Perhaps you've
heard that link popularity and link reputation is
important.
They are important, but don't become so obsessed with
linking that
you build your entire strategy only "just around link
building."
You want to use all of the basic principles to carry
your Web site
through and you may want to do some linking based on
the look of
the "competitive landscape" for your keyphrase. You
also want to build links based on what "makes sense"
for your visitors.
Some search engines like Google give more weight to
elements like
link reputation which is an "off-page" influence while
other search
engines like Yahoo will give more weight to "on-page"
influences
such as your keyword phrase usage and how it is used
on the page.
Link
exchange service
Be very careful about
using any kind of "link exchange service"
that offers to inflate your link popularity quickly.
The one thing
you don't want to do is have the appearance of
"unnatural linking"
or anything that looks remotely contrived. Exploding
link popularity overnight is bound to get you flagged
for penalty.
How to make an important sales letter
Next time you are
working on an important sales letter, remember to
spend at least 50% of your time working on that all
important headline text. This includes both the Title
Tag and your main <H1> Header on the page. Little
changes to Heading text can make huge impacts with a
little
thought.
Do
you have a robots.txt file?
Do you have a
robots.txt file set up on your server? Here's what
Google says in their Webmaster Guidelines:
-Make use of the robots.txt file on your web server.
This file tells crawlers which directories can or
cannot be crawled. Make sure it's current for your
site so that you don't accidentally block the
Googlebot crawler.
Google just got really
serious about sites selling links.
I have been warning readers that Google HATES sites
that sell links.
Now they have started taking some serious action.
Hundreds of
high ranking sites that have been seriously selling
links have
seen their PageRank that shows on the Google Toolbar
drop.
It's interesting to note that so far their actual
ranking in the
search results has not changed, but that could change
any day. It looks like the main purpose of changing
the PageRank that shows in Google's Toolbar was for
Google to make a public statement.
So far they have not dropped the rankings of the sites
that were buying the links, but that could come next.
If you have been buying or selling links openly, I
suggest you change things immediately.
Link pointing back to your home page
At the bottom of your
pages, do you have a straight text link pointing back
to your home page? Does it say "home"? If so, this
isn't doing your site any good. Change it to "keyword
phrase home" (IF it sounds appropriate to do so.)
In other words, use your keyword phrase in the link
text pointing back to your home page. The link should
be an absolute link versus a relative link.
A great tip on freshening up
some of your Title Tags.
Think about this. Turn some of your titles into a
question.
Asking a question is a great attention getter.
-Where on earth would you go if you had your pilot
license?
-What would you do if your career was terminated?
-When should you submit your web pages?
By asking a question, you create more response because
it makes the
reader think.
Optimizing for principles
Remember that
optimization principles also apply to your press
releases or media releases. Next time you put out a
press release, build in a couple very busy high
performance phrases related to real world news. These
can sometimes be spotted easily
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