Bruce99

I hope this is the right WF section ...

Hi warriors,

I have been on this site a lot in the past, I used to work on client sites seo from 2006, but much has changed in the last few years. I have moved from corporate seo marketing analysis (engineer, marking degree, mba) to the dog industry in AUSTRALIA. I tell you my qualifications, as I am looking to avoid players and hire people who know what they are doing.

I dont want a 50 page generic report that I could make, I want to find the specific issues Google has with my site(s), and to regain my ranking for core keywords.

In the past I have performed the basics of seo (on page, off page, video creation, article creation, forum submission etc) but I know Google has change a lot in the last year since the series of updates, and I have not kept up.

I have two sites, one dog walking, the other dog treats (both dot com dot au - Australia)

My dog treat site used to rank about 6, two years ago for my core "dog treat" keywords in Google Australia, but for about a year slipped to rank 12.
About four months ago it fell to page seven. This seemed to be around the time of Google's last major algorithm change.

Originally I upgraded both sites because I was using Joomla 1.5 (and google webmaster tools gave me a "recommendation" to upgrade). Both sites were finalised a few weeks ago to J2.5. I also use Virtuemart 2.x

I have also found that Google's webmaster tools has an issue with 'duplicate titles' but that is actually many different internal url's pointing to the same pages - an issue with cms .. that will be painstaking to resolve as there are many causes, not easily code changed. I dont think that this is the issue .. though it could be...

My dog walking site is performing well still. The only thing different I have been doing for the dog treat site is social links (my fb and twitter mainly). Cant see that is the issue either, nothing black hat there.

I have no idea why the dog treat site is penalised and or how to get back on page one. I have plenty of original content, I update content and I use social media ... I should at least be on page two in Australia ... but as said, my site suffered a massive rank drop.

Perhaps google has spotted grey links from years ago and decided they are now black?

I want an seo/ website analyst with specific abilities to review such an issue (more than the link analysis I have done). I need someone to trouble shoot (ie find) what is the specific issue(s) and Advise what I can do to correct them.
As you can see this problem has gone well beyond a discussion. I am no longer getting new customers to my site. I am doing a lot of work for nothing. I have upgraded sites, with good products at good prices ... they just need to be seen.

Please PM me if you have a specific offer of what you will do for how much ..

Cheers bruce

just a dog guy.

Peter Lessard

If this has cost you and is costing you significant money I would strongly suggest bringing someone on that will be able to fix the issues and also that with their knowledge can increase sales and conversions enough that having them take care of this for you full time just makes sense.

I do this already for dentists, orthodontists etc.. because for them it is not an option to have their online marketing break and try to fix it after the fact. Of course for them one good new patient can mean so much money that my fees are a joke to them.

I would also suggest that you should not be at the mercy of Google rankings and you should never have just one horse in the race. I make sure all my clients have multiple sources of traffic such as multiple site, vids, and social channels.

Bruce99

Hi - I get what you are saying.

In respectful reply. If the ranking thing is something that Google hates (secondary sites from long ago or whatever) I could disavow or whatever, but I am after a second professional opinion.

I can show the person who wins this any google webmaster info they need etc.

Because I sell dog treats at very low margins (to entice volume purchases) I dont have a lot of money left over for adwords or an seo monthly fee. Particularly now that I am not getting any new customers.

After the dog walks (my day job), I have the rest of the day to concentrate on seo, whether that be articles, video creation and posting, social media etc. I am dubious about automatic link generation (ie on unprotected wordpress sites etc) in the current Google climate (which is often the seo pitch that I have unsolicited received).

"suggest bringing someone on that will be able to fix the issues" yes that is want I need. The follow up seo offer, after a problem has been rectified can be negotiated, but that is part two.

"you should not be at the mercy of Google rankings and you should never have just one horse in the race. I make sure all my clients have multiple sources of traffic such as multiple site, vids, and social channels"

I have dabbled in a few secondary sites, but not for generating sales themselves. These have not been updated for a long time, so I doubt that they are the cause of the ranking issue, but then again, that is why I am looking to hire a fixer.

I have vids and social channels, but of course they could be leveraged more.

These are considerations after I find out what issues are. Perhaps I have misdiagnosed the site and there are no issues. But with substantial content, new joomla version etc, I just cant work out what is holding it back. I don't want to pay for seo over the top of an issue, as that would be throwing money away and set for failure.

If you understand and want to pm me with an offer, please do .. My site is the healthydogtreat site in the signature ... Thanks !

just a dog guy.

Wolfster

You don't sound like you could afford me (or really anyone else worth anything), so this little bit of advice is free:

There are all kinds of things you could try, but with no guarantee that it is the answer.

For example, your site doesn't appear to be very social. That's a big one these days with Google. You need significant visitor interaction with the site, preferably real, but even faked (if it is faked well) would be better than what you've got.

Do you have data on the bounce rate? That's more important than ever.

The graphics on the dog walking site are more upbeat and more attractive and may be improving your bounce rate. Compare them. If you see a difference, that could be your problem right there.

You can improve that with a more positive feel for your visitors, i.e., color and pleasant graphics of dog owners doing pleasant things with their dogs, and by doing more social and running periodic contests, surveys, etc.

You should probably also consider informative, helpful articles on dogs and dog ownership. I know that is not what you are selling, but again, that along with the right social should help considerably.

Hope something here helps.

Check it out. Take the leap.

http://farleyventures.com/leapfrogtwist

Wolfster

By the way, the above was just my quick impressions. I did not look very far or very long or do any in-depth analysis, so if the visitor interaction is there somewhere and I just didn't see it, I suggest you consider making it more visible == on the home page.

Check it out. Take the leap.

http://farleyventures.com/leapfrogtwist

wpsolution

Hi Mate,

We are an outsourcing company that caters content writing, seo and wordpress development services. We do provide high quality and trusted Virtual Assistant in a very low rate.

Please visit our thread here for more information: [WTS]Hire You Quality Virtual Assistant for only $50/week Plus 2 days free!!!

Looking forward on hearing from you.

Thank you.

Hire your High Quality Virtual Assistant with a very affordable weekly fee from us.
Philippine Virtual Assistant Services
SEO/SEM Services for a very Low Price

Peter Lessard

Quick things to do. Look at bounce rate and return rate. Those of course can only be fixed by cleaner designs and communicating with your list to make them go back to the site.

On the mechanics end have you noted that the #1 ranked site on the big G in Australia has almost zero authority and very few inbound links built and if you use free tools to check their keyword density things like dog treats and dog treat are not even mentioned. Yours runs at 10% for dog treat and 8% for dog treats, rather high.

Google is going out of its way to make traditional search engine optimization obsolete and basically if they notice you they lay a beating on you. I have taken on clients that tried for months and months with various companies to regain that gravy phrase with a well aged domain with tons of links. Time and again I have slipped in there and regained and kept for a year and more a spot in the top 3 with a fresh EMD with a similar keyword embedded facebook vid and boy do I laugh every time people say EMD's are not working (yes even after the recent update). The point is that these days a new site with almost no seo or links can often outrank an aged site that has been noticed by Google.

My long term approach is always the same.
Increase time on site and conversions. Build a list on site and on Facebook to make sure repeat visits are common. Build out other properties and vids to rank very quickly for those phrases that were lost and that will take time to reclaim.

If you are in a niche selling a product that there is NO way whatsoever to pay for traffic and make profit its time to look for another industry. I do not believe that is your situation though but you may need a complete overhaul in image, approach or pricing model.

If a star marketer inherited your business he would have a video of a dog doing something absurd like riding a great white shark and being rescued at the last minute by the poor owner with a caption that says its much easier to buy bobs shark treats, get 5 million views and traffic to site and magically Google would skyrocket all your ranks due to your traffic and relevance.

No budget and lack of cutting edge marketing will lose now that Google could care less about our personal investment in seo tactics.

Matt Broody

Hello,

We can offer our services

Boost your rankings TODAY

TommoBedhair

We can offer our services - Info@GoogleDetox.com. We've been recovering sites for over 3 years, and have a vast portfolio of clients that are happy to give testimonials.

SEO Recovery Guru - Recovering Penalised Sites Since 2011

Bruce99

<<< Wolfster;8820200]You don't sound like you could afford me (or really anyone else worth anything),

That may be true, I am not a corporation. Though people I have hired for link creation in the past (at what I consider substantial money) often did not define what they were going to do, and ended up putting me on the equivalent of link farm sites ... They are now removed. The dealings I have had in the past with 'seo professionals' has not engendered trust. Of course it doesn't apply to everyone, just saying that the seo industry has seemed a little flaky to me in the past (as well as when I worked as a client services manager inside of one and they faked the seo links).

HOWEVER I am looking for analysis at first, seo later, so analysis was what this ad is about. Fix the problem THEN chase customers. (assuming their is a real bad link issue ... (or tech site issue) ...

>>>For example, your site doesn't appear to be very social. That's a big one these days with Google. You need significant visitor interaction with the site, preferably real, but even faked (if it is faked well) would be better than what you've got.

I considered blogs and forums but the moderating time wasting to stop spam seemed too hard. That is why I opted for fb and twitter, to bring them to my site. If I cant rank, then no one will see my site to be on the visitor interaction pages (whatever that might be).

A lot of seo people (even in here) have suggested the social media route instead of apps on my site itself, but then again a lot of people seem to be disliking that now?!

>>>Do you have data on the bounce rate? That's more important than ever.

My dog walking site has a bounce around 82% and the dog treat 73%. But this includes people who land on any page in the site, and often my biggest visitors are to my article pages. If they are searching for a specific piece of tech dog info and dont get it, they will bounce off that one article page.

Were you asking because of the assumption that high bounce rate or low visitor duration time will have google drop you in rank?

>>> The graphics on the dog walking site are more upbeat and more attractive and may be improving your bounce rate. Compare them. If you see a difference, that could be your problem right there.

The 'avg visit duration' on my dog treat site is higher than my dog walker site, but my dog walker site has a much higher ranking for core keywords, and did not lose its ranking when the dog treat did. Since they have the same cms and often similar links, then that is one big part of the puzzle I have no answer for.

I could put more happy dog images on the dog treat site if you dont think it is fun enough. I was approaching the site from an information source and health perspective rather than a fun laugh and giggle site (branding perspective) but I can see how perhaps I should have more pics rather than just the rotating banner showing treats ...

Perhaps I will add a few of the dog treat videos at the bottom of the page too. As you can see I am not brilliant at 'sales pages' ..

... but again this ad was about fixing ranking problems, so far defined by most people as bad links ...

>>>>>You should probably also consider informative, helpful articles on dogs and dog ownership. I know that is not what you are selling, but again, that along with the right social should help considerably.

Hi, definitely gives me something to consider.

You will see that all my articles are original, and in the past I spent a lot of time researching the latest dog trends (on-line analysis and research papers) but that was time consuming and did not boost my visitors appreciably.

The dog treat site is mostly articles about dogs I visit and youtube videos of them, plus research into raw diets and the value of meat from a nutrition point of view, since the treats I sell are a high % of meat.


All that aside, I would have thought ranking high, having people buy product would be my goal, not necessarily long duration on site for people who dont buy product. I have a high loyalty (repeat customers) for people who become customers, but since my rank has dropped, I am getting NO new customers.

tweaking my graphics and beautifying my site seems like icing on a mud cake, even considering a blog or whatever, but without ranking who will read the blog? I use fb as my blog ... not sure if I would have time to moderate something on my own site ...

just a dog guy.

Wolfster

What I suggested was fairly superficial, I admit. But I am not really trying to get your business. I would probably have to charge you about $1,200 a month, just for the SEO. Anything having to do with site design, etc., would be extra. I kinda doubted you would be into that.

Good SEO is expensive, and getting more expensive all the time. You may be ahead to try some advertising. It can get pretty expensive too if you aren't careful, but you usually have a little better understanding of what you are getting for your money and can make faster adjustments as you review the results.

That approach (even when it fails 80% of the time) can also sometimes give you a better sense of what keywords (and even what sort of graphics, headlines, teasers, etc.) drive the quality, targeted traffic everyone wants, which can in turn improve your understanding if and when you decide it becomes time to do more and better SEO.

More and more of the marketers I see that are doing well are taking this admittedly more circuitous route.

Check it out. Take the leap.

http://farleyventures.com/leapfrogtwist

djhope

Hello Bruce,

I can not PM you because I am fairly new here. I would like to help you. I am both an SEO and Web Developer. I could offer you a start of 500USD per month. This is for both my SEO and Web Development/Programming skills. Let's talk more about your site's issue. Send me an email : justinhoped at gmail dot com
or skype : justinhoped