Ask the SEO Guy Anything!

[code888]

Hi Terry, Just stumbled upon this thread yesterday (SEO'ers, BEWARE! A Quantum Shift is coming - Google Caffeine!) and wondered whether you have a clue about what could possibly make the difference between the current Google ranking mechanism and that of the Google Caffeine?

[ThomasMeyers]

Originally Posted by LookItsMeTerryG

Well for general advice then..

* Target trusted, authority sites: the closer you can get to bbc.co.uk, cnn.com, whitehouse.gov, etc... 1 link hop away is great, 2 is good, etc .

* Remove/Stop building spammy links

* If you've got mainly 1 type of links (say.. directories for instance) balance out a bit. A diverse link profile is an effective one.

What are some SEO tricks to get hubpages to rank higher?

[skatir]

Hi,
what is the best resource to find Trust and Authority links ?

[Dr Dan]

Hey Terry,

Here is the deal. I want to create a new video squeeze page site (example) http://stress-reducer.com

But I would like to use my existing wordpress site http://rockstarsecretstolife.com/stress-reducer
and have the http://stress-reducer just forward to the http://rockstarsecretstolife.com/stress-reducer

I would be building backlinks to http://stress-reducer

this way I wont have to create or upload a whole new theme and activate all the plugins etc.

as far as backlinking, seo, google etc. does it have any negative affects?
or should I just take the extra step and time to copy and past a new theme/site?

Thanks Terry you rock!

[emigre]

Thanks for all the invaluable info you've given here. Hope you can help with my question:

Is it worth separating sites to various hosts so that they have different IPs after they've already been linked together on the same host, or is it too late.

[imlogic]

Hello Terry,

You said you use xsite pro... what type of site structures do you use? and how do you determine how many pages a site should be in order to compete effectively?

Thanks

[Sylonious]

What is the best (cheapest) way to promote a strange link bait?

[321sitemonitor.com]

How effective you think are social networking. I am not asking you some simple basics but simply telling you to compare it with email marketing. I mean one way to reach visitors is by social networking websites but the other way is emailing directly to those who are really interested to what you are offering.

I know that contents on such websites will remain for long and haul but do not consider that thing and then reply back to me.

Thanks in advance!!

[fir3d]

Exact match domains get a significant boost in the serps especially .com. I wanted to ask if you knew what would get more of a boost in the serps

keyword.net
or
akeyword.com

There are still some confusions about stop words in the domain

[hans1]

Hi everyone,

does anyone here know what else apart from permalinks
and canonical rel , I have to setup to get my WP Blog Post to show up and,
look like that , in search results , when entering search term in google?

"MYTITEL OF THE POST / WHATEVER"
"MYDESCRIPTION OF THE POST...."
"hxxp://blognameurl.com/mycustom-postnameurl"

searching very long now but still couldn't get this right.

Any Help Please warriors !

Cheers

[johnben1444]

Does article distribution service boost page ranking or does harm instead. I learn acquiring lost of links overnight is bad for SERP.

[Mitch Miller]

I have a site that I have been experimenting with. It has been hanging at positions 27 thru 33 for a couple weeks. This morning it jumped to #2. Of course I thought I had finally figured this SEO stuff out!

I was searching in the FF browser. Just for kicks I fired up my IE browser and had the wind sucked right out of my sail as the site was still showing up in the 30th position.

I cleared out search history etc and the results were still the same for both browsers. I was not logged into my Google account.

My question is can the search engine results vary from one browser to the next?

[fir3d]

Originally Posted by Mitch Miller

I have a site that I have been experimenting with. It has been hanging at positions 27 thru 33 for a couple weeks. This morning it jumped to #2. Of course I thought I had finally figured this SEO stuff out!

I was searching in the FF browser. Just for kicks I fired up my IE browser and had the wind sucked right out of my sail as the site was still showing up in the 30th position.

I cleared out search history etc and the results were still the same for both browsers. I was not logged into my Google account.

My question is can the search engine results vary from one browser to the next?

this was probably google's personalized search since they are now using it even when you are not signed in. What it means is if you click/visit one of the results they will show it near the top of the result (saved in a cookie I think - which is why it varies between browsers).

[Mitch Miller]

Thanks. I do remember reading about that now. Just something else that makes ranking even a little bit harder I guess. Those sons-a-bitches...

[John W.G.]

This thread has been a huge blessing to me - thank you Terry

Here's my question:

Do I have to have a missing <!DOCTYPE> declaration at the top of each page on my site?

I ran my site through siterportcard.com and the #1 problem with my html according to their test is that I do not have a missing <!DOCTYPE> declaration.

So I went over to HTML doctype declaration and tried all of their suggestions but every one of them messed up my sites look when viewed in Firefox and IE.

Any thoughts?

[LookItsMeTerryG]

Originally Posted by RockStarMarketing

Hey There Terry G!

I have been DOMINATING the local map listings for over a yeah in PHX for a few geo-modified key terms. Its been my biggest money maker. As of yesterday......NADA!!!!

All but a few are nowhere to be found? They are stilllisted as active in my local business center backend - but now....PHOOEY!~

Any ide whats happening here? I was pointing 10 - 12 at 2 phone numbers, but all the same URL.

Do you reccomend i take them down, relist with a different account? Or new phone number - or subdomains???

Thanks Bro!

I'd just reset everything up under new numbers I bought through skype. Seems to be the best option... and create subdomains for the url.

[LookItsMeTerryG]

AshleyAA - There's no anchor text in that link.. which is why you're not seeing it. Perhaps its part of the template all those sites are using? Yeah, they'll carry some weight in Google.

johnhoefer - Amount of links doesn't really tell me much. Are the links high quality? I've seen sites gather over 100,000 incoming links per month, but most were high quality. As for the question of worth it -- If the money's good and you don't mind doing the work, then sure!

code888 - As of now, all caffeine stuff is guesswork. We'll know when it goes live on multiple data centers.

ThomasMeyers - Leverage the authority of the root domain and build tons of mid-low quality links to your hub.

skatir - I like DMOZ and google queries such as: keyword "resources".

rockstarinlife - If you 301 redirect you'll lose between 1-10% of your incoming link strength. Not a big deal, unless you're dealing with a penalty or something on the domain you're redirecting to.

emigre - At this point I wouldn't worry too much. Just for new sites, create them on a fresh hosting acct.


imlogic - I actually haven't used the software since shortly after I posted that recommendation. I'll check and get back to you.

Sylonious - What do you mean by strange?

[naonline]

Hi Terry,

Apologies in advance if this has been addressed before but this is a massive thread to search through....

What are your thoughts on Google real time search and it's implications for traditional SEO?

Cheers

Nick

[butters]

Hey Terry, first of all, great thread .

I do have 2 questions...

First of all, what sites other then edu/gov are the best places to get backlinks from? Little example, are forums better then blogs etc..

and

What are your method to finding these blogs, do they have to be do follow?

[mlmguru]

I was just told by someone who may not know what they're talking about that having more than one domain on my godaddy shared hosting account will affect my SEO. I have 7 sites, some are related to each other some are not. Will having multiple domains on my hosting account really affect my SEO? If so, how badly, how big of a deal is this really?

[kachaloo]

Hi,
I want to list my site in dmoz is there a service I can avail to get this done as its been two months and I don't have any updates from them and there is no way to get in touch with them.

Cheers,
Kachaloo

[fir3d]

Originally Posted by liz19

how to promote my sites...???and got more traffic??

you are selling seo services

[butters]

Originally Posted by fir3d

you are selling seo services

That does amuse me

[patadeperro]

What is the fastest way to create back links to your sites?

Regards.

[edpudol1973]

Another question, does blog comment back link are better than back link from social bookmarking sites, article directories, and Angela Edwards List?

[rbr451]

I was just told by someone who may not know what they're talking about that having more than one domain on my godaddy shared hosting account will affect my SEO. I have 7 sites, some are related to each other some are not. Will having multiple domains on my hosting account really affect my SEO? If so, how badly, how big of a deal is this really?

I have the same question. I have a main domain on my hosting service with several (related and unrelated) in sub-directories. Right now, they look like this:

maindomain.com
maindomain.com/otherdomain1/
maindomain.com/otherdomain2/
maindomain.com/otherdomain3/
etc.

The domain names are pointed directly to the subdirectory the site is in.

Wordpress will let me install multiple sites in the same directory, but I haven't done that, yet. Would it be better to do that and have:

maindomain.com
otherdomain1.com
otherdomain2.com
otherdomain3.com
etc.

Or would that even make a difference? In short, should I have a hosting plan for each site for seo purposes?

Right now, when I do a linkdomain: search at Yahoo! for any of the otherdomains, I get at least one link with the maindomain in the url.

Am I worried for nothing or will this effect my seo for all my sites?

[davison]

I'm new to this and don't really understand half of what's in these posts. Can you recommend an e-book or site that can help me get started with the basics of SEO? Thanks!

[naonline]

Originally Posted by davison

I'm new to this and don't really understand half of what's in these posts. Can you recommend an e-book or site that can help me get started with the basics of SEO? Thanks!

Google - 'search engine optimization'

Go to SEOmoz

[pewsingh]

Hi there, am trying to optimize for google maps (business directory), outside of USA. How to I get citations for non-US sites? How do I work out what google is using for this in other countries? Thanks

[TimD]

Originally Posted by LookItsMeTerryG

I'm considering it... but I'm also considering doing an ebook on this. I don't know how I feel about giving away the golden egg so to speak though.. this is something I've only ran across 1 other person doing (and he's not even doing it to the max benefit...). It's literally the only thing I've ever found in SEO that has to be a loophole or something... it works THAT well.

However, for the time being I'll point you in the right direction:

* Expand the local profile as much as possible, video, images... reviews.

* Local SEO runs essentially on citations from major data providers. There's tons of lists around that list the important ones, thought it's some of the unmentioned ones that really put the icing on the cake as far as this method is concerned.

* Google Maps likes to rank businesses according to proximity to city centroid... any hyper-local information you can provide about your business helps.. phone numbers, physical addresses, associations...etc.

That should be enough to get your gears spinning

Terry, this is pure gold. If you do create a package - put me first on your list. I think this is an enormous untapped market. If you can crack the 10-box, that's got to be the fastest way to the top of the page 1 for local companies.

Thanks!

[LookItsMeTerryG]

naonline - I think real time search is going to impact us in a variety of ways. First, we'll need to focus on fresh, frequently updated content (or update the site regularly). Then you'll need social media presence (the link graph of the web is being heavily skewed by twitter, facebook et al). Also, more terms are going to send less traffic in the future, what with Google trying to keep people on their site more -- look at the options being offered now (google barack obama and see what comes up).


butters - I like blogs or bribing students with free product or cash I just search them on Google using inurl:.edu + keyword


mlmguru - As long as you're not interlinking them heavily, not a big deal at all.

kachaloo - Become an editor. I'm one -- it's easy.

patadeperro - While the fastest way isn't the best way, it's definitely XRumer.

edpudol1973 - I'd say blog comments are damn effective, still, after all these years. They're easier too.

rbr451 - I wouldn't split them up unless they're on completely separate and unrelated topics. I'd rather spend my time building trust and authority for one domain than 50, ya know?

pewsingh - Look at international business directories, organizations, yellowpages, yelp, yahoo local, gumtree, etc.

[kaizen0909]

anyway of getting other people out of the LBC listings?

[Spark]

Hi SEO expert,

I really need your advice.

Let's say i wish to increase youtube video ranking on all search engine [Top page / 1st ranking]. Does building backlnks target to the video help? Just do the same as ranking a normal site will do?

Targeting the anchor text that i wish to rank well for my videos?

Appreciate your help on this. Thanks

[Seany D]

Originally Posted by LookItsMeTerryG

Hey guys,

I've been a longtime lurker here browsing around (we're talking YEARS of this stuff) and I've decided to give something back. If you've got a SEO related question or need some advice, ask here and I'll answer!

About me:

I've been doing SEO professionally for clients for about 9 years now, have several of my own sites (read: more than 60) top 3 in Google and am a ridiculously intense data hound. All of my campaign efforts are recorded, analyzed and tweaked, thus: I'm not just rehashing information found elsewhere. The majority of my knowledge comes from the data produced by setting up several test sites in several niches.

Most importantly, I'm not selling anything here. Just offering some free advice from someone that's been around a while and has consistently produced top rankings.

Let's go!

I recently purchased an Online Movie Blog, and I'm looking for someone
to provide me with a detailed "SEO/Website Audit"
I would like to know what needs to be done in terms of SEO for the site and would then like to get things in motion so I can start bringing in some quality traffic. I'm looking to get this done ASAP, so if you can help me please let me know.

I can not PM at this point, so let me know how to proceed if you are interested. I will of course pay for the SEO work that is provided.

Thanks in advance
-Sean

[Meltea]

Hi Terry,

Thank you for the wealth of information and the time you have devoted to this thread. You have really helped a lot of people.

It was your thread that actually made me register with WF and I had a couple of questions.

1. Are you taking any new clients for SEO service. If so, I wouldn't mind learning a bit more about your rates.

2. There is a website in my niche that is an authority site. Many of his category pages on his blog rank number 1 for highly searched terms. I did a backlink check in Yahoo and one of his category pages has only about 300 backlinks pointing to it and most are from spam sites that have scraped his pages.

Is it possible that the individual posts in this category have so much authority that they have floated the category page to number 1 out of 39 million sites (no quotes), 1 out of 10 millions sites (with quotes) which results in 245,000 exact searches in keyword tool.

[valdivz]

Terry- do you recommend any blog networks to help with SEO???

[Pixel]

hi,

I would like to ask about negative effect of incoming links. Can links hurt the rankings of site?

I have a site which ranks at the end of results for my main keywords and when I search for unique phrase from my homepage(putting the phrase in quotes) other site(tagfecher dot com) outranks mine and my site is in ommited results. I think that I have too many spammy links coming from footers of the sites. What is your opinion about this?

Thanks and Happy Holidays!

[Michael Bunata]

I have been working on the Internet now for the past 6 months as an affiliate. One of the challenges I am running into is finding "SOC", Strength of Competition. I use Market Samurai and I absolutely love it, but I wish it had that one element. Can you share with me how I can use Google to find the SOC or if you have a recommendation of the best software to use for keyword research? There are a lot of pros and cons out there in regards to a good software program.

I really appreciate your help.

[alloo]

Originally Posted by Michael Bunata

I have been working on the Internet now for the past 6 months as an affiliate. One of the challenges I am running into is finding "SOC", Strength of Competition. I use Market Samurai and I absolutely love it, but I wish it had that one element. Can you share with me how I can use Google to find the SOC or if you have a recommendation of the best software to use for keyword research? There are a lot of pros and cons out there in regards to a good software program.

I really appreciate your help.

Michael, "the great warrior" who's name is Kurt has a module for his tuelz called Inz 2.0 that is the best competition evaluator for keywords and phrases. But if you abuse it Google will snap at you.

[Michael Bunata]

Originally Posted by alloo

Michael, "the great warrior" who's name is Kurt has a module for his tuelz called Inz 2.0 that is the best competition evaluator for keywords and phrases. But if you abuse it Google will snap at you.

I just looked for it in google and the term Inz 2.0 doesn't come up. Do you have a link by chance?

Thanks

[alloo]

Tuelz internet marketing and web site design software
make sure you can run the free version of tuelz before you buy anything.

[Michael Bunata]

Originally Posted by alloo

Tuelz internet marketing and web site design software
make sure you can run the free version of tuelz before you buy anything.

Thank you for your help. I really appreciate it.

[enigmanic]

This is a question for Terry or anyone else who's had experience: I have a blog for which I write unique content every day. Should I be creating tons of backlinks for EVERY post I make? Or should I be concentrating on backlinks to my top level domain and only my more popular posts? Creating backlinks to every post for every blog seems very time consuming, but I was curious if everyone else is doing the same.

[johnng]

I read an eBook about Press Release. I found out later it was probably 1 year old. In the example given there was a Press Release done sometimes ago and was on Google Page 1 when I checked it using the keywords given.
I followed the example and did a Press Release of my own Blog, costed $19. My website did not not get anywhere, but the Press Release itself did get to the 4th position of page 1, searching for the key phrase in my Press Release headline.
Even that would not be too bad, unfortunately it did not stay in that position for more than several days. In fact it faded completely not long after.
My question: is Press Release effective?

[Jayson L]

Originally Posted by johnng

I read an eBook about Press Release. I found out later it was probably 1 year old. In the example given there was a Press Release done sometimes ago and was on Google Page 1 when I checked it using the keywords given.
I followed the example and did a Press Release of my own Blog, costed $19. My website did not not get anywhere, but the Press Release itself did get to the 4th position of page 1, searching for the key phrase in my Press Release headline.
Even that would not be too bad, unfortunately it did not stay in that position for more than several days. In fact it faded completely not long after.
My question: is Press Release effective?

My prediction is that press releases are already, or are going to be the next big juicy steak when it comes to backlinking. I am an insurance agent in the insurance niche and have looked at some of the top sites. Look at Carinsurance.com They are #1 for many reasons, but they also have a lot of press releases. They are harder to get in the hundreds like article marketing and take more of a professional to write. I am leaning toward using them big time in 2010.

[FJM2010]

Wow tons of great info, thanks for the local listing info as well..cheers

[arttse]

You can build backlinks for every post but eventually you will get tired and bored and probably give the game away if you dont see results.

If you continue writing new posts eventually you will gain a reputation as an expert in your field and you will improve traffic.

Backlinks isnt everything.

Just keep writing unique content and one day your site will become credible like ehow and wikipedia. That should be your goal. To build an authority site. Wikipedia and ehow didnt become authority sites by spamming every other website. They achieved it the natural way - and so should you. this plan could take years to see results but its the only way if you want to be in the game long term.

If however you dont care about the long term, then go crazy building backlinks for every page you want to get ranked in.

Originally Posted by enigmanic

This is a question for Terry or anyone else who's had experience: I have a blog for which I write unique content every day. Should I be creating tons of backlinks for EVERY post I make? Or should I be concentrating on backlinks to my top level domain and only my more popular posts? Creating backlinks to every post for every blog seems very time consuming, but I was curious if everyone else is doing the same.

[John W.G.]

I understand that links should be from a variety of types of sources. Here's my question:

Would Google frown on my site if I got links to all of my internal pages from the same URL's that link to my index page?

I know I need to deep link so my thought is why not link to several pages at once when I get a link if I can get multiple links, say from blog commenting for example.

Thanks,
John

[jhess56]

When using an rss feed to either auto update a web 2.0 property or add content to a blog...how do i nofollow that rss feed? i know how to nofollow anchor text links of course. but when the rss feed content comes up it has outgoing links linking to the content source which seems to be leaking page rank that i want going towards my money site instead. thoughts?

thanks

[csniper]

hi, I am a newbie (started march 2009 usual newbie story) and I have only made about $200.00 but that is beside's the point I would love some tips on seo (free)also do you have any tips for optimizing classified ads I know that google loves us free ads and if i type in an exact match keyword (how to lose weight fast us free ads) i come up number one out 993,000 search's but i would like to know how i can get my ad to show up on the pages with more competition thanks