Please help! Conflicting Answers

[Melissa82]

Hi everyone. I'm just beginning my first SEO venture and I'm about two weeks away from going live. My first question for you "Warriors" is that for the next two weeks I have time to plan my SEO strategy but sadly I have no idea where to begin. I can't do backlinks yet until I go live right? My site will be in html and the goal is to get people to fill out a form. Obviously my SEO strategy is to get as high as possible in the search engines within my moderately competitive keyword niche but I'm reading so many conflicting backlink strategies from the senior members here (i.e relevant vs irrelevant links, LSI, signing up with this person or this person etc.). I don't mind paying monthly for backlinks but who do I use? What's the most I can do before getting sandboxed?
So, any strategy advice will be much appreciated. Remember I can't go live for two weeks so what can I do to prepare ahead of time? I hope I haven't asked too big of a question, sorry.

Thank you all so much!!

[smwordsmith]

Some people think there is no sandbox. Others say to limit your backlinking to:

5 - 10 per day for the first month
20 links per day for the second and third months
50 links per day when the site is two to three months old

So, you are right, there is conflicting information out there.

As to what you can do now- if you are selling a product or service, you can start building your list by writing and submitting articles to the major directories and having people sign up on your list with something like Aweber. You don't need a website for that.

You can also join related forums and get your presence and authority established there so that when you go live, people will 'listen'.

[BarryWheeler]

There's a great book if you want to search it out ... it's called ... Search Engine Optimization: An Hour a Day. It's by Jennifer Grappone and Gradiva Couzin

Talks about developing an SEO strategy and giving you step by step things you can do to build your site and improve its ranking.

[nicktyler]

You will allways get conflicting information on the internet and especially on a forum like this one. It is really up to you to decide what to beleive and what action to take from it. Other than that I can't really help. Sorry.

[BarryWheeler]

Originally Posted by nicktyler

You will allways get conflicting information on the internet and especially on a forum like this one. It is really up to you to decide what to beleive and what action to take from it. Other than that I can't really help. Sorry.

That's as honest as it comes!

[dburk]

Hi Melissa82,

I recommend that you start by reading this Google Webmaster help page:
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Webmaster Tools Help

Then read and study this SEO starter guide:
http://www.google.com/webmasters/doc...rter-guide.pdf

Then take a step back and form a marketing strategy. After you have developed a sensible marketing strategy you can form a search engine marketing strategy that supports the goals of your overall marketing strategy. SEO is a process, a tactic, not a strategy. Once you have a search engine marketing strategy you can choose the SEO tactics that support your marketing strategy.

Your search marketing strategy is part of the promotional element of your overall marketing strategy. It's all about achieving the goals of your marketing strategy through tactics that promote targeted traffic. Don't get hung up on just trying to get high rankings, you need targeted traffic, and rankings is just part of the strategy, not the goal. Your most effective promotional tactics should bring targeted traffic as well as rankings.

Tactics that generate targeted traffic tends to generate higher rankings. Tactics like SMO that focus on targeted traffic generation will generally produce synergy that magnifies your efforts.

Avoid taking advice for strategies from an SEO tactician, as they often have limited knowledge about marketing. Many workers in the SEO industry fancy themselves as SEO experts, yet have little understanding of how search engines work and even less knowledge of marketing strategies. Search engines are focused on providing relevant results for users. Relevancy is the most essential factor in all of your SEO efforts. When a self-described SEO expert suggests tactics that totally ignore relevancy signals, do not walk, but run in the other direction.

[RevSEO]

Originally Posted by dburk

Relevancy is the most essential factor in all of your SEO efforts. When a self-described SEO expert suggests tactics that totally ignore relevancy signals, do not walk, but run in the other direction.

And here we go again....Have you tested your theory on relevancy with backlinks? At this time relevancy still isn't important with backlinks, what's more important is the quality of the links in the overall link portfolio.

I'm assuming with such a bold statement you've done quite a lot of SEO? Care to share with us your previous experiences.

Relevancy is important for human visitors/conversions, but from an SEO perspective you don't need to kill yourself looking for only relevant backlinks.

[dburk]

Originally Posted by RevSEO

And here we go again....Have you tested your theory on relevancy with backlinks? At this time relevancy still isn't important with backlinks, what's more important is the quality of the links in the overall link portfolio.

I'm assuming with such a bold statement you've done quite a lot of SEO? Care to share with us your previous experiences.

Relevancy is important for human visitors/conversions, but from an SEO perspective you don't need to kill yourself looking for only relevant backlinks.

Hi RevSEO,

There you go again!

YouTube - &#x202a&t=44s;Ronald Reagan:There You...

Are you defining relevancy the same way search engines do? If so then I will assert that an irrelevant backlink has absolutely no direct influence on rankings. You get no ranking benefit until after you channel link juice through relevant anchor text. In all my years of search engine marketing I have never seen evidence that suggest otherwise, have you?

I am not suggesting that you cannot get an indirect influence, albeit highly diluted, by channeling link juice from irrelevant backlinks through relevant anchor text on downstream pages. I am asserting that irrelevant backlinks have no ranking benefit until after you have channeled it through a relevant anchor text.

I challenge you to show me a single example where this is not true. Until then, in the words of the famous Ronaldus Magnus:

YouTube - ‪Ronald Reagan "Shut...

[Melissa82]

I really appreciate all the time you guys have put into your answers. You've really given me a lot to sink my teeth into. Thanks!!