4 Article Marketing Myths: Busted

Posted on July 4, 2012 by SEO Expert

The idea of article marketing is to push content into getting published on other websites. Veterans in the SEO field still swear by this method to build traffic, backlinks and basically increase their online visibility. But not everything being said about article marketing is true. Today, I’m going to explain five of those misconceptions, and hopefully put to rest all the nonsense talk about what the method is not really about.

Article marketing myth #1: Use article directories to build easy backlinks.

Truth: Okay, I have mentioned before that backlinks coming from article directories are indeed valid ones. Granted, if an article directory has a high PR, the backlinks may actually bear some weight. But here’s the thing – using article directories as a backlink farm is wrong.

Articles submitted to directories need to pass some qualifications before getting approved. If you’re only after the backlinks coming from article directories, then you’re better off doing simpler things like blog commenting and forum posting. It’s just too much work to create entirely new content just to get 1-2 backlinks. Those backlinks are most likely not even relevant to the topic of your website.

Now, this doesn’t mean that article submission is a totally futile system. Backlink building can still happen but only really well-written articles have a chance to benefit from it. As the articles get published in the directories, other publishers may decide to re-publish (syndicate) them. When the article (and the resource link it came with) gets published on another website – a relevant one – a more powerful backlink is created. So, the idea is to submit re-publish-worthy content to increase syndication instead of submitting poor quality ones in exchange for equally poor backlinks.

Article marketing myth #2: Spin articles to increase article submissions.

Truth: Article spinning was the hype a few years ago for marketers who want to get more mileage out of a single article. Spinning is done by re-wording or rephrasing some or all portions of an article to create different variations of it. As it was believed, article directories required unique articles (we’ll tackle this later). But spun articles doesn’t really equate to unique.

Let’s take a close look at what some of the article directories are saying about spun articles in their guidelines:

“Must Not Contain Rehashed Content, or Material Overly Similar to your Prior Submissions.” – EzineArticles.com

“Submissions must not be spun or be PLR (Private Label Rights) articles or term papers/essays for sale.” – GoArticles.com

“…Rewording or rephrasing other published texts (articles, website content or books) is not considered original writing.” – Suite101.com

As you can see, article directories seem to have a way of detecting whether an article was spun or not. Articles spun using an automatic spinning software also tend to turn out as unreadable and incoherent pieces.

In any case, to totally benefit from article spinning, it must be done manually to make sure it reads least like the original one. If that’s the case, then you’re better off spending your time crafting an entirely new article – decreasing the chance of rejection from the directories.

Article marketing myth #3: Article directories only accept unique, unpublished articles.

Truth: Article marketing is not as easy as sending off articles by a single click. Each article directory has its own set of quality guidelines that authors need to adhere to when submitting content. Possibly the most debatable item among them is whether or not previously published content is accepted.

Before you believe what you read on blogs and rant boards, why don’t you go and check the guidelines yourself? EzineArticles doesn’t mention anything about content uniqueness, except for the bit about spinning (see myth #2 above). GoArticles seems to be only concerned about the real authorship of the articles being submitted. ArticlesBase require original articles – not unique (this article explains this in detail).

Now, there are hundreds of article repositories out there, so some of it may really look for 100% unique submissions. Suite101, for example, explicitly wants:

“Original articles only. All writing must be previously unpublished anywhere on the web (including your own blog or other writing sites)…”

Admittedly, there is really some truth to this myth. But unless it’s a reputable directory with a track record of publishers actually syndicating your content, it’s not worth the effort.

Article marketing myth #4: Article directories create duplicate content.

Truth: We have settled the issue with using the same content to submit to article directories. So, now that your article appears on your own website and the directory, does that mean they are duplicates? Directories exist to serve a platter of content for publishers. If all these publishers decide to use your article, then are those duplicate content as well? Technically, it is the same text, but the answer is no. This is called syndicated content.

Search engines like Google already know not to display the same content in SERPs. According to the search engine giant:

“Duplicate content doesn’t cause your site to be penalized. If duplicate pages are detected, one version will be returned in the search results to ensure variety for searchers.” – Google Webmaster Central Blog

They are also very much aware of the activity involved in article marketing:

“If you syndicate your content on other sites, Google will always show the version we think is most appropriate for users in each given search, which may or may not be the version you’d prefer. However, it is helpful to ensure that each site on which your content is syndicated includes a link back to your original article. You can also ask those who use your syndicated material to use the noindex meta tag to prevent search engines from indexing their version of the content.” – Webmaster Tools > Content Guidelines

Now we can all continue with our article marketing efforts without the fear of getting our sites penalized for duplicate content.

If there’s one thing you need to remember when doing article marketing, it is to get your article published and indexed on your own website first. This way, all the things mentioned above will make more sense. Article marketing remains to be an effective strategy in creating a successful website.

SEO Metrics Monday: Ranking Fluke?

Posted on June 27, 2012 by SEO Expert

I know it’s late, so I’ll cut to the chase –

Check this out:

I can’t tell if this is a ranking fluke or not. Is there really such a thing? I’ve seen SEO Website rank in page 8 before, but it only lasted a couple of minutes (I got so excited I forgot to do a screenshot). I’d like to think that all our SEO efforts did the trick. Anyway having a recent post in here may have also helped. Like I mentioned in this post, continuous content production is being monitored by Google.

How did you feel when you first ranked for your keyword in Google (or any other search engine for that matter)? If this is not a fluke, then good things are about to happen to SEO Website, so watch out! Subscribe to our mailing list to keep updated.

Local SEO – Is It For You?

Posted on June 22, 2012 by SEO Expert

Many small businesses go online with a vision of conquering the world. But building a global brand could mean competing with the likes of Coke and Nike of the industry. Not that it’s a bad idea or that you can’t do it, but sometimes, it pays to start small – local, that is.

What is Local SEO?

Local SEO is a simpler form of optimization where a website is optimized for a local market, say a city or a county. The idea is that people use the web to search for everything. Since the web is so big, users tend to put a location keyword on their search, in order to arrive at a business within their vicinity.

Search engines have evolved, integrating geotargeting in search results, particularly if you are logged in to their system (such as your Google account). How else would they have figured out whether to display Google in Spanish while you are browsing in Mexico? You’ve probably noticed, too, that the ads are tailor fit to your locale.

Why do Local SEO?

It is more realistic to optimize for a local market if you have a brick-and-mortar business like an auto repair shop or a pizza delivery service. There are so many pizza delivery websites online, but you really only want to get ahead of the ones in your area. It would be futile to compete in ranking for the general ‘pizza delivery’ keyword unless you’re willing to deliver across the country!

Local SEO helps bring targeted audience to your website, which after all is what your business really needs. Doing it obviously requires less work and money compared to a full-on SEO campaign.

How to do Local SEO?

For local SEO to work, a location (preferably an address) must be visible on each page of the website. That should give the search crawler a pretty solid idea that you exist in that locality. Another thing that would give away your locality is a local phone number.

Social web also plays a role in strengthening your online visibility. Claim your business, verify or create a profile in these following websites:

Google Places for Business
Bing Local
Yahoo Local
Facebook
Foursquare for Business
and other similar websites and directories…

As Google declares, “97% of consumers search for local businesses online”. You’d want to be there when these people start searching for your business.

In Local SEO, there is much less competition – it’s easier to rank. But it doesn’t mean that your business can’t expand that way. Local SEO could just be the start of a much bigger SEO campaign in the future.

Newbies: 5 Essential On-Page SEO Tips

Posted on June 20, 2012 by SEO Expert

Every quality blog post is written with readership in mind, otherwise it’s just useless blabber. But even the most intricately woven words may not reach the bigger audience it deserves. That’s where SEO comes in.

Search engine optimization is usually done on a website level. It requires months of work using different approaches and strategies. For somebody who’s just starting out with SEO, it could be overwhelming!

That being said, there’s nothing to lose in taking things a little at a time. Besides, SEO is a continuous process and constantly evolving. You can’t be left too far behind. For starters, on-page SEO is the way to go. It means doing work in your virtual abode.

Working on an article or a blog entry? Before you hit the publish button, take a look at these 5 easy optimization tips:

1. Strive for keyword prominence

If your post is about the best fluffy pancake recipe, then the entry should be entitled as such. Imagine yourself doing a Google search for your entry. What keywords would you use? These keywords should be visible in the post title and in the article body. As we know, search engines list down results with these terms in bold face.

Mentioning the keywords in the main text makes it easy for search engine crawlers to pick up the main thought of the entry. Doing it in bold face further intensifies its importance.

Aside from using the keywords in the title and the main text, it’s also important to place it in the permalink. Make sure your blog permalink structure is set in a way that it shows readable text instead of encrypted numbers.

Keyword prominence plays a big role in SEO, but overdoing it can result to keyword stuffing which search engines consider as spam.

2. Post interesting, quality content

There’s no other way around it – content makes up a website. It has been established that putting up a blog on a static website helps a lot in SEO. The more text search spiders crawl, the more chances at ranking you get.

But it’s not just about putting words in there. Readers like all things fresh and interesting. People will keep coming to a website chock full of worthwhile information. Duplicate content are recognized by search engines, so forget about copying from others.

3. Update with consistency

Update your blog on a regular basis. Google made at least 4 updates concerning ‘freshness’ of content in their May announcement. Aside from dishing out interesting articles, give your blog followers something to look forward to, like a weekly postcard. Here, we do a weekly post called SEO Metrics Monday.

A regularly updated website also gets crawled more often. You don’t have to blog everyday. In fact, you can space out your entries so that they get posted a few times a week. Doing so should get you covered on days that you feel burned out from writing.

4. Link to yourself, and to others

Start building backlinks. Some SEO practitioners consider these as their bread and butter, and would even pay to get them secured. Even if the rules of the SEO game changes so often, it is believed that backlinks would remain to be a important ranking factor.

Link to other pages on your blog to let the search engines know how related your blog posts are, and how much content you have to offer on a certain subject. Linking to others on the other hand can prove your blog to be a ‘real’ one, citing important sources like news sites or dominant sites of the same topic as yours.

*Once your blog is posted, the next step is to develop backlinks externally.

5. Use images

Images make reading a post easier. I gives the eyes a breather from all the black-and-white (or what ever color scheme you’re using). Some people (like me) sometimes use the image search instead of the regular web search to search for information.

SEO can also be applied on images. As you may have noticed, images also get displayed in SERPs. It’s an opportunity you shouldn’t miss to place your blog on top of the search results.

There you go! Hopefully these five tips will encourage you to pursue a deeper knowledge in website SEO.

ICANN To Create New Custom TLDs

Posted on June 14, 2012 by SEO Expert

Yesterday, ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) unveiled a list of possible new top-level domains (TLD). These are generic TLDs (gTLD) being applied for by various companies and individuals worldwide. As the governing body for TLDs like the universal .com, .gov and .org, ICANN will evaluate each application for approval.

By 2013, domain extensions like .art, .pizza, .hotel and even .通用电气公司 (yes, a non-Latin character) would be valid web addresses. Who knows how this would affect website SEO? gTLD names like .app and .inc are among the most requested. Giant brands seem to be taking this opportunity to secure their own territory as well, such as .gap and .chevrolet.

Introducing these new top-level domains should create more choices for webmasters, granted only 22 gTLDs are available at the moment. However, some groups oppose this massive unleashing of TLDs because it might create confusion to users. Granting ownership of common words like .love and .shop to a single entity could send domain registration prices through the roof. Unlike now, where a .com can be served by different competing domain registrants (lowering the price). To add to that, companies might be forced to register their own brand for the sake of owning it.

And this entire movement doesn’t come cheap. Each TLD application costs $185,000 and there’s a $25,000 annual fee on top of that. Google seems to know what it’s doing – it has applied for 101 gTLDs. But really dominating the game seems to be donuts.co – applying for a total of 307 top-level domains under different company names.

In any case, anybody who wishes to oppose a claim may contact ICANN directly. A 60-day comment period was opened together with the announcement. The world may send their rants, after which there will be a 7-month period for filing formal objections.

Is Guest Post The New SEO Spam?

Posted on June 9, 2012 by SEO Expert

A guest post is an article or a blog entry written by somebody other than the usual blog author/s. Also known as guest blogging, this type of content contribution is popular among blog networks because it helps in visibility and link building (I have written about it previously here). It also gives blog owners something to publish while they get a break from writing.

It was good until…

Guest blogging is really a great concept, but recently the practice has been tarnished by abusive web spam operators. Since link building through link exchanges became extinct with the Google Penguin update, a new scheme has taken its place in the form of guest post offers.

I used to receive link exchange ‘deals’ every now and then on my email, but lately a different breed of emails seem to reach my inbox. Some of them are so creatively written they may just convince those bloggers who are oblivious to SEO.

Others may refer to the guest post as a ‘sponsored post’ because some money is involved. Who wouldn’t want to get paid to publish free unique content?

This is where many webmasters overlook the quality of their website over easy cash. I know some bloggers who willingly accepted a schemy guest post offer for what they believe is a reasonable amount of money.

Why is it so popular?

The way guest blogging typically works, a unique article is given to the blog owner to publish on his blog. The blog owner can pick a topic of his choice to suit the overall blog genre. A financial advice article simply wouldn’t be relevant to a craft blog. The article will usually contain 1-3 links to any website the author pleases. That last part about the links is really what the guest post business is all about.

Contextual links (links within a text paragraph) are believed to be more valuable than sidebar links because this can be seen as an endorsement on the part of the blog owner.

Are they really spam?

If you know the author, or at least you know his reputation in your blog circle, then the guest post offer must be legit – that is, it wouldn’t be used to plant spam backlinks. But this guest post about a ‘Tasmanian road tip’, for example, has a dubious looking link placement which seems to be targeting the ‘buy cars’ keyword.

The article was well written and came with images. The only thing that would tell it off is the out-of-context link, which we already know Google doesn’t want.

Guest post offers are more likely to increase in the next few months, until Google starts another algorithm change that cracks down this tactic. It is indeed becoming the new web spam, but still, not all guest posts are made with bad intentions. There are still legit offers out there, all you have to do is screen them first.

What is The Google Sandbox and How To Avoid It?

Posted on June 5, 2012 by SEO Expert

Google Sandbox is a term used by webmasters to describe the theory of why new websites don’t seem to rank high in search engine result pages (SERPs). New (hence, less authority) websites are believed to be held in a ‘sandbox’ for some time before it gets indexed and ranked by the search engine. It’s sort of a waiting room for websites while they get evaluated before being deemed worthy to be shown to the public.

Are you experiencing the Google Sandbox Effect?

The sandbox effect theory has been around since 2004, but until now, it has not been proven as a definite fact. Although highly debatable, there is some reason for us to believe that the Google Sandbox still exists.

A used domain that has been previously penalized is likely to be frisked before being allowed back in the SERPs. It may still have some leftover PageRank, but it still won’t show up in the results page. To check if your website is being put under the lens, simply do a site:www.example.com search in Google. A zero turnout means that your site is still not indexed.

Why does Google Sandbox websites?

Google’s crawl spiders actually act fast in indexing new content, in my experience. So really, this sandboxing is implemented toward spam sites to keep them out of Google search results. Websites trying to rank for highly competitive keywords are most susceptible to experiencing this effect.

Spam sites are created to trick the search engines into thinking that the websites deserve to rank high. But unusual backlinking and poor content instantly raise a red flag to let search engines know that a website is potentially up to no-good. Why and how would a newly created website have so much backlinks from different websites in so little time? Sometimes you don’t need to dig deeper to know a website is created for spam.

How to avoid the Google Sandbox?

If you know the best SEO website practices, then you should already know how to avoid the Google Sandbox. In any case, here are some helpful tips:

Publish ONLY ORIGINAL content. Never copy from somebody else.
Don’t buy backlinks or participate in link farms.
If you just bought an expired domain, ask the previous owner if it was penalized. If it was, request for re-inclusion to Google or consider another domain.
Make sure you only link out to good sites. Also check your content for broken links.
Use a reputable host to keep your website up and running AT ALL TIMES.
Try going for less competitive, or long-tail keywords.

Basically, avoid doing something to your site that might hurt its quality. The sandbox waiting time can last from a few weeks, up to 6 months, sometimes even a year. It all depends on the website’s consistency and quality.

How To Use Twitter For SEO Effectively

Posted on May 26, 2012 by SEO Expert

Most of you already how to use Twitter – for status updates, exchanging messages, posting on-the-go photos or even for link dissemination. What you probably don’t know is how to tap the power of Twitter for SEO.

I’m not about to say that it is the best place to start planting backlinks. No. Well, okay, it can be beneficial in rare occasions but it is more often than usual, not. Read on to find out why.

What is Twitter

Twitter is social networking at its simplest. The platform allows a user to send short blurbs called ‘tweets’ to his ‘followers’. Links and images may be attached to each tweet but the entire message must stay within the 140 character limit.

Many businesses sign up on Twitter to use it as an advertising medium. When a user tweets about something, his followers instantly receive it. If the tweet is interesting or compelling enough to share, the followers may re-tweet (RT) it, and then his followers may re-tweet it again – and so on. So here, the more followers, the better.

Twitter SEO

As far as backlink building is concerned, you must know that Twitter links are ‘nofollow’. Although SEO experts have concluded that these types of links are not entirely deplete of backlink juice, it is still not a one-off deal. Google may only credit a nofollow backlink if the post goes viral or if somebody with authority (huge network, well known brand) re-tweets it. On the bright side, Bing and Yahoo doesn’t care for the nofollow attribute and will credit the backlink towards your site’s ranking.

But backlinks aren’t the only stuff that drive SEO. With the right followers, Twitter can be a great channel to direct targeted traffic to a website.

Keywords also play a role in Twitter in the form of hashtags (#topic). Frequent use of hashtags enable the platform to determine trending topics and at the same time allow users to easily search for related tweets.

Follow me @klimseo

Wider Reach

Twitter’s privacy setting is as simple as a yes/no question. Tweets from a public account may be accessed by anybody, so a quick hashtag search can expose it to more users. The wider the audience reach, the higher the probability that your messages are passed along, and so the links on it get more visits.

Another great feature of Twitter is its integration to other social platforms, like Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Digg, and many others. Each tweet also has its own URL so even somebody without a twitter account can access the it.

Tweet Tips

Twitter is really one of the sweetest things that happened on the internet. Its user-base is growing by about 1.123 million new accounts per day! There’s no doubt that it’s a great place to tap SEO juice.

Here are my short and tweet tips on how to effectively use Twitter for SEO:

Blast out RT-worthy tweets everyday (tweet funny, tweet useful, tweet current)
Engage and interact (reply, re-tweet, favorite tweets)
Follow the trends (hashtag it!)
Don’t be a snob (mention, follow back, thank your followers)
Don’t buy followers (real people followers are better than robots)
Integrate Twitter to your other social media accounts
Promote your presence (provide ‘follow me’ links on our website, fan page, etc.)

Got more ideas? Share them here by leaving a comment!

WordPress SEO Tip: Privacy Settings

Posted on May 23, 2012 by SEO Expert

Here’s something every SEO blogger must do when setting up a new WordPress blog: check privacy settings.

This option can be found under Settings > Privacy on the left sidebar.

The default setting is private (ask search engines not to index this site). Ideally, you’d want to finish furnishing your new blog with widgets and plugins, and maybe a few content before showing it off to the search engine spiders (robots that check a website’s content every now and then, for indexing).

If you feel that you have ‘opened up’ your site too soon, don’t worry. Search engine spiders will eventually index a later version of your blog. But what we’ve found is that the first indexing can determine your ranking for your site, so don’t give search engines an initial impression that your blog is a “thin” site, beef it up with some content first, before giving the SE’s the green light to come and check it out.

To see which pages have been indexed so far, do a site: example.com search (replace example.com or www.example.com with your own domain).

site:domain.com search shows which pages have been indexed

There’s a disclaimer note in WordPress about these settings though:

Note: Neither of these options blocks access to your site — it is up to the search engines to honor your request.

Just think of these privacy settings as your website’s stoplight. There’s a red light for ‘stop’ and a green light for ‘go’. But sometimes, there are drivers who ignore traffic lights.

Anyway, make sure you allow search engines to crawl your site, for SEO’s sake.