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WordPress SEO Basics

February 14, 2011 By
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WordPress is a great platform for building both blogs and websites but there a number of things you can do to improve the on-page optimization.

If you only concentrate on improving three things, these top the list:

Permalinks

The Permalink structure controls how WordPress dynamically creates the url to your Pages and Posts and the default structure isn’t that great.

Here’s an example…

Let’s say you publish a Page named, “Contact Us.” By default, the generated url would look something like: YourDomain.com/?p=2

Do you see the “?p=2″ portion after the main domain name?

That portion is called the “Permalink” and is generated dynamically by WordPress as soon as you publish the Page. The “?p=2″ looks a bit strange to human visitors and doesn’t tell the search engines anything about the on-page content.

While there are a number of Permalink structure options, I prefer using the custom “/%postname%/” structure.

After making this change, the “Contact Us” Page would now get a website url structure like this: YourDomain.com/contact-us
This makes more sense for visitors and will improve the relevance for the keyword phrases contained in your Post/Page titles.

Improving Your On Page SEO

The most popular SEO Plugin for WordPress is called the “All In One SEO Pack,” by Michael Torbert.

Installing it will give you a number of benefits including:

•    The ability to control the “meta title” for your homepage and for every Page/Post you create.
•    Control over the “meta page description” for your homepage and for every Page/Post you create.
•    Control over the “meta keywords” for your homepage and for every Page/Post you create (if you’re still in the habit of entering meta keywords).

Website Performance Improvements

The “WP Super Cache” plugin, by Donncha, will help your pages load faster for visitors and search engine robots (aka bots or search engine crawlers).

How it does this is a bit technical but I will do my best to explain…

Instead of serving up the dynamic WordPress pages the plugin generates static html files. After it generates the files, your webserver will serve those files instead of the WordPress PHP scripts (which are heavier and slower loading).

As this criteria now plays a role in the search engine algorithm, you enhance your ability to rank in the SERPs.

If you need a website designed or optimized for the search engines, be sure to contact us as

support@page1marketinggroup.com

We serve Wilmington NC and surrounding counties “face-to-face” but we work with clients nationwide.

Filed Under: SEO Tips Blog Tagged With: , , ,

What Affects My On-Page SEO?

February 12, 2011 By

When optimizing your site for the search engines, you should improve what is called your “on page” SEO as well as your “off page” SEO. On page SEO includes those things that can be done to your web pages to enhance their ability to rank for a particular set of terms and off page SEO (aka offsite SEO) are the techniques, like link building, that are done elsewhere.

Here are five (of the many) website factors that may affect your on page SEO:

Website Design/Coding

You may be surprised to see “web design” included in this list but it really can affect your Search Engine Optimization efforts. Here’s how:

•    Your design should look great so as to keep your visitors on your site as long as possible . (this improves what is called, “visit duration.”)
•    Your site should be well-coded and should validate with the “W3C validation tool” whenever possible.
•    Your images and coding should be optimized to be as “light” as possible. This will improve your “page load speed” and this is good for both SEO and human visitors… no one likes to needlessly wait.

Meta Title

Your “meta title” information is added to the page source (i.e. your website coding) and is displayed to visitors in the topmost portion of the browser window.

Generally speaking, your meta title should include the two-to-three keyword phrases you are optimizing the page for and be kept relatively short (i.e. about 60-80 characters max).

Meta Page Description

How much your meta page descriptions affect your SEO is up for debate but there are other benefits to writing a good meta page description as well.

As a general rule, I suggest that your meta page description read well, contain the primary keyword phrase you are targeting and be kept to no more than 156 characters, including spaces.

Most of the time, the search engines will use your meta page description text when creating your search engine listing. The more exciting the text is, the better your chances of “getting the click.”

On Page Content

They say that “content is King” but that’s not entirely true. Poorly written content, or content that is “stuffed” with keywords will do much more harm than good.

For best results, your on page content should be well-written and unique to your site. It should also be tightly focused around the 2-3 keyword phrases you are optimizing for.

That’s not to say that you should repeat your keyword phrases over and over, but that each page’s content be more focused than broad.

Your Web Page URL

If at all possible, it’s best to see that your urls include your primary keyword phrase.

For example, if you were targeting the term, “seo expert,”  it would be best if the url were something like: domain.com/seo-expert
As your url now includes the phrase, “seo expert,” you help the search engines better understand the relevance of your page’s content.

If you need to have a mobile or standard website designed or optimized for SEO, contact us for a free phone consultation.  We specialize in getting your small business on Page 1 of Google search results.  For web design or website SEO, email us at jeanette@page1marketinggroup.com

We are located in Wilmington NC but handle clients internationally.

Filed Under: SEO Tips Blog Tagged With: , , ,

Optimizing Your Google Places Listing

February 12, 2011 By
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Optimizing your Google Places listing is critical to your business success.  Potential customers always have their cell phone with them, and they are constantly searching for businesses, such as restaurants, doctors, or retail stores. They are using Google search to pick the business they will visit. And Google search is bringing up Google Places listings.  If you have a business, will you be found?  Google Places gets you a mobile listing. So if you want to be found when people search on their cell phones, you need to be sure you are on Google Places and that your listing is optimized. Read on to learn more about optimizing your Google places listing.

While there is much more to optimizing your Google Places listing than first meets the eye, these five tips will give you a “leg up” on your competition:

1.    Fill out every field completely.

There are about 20 fields to fill out when completing your Place Page listing. I recommend that you fill out each and every field as skipping even one can negatively affect the ranking of your Places Page.

As a general rule you’ll find the more complete your listing is, the better it will rank for the keyword phrases you are targeting.

2.    Utilize every category available to you.

Google only requires you to use one category for your listing but will allow you to use up to five. You can get your Place Page ranked for more terms if you include the keyword phrases you are targeting in the category names.

Warning: Don’t take this to mean that you can stuff your categories with multiple keyword phrases. I have seen this practice done but it is dangerous and may result in penalties from Google.

3.    You can add up to ten photos — add all ten!

Google allows you to use up to ten photos and I encourage you to use every one of them. If you really want to enhance the benefit they bring, consider uploading the images to Panoramio or Flickr and geo-tagging the images with your business address.

4.    You’re allotted five videos — don’t forget to use them too.

Yes, it’s a bit harder to create videos than it is photos, but this is actually good news. How, you ask?

Well, you’ll find that many businesses don’t include a video in their listing and those that do rarely add all five. As I said in tip #1, the more complete your listing is, the easier it is to rank well for the terms you’re targeting.

5.    Build as many citations as possible.

A citation is an online reference for your business and services. Google uses them to validate that your business truly exists and that it offers the type of services you list on your Places page.

It’s extremely important that your citations closely match the information found on your Places page.  As you can control the citations you create, it’s best if the information matches your Places Page information EXACTLY!

You can create your own citations at directories like the Yellow Pages, Super Pages, CitySearch, Insider Pages, Yahoo Local, Localize and a number of others.

If you just want to run your business and have some one else take care if all this Google Places , web optimization, and mobile presence stuff, then contact us. We can hold your hand in Wilmington NC and surrounding counties, but we can do this by phone or email if you live further away.

Email us at support@page1marketinggroup.com

Filed Under: What's Hot in Mobile Marketing Tagged With: , , , , ,

Common Search engine optimization Terms You Must Know

February 12, 2011 By
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As a top consultant for local businesses in Wilmington, NC, we are frequently asked “what is SEO and why is it important for my website to be optimized for SEO.  If you are planning to develop a website, either a standard website or a mobile website, it is critical that they be optimized for the search engines.  This article will introduce the key terms involved in Search Engine Optimization.

As Search Engine Optimization, or SEO,  is extremely technical, there are lots of specialized terms utilized when discussing this topic. I’ll list a few of the most frequently misunderstood terms beneath, beginning with SEO/SEM (and the difference between them).

1) SEO/SEM

Seo stands for “Search Engine Optimization.” It is a set of methods employed by an Seo Advisor to enhance your website’s rankings within the search engines like google for a specific set of key phrases, or keyword phrases.  There will be far more on this subject later.  SEM stands for “Search Engine Marketing” and it is becoming utilized  more and more by search engine professionals. In addition to the regular Search engine optimization strategies, SEM Consultants also specialize in:

  • Creating Pay-Per-Click Campaigns on the search engine of the selection… predominantly Google, Yahoo and Bing.
  • Buying compensated “inclusions” from search engines like Google. This is paying a search engine corporation to  assure that your web-site will be included within their search results.

2)  SERPs

SERPs stands for “Search Engine Outcomes Pages.” It’s the page that’s returned when an individual conducts a search by means of a search engine. Search engine optimization techniques are used to enhance your internet page’s ranking amongst the other “organic” listings inside the SERPs with the greatest objective of growing targeted website traffic.

3)  Keyword Phrase

It is really significant when you grasp the idea on the “keyword phrase” as it is the backbone of Seo. A keyword, or keyword phrase, may be the phrase(s) entered to the search box by an world wide web consumer. Since the search engines return the internet pages they believe to become most relevant for the keyword phrase entered, it is important which you recognize the idea and do your very best to optimize your pages for the keyword phrases you would like to be discovered for.

4)  Backlinks

Finally, we will discuss backlinks. Most Seo Consultants agree that the creation of backlinks (aka hyperlinks, website link constructing, one-way links, and so forth.) that stage for your pages really should be your main objective. You need to create high quality hyperlinks, that include your targeted keyword phrases and you have to do this on an ongoing basis. Search engine optimization is not a “once and done” sort of activity, it requires continual improvement/management to be really effective.

Contact us today if your website needs help.

Support@page1marketinggroup.com

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