Try using smaller paragraphs with mixed-case text. Use boldface, italics, uppercase,and different text color variations for emphasis. Employ browser-safe fonts such asTimes New Roman, Georgia (serif font), Arial, Helvetica, or Verdana (sans serif font).Strategically employ bulleted lists, headings, and subheadings for clarity and informationorganization. Using these options is helpful from an SEO perspective. Furthermore,employ sufficient alignments, whitespace, and text padding for additional clarityand web page look and feel.
Be mindful of web-safe...
Video Sitemaps Seo
PMA00:03
Video Sitemaps are yet another extension of XML Sitemap Protocol. Video Sitemapscan be helpful if your videos show up in Google SERPs. The following fragment showsa basic video Sitemap with one example video:
<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9"xmlns:video="http://www.google.com/schemas/sitemap-video/1.1"><url><loc>http://mydomain.com/article23423.html</loc><video:video><video:content_loc>http://mydomain.com/videos/article23423.flv</video:content_loc></video:video></url></urlset>For...
Using Analytics As a Business Case for SEO
PMA00:09
You can use a properly structured plan as the business case for an SEO project. The way to dothis is to express the target results of an SEO project in terms of financial impact. You couldinclude a variety of metrics in a business case,
such as:• Revenue• Lead generation• Margin• Branding value• Reach• Other action triggers (newsletter sign-ups, contact requests, demo requests, free-trialacceptance, viewing a specific piece of content, etc.)Measuring such things requires that you tie organic search engine visits to the revenue andother conversions...
Why Measuring Success Is Essential to the SEO Process
PMA00:08
Although quantifying deliverables and measuring progress are important for external reportingpurposes, it is just as important for SEO practitioners to measure the efficacy of their own effortsto make timely adjustments as necessary. As you will see in this chapter, numerous tools areavailable to aid in this process.
At the beginning of any SEO project it is wise to establish baseline data points for the website.This includes the following:• Quantifying organic search traffic by search engine and keyword• Quantifying a baseline of the major keywords...
Google Quality Guidelines: Search engine spam
PMA01:58
Hidden text Using invisible text specifically tailored to search engine spidersCloaking Presenting different content for the same URL to the web user and the search engine spiderSneaky redirects Using JavaScript to redirect web users to a page they did not expect, usually one that is unrelated to theirsearch queryIrrelevant keywords Employing techniques such as keyword stuffingDuplicate content Using the same content on numerous domains or subdomainsBadware Using malicious tactics including phishing (pretending to be another site) and malware...
Search Engine Spam
PMA01:55
Search engine users search to find relevant content. And search engines try to deliverlinks to relevant content. Unethical SEO, referred to in the industry as spam, attemptsto boost page rank by abusing the idea of relevant content—that is, improving pagerank by doing something other than delivering quality, relevant pages. So, for example,getting a page about Viagra to come up in a search for sports results would be consideredsearch engine spam.
If you are an established brand or company, your image is everything and you will doeverything to...
SEO Keyword Tuning with PPC Testing
PMA01:43
The PPC paradigm allows for fast, real-time feedback loops. You do not need to waitseveral weeks or months to realize whether your SEO is working.Say you have a list of pages with specific targeted keywords.
You can create an equivalentPPC test campaign using exact keyword matching to see whether your pagesperform as expected. You can also use broad keyword matching to see whether thereare other keywords that you may have missed but are producing good conversion rates.Finding mistakes quickly can save you a ton of money and time in the long run....
Utilizing blog comments, newsgroups, and forum postings
PMA01:41
The idea is much the same when posting comments to blogs, newsgroups, and forums
as it is when submitting articles. Simply include your signature with your URL every
time you post. Note that some sites do not allow URLs. Others employ the nofollow
attribute to discourage you from placing links in your posts.
The basic rule of thumb is to be relevant to the topic you are posting about. Try to
include keywords relevant to your site. Otherwise, your post could look like spam and
you might get banned. Here are some search command tips you can use...
Adding Your Links Everywhere
PMA01:40
You can do many things outside your site to foster healthy link building. You can writearticles, submit blog comments, and post to newsgroup and forum messages. Whatyou want to do is leave your URL within any content you create.Submitting articles
Many sites let you submit your articles, including ArticlesBase, EzineArticles, ArticleGeek, and many others. When you choose your article submission vendor, ensure thatyour articles are always properly credited.When your articles are (re)published, you want to make sure they contain appropriateattribution...
Backlinks from .edu and .gov domains
PMA23:16
When Matt Cutts (Google search quality engineer) was asked about the extra ranking
boost from inbound links originating from .edu and .gov TLDs, he responded as follows:
This is a common misconception—you don’t get any PageRank boost from having
an .edu link or .gov link automatically.
Although Google denies that .edu and .gov links get a PageRank boost, you can easily
construe that the domain extension does matter in some sense. When Google flat out
denies something, it is almost always because it is not true. But when Google is cagey
about...
Website Success Metrics Seo
PMA23:15
Although website content optimization is basically common sense—who doesn’twant a fast, easy-to-find site with engaging content?—it helps to know the realimpact that it can have on your audience growth, engagement, and ultimately, conversionand monetization. The following are generally accepted, simple metrics thatyou can change through the optimization techniques.
Unique visitorsHits are not what you think. A server hit is an HTTP request for a single webobject. One web page view can require many hits to the server. The true mark ofhow you should...
Top 10 Tips for Optimizing CSS Seo
PMA23:12
The following 10 best practices are designed to speed-optimize your CSS, and yourHTML markup:1. Replace inline style with type selectors to target multiple instances of identicalelements.2. Use descendant selectors to avoid inline classes.3. Group selectors with common declarations.4. Group declarations with common selectors.5. Combine common styles into shared classes.6. Use inheritance to eliminate duplicate declarations.7. Use CSS shorthand to abbreviate rules and colors.8. Abbreviate long class and ID names.9. Use CSS2 and CSS3.x techniques.10....
Image SEO
PMA00:12
Images are integral to content. Meaningful or unusual images that attract attention also serve toassociate your content in the reader's mind. Think of an image as an internal reference that helpsreaders remember a piece of content.
Image SEO is also crucial because Google recognizes the importance of images. I do the following:• provide meaningful file names with SEO keyphrases• provide Alt and Title tags with SEO keyphrasesThis has helped me to drive traffic for hugely competitive SEO keywords via images instead ofcontent alon...
Lead paragraph SEO
PMA00:11
I don't beat around the bush. I open my articles with a sentence that reiterates the page heading andexplains what the reader will get from the content.This is great for SEO for two reasons:• it creates a meaningful content teaser for humans viewing search results• it allows you to use the primary SEO keyphrase again in a natural wayBy making your opening paragraph as meaningful as possible, and as closely related to the pageheader as possible, you encourage Google to return that portion of the page in the search results.Bonus SEO tip: I use the...
5 reasons why video blogging is great for SEO and marketing
PMA00:10
Video blogging (adding video clips to a blog) can help to drive traffic, lower bounce rate, increaseengagement and conversions, and generally improve SEO (Search Engine Optimization) andInternet marketing.Video blogging also provides plenty of "different" marketing opportunities that written contentcan't.Bloggers who rely on written content only may find their rankings in search engines suffering asGoogle continues to include more and more video results (especially from YouTube) in its organicsearch results.Why start video blogging?In order to...
Benefits of long-tail SEO
PMA00:08
There are a number of extremely beneficial side effects to targeting long tail SEO terms, including:• More focused content• More targeted traffic• Higher conversions• Implicit PageRank improvement for high competition SEO termsIn effect, what you are doing by going after long-tail SEO terms is improving the focus of yourcontent so that the traffic driven to your site is more targeted. Having highly targeted traffic arrivingon your blog or small business website means that you are able to increase conversions rates andmake more money.In addition,...
long-tail SEO terms to increase website traffic
PMA00:08
Targeting long-tail SEO terms to increase website traffic via Google search only works if you areable to correctly identify the "right" SEO terms in the first place. The right SEO terms have thefollowing attributes:1. Relatively low monthly traffic2. Relatively low competition3. Relevant to your blog or small business4. Are focused and targeted to your ideal audienceOften, great long-tail keywords are slightly more focused versions of the SEO terms that you aren'table to reach the top page on.For example, you might not be able to reach the first...
PHP Array
PMA23:51
array
array array([mixed ...])
Creates an array using the parameters as elements in the array.
By using the => operator, you can specify specific indexes for any
elements; if no indexes are given, the elements are assigned indexes starting
from 0 and incrementing by one. The internal pointer (see current, reset, and next) is set to
the first element.
$array = array("first", 3 => "second", "third", "fourth" => 4);
Note: array is actually a language construct, used to
denote literal arrays, but its usage is similar...
Send Email from a PHP Script
PMA23:35
you use the mail() function (in combination with a web form in particular), make sure you check it is called from the desired page and protect the form with a CAPTCHA
mail(to,subject,message,headers,parameters);
<?php
$to = "someone@test.com";
$subject = "Test mail";
$message = "Hello! This is a simple email test.";
$from = "someonelse@test.com";
$headers = "From:" . $from;
mail($to,$subject,$message,$headers);
echo "Sent.";
?>
The mail() function is used to send email...
WORDPRESS & BLOG PERMALINKS
PMA22:37
If you are using Wordpress as your CMS (content management
system), or are running a blog on it, you should take the following
steps to optimize your URLs, also known in the blogosphere as
Permalinks. Permalink is just another name for the specific URL
assigned to each blog post or page you publish.
There are other blog systems out there but I personally use Wordpress
mostly and it is my favorite so far. This principle applies to other blog
software but I’m using Wordpress as the specific ‘how-to’ example
here.
The default format of a blog post/page...
Essential WordPress Plugins
PMA02:21
One of the great things about WordPress is that you can extend it with all kinds offunctionality with WordPress Plug-ins. There are hundreds of plugins that you can use,but here I’d like to list a few of the essential ones.In WordPress 2.7 and above you can search for and install new plug-ins from within theWordPress Admin UI. In the past, you had to find them in the Plug-in directory,download them, and then upload them to your WordPress installation. WordPress 2.7+simplifies this process a lot!Here are a few of the essential plug-ins that you’ll...
Headings & Links Seo
PMA22:58
If possible, you want to use the core terms and top variations inheadings and sub headings (H1, H2, H3…) on the page. It’s notabsolutely essential that the heading is the first thing on thepage.
Besides the headings, you should also try to work these same terms into the text oflinks on the page. This is usually a logical thing anyway, because you should havetwo URLs that you’re trying to get ranked for every search term (a first and secondchoice) so you can take care of this just by linking them to each other usingkeywords.
You may have already...
Make your site easier to navigate
PMA06:36
The navigation of a website is important in helping visitors quickly find the content they want. It canalso help search engines understand what content the webmaster thinks is important. AlthoughGoogle's search results are provided at a page level, Google also likes to have a sense of what role apage plays in the bigger picture of the site.
All sites have a home or "root" page, which is usually the most frequented page on the site and thestarting place of navigation for many visitors. Unless your site has only a handful of pages, you shouldthink...
URL structure
PMA03:10
• Use words in URLs - URLs with words that are relevant to your site's content and structureare friendlier for visitors navigating your site. Visitors remember them better and might bemore willing to link to them.Avoid:• using lengthy URLs with unnecessary parameters and session IDs• choosing generic page names like "page1.html"• using excessive keywords like "baseball-cards-baseball-cards-baseballcards.htm"• Create a simple directory structure - Use a directory structure that organizes your contentwell and is easy for visitors to know where they're...