Finding An Ethical SEO Consultant
If you want your website to register its presence in the competitive world of Internet, you’ve got to resort to SEO techniques. Otherwise, a website fails to get noticed amongst millions of them. But the bad news is that there are many unethical outfits out there who promise you great SEO, but all they do to get your website a high page rank on the results page is employ a variety of unethical techniques (the so called black-hat techniques) to fool the search engines. If caught by search engines, your website can be blacklisted and banned for adopting unethical SEO techniques. It is, therefore, absolutely important that a website owner works along with an ethical SEO consultant, and here’s how you must choose one.
Guide To Choosing An Ethical SEO Consultant
The Internet has made the world a smaller place and a website owner can work with SEO consultants based in any part of the world – there are many SEO consultants’ websites all over the Internet, and tracking down one is not all that difficult a task. And here’s how you must choose one:
1. If the SEO consultant is a professional, then he must be accredited by many reputed organizations such as Google AdWords, Web CEO University, and SEO Pros. If the SEO consultant has more accreditations, well, the more the merrier. A certified SEO professional is ethical by default – ethics are inbuilt into their work code.
2. He must have an impressive roster of clients who speak highly of him. And he must not be hesitant to give out a few references.
3. If the SEO consultant is professional and ethical then it automatically follows he will have a successful track record. So, go ahead and check the websites he has performed SEO on, and check if they rank high on search engines results pages.
4. The SEO consultant needs to be versatile and he must offer services such as website analysis, content writing, keyword research, link building, SEO and, of course, adequate reporting back to the client.
5. The SEO consultant must have a clean track record, in the sense that he must never have been blacklisted for adopting unethical SEO techniques. Such techniques include spamming search engines, trading links with websites that are part of link farms, or cloaking, which means coating keywords with the same color as the website’s background and stuffing a whole lot of them on all the pages. You can find out if the SEO consultant has resorted to dubious means by running a check on him on search engines and on message boards. Plus, you can always check with his references too.
That was a small guide on how to go about selecting an ethical SEO consultant. True, finding an ethical SEO consultant will take a little bit of time and effort, but it is well worth it. Because an unethical SEO consultant can kill a website, while an ethical consultant can help you build your fortune.
By: Ben Norman
About the Author:
Asher
SEO Expert or Just a Cowboy?
And as sure as night follows day, when your site fails to make the first page it’s tempting to blame Google, because, how could your beautiful new website be the problem?
So, take a deep breath and read the next line.
It’s not Google’s fault, it’s not your website’s fault: it’s your fault.
Sorry, but you haven’t finished the job. Your next task is going to be challenging, but in this new world, competition is fierce, and to finish the job you’ll need to pay careful attention to the various ways you can claw your site up the rankings.
But don’t despair. You can get help, it even has a name Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and there are plenty of consultants and companies offering SEO services, the only problem is sorting the wheat from the chaff. Luckily for you, you are just about to read The Six Golden Rules for Choosing an SEO consultant.
Golden Rule Number 1: Contacted by an SEO firm? Keep your wits about you!
Although it does not automatically follow that all SEO firms that contact you are just out for a quick buck you should keep your wits about you and be wary of any that do. The majority of good SEO consultants will rather react to an inquiry than spend time trawling the Internet looking for poorly optimized websites.
Golden Rule Number 2: Guarantees are lies – spurn them and the companies that offer them
Okay, as Golden Rules go it is not fair to say that all guarantees are lies, there are a few genuine guarantees that are offered in good faith and as a sign of confidence, nevertheless err on the side of caution and treat them all as you would a suspect standing over a dead body with a smoking gun.
SEO consultants have no control over how the search engines search; they have no influence over the competition and so no matter how much you want it they are not in any position to offer you meaningful guarantees with regards to the results that can be achieved.
There are no ’special relationships’ or ‘tricks’, if you are offered a guarantee, or think yourself covered for insisting on one, it is quite possible that the guarantee offered will be worthless.
Guarantees that are freely offered are generally not what they seem. Anyone with a basic knowledge of SEO will be able to rank you high for an uncompetitive search phrase; being ranked number one for a search phrase that no one is using is as useful and expensive as erecting a billboard in the middle of the Sahara Dessert.
Golden Rule Number 3: Secretive SEO’s should be shown the door
Your relationship with an SEO consultant should be similar to that you would expect from your accountant as you are ultimately responsible for your website and the actions of the people that you employ to build and maintain your website.
There is no reason for an SEO consultant not to explain why and what they are doing and they should be prepared to document all that they have done. They should not insert undocumented code and you should be careful of those that want to install their own software; give consideration as to what will happen if you decide at a later date to end you relationship with them.
Golden Rule Number 4: Treat references with a pinch of salt
References are useful but will not always tell the whole story. Ten years is a lifetime in SEO, and it is a subject that is more to do with understanding the ‘now’ than the ‘then’.
Search engines in their current form first started to appear in the mid 90’s and a lot has changed in search engine technology which gave birth to the SEO consultant. As the search engines have become more adept at spotting and penalizing websites that achieve prominence by stealth rather than merit, so SEO techniques have had to evolve.
Despite the SEO basics being the same for any website how they are applied and to what degree is very dependent on each specific website; its design, maturity, market, purpose, objectives, the type and size of the organization as well as how competitive the market. Some SEO techniques that are relevant and effective for some websites will be irrelevant and ineffective for others.
Golden Rule Number 5: Prepared to be disappointed
Limit your expectations. No matter how good the SEO consultant they will not be able to take you from ‘nowhere’ to a number one listing overnight. There is no magic bullet that will allow a one page website to permanently out rank a large multi-national, if you believe those that say there are, expect to be disappointed.
SEO takes hard work, time and patience.
Golden Rule Number 6: Are they worthy of your trust
The most important quality to look for in an SEO consultant is trust, as more often than not you will be entrusting your SEO consultant with your business and reputation.
If you are not familiar with SEO speak you need someone who is not going exploit your ignorance, isn’t going to shift blame on to others and is going to do things right, with long term objectives, and not implement solutions that offer immediate rewards followed swiftly by long term and serious pain.
A good and trustworthy SEO consultant is worth their weight in gold, like good neighbors; when you have found one, think twice before moving.
Have you got a Champ or a Chimp?
The following is a questionnaire that can be used as an aid to ask potential SEO consultants a number of questions.
Based on how they respond to the questions it will help you root out those that lacks the basic knowledge, expose those that are willing to tell you what you want to hear and identify those that are prepared to tell you what you should hear.
It is not recommended that the information you gleam from the questionnaire is used as the sole criteria for evaluating an SEO consultant but it will help identify the SEO cowboy, saving you time, money and heartache.
http://www.surveygalaxy.com/surPublishes.asp?survey_id=2271
By: Martin Day
About the Author:
Martin Day is a freelance Internet Marketing Consultant and
a Director of Survey Galaxy Ltd, to contact the author
please email martin.c.day@btconnect.com
Cedric
SEO Experts and SEO Consultants, Find Out About Them and What They Offer
SEO experts offer a wide range of services for their clients, from natural SEO to paid advertising. SEO consultants review the content that you have in your website and optimize the information. Then they obtain quality links to your site. It is important at this point to understand that the content of your website affects your ranking on a search engine such as Google. SEO requires that keywords and phrases be used in the webpage appropriately. The keywords should be used in titles and in the name of the website or URL if possible. SEO experts review the content of your website and advise you accordingly. They are able to determine whether you will be ranked high or low in a search engine by comparing the content of your webpage with the standards of the search engine. They should be able to also determine what is needed to beat your competition.
SEO consultants also offer advice on the development of a website. The advice that SEO experts give is just technical advice. It may include things such as who to approach for quality links to your website as well as how your content should be laid out to improve rankings.
SEO experts can also help you develop new content on your website that will really make a major impact in the search engines. As mentioned earlier, the content of your webpage plays a significant role in the ranking of your site in the search engines. The content also matters when you desire to make sales; you must have a well-written and marketed page to sell your customers. When you have reached your goal of attaining top search ranking, you will be receiving plenty of traffic if you targeted quality terms. This is definitely needed to succeed online. Receiving plenty of traffic is not the end of SEO; you can constantly improve by branching off in similar terms by using synonym search phrases and other tactics to find more customers. It is important that you are able to sell your services or products online. SEO consultants can also help you meet your online goals by helping you develop the content of your website so that your visitors will actually buy your products or services.
Keywords are very important to research and focus on when hiring someone for these services. SEO experts deal with search engines and understand how they work. They keep track of algorithm changes and are always open to the latest advice in optimizing for the search engines. These consultants therefore need to know how to research and capitalize on keywords directly related to your website. SEO consultants can offer to perform keyword research on your behalf to help you grab those top rankings. Their research is aimed at what people look for when making searches in the field your website is in. They then use these keywords in your webpage content as well as in links pointing to your website. Your website’s external links make a huge impact on your ranking in the search engines.
Some SEO experts offer training in the field of SEO. They can give you the skills that they have learned in SEO and pass on the knowledge to you. In so doing, you will be able to perform SEO for your own websites so that you can grab those top rankings more effectively.
By: Joel McLaughlin
About the Author:
Joel McLaughlin found Dataflurry cheap web hosting services in 2001 under the name JDM Design; since then Dataflurry has grown. Joel looks forward to providing some of the best Cheap Hosting, Web Design, Internet Development and Search Engine Optimization.
Looking for Cheap Web Site Hosting Services, look no further than DataFlurry Cheap Website Hosting for Small Business & Ecommerce web sites. We also offer SEO Search Engine Optimization Marketing Services.
Daniel
Obtain Success With the Aid of the Best SEO Company
Yes, you may have heard the term SEO but do you truly understand it? Do you know what can SEO do to your online business? You have to continue reading to have the questions to these questions.
What is SEO – it stands for Search Engine Optimization. SEO or search engine optimization is the process of increasing the traffic of your website and it can bring visibility and popularity to your website. It is a helpful and valuable tool that can make your business be popular and to earn plenty of money. Even if your business have good products, if you do not have visitors in your website, then you will not gain customers an earn profits. With the aid of SEO, you can gain a lot of visitors and you can turn these visitors as your customers.
Most people use the internet for information, products and even services. They search for their needs through the search engines. As you can see, as you type a specific keyword at the major search engines such as Yahoo, Google and MSN, you will find a lot of results – about thousands of results. But of course, those results that are found on the top rank are the ones that visitors or internet users will take time to look and visit. Since they believe that those results are the reliable ones for the information, products or services that they need.
Now, you maybe wondering on how your website gain traffic and can be on the top rank of the major search engines and can be ahead of your competitors online? For you to achieve all of these, you have to make use of search engine optimization. Search engines use algorithms so to supply answers to users who are searching for information online.
Search engine optimization uses a lot of methods in order to make sure that your website remains at the top of the search engine listings. This happens through the keywords articles. So in order to remain on the top rank, you have to create valuable articles that are useful to internets users and with the search engines as well.
In order for you to achieve you goals – to be on the top rank of the major search engines, to obtain traffic, visibility and popularity, to be ahead of your competitors and to earn a lot of profits, it is better to make use of the best SEO Company who can do the work for you effectively.
Maybe you are wondering on how to find the best SEO Company that can aid you in achieving success. One good way to find the best SEO Company is by typing your business theme or topic on the major search engines such as Google and Yahoo. Like for instance, if you are into Florida real estate, then type Florida real estate on Google or Yahoo, surely you will be given a lot of results but just open those on the top rank and look for the SEO Company that made them on the top. Then simply contact the SEO Company.
Definitely, this SEO Company can make your website and business successful since the Company will use effective tools to achieve your goals.
By: Eliza Maledevic Ayson
About the Author:
For More Article Visit :: http://www.thearticleinsiders.com/
Anastasio
So it becomes in the interest of business to use a content writer that has a broad knowledge of how that part of the business works. Website keywords need to be placed in the right predetermined locations at just the right intervals so these search engine bots recognize them. Usually these intervals are once every one hundred to two hundred words, but the trick for the accomplished writer becomes how to place them so they blend in with the text. You want the piece to read without abrupt jolts when the reader comes to a keyword.
This part of the SEO marketing operation requires a deft hand on the part of the content writer. Usually the best at couching these words or phrases in their proper locations are those with some experience in a related field whether it be journalism or ad copy. It’s not enough to just plunk these website keywords in haphazardly at the right intervals; the text needs to flow as well especially when the copy is designed to sell a product or service.
SEO marketing has another challenge for the professional writer. On top of blending in these keywords, the writer needs to be aware of the overall aim of the content they are building. They need to know who the client wants as an intended reader and what market the content will be geared toward. In other words, they need to know the aim of the document. In many cases SEO marketing and the keywords that are involved are the tools used to get the prospect to the intended page; quite often it’s the writer’s job to keep them and make the client’s case once they arrived.
In most cases the content writer needs to move fast. Studies have shown that people will only stay with a page that captivates them within the first five to nine seconds after they’ve clicked on. In other words, once the website keywords have got them there, it’s the content writer’s job to keep them.
By: Robert Starr
About the Author:
Robert Starr is a professional writer/editor with several published books and a degree in journalism. He’s brought 20 years of experience in the craft to his own on line writing/editing service. You can reach him at
robstarr
Achilles
5 SEO Strategies and Tactics
But you know, despite the techno-R2-D2 dialect things that the dudes from an SEO department throws at you such as SEMs, Page Ranks, Keyword stuffing or density, Algorithms, SERPs, Alt Tags, Anchor Texts, Inbound or Outbound Links… SEO is as simple as it gets. It’s as simple as it’s called – Search Engine Optimization, and all you have to do is to optimize the website for search engines to find it easily. The only thing about it is that it involves a lot of work. But if you look at it on a different point of view, it’s quite enjoyable.
But what does SEO do actually? Search Engine Optimization is getting your content listed in all the top positions in major search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN for your targeted keywords. When someone does a keyword search in a search engine for your particular subject or niche – you’ll naturally want your site or content to be at the top of the líst. That is what SEO does for your website. Keeping the traffic in and letting it do that for as long as the website stands. Now, isn’t that a good thing?
To let you know what SEO companies do on an SEO campaign, let me give you the top 5 techniques and tactics that the dudes from an SEO Company usually do on their campaigns.
Keyword Research
Knowing your keyword is very important to achieve the highest rank in search engines. SEO Companies usually use software tools such as Wordtracker and Seobook to research for their keywords. These tools give them a rudimentary number of searches. Relevance is also very important in keyword researching. The design of a website must be relevant to its keyword. Another thing that SEO Companies do is doing some deep-linking to these pages on their sites. SEO companies usually find and build backlinks to these interior keyword pages and not just to their home page or domain URL. Picking keywords with medium to low competition is something to consider as well. This way, it’ll be a lot easier to achieve higher rank.
Want SEO? Then visit SEO Philippines at www.myoptimind.com.
On-Page SEO
On-page optimization and web design factors play a very major role in SEO campaigns. These are the first things that search engines look for in a website. It’s important for an SEO company to make sure that their website is as SEO friendly as it can. Also, SEO companies make sure that all of their pages are easily reachable from their homepages. This is easily done by a strategy called navigation bars or menus. Navigation bars lead to other webpage in a website.
Sitemaps also play significant roles in SEO. SEO companies generate XML sitemaps and upload them to their website. This technique makes the search engines very happy, because this makes it a lot easier for search engines to crawl your website through that.
SEO companies prioritize website’s title and description as well. The title and description should contain some of their selected keywords. Dudes from an SEO Company also make sure that they use them to draw and attract interested visitors to their site and content, and not just the search engine. They also make sure that their title and URL contain keyword relevance for maximum effect. Having some of their major keywords in a domain name also makes this a lot easier for search engines to visit their website.
Want to make it to top 10 in a search engine? Then visit SEO Philippines at www.myoptimind.com for more details.
Link Building
There are many strategies and tactics developed within the SEO, and Link Building is still the most popular and most effective way of boosting a website’s rank on any search engine. Backlinks from relevant sites are as important as the keywords themselves. An SEO company makes it their top priority to make sure that the ‘anchor text’ is related to their keywords, while making sure that the text and overall quality of the content linking to their site is relevant. These guys make sure that they link out to high quality, high ranked relevant sites in their niche.
Only the latest SEO strategies and tactics can be served by SEO Philippines. Visit SEO Philippines at www.myoptimind.com.
Article Marketing
Article marketing, though not as effective as link building, is still a well-established way of getting some quality backlinks or inbound links. Doing a 500-800-word article with backlinks included within the article itself or on the resource box is still an effective method to receive a lot of traffic. Longer, more informative articles also work for many SEO companies. This is by using intensive network of press releases and distribution in article submission sites like SubmitYourArticle, Isnare, Thephantomwriters, and other major online press release sites. While doing all that, SEO companies still make sure that they’re also talking to users, users whom might become their clients. So these guys make use of their imaginative juices to make their article SEO-friendly and reader-friendly.
Blogging and Social Media
Search engines are inlove with Blogs. Blogs are the most favorite spot that search engines visit. Newly updated entries, articles, live comments, and chain of communities, these blogs are what’s making SEO more and more fun. SEO companies usually use WordPress blog software for their blogging purposes. Most of these guys use WordPress because it’s extremely effective for SEO purposes. WordPress software is easier to install on a website even if they do not have any knowledge in installing server-side scripts. Other SEO Companies also use Blogger (owned by Google), Bloglines and other free blog hosts to help distribute content. Search engines love these highly SEO friendly blogs with their well structured content and keyword tagging.
Social bookmarking is becoming very important on the web. Social media sites such as Friendster, MySpace, FaceBook, Twitter and media news such as Digg, SlashDot, Technorati are now among the targeted media that SEO companies use. SEO campaigns include joining these sites and using them to their advantage. Though very time consuming, SEO companies are still using this strategy because of its great benefits and conversion.
But apart from those things I said earlier, planning is still the heart of an SEO campaign. Planning is the foremost important part of an SEO campaign. In our every undertaking, planning is the least element that we would want to forget. Planning and strategizing is very important in every SEO campaign. Understanding what SEO strategy to use is integral. This way, we wouldn’t run into some major problems where we would have to resort to resetting our efforts and start again from scratch. Now, that would be very costly and time consuming.
But first, you should take into mind that SEO is not complicated. A lot of work yes, but not complicated. As I had said, with a right point of view, SEO efforts are very enjoyable, especially when it comes to blogging, article writing, link partnership, and social media efforts. When used effectively, SEO can give you the targeted traffíc you’re seeking. Just do what we do and you’re on your way to success.
SEO Services
The aim of search engine optimization is for websites to have a high ranking during searches. This is so that more traffic will be directed to their site and more business and income will follow for the site owner and the SEO Services Consultant.
SEO Services Consultant: Scope of Service
An SEO Services Consultant should be able to provide various services to the client at a reasonable cost. The services usually offered by an SEO Services Consultant includes but may not be limited to keyword or key phrase research along with checking out the competition, SEO web design for your site and other web pages connected to your site, working with the necessary codes and content for the site, build link popularity for the site and website SEO maintenance for the particular site.
Other services of a particular SEO Services Consultant may be excluded by other consultants. Other services which may be included are submission to search engines, looking for optimum URL’s or domain names for your site and providing content for the site.
Keyword or key phrase research entails researching the optimum words or phrases that are widely used during searches. These keywords and key phrases will then be integrated into articles that are relevant for the site by the SEO Services Consultant. Relevance is important because many crawlers look for this when they go through a site.
The date and information that robotic spiders seek out need to be relevant to the site they are connected to. These will help in the efficient and proper indexing of the site and will help to rank the site. This is why content is important to a web site. It holds the keywords and key phrases relevant to ranking. By keeping the competition close, the SEO Services Consultant will be able to see what methods work for similar sites. This means less trial and error when picking out keywords and phrases and other methods of search engine optimization.
The SEO Services Consultant will need to be vigilant regarding the changes in trends of keywords and key phrases since these changes can be seasonal. This is where SEO maintenance work comes to fore. The job of the SEO Services Consultant will continue well after the website is established if this is part of the agreement between the SEO Services Consultant and the client.
SEO web design for the client’s site is also a big influence in the ranking of the site and the popularity of the site to human browsers. This is because SEO web design makes the site a lot easier to navigate and load. Easy navigating and quick loading are some of the reasons why visitors to the site might want to go back to it.
The SEO Services Consultant will most likely suggest to the client several easy ways of optimizing the web site. Among these suggestions will be scaling down the larger pictures to enable quick loading and making the site more navigable to users.
Having relevant content is also a must since relevant content is what browsers are looking for when they visit a site. A site that does not meet the requirements and needs of the searcher will be abandoned promptly upon the discovery that the site is irrelevant.
The SEO Services Consultant must also make sure that web pages connected to your site are easy to reach and that there are also relevant links in the site to promote it with other similar sites. Link building will help promote and build popularity for your site. There are many other sites that wish to use links as a way of getting their ranking to rise.
Site maintenance is a necessary service of an SEO Services Consultant. In order to achieve higher ranking during searches, a site must be continually maintained and primed to meet the demands and needs of users and that of the search engine. Some SEO companies use underhand methods to achieve this goal. Using black hat techniques to get higher rankings will eventually lead a search engine to ban the site and maybe also the SEO company or SEO Services Consultant who employed black hat methods to achieve higher ranking.
Due to the numerous possibilities of manipulation during search engine optimization of web sites, many search engines have instilled rules and regulations which will control and manage the sites being submitted to them. Website submissions are included in what an SEO Services Consultant will do for a client.
Employing black hat techniques to ensure higher ranking can be dangerous for both the client and the SEO Services Consultant. This can lead to being banned from the search engine and its services and being branded as a black hat SEO Services Consultant.
SEO Expert or Just a Cowboy?
SEO is not rocket science but can still appear mysterious to people that are new to the subject. There are many people out there that will be quick to promise the moon, take your money and run. So how do you decide if your SEO consultant is a real diamond or just glass? Maybe this article might help.
As a website owner it is perfectly natural to expect your website to rank near the top of the search results. After all, with all that fantastic content that you’ve just spent days and weeks fine-tuning, how could it not be immensely popular?
And as sure as night follows day, when your site fails to make the first page it’s tempting to blame Google, because, how could your beautiful new website be the problem?
So, take a deep breath and read the next line.
It’s not Google’s fault, it’s not your website’s fault: it’s your fault.
Sorry, but you haven’t finished the job. Your next task is going to be challenging, but in this new world, competition is fierce, and to finish the job you’ll need to pay careful attention to the various ways you can claw your site up the rankings.
But don’t despair. You can get help, it even has a name Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and there are plenty of consultants and companies offering SEO services, the only problem is sorting the wheat from the chaff. Luckily for you, you are just about to read The Six Golden Rules for Choosing an SEO consultant.
Golden Rule Number 1: Contacted by an SEO firm? Keep your wits about you!
Although it does not automatically follow that all SEO firms that contact you are just out for a quick buck you should keep your wits about you and be wary of any that do. The majority of good SEO consultants will rather react to an inquiry than spend time trawling the Internet looking for poorly optimized websites.
Golden Rule Number 2: Guarantees are lies – spurn them and the companies that offer them
Okay, as Golden Rules go it is not fair to say that all guarantees are lies, there are a few genuine guarantees that are offered in good faith and as a sign of confidence, nevertheless err on the side of caution and treat them all as you would a suspect standing over a dead body with a smoking gun.
SEO consultants have no control over how the search engines search; they have no influence over the competition and so no matter how much you want it they are not in any position to offer you meaningful guarantees with regards to the results that can be achieved.
There are no ’special relationships’ or ‘tricks’, if you are offered a guarantee, or think yourself covered for insisting on one, it is quite possible that the guarantee offered will be worthless.
Guarantees that are freely offered are generally not what they seem. Anyone with a basic knowledge of SEO will be able to rank you high for an uncompetitive search phrase; being ranked number one for a search phrase that no one is using is as useful and expensive as erecting a billboard in the middle of the Sahara Dessert.
Golden Rule Number 3: Secretive SEO’s should be shown the door
Your relationship with an SEO consultant should be similar to that you would expect from your accountant as you are ultimately responsible for your website and the actions of the people that you employ to build and maintain your website.
There is no reason for an SEO consultant not to explain why and what they are doing and they should be prepared to document all that they have done. They should not insert undocumented code and you should be careful of those that want to install their own software; give consideration as to what will happen if you decide at a later date to end you relationship with them.
Golden Rule Number 4: Treat references with a pinch of salt
References are useful but will not always tell the whole story. Ten years is a lifetime in SEO, and it is a subject that is more to do with understanding the ‘now’ than the ‘then’.
Search engines in their current form first started to appear in the mid 90’s and a lot has changed in search engine technology which gave birth to the SEO consultant. As the search engines have become more adept at spotting and penalizing websites that achieve prominence by stealth rather than merit, so SEO techniques have had to evolve.
Despite the SEO basics being the same for any website how they are applied and to what degree is very dependent on each specific website; its design, maturity, market, purpose, objectives, the type and size of the organization as well as how competitive the market. Some SEO techniques that are relevant and effective for some websites will be irrelevant and ineffective for others.
Golden Rule Number 5: Get Prepared to be disappointed.
Limit your expectations. No matter how good the SEO consultant they will not be able to take you from ‘nowhere’ to a number one listing overnight. There is no magic bullet that will allow a one page website to permanently out rank a large multi-national, if you believe those that say there are, expect to be disappointed.
SEO takes hard work, time and patience.
Golden Rule Number 6: Are they worthy of your trust?
The most important quality to look for in an SEO consultant is trust, as more often than not you will be entrusting your SEO consultant with your business and reputation.
If you are not familiar with SEO speak you need someone who is not going exploit your ignorance, isn’t going to shift blame on to others and is going to do things right, with long term objectives, and not implement solutions that offer immediate rewards followed swiftly by long term and serious pain.
A good and trustworthy SEO consultant is worth their weight in gold, like good neighbors; when you have found one, think twice before moving.
Have you got a Champ or a Chimp?
The following is a questionnaire that can be used as an aid to ask potential SEO consultants a number of questions.
Based on how they respond to the questions it will help you root out those that lacks the basic knowledge, expose those that are willing to tell you what you want to hear and identify those that are prepared to tell you what you should hear.
It is not recommended that the information you gleam from the questionnaire is used as the sole criteria for evaluating an SEO consultant but it will help identify the SEO cowboy, saving you time, money and heartache.
By: Liana Souza
About the Author:
Liana S is an Online marketing Specialist. A native American, Bangalore Based SEO Expert.
Errol
SEO Software Showdown
For the most part, just about any product can help you in some way unless it’s a real piece of junk. So if you already have one and are not getting the results you want, try to spend a little more time with it and make it pay off. But if you are looking, read on. This article covers 3 that have helped thousands get the ranking they need. Even if one is not right for you, you can see what the top rated tools do.
But before we dive into the tools, let’s look at why we need them. In short; using SEO software is like buying time and expertise. A good product will save you a great deal of time and deliver the results of a search engine optimization expert. If you have a lot of free time to learn and perform manual SEO, you can save a hundred or so bucks and do it all without a tool. If you’d like to see faster results and focus your time in other areas, it’s probably worth the money to buy a good product. Of course with so many claiming to be the best, the hardest part is finding the one that will work for you.
Over the past nine years, as an SEO consultant, I’ve used over a dozen well known, and not so well known SEO tools. The results have varied from “Wow!” to “What a waste!” We’ll focus on the “Wows!” three types, one of which is likely to do what you need; 1.) Jumpstart (for maximum return with minimum cost), 2.) Site Owner’s Best Friend (to tackle major SEO tasks and more), and 3.) SEO Pro Pick (what SEO professionals use to get the best possible results in the least possible time.)
So here they are, arranged by cost starting with the least expensive…
1.) SEO Equalizer ($77)
Those new to SEO, looking for a jumpstart with SEO software have found a winner with SEO Equalizer (http://www.EqualizeSEO.com). It became popular as an SEO spy tool and soon caught on as a great link building program and keyword analyzer. It provides an easy ‘in’ for anyone wanting to take control of their Web placement destiny. It’s great for anyone who wants to minimize spending, boost ranking and does not mind waiting a little longer to see great results (as compared to the Pro Pick, SEO Elite below.)
Here’s what it does best:
A.) Finds your most competitive keywords and phrases
B.) Locates and analyses competitor sites
C.) Builds and helps maintain link partnerships
Quick to learn and easy to use, SEO Equalizer is also one of the best bargains at $77 for a full license.
2.) Traffic Travis ($99)
This is a one of those hidden gems you dream about finding. A great app that not a lot of people know about (probably because the name is not very descriptive.) With a price tag of about $100, Traffic Travis (http://www.TrafficTravisSEO.com) is powerful enough for professionals and easy to use for a website owner, new to search engine optimization, who just wants results with very little learning curve.
Traffic Travis is like the “Swiss Army Knife” of SEO software and has become known as the “Site Owner’s Best Friend.” Here’s some of what it does…
A.) Finds, sorts and organizes your most important keywords
B.) Shows your site’s (and competitors’) rankings on major search engines
C.) Completes full SEO page analysis for any Website, so you can see what the top ranked pages are doing right fro ‘on page optimization’ and how you can do even better.
D.) Helps build and manage backlinks (very important for Google.)
E.) Manages your Google AdWords campaign if you do PPC.
F.) And even builds online survey pages to quickly collect visitor feedback once they find your site.
It’s tough to do an “apples to apples” comparison of this one with either of the others. It wears a lot of hats that Website owners can benefit from. Like SEO Equalizer it has shown me slightly slower results than SEO Elite, but is a great value.
3.) SEO Elite
My first “Wow!” happened in 2005 with SEO Elite (http://www.SEOeliteWeb.com). This app was the first truly affordable piece of SEO software I came across that did all it promised. At $167 it’s about half the price of similar products but packs a lot more punch. It has three things that impress me almost as much as the results it gets…
A.) No annual fees (unlike some that charge $100 a year in “subscription” fees.)
B.) Free lifetime upgrades (I’m already on my 3rd version and it keeps getting better!)
C.) No Questions Asked, 8 Week Guarantee or full refund
That’s why I bought it. This is why I kept it…
Google results after the first four weeks:
# 1 Spots = 7
# 2 Spots = 11
# 3 Spots = 16
Links = 409 high quality inbound links obtained (extremely important to rank well on Google)
That was all in the first month and for just one site. In the three years since then I have received hundreds of additional top rankings spanning multiple sites.
Here are some of the things SEO Elite does very well…
A.) Let’s you check your site’s ranking for unlimited keywords on the major search engines
B.) Tracks any changes in rank and notifies you
C.) Finds the best possible link partners for your site, based on Google’s standards
D.) Shows which partners are still linking back to you
E.) Performs backlink searches on all major search engines
F.) Analyzes and compares special search commands on Google
G.) Finds exactly which websites your competitors are advertising on
H.) Helps you eliminate any penalized websites you link to
If you need great SEO software, can invest $167 and don’t mind spending a few hours mastering a new tool, SEO Elite is worth looking at. It’s the most widely used professional SEO software package for a reason.
Getting the right SEO software can be the best buying decision you ever make for your website. Enjoy!
By: Scott Jason
About the Author:
Scott Jason has been an SEO professional since 1999 and has had the opportunity to see the release of new SEO software products first hand, often as a Beta tester. The founder of http://www.BestSEOcopywriting.com , Scott also servers as the software reviewer on several popular blogs, including SEOpartner.
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Google On Page SEO Tips & Strategies
from http://www.seobook.com On the page search engine optimization techniques that will help your site rank better in Google’s search results.
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