Posted by Jim Mueller on Sat, Aug 14, 2010 @ 11:46 AM
Hi! Today, I want to talk about how do you get ranks in Google Maps? So let's go to Google Maps on a local search so I did a search for dentist. Google is smart enough to know that that's probably a local intent search. I don't really want to find a dentist in another city. It knows my IP address so it matches up with Denver. So here is the Google Maps, we call it the seven packs, so seven results and this usually show up in position number four on the Google search results. And basically, Google maps and who shows up here in what order has a whole different algorithm and rules than the regular organic SEO results, the top ten.
So one of the big factors is web citation and a web citation is an equivalent of a link in a regular, organic SEO world. A web citation is an equivalent of a link for local rankings. An example of a web citation is anywhere your company name, address and phone numbers are found on a credible source in the internet. I'll show you an example. Here's yellowpages.com. There's literally hundreds of these directories Local.com, other Google places, Bing Local, Yahoo Local, City Search, it goes on and on. So we search for a dentist here in yellowpages.com and we find these listings. I'll go down here to one of non-paid ones. When I click on that, you see the dentist's name which is his company name, the address and the phone number that they're considered a web citation from a credible source yellowpage.com. You can also put a lot more information about your services.
You can get reviews on your service. Reviews are a big help as well so if you notice back on the search result, you'll notice that these are reviews over here. When I click on those, it will take me to the reviews. So the number of reviews you have also contributes to the rankings here. One other thing to notice with regards to these directories, quantity definitely helps. The more places you'd be found, the more web citation Google finds, the better. But Google will score you on the accuracy of these web citations with regard to your address and phone number and information. Also the consistency from directory to directory, the more consistent they see the information, the higher your score and you also need to renew some of these on an annual basis.
The other factor is how close is your company zip code address to the zip code that is being searched for. And lastly, putting your address on your website is important, especially your home page. Put your address and your phone numbers maybe in the footer or somewhere else in the page and it's good to have that on any page if you want it ranks locally for that phrase. This is by far not a comprehensive, by no means not a comprehensive list of things in their algorithm but these are some of the big ones that you can focus on and should help you get found on Google Maps.
Posted by Jim Mueller on Sat, Aug 14, 2010 @ 09:36 AM
SEO Question:
How Critical Is It To Put Your Address On Your Website For Local SEO?
SEO Answer:
With regard to local rankings, it's very important to have your address on the page you want to rank for...especially your home page. It's also a good idea to have your phone number right next to your address. Google refers to this as a 'web citation". A web citation is anywhere your name, address and phone number are found on the web...it's the equivelant of a link in the "non local" SEO world.
Full Video Transcript
So I wanted just to show an example of lists of web citation so you can get your web citations. There's literally hundreds of them like Google Local, Yahoo Local, MSN which is Bing actually Google calls it Google Places now, Yelp, City Search. ow The online Yellow Pages, Super Pages, yellowpages.com and here's just a laundry list of directories that you can find yourself and get web citation.
Let me show what one looks like here. Look up public relations, click on that. So this is an example of a bad one, it's got the phone number but no address so let's look for another one. This looks like a good one. So see where they have their address and phone number and company name that would be considered a web citation. That's going to help you show up in Google Maps.
Posted by Jim Mueller on Sun, Mar 28, 2010 @ 06:44 PM
Full Transcript
Hey, everybody. It’s Jim Mueller with another episode of SEO Answers from Reignnet.com. I want to talk about domain choices here. And I get a lot of questions from my clients asking about dot com versus dot net. So, I’m going to answer a couple of those.
Basically, the dot com is almost always going to be more valuable than dot net, dot org, dot US, things like that. So the next question I get is, which is more valuable and which choice should I make, mykeyword.net or mykeywordalmost.com? So the example would be internetmarketing.net if internet marketing is what I’m going after or internetmarketingcompany.com? And the choice would be internetmarketing.net.
Next question, country code top level domains such as these, if you’re going after more traffic around the world, is it valuable to get your domain with these country codes. And the answer is, if your business is specific to that territory, then yes, it’s going to be more valuable to do that. However, if you’re doing it just to get ranked worldwide, then the problem with that is while you are going to get more authority in these regions, you’re going to get penalized in the other regions of the country because you have this country code in your domain.
So, it’s definitely not worth it if you’re just a US company trying to get ranked worldwide. Just stick with your dot com, dot net, whatever you have.
Another question is keyword in the domain versus having the exact keyword. This comes up a lot. So, it’s exponentially more beneficial to have your exact keyword, mykeyword.com than to have mykeywordservices.com. I think everybody knows it’s more powerful to have just your keyword but I don’t think they understand that it’s exponentially more powerful to have just your exact keyword in your domain. And, with that being said though, if you have your keyword in your domain, it’s better than not having it but not [Phonetic] [0:02:18] is much better because I think people think it is.
So, example two, mykeywordservices.com versus mykeyword.org. So if you had the choice, having your exact keyword even though it’s dot org which isn’t as valuable as dot com, having your exact keyword is going to be the better choice in this situation.
Example three is my longtailkeywordphrase.com meaning if I can’t get internet marketing, if I’m going to go after internet marketing consulting company or internetmarketingconsulting.com, is that a good domain URL to go after. And the answer is if that’s the exact phrase you’re going after, then it is a great domain. If internet marketing consulting is the phrase I’m going after, then internetmarketingconsulting.com is a great domain.
And lastly, again, these are all – revolve around not being able to get the domain you want because it’s so tough to get the short domains. If you can’t get the domain you want, probably the next best choice is to get the plural version of your keyword or adding an S specifically.
So instead of mykeyword.com, mykeywords.com. And example would be internet marketing consultant. If that’s not available, then the next best choice would probably be internet marketing consultants with an S.
Just a side note, a lot of times, you want to check your keyword analysis. Sometimes, the plural version of a phrase actually gets more search volume than the singular version.
So, that’s it for now. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions of your own, please email them to Jim@Reignnet.com and I’ll be more than happy to include them in one of my episodes. Talk to you soon.
For Internet Marketing Help call 888-778-1657
Posted by Jim Mueller on Sun, Mar 28, 2010 @ 06:42 PM
Full Transcript
Hey, everybody. Jim Mueller. Welcome to another episode of SEO Answers. Today, we’re going to talk about internal linking. Again, this is going to be short and sweet but these are a few tips that you can implement immediately.
Internal linking, a good example for internal linking is Wikipedia. So, if we take a look here at Wikipedia, I don’t know if you’ve noticed but it seems like Wikipedia ranks number one or two for almost everything. Really high profile keywords such as internet marketing, there’s Wikipedia. The funny thing is they don’t have as many backlinks as some of the other sites that rank underneath them. One of the reasons is their internal linking strategy. So if you look at Wikipedia, whenever you go there and you see a hyperlink, you click on it, it takes you to another page within Wikipedia.
So rarely do they ever leave the site and so what they’re doing is they’re doing internal linking and that help transfer some of the link flow into certain pages.
So, what we’re going to do is show you real quick how to do this on your website. This is my website here. Everybody has a different content management system. I happen to use Squarespace which is a really cool platform to build your website on. But as I go on and edit the page, what you want to do is you want to find the phrases that match the keywords that you’re going after for this particular phrase. And you want to link them to other pages in your website.
So I’ve already done some here previously but I’ll do a couple here right now. So basically, what I’m going to do is take pay per click campaigns. That’s something that I would like to highlight and potentially get ranked for. So I’m going to link that to one of my internal pages and you want to link it to the most relevant page on your website as close as could be.
So I have a pay per click page. That’s about as relevant as you can get so I’m going to link that. And so now, there’s a hyperlink to pay per click campaigns to my pay per click page. Let’s also do social media marketing. This is in my services folder. There’s my social marketing. And then I’ll do search marketing which I’ll link to my SEO. Okay, let’s save and close that.
As we take a look on the page, you’ll notice that those three links I did when I click on those will take you to my particular page that’s relevant to that. And that’s going to give you some internal linking and Google pays a lot more attention to the phrases that are hyperlinked than the phrases that are not.
So, that’s it in a nutshell. Thanks for listening. I will see you next time.
For Internet Marketing Help call 888-778-1657
Posted by Jim Mueller on Sat, Feb 27, 2010 @ 12:13 AM
Today I explain what canonicalization is in simple terms. This is a mystery to most people who are starting out with SEO and inbound marketing, however, it's important and has an effect on your SEO. It's also one of the most simple things you can do to improve your SEO.
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Posted by Jim Mueller on Sat, Feb 27, 2010 @ 12:06 AM
Today we discuss the process of keyword analysis or keyword research...thse two terms are used interchangeably. Any sound inbound marketing strategy will start with this step because it is the most important part of the entire process. The keywords you identify from this process will drive most everything you do online.
Full Video Transcript
Hey, everybody. Jim Mueller with SEOAnswers. A question of the day is what exactly is keyword research, keyword analysis? So, let’s jump right in. Typically, I’ll ask my clients to give me five core keywords and these are words, phrases that best describe the products and services that they sell. Also, what they think their perspective customers are typing into Google, looking for products and services that they sell. So once I get those core phrases, then I’ll begin to look for all the alternatives, the synonyms, variations, the plural versus the singular and come up with an exhaust of list which can become quite extensive. But we would want to look at all the choices before we get started.
The next thing we want to look at is the search volume. So, why is this important? Well, it’s important to know the size of the market that you’re going after. So, if you’re going to spend time and money trying to get rank for these phrases, you need to know how many people are searching for those phrases. So for example, executive coaching gets about 60,500 searches a month. Now, executive coach gets about a third of that. So, I didn’t know that and I know my client didn’t know that before we did the research. So that’s why it’s important to do this. Another example is certified executive coach so you look at that and it only gets 210 searches a month. So I definitely didn’t know that until we did the research. So, it’s important to know.
The other reason it’s important to know is if somebody is looking to hire an SEO company to get them ranked, a lot of times these companies will say, “What phrases do you want to get ranked for?” And if I’m a certified executive coach, I’ll say, “Hey, I would love to be ranked on the first page of Google for that phrase.” That company will say, “Okay.” And then $2000 later, you’re on page one of Google for this phrase but it only has 210 searches a month which you probably didn’t know and you’re not going to get all those searches. You’re only going to get a percentage and unbeknownst to you, you probably could have gotten ranked on page one of Google with just a few blog posts based on a term like that. It just depends on how competitive it is but sometimes you got to know the search volume, how competitive it is before you know how much you need to spend on SEO.
The next thing we look at is the number of competing pages. So, we basically want to know how competitive these phrases are. And one of the quick ways to determine that is to look at the number of competing pages. So, if we take executive coaching, we do a search in Google for that, here we see results one through 10 of about 1,160,000 competing pages. So, this number gives me an idea of how competitive that phrase is and then use that information to make a recommendation to my client.
Another way to determine the competitiveness of a phrase is to look at who is ranking on the page one. So let’s go look at the websites and I’ll look at how many backlinks they have, how long has the site been around, what’s the page rank and I’ll take all these things into consideration. I’ll also look at, you know, the last position number 10 because if you’re going to get on page one of Google, you have to at least knock off number 10. Right? So, we’ll look in number 10 and we’ll see, you know, what their backlinks are, how long they have been around, what their page rank is so we’ll take that all in consideration and before I make my determination.
So, once we get to competing pages, then I kind of have a ratio. This is just my deal where I divide these two numbers and I get a ratio and the lower the ratio, the better. And basically, what it tells me is what’s the best balance and what’s a good word to go after. Typically, the more search volume, the more competition. Once in a while, you will find a phrase with a decent amount of search volume. Not so much competition. Then this ratio here is going to be low. That might be a phrase we’re going to go after.
So, once we do all this analysis, what comes out of that is a list of keyword phrases that I call – or keyword palette and this is a list of phrases for my clients to choose from when they’re writing blog posts, when they’re doing their title tags, meta descriptions, writing a press release. They’re always going to want to be cognizant of these keyword phrases and work those in to their marketing materials, their website, their content, their blog articles and so forth. So, you can see how important it is to do this analysis up front.
And then out of that, we’re going to do those title tags, meta descriptions and that will be for another video blog post later on. But – so for right now, that’s it on keyword analysis. I hope that helped. Thanks for checking in and I’ll talk to you next time.
Posted by Jim Mueller on Fri, Feb 26, 2010 @ 11:57 PM
Today I'll show you what the heck "Meta Data" is. I'm sure you've all heard this term used a thousand times but a lot of you don't really know what it is specifically. It deals with title tags (or page titles), meta descriptions (or page descriptions), meta keywords, H1, H2, H3 tags, Alt tags. Any inbound marketing firm will bring these up and you should know what they mean...happy viewing.
Video Transcript
Hey, everybody. My name is Jim Mueller. Welcome to another episode of SEO Answers. Question of the day is what on earth is meta data? Specifically what are title tags, meta descriptions and meta keywords? So, we’ll start with title tags.
Where do you find title tags? Well, you find them at the top of the browser and I’m using Firefox here for Mac. So they’re right here in the middle, inbound marketing, SEO consulting, internet marketing firm, SEO contents. So those are the title tags for my website, for ReignNet.
Let’s see what they look like in Safari. Basically, they look the same. I also did a screenshot for Internet Explorer because that’s what most people are using and the title tag shows up in the blue bar at the top right there. Now, where else does it show up? Well, it shows up in the search engine results so if we do a search for inbound marketing consultants, here’s ReignNet’s site. And then here’s my title tag. So all these blue bold lines here are title tags. Okay?
Now, why is a title tag important? Well it’s important for several reasons. One is it basically describes what your webpage is about not only for the visitor but for the search engine. In terms of Google, they have about 197 attributes that go into determining who’s going to show up where in the search results. Title tags weigh very heavily on where you’re going to show up in the search results. In addition to that, if somebody does a search and they come to this page, this is the first thing they see is your title tags. So this needs to be something that’s going to match what they were searching for and catch their attention. So you’re competing for the clicks here.
Next, meta descriptions. So, a meta description is this sentence that appears right below the title tags. Now, Google only shows about 160 characters. Your sentence and meta description can be longer than that but Google is only going to show about 160 characters. And this meta description, again, is a sentence that describes what your page is about but it should also be compelling and try to drive some action by the visitor because remember, you’re competing here for clicks and just because ReignNet shows up number two for this search result doesn’t mean somebody is going to click on that. Somebody might read something down here that catches their eye and that meta description causes them to click on that result instead of mine. So, it’s very important to write a crisp clear meta description.
Last is the meta tags. Now, meta tags are basically a laundry list of the keywords that you’ve identified. In our last episode, we talked about keyword analysis and research so at all the keywords that you analyzed and then came up with a final list to write your title tags which are also referred to as page titles by the way. And then we wrote our meta description and then lastly, the meta keywords.
Again, it’s just kind of a laundry list of all the phrases that you would like to be found for in Google that best describe what that page is about and those are not seen on your website or in the search results. They’re just kind of in the background. Only Google sees them. I should tell you though that meta keywords are becoming less and less a factor in terms of where you’re going to show up in the search results. Even Google has alluded to this.
So – but my personal belief is you’ve done the work to identify the phrases. You’re already in there putting in your title tags and your meta descriptions. You might as well load your meta keywords in there. I figure if you get just a little benefit from it, it’s definitely worth the time. So, anyway, that’s meta data. Thanks for checking in and I’ll see you next time.