There are many other great SEO Tools out there, but these three are a great starting point. Go check out these SEO resources and you’ll be learning how to improve your website’s SEO in no time!

Categories SEO Tips, SEO Tools
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How to Get Quick SEO Results

by Darrell D.
August 4th, 2011

Is it possible to get quick SEO results? Yes, it is possible. However, it is never guaranteed. You may have noticed that DramaticTraffic.com is a very new site. Dramatic Traffic was launched on July 31, 2011. For the month of July, leading up to that point, Dramatic Traffic was only a progress bar, a Twitter stream and a place to sign up for notifications. That means that when we launched the full site on July 31, we had no recognition or ranking for ANY keywords. Would you believe that within 2 days we would have a Yahoo rank of 11 of one of the keywords we chose to target? It’s true.

How did Dramatic Traffic earn a top 11 ranking in Yahoo in just 2 days? We did it by making sure we built our site and subsequent pages with good SEO techniques. Does this mean that we (or you) will be able to replicate these results for every keyword? No, but that does not mean we shouldn’t try, right? Here’s what we did to get such a high ranking:

1. We made sure that the Title, Meta Keyword and Meta Description contained the keywords we were MOST interested in ranking for. We did not overload these fields with keywords. We focused only on the ones that mattered most to us.

2. We made sure there was original written content near the top of our home page that repeated those keywords.

3. We wrote a blog post that was about a specific keyword we wanted to rank high for. Let me repeat that. The blog post focused mostly on a single keyword. We’ll write other blogs about other keywords, but we wanted to rank high for that specific keyword, so we made sure that the blog post had that keyword mentioned several times. This ensured that the search engines would know that the keyword was very relative to the content on that page.

4. We made sure that the Title, Meta Keywords and Meta Description fields were focused on that keyword. Does that sound redundant? Yes, but that’s the point. The blog post was written with the intention of being a resource for those needing information about that keyword. By making sure the keyword was mentioned in the blog title, blog content, page title, meta description and meta keywords, the search engines had no problems recognizing what the article was about.

Let me also mention that the blog post not only contained the keyword multiple times, but it mentioned it early (within the first sentence) of the article.

Following these practices will get your website improved ranking in Google, Bing and Yahoo…guaranteed. Will it deliver results as quickly as this did for Dramatic Traffic? Sometimes. Will it get you on the first page or two of the search engines? Eventually. However, success like this is not often achieved by a single blog post. Many times you will need to continue to keep adding strong content to your site before you’ll get the ranking you desire. And that is exactly what we will keep doing.

Good Luck!

Categories SEO Tips
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What is the Purpose of an XML Sitemap?

by Darrell D.
August 3rd, 2011

A sitemap is simply a list of pages on your website that is formatted in a way that search engine robots like. Therefore, creating a sitemap for your website is a great way to help the search engine robots navigate and index your pages. You may be wondering how to create a sitemap or be intimidated by the thought of creating a sitemap. Fortunately, building a sitemap may not be as hard as you think it is.

I recommend building your website using WordPress. I realize that WordPress will not work for all website needs, but it is a great platform that will more than meet the needs of most websites. Dramatic Traffic is built on WordPress, using the iThemes Builder platform. Even though I do know how to code websites, this entire site was built without me ever writing even a single line of code. I also recommend using HostGator to host your website. They have a great support staff, and installing WordPress requires only a few simple clicks. If you need more info about using or installing WordPress, contact me using the Contact slider on the left side of your screen. I will have future blogs and videos that cover WordPress details.

Once you have WordPress installed, click on Plugins, Add New, and search for XML Sitemap. I recommend the plugin called Google XML Sitemaps by Arne Brachhold. Go ahead and click on the orange Install button and then activate the plugin. Once it is activated, look for the XML-Sitemap link in the Settings section of your admin control panel. A page will pull up that shows various customizations that can be made to your sitemap. I don’t recommend changing any of the default settings. Instead, look near the top of the page and you will see a link to create your Sitemap. Simply click on that link and, voila! Your sitemap is done. The plugin will handle all the sitemap updates automatically, and it will even tell Bing, Google, and Ask.com when you add any content to your site!

If you are not using WordPress for your website, there are still some very helpful resources that help you create a sitemap. Google even has a Sitemap Generator that you can find here. If you need more resources, Google provides a Wiki of various Sitemap Generators. You can find those resources here.

Once you’ve created your XML Sitemap, you need to submit it to Google and Bing (unless you use the WordPress plugin I recommended above). Google and Bing both have Webmaster tools that are free. The tools at each of these sites are very helpful and should become a regular part of your data analysis routine. Once you have created an account at each site, you will see a button in the middle of the screen to add the URL of your site. You will then need to verify your site, using one of several methods they provide. Once you have completed that step, you will be able to submit your sitemap. On Google, look for a section on the lower right side that says Sitemaps. Then follow the directions to add your sitemap. For Bing, look for a section at the top of the page called Crawl. Click on it and you should then see a section labeled Sitemaps. Click on the link and follow the directions to add your sitemap.

As you can see, there are many resources at your disposal to help you get a sitemap added to your website with little or no pain. Take a few minutes right now to create your sitemap and submit it to Google and Bing. You’ll be glad you did!

Categories SEO Tips
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SEO Overload-It is Possible to Use Too Many Keywords

by Darrell D.
August 2nd, 2011

One mistake I’ve seen people make is what I call Keyword Overload. Keyword Overload is usually caused by thinking that you have to put keywords for all of your major items (or categories, departments, widgets, etc.) on your home page. I know that you want people to visit your homepage, but your higher priority should be to get people to the exact spot on your site that will give you the best chance to get them to take desired action. Let’s break this concept down.

Your website does not reside on a single street corner like a physical store does. Likewise, your website does not have merely a single point of entry (aka doors) like most physical stores do. Your website sits on the information super highway and has as many doors as it has pages. Each of these pages has the opportunity to bring the customer directly into your site and right to the spot that has the item or info they were seeking. Isn’t it a hassle to go to Walmart just for milk? Have you ever bought milk at a convenience store (and paid more) just because it was easier to locate? If you build your website’s SEO properly, you’ll have people coming to your site and arriving directly in front of the milk aisle. They’ll find exactly what they want and get it from you.

This principle teaches us not to worry about optimizing our homepage for every keyword. Instead, make sure you have strong landing pages for each of your optimal keywords. If you want your keyword to be found in Google, then take the time to build a door to that aisle. Make sure the page has 3-5 good keywords in the Meta Keyword field. Look at the Page Title and make sure it is using those same keywords, AND it is a readable sentence or phrase. Then fill in a good Meta Description that contains a point of action (buy, sale, free, limited time, exclusive, etc.), reuses the keywords, and is also human readable.

Once you have those steps completed, take a few minutes and write up original content for that door that is rich in the keywords you’ve been using. Oftentimes a supplier or vendor will provide this content for you. While using this content is better than nothing, Google will recognize that the content is not unique to your site, and it will not give you a lot of credit for it. This is what is referred to as “shallow content.” If possible, avoid shallow content. If the item or category or widget is worth building a dedicated page, it’s worth writing unique content for it.

Now you can see that your site will still contain all of the keywords that you want to be recognized for, and you will be bringing visitors directly to the content they are seeking. You’ll give them a better web experience, and your company will reap the benefits. Remember: if your homepage is telling the world about ALL the wonderful things you offer, to Google it’s actually saying nothing at all.

Categories SEO Tips
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SEO vs. PPC

by Darrell D.
August 1st, 2011

You may be asking yourself if you should spend your resources on improving your SEO or improving your PPC campaigns. Ideally, you should spend resources improving your search engine optimization (SEO) AND improving your pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns. PPC campaigns are very different than SEO and cost money in both the time to set them up (or pay a consultant or firm to set them up) and the money for each click you receive. However, this does not diminish their value and importance in having a well-rounded web exposure strategy. At the very least you should be bidding on your company’s name or common misspellings of your company’s name.

But if you were to make me choose between having only a PPC campaign or an SEO campaign, I would definitely choose to put my resources into ensuring I have good SEO. The reason is simple. If I properly optimize my website, I will get the ranking I desire in Google, Bing/Yahoo, etc., and I don’t have to worry about continuing to pump money into a campaign to maintain that rank. That does not mean that we should take a “set it and forget it” approach to SEO. I’m simply saying that results from a good SEO strategy have longer lasting results than a PPC campaign whose results end the moment my money dries up.

Both SEO and PPC are very easy to get started and yet take a lot of work to “perfect.” I use that term loosely because I do not believe it is possible to have a perfect PPC campaign or a website that has perfect SEO. Anyone who tells you otherwise is fooling themselves or trying to fool you. Here are some good SEO tips to help kick start your website SEO.

1. Design your website with SEO in mind. If you haven’t yet built or published your website then you are in a GREAT position to make sure you use SEO best practices from the very beginning. I’ll have more about this in future blog posts and videos. Don’t worry if your website is already published to the web. Go ahead and start implementing these best practices today and the results will come!

2. Make sure you are taking a few minutes to fill out the Title Tag, Meta Description, and Meta Keywords fields. These fields are very important to search engines. These fields often determine the information that will be shown on SERPs (search engine results pages). You may have heard that Google does not give any weight to the Meta Keyword field and you shouldn’t waste your time filling it out. While it is true that Google doesn’t pay any attention to the Meta Keyword field, Bing/Yahoo does. It certainly doesn’t hurt you to use this field. Just make sure the info you put there is relevant to the page content.

3. Make sure you are using ALT TEXT on all images on your site. This is your way to tell the search engine robots (also called spiders) what is in the picture. If you have a picture of your latest widget, robots can’t tell the world about it unless you include the description of the picture in the ALT TEXT field for that picture.

4. If your website is very large you may be overwhelmed with the thought of where to start. Don’t worry. SEO is a large task, but it is not an impossible one. I suggest you start in one of two places. Either start by optimizing your most popular pages or your newest pages. Your most popular pages might be your best selling items, most searched for pages or most visited pages. Then keep identifying the pages that will give you the biggest return on investment (ROI) and optimize those pages.

Okay, that’s all for today. There is MUCH more that can be said and will be said about SEO. Dramatic Traffic is here to help the world find the path to your door. We want them to find your widgets. Let us know if we can help.

Categories SEO Tips
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Dramatic Traffic is a SEO company with a simple goal: Help create a better web experience. We do our part by helping businesses and individuals optimize websites so that people can find what they are searching for. We don't use tactics that Google, Bing/Yahoo and the other search engine companies don't like.


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