LUCID Public Relations » LUCID Blog

SEO Site Review

Dan Sevigny — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 20:02:59 +0000

If you are doing your own SEO or are wondering if your current SEO firm is doing their job correctly you can submit your site to LUCID Public Relations for a free site review. If your site is selected for review it will be graded by LUCID’s SEO expert, Dan Sevigny, and published on this site for discussion amongst our experts and readers. If you would like a private site review please contact Dan Sevigny at (dan@lucidpublicrelations.com).

Find out how your site is performing in the search engines and find out what you can do to increase your ranking today–submit your site for a site review by emailing web@lucidpublicrelations.com now.

SEO Linkbuilding – How to Get Links by Writing Articles

Dan Sevigny — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 18:59:00 +0000

Links are the driving force behind gaining the coveted #1 positions for high search volume keywords. Today I am going to explain 3 things as they relate to building links by writing informative articles on your company blog or website. I will go through the following main three points:

Why you need links
What links are good links
HOW to get links by writing articles

First off, lets go over why you need links in the first place. As you may or may not already know, building a steady supply of links from related, high profile websites to your site is the single most important factor in search engine optimization today. By discovering links to your site from high quality, highly relevant websites major search engines (Google, Yahoo & Bing) are able to see that your site is credible and relevant for industry related keywords. According to Google, their “search works because it relies on the millions of individuals posting links on websites to help determine which other sites offer content of value.” — in this way, the web is somewhat of a democracy, allowing links to serve as votes of confidence for your site. The only difference in Google’s democracy and ours here in the USA is that Google gives a bigger vote to more “credible” sources. So in short, you need links from individuals/organizations in your industry who are credible and highly regarded by search engines because these votes are the kind that count with Google and other major search engines today.

Alright, so you know why you need links and I have briefly touched on what kind of links are good links, but what exactly are we looking for in a good link? A good link will be all of the following:

From a domain with high Google PageRank or PR (individual page PR is important, but if the domain has a high page rank you are just as well off, as the individual page will gain PageRank over time. Read more about PageRank.
From a domain or page that is relevant to your industry (For example, LUCID Public Relations is relevant to a number of related industries such as marketing, advertising and search engine optimization–links from quality sites in any of these industries would be great for us).
Utilizes your keywords in the anchor text of the link (for example a good link for LUCID would look like this: LUCID Public Relations)
Is a DoFollow link (one that passes a vote of confidence to your site, as opposed to a NoFollow link which is used for advertisements or sites that a webmaster wants to link to, but not endorse in any way). Read more about NoFollow/DoFollow at Google.

Now that you know why you need links and what kind of links are good we can get into the most important part of this article: how to get great links by writing articles on your site!

If you don’t already have a blog set up on your site, now may be the time to get one set up– there are many ways to get articles on your site, but that will have to be discussed at another time (or with your web developer). If you already have a blog CMS (Content Management System) set up, or know how to create articles on your website, you are ready to get started. There are several elements that you want to include in your articles in order to attract the most useful links.

Make the article topic relevant to your industry. At LUCID Public Relations (we are an SEO and Public Relations firm) we write only about public relations, SEO and internet marketing– this attracts links from websites that are related to ours.
Include keywords in the title (without making it look “spammy” or overstuffed with keywords). Often times people will link to articles using only the title of the article as anchor text, so using your keywords in the article title will increase the likelihood that those keywords will be included in your anchor text.
Provide useful, intelligent information for your readers. This one may seem like a no-brainer, but believe it or not, many webmasters think that pushing out poorly written articles on a mass-scale is the solution gaining important in the search results. Not only does this practice damage your brand by making you look like a spammer, it doesn’t work nearly as well as writing thoughtful and original content.

Think about the process of distribution that an article goes through once it is published on your site–how are you getting the word out? I will spare you the “if a tree falls in the forest” analogy, but this is really important: if you write amazing content and no one ever sees it you are guaranteed to not get any links, so find a way to distribute your work. You may want to try these avenues:

Social Networking: Blast new articles out to all of your friends on Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, etc. Often times articles on mediums like these can spread like wildfire from one profile to the next, causing an article to go “viral”.
Social Bookmarking: Submit your articles to sites like Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, Del.Icio.us, Fark, Slashdot, Propeller, Etc. — often times, sites like these can bring in 20,000-30,000 hits in a day (don’t believe me? Check out the Digg Effect/Slashdot Effect on Wikipedia).
Ping Ping Ping!!: Ping the search engines when you have new articles written. Our favorite service for this is called Ping-o-matic– this one-stop pinging machine will tell a number of sources that you have recently updated an article on your site and is great at driving in search engine traffic. Furthermore, after you submit your site using Ping-o-matic, it may start showing up in Google’s blog feed (which means your articles will be instantly indexed, rather than having to wait days at a time).

Please feel free to contact us at LUCID Public Relations or comment below if you have questions or comments and we’ll be sure to get back to you as soon as possible (if you want a reply, emailing or calling us is the best way to get one).

URL Canonicalization & WHY it Matters

Dan Sevigny — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 19:32:08 +0000

Matt Cutts recently wrote a blog post about URL Canonicalization and although it may sound boring it is incredibly valuable to any person doing, seeking, or contemplating SEO. Canonicalization, to put it briefly, is redirecting many different variations of a web address to one chosen variation, therefore erasing duplicate content that can get you penalized and your content dropped or lowered on search engines. This example, taken from Matt Cutts’ blog, shows how seemingly the same URLs can all lead to different pages and content if it is not properly canonicalized.

www.example.com
example.com/
www.example.com/index.html
example.com/home.asp

Although all of these URLS could potentially lead to the same page on your site, they are in fact different URLS and can be seen as individual pages by search engine spiders. As Matt points out, all of those URLS could potentially lead to different content. Canonicalization is when you redirect all the variations of your page to one, allowing search engines to easily recognize that there is only one copy of your page. The easiest way to do this is to add a 301 redirect to your .htaccess code. a 301 redirect, or a permanent redirect, is a search engine friendly way to forward visitors and search engine bots to your desired page.

You should canonicalize all of the pages on your site to one form (either www form or non-www form). Adding the following code to your .htaccess file (if you are on a CMS, be careful that this does not conflict with their default code):

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\. [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^([^.]+\.[a-z]{2,6})$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.%1/$1 [R=301,L]

You can find other variations of the 301 redirect in htaccess by simply searching google for “301 htaccess”. If you have any questions or need help you can also email LUCID’s Internet Marketing Director, dan@lucidpublicrelations.com and he will assist you.

How to hire an SEO company

Dan Sevigny — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 00:22:45 +0000

SEO means Search Engine Optimization – this is the process of making your site more accessilbe to search engines with the goal of increasing your ranking for certain keywords; Search Engine Optimization experts or SEO firms are the professionals that are employed to do this.

Before you run off and hire the first SEO firm you can find, there are some things you should know. Hiring the right SEO firm is essential, because hiring the wrong individual or company to do SEO for your website could result in penalties or even a ban from Google and other search engines. You need to find an SEO firm/person who knows what they are doing. This article will show you what questions you should ask an SEO company, what qualities a good SEO company has, and how to avoid bad SEO firms and SEO scams.

Questions to ask an SEO Company

This list of questions is based off of Google’s Search Engine Optimization article on the Google Webmaster Tools Help website.

Can you show me examples of your previous work and share some success stories?

The potential SEO company or consultant should have at least a few clear SEO success stories. The best answer involves not only verifiable keyword rankings gained for a website, but how those rankings converted into sales or other goals for the client. Ignore any SEO company that tries to impress you with #1 results on Google/Yahoo/Bing for keywords using more than 4 words. Focus on how much traffic they brought to the client and how that traffic generated sales, sign-ups, leads, etc.

Do you follow the Google Webmaster Guidelines?

The answer to this should be: YES, YES, YES.

Do you offer any online marketing services or advice to complement your organic search business?

Most legitimate SEO firms should (and do) also offer advice and/or management for pay per click services like Google’s Adsense.

What kind of results do you expect to see, and in what timeframe? How do you measure your success?

You want an SEO company that is realistic with you about what you can expect. This is obviously something that is decided on a case-by-case basis, but I think most results can be expected within 6 months. Success can be measured by gain in traffic, increase in website conversions from search engines, or top 3 result presence for specific keywords.

Other good questions to ask an SEO company:

What are your most important SEO techniques?
How long have you been doing SEO?
How can I expect to communicate with you? Will you share with me all the changes you make to my site, and provide detailed information about your recommendations and the reasoning behind them?

Qualities of a good SEO company:

Honest & Transparent – Your SEO company should be able to explain to you in plain English what they are doing for your site (both on-site and off-site) to increase your search based traffic.

Communicative – You should be able to contact your SEO company with questions about your SEO project and they should have time to talk with you no more than 24 hours later. They should also clear any changes to your website with you before making them, ensuring that you understand what they will be doing before they do it.

How to avoid bad SEO companies and SEO scams:

There are literally hundreds of thousands of scams that have sprung up around Search Engine Optimization – in addition to that, there are hundreds of thousands of ‘SEO experts’ who, despite good intentions, just don’t know what they are doing. The field of SEO is not regulated by any official body and has not been (until recently) taught in any schools in the United States – as a result, anyone who knows how to use a computer can jump up and claim: “I’m an SEO Expert!” As an SEO firm we have been contacted numerous times by people who claim to be SEO experts who ask us questions about simple SEO related tasks that any real SEO expert should already know.

So, how do you avoid SEO scams and poor quality SEO imposters? Ask lots of questions when interviewing your potential SEO company (the list above is a good place to start, but also ask some that are more specific to your website).

Also, watch out for any individuals or companies who:

Send unsolicited emails about their services

Guarantee 1st page or 1st place rankings

Don’t have a website

Can’t give you references

Can’t explain their SEO methods

Good luck and remember: take the SEO hiring process slowly and seriously. Find an SEO expert who understands your business, your goals and has an established track record of success to show you.

SEO Help: Website not indexed by Google

Dan Sevigny — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 16:38:53 +0000

There are many reasons why a website can go unnoticed by Google and other search engines – I will go over the causes and, more importantly, the solutions to this problem.

1) Make sure you have properly attempted to find your website in Google search results
Go to Google and use the site search function – this will show you all of the pages that Google has indexed for the specified domain. Example: site:yourdomain.com – if nothing shows up, also try site:www.yourdomain.com , site:http://yourdomain.com, and http://www.yourdomain.com . The results are not likely to change, but it’s worth trying a few different ways just to be sure.

2) Was your site indexed by Google before?
If this is a new problem for your website, you may have been blacklisted by Google – if this is the case see our article about removing and avoiding Google Penalties

3) Is your site new?
If your site is new, it may take Google and other search engines some time to find it – post some links to your site on popular websites around the web and Google will follow those links to your site soon enough. Also, submit a sitemap to ensure that Google finds all of your pages. See the Google webmaster central article on creating and submitting a sitemap for more information.

4) Website has been around a while, but STILL isn’t indexed:
If your site has been around for more than a month and has still not been found by search engines you either need more inbound links or you have been hit by a penalty. Try getting some links to your website on other sites – if this doesn’t rectify the problem within a week or so, you are almost definitely looking at a blacklist problem. Rectify any violations of Google’s webmaster guidelines and submit a reconsideration request once you have made your site comply.

SEO Tip: Google Penalty – How to Remove or Avoid One

Dan Sevigny — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 05:07:04 +0000

Detecting and diagnosing the presence and cause(s) of a Google penalty or ban can be very difficult, but don’t worry it is always possible. Google provides a very thorough list of Webmaster Guidelines in Google’s Webmaster Central; we will touch on many of the points described there, but to get all of the info I suggest you read that article in full at some point.

Let’s get straight to it – if your website has stopped showing up in search results, has dropped for certain keywords or has experienced a large drop in traffic lately you may be worried that you have been penalized by Google. you may be right, or you may have experienced the drop in rankings for a variety of other reasons (which we will go over at the end of this article).

Has your site been banned by Google?

Double check by performing a site:yourdomain.com search like this one: for LUCID Public Relations. The site search will show you all of your website’s pages that are listed in Google’s search index. If your website doesn’t show up for this search, you have been banned and need to find out why, then submit a reconsideration request with Google (2-3 weeks processing time).

How can you find out if your site has been penalized by Google?

Search for your domain name (not a ‘site: search’ just the domain – example: http://lucidpublicrelations.com) in Google – if it doesn’t show up #1, you have a penalty. Jump to the Webmaster Guidelines List list below to see where you might be violating Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.

Next, search for unique page or article names – if your article titles are common, this may not work, but if you have an article or page with a name like “SEO Tip: How to Remove (or better yet, Avoid) a Google Penalty” this should work. For unique names your site should show in the first page of results. If not, Jump to the Webmaster Guidelines List.

Have your dropped off completely for your major keywords or have you dropped from first place/first page to 3rd page or worse? This is probably due to a devaluing of your inbound links by Google. Basically, Google has determined some of your links to be spam, advertisements or the result of SEO work. See the section below on building quality inbound links to avoid penalties like this.

Webmaster Guidelines List: Most Common Penalty Causes:

This list is not an official Google list of the most common Google penalty causes – these are the causes we have noticed from years of SEO work & through our discussions with other SEO experts.

1) Bad Link Building Penalty:

It can sometimes take Google a while to discover bad inbound links. The problem is simple – when Google devalues your inbound links your site loses authority for the keywords that those links helped you with (the keywords used in the Anchor Text or on the page the links pointed to).

Building Good Links:

Content of linking site should be relevant to yours

As a general rule, there should be very few other outbound links on any given page (as a general rule we use 25-30, but even that is a lot, shoot for 5-10 if possible)

Build links consistently, not for volume of links – If you are manually influencing the number of links that are coming in to your site, you want to give Google the impression that these links are being created naturally (through user interest in your content). Natural links will either build or remain consistent over time – avoid situations where you are building a large amount of links then dropping that number off in any given period of time.

2) Recently Changes Effecting Accessibility:

If you made and changes to your site and/or content recently, make sure that search engine bots can still see all of your content – you may have also dropped in ranking just because your content changes have reduced the relevancy of some keywords for your site. Check your website using a LYNX text-only viewer to see what your website looks like to search engines and other bots. If all of your content isn’t visible, you have some accessibility problems that need to be addressed. Make sure that your content is written in text, not in iframes, javascript or image based Flash on your website.

3) Duplicate Content:

Some webmasters have duplicate content problems without even knowing it – any time you have multiple URLS with the same information you are facing a duplicate content problem. Google created a short snippet of code that can solve this problem. In addition to using this code on sub pages, you should use it on your home page so that all versions of your URL point to a single, preferred version.

Example: http//:yoursite.com, http://www.yoursite.com, http//:yoursite.com/index.php, http://www.yoursite.com/index.php should all point to one version (usually http//:yoursite.com or http://www.yoursite.com) as the preferred version. This will clear up any possible confusion Google is having about preferred versions of your content.

See the full list of potential Google Penalty Causes in Google’s Webmaster Guidelines Article

SEO Tip: Google Local Business Center

Dan Sevigny — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 23:04:17 +0000

Getting listed in Google’s local search results is a great way to get your company increased exposure with a large local audience of potential consumers. Many business owners know how to set up a Google Local listing but very few know how to properly format their listing in order increase it’s prominence on Google maps and in search engine results. By the time you are done reading this, you will know how to properly set up & optimize your Google Local account.

What is a google local business center account?

Google’s Local Business Center is a directory of Businesses that are organized by location and keyword relevancy in Google Maps and in Google search results. Often times, you will see Google’s local business results above organic results in search engine results pages for search terms that include a geographic location (example: Santa Monica Dodge). The image below shows Google local business results on top of organic search results for the term ‘Santa Monica Dodge’.

You can see how important having a local business result can be – after all, even after getting ranked #1 organically, you can still get pushed down several result spots by a large local business listing. It is very important to get listed in these results.

How to set up a local business account:

Go to the Google Local Business Center and add your company to their system. Follow the simple set up instructions and include as much information as possible on your company (store hours, pictures, videos, descriptions, multiple phone numbers, etc) – this will provide search engines with more info on your company to rank you with.

Google Local Business SEO:

There are a number of factors that come into play when Google decides to rank your business in the local search results – these include (but are not limited to):

Using the target city in your business address:

The most successful local business SEO campaigns are actually located in the city that they are attempting to optimize for. This is not to say that you need to move your business, or lie about your location, just that it is a very important (if not the most important) factor in getting ranked in local search results. You can get ranked in the local search results for a city if you are in a city nearby (especially if Google Local has a small number of competing businesses for that city).

Getting citations or business mentions from highly accredited outside sources:

Perhaps the most important aspect (that is within your control) of getting ranked highly in local search results is outside citations. Getting listed with local directories and IYPs (Internet Yellow Pages) can be the boost you need to get to the top of local search results. These outside sources serve as votes of legitimacy for your business – make sure to include the same city, address and keywords you used in Google Local Business Center in each IYP or directory listing in order to get the maximum benefit.

Some of the most popular IYPs to get listed on:

Superpages
Citysearch
Yelp
Yahoo Local
InsiderPages
YellowPages.com
BizJournals
AreaConnect
MagicYellow
Switchboard
MerchantCircle
GetFave
Yellowbot
Yellowpages.Lycos.com
Kudzu
Discoverourtown
Loqal.com
Local.Ingenio.com
YellowUSA.com
IAF.net

Selecting the right categories for your business (when setting up your account)

Claiming/verifying your business ownership:

This is a such simple task to perform, yet is forgotten by many business owners – claim your local business listing! Simply find your business on Google Maps, and click on Edit (you may have to click on ‘More’ to find this). Next, look for a line that says: “Are you the owner? Claim your business” and click on the link to claim your business.

Next, Google will ask you if you want to edit your business information (update business name, contact info, payment types, hours, categories, etc), suspend the listing. If you are ready to go, simply click the box checking that you want to edit your business information, confirm the information listed there and click ‘Submit’. Google will send you a postcard with a pin number on it within 2-3 weeks; you can also verify your listing using the phone number you provided when you set up.

Good luck and remember, if you need help, LUCID Public Relations is only a phone call away!

SEO Tip: Using Description Meta Tags

Dan Sevigny — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 17:14:46 +0000

The description meta tag as we mentioned in our last installment of SEO Tips, is the only meta tag that holds any weight with major search engines like Google (keep in mind, it is not used for ranking purposes, rather it effects the way your site is seen in search engine results).

Description meta tags should be formatted like this:

It is important to keep in mind that you will need to use a different meta description for each page on your site (otherwise it is more or less useless to your users). The meta description should accurately describe the content of your page.

Why we choose not to use meta description tags:

When a user searches for something on a search engine like Google, they are looking to find a website that has content matching their query – or in other words, they want to find a site that is relevant to their search. You may notice that when you search on Google, certain parts of the description under each site listed are bolded – this shows the user that each site listed has the keyword they are looking for and more importantly shows the context in which it is used.

Consider the following search result for ‘LUCID Public Relations’ – this user is searching for our company. The fourth result down, lucidcommunications.ca has ‘LUCID’ and ‘pr’ highlighted, but given the context that both terms are used, the user would be able to tell that it is not a link to the right company.

Whether you decide to use meta description tags or not – just keep in mind that by not using them you are allowing Google more flexibility to show users why your page is relevant to their search (and keeping irrelevant clicks off your site, because they will bounce anyways).

When to use meta description tags?

We do think it is appropriate to use the meta description tag on pages that have little or no visible text (although this issue would be better resolved by adding more) and on pages that have only pictures (say, for example, an image gallery – but again, providing accurate text descriptions of each picture is probably a better way to go).

What is your preference for meta description tags? Why? Let us know!

LUCID SEO Tips (Search Engine Optimization)

Dan Sevigny — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 20:47:48 +0000

The team at LUCID was talking today about ways we can help out other business owners without having to charge them full price for our SEO services – then the thought came to us: publish bi-weekly tips that people can actually use on a day to day basis to improve their ranking.

We could cover important topics such as On Site SEO, branding, link building, social media and much more in short, bite size and most importantly, practical tips.

We want to hear from you – what do you want to know more about? How can we help improve your knowledge of SEO. Are you a little foggy on how link building works? Or maybe you want to know the key aspects of On-Site Optimization. Whatever it is, drop us a line and we will do our best to address your question in one of the bi weekly installments.

We are very excited about this new endeavor and hope that it helps out a lot of small/medium size business owners who just can’t afford professional SEO services right now.

You can support our efforts by signing up for the LUCID SEO Tips RSS Feed Here: LUCID SEO Tips RSS Feed

Looking forward to hearing from everyone!

Remove Ripoff Reports (RipOffReport.com)

Dan Sevigny — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 17:33:57 +0000

Ripoff Report (www.RipOffReport.com) is a consumer complaints board website that allows anyone to post negative experiences and reviews about companies and individuals. Although many people use the website legitimately, it is all too common for competitors and liars to use Google’s unusually high domain preference for Rip Off Report as a way to spread false information about a company in search engine results.

When an abusive Rip Off Report is written about a company or individual there is little to be done in terms of removal – the owner of RipoffReport.com, Ed Magdeson, takes pride in the fact that Rip Off Report has never been legally required to remove a Ripoff Report from the site; in fact, Ed’s message to the victims of unscrupulous users on his website is as follows:

“From time to time, the Ripoff Report receives notices from companies and individuals who claim that false or inaccurate information about them has been posted on this site. Sometimes we receive letters from lawyers with similar allegations. These people sometimes threaten to sue Ripoff Report for defamation and other claims unless the statements they do not like are removed.

If you are considering sending us a notice or demand (or if you have already done so), this page is intended to provide you with information that may help you to better understand the situation and your rights, as well as the rights of the people who post reports here. You need to understand that threats against Ripoff Report are not effective, nor will they result in the removal of any reports.”

The only way to get a Ripoff Report Removed from Ripoffreport.com is to join Ed Magdeson’s paid (monthly) service called the Rip Off Report Corporate Advocacy program – the corporate advocacy program is rumored to cost upwards of $50,000 a year. Many business owners get emails from Ripoff Report inviting them to join, causing the widely held perception that Ripoff Report is a scam and Ed Magdeson is nothing but a con artist.

You can’t remove a Ripoff Report from Ripoffreport.com but LUCID Public Relations can bury the Ripoff Report in search engine results, effectively keeping it hidden from potential or current customers.

Whatever the truth may be, in the end it all boils down to one fact: you have a Ripoff Report written about your company and you need it removed. You have come to the right company. LUCID Public Relations has had great success in suppressing and even permanently removing Rip Off Reports from search engine results – with tried & true methods that NO other SEO company, Public Relations firm, or Rip off report removal service is using, LUCID Public Relation is easily one of the most effective and efficient companies offering this service.

Depending on the severity of your case (number of reports written, keywords included in the Ripoff Report, number of responses on your ripoff report, etc) LUCID can get your report removed from the first page permanently in 2-10 months. Usually we will see the Ripoff Report bounce around from 1st page to 2nd or 3rd page for several months before it is permanently removed. In some cases we have been able to remove a rip off report in less than 48 hours

LUCID’s removal methods to not only apply to Rip Off Reports – we can suppress or remove any negative press releases, information, news articles and more.

LUCID also specializes in removing/suppressing reports on:

Complaints.com

TheSqueakyWheel.com

ConsumerAffairs.com

ConsumerAction.com

Complaintsboard.com

…and more

Don’t remain a victim of Ripoff Report & unscrupulous complaint writers & don’t lose business as a result of getting listed on RipoffReport.com.

Call or Email LUCID Public Relations today for a free analysis, quote & estimated timeframe for removal.

PHONE:310 859 4600

EMAIL:Web@LucidPublicRelations.com