Why A Dynamic URL Structure Is Bad For SEO
July 18, 2010
Why Static URLs are Best for SEO
When attempting to improve your site’s ranking, it can be productive to examine your URL structure and do what you can to make it more SEO responsive. Namely, if your URLs are dynamic, it would be in your best interest to change them to static.
What is URL Structure?
URL structure is one factor that helps search engines find you. Search engines generally find “clean” URLs faster and easier, which would translate into a static URL, or a URL that never changes, doesn’t have symbols, and uses keywords. Some examples of dynamic vs. static:
A dynamic URL, which changes based on what database it was found by:
http://www.example.com/forums/thread.php?threadid=12345&sort=date
A static URL on the other hand, is a URL that doesn’t change and ideally uses keywords. It looks like this:
http://www.example.com/forums/the-challenges-of-dynamic-urls.htm
Dynamic URL vs. Static URL
A dynamic URL structure means that your URL is stored in a database and can change based on what database led the reader to your site.
The downside to a dynamic URL is that search engines don’t like them as much as static URLs, meaning they have a lower click-through rate and they can lead to duplicate content problems.
A static URL means that the URL cannot be changed unless the HTML code is re-written.
The advantage to a static URL is that search engines find them faster, and they help to keep your server more organized. Additionally, it’s easier to use keywords in the URL, which attracts users, and results in more click-through.
Should You Switch?
If you use dynamic URLs you should switch to a static URL structure. It will help keep your site more organized, increase your click-through rate, and help your site get found faster and easier by search engines. Additionally, you would only have one URL assigned to each page and product.
When you make the switch, you should make sure your URLs are more consequential and use keywords.
For example, instead of having a URL that says www.example.com/store/prod1.html, you could have a URL that uses a keyword and looks more like this: www.example.com/websitedesign.
When a customer sees this URL, they will know exactly what the page will hold — a page on web site designs.
The Bottom Line
Static URLs have an advantage. They are easier for search engines to read and your users can easily figure out what the URL will lead them to. Using keywords within the URL structure gives static URLs a lead over dynamic URLs. To increase your click-through rate and help out your SEO, I suggest you make the switch.
Why It Is Not Enough Just To Get To Page 1 Of Google
July 13, 2010
Here are a few graphics that show the click distribution for the first page of Google search results.
Notice the difference in the number of clicks between having your website in the top 3 results as opposed to being at the bottom of the page.
So you see that just being on page one of Google is not enough if you really want your website to stand out above the rest and get more clicks than your competitors.
Over 75% of the clicks go to the sites that are in position #1, #2, or #3.
Do you know where you rank for your keywords? contact us for an in depth report and analysis of what it would take to get your website to the top.
Step By Step Inbound Marketing
July 10, 2010
As I speak to different Chicago business owners and execs about search engine optimization campaigns that Design & Promote can provide them with and am often asked this question “what steps do we need to follow to be the most effective with inbound marketing”.
I understand some companies would like to handle SEO in house and feel that if they just had an instruction sheet that they could hand to their marketing manager or website guy or girl and everything would be peachy.
There are quite a few steps and many rules and best practices to follow to be successful at inbound marketing but here is a primer for you.
To learn more about search engine optimization or to get a free seo analysts of your website just give our office a call.
On Page SEO
1. Add Statcounter and Google Analytics – You will want to benchmark where your site is before you start improvements and you will also want to take note of what keywords are already possibly ranking well.
2. Keyword Research – Search for high volume related keywords using http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com or the keyword tool on http://www.seobook.com. Do not pick keywords that have too much competition, better to be on the top of a small mountain than at the base of a large one. Add town modifiers if you have a local business. Time spent here will make or break your seo campaign. Check your competitor’s keywords and back links.
3. Change Page Titles – These should be up to 70 characters in length and contain keywords and be relative and different for each page of your site.
4. Change Page Descriptions –These should be up to 150 characters or less in length and have keywords, a call to action and be unique for each page.
5. Change Page Keywords – You should add no more than 10 keyword phrases separated by commas and be relative and different for each page.
6. Add Alt Image Tags – Add an alt description tag to every image that includes a keyword phrase. For a bonus change the name of images to match your keywords separated by dashes such as keyword1-keyword2.jpg.
7. Add Keywords To Page Content – Judiciously add keywords to all page content taking note of keywords used in title and keywords tags for each page. If you can include your keyword in a header or sub header font all the better.
8. Landing Pages – Create landing pages that offer high value advanced information such as a white paper in trade for contact information using an email form. The goal here is to capture at least an email address that you can use to follow up or add to your newsletter.
9. Site Navigation – All navigation should include http://www. Not just /
10. Create Site Maps – Add an html and xml site map and submit to Google, Yahoo and Bing.
Off Page SEO
11. Record Existing Back Links – Use Yahoo Site Explorer to export a back link report and save for later comparison.
12. Universal Business Listing – Add your site including a description that include keywords from above $30 http://www.ubl.org
13. Blog Comments – Comment on blogs related to your website’s topic that are meaningful and try to include your keywords in the comment text and your name field.
14. Directory Submits – Locate free niche and local directories related to your website’s topic and submit your site to these.
15. Press Releases – Write a press release where the title and content contains your keywords and provides anchor text links within the body of the release, submit to many online press release sites including the $12 option at http://www.onlineprnews.com I suggest reading their instructions before submitting. One press release per month is optimal.
Social Media.
16. Linkedin – Add your link in your Linkedin profile and update your profile to include a pretty large description including keywords. Add connections and join groups related to your main topic. Connect to your customers and not your peers. Add recommendations to your best customers and business partners. Update your status regularly and sometimes include links to your site or other related resources.
17. Facebook – Create a Facebook page and add links to your website pages, add friends and suggest to friends. Update your status regularly and sometimes include links to your site or other related resources.
18. Social Media Bookmarks – Create an account in Digg, Stumbleupon and as many other sites that time affords and add links to your pages that include your keywords in the title and description.
Extra Credit
- WordPress Blog – Add a WordPress blog to your site and write one post a week taking note to include your keywords in the title and content. Use All In 1 SEO, Google XML Sitemap and ShareThis plugins. Change the Permalinks to Post-Name and add sites to ping list. Link RSS feed to Linkedin, Facebook & other social media sites.
- Article Writing – Create informative articles and submit to http://www.ezinearticles and http://www.goarticles.com
- Hub Pages – Create a Hub Page about your topic and use anchor text back links to your site.
- Squidoo Lens – Create a Lens about your topic and use anchor text back links to your site.
- YouTube Video – Create a video with a title and credit screen that contains your contact info including website and add to http://www.youtube.com and other video sites. Make sure you include a title and description that includes your keywords.
- 301 Redirect – Direct all visitors to www not without by using special code otherwise you will have 2 sets of back links not one.
- Auto Responders – Create a drip marketing email campaign using contact forms.
Reporting & Notes
- These items are arranged in order of importance and should be followed step by step for best results.
- Keep track of your keyword ranking, back links and traffic counts weekly or monthly and adjust accordingly.
- You can’t improve what you can’t measure.
- The top 3 website that come up for each search get 70% of all the clicks.
- 90% of people do not go past page 1 in the search engines, they just search again using a different phrase.
- Over 80% of people use Google for online searches so Yahoo 6%, Bing 4%, and the other search engines don’t matter much.
- Many visitors and no sales means you need a better call to action on your site.
- Until you get more back links than the website in any position you will never top them.
- Link exchanges give away as much power as you gain so the net result is usually not much more than 0.
I hope this helps you understand the many steps it takes to succeed in inbound marketing
What Is The Best Keyword Density for SEO?
July 6, 2010
When writing an article, website content or blog post, one of the most important considerations is how to get your page to that coveted number one spot in the Google page rankings. There are many factors that go into your Search Engine Optimization (SEO), but one of the most important is keyword density for SEO. Before we can discuss keyword density for search engine optimization, also known as inbound marketing, we’re going to have to define what a keyword is.
What is a Keyword?
The keyword is what a potential customer is going to type into the search box on Google or one of the other search engines when looking for your product or service. Finding out what the best keyword phrase is for your business can be tricky. There are many people right now dedicated to doing research in order to figure out the correct keyword density for SEO. For example, if searching for website design, which would be a more effective keyword? Web site design or website design? Website design wins with 5,425 searches vs. web site design at 2,729. So you can see how important doing your keyword research is.
What is Keyword Density?
Now that you know you understand the importance of doing keyword density for SEO research, it’s time to focus on keyword density. In the most layman terms possible, keyword density is the percentage of times you use your keyword within a post. Percentage is important because it’s how Google and other search engines read your content. Google is going to scan the content on your website and based on what the most used keyword or phrase is, that is how Google is going to categorize your website and then rank it.
How Many Keywords Should I Use?
It’s best to focus on only one or two keywords per page, especially if your keyword is extremely competitive. For example, the phrase: keyword density for SEO gets 8 searches but Chicago gets 5,698. Chicago obviously is the more competitive keyword here. It will be more difficult to get the number one page rank using the keyword Chicago, so it will be important to focus completely on Chicago and not worry about other keywords. But don’t forget that keywords can also be phrases. So adding another word to Chicago can really narrow down your competition. Chicago pizza only has 522 searches. Again, doing your keyword research is incredibly important.
What Should My Keyword Density Be?
Google’s requirements say that no more than 2% of a web page’s words should be the keyword. Any more than that will be considered spam. However, Yahoo and MSN Search will permit as high as 5% keyword density for SEO. Therefore, hitting a sweet spot of between 2% and 5% keyword density is probably your best bet.
How Do I figure Out My Keyword Density for SEO percentage?
There is actually a nice tool that does all the work for you. In fact, I used the tool to figure out that my percentage for my keyword (which was: keyword density for SEO) is at 1.9%. If my keyword was simply keyword density, I would be at 3.7%.
Keyword Research for Titles
We’ve been talking about the body of your website as of now, but it’s important that your title have a much, much higher keyword density for SEO. The title should have between 30% – 75% density.
Keyword Conclusion
When writing, keep in mind what your keyword density for SEO should be. It’s important your content still flows well and is rich in information and entertainment, but doing your keyword research and keeping your keywords in the forefront of your mind will help you get found on the Internet. Love your keywords and they will love you back.
By the way the keyword density of this post for “keyword density for seo” is just under 2%
Find out which keywords your website is currently optimized for with this simple test:
Is your website not optimized for the correct keyword density for SEO?
Our search engine optimization copy writing services can help! Contact Design & Promote today at 630-995-7109.
Having A Website Was Important Yesterday: Why SEO Is Important Now And For The Future
January 21, 2010
As we reach the end of 2009, more and more companies are realizing the importance of having a web presence. A large company knows how imperative it is to have a website and be active in the online conversation, but even small businesses are finding it harder to compete without a website.
Just five or ten years ago, the competition for local search results was much lower. If, for example, your auto shop in Naperville decided to create a website back then, there would be a good chance that it would easily end up high on the search engines for certain keywords like Naperville auto shop or Naperville car repair. As long as this site was easy for Google and other search engines to find, it wouldn’t require a lot of effort to have good search results.
As most of us know now, getting clicks from Google has become extremely competitive, and companies are even paying thousands of dollars a month to have a sponsored link on Google. Instead of throwing your money away on every click that doesn’t convert to sales, why not focus on the organic search results that you don’t have to pay for? Once your website is at the top of Google for your most important keywords, you won’t have to pay for every visitor to your site and you can have significant increases in total visitors to your website.
Like I said earlier, the more competitors who have a website, the more important it will be to focus your efforts on SEO. Search Engine Optimization goes beyond creating a good website with engaging content. After all, what is the point of even having a website if people can’t find you on Google and other search engines?
At Design & Promote, we will work with you to closely evaluate how we can get your website closer to the #1 position on Google. SEO is an ongoing task that requires an initial time investment, but it rewards companies in the long run with exposure to more people than any advertisement can generate.
With a higher ranking on search engines, your website is bound to get more visitors. Over time, this will not only increase your revenue, but also increase the popularity in your brand. More people will become loyal to your product or service, which will help spread the word that your company is offering something everyone needs.
Today, it is imperative that you use proper SEO techniques that will lead to long-term growth. Find a good SEO company that will do quality research, measure their efforts, and report progress frequently. A well-balanced Search Engine Optimization approach will finally make you happy that you invested in a website in the first place.
Meta Descriptions Are Important Get Control Of Yours!
November 19, 2009
There are a lot of people arguing over meta tags and their influence on search engine optimization. Since no one knows exactly how search engines work, it seems logical that it would be important to do everything in your power to have the most success. Therefore, it is definitely in your power to add relevant titles, keywords and descriptions to all of your web pages. Our focus today is on meta description tags, because it is looking like now more than ever before, they will be playing a larger role in your search engine success.
A month or so ago we posted this article on Using Keywords To Create The Most Efficient Website Title, which outlined the importance of titles and how to write a good one. We will be getting to some tips on writing affective descriptions, but let’s first start with why they are so important.
Google is constantly changing how they measure websites and list them on search results for certain keywords. This is why it is so important to have a professional SEO company that knows the latest trends in the different search engines. What was important yesterday or a year ago might actually hurt your search results tomorrow or somewhere down the road.
We are seeing a strong difference in the importance of the meta description on your web pages compared to the past. For example, what Google and Yahoo used to use in place of your description on their search results was the description your website had on different open directory sites. Now, you can add the “NOODP” and “NoYdir” meta tags to your pages to prevent this.
This type of change by Google indicates that they are giving more control to the website owners in terms of what they want to display in the description on the Google search engine results page. Another difference is that Google used to always disregard the meta description and just use a snippet of information from the specific page that ended up on the search results. However, Google is now choosing to use the meta description in certain instances, when they feel like it is relevant to the search query. Watch this short video by Google’s Matt Cutts to hear how they are changing their philosophy on meta descriptions.
As you can see, it is important to have a description not only on your homepage, but to include a unique one on all of your website’s pages. If you don’t, Google will always just use a snippet of information that you can’t control. Like Matt Cutts said, Google isn’t always using the description, so in order to have the most control of the search result that is your first impression to thousands of people, you need to write the most relevant and helpful description possible.
Here is some basic information to get started on writing a quality meta description:
- Google will display a maximum of 160 characters, so keep the description down to 5-24 words to make sure a searcher can read the whole thing
- The description promotes your company—use appealing words that will attract people to click on your link
- Like we said earlier—write a different description for every page to make it relevant to the content on that page and better for search results
- Include the specific page’s keywords in the description to increase search results
Whether you believe the meta description on your website pages will affect how close you end up to the number one position on Google or other search engines or you don’t, you definitely need to realize that SEO isn’t just about making the robots happy. Enticing the people that search for your product or service is the most important part of SEO, so remember to write descriptions that people will want to learn more about.
Social Media Mistakes For Chicago Businesses To Avoid Part 2
October 29, 2009
Don't bully your fans
In our last post, we discussed some ways that companies frequently make mistakes while using social media for their business, resulting in a passive approach and eventually a failing social media campaign. The following tips will help you and your company avoid making the opposite types of mistakes, being too aggressive with social media:
Creating Pages On Too Many Sites: Since social media for business is a time consuming endeavor, it is impossible to reach everyone and be involved on every social media website, all while running a successful business. Devote some time to research your industry on different social media sites and identify which ones will benefit your company the most. You need to find the place that will allow you to interact the most with your potential customers, and that is going to be different for every company.
Abusing The Rules: Social media users are a group of intelligent people that don’t want to be manipulated. If your organization uses certain techniques, for example, posting multiple spam-like messages in Facebook or Twitter to try and attract more fans, people will get upset with your company and stop following you. The majority of companies that make this mistake are just starting their efforts in social media and want to try and get their message out to the highest number of people as fast as possible. However, the better approach is to sign up, read what other people are talking about and get a good feeling about the overall conversation on that social media site, and then slowly join in with valuable information.
Obvious Selling: Companies that go on social media and try the usual hard sell tactics in business will find that followers/fans don’t respond positively to it. The whole social media culture is based on people communicating with others in order to help everyone. It is not about businesses selling their products to consumers in the social media realm, so don’t treat your followers like they are just there to buy your product. Remember, you have to contribute to the conversation before you can expect anyone to buy what you’re offering.
Deliberate SEO: It is not a secret that social media has become an important part of search engine optimization. This shouldn’t mean that the only reason why you’re on social media sites is to get more links to your website. Your success on Twitter, Facebook or anywhere else depends on how much you offer other people. They aren’t just search engine robots scanning your page and looking for keywords, so don’t expect them to stay your follower if all you’re looking for are keywords and backlinks.
Using Keywords To Create The Most Efficient Website Title
October 1, 2009
Your search engine optimization efforts include many different ways to get your website higher on sites like Google, but some are more important than others. Before worrying about how many backlinks you have or how many blog posts you’ve written, a good website should always have keyword rich title tags. Similar to our recent post about Why Buying A Domain Name That Includes Your Keyword Is Important, the title is also one of the most important factors in good SEO.
The title tag is like a headline, it appears at the top of the web browser when your homepage is open, and it also is what appears on the search engine results page when your site is listed. Because of these factors, it is important to remember that what you write in your title is not only for search engines to crawl and find keywords in it, but it is also likely that your title will be the first thing someone reads about your website. You don’t want to write something that is just keyword after keyword, because someone reading that won’t be very compelled to click on it.
One basic rule for incorporating keywords into the title tag is to use your most important keywords first, because the order in which the words are plays a role in how search engines scan it. It is more important to use different keywords in the title than to repeat any keywords, because the title will be more relevant to a wider variety of keyword searches if you use your 2-3 most significant keywords. You don’t want the title to be too long, so keep the number of characters including spaces to less than 75. For example, Design & Promote’s title, Chicago SEO Web Design And Search Engine Optimization Design & Promote, is 70 characters with spaces, and you can see when searching for “Naperville web design” on Google that the whole title appears, not just a portion of it followed by three dots:
Once you have the basic title down, here are a few more tips to make it even better. If you want to include your company name in the title, make sure it is at the end. Some companies rely on their geographic location, which is a good thing to include in the website’s title. Finally, make sure every page on your website has a unique title which distinguishes the content of that specific page. This will help search engines crawl your pages and also help visitors to your site navigate through it.
Below are two examples of title tags that different websites are using. As you can see, the first one needs some improvement. This title is for the a bakery in Chicago. As you can see, they only used “Home Page” and left out the most important keywords that they want people to search to find them online.
The second one follows the most important rules. It uses the most important keywords first, is the right length, and it makes sense when reading it.
Why Buying A Domain Name That Includes Your Keyword Is Important
August 7, 2009
We have become so used to the online world that websites have become a source of information and knowledge for most of us. So, the naming of a site becomes very important, as that is the identity of the site and that is the way people will get to know the site.
There are many theories regarding the naming of the site. Some people believe that it is better to choose a domain name which is similar to that of the name of the company. In this way, the company and its site will share the identity and will benefit each other.
Another more popular and much acceptable theory is that, it is better to include the keywords in the domain name. This theory has found a lot of followers, as people genuinely believe that if the domain name of the site has one or more keywords, then the site will be optimized in a far better way.
The search engines have many techniques of listing a site in their search pages. One of the important factors is the presence of keywords that are being chosen. You need to choose the keywords and ensure that those words are present in the content of the site. The keywords also need to be marked separately so that the search engines can track them easily. So, this is how, the keywords are related to the search engine page listings.
It is considered better to have one or more keywords in the domain name, as it will be easily spotted by the search engine and it will be easier to get a better ranking for your site. The search engines go by searching the domain names first and then looking into the contents of the site. So, if the keywords are present in the domain name itself the search engines will track it down and then go on to search the content of the site. Once both the domain name and the content share some common keywords, the search engines tend to give a higher ranking to those sites.
So, while registering the domain name for your site, take care to include at least one keyword in it. The more keywords you include in the domain name, the better it will be for your search page rankings. The higher the search page rankings, the better revenue it will generate.
Design & Promote Domain Names – Check Available Domain Names
How To Effectively Optimize A Local Business Profile
July 9, 2009
A small and local business profile can also attain a high ranking in the local searches if they keep in mind certain key things. This need not involve link building and online advertising. Sometimes merely updating the website’s business profile can be of immense help in positively influencing the ranking of the website in local searches. If your’s is a local business house with just a small website, then you should funnel your energies towards luring local clients only. That is why it is quintessential to harp on your local identity. Each page of the website should have a section mentioning the physical location of your business.
You should act prudently in describing the physical location. For example if your carpet cleaning business is in Oswego Illinois, the title of your website shouldn’t proclaim “Carpet Cleaners Oswego, Illinois”, because many people have hardly heard of this relatively obscure place called Oswego. However, since Oswego lies in Chicago’s geographical area, which is quite well known, you should rather tout your business location as “Carpet Cleaners Chicago, Illinois”.
However, stressing your physical location in webpage is only half the job done. Now you should also add proper contact information which can also help your business in local searches. If you think that is improbable then you can’t be more wrong. You should always get your business enrolled with Google Maps or Yahoo Maps. This is quite an easy task when you go to these Google or Yahoo Maps website and search for your physical address when you find that you can link that page to your website with the “link this page” option. Then you can paste that link in the contact information section of your website. This would also help your customers not only to find your business but also post reviews about your business in Google and Yahoo through that particular link.
If you provide some driving directions in your contact information section of your website with some relevant local keywords and key phrases even, that can to some extent help in your website climb up the index in local searches. Thus, not only through keywords and link building, but by effectively tweaking your business profile you can help yourself get noticed in local search engines of Google and Yahoo. The Meta description or keywords used to describe your business in local search engines should also contain the most effective part of your location to help you get noticed in local search engines.
These tips of optimizing your business profile can also be used when you advertise your business in free local directories. Enlisting your business in good local directories with an optimized business profile is also a great way to augment your chances in local Chicago area SEO.