FreshWebz Web Design & Affiliate Marketing Blog

I recently relaunched http://www.easyonlinediscountcodes.com and did some SEO work on it. Within just a month or two, it has managed to reach 20th place in Google for the search term “online discount codes“, which has approx 8,000 searches per month & about 50,000,000 results to compete with on google.co.uk!!

There may be further developments with this site, so hopefully the content will become even more comprehensive & improve the rankings still further!

It just goes to show that there is definitely something strange going on with Cashback Shopper, as this site still fails to rank in Google, despite being optimised more than some of the sites that are actually in the top 10! It’s very annoying & my resolution for 2010 is to find out why.

I’ve been carrying out a lot of link building on Cashback Shopper as its Google rankings have pretty much vanished & I’m keen to recover them. I wonder if it’s because the site is a white label & Google has decided it’s just duplicate content.

However, a recent ranking check of Bing has revealed that Cashback Shopper has 15 page 1 positions, 5 on page 2 & 5 on page 3, for some of the most popular search terms relating to cashback shopping. This is how the site used to feature in Google, so I hope these positions aren’t just temporary until Bing picks up a market share of searchers.

It’s very frustrating that Cashback Shopper is in no4 spot for “cashback shopping” and “cashback uk” in Bing, but neither phrase is anywhere in Google! I guess I just have to keep trying to find more Google worthy links for the site

I still hear a number of people talking about page rank, page rank, page rank, when discussing whether their website is doing well, or trying to assess the results of their search engine optimisation efforts. However, page rank became less relevant when Google removed PageRank values from their webmaster centre!

Here’s the statement Google made when they did it:

We’ve been telling people for a long time that they shouldn’t focus on PageRank so much; many site owners seem to think it’s the most important metric for them to track, which is simply not true. We removed it because we felt it was silly to tell people not to think about it, but then to show them the data, implying that they should look at it.

However, if this is Google’s position, then why bother updating their toolbar PageRank values? Doing so is only going to create a stir in the webmaster community & cause confusion as to it’s relevance. Surely it would’ve been much mbetter to remove it from both webmaster tools and the Google toolbar at the same time.

It’s also important to remember that the toolbar Page Rank values can be a couple of month’s old, so they’re out of date even after the update & therefore not really relevant to your current ranking position. The recent PageRank update has left many webmasters confused with most reporting major decreases in their website’s ranking in the search results. But if Google’s statement is to be believed, should you really be concerned about it?

If you have a search engine friendly site, the most important issue for your Google search engine rankings are quality inbound links!

Use one of our link building or Google Ranking Boost packages to get guaranteed links for your site

Search engine optimisation can be very time consuming for small business owners, not to mention often expensive if you outsource to professional SEO companies. I’ve recently been quoted a price of £500 per month, for a period of 12 months, to promote just one of my sites, which is way above my limits!

Google says it understands that many small business owners and webmaster don’t have the time or funds and are offering some quick DIY tips.

“Google Guru” Matt Cutts has put his top SEO tips into a video. It’s not particularly long but does give some good tips for webmaster or business owners new to SEO.

Here’s the video:

I wrote previously about using article submissions to increase the number of backlinks & traffic to your website.

I’ve been submitting my articles manually, to the top 10 article directories, but this process is very drawn out & complicated by the slightly different layouts & entry requirements of each directory. With thousands of directories out there, although submitting to the top 10, 20 or 30 will achieve results, it will be impossible to do many more manual submissions, which will mean you have to write significantly more articles to get more links.

I’ve been looking at the different article submission websites & software for some time & decided now was the time to take the plunge!

I’ve used Submit2Please’s Article Submission Service in the past, but the charges could be considerable if you have a number of articles to publish:

• $49.95 for 100 PR 3 and above Directories (35+ PR 4 & above Directories & 65 PR 3 Directories)
• $74.95 for 200 PR 2 and above Directories(35+ PR 4 & above Directories, 65 PR 3 Directories & 100+ PR 2 Directories)
• $99.95 for 300 Various PR Directories (35+ PR 4 & above Directories, 65 PR 3 Directories, 100+ PR 2 Directories & 100+ PR 1 & 0 Directories)
• $124.95 for 400 Various PR Directories (35+ PR 4 & above Directories, 65 PR 3 Directories, 100+ PR 2 Directories & 200+ PR 1 & 0 Directories)

Bearing in mind I currently have 7 articles to submit, this is a bit too much to pay!

So, I started to look around for services or software that promise to submit to a large number of sites at a reasonable cost, whilst making sure that the submissions are valid & not classed as spam by either the directories, or Google.

Apart from the dodgy looking article submission software packages for $37, there seems to be a consensus of opinion around the following:

• iSnare
• Article Marketing Automation
• Article Marketer
• Ultimate Article Wizard
• The Phantom Writers
  

I was drawn to Article Marketers & Ultimate Article Wizard out of these, mainly because The Phantom Writers is another pay per article plan, iSnare seems a bit too cheap (my opinion on cheap services has been clouded by my recent experiences with 1and1 & Tiscali!) & other users have suggested that AMA only gets your articles out to about 30 sites.

I was originally put off UAW as it costs $67 per month & it seems that you have to spend time using it to rewrite your articles using what is known as “spinning”. Content (article) spinning involves taking an original article and using it to generate 10’s or 100’s of new unique versions of the text & these “spun” versions of your article are submitted instead. Each of these new articles presents the same ideas and concepts as the original, but expressed in different ways. Whilst all are readable and grammatically correct, each is different from the others in terms of the words on the page and therefore unique in Google’s eyes.

The importance of “spinning” your articles will depend on whether you believe that the backlinks from duplicate articles are being disregarded by Google, when Google’s duplicate content filter is treating the article submissions as duplicate content! If this is the case, then it seems pointless to submit your articles to any more than one site for link purposes, but of course, there is the side issue 0f site traffic that your article could generate. There seems to be some debate as to whether this is the case or not, with some people saying it does & others saying it doesn’t! Here’s the part of Google’s duplicate content policy that seems to say it does!

If you believe that each time you submit your article you need to use a different title, different summary, different resource box, and different article body, then perhaps the extra cost of UAW is worth it. However, I’ve also found a free spinner system called Jetspinner that I’m signing up to, which will hopefully allow me to carry out this process for nothing. Then I can create dozens of versions of my articles & submit them to all the directories instead!

Jetspinner also advertises its own article submission service called Jet Submitter (which also costs $67 per month), but as I’ve already signed up with Article Marketer for 3 months use (cost $79.95), I’m going to have to use it for now. If I’m not happy with it, I may switch to Jet Submitter & use their combined tools, but I’ll use this time to submit as many articles as possible, on all of the topics covered by my affiliate websites & see if it makes any difference to their links & rankings!

This video is a session by Joost De Valk on Wordpress Optimisation Strategies from 4uexpo London 2008. Please note, this is the full session and is 52 minutes long.

I plan to watch & then post my comments )

First, here’s something you probably already know…

Achieving top rankings in ANY search engine in 2009…Is All About Getting More Links From Other Sites.

The reason is simple: Modern search engines place a huge value on links. The more links you have and the better quality these links are, the higher you’ll rank. If a site is linking to you, they are essentially casting a vote of trust. And the more “votes” you have, the more trustworthy your site is to Google, which naturally translates into better rankings.

With today’s Google and Yahoo, it’s also the clickable part of the link (also known as “link anchor”) that counts. Meaning, if you want to rank well for a specific keyword like “blue widgets”, you need more links with “blue widgets” in their clickable part.

Now, this all is fine, but the critical question most webmasters are struggling with is:

Where Do I Get High Quality Links And How Many Do I Need Before I Rank #1 For My Keywords

The fastest and easiest way to answer this question is by analyzing a competing website in your niche that already ranks very well.

Understand this fundamental principle, and you will be smarter than 95% of webmasters out there who are forever stuck on page 27 in Google because they are walking in the dark. Do not work harder when the solution is to work smarter, and do NOT reinvent the wheel by trying to figure the whole thing out by yourself.

You see, most super-successful webmasters who profit from the search engines don’t claim to understand exactly how Google and Yahoo work. But what they do understand, is how to look at the top-ranked sites in these search engines, draw legitimate conclusions as to why they rank so well and copy the best to make their own sites succeed.

Professional Optimisation Consultants Charge Upwards Of £2,000 For This Kind Of Research!

But! SEO SpyGlass enables you to secretly (and ethically) spy on your Google and Yahoo competition and see exactly why they rank better than you. Just launch SEO SpyGlass, and in a matter of minutes you will know everything humanly possible about why ANY site ranks well.

With SEO SpyGlass, you’ll know the answers to the critical questions any webmaster wants answered:

• Where to get high-quality links to one-up the competition and rank better for my keyword searches?
• Exactly which anchor texts (the clickable part of the link) should I use to outrank my niche competition?
• How many links it’ll take to propel my site to the top of the search engines… and get a ton of laser-targeted (and free!) traffic which translates into sales?

For the advanced folks: SEO SpyGlass will reveal the entire link building strategy of your competition, and tell you exactly why they rank well in great detail. Here’s what kind of an insight scoop you can expect from SEO SpyGlass:

• The total number of backlinks your competitor has (yes, today’s search engines place huge value on links.)
• The Google PageRank of every backlink (see how important these links actually are to Google.)
• The Alexa Traffic Rank of every backlink (uncover your competitor’s biggest traffic sources.)
• The total number of PageRank 0 to PageRank 10 backlinks your competitor has (mirror these numbers, and you’ll be able to beat your competitor’s PageRank.)
• The total number of backlinks coming from the same IP addresses (are your competitors buying site-wide links? Should you do the same? Let’s find out!)
• The exact anchor texts and anchor URLs your competitors are using (anchor text is one thing you must implement right to rank well. Find out which anchors work for your competition!)
• Your competitor’s anchor and title keyword density – which is how many times a given keyword appears within the anchors and titles of their links (you will need to mirror these numbers if you want to one-up your competition.)
• How many of your competitor’s backlinks come from forums and blogs (are they tapping into social media for traffic and links? Find out with SEO SpyGlass!)
• How many of your competitor’s backlinks come from homepages of other sites, rather than internal pages. (This is often a dead giveaway of paid links. Oftentimes, you can even see how much they are paying per link!)
• Whether or not your competitor has backlinks from DMOZ or the Yahoo! Directory (these directories are so authoritative, you will get a rankings boost just from a single link from them!)
• The exact link value of every backlink your competitor has (see how valuable each of their links is)
• The exact age of every Website linking back to your competitor (see if they get links from established, authoritative sites.)
• Plus much, much more!

Download your copy of SEO SpyGlass now!

If you’re selling products and services that are related to a special area, it is crucial that your website gets found by people that are looking for it. One of the easiest ways to get found by people that live in your area is to optimise your web page titles for your product & location.

What is the web page title?

The title of a web page is the text that is written between the tags in the HTML head code of a web page, is displayed in the web browser window when someone visits your website and it is usually used as the linked text when your website appears in the search results.

Why should you use optimised web page titles?

The web page title is one of the main factors that Google, Yahoo and other search engines use to rank web pages. A good, relevant, informative web page title greatly improves the chances of getting high search engine rankings for your product/service.

The web page title is used by the search engines as the bold linked text on search result pages. That means that it should be clear, relevant, concise and appealing, so that web surfers will be drawn to click on it.

How to write your web page title so that it gets better local rankings

If you optimise your web page titles correctly, they will both increase your search engine rankings and attract people from the local area & those looking for your products/services, to your website.

You’ll benefit from targeted traffic and targeted traffic leads to more conversions i.e. sales. Here are some things that you can do to improve your web page titles:

Include the name of your business, important keywords and your city in the title of your homepage:

FreshWebz – Affordable web design in London and Essex

Depending on your business size, change the order of these items. Well known businesses should list their company name first. If your business is new then it’s usually better to list the keyword first:

Affordable web design for small businesses: Freshwebz in London

People are probably looking for a solution to their problem (web design) instead of your actual company name. Instead of your town, you can also use the name of the greater area if your service is available in that area.

Use a different title tag for every page. This is important! The title should reflect the content that can be found on the page, so it’s less effective just copying the homepage title to every page. For branding purposes, the titles should contain your company name and a popular keyword for which you want to be found on search engines:

FreshWebz: Search engine optimisation & SEO services in London and Essex
FreshWebz: Web design Portfolio – websites designed for recent clients
FreshWebz: Contact us for an affordable quote for your new website design

Use short web page titles. Short titles are much easier to read for web surfers. Do not try to stuff your title with keywords in the same way that you wouldn’t stuff your page content with keywords. It is much better if your web page title is highly relevant to one keyword, than somewhat relevant to many keywords. If you want to optimise your website for different keywords, optimise different pages for different keywords.

Do not use special characters in your titles. Avoid symbols and other special characters wherever possible. They might not be displayed properly on all computers and your website listing might look strange in the search results.

If you change your web page titles as described, your website will get better rankings on search engines and it will be found by people looking for your products/services & who live in the right area. By getting more visitors for one topic, you will improve the overall ranking of your site & so improve your position for other search terms.

Unfortunately, the web page title is not the only element that influences the position of your website in the search results of Google and other search engines. If you want to make sure that your site appears in the top 10 results, you should optimise all factors that are needed to get top rankings. FreshWebz can offer your website guaranteed Top 10 Google rankings for your desired keywords in the natural listings.

It’s got to be something to celebrate, even if Yahoo only makes up a tiny fraction of the search market nowadays – something like 4% in the UK according to an article in Web User magazine. But what the hell, Top Spot is still Top Spot )

Cashback Shopper has just achieved the number 1 position for all the following keyphrases on Yahoo:

• shop cashback
• shopping cashback shopping
• shopper cashback
• shops cashback
• uk cash back
• cash rewards site
• extra cashback
• free cashback
• cash-back directory
• get cashback
• uk shopping cashback
• uk cashback shopping pays cash
• cashbackshopper
• cashback shopper
• earn cash back rewards
• cash back uk
• cash back shop
• cash back directory

and is in the top 10 results for 19 other keyphrases!!!!

It’s taken 9 months of constant promotion, blogging, marketing, seo etc. but it’s a nice feeling when the results are so visible. Will keep working at phrases that aren’t doing so well & the key objective is to start making a bigger dent in the Google SERPS!

The best Google positions currently achieved are:

cash rewards site 7
cashback shopper 1
cashback shopping 3
cashback shopping site 7
cashback site 3
cashback uk 9
earn cashback 5
extra cashback 4
shopper cashback 1
site cashback 4
uk cashback 2
uk cashback shopping 2

with 17 other phrases appearing in the next 2 pages of results.

MSN is a strange creature; I have about 13 top ten positions, but only 2 other phrases in the next 2 pages and a dozen or so ways down in the top 100! But with a only 3% of the search market, it doesn’t really matter anyway.

So, the aim now is to find the most searched phrases (& those with the highest KEI) from all these on Google & give them a real push to try & get them to the top!! With lots of FREE traffic up for grabs, this is the most important task for any affiliate marketer!

It appears that simple inbound links are no longer good enough to improve your search engine ranking by themselves. As web masters buy up thousands of paid directory links, the value of those links diminish, simply because the links are on websites that are largely irrelevant to the content of your site.

More emphasis is now being placed on articles which should contain information about your websites topic. The content contains links to your site & the idea behind this is that the links show the search engines that your site is relevant to the links pointing to it.

I have already written an article myself for ezinearticles.com, but it can be a time consuming effort (when you’re blogging as well!!), so I decided to look at some Article Writing Services.

I found a UK company that claims to have been researching and writing content for various websites in the US and United Kingdom for more than three years, writing web content for travel and tourism web sites, research websites dealing with history, place information, hotels, hospitals and other articles too.

The effective team of the company consists of 35 well trained Writers, 4 Supervisors and 6 highly qualified editors, and 3 System Administrators & they claim to carry out the following steps when writing articles:

» Conducting research on the key words
» Keyword optimised fresh 400 words per article.
» Writing optimised meta title
» Writing optimised meta descriptions
» Writing meta Keywords
» Unlimited changes on each article

The cost for their service is £5 per article & so I’ve signed up to have 10 articles written for My Travel Extras & Cashback Shopper. Once I get the articles, I will be able to give more information as to their quality & the company details.