3 Questions you should ask your SEO Expert?

I get lot of request each day asking for an SEO Job but I normally do not take any SEO work for clients but I see that many of my clients complain about the SEO people they have hired have not done anything about SEO and have charged them quite a good amount of money. So how could they have saved that money? By asking few simple questions to the so called SEO experts.

1. How long they have been into SEO?
   The first and the most important thing you should understand is SEO is not an overnight task and they have to be in it for quite a long period of time for making any success. So ask the same to your SEO provider? How long have you been doing this? Verify the same with their domain who is information and see if they have been doing SEO for so long.
2. How much they have worked SEOed themselves rather than clients?
   The main reason I do not take up SEO job is I am too busy with SEO of my own forum and blog and if I can get my site ranked well I would make more money than any client can pay me. Do they think the same and have their own site or product which they rank very well.
3. How transparent are they when it comes to working for you?
   The next thing you should ask is how they will go about getting good rankings for your site. It may not be exactly what they would do but mainly the strategy. Let them do some keyword research or even go beyond it to analyze your competitors’ site and their strategy. If they talk about too many jargons like PageRank / NoFollow get familiar with them.
   To add to this question many SEO experts (as they liked to be called) tend to give that this is something where they have some backdoor entry into Google and can rank you pretty well in Google by paying them and they cannot disclose anything beyond this. This is complete bullshit and you should never even think about replying to such peoples’ emails. Google never wants their users to get results influenced by such sick minded people and never even encourages such people.

Bonus Question: What they know about what not to do in SEO?

People always like bonus and it’s my turn now to give one. Ask them about what they should avoid when it comes to SEO and see how well they are aware of blackhat SEO and how they avoid them.

Apart from clients there will be many SEO Experts (:D) reading this and so don’t be fooled if people impress you very well with the above questions and there are still more you can do is read testimonials of previous clients and try contacting them using phone numbers if any or even using email address.

There is no exact science when it comes to SEO but then its also not rocket science and anybody and everybody can know about it if not be an expert. Get yourself SEOBook by Aaron Wall and start reading it. It is certainly the best book on SEO and will certainly not rip your money off. Not only a must have for anybody getting into SEO outsourcing but also for SEO experts. It’s a good value for money.

Source:http://imtips.co/questions-you-should-ask-your-seo-expert.html

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Basic SEO Tactics - Social Media

Many a times am asked what are the basic SEO tactics to know and keep in mind. Well if one starts to explain this then the list can be a little overwhelming. However to keep matters a little simple I would suggest the below so as to be a little more effective:

• Key Word Research And Optimization: Before going into any detail you would first require to do a proper keyword research. Key words are the search words that your target audience would be keying into search sites say for instance Google. The key word research would be done in two parts. At first level you need to check on what does your target audience search. The second part you need to check out on is what keywords do your competitors optimist. Usually the two would be more or less similar however it is good to check out. Post your findings you then need to decide on which key words you will emphasis on and optimize. These would be in tandem with the brand personality and image that you may already have or you may want to create. You will need to be clear on what is the brand philosophy because without this you will not be able to be in-sync with the rest of the brand - customer perception.
• On-Page Content Keyword Optimization: Once you have frozen on your key words you need to then make it a conscious effort to utilize the same words. This is known as key word density. However it does not mean that you use the words so often that the reader has no other words to look at. Too much of density makes search spiders also suspicious and they may choose to not follow your page. The algorithms in the search engines are very much tuned to such spams. They can detect such things and can almost ban your page as a matter of speaking. Hence you do use the words but in a creative manner.
• File Name: While working at server level you will have many files to upload and save. This could be either for dynamic data or static information. The search engine scans through these as well. Do not name files as file1, file2 and so on. Instead use this space as your key holder. Have the correct File name that the pages within suggest.
• META Keyword And META Description Tag: When you edit HTML you will notice that you have spaces for Meta words. Use these appropriately. These are important for search engines. They understand the programme language and you can use these to the fullest.
• Page Title And H1 Headline: I would encourage you to be creative. However do not be so creative that the keywords are missing from your titles, headlines and sub heads.
• Image Alt Tag: Many a times I have noticed that while saving the images we do not mention the proper names instead we call them image1, image2 and so on. A very important fact is that you are missing out on great amount of search spider attraction material.
• Link Building: This is another important aspect of SEO. While working it is imperative to have a Link Strategy in mind as well. Links direct and guide the search engine crawlers towards your main page / blog / site. Links work as arrow indicators on highway for the speeding spiders and crawlers. This does not mean that you start to have link packages and get into some aggressive link farming trap. The moment we get into this zone the algorithms at search engine start to flag this as they recognize spamming actions. Additionally you need to be careful on the part from where the links come to your page / site / blog. It is good if they come from a high traffic page. At the same time that page should not have too many links or else again the danger of neutralizing the effect comes in. Allow me to explain: Let's consider two options. Let's call two pages as 'Page A' and 'Page B' respectively. Page A has high value traffic and too many links. While Page has good traffic not as high as Page A but is healthy traffic and has less than 20 links. When you will submit you link to both Page A and Page B you will notice that the search engine considers the trust value as equal. The reason being that too many links cause the search engine to start looking at spam information. Hence Link farms etc get into negative count. Add to this your link should be supported by proper copy matter and keywords that point towards your link. There are many more factors to consider before jumping into the back-link strategy.

Source: http://pervarakapadiaatmoney.blogspot.com/2010/12/basic-seo-tactics-social-media.html

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Social networking 'leads to sex faster'

Facebook, texting and other social networking tools make new couples to jump into bed faster, reveals a new US survey.

According that third annual sex survey by Shape and Men's Fitness magazines, nearly four out of five women and three of five men say that digital intimacy leads to having sex faster, reports a foreign news agency.

However, only 38 percent of women said they have actually slept with a date any sooner because of online intimacy.

Smart phones and laptops are the new toys that lead to the bedroom, it said, with nearly 80 percent of women and 58 percent of men saying social media tools leads to sex faster.

Moreover, texting is the topmost way lovers keep in touch, with men texting 39 percent more often than calling and women 150 percent more.

As many as 65 percent of those polled said they had been asked out by text and 49 percent through a Facebook message.

And as soon as the relationship clicks, 72 percent of women reported scouring a current partner's ex-girlfriends' Facebook pages.

Even in the heat of passion, some people just can't get enough of their digital devices, the survey found.

When a call or text comes in during sex, five percent of respondents said they glance to see who is calling and one percent said they stop to answer the phone.

And when the spark is extinguished, digital dumping is the new way to break up, with 43 percent of women and 27 percent of men reporting getting a text along the lines of "It's not you, it's me."

For the heartbroken, the Internet keeps hope alive, with 81 percent of all respondents saying they won't de-friend an ex on Facebook and 75 percent admitting to constantly checking a former sweetheart's page. (ANI)

Source: http://in.news.yahoo.com/social-networking-leads-sex-faster-20110124-233331-714.html

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10 Simple Tips To Get 250,000 Page Views Per Month

When we started our business 16 months ago we decided to use a blog as the central marketing tool for our business. We did it because we didn’t really have any money for advertising and we never really believed that attending networking events would work for us. We placed the blog at the center of our website and only had one commodity on our hands to make it a success….time.

It’s been a long journey but 16 months later we now get 250,000 pageviews to our site per month, in the last year we have brought in over $500,000 in business as a direct result of the blog and the business operates in 2 countries and our content has been picked up all over the world. We’ve largely used social media to promote the blog and grow that audience and today I wanted to share some of those tips with you and even though you might not have a business attached to your blog you’ll hopefully gain some good insights in to what works for business blogging….

1. Get some professional help at the start: We paid a small amount of money to get our blog designed by a professional at the start as well as getting somebody to add in the proper SEO plugins. Since then we haven’t really touched it design wise and have instead focused on the content. If you are serious about blogging or creating a business around your blog then you should invest a small amount of money at the start making it look professional.
2. Integrate Facebook wherever you can: Facebook is the most important social media tool we use in terms of bringing traffic to our site. It accounts for just over 18% of the traffic on our site and the 11,000 odd Facebook likes we have are people who come back to our site on a repeat basis to consume our content. Make it easy to share your content through Facebook and if the content is good enough it will spread like wildfire.
3. Forget about getting traffic from Twitter: Many people get obsessed with Twitter as a social media tool that drives traffic but let me save you lots of time and energy now because it simply does not. Less than 1% of our traffic comes from Twitter on a monthly basis despite some of our stories getting 100s of Retweets. You can certainly share the odd link through Twitter to gain some new readers but it is not the magic formula that you have been looking for.
4. The old blogging tricks still work best: Read many of the great posts on there or on any of the other great blogging advice sites and they’ll give you great advice like to make sure you add catchy titles (probably why you are reading this post in the first place), to write often and to guest post on other blogs. These are old pieces of advice but in a world where people are obsessed with social media and the new tools those are the tools that by far and away work the best. They are the easy wins.
5. Give everything away for free: As a business we sell advice on social media. We also do a very strange thing in that we give that advice away for free on the blog all the time. There is nothing in our heads that we keep for ourselves but instead focus on sharing as much of that knowledge as possible. By giving valuable advice away you make sure that people keep coming back to your blog for more advice and that’s how you build and audience. People are selfish, if they are coming to your blog they want something for free and that is what you will have to offer.
6. Be Social In The Real World: A huge amount of people who read our blog are people that we have met in the real world. Being social online is one thing but forging a social relationship with somebody in the real world is still far more powerful than anything. Try and attend conferences within your niche, meet people with similar interests and if relevant share your blog with them. If you are lucky enough to be able to speak at any events then work your blog in to the presentation and pitch yourself as the person of authority on your given subject.
7. Use rich media content if at all possible: Text is great and it’s an important part of blogging but not everybody is a good writer and even people who can write should try and support their content with rich media content if possible. I think it helps you stand out form the crowd. What do I mean by rich media content? Photos, videos, podcasts, diagrams, slidehows or presentations. The technology is there now for you to post most of these things for free and they’ll push your content out even further to new platforms.
8. RSS is still the dream subscriber: These days you’ll see plenty of ways to subscribe to blogs including email, Twitter and Facebook to name but a few but one stands head and shoulders above all the others for me and it’s the oldest one in the list…RSS. Getting an RSS subscriber is getting somebody who is totally committed to receiving your content every single day. I cherish RSS readers in a way that I would never think about Twitter followers or Facebook likes. The social subscribers are doing it as an impulse but an RSS reader is somebody who wants to get your content every single time you publish it instantly. You should take RSS subscribers over everything else in my opinion.
9. Build A passionate community around your blog: This is by far the hardest point on the whole list and there isn’t really any written rule on how to achieve it. The one thing I think you have to do most is be nice to everybody and reply to as many comments as you physically can. Comments on your blog, comments on Twitter, comments on Facebook or Youtube or wherever the person has left a comment. People fly through the web these days pausing for a second at a time on sites these days so if they are taking time to leave a comment oon your blog then the very least you can do is stop and answer them. Building community take a lot of time but you should never underestimate the power of word of mouth when it comes to your blog or business and a passionate community is just about the most powerful thing around today.
10. Never give people the hard sell through social media: Once you build a community or a large audience for your site the temptation is always there to try and sell to them or to push your products. We never ever write blog posts asking people to use our services. Make no mistake that they can find our services within one click if they are looking for them but we’ll never push them because people can smell the hard sell a mile away and they’ll never go for it and you’ll end up pushing them away instead. The idea with social media is to engage people and have a meaningful conversation with them. That is what works best in the long run.

Source: http://www.dailyblogtips.com/10-simple-tips-to-get-page-views

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Top Blog SEO Techniques to Use

Blog posts have been all the craze for quite some time and they have many internet marketing benefits but they have to be approached correctly. There are many search engine optimization elements that should be present with each blog post and it is important to realize this if you want your blog posts to go the extra mile.

Here are several top blog SEO techniques to use:

• URL Structures: Often times a blog post will use programming language that looks like a string of characters or the entire title of your blog post. Either one really doesn’t do much for your SEO. The entire title is better than the random characters but ultimately you want to pull out your most important words from your title or even use keywords tastefully if they apply to your post and use those for your URL structure.
• Internal Linking: If your blog is located on the URL or domain as your main website you can gain a great advantage by hyper linking keywords and linking them to some of you main product or service pages.
• Plugins: Most of the blogging platforms have a large variety of SEO related plugins that will complete some of the SEO work for you so you don’t have to think about it.
• Images: Images have a variety of advantages, everything from user experience to search engine marketing. Image search is a popular place to be visible in as well and by utilizing images in your posts and tagging them with keyword rich phrases in the alt tags you increase your chances of being visible in the photo search area.
• Meta Info: Many blogging platforms out there now allow you to write custom meta information for individual blog posts which is just another area you can entice the search engines to ping you into the search result space.

Blogging every week for all businesses is important but it is also important to blog correctly so you are always maximizing your efforts online. Take the time to go the extra step with your blog posts and over time you will see much more activity happening from your hard work.

@Searchengineoptimizationjournal

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