Happy waiter by howard N2GOT

Today someone was searching for a “client’s guide to SEO” over at my SEO 2.0 blog. I think this topic is more fitting here on SEOptimise so I will explain the best approach to SEO companies and Internet marketing agencies for potential clients.

In 2010 most people in business already know at least something about how Google works.

Business people know about keywords and often pay for Google Ads already. That’s why it’s easier nowadays to deal with clients. You don’t have to explain anymore that SEO is needed or how it works. They already know and thus they contact you.

There also some drawbacks as many SEO clients already have had a bad experience with SEO practicioners, are convinced they know themselves what’s best for them and last but not least have too high expectations for a too low price.

A client can gain a competitive advantage by approaching SEO agencies in the right way.

Basically finding a fitting SEO agency is like finding a good restaurant and eating out. Thus I will use this allegory to make my explanation easier to grasp. You need to know a few more things to approach an SEO agency correctly.
Continue Reading »

Ever since Google Webmaster Tools added the so called “search queries” data I’ve become a huge fan of them. I’ve listed the 10 Google SEO tools everybody should use in the past but to be honest I focus on three of them right now Google Insights, Google Analytics and Google Webmaster Tools for SEO inspiration. The wealth of information GWB offers is like a goldmine.

The tool-set has grown over the years steadily but I was neglecting it. By now there are numerous ways to use Google Webmaster Tools for SEO. Again I will focus on three of them here and explain how to use GWB for

1. Keyword Research
2. Link Building
3. CRO/Conversion Rate Optimization

Continue Reading »

We all love case studies. Who is we? We in the SEO industry, we in social media and online marketing, we business people. Case studies show on real life examples, real websites, projects and campaigns that something works.

Good case studies are more than proof though. They also show you how to market or optimize a site. They show an example of how it actually works.

Case studies combine both, the insight of a how to articles and the business proof of a finished campaign. They shows the results from experience.

These are some of the reasons why I’ve collected a comprehensive list of 30 SEO, social media & marketing case studies that prove the ROI of it All.

Yes, the ROI in SEO, social media and other kinds of online marketing is still too often fuzzy. We want success stories, numbers and explanations so that we can reenact the steps you need to succeed. So here they are, enjoy:

Continue Reading »

Lately we’ve witnessed a backlash in the SEO industry regarding SEO advertorials. In other words some SEO practitioners have attacked a British newspaper publisher for contacting them to sell so called “SEO advertorials”.

I was a bit surprised because I consider SEO advertorials a legitimate technique of search engine optimization. The issue here seems to be the way these SEO advertorials were devised, not SEO advertorials generally.

Thus I’d like to explain how SEO advertorials can work for both publishers and search marketers without being considered to be outside the Google webmaster guidelines.
Continue Reading »

Wicked by xlorddashx.

Black hat SEO is both a myth and a reality we have to face sooner or later as SEO practicioners. While I abide by probably one of the strictest SEO codes of ethics around and SEOptimise is a clean white hat SEO company company itself we still can’t deny that there is black hat SEO.

The sheer existence of black hat SEO techniques must be acknowledged for several reasons.

As Rishi Lakhani noted on his new SEO blog: You need it at least to know what to avoid or to know how competitors who perform worse than you still manage to outrank your site.
Continue Reading »

CC Image Couch Potato by Shawn Allen

As a SEO turned business blogger I noticed that the main difference between old school SEO and new school SEO is the level and focus of activity/time spent working on your site or blog. I say site or blog as formerly you had only a site and now you most often have a blog (on top of a site). The time spent on different activities like

• on page SEO
• content creation
• link acquisition

changed considerably.

Continue Reading »

CC Image by radcarper.

Do you remember the term link bait or link baiting? While 2006 and 2007 link baiting was all the rage in recent years it seems people don’t talk or write much about this practice anymore. Has link baiting vanished? Not at all.

Link baiting is daily business right now, it’s the norm.

Indeed I would go as far as to state that link baiting is currently the most important link building tactic or strategy (depends on the bait really). Continue Reading »

For a few months now my work consists mainly of business blogging. I do less and less conventional client SEO work like keyword research or link building. This is quite a change as I’ve been a full time search engine optimizer and SEO consultant for several years in a row. Thus I still get SEO related inquiries and offers.

By now many people know what SEO is about, at least superficially. This is often more of an issue than a help though. Some people have some distorted preconceptions as what SEO is about and how it works.

This week an inquiry was about link building for a travel website. I won’t disclose which site or destination it was about but it’s one of the most popular and very competitive ones. The email asked for link building and ended with the sentence “let’s start with 50 links”. Continue Reading »

Update: We now have a 15% discount code for the SMX London 2010 event.

For those who couldn’t make it to SMX London I’ve written up my notes from the last 2 days spent at the event.

Flickr Image credit: burningmax

I didn’t quite make it to up to my 77 SES London takeaway tips, but overall I felt this was a very useful conference and the audience certainly seemed to appreciate the more advanced approach to the sessions this year. Continue Reading »

More and more conventional link building methods, like directory submission are of less and less value, Google does not even recommend high quality paid directories any more. In fact soon we’ll see a situation where all artificial ways of link building will be frowned upon.

On the other hand former SEOptimise writer and renowned UK search marketing blogger Patrick Altoft reported a few days ago about companies which spend thousands on link buying budgets per month. This way of link acquisition is not allowed by Google for a long time by now and many high profile sites have been penalized already.

While the urge of spending money on links comes as no surprise it is met by an often low quality shady part of the SEO industry. Getting links naturally requires also an investment, an allocation of time and resources combined with know how in some Internet industries like web design or development but not solely.

The money gets spend not on the links directly but on a web venture that gets links naturally and sustainably over time. The allure of “free” is in most cases the key to get links but also altruism leads to a direct ROI in terms of links. So think twice before spending money directly on low quality links.

Stop link building artificially and use one or several of the following 30 ways to get links naturally:

1. Create a timeless or regularly updated resource list, example Web developer’s Handbook
2. Program a free tool or software everybody needs in a particular niche but not everybody offers yet (compare the query font tester vs color picker)
3. Develop a high quality theme or template for a well known platform like WordPress, Drupal, Joomla that gets updated along the software
4. Program a WordPress or other popular blog platform plugin, in the best case a platform independent one like Akismet
5. Develop a Firefox plugin for a recurring task or dealing with a widely spread annoyance like BugMeNot
6. Organize a genuine yearly recurring competition like the Web 2.0 awards
7. Organize a Recurring charitable event like the Blog Action Day
8. Forge a lasting partnership with a similar service provider, like a graphic design agency joining forces with a PSD2XHTML provider
9. Build a community like 9Rules where people “proudly” are part of and display on it on their sites
10. Support artists with free or cheaper web hosting (or anything else they need) like MediaTemple does
11. Mirror a high traffic site, for instance an open source software or an activist site
12. Offer a rebate for a particular group, especially students but also workers class families, veterans or whatever disadvantaged group
13. Offer free music or other audio downloads. or at least a way to listen to the audio online, that’s the secret of success of MySpace
14. Offer free ebook or better free ebooks (more than one) like O’Reilly for instance
15. Maintain a business blog updated regularly with high value resources, best example is Inside CRM
16. Get your content translated and republished in multiple languages and countries
17. Join a community and become one of the most valuable members like Maki of DoshDosh did on Sphinn and Digg
18. Offer high quality free icons for download and free use
19. Offer background patterns for free for web designers
20. Offer free wallpapers for download and invite artist to modify them
21. Create a Facebook application and maintain it over time
22. Create a CSS solutions for common tasks or CSS problems or even better are whole set of solutions
23. Offer free scripts and “chunks code” (like CSS as it’s not a script) for webmasters to use freely
24. Create a highly useful and visually appealing Flash application like SimpleViewer
25. Give away images using a creative commons license on your website
26. Publish recipes for healthy, Italian, French, Chinese or any other kind of desirable food not everybody can buy
27. Offer fundamental self improvement advice like hackyourself does
28. Start a green initiative, whatever it might be, there are thousands of ways to do that, carbon free websites is great example
29. Educate children, especially from poor families be it in the West or down in the “global south”, e.g. the 100 Dollar laptop gained huge recognition
30. Help animals and boast about it displaying images of them you don’t have to as obnoxious as PETA

As you see many of these ways of getting links naturally are projects based on market forces or in other words on what many or most people need. The best thing on the Web is additionally that even free things normally not provided by the market can be offered in a profitable way as by gaining links the investment is made profitable at last.

Of course all these ways of getting links also get you reputation and fans and thus traction in social media too. People hate companies and busineses overselling but they love free stuff and those who offer it. When everybody loves you also those who are willing to spend money will find you.

In case you wonder now “how can I achieve that, I’m no programmer, designer, content creator, artist, activist” you don’t need to be, there are plenty out there are they’re short on money especially those from India. Sometimes even 100$ are enough.