Month: May 2012

  Another new update you’ll want to factor in when choosing your domain is your keywords.  We taught this in great detail in our course, but it’s become even more important with Google’s latest penguin update.  It appears, at first research that the following things are now true:

•   Google gives you higher ranking in search engine results if you have a domain that “is” the keyword or “contains” the keyword.
•   Google no longer seems to put as much weight on the type of domain you purchased (.com, .net, .org., .info, .biz., etc…)
•   Google no longer seems to negatively impact domains with hyphens (users may still view them as spammy but it doesn’t seem to effect search engine rankings as much anymore which means users will grow more accustomed to this type of domain).

So…if you missed out on a major keyword in the past due to what was true about Google’s past algorithms, you may want to consider heading back and doing some fresh research to buy some more highly relevant keyword domains for your business.

 

 

Google’s new pet Penguin has been causing some chaos in the SEO world.   With any new algorithm update, there are never absolute answers and for the last month, I’ve heard every theory imaginable, some I trust more than others.  Here are the valuable and trusted tid bits I wanted to pass on to VMB land…

On Page SEO has had the most impact with the new Penguin updates and it has caused some sites to disappear completely from Google’s search engines and some to drop drastically in rankings.   Here are some of the things you’ll want to pay attention too:

• Over optimized anchor text
• Low Quality Links
• Keyword Stuffed Run of Site Links
• Too many outbound links per page
• Hidden keywords
• Repetitive keywords / Keyword Stuffing  (write naturally, not for the search engines)
• No Duplicate Content
• Fresh, Quality Content
• Lack of rich media (video, photos, chart), etc.

One other important thing to consider is that if another website gets affected by the Penguin update and is flagged as “spammy”… if that site has a link to your site (in other words, they “voted” for you on their website and sent you some of their link juice), your site will be affected in a negative manner due to their drop in authority.

In summary, Google is learning more and more about how to judge the “quality” and “relevancy” of a website.  Although black hat SEO practices are the only way to manipulate the search engines for quick ranking in a highly competitive niche, you have to be careful about the quality, quantity and diversity of your practices.

Additionally, if you want to stay in the good graces of Google, the most important thing to remember is that you should be writing your content for your visitors.  Write often, write naturally, provide value and keep your visitors engaged.  These simple things will help your SEO efforts more than anything else.