blogging crew » traffic

What to do when your search engine ranking drops

admin — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:58:43 +0000

Search engine rankings are not set in stone and are constantly shifting as your site and your competitors’ sites are analysed and ranked by the search engines.

Going up the rankings can be exciting and rewarding and there are plenty of guides on how to do that, but what do you do when you start to fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall…?

Nothing

The first thing you do is absolutely nothing. Sit back, chillax and wait. The search engines are constantly fiddling with their algorithms and the weighting of ranking factors which affect how websites are ranked in the results. Sometimes a change can occur that doesn’t have the desired effect they wanted and penalises sites that were previously well ranked. When this occurs (and they notice it) the changes may be rolled back or amended and you can find your site jumps back to its previous positions over night. Give it a couple of weeks or so before you start making any changes.

SEO audit: Is your site fully optimized?

Do an audit of your on-site SEO to make sure you have covered all the areas you can optimize. Your website doesn’t exist within a vacuum and there are thousands of websites working to grab your position and who are squeezing every bit of juice out of their website to do it. Make sure you are using your target keyword(s) across these areas: title tag, H tags, image alt tag, image file name, internal link anchor text, internal link alt tag, site map, first paragraph of copy and page URLs.

Roll back any ‘black hat’ tactics you have undertaken

You can click here to read Google’s guidelines for webmasters which spell out what Google expects from a website as well as what not to do. If you have recently undertaken any of the following practices you may have been slapped by Google!

- Bought links

- Used hidden text or hidden links

- Introduced cloaking or underhand redirects

- Created pages with irrelevant keywords

- Added multiple pages, sub-domains, or domains with substantially duplicate content

- Set up a “doorway” page created just for search engines

Not necessarily ‘black hat’ but if a larger proportion of your website is now allocated to advertising space rather than original copy Google is going to take a dislike to you…”If your site participates in an affiliate program, make sure that your site adds value. Provide unique and relevant content that gives users a reason to visit your site first.”

Update content more regularly

Google likes fresh content and sites that are updated regularly. If you haven’t made any changes for a long time go back and review your web copy or investigate ways you can introduce regular content to your site e.g. articles, news, a blog etc.

Build up alternative sources of traffic

Because of Google’s dominance in search and putting your eggs all in one basket can almost become unavoidable, but direct traffic is still a source! Once they arrive to you from a search engine do everything you can to turn them in to a repeat visitor. As well as increasing repeat visitors percentages build a following on social media sites e.g. Twitter, Facebook et al as well as within your websites community e.g. forums, blogs et al.

The above article was written by ‘Matthew’ of internet hosting company Heart Internet.

Top 40 list of lists

admin — Wed, 13 May 2009 11:18:53 +0000

What do Bloggers and blog readers love?

Their partner? Perhaps.

Their Children/Parents? Probably.

Lists? 100% guaranteed.

What about a list of lists? Absolute utopia!!!

Here’s a top 40 list of lists for you to dribble over, all related to building, managing and marketing a website.

Scripting (HTML/ CSS, PHP, Javascript etc…)

20 Useful PHP Components & Tutorials for Everyday Project:
http://www.noupe.com/php/20-useful-php-components-tutorials-for-everyday-project.html

53 CSS-Techniques You Couldn’t Live Without:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/01/19/53-css-techniques-you-couldnt-live-without/

70 New, Useful AJAX And JavaScript Techniques:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/03/08/70-new-useful-ajax-and-javascript-techniques/

Top 30 Ruby on Rails Tutorials:
http://webdeveloper.econsultant.com/ruby-rails-tutorials/

Web design

100 Websites With Outstanding Artistic Design:
http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2008/12/100-websites-with-outstanding-artistic-design

Top Ten Mistakes in Web Design:
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9605.html

Top 100 best fonts of all time (German website):
http://www.100besteschriften.de/

Top 100 CSS Designs of 2007:
http://www.nerdbusiness.com/blog/top-100-css-designs-2007

Top 100 CSS Designs of 2008:
http://www.nerdbusiness.com/blog/top-100-css-designs-year

A Collection of 30+ Free Stock Photo Sites:
http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2009/03/05/a-collection-of-30-free-stock-photo-sites/

Top 10 Sites for Web Designers:
http://tutorialblog.org/top-10-sites-for-web-designers/

50 Useful Design Tools For Beautiful Web Typography:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/01/27/css-typographic-tools-and-techniques/

20 Steps to Better Wireframing:
http://thinkvitamin.com/features/20-steps-to-better-wireframing/

20 Free & Open Source Image Galleries for Web Designers:
http://www.cmdshiftdesign.com/blog/2008/11/17/free-image-galleries/

99 Resources for Web 2.0 Design:
http://vandelaydesign.com/blog/design/web-20-design/

Top 20 CSS galleries (and more):
http://www.web-design-list.com/

Top 34 Web Design Mistakes:
http://www.bootstrike.com/Articles/DesignMistakes/

Freelancing

12 points to include in your design contract:
http://freelanceswitch.com/clients/what-should-be-included-in-a-design-contract/

7 Tips For Writing A Winning Web Design Proposal:
http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2009/03/03/7-tips-for-writing-a-winning-web-design-proposal/

10 Steps To The Perfect Portfolio Website:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/02/26/10-steps-to-the-perfect-portfolio-website/

Web copy & Blogging

5 Simple Ways to Open Your Blog Post With a Bang:
http://www.copyblogger.com/5-simple-ways-to-open-your-blog-post-with-a-bang

100 Excellent Free WordPress Themes:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/01/08/100-excellent-free-high-quality-wordpress-themes/

10 Blogging Tips for 2009 to Make It Your Most Successful Blogging Year Ever:
http://www.bloggingtips.com/2008/12/31/10-blogging-tips-for-2009-to-make-it-your-most-successful-blogging-year-ever/

10 Writing Tips for Web Designers:
http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2009/02/10-writing-tips-for-web-designers/

Social media

27 Twitter Applications Your Small Business Can Use Today:
http://www.smbceo.com/2009/03/25/top-27-twitter-applications/

10 ways to measure social media succes:
http://econsultancy.com/blog/3407-10-ways-to-measure-social-media-success

25 Free Social Media Marketing & SEO Ebooks, White Papers + Other Downloads:
http://www.seoptimise.com/blog/2009/03/25-free-social-media-marketing-seo-ebooks-white-papers-other-downloads.html

200 Blog Posts on Social Media:
http://www.spotlightideas.co.uk/?p=1787

Online marketing

Top 100 SEO & Internet Marketing Blogs:
http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/seo-blogs/

9 mistakes when creating [PPC] ad text:
http://www.ppchero.com/9-mistakes-when-creating-ad-text/

13 myths of pay per click:
http://www.ppcblog.co.uk/ppc/13-myths-of-pay-per-click/#comment-100985

10 Ways To Increase Your Adwords Quality Score – A Mini Case Study:
http://www.redflymarketing.com/blog/10-ways-to-increase-your-adwords-quality-score-a-mini-case-study/

7 Tips For Finding & Expanding Your Negative Keywords:
http://www.redflymarketing.com/blog/how-to-build-a-negative-keyword-list/

10 sales and marketing tips I learned from strippers:
http://www.onlymarketingjobs.com/jobboard/cands/newsview.asp?id=1511&nc=&ex=

Top HTML Email Coding Mistakes:
http://www.mailchimp.com/articles/top-html-email-coding-mistakes/

Software/ programs

Free HTML Editors, Web Editors, and WYSIWYG Web Editors and Site Builders:
http://www.thefreecountry.com/webmaster/htmleditors.shtml

Top 40 Free Downloadable Open Source Social Networking Software:
http://www.vivalogo.com/vl-resources/open-source-social-networking-software.htm

Analytics, optimisation & usability

14 free tools that reveal why people abandon your website:
http://www.conversion-rate-experts.com/articles/understanding-your-visitors/

108 ways to improve your conversion rate (scroll down page to find):
http://www.conversion-rate-experts.com/articles/101-google-website-optimizer-tips/

10 Web Analytics Tools For Tracking Your Visitors:
http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2009/03/26/10-web-analytics-packages-for-tracking-your-visitors/

10 Usability Tips for Web Designers:
http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2008/12/10-usability-tips-for-web-designers

Increase your Blog traffic

admin — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 14:12:27 +0000

So you’ve got your blog running, you’ve written some great articles… but you have zero readers. Aaarrrgggh!!

Fear not dear blogger, here’s a few tips to help your traffic start to flow.

Comment on other blogs: Commenting on other blogs can increase traffic to your blog. Leave good, constructive comments. Don’t just write “great post” or similar. If you come across a controversial subject or post on someone else’s blog, put your comments in a memorable form, and in an adult manner. Controversy is a very effective way to become famous (or infamous!) with very little effort, but be careful not to alienate yourself. Don’t just disagree with the author for the sake of it!

Submit your posts to Social Media Sites such as Facebook, Digg and arguably most important of all now, Twitter: Social media sites are brilliant for boosting traffic quickly providing your articles are worth reading of course. This will add credibility to your blog and you are likely to recruit faithful followers.

Join and take part in the online forums: Don’t forget to add a signature with your blog URL at the bottom of your posts. Good comments on forums should reward you with visitors to you blog, but don’t come across as a spammer by contributing to the forum too often.

Bookmarking Articles: Ask your visitors to bookmark your articles. Sites like StumbleUpon, del.icio.us, Google Bookmarks and del.irio.us could provide you with loads of traffic.

Always reply to comments on your blog: If someone has taken the time and trouble to comment on your post it is common courtesy to respond. Interactivity with your readers will definitely increase your traffic.

Write with consistency : Write at least 3-5 resourceful articles a week. Doing this will let your visitors understand that you are a dedicated blogger, who always has their interests at heart. If you don’t write regularly why should they visit your blog regularly? However, don’t write for the sake of it! That can be very counter-productive.

Link to other’s articles : Linking in and out will help a lot. If you come across a great article ask the author if you can have their permission to link to it. He/she is hardly likely to say no. The chances are the author will link back to you too.

RSS Feeds : Always syndicate RSS through feedburner. Why? Because they are the best in their field.

Engage your readers: Put up polls, ask your readers questions, give them quizes, free tools, etc. Make them want to come back and tell their friends about you.