There is no single definition of advanced SEO. There are a few of attempts to describe what it might mean or consist of and what not but there is no entity or authority that could define such a broad term like advanced SEO.
I can’t define advanced SEO either. What I can do though is to collect 30+ advanced SEO tactics, techniques and resources.
These methods are no doubt advanced in the sense that they are new and progressive, sometimes more difficult than basic SEO or require special tools and expertise. Some of the tactics are no short term tactics, they’re probably strategies.
Also I’ll attempt to debunk the wide spread notion that just a few tactics out there are somehow advanced SEO by virtue of their sheer complexity, difficulty in implementing or tediousness.
Most notably I refer to the controversial practices of so called PageRank sculpting and IP delivery. While both are highly contested to be valuable at all or “advanced SEO” most SEO methods below are not controversial. They have an undeniably positive impact on your SEO efforts. Some will contest whether they are advanced or even SEO but they don’t hurt your site or business like the two above often do or at least might when badly executed.
Web Design/Development
- Landing page optimization for organic search results
- ROI oriented usability testing (Split A/B Testing etc.)
- Streamlining information architecture towards a predefined sales funnel
- Enforcing security considerations to prevent crackers from compromising your system and hijacking your site’s authority
- Implementing dynamic scalability for large sites by self replicating processes
- Siloing content on important keyword optimized pages (instead of PageRank sculpting)
Web Analytics
- Identifying the target audience by age, income, education, computer skills, region and understanding it
- Conversion attribution to find out how many stages were involved in making a person finally appear on site or buy
- Twitter analytics to follow your true fans and connectors who spread the word and realistic Twitter traffic numbers
- Monitoring long tail keyword combinations and frequency for early acknowledgment of trends
- Time based and historic keyword research to identify potentials for recurring traffic spikes
Content Creation
- Creating videos, ebooks, infographics and other rich media for SEO purposes
- Semantic SEO trying to understand user intent and serving the appropriate content
- Business blogging beyond solely SEO copywriting keyword rich content for search engines
- Writing of “magnetic Web content“, with “killer headlines” and irresistible hooks
- Defining an SEO code of ethics for your company and anticipating upcoming industry standards
- Allowing and managing and user generated conent with crowdsourcing, tagging/folksonomy
- Predictive SEO in order to be the first to offer supplies for demands that don’t exist yet
Link Acquisition
- On topic widget bait for long term recurring results (not just link bait)
- Creating both funny and engaging quizzes. Example: SEO expert quiz
- Preparing and implementing contests to actively empower audiences as brand evangelists
- Establishing reputable awards or annual best of collections. Examples: Web 2.0 awards, Semmys
- “Pulling a Calacanis” that is stirring controversy to gain attention and make adversaries and supporters to link to you
Social Media Outreach
- Proactive online reputation building, instead of just reactive firemen like management
- Social CRM for all relevant groups (beyond “customers”). Example: Influencers
- Creating and spreading viral memes through various media independently of your own presence there
- Creating communities both inside and outside your own websites. Example: Dell Idea storm
- Disseminating social media press releases and cultivating blogger relations
Expanding into New Markets
- Embracing Twitter plus other Microblogging for business purposes
- International multilingual SEO on one site or creating parallel sites
- Geo-location based local SEO and IP delivery for international businesses
- Mobile search optimization with appropriate CSS formats for different use cases
- Introducing “real life” SEO with links you can scan with your mobile
So you see that you don’t have to resort to PageRank sculpting or other questionable SEO techniques advocated by some people in the SEO industry who often fail to embrace a holistic fndability appraoch and instead overtly focus on technical aspects.
This list does not contain all current advanced SEO methods, by far not all of them.
I compiled this list quite quickly from the top of my head. The 30 tactics that first came to my mind got listed. Afterwards I searched for the links supporting or explaing these tactics. So you are welcome to add some more advanced SEO tactics I didn’t mention yet!
Good list! Also you need a Digg button =)
Nice links. Will start implementing them. :-)
I think you did a great job, I can use it for interview of my next sr. SEO.
Thanks
Thanks Tom! Take note though that SEO blogs and topics are banned at Digg unless you say that SEO sucks.
Tad,
Nice work on something you threw together quickly.
BTW, gave a well-deserved Sphinn and a Tweet!
One advanced SEO tactic I didn’t see on the list is using PPC efforts and data from paid campaigns to inform and optimize your SEO efforts.
http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/04/21/09/seo-ppc-data-sharing
Cheers!
Ken Lyons
Thanks Ken for the suggestion and support. Indeed I don’t really do PPC myself so I rarely include PPC related tactics in my lists. Nonetheless using PPC ads for keyword research (testing the actual demand) is quite common.
Thanks Tad, I didn’t know that! It’s like Digg is trying to screw up! Then even recently got rid of their “Shout” tool, which I think was very popular and important for Digg.
Also, I wouldn’t add PPC to SEO, it’s a part of SEM: http://newevolutiondesigns.com/blog/SEO-Vs-SEM.html
Again, good article!
Useful SEO resources.
I just want to find some tips about SEO.
Not a bad list. I have searched for ‘advanced seo’ before and most stuff is from 2007. Google ranking aged pages – useless.
Wow! What a great list! I have my work cut out for me!
Really great collection, and thanks for the link! We appreciate it! Come and read our blog again sometime soon, you might see me lurking around your blog!
I thought this list was very well done.
That is a great list with a lot of information. Thank you.
Very nice articles.Thanks for sharing.
Great techniques.
Great list – thank you! QQ about SEO & URLs when building a new site that I could not find answered here. let’s say your site is a brand name that is tangential to the product eg “Deluxe” and “shampoo” (you’re selling a brand of shampoo called Deluxe on http://www.deluxe.com). Your web developer has gone for utilitarian brevity and made all your page URLs http://www.deluxe.com/services, ~/contact etc and you know that no one will be searching for http://www.deluxe.com/services but rather ‘great shampoo’. Do you (i) add new URLs with ‘great_shampoo’ inserted after deluxe.com and direct them to the default URL, or (ii) scrap the default URLs and start over with http://www.deluxe.com/great_shampoo/ as the root for all default URLs? Will Google bot read these differently or does it not matter?
A great list of useful seo knowledge. But how about adding some geo-tag-links to your collection? Still missing this upcoming seo tools…
I strongly agree with the comment stated above. Geo-tag-links seemed to missing from this. Very helpful post though!
Thank you for sharing
Great list and great article. bookmarked :) I used the 3 second test for the user experience. Lets see what happens.
I just now realize that I have to learn alot. you are a genius.
Really it is very help full and a great technique.
Thanks for that good collection, ther is a lot of things which i did not mention yet!
Advanced SEO is a little like obscenity; You can’t describe it, but you know it when you see it. (Just like our designs. Just quietly.)
Nice article. Thanks.
The list is great but I don’t know how far it is easy to implement all.
Awesome list! Lots of great links and tips.
This is fantastic! Finally a comprehensive list of advanced SEO tips that we can all take advantage of. Nice work. Care to write for my blog?
I think an important issue many commentators are missing is the power of bringing these social tools inside the organisation to improve efficiency and internal communication and tear down functional silos. People like us, who understand people and communication and technology, can unleash our connected vision within the organisation – and perhaps make even more of a difference than we do outside the walls. Don’t block Facebook. Migrate to it as a tool that your employees have already embraced and trained themselves on.
I dont understand how do we publicise our blogs.Even well written blog need publicity to make a mark and get link baited
Hey everybody. Thank you for the list. But what about well structured Headings? I think the “old-school” Seo Optimization focusing on headings is still a important thing.
I particularly like the long tail keywords and it’s always good to have good original content. Thanks for a great article!
What about RDF?
Hi there,
Actually its rally nice to read something that goes beyond the basics. Everything that I have read is just about the basics: you should do this, avoid doing that.
These tips may be helpful from research point of view and maintenance.
Please send me other tips that tell me how SEO is actually done.
Thanks
Very good primer on the subject and should help many businesses better understand SEO. I will be recommending it.
A neat little trick (for addition beneath Link Acquisition) is competition / contest entering (rather than hosting). Nearly always generates a profile / link.
Thanks for the great list! It’s not too often that you come across good tips for advanced SEO. I came across a list of SEO resources that help in both beginners and advanced SEO… Helps people like me: http://www.socialpeel.com/2010/08/11/21-most-informative-seo-resources-of-all-times/
It’s so true that important rich keywords optimizes pages thoroughly. If you can use this you are all set..Thanks..Great SEO tips here..Seb-
Nice work , maybe i add a few more, but i think you make a top 30 very clean
Nice information, i like it, very interesting.
Thnaks for the this list. i agree that it is hard to get any information beyond the basics – which, it appears to me, won’t get you to number 1. As a relative newcomer to SEO it can be tough to work out what is/isn’t important. Only yesterday I was ridiculed on a forum for sharing what I considered to be an advanced tip, but was told that people had been doing it for 2 years.
Many thanks for putting this list together, I have been reading a great deal on SEO for our site but seem to have hit that barrier where I just can’t get us anywhere further up the rankings on the search results for “GRAPHIC DESIGN BRISTOL” I think ALT tags are the only thing outstanding, I am trying everything, and I have not given up yet!
What is strange is that the number one result on the search is just a basic site that does not even seem to have considered SEO. Ahhhh!
Great list, I now just need to find somebody to get started on each one!
This article helped me to understand better on SEO
I enjoyed reading this article and this has lot of things or terminology which can be useful for any seo agency.
good information about SEO. i liked it. Thanx for sharing