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I have continually stressed the importance of links in regards to optimizing your storefront to ensure that your site is ranked high in search engines, Alexa and Google Page Rank. While there are three types of links: inbound, outbound and reciprocal, it is important to understand to which sites to link your URL. In the world of the Internet, linking sites is a form of association. You are saying “think of me when you are on this site, we are friends, etc.” Therefore, a rule of thumb and suggestions to link by:
1. Content must be related!
As I stated before, links are considered association not only to customers, but search engines as well. Before adding an outbound link, make sure supporting context exists. With inbound links, you don’t want to risk putting your website in a negative light. Check the Page Rank of the sites you are associated with—yes, it is a popularity contest…but hopefully without all of the drama! This is especially useful when determining whether or not to pay to be listed in a directory. Even if the site is popular, content still must be related! Have a purpose for the link or you will be penalized when the spiders crawl.
2. AllinURL
Searching for sites that use the same keywords you do is a great way to find new sites to which to link your site. You don’t want to link to competitors, but you should respond to blogs and forums. This will help expand industry discussion and you can sneak in your URL for contact information or as a hyperlink. For instance, if you are responding to a blog to which you disagree, include a hyperlink to the page on your site which helps prove your point. This is also a great chance to add more links to deeper pages on your site. (Yes, I do encourage comments to my blogs…I get lonely!)
3. Blogs
We all love blogs, or we wouldn’t be here…and they are a great way to encourage customer-generated content and outbound links. For instance, I have written many blogs in response to an article. Adding the link to the article helps both sites because search engines perceive this as credibility, social interaction and related content. Truly, I do it for the sole purpose of educating my readers and avoiding plagiarism…
Blog rolls are another great way to expand your blog. Add an RSS feed of another blog on a topic that your readers might find interesting. Again, this increases credibility, association and outbound links. Additionally, with greater information on your site, you are likely to gain repeat visitors.
4. Quality, not Quantity!
To sum it all up, it is important to remember that when you create links on a daily basis it is QUALITY not quantity! This includes the factor on content, page ranking and credibility. The Internet is a great place to create loyal customers and gain brand awareness, but you are constantly molding your brand image. Be sure this is done with careful consideration… not everyone’s brand can be strengthened through the help of a tree frog.
Now, go link crazy!
Webster
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Tags: e-commerce solution, link, search ranking, page rank, alexa, hyperlink, outbound, inbound, reciprocal, site optimization, SEO |
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Categories: SEO, RSS, User Generated Content, Ecommerce Blog |
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Busted!
While there is, and probably always will be, a battle between creative and design, ShopVisible is a happy medium where it is possible to have a site at the top of the search engine results that still beams with creativity and innovation. Most people will argue and say that copy, tags and links are needed to optimize a website. Creatives want to use flashy images, videos and pop-ups that Google ignores in its search algorithm.
But why not have the best of both worlds? Check out some of our clients’ sites. While all are designed from the inside out for maximum optimization, they are all customizable and unique with unlimited room for creativity and design.
When designing a new site or even refreshing an old site our programmers work closely with the designers on developing an eye catching site that is easily spidered by Google. We have many proprietary techniques that we use to optimize our site, many of which revolve around the way our Site Manager handles inventory.
(Warning: This might get a bit technical)
We love Div tags and Style sheets because the code is clean and easily read by search engines. When rendering a page we don’t include strange symbols in the URL, instead we try to make the URL as descriptive as possible using plain text. This helps both search engines as well as customers browsing our site. We tag and name everything, although Google may not weigh tags and names heavily when ranking a site, because it does help Google figure out what kind of content is on our page and why it would be relevant to a customer.
And after all of that, you can still have a beautiful site displaying all of your flare that will draw in customers.
Check it out.
Webster
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Tags: seo, google, ranking, form, function, design, creativity, spidering, e-commerce, search optimizatoin, search rankings, URL |
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Categories: SEO, RSS, Ecommerce Blog |
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Have you heard of the “Google Sandbox?” I hadn’t. The article “The Mythical Google Sandbox and How To Excape It” is pretty interesting and helps explain the theory. I suggest you read it first.
Done? Okay, now for my thoughts…
The idea makes sense. Search for the latest news and articles will come up explaining what you just heard on the radio or saw on the television. But if you try to search for something that happened a few months ago, the results vary and the article won’t be as easy to find. Bill Platt is saying the same thing happens with a new web page. “If the page has not generated any link popularity of its own,” it will disappear into the vast space we call the World Wide Web.
This is where start-up companies need to pay attention. If you are just starting a website, you should be more concerned on the product as opposed to constantly updating content, writing blogs (even if they are entertaining) and creating inbound links to optimize your search results (although it is extremely important). Therefore, instead of having a month of fame and then getting sucked into the “Google Sandbox,” consider purchasing a retired domain name.
Retired domains will give you some sort of error as the page no longer exists, but still show up in search results depending on the number of inbound links and how old the site is. Try the search tools explained in my previous post (link:URL) and research to see how popular the site used to be. If someone who obviously understood SEO used to operate under the name, it would definitely be worth the extra cost for the affiliation as opposed to starting from scratch.
If you still aren’t convinced, consider contacting my buddy Josh here at ShopVisible. I’m sure he’d love to talk to you about your new website!
Webster
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