Are you following a systematic plan for ranking on the search engines or are you simply gambling on the newest search engine trend?
Free traffic…coming in day after day and month after month. Isn’t that what everyone wants?
Yes…so it’s no wonder there is always some new trendy strategy for getting you to the top of the search engines.
The problem is that just like most trends…each of these leave people confused once Google and the others make little changes to their indexes (which happen every few months it seems).
If you’re trying to trick Google, you’re playing a losing game. It’s not about finding whatever trick you can today…it’s about giving Google and the others what they want for their visitors…good relavant sites with content.
Let’s cover 5 principles of good search engine plans.
1. Keyword Research
There are dozens of potential keyword tools including the Google Keyword tools, Wordtracker, and others. It’s not as much the tool that matters here as the way you apply it.
Your goal isn’t to just find high traffic keywords. It’s to find TARGETED BUYERS for whatever you’re selling. For example, if they add words like ebook, book, shopping, tools, buy, shop, review, etc. to the keyword phrases, they’re likely looking to buy something (buy nascar, basketball shoe shopping, internet marketing tools, etc.).
What I’ve seen from my own stats also is that it’s not just a few big keywords you’re going after, it’s thousands of longtail phrases that make up the majority of your visitors. Many of these you likely never target directly as they only get a few visitors per month, but they add up as you keep adding new content to your site.
2. Volume of Content
That takes us to point #2. Come out with content regularly. In fact, you’re often better off producing a large volume of good content than taking your time and only producing a few “great” pieces. That’s because everything you produce won’t be brilliant 100% of the time.
The more content you get out there, the more often you’re nail it by hitting the points people want.
Here’s a key. Be attention grabbing and controversial…like Michel Fortin did with his recent The Need for Long Copy and Other Stupid Myths.
I often have trouble being an extremist myself even though it is the best way to grab attention because usually that’s not where the truth is. For example in the above article I agree with Michel on some points but would disagree with him on others. I regularly get magalogs for magazines, and they’re definitely very long copy (often some of the best copy – putting online copywriters to shame). Yet I’d never claim the product was overpriced or poor as we’re talking $19 subscriptions being sold with 24 page full color sales pieces.
3. Onsite Optimization
Work on onsite optimization…a few of the key principles being:
– Make sure the titles of your post match keywords you’re going after (I do this many times but not all the time so don’t sit there trying to figure out all my titles).
– Add the keyword phrase you want in an alt title tag for the photo you include.
– Work on including keywords in anchor text pointing to other articles on your site.
4. Incoming Links
You need links…even if you have to beg, borrow, or steal them.
This is where many of the cheesy trends come from. They’re trying to get some why of generating a huge quantity of incoming links without an quality content.
Instead focus on the good sites. Build relationships with bloggers in your industry (who can give you incredible links). Run guest posts. Send out articles. Publish quality press releases. Write content people actually want to link to.
You’ll find getting a few high quality links to a site gives you the ability to run many of the other quantity strategies effectively. Think high quality links from sites which already rank on the search engine as the priority first. And then work on generating links from other quantity strategies.
5. Consistency
Instead of just doing a burst of action, setup a PLAN and fulfill on it. Keep producing content. Keep working on links. And grow your business.
SEO is one of those strategies that many people give up on, because it takes time to rank for the most competitive terms. You can often rank for longtail phrases overnight, but you’re not getting a highly competitive phrase that quickly unless you already have a very high quality site with a lot of incoming links.
In just a few days I’ll be releasing a simple course showing you how to put together a customized seo plan that’s right for you, your market, and your business. This is something I haven’t seen anyone offer yet, and there will of course be a special limited time deal when it’s first made available. Keep an eye out for it!
