Scotland SEO Blog

There are several reasons to create a blog, the first being to attract more traffic, the second being to add links to your web pages. Blogging for link juice has become popular however there is a right way and a wrong way to maximise your links.

Use and offsite blog.
Linking from within your own domain provides on marginal value, in fact it is similar to linking two pages together. Blogging from an offsite domain is regarded as another web site linking to yours.

Only one link per page.
The second mistake that most web owners make is to go link mad. Google is one search engine that really only values one link to a particular page per page. If you have a post with three links to your web site, only the first will be counted. You can have one link to ten different pages on your web site so long as each page has only one link.

Make the link count.
When linking to your web site, make sure you use keywords associated with the web page you are linking to. If you do not use keywords the links value is significantly reduced.

Ignore the sidebar.
The sidebar is a great place to have ads, and links to pages within your blog. However, if search engines only recognise one link per page, then having sidebar links and post links is doubling up. If you do want to have navigation links in your sidebar, make them ‘nofollow’ links.

Link often.
Every time you post it should link to one of the pages on your web site. Whilst you can have as many links to as many pages as you want, the reality is that you don’t want it all to look spammy. Select the most important pages on web site and link to them as often as possible.

Follow those simple guidelines and the number of inbound links will improve significantly.

There is more to link building than just finding suitable sites and encouraging links. You need to be more proactive by getting out and developing links.

Links can gained through directories, article submission, forums and social sites; in fact, anywhere there is an online page there is the potential for a link. Not all pages are suitable for linking and there will be times when perhaps you find a link that is coming from an undesirable sight. Those are the pitfalls of link building - you cannot always pick your links.

There are many links you can pick however, and these you need to be constantly checking and updating. Links from social sites can often be modified to point to pages you want to develop. You also need to ensure that all links still flow to active pages on your site, particularly if you have been doing some heavy spring cleaning. Link building is a continual process - not always a set and forget.

If you think your links may be getting old and rusty then you may need to spend some time redeveloping your link building strategies and ensuring that all links are providing the utmost value. Internal link building strategies need to be constantly monitored. Don’t let them get rusty.

(cc)credit: Mark Barkaway

Image is everything and images are everywhere so when it comes to branding and marketing your online business, the first consideration has to be your image and how others perceive you.

The online world is in a unique position when it comes to image. You can promote your image through website and through offline activities such as sponsoring events or charities. However, your online image can be promoted in so many more places online that branding and marketing activities could almost be a full time job - in fact, for many large organisations it is.

Product and company branding is about increasing brand awareness. Online forums and social networking sites are being used more and more each day to undertake branding and marketing strategies with good results. In fact a measure of the return on time invested is greater than that for the offline world and traditional marketing methods.

Through these online activities you can deliver your branding and marketing program to literally millions of individuals and often the message is passed on by the very people viewing your activities. In the online world, it only takes a small number of individuals to recognise you or your product in a positive way and the word spreads faster than a wildfire.

Traditional word of mouth, ie, talking, is slow compared to digital word of mouth. Digital word of mouth can reach thousands or more in seconds, spreading the word. But beware, as quickly as good news travels, so to does bad. Your branding and marketing campaign needs to stay focused on delivering a positive message and developing a trust.

Branding and marketing is all about image. Create a positive image and you have a firm base to develop your online activities.

Keyword research is an important part of any online business and collecting a list of important keywords to attract users to your site can be daunting. Whether you’re developing a pay-per-click campaign or looking for effective keyword content, these five keyword research tips may help you find the right target keywords.

Brainstorm
Make a list of all the obvious keywords that could be associated with your site. Try to think of every variation possible including plurals.

Competition
Try each word on your list in the search engines and make note of the top ten sites for each word. If there is a trend to certain sites appearing regularly, check the keyword meta tag in their page source code. Are there any keywords that your could add to your keyword research list.

Research Tools
Now that you have a set of basic keywords it is time to use a keyword research tool to drill down for related keywords. There are many tools that also enable you to check the number of searches made for each keyword - if keywords get 10 or more searches each day, note them down, less than 10, delete them from your list.

Search Engines
You will have a lot of keywords now so it is time to really trim them back to a manageable level. Use the search engines now to search for your keywords. Enter the keyword (in inverted commas) and see how many sites are returned.

Prioritize
Make a note of the keywords with the fewest sites returned. You do not want to compete with millions of other entries for one keyword.

Once you have gone through this process, look at some long tail keywords or keyword phrases that could be used. Start to think of questions that users may enter into a search engine. Once you have this list, go back to the search engine and repeat that step. Keyword research is time consuming, however, once you have your list, you can start to target those keywords to effect.

The basic premise of these five steps is to find keywords that have a reasonable number of searches performed each day yet have the smallest competition pool. Whilst this represents a very basic keyword research program, for individuals considering doing there own SEO work, this type of keyword research is a good start.

Domain names have been the subject of legal disputes for several years now with companies complaining about domain name farming around brand and corporate names. Do you know what your rights are here in Scotland?

The registering and ownership of domain names here in Scotland is covered under UK law and provides substantial relief for many businesses. The most important issue when disputing a domain name is to establish your rights to that brand or business name.

In many cases this can be done by simply proving registration of your business name or trademark. This will almost always satisfy previous rights to domain names for both .uk and .eu domains. It may often be enough to satisfy complaints when challenging ’similar’ domain names that try to take advantage of slight changes to your brand or trademark.

If you have not registered your trademark then you will need to demonstrate a history of ‘use’ of that trademark and that the trademark is associated with your business. You would need to provide historical evidence including sales and advertising material bearing that trademark.

In simple terms, no one can take your registered business name or trademark and ‘beat you’ to registering it as a domain. You may also be able to dispute similar names that take advantage of your reputation.

There are several bodies that may hear your dispute including Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) and the Nominet Dispute Resolution Services (DRS). If you feel that your business, trademark of brand has been registered as a domain then speaking to your web service provider in Scotland may help. You should also approach a legal representative that specialises in internet law.

Running a good analytics trial can reveal some interesting results. Some web masters seem to become fixated on statistics, often running more than one statistics program at once.

This can be a real trap as many analytics programs operate differently. Some have trouble with Java Script when the user has it turned off in their browser. This causes some analytics program to return different data confusing the web master.

Statistics are just numbers. Before incorporating any type of web analytics into your site, you need to determine what factors are important - measure them and only them. These statistics can be valuable for assessing how well your SEO and marketing programs are running.

If you overdo the statistics or dwell too long on them, you will find yourself constantly changing your programs and not moving on. If you update a marketing program for instance, give the update a chance to deliver your objectives. Analytics should be used to check trends, not one off events.

Too many web master get caught up in analytics forgetting what their real aim is. Analytics are great tools, just remember they are not the be all and end all. Work to get your sight delivering what you require - use analytics to fine tune your activities.

For many business owners there is now an option to use long tail words in Google Local (maps). Not only that, you may be able to select your own categories. Long tail words have been associated with better targeting in search results.

If you haven’t checked out Goggle Local Maps then I suggest you do. Once you list your business in Google Local your business will be returned in search results and the associated map will flag the actual location of the business. Check the following which is a Google Map search for ASM Development:

View Larger Map

Google Local and Google Maps are making life far more interesting for advertisers providing potential customers with all the information they need to find your business.

Many web site owners complain about the cost of advertising, particularly when it comes to social marketing through many of the social bookmarking sites. Do they have good cause? The click-through-rate is often very low with even lower conversion rates.

If you think about it carefully, any online advertising program is going to be hard to convert. However, compare the cost of promoting your business to millions online to that of promoting your business through traditional media such as tv, radio and print. The cost of advertising is far higher and the results much harder to measure.

With most of the online advertising done on a pay per click basis, you are often getting much better value than through traditional media.

Add to this the ability to target you advertising to much higher degree and the value becomes greater. The age group 18-25 are watching less tv now and spending more time on social media sites such as Facebook. If you are looking to target that audience then Facebook and similar sites are the place to be.

Long term, the solution to conducting a successful social marketing campaign is by changing your focus. Traditional forms of advertising no longer work. Online marketing is not about engaging people, communicating with them, and getting them to advertise the product for you. Any subsequent advertising acts as a reminder, a discussion point, and of course as a path through to your product.

Do the numbers carefully and you may find that social marketing is better value than you think.

Everyone has heard of Web 2.0 and many companies have updated their web presence to take advantage of the new online social environment. There are however many companies that haven’ made any attempts to convert. It is never to late to join and these four steps will help ease the transition.

Web 2.0 Requires Interaction

The main focus of Web 2.0 is on interaction. User’s want to interact, it is a part of human nature. Not only do users want to interact, they are curious, they want to know more about the people they dealing with, the unseen faces. They also now want more information on the products or services they are considering using. Millions of people now share their experiences on places like Facebook.

You need to create your own presence in some of these places. The following three steps build on this interaction.

Web 2.0 Blogs Their Own Trumpet

Blogs have become one of the commercial success stories of the past two years. Most major corporations now include blogs with regular blog posts. Web 2.0 is all about communication and what better way than to have a blog. Blogs also help to build relationships due to nature of the content and the ability to leave comments, comments that can be replied to.

Web 2.0 Wants You To Broadcast To The World

If you have a blog then broadcast your content using RSS feeds. Encourage subscriptions using professional (but free) services such as Feedburner. I may not be able to visit your pages everyday, but if your content is good then I may just subscribe so I don’t miss anything of importance.

Web 2.0 Wants Me To Share Your Content

Yes that reads right. Web 2.0 encourages me to share what I find on the net with all my friends. You can help me share your content by including bookmarking buttons on your sites. If I like what I see, I can simply click on a bookmark icon and within seconds everyone on my social contacts list can see what I have found. If your lucky I may even send them message saying ‘come and check out what I have found’.

Joining the Web 2.0 community is almost as easy as that. I say almost, you need to go back and check on the first step. Become active in the social community yourself and you will find your business start to develop, over time, significantly. Web 2.0, it is not the future, it is now.

Keyword stuffing is the act of jamming as many keywords as possible into your content development program. The aim is to create a document that ranks highly for those keywords. The end result is often the reverse and visitors will take one look at the first sentence and run away.

How many keywords should your content contain? It is a reasonable question and one that we constantly get asked. The simple answer is, there is no answer. Content should be written for the reader first. This creates a document that flows naturally, is easy to read, and contains valuable information. Content development strategies can then be used to enrich the document, article or post.

Keywords are important, but so is the article itself. Once you have created your article, you can sift through editing and inserting keywords where they could fit naturally. Take the following document.

An underwater camera is great for taking underwater camera shots as an underwater camera has been designed specifically for taking underwater camera photos by underwater camera fans.

I wonder, do you think that underwater camera may be the keywords here? The passage contains nothing to thrill a reader. In fact, after read the first line you are likely to shake your head and find a more professional looking article. Clever content development strategies can produce top quality content that is still rich in keywords. Let’s rewrite the above to make it keyword rich, user friendly and professional looking.

If you are a fan of underwater photography then a good quality underwater camera is a must. They have been designed to withstand a variety of depths (check your underwater camera’s specs) and provide excellent quality photos.

You may think that this version is no longer keyword rich. It is debatable however, the passage is easy to read and provides some value to the reader. The keywords are used but not overused so I would argue that the article fits the requirements for keyword content development.

The passage could use more work with perhaps the keywords being moved to the start of the first sentence. There are no definitive answers on this. A simple content development rule that has now become accepted as standard is to use your keywords once in each paragraph with the keywords being used as close to the start of the first and last paragraph as possible.

Content development strategies that stuff you web pages with keywords are no longer acceptable. Search engines may well punish the article for keyword abuse, visitors will punish the site by not returning, more importantly, no one will bother to link to you. As an SEO strategy - it sounds like a big failure with all the important ranking aspects going backwards. Keyword stuffing, it is not worth the trouble.