Video (5 Tips for Effective SEO)

This video is a pretty good starting point for SEO, it focuses on the BIG things you do and don't want to do, so I thought you might enjoy it...

ALT TEXT

So you might have stumbled upon something called an ALT text...you are probably wondering what in the world it is...Well to be short, ALT text is a description of an image in case a disabled person uses the site so that he or she can navigate the site.

Translated to SEO language...it is a huge factor for bots when they scour your site looking at your content, because believe it or not but bots can't tell what a site is about just by reading your images or flash programming. In essence, it is much better to have a crappier looking site using just HTML than using brilliantly-made and laid-out flash or imagery. Bots cannot read images or flash!

To do an ALT text, just go to the image in question in some kind of programming utility and enter in the text that best describes the image. You should choose something related to your keyword for the page because bots factor that into the equation. Again, be wise about your use of keywords though, don't overstuff and don't dilute your keywords here...

Aren't you just loving this process, you are now getting into the nitty-gritty...

Video (Keyword Research)

For anyone doing keyword research, trying to find the perfect mix of keywords, this video is for you!!

Keyword Checklist...

Just to help everyone out, I thought I would make a little checklist when it comes to your keywords...this should help you out to organize them a little bit since they are some of the most important factors when it comes to search engines...without any further adieu then, I present the checklist:

1. Keyword in the URL
2. Keyword in the domain name
3. Keyword in the title tag (10-60 characters)
4. Keyword in the meta tag description (less than 200 characters. Long)
5. Keyword in the meta tag keywords (*Each keyword must be listed in the body text*)
6. Density of keywords in the text (about 5%)
7. Keyword Density of individual words (1-5%)
8. Keyword in the H1, H2, H3 headings
9. Keyword: font size (Attention = bold, italic=italic)
10. Keyword proximity to other keywords
11. Order of keyword phrases
12. Keyword prominence (Order of appearance in page, earlier = More emphasis)
13. Keyword in the ALT text(used to describe images)
14. Keyword on the site links to pages (anchor text)

If I haven't discussed one of these factors in a previous text, I will make it a priority to talk about them in a later posting, let me know if you have any questions or comments about any of these so I can get them updated!

Thanks!

Keyword Density and Goldilocks

One thing I wanted to add to my earlier post about keywords is a little tidbit about keyword density. It is a little bit of a tricky subject, because you almost have to play a Goldilocks game to really get it right on Google.

Put too many keywords in your body text, meta tags, or headings and Google will deem you the title of SPAM! Dilute your keywords and you will not even be recognized by Google...so what is the perfect solution?? Some say about 3-5% is a good range for your keyword density, but it does not apply in all situations..The best way is to find out what they rest of the websites are doing that are competing with you. In order to do that, I recommend using the following keyword density tool found here:

http://www.seotoolset.com/tools/free_tools.html

To do this, just go to Google, type in your keyword and take note of the first ten results. Take these sites and put their URL's in the tool and check what they are all doing for their keyword density. Then either dilute or concentrate your keywords in order to match what everyone else is doing. This is probably the surest way to get in the top 10 results...

G2

THE FIRST, MOST IMPORTANT THING

Hello everybody!

I would like to start out this SEO adventure with the most important starting subject in SEO....KEYWORDS! So, you have a great idea and you want to get indexed by Google so people will come to see your idea...you need keywords!

The best way for me to do this was to make a list of all pertinent subjects to home security. I started out security, home security, security systems, ADT, etc....until I had a huge list. Then I investigated each keyword to see if people actually searched for this word. Some great tools for this include Google's keyword tool (https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal), Wordtracker (http://www.freekeywords.wordtracker.com/) and Overture (http://www.inventory.overture.com/). All of these would be great tools for you to use! The most important thing with keywords though is to pick something that is searched for but that is unique, meaning there are not 5 bajillion searches for your word. If you go that route, you may never see your site ranking in Google at all because of how competitive it can get. Google's keyword tool is great for checking how competitive a keyword is..

Once you choose some keywords that describe your site, I would suggest you start with one keyword per page to make things simpler. In order for the search engine to know what keyword belongs to what page you will need to place a small HTML tag after the tag and before the head tag. So go to the page's HTML, and place this code, substituting the appropriate keyword:

meta name="keywords" content="your keyword"

(Don't forget to open and close the phrase with brackets < > )

Doing this will be like shouting to search engines that your site is about such and such subject. You may also at this time want to create a description about your site, so make up a great description that tells what your page is about, but also attracts readers. If you look at Google, the description is what appears beneath the site name, so it is an important subject. When making a description, it is also good practice to place your newly-selected keyword toward the front of the description if possible. However, avoid over-stuffing your description tag with your keyword because Google thinks of this as spam. When you have a description prepared place this tag by your other keywords tag you just put in:

meta name="description" content="your description"

For your own knowledge, a meta tag basically is a hidden indication to a search engine to describe additional information about your page. Just as an example, I will post what I have put for my site:

!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
head>
meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
title>SECURE 24 SEVEN | Authorized ADT Dealer | ADT Washington DC
meta name="description" content="ADT Home Security Washington DC | Receive a free ADT-monitored home security system when you set up a monthly monitoring agreement | Authorized ADT dealer| Secure24Seven" />
meta name="keywords" content="ADT home security Washington DC" />
meta name="robots" content="index, follow" />
link rel="stylesheet" href="./css/default.css" type="text/css" media="screen, projection, handheld" title="Default" />
link rel="stylesheet" href="./css/print.css" type="text/css" media="print" title="Default" />


You may also notice the little "robots" meta tag. This is a good practice to get into for your pages since it is almost like you are inviting the little search engine bot over for search engine tea and crumpets...

I hope this helps clear up some of the mystery with keywords, it is an ongoing subject of interest, so I will make other posts when I have some more time... See ya

G2

Links and Content...

The first thing you will ever learn and that I have had ingrained into my brain now is that there are two things that matter in SEO: LINKS and CONTENT. If you have those two things as optimized as they can be, you will have a high Google Page Rank, and you will have a lot of indexed pages by Google...This all equals in the end a high ranking in the search results for Google. I am now directing all my tireless efforts into those two things then: links and content. All of my postings hereafter will be focused on one of those two subjects. I hope that this helps in your efforts when you get down to the SEO craze...

G2

Blog blocking....

While creating this blog, I have been blocked out by Google...it appears that they have some pretty strict regulations regarding commercial websites. So, I'm not entirely sure when I'll be back, or if I'll ever be back, this may be my last message for this short run of time. All you have to do if Google blocks your commercial blog is send them a little message letting them know that the blog was made by you and not some program...Until next time....

My New Project....

I have just been given a new project to take a leads site that is currently unranked by Google, and turn it into something really special...the site is www.secure24seven.com so you can check out the progress as time goes on...As it is right now, the basic images, buttons, and forms are on the page, but NO SEO or Web 2.0 has been used for the page at all.....That will be my job as project manager, to make something out of nothing...Thus it begins!!

Hello and Welcome!

Hello and Welcome to my blog! Here we will attempt to debunk some of the truths and myths that are found etched within search engine optimization...I will document step by step the actions I take, even the most minor actions and script..This to the effect of helping you people around the world to get your own site up on Google! Please check back frequently for updates or just subscribe to the RSS feed and get updates automatically, Thanks!!

G2